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Front Mission: Gun Hazard may be an exception to the Front Mission rule by athodyd 04/02/2005, 8:20pm PST That rule being that Front Mission is boring and overrated. Still wasn't released in the States though, even though what is arguably its sister game Assault Suits Valken was released as Cybernator, one of the best goddamn SNES games ever, and generally left unharmed except for snipping out a bunch of extraneous dialogue. Anyway, FM: GH is a side-scrolling mech action RPG and one of the very few RPGs where I have enjoyed the normally horrible gruesome awful chore of levelling up, because instead of wandering around a map waiting for the screen to go all pixelly you just enter a level and bust robot ass with weapons that become increasingly satisfyingly powerful. I've never played an RPG with a more visceral and noticeable sense of increasing power, since a level that was original a grueling death-march becomes a carefree romp with you and your powered-up shotgun. The billions and billions of annoying customization choices of other FM games are basically eliminated and replaced with a straightforward system of weapons, chassisesesess, and accessories that are ordered by how much they can be leveled up, reducing the problem of what you should spend money on to whether you should max out a current weapon's XP or trade it in for the next level up (which often starts out at a lower damage rate than your fully-maxed out obsolete gun). The gameplay is generally similar to Cybernator (meaning it's good) and what I remember of the story was pretty decent. If memory serves, at one point you help bring an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict by blowing up the Jews' rolling battle fortress from the inside, and I've always taken that as a sign of quality game writing. Other than that, I can't think of a Front Mission game worth playing unless you're really really determined to enjoy some robots stomping around failing to hit each other with future machine guns accompanied by lengthy Japanese writing about how war is bad and terrible even when it's necessary to prevent a greater evil or acquire oil and Korean women. If it had a battle system that was anything but the overplayed SPEND ACTION POINTS TO MOVE AND SHOOT!!!! formula (why hasn't anyone else picked up on the truly awesome simultaneous action system of the Combat Mission franchise?) I might be more interested but as of now if I want hot fresh tactical giant robot combat I'll play a game where I actually control a hot fresh giant robot as opposed to just telling it to plod over to someone and knock them over the head (and miss).

Ace Combat 5 by Mischief Maverick 02/27/2005, 2:04pm PST     I take it all back by Mischief Maker 02/27/2005, 7:38pm PST     The story for Ace Combat 4 was very similar NT by The Joosh 02/27/2005, 8:05pm PST         or any other Japanese game by FABIO 02/27/2005, 10:30pm PST             Re: or any other Japanese game by Creexul :( 02/28/2005, 11:16am PST                 sounds like Front Mission with planes NT by FABIO 02/28/2005, 11:18am PST                     Exactly. NT by CattleHumper 04/01/2005, 6:51pm PST                         Did Front Mission have fun gameplay to go with the shitty jap plot? NT by Mischief Maker 04/02/2005, 12:42pm PST                             no by FABIO 04/02/2005, 3:33pm PST                                 Fire emblem is good though. by Mysterio 04/02/2005, 6:10pm PST                                     the GBA game? try again NT by FABIO 04/02/2005, 6:21pm PST                                         Fire emblem is good though. by Mysterio 04/02/2005, 6:48pm PST                                             Re: Fire emblem is good though. by Daverd 04/03/2005, 12:09am PST                                                 there you go! NT by FABIO 04/03/2005, 7:05pm PDT                                 Front Mission: Gun Hazard may be an exception to the Front Mission rule by athodyd 04/02/2005, 8:20pm PST                                     Re: Front Mission: Gun Hazard may be an exception to the Front Mission rule by FABIO 04/02/2005, 9:16pm PST                                         Haven't they balanced LSN by now? It's coming out on retail soon. NT by Mischief Maker 04/02/2005, 9:44pm PST                                             Can you play that in single player? NT by Mysterio 04/03/2005, 4:31am PDT                                                 they added a single player campaign. Haven't tried it. NT by FABIO 04/03/2005, 7:02pm PDT                                         Re: Front Mission: Gun Hazard may be an exception to the Front Mission rule by athodyd 04/02/2005, 11:56pm PST                                             Re: Front Mission: Gun Hazard may be an exception to the Front Mission rule by FABIO 04/03/2005, 7:17pm PDT                                                 I am a beer and pretzels general NT by Harry Grognard, USMC (ret) 04/03/2005, 7:18pm PDT