SMT Online: Imagine, And Why It Is Failing.
Well, koda posted a rant about Rappelz in response to my statement about dungeons in Imagine and I guess I should elaborate on what’s wrong with Imagine right now.
This is sort of a repost of this message that I posted on Globe’s forum, but this blog post focus more on why Imagine is failing.
Currently Imagine has 5 towns, 5 fields and 6 dungeons:
Towns:
3rd Home
Shinjuku Babel
Arcadia
Souhonzan
Protopia
Fields:
Suginami
Nakano
Shibuya
Ichigaya
Shinagawa
Dungeons:
Suginami Mine
Ichigaya Garrison
Shibuya Quartz
Cell Tower
Suzaku Caverns
Shinagawa Catacombs
In terms of towns, other than repairs/supplies, there isn’t a point to head of to Arcadia/Souhonzan/Protopia so people tend to gather around 3rd home or Shinjuku, depending on which dungeon they are hunting in.
In terms of fields, no one hunts there, less Shinagawa during new moons, since the xp field mobs gives are much lower than those in the dungeons, and the fields hardly have any mobs above level 30.
In terms of dungeons, Imagine has this concept of bronze/silver/gold version of a dungeon. The map is the same for all 3 version, just that the mobs that populate it are different, and there may be a slight mechanic difference.
Other than Suginami Mines and Ichigaya Garrison, the other dungeons suffer from long empty hallways and/or low mob density issues. You end up spending more time walking around, rather than fighting if you try to xp in a dungeon other than Ichigaya or Suginami.
Also, they are currently only 2 gold level dungeons, which are once again Ichigaya and Suginami.
Questing for xp is a nonexistent concept since there are close to 0 quests in the game, other than the main storyline quest they call acts.
In terms of items, practically nothing is better than CP items, or items gotten from their item malls. A lot of things are tied to their item mall as well, including things like weapon manufacturing and items enchanting.
Due to rampart RMTing on the JP servers, it’s possible to get some common CP items using makka, the in-game currency. But until fairly recently, makka has very little worth as you make way more makka than you spend them, resulting in everyone easily having millions stocked up.
In addition to the above, Cave, Imagine’s developer has an “interesting” twist to your usual item malls: fortune cards.
It’s basically a form of lottery. There is a list of possible rewards, and you get a random reward from the list each time you attempt it. They usually last for a month before they change the rewards.
Out of this list, some are rare rewards, some are common rewards and some are super common rewards etc…
1 CP is the equivalent of 10 yen or US$0.10.
There are currently 6 different fortune cards line up, and the cheapest one cost 15CP or US$1.50 a try and the most expensive one cost 60CP or US$6.00 a try.
They also held “special” fortune cards sometimes, e.g. currently, there’s a fortune card that cost 300cp, or US$30 a try.
The top reward usually have a 2-4% chance of it happening, which means that on average, you have to spend hundreds or even thousands of dollars to get them, and you have a limited time to “play” the lottery before they are gone.
The gold level dungeons are tuned to a certain gear level and in order to reach that, items from lotteries are needed as there are no non-cp alternatives. e.g. things like material sequencers which prevent your weapon from exploding on a failed modification etc…
Armor/weapon from lotteries are also significantly stronger than their non-cp counterparts.
A normal melee ring adds +3 str. A cp lottery ring adds +15% melee damage and 5% xp.
Normal armor has 0 effects, cp armor can have something like +10% melee damage, +20% more damage against certain mobs.
There are 3 main character archetype in the game, melee, gunners and mages.
At the beginning till around August 2007, melee are fairly weak as they don’t have easy access to elemental weapons. Once they have them however, they start to elapse past gunners/mages in terms of DPS and survivability.
Melee are now capable of doing single/AE version of nearly every damage type. Gunner are limited to single target and mages are limited to only single/AE version of 4 damage type; fire/ice/lightning/wind.
This imbalance was pretty obvious when people ran suginami gold but is sort of resolved itself when it comes to ichigaya gold as fire damage is about the only thing needed in there, and AE damage isn’t that important.
Still, melee continue to complain that they are underpowered in both the English and Japanese community and as a result, lotteries are tuned more towards them, widening the gap between melee and the rest.
Thankfully there isn’t any pvp, or melee will probably dominate everyone.
The level grind past 85 is pretty horrid as well:
85 97,400,000
86 110,050,000
87 162,000,000
88 264,000,000
89 354,000,000
90 696,409,989
91 1,392,819,977
92 2,089,229,966
You need around 2b xp to level from 92 to 93, the current cap. 2b xp is enough to get you from 1->89. 1 round of ichigaya gold bring around 500k-600k xp. You will need about 4178 rounds to clear 92->93. 1 round take about 5-10mins to clear at max efficiency.
