Pseudo-Retro RPGs

[chad78]

I've been playing a lot of retro-style games lately, particularly RPGs.

It all kind of started with Retro City Rampage (which isn't exactly an RPG).

Then my OUYA arrived, and I learned of Saturday Morning RPG. Which lead me to Dragon Fantasy.

Then I found Gailardia. (It is retro style, but takes it self a lot more seriously than the other games listed above, which are all full of nostalgic insider-jokes and pop culture references.) Gailardia has a number of sequels, so far, only 1, 2, and 3 have been translated into English.

Then there's Doom & Destiny (more self-referential pop culture humor.)

There's Gurk - which is a lot *too* retro for me. It's like not even 8-bit. I can't really even play it.

Gailardia is pretty close to Dragon Warrior (Dragon Quest). Actually, more like DW2, since there are 3 people in your party. It can be hard sometimes to know what to do next, the translation quality is not superb, but for the first one (which is free, and no ads) there is a pretty decent online walk-through. I can post the link if anyone is interested, or you can google.

Saturday Morning is more of an action RPG, it's technically turned-based, but you can defend and there are mini-games to boost your attack. Similar to the Super Mario RPGs (Paper Mario and Mario & Luigi series).

Dragon Fantasy is very close to Dragon Warrior as well, (the name, of course, a combination of Dragon Warrior and Final Fantasy), but can try too hard at times to be funny.

There are tons of other non-RPG retro-style games, Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, Double Dragon Neon, Evac, Radiant (which I LOVE), and so many more.

What are you playing?

[ctophil]

I haven't been into Indie RPGs as much I want to. I've played some demos, but the only one I bought was Breath of Death VII for the Xbox Live Arcade, which was pretty cool if you like old school goodness similar to Dragon Quest! I liked Doom & Destiny as well. Do you know if the Ouya can play Android-based games made for the tablet and phones? If so, do they have glitches or work like a native game? I want to play several Android RPGs like Zenonia series and Dungeon Hunter; but I would rather play them on the TV than some little screen. :-)

[chad78]

Breath of Death VII - I forgot about that one! I bought it, played a little bit and then forgot about it. It's still on my 360. There's also Cthulhu Saves the World by the same people.

Ouya can side-load Android apps and games, and most of them work "out of the box" - but - keep in mind, you're interfacing through a controller, and not a touch screen, so if the games do not have controller support, you will have to use the controller's built-in trackpad, which is not nearly as easy to use as a touchscreen.

The OUYA has no built-in overscan fix, which means if there is important information near the edge of the screen, it may not show up on your TV. Some TVs are worse than others about overscanning, and some have options in the menus of the TVs themselves that compensate for it, but the OUYA does not have any such option. There is one thing you can turn on or off buried in the systems advanced options menus, but it doesn't do anything as far as I can tell.

Again, the overscan thing isn't an issue for all (or even most) standard apps and games, but when it is an issue, there's nothing you can do to fix it. And for some RPGs - there are status boxes, menus, and text boxes that may or may not be near the edge of the screen.

Basically, it's an app-by-app thing, you just have to try it to see. The main thing for RPGs, though, would be do they support controller input or not.

If you just want to use the OUYA as a "make my Android big" device, I would suggest getting something else, either a Google ChromeCast or plugging your phone/tablet into the TV via HDMI, or something like that. I like my OUYA, and I like some of the games on it, but it's not the best Android experience. It's cool for what it is, an inexpensive game console with hundreds of free games - (all the games are free to some extent - first few levels, 24 hours of game play, freemium, or straight up completely free). But it's not a replacement for a standard Android device.

[ctophil]

Cool, thanks for the info. There are 3 games on Ouya that I want the most. They are Echoes of Eternia, Final Fantasy III, and Pier Solar HD. So I'll get the system eventually. I have the Vizio Co-Star (android-based) right now. It's a great TV/Movie streaming device due to Google TV and other apps. It also has Onlive--the video game streaming service. But I need the controller to use it properly. Games that you can download (from the Google Play store) on that thing are stupid. It seems like 90% of the Android games can't be downloaded. Sounds like Ouya is a much better android, gaming console altogether.

[Mister Zero]

Deep Dungeons of Doom and Destiny Fantasia for Android