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| "You can't run away... You can't run away...! You can't run away!!" |
I occasionally read back through some old entries on this blog. About 10 years ago, I went through an exercise where I updated every single day and I maintained that for well over a year. Because I wrote so frequently during this period, there's an unusually detailed record of my thoughts and feelings during that time period between 2013 and 2014. In one particular entry, I lamented the fact that so many entries in the Super Robot Wars series were essentially unavailable to me because fans had not yet translated them into English. Now, so many years later, there aren't really that many more fan-translated titles out there and I've finally gotten to the point where I've played them all. I got a chuckle out of one line from this entry from when I first played Super Robot Wars J: "...but I'm eager to see if they produce another polished fan translation for Super Robot Wars D or F because at this point I'd love to play them. I'm starting to wonder if it would be faster just to learn Japanese, though."
It genuinely would have been. In fact, if I'd started learning in earnest right at that moment, I'd probably be fluent right now. In fact, Super Robot Wars was indirectly responsible for catalyzing my desire to learn Japanese, combined with an offhand comment on a podcast and a YouTube video I happened to stumble on many months ago. I can't even precisely recall the sequence of events anymore, but I know I'd decided to try playing one of the games in Japanese with only the assistance of a translated menu patch. At some point during that exercise, I learned that I could quickly translate on-screen text with Google Lens and I was so enamored with that possibility that the sheer novelty of it blew me away. This game was Super Robot Wars R for GBA. Soon after, I played Super Robot Wars D as well, which I namedropped in that entry from about ten years ago as a pie-in-the-sky "maybe I'll try this" option.
I really enjoy Super Robot Wars because I love robots, I love strategy RPGs, and I love flashy 2D animation. But now, I have another reason to keep playing these games. It's good practice. I'm not going to say I sit here and analyze every line of the (considerable) dialogue in these games, but I do pick out lines here and there and it's a true joy when I can read them without assistance. It's truly not something I ever thought I'd be capable of. Ten years ago, I thought "there's no way I'd ever go through the trouble of learning a new language or trying to play through a game in Japanese—it's just too overwhelming." It's true that it is overwhelming to learn a new language, but it's also very rewarding. I spend hours on Japanese every day, but I get a little better at it every day. I hope in a few years (before I'm 40, hopefully) that I'll be something I can call "proficient." Maybe that will even open up new opportunities for me. We'll see.
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| I sent this hastily snapped photo to a friend because I was so pumped that I'd puzzled out that this means "the pilot's in danger!" |
As for the game itself, it does a few cool things that I haven't seen that often in other games in the series. First of all, it has a Mission Select system that allows you to take on missions in whatever order you like, much like the very recent Super Robot Wars 30. This rarely affected me much, though, since I just kind of did them in the order they were provided in the list. What it does mean is that missions are much more tailored to specific groups of units than other games in the series, meaning it wasn't always possible just to stick with my favorites. I often found that I was saddled with a group of units I wasn't planning on using or upgrading in the long term, which made those missions a bit more difficult or tedious than they needed to be.
There's also a bit more traversal in MX than usual. In fact, I'm not sure I can recall any other games off the top of my head in which it's possible to navigate between different maps within the same mission. Many missions involve entering a battleship or going into a sub-level, possibly while multitasking with units on another level. Your ships can't enter these sub-levels either, which had the side effect of making the Nadesico crew or Evangelion units less useful on those maps as well, since they're so tethered to the ships for energy purposes.
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| Some enemies guard the entrance to an interior area. |
I do feel like I'm kind of in the "sweet spot" era for Super Robot Wars in that the graphical fidelity is good and the systems are good as well. Although I miss not having Ace Bonuses (special perks for getting 50 or 60 kills), there's a robust skill system with appropriate limitations much like Super Robot Wars Original Generations. More recent titles have gone overboard with the skill system and completely removed any limitations, meaning you can make everyone as absurdly powerful as you want. MX has a pretty good balance in that the game never feels difficult to the point of being unfair, but there's enough friction to keep the game engaging beyond the surface.
I'm torn on where to go next with this series because I have a lot of options. I haven't even discussed the rabbit hole I went down recently with setting up a Japanese PSN account, but maybe we'll discuss that later!
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| Terminus Blaster! Discharge! (ta--minasu burasuta-- deisucha--ji) |