This 5-10mins efficiency can only be reach if everyone in the party uses CP run speed/damage increasing items.
4178 * 5 => 20890 minutes or 348 hrs. Even if you spam 5x xp up for 30mins fragrance from the lotteries, it’s still 69hrs.
Without CP consumables, a full group will clear the place in around 10-15mins, effectively doubling the time required to a hefty 696hrs.
Can’t field a full party all the time? Increase that to 15-20mins a round, resulting in 1044hrs.
If you play for 4hrs a day, it’ll take you 261 days to clear 92 to 93.
Even at max efficiency, unless you play way more than 4hrs a day, it’ll take you a good 87 days to clear 92 to 93.
There isn’t that much of a point to hit max level either. You tend to max out your main combat stat around mid 60s and you only get a fairly minimal damage boast every 10 levels. There are currently no devils above 85 either and devils as a whole are useless, except to attract mob attention.
A lot of people intending to play the English version think that they can rear up a particular devil they like and use it forever. Unfortunately that isn’t true.
If you run sugi gold, you will use a devil capable of using fog breath and/or void/resist piercing attacks.
If you run ichigaya gold, you will use a devil that void magical/psyche attacks and/or one that voids ice.
Use anything else and your devil will be dead most of the time, unless you intend to leech xp off other people.
There are of course bugs that exist since the JP closed beta that has yet to be fixed.
Offhand, pathing issue around the door in Ichigaya’s boss room is one.
Characters/devils being unable to move after using a skill with charge time is another.
Not zoning correctly as well.
To summarize: Cave is just out to maximize profits with their lotteries.
There are hardly any content and they aren’t making much of an effort to improve them.
There isn’t any PvP and the difference between a level 65 char and a level 93 one is minimal.
Literally the ONLY thing to do in here is to grind to max level, wait for cap to be raise, then grind again.
Play Imagine only if you can stand the above.
Currently, on the JP server, the 80+ population has significantly reduced, but what do I know about high level gameplay? I’m “only” level 88 and my alt is level 85…
I wonder how many fanbois will look at this post with rose-tinted glasses and bash me for this post.
74 Comments »
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL
Hey Finella, looks like your blog is still getting linked from the Aeria forums.
Haha! omg, i guess i will pretty much be out of the game after the acts stop then, it doesn’t really sound like they care about implementing new content either, and are healers non-existant/not needed?
Healers aren’t needed since consumables are so cheap and easily accessible.
Not to mention how much of a pain it is to target other people in your party…
Better off fusing a devil that can heal decently and depend on that.
This is sadly accurate.
So much wasted potential.
Holy sh-
You totally destroyed all my hopes for this game.
I was flabbergasted… and to think I have such a high hope for this game.
Time to find another MMO, I guess.
And I kept hearing how people praise Cave like some benevolent developer, how they give free cash shop prize for every two months or so.
Btw, how badly is Demon Depository needed in this game?
Most people keep saying it was unneeded, just focus on two demons or so, but reading your blog make me think otherwise.
Cave hardly “gives” any CP items.
The last they ever gave away usable CP items was the storage tickets/xp fragrance for the anniversary celebration back in April.
Devil storage isn’t really needed until you hit 2 stages: mass producing devil for crystals to enchant your gear and to fill up your akuma zensho.
Even then, it’s mainly for convenience purpose.
3 open COMP slots is plenty to fuse any skill to any devil and you typically only need to fuse a dungeon specific devil for the gold dungeons.
What you use up to the silver level doesn’t really matter.
I was woundring how aeria was planing on taking this game. They always tried to push Item Mall items onto people and i was thinking they would do the same here. What you mentioned about item mall items being weapons totaly made me pissed. I can deal with some item mall’s but when equal opertunity like that is takin from the game and given to the people with out debts then its awful. I game to relax, have fun, and meet new people. How am i going to have fun if all i can think about is making a payment to these people for some fun gear? Thanks for this blog!
Considering how Aeria handles their translation: http://finella.nemissa.info/2008/12/03/dear-spenceraeria-for-goodess-sake-hire-a-real-translator/
Be very worried?
The bulk of the more powerful items from Imagine’s item mall is off their lottery system which means you are effectively fighting for a rare drop with money, and those items are vastly superior to normal drops. This applies to armor, weapons and even consumables.
I’ll repeat again that gold dungeons are tuned to a certain gear level, and you can only reach that by having CP items.
Some CP items can be bought with makka on the JP server due to RMT, which is fairly disastrous to the economy.
I’d like to say sugi gold doesn’t require special gear. My current noob swuad of 40/50s with only a few enchants can run it 5x in 45 minutes. Sure it’s not great time, but still beating what we could do in sugi silver and it’s not hard.
Look at gold dungeons from a low “tech” perspective i.e. what will happen on the EN server, not from the rampart RMTed state of the JP server.
i.e. A world where class 6-2 enchanters aren’t common, and you are most likely only to get low 1x% chance to enchant cait sith to a pair of non CP legs.
That is the state of sugi gold when we first started to do it.
Some CP gear are still CP. Some enchants are still enchants. Without CP, directly or indirectly, the gear gap between silver and gold cannot be easily filled.
Wow, thanks for this post. I just started playing the game, played for about an hour. Went to check the forums to see what people had to say, saw this and…yeah. Uninstalling game now.
I never really looked up info about the game. I just saw there was a SMT MMORPG, thought “cool” and checked it out. Now, I see it’s not exactly “cool.” To me, MMORPGs are about the people. I can ignore some faulty gameplay if I’m playing with some very good friends. However, for a MMORPG to thrive, the gameplay needs to be about the people. I’ve played a ton of MMORPGs, with FFXI and WoW being what I’ve played the most. Both are polar opposites of how they work but show just how well their system can work.
For instance with FFXI, you HAVE to play with people to get anywhere. You cannot get anywhere in the game without a group. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting so many people online because of that. Not only that, but the servers are mixed of both JP and NA. While sure there are quite a few racist JPs, I’ve been able to befriend a lot of Japanese people (Which made the weeaboo in me happy, but was also just awesome beable to befriend people from another culture) (Are there any plans to for a combined server for Imagine? That would be pretty cool). There’s then just so much content to actually do with a group, plus rewards to make it worthwhiled.
And while WoW does have that to an extent with Raids, it’s not NEEDED. But what I love about WoW is PVP. They did a wonderful job with PVP in WoW. I guess the best way to explain it is that I need to display my male dominance haha, but I love PVP. Like, I can’t play a FPS on story mode or single player or w/e. I need to be online fragging people. WoW’s PVP gives me that in a MMO.
And from then reading this post, it sounds like Imagine has basically nothing to it. It’s just EXPing for…no purpose. And so yeah, while it might be fun to experience it with a few friends, there’s then not much to go on. From the sounds of it, the game is not going to last all too long, outside of the whole “OMG SMT” thing. Then again, we are talking about the mass populace, so the whole “OMG SMT” thing might allow it to live quite awhile…
Although reading your new thread on the forums made me realize there’s another class that games like this appeal to: The “I’m still in grade school, living with my parents” class. Which is fine, I used to be in the same boat years ago (Given back then I’d rather play on a private RO server then a free MMORPG). But at the same time, it’s 15 dollars. You can make 5 dollars an hour mowing lawns. Mow for 3 hours and you just paid for a month. But oh well. You get what you pay for, huh?
Are the Acts atleast entertaining? Is that worth going through?
The acts are worth going through. The game is actually really fun and good… until you run out of content. That’s the problem, if SMT sucked, we could simply quit and never look back. But the game actually rocks, so learning that past level 35 there is no more content and basically nothing to do but endless runs of a couple “dungeons”, you’re pretty much shocked.
Question to Finella: On JP SMT, have they fixed the Plasmas farming issue in Nakano Forest (or elsewhere) or is it still the best way to get money?
This post wasn’t meant as a reply to Ensam, my bad.
Not really. War quests/Ichigaya gold introduce quite a bit of money as well.
There isn’t much of a money sink in the game though, so makka sort of devalue overtime.
Thanks for your reply, Finella.
And just ignore the bashers, they are blinded by their fanboyism. If anything, you should be thanked for preventing us to waste any more time on this “game”, so thank you.
Let me make this perfectly clear.
I don’t like the way you write things, it’s very haughty, elitist, and condescending.
I like the game, and I play to play on the JP server after I get the hang of the game with the (poorly translated) English beta, because it’s good practise for a Japanese student, it’s megaten, and I find it fun. Obviously I can’t comment on some of the things you’ve said, as I’m still rather new, but some of the things you say are a bit presumptuous, and you’re spurning a lot of misunderstanding on the Aeria forums, something I largely attribute to your writing style, which is basically telling people why they should hate the game and not play. Understand that if people want to play the game a certain way, they are free to do so. It doesn’t matter to some people (myself included) that demon rosters need to be changed up to do well in certain dungeons. You seem the kind of player who min-maxes to be the best of everything, but not everyone plays like that. The reality of the matter is, that in a f2p game, the companies will ALWAYS push their item malls hard, because in the end A CORPORATION IS IN IT FOR THE MONEY. They may be in it for fans as a secondary objective, but Cave wants money, period.
It’s just that all your comments come off as sounding jaded and bitter, and TELLING everyone why they should hate the game.
I like the game, and I find it fun, as do many others, I’m sure. So please don’t wreck people’s fun with negativity, and posting opinion as fact.
Not everyone is a min-maxer.
True, my language is a tad strong, but that doesn’t make my arguments invalid. What is so presumptuous about my post?
My post concentrate on just one area: What a player does towards the end of the game and not to have unrealistic expectations just because of the “Megaten” branding.
A good example is the devil bit which you misinterpret completely: A lot of people were telling me that they like XXX devil and would like to fuse one with good skills etc and use it forever. While this is possible on console, it’s not here. In fact, for most JP party, you are required to state what devils you have, on top of your level/skill set/stats.
I don’t have a problem with fusing a dungeon specific devil since I’ve been doing that for at least a year, but others new players might, hence my warning.
And min-maxing? The game after a certain point forces you to do it, or you can’t progress. Don’t take my word for that, others are claiming the same thing: http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/genmessage.php?board=921999&topic=47058028
Every single member of my clan had to reset their stat at some point. Every single one of them, in order to handle the leap from silver dungeons to gold dungeons. You can ask Jillia/Melli on Aeria’s forum about this since she’s in my clan and experienced this first hand.
Let me repeat this again: Gold level dungeons are tuned to a certain gear level and to reach it, CP is required.
RMT is rampart on the JP server, which is about the only reason why certain CP items are flowing into the non-CP user, allowing non-CP users to “advance”.
This will most likely not exist on the EN side.
Since you understand Japanese, register an account on the JP server and check in-game message board.
It’s filled with titles like:
RMTの取り締まり表明について（公式RMT批判含む）
ＲＭＴ業者のＴＥＬＬ広告
ＲＭＴ業者キャラがＴＥＬＬで宣伝を流してますけど・・・
This should also demonstrate how bad RMT has become.
There are plenty of bugs, such as this; 「Ctrl」+「Alt」+「Delete」キーを押下した際のタスクマネージャー起動で、クライアントが強制終了することを確認しております。 listed in their official bug list, and all of them have been there for months. You can easily see it if you register an account.
Cave come up with new CP items every week. There’s a difference between pushing for profits and ignoring the masses.
Population decrease at the high end is very visible. There’s an in-game party list and lately it barely reaches page 2. Minus off clan advertisement/enchant request and it’s barely half.
Back when Suginami Gold was first released, the pages average 4-6 at least, and there are hardly any clan advertisments.
Threads like this: 真・女神転生IMAGINE 引退する人、しない人 on 2ch makes it even more obvious.
In the past, you see tons of people gathering around dungeon lobbies shouting/recruiting for groups. It’s a miracle to see more than 5 people these days.
Again, no where am I saying “don’t play”, I’m saying be aware of what the game truly is.
I am and will still be playing SMT Online: Imagine for a while.
remember now it is aeria and they do add content already gib=ven cash items out etc. This is beta it will get better. Just cuz one company ran it poorly dont mean others will.
J, you are in lala fantasy/denial land. I would LOVE for this game to be ‘fun’. However you need to understand how cash shop items work. Cash shop games don’t need to give a lot of content, b/c they don’t NEED to hold high populations/just enough to keep the spenders spending; as opposed to subscription games which must provide content to keep EVERYONE paying. I played a week of the beta, and while I loved UO, the way the skills are done/risk/reward model just doesn’t satisfy me. Spend 1000’s of skill points for +1 str/mag etc? Something is DEFINITELY wrong with that. Also money stacking in piles of 50k O.o, honestly what if you don’t use the cash shop to open the other storage containers. Where do you keep this junk, especially since there is no money drain built in? There are some serious issues to consider, but instead of treating it as a ‘beta’, you guys want to treat it as a finished product, and defend it. Simply put you are using irrational ideas, attempting for a rational solution, but an irrational idea may only lead to an irrational solution. Bottom line, this game better not get out of beta before the end of December as Aeria has planned. Watching the video posted of the gold dungeon on a later blog on this site, I noticed how the exp bar moved…puke slow. You get mad at the blog poster for being honest on how he sees things and ask instead of putting rosy glasses on, while he explains how he sees the game. In the end though, a pile of sh&t is still a pile a sh&t, with or without rosy glasses. A is A, B is B, A will never be a B, even if rosy glasses make it look that way.
About money, they started to sell 50k vouchers a few patches back. These vouchers cost exactly 50k, and when you click on them, they convert back to 50k stacks.
Voucher itself stacks up to 100.
Problem happens when you try to convert those vouchers back to money stacks, as you need to double click on the voucher stack to convert them one at a time back to money…
I use a simple macro to convert money for me. Should be unecessary but alleviates the problem for myself.
I don’t see how it would make much differences, Aeria is only a publisher, there’s a limit in what they can do, if the producer, Cave, already screwed up the game to this extent then that’s what we will got too.
And by asking random people and most probably unprofessional to help them translate this game, I fear what Aeria has in stock for the future.
And everyone that have experience in f2p english MMO for at least one year would probably understand how screwed up and greedy is most, if not all, West publisher company.
Now that the actual game is out of the way, just how many Acts are there?
I doubt the “story” will get good, but I wanna at least try them all before I quit. Hoping for a decent tie-in to SMT2, which again, I am doubting.
16 acts total.
As a reference:
Act 16 was added August 2008.
Act 15 was added in July 2008.
Act 14 was added in April 2008.
Act 13 was added in December 2007.
The single player games are pretty bad too. The fanbase for them are just as rabid too.
Hi, I’m just wondering what does Fog Breath do. I’m trying to find out to attempt to use them on the English version. Also, what area of skills does void/resist piercing attacks fall under?
Fog breath causes amnesia or whatever they translate it to. The first curse spell from the curse chain expert and amnesia shot from magical bullet does the same status effect.
Amnesia prevent mobs from using all skills, except attack/dodge/counter/block.
The bosses in suginami gold cast ~dyne spells, megido and uses elemental spins. On top of that, they cannot be int erupted/knocked back so they will always get their attacks off. Only way to stop their attacks is to hit them with amnesia.
Void/resist piercing just refers to devils affinity: i.e. mobs that void or resist the damage type: piercing; they are not skills.
Examples of mobs that void piercing are ganga/unicorn/phoenix.
Heh your post is why I like IMAGINE. If I wanted everything in your post I’d go to WoW. I don’t see why you need to worry so much about having a demon that goes against the mobs so much(when usually mobs are dead before they can even do anything). Players are already over-powered then demons for one. We would run sugi gold at level 40 and don’t have a problem with the big bosses. Granted it took about 15-20 minutes for one run, but we were weak, anything higher and with good gear shouldn’t even be worrying. Ichi gold sucks for gunners but the new update fixes them A LOT. I also don’t see why you think melee is overpowered. When I see mages double rushing for 9999 in a row if they hit weakpoint and 3-5000 or so non-weakpoint I don’t really get it when melee only have that option for their double spin to such numbers. Having half your inventory just for weapons is a bummer too, not to mention when you gotta switch between types a lot on the fly. Mages also usually get double bonuses sometimes one new cp stuff when things increase magic and another increases shot damage. And why worry about peope buying CP? As you said, if you play the game, you easily have enough makka to just buy the new stuff anyways. I agree with the fact though we need more to do besides dungeon runs, myself I can’t run them continously like some people do. I do like 2-3 party runs max a week, grinding isn’t my thing.
I really hate it when people make such remarks about mages:
“When I see mages double rushing for 9999 in a row if they hit weakpoint and 3-5000 or so non-weakpoint I don’t really get it when melee only have that option for their double spin to such numbers.”
Please to show how a mage can hit for 9999 damage regularly on things that actually give XP. aka not a random immature frost in suginami field
Best case scenario, I do 6-7k against nightmare jack frost, 5k against the earthies/aquans boss in suginami gold and that is if I use damage up fragrance and abuse sharpshoot.
Look here as well. Full enchants, close to fully modded flame horn. Even if you multiply the damage seen by 1.5 (which is not how damage up fragrance is calculated), no where is it near the numbers you wrote.
I can argue about how melee can clear the 4 elements + power rooms in suginami gold with 1 tail of the dragon using sharpshoot/fully modified answerer if you want to talk about specific cases.
“Having half your inventory just for weapons is a bummer too, not to mention when you gotta switch between types a lot on the fly. ”
And mages don’t hold multiple weapons… Thanks, I’ll bank my flame horn/poseidon/screeching wind god/etc. Not to mention the stack of disposable daggers for trash mobs since elemental rushes = durability drain.
“Mages also usually get double bonuses sometimes one new cp stuff when things increase magic and another increases shot damage.”
No. Read this
Or a summary:
“This is where a lot of peple get confused. Something that says アタックの威力が２５％増す (Increase attack damage by 25%) don’t mean that it’ll increase ALL physical damage skill you do by 25%, only skills that have the movement type “attack” will get the increase.
Another one that a lot of people are confused about is ショットの威力が２５％増す。※破壊魔法を含む。 (Increase shot damage by 25%. *Destructive magic included). A lot of people take it to mean that this damage increase will apply to all spells, it won’t, it only applies to spells with the shot movement type.
Agi and the other spells from the destructive magic expert skills have the shot movement type, hence they will get the increase. Kamaitachi and the other skills from elemental rush have the rush movement type, so they will not benefit from things that grant plus shot damage.”
Test it. damage changes is very obvious.
Don’t get me wrong, gunners and mages are buffed up this patch and melee aren’t able to abuse sharpshoot + 0 int enhance anymore. Melee with those two + special cp armor like the bodyguard set were elapsing pass everyone in terms of damage.
Er that’s what I meant with shot increase in cp items. I’ve played 3 of the main offenses though and I still think it’s much easier to get more damage for your buck as a mage even before the update. My melee was the hardest one to get any decent damage(and having to make 8 or so slotted weapons was a *****), though, didn’t abuse enhancement and sharpshoot either.
I wonder when I’m gonna learn to keep away from f2p mmo’s …. Every single f2p ended with huge disappointment for me. I’m just sad to see a series I trully love spawning such a brainless game. Such a shame it wasn’t made a propper globe-wide appealing p2p game :/
Gold is not that tough!! If you gotta finish it in 15min and have no fun (like a factory job) — then maybe you gotta be all tricked out. If not it’s a great level appropriate challenge. If anything Imagine caters too much to hardcore hardcore players (yes that’s two hardcores)
If you’re not having fun being high level, you can always make a new account and start over from a different angle.
Also CP equipment is not much more powerful. If anything players are always shocked that all equip is relatively virtually identical stat wise. With the modding system it is very easy to make a weapon much more powerful than CP equivalents. Even with a CP weapon of many slots, generally risking CP items is not as practical for modding purposes. My only real complaint is aesthetically the equipment tends to look nothing like what any Megaten old-timer would expect to see in a Megaten game. There is a kind of aesthetic disconnect there which is unfortunate. It would be nice to see higher pings imposed, but it is a wonderful game for the most part… especially if you don’t get too invested in it.
Michael, stop trolling and gold is of course easy if all you do is leech.
Please show me a non-cp ring that adds +10% damage or a crafted gun that is half as good as Avalon.
Come on, fraps a solo run through Suginami Gold without using a single CP item to prove me wrong. I mean, it’s easy right?
I don’t get it, if you didn’t like it why the hell did you make an alt that high? Talk about contradictions.
You obviously miss the 9001 posts where I question my sanity for still playing SMT Online: Imagine.
Just because I play it, doesn’t mean I must like all the elements that the game has and go “omgbestgameeva”.
It’s still pretty retarded to have wasted your time, with not one but two characters. Considering you knew there wouldn’t be any content anytime soon so that the heavy grindage would pay off.
gg
Alt is leeching on a second PC, hardly any addional effort required to actually level her. /shrug.
I should come to say the reasons, but it’s up to you on how to judge.
Finella actually made that lv 85 enchanter mainly to help globe klan member on enchanting crystals. You see, not everyone can understand Japanese, so whenever our member decided to enchant a crystal usually it became a major language trouble for them. Sure finella can help them ask someone to enchant this and that but sometimes it became a major hassle since :
a) it’s always a long queue on enchanting stuffs,
b) some favorite enchanters limit services to 3 times only, i.e crystalizationsx1 and kongoux2, c)not everyone can be online on full moon due to time and RL situation.
Another main reason is for the enhance buff, typically a high damage output is an absolute neccessity in gold dungeon to run it efficiently, why finella wouldn’t take buff? That time she was testing new chain skills like Magic Bullet and grand curses, and she doesnt have enough points to actually learn enhance.
Little by little we run gold dungeons with her casting buffs from her alt while her main attacking mobs at the same time (have to see this for yourself, I find it quite amazing). And with the new enhance int-based mechanism changes, it’s like more the reason to have a high int enchanter providing 1.5-1.6x damage output buff.
About your comments on she being retarded on wasting time, I dont think so, she is playing those 2 chars at the SAME time, yes, you can call her crazy but not retarded (if she was retarded then my name will be on 2ch sarashi thread gold dungeons blacklist for being a weak, clumsy, lv 73 leecher like some of other english klan’s members, I wont say names).
About why we and her still playing on this failing game, maybe it’s because we actually love this game? well, idk either. What I know for sure is that we like to play with other members, good playmates = good games.
Who is trolling? I honestly didn’t think this post was still active (I see the dates now)
Was just making the obvious points. Ie. Gold isn’t “insanely demanding” if you take your time with it — if you wanna point and click rape a dungeon bar none, then yeah it’s gonna get really tedious and boring, and frankly I’d be questioning my priorities too.
My char isn’t level appropriate for Gold but I’ve been thru it a few times, and I know with a pretty basic level appropriate party, it wouldn’t be tough to come out alive with good exp. The problem is people that level that high don’t know how to enjoy a game in the first place. If you pace yourself realistically IMAGINE is always overflowing with new content. I’m sure CAVE is aware if new stuff was pumped out any quicker it would overwhelm a lot of players even more than the myriad of available options already do. Casual players probably account for most of the games profit margin at any rate.
If you care about exp enough to accuse people of “leeching” because they’re not spazzing out about everything I have no idea what to say.
If you want to kick IMAGINE around some more though, I’d through movement lag onto the pyre — it’s hard enough to keep up with a party… why kick players back by default? Same goes for mount auto pilot / chase stopping indefinitely for the slightest lag turbulence. In general IMAGINE has no mercy for lagging players. But I gotta admit, I played on a lag free full-speed connection a little while back and I was bored out of my skull. The lag I could do without, but the max-ping time should be cut down to 25% what it is.
You are not level appropriate for gold but you know how gold function because you tagged behind others…?
:psyduck:
Obviously I’m talking out of my arse when I mention CP items is requied to reach the gear level realistically required for gold.
Oh wait, you are the great Michael, of course you know everything in this game with your superior command of the Japanese language.
I’m sorry, I’ll listen to your advice and clear gold dungeons in 2hrs or more. Obviously the longer the grind is, the more fun it is.
I mean, everyone is obviously still in their 40s in this game like you. I mean, the alt I had that “xp” solely on war xp manage to level from 21 -> 47 and Anna’s new alt hit 30 to 41 in less than 6hrs total of grinding…
I’m really sorry that I average 3-4hrs a day in the game and don’t play everyday! I could have use the 4hrs to watch TV but I am OCD so I spent it all on the game!
Cave is obviously doing it wrong when they market they lottery as “targeted for gold dungeons” too.
I’m sorry that we have friend/clan mates to grind with. Really sorry.
We are obviously taking the game too seriously and hence don’t know as much as you. We should relax like you, get kicked out of 2 clans and form a clan of one and go solo shibuya quartz.
BTW, please enlighten us about the mysterious non-cp ring that matches the +10% damage CP ring as well as the Avalon equivalent. I’m too stupid to find one.
They are obviously plenty of content for low level players like… grind higher?
Stop being such a god damn troll, Michael. Read and review what you type before you hit that shiny submit button.
“Oh wait, you are the great Michael, of course you know everything in this game with your superior command of the Japanese language.”
I have no idea what you’re even talking about. I personally think a lot of the English community playing on the Japanese servers are unfortunately pretty nuts (as you’d sort of expect) but that’s my right. I appreciate the blog as an IMAGINE resource, but I don’t understand your attitude.
I just posted an alternative perspective on the game, because there are a lot of people looking for info on IMAGINE due to Aeria’s launch at the moment.
I will post anon btw, as is my right, with no further intention of developing a persona here. The blogger especially should respect the privacy of people commenting under anon names.
Dear Michael,
I’m still waiting for you to enlighten me about the non-CP ring that matches the +10% damage CP rings, as well as the Avalon equivalent.
If you can’t even prove your own statement on there being CP alternatives, how the heck is the rest of your nonsense valid?
You can continue to post “anon” and I can continue to call you our by your more-commonly-known-name-which-is-hated-in-the-community aka Michael/yksehtniycul.
Respect my rights to freedom of speech, man!
You don’t understand my attitude? Neither do I understand yours.
Insulting my members, insulting Globe as a whole, then come crawling to Blue to join them once your drama-esque acts cause your own clan to collapse was pretty hilarious though!
p.s. Learn to actually use the reply function.
Hated by a handful of cracked in more ways than one people^
Hi! ^_^
Mind telling us about the CP alternatives now or is that still a big hush hush secret that you can’t say?
Don’t worry, we, the psychos, will still love you if you reveal it to us since we know deep in our hearts that you are the most knowledgeable among us and we await your enlightenment.
[...] 02:24 #136 (permalink) huf lei esto y quede bastante, decepcionado SMT Online: Imagine, And Why It Is Failing. | ??????? Leanlo. Saludos! [...]
Ok….I made a long post sticking up for the game, but maybe that’s just out of my love for SMT: Nocturne/Lucifer’s Call.
I just went back up and saw some of the stats you posted and it does seem insane to be honest. I didn’t read some of that the first time because I had to skip a huge bit as I’m only level 17 and have been playing for a few days. It just seems so brilliant at the moment that it’s hard to read people saying how bad it is, but when it comes down to it, yeah ok, it might get really annoying once I hit level 35 or so.
Like I’m playing one of the best games I’ve played in ages and then it just stops and turns into meaningless grinding, but maybe it’s just a bit too hard to take at the moment.
Nocturne was just so classic, and this game brings a lot of those feelings back, and it sucks thinking it’ll probably turn out nothing like it. I mean, that game had me around level 90 when I finished each time, and I don’t really think it would’ve been anything like what it was if it just……stopped at level 35.
I guess the creators are gutted at this, but it’s in the hands of the money men? Maybe if we kick up enough of a fuss and the money men grow a brain between them, they’ll see that they could have something classic here, but if it’s been out for so long in Japan already without anything else being added, well…….I suppose I’ll just have to try and be happy that it at least brought a lot of cool gaming memories back.
To finish : is there ‘any’ hope at all that more content could be added and that the game could be saved?
The main pitfall of this game falls into a few categories: people being attracted to it by the SMT label is one and people assuming what they experience from 1 to 40 to be the same as 40 to 93 is another.
The first 40 or so, you can make it there with a combination of your own acts, your clan mate’s acts and light sugi silver/ichi bronze grinding.
After that point, you realize that everyone has finished their act and the only thing left to do is dungeon grinding and again I’ve to mention the gear gap between silver and gold is fairly huge. It’s at this point where you either keep grinding mindlessly or prepare to gear up for gold, which is heavily dependent on cash shop items.
This is the bit that people have yet to see and this will, and would break most people’s will to carry on with the game.
As for hope, well, there are plenty of holes etc… on the existing maps that indicates where new fields/dungeons/etc… are suppose to go, but these holes are being filled up in a near nonexistence pace.
We hope that things can change, but then again, hope is kind of diminished overtime when updates after updates add fairly little to address the issues of the game. Even this latest update has close to 0 actual content.
This is a lot of bitching, the goal of the game is to have fun, lot reach the max level asap.
Deal with it.
>>lot reach the max level asap.
What? Plz2TakeNickIntelligentPersonSrsly.
Hint: Read before commenting. My post is about the lack of content, resulting in grinding being the only thing left to do.
There’s definitely a lot of other things to enjoy in the game like…?
p.s. I find it fun to mock ignorant people like Michael above about Imagine, more so than the game itself. Which is why I’m taking
bitchingblogging very seriously.In before “ohnoes, Finella is egotistical”.
Psychos or whatever, thanks for the timely updates.
PS: Over at digitaldevildb.com we’re having a hard time finding contributors, and would like to get a timely article up for Aeria’s Imagine, and our Cave Imagine page is really outdated and needs to be replaced with information post Beta (yikes)
So far Aeria’s forums and Gamefaqs (being the #@*$ they are) have pulled our requests for help. We have a contributor compen$ation program.
If someone doesn’t do everyone the solid, I’ll have to write it, and it would be hated by the Imagine elite by association.
PPS: I play Imagine for fun, and it is fun. I’ve never really played MMOs before a Megaten one hit the scene, and I gotta admit I wouldn’t be surprised if Imagine is one of, if not, the best. And honestly it is my favorite Megaten game all around. Too bad there is not much of a gaijin community on the J servers.
I’m really disappointed Michael.
Here I am, thinking that you would help the community by finally telling us what the alternatives to the 10% cp rings and Avalon are.
This is sad, very sad that you are hiding this information from all of us.
Why? Why are you soliciting people into doing things for you when you refuse to share with us this wonderful knowledge which we are oblivious to. Why?!
I do wonder why you want an alternative to the best CP items. If there were in-game alternatives to the best stuff then why would people buy CP in the first place?
That said, some things in-game are just as powerful as most CP items if not more so in some cases(relic pistol, the new elemental blades).
I already went though this with you: no proper money sink in this game = makka worth decays overtime = economy will eventually reach a saturation point where barter trading is the only form of economy left.
CP alternatives that acts as money sink are needed to prevent this grim situation that will hit the game sooner or later.
Case in point, the one month without melon and the period between 14th to 18th of January where the farmer flooded the market.
After effects of it is still visible now.
And you miss the point of my reply to Michael. He’s claiming there are no difference between CP and non-cp items.
While they are SOME alternatives for weapons, there are practically none for armor other than aegis/glepnir.
A CP ring that ads +10% spin damage is still a CP ring even if you bought it off the bazaar.
hi! I like you, u are very funny!
go on with Micheal!
and micheal! post more!!
and show us that 10% cp ring !! whatever that is.
Thanks for not deleting comments :)
I don’t know what your on about rings, but 10% equip, though technically CP can be picked up in the bazaar for virtually nothing. I don’t understand why everyone feels as if they have to be tricked out in the first place. CP is for casual players who’d rather spend money on virtual commodities than feed a family for instance. If you really like games, CP just breaks them. The game is very easy, why make it easier? I just buy CP stuff (with macca) for looks. If I could buy CP on the J servers, I might buy some now and then to support CAVE, but spending money on a flip of a bit just seems somehow depraved.
I say play to have fun, and make your char into an expression of yourself (it’s a social game after all) …you’re not gonna be the number one damage dealer on the server, and if you are, heaven help you Ok (now back to the hating!)
“Also CP equipment is not much more powerful. If anything players are always shocked that all equip is relatively virtually identical stat wise.”
Hi, have you forgot what YOU typed?
You said that all equip are identical stat wise. I’m simply asking you to show me a non-cp ring that adds 10% damage. Heck, forget 10%, show me a non-cp ring that adds 5% damage.
I asked for a non-cp 10% damage ring and here you go, telling me to buy a CP ring with makka off the baazar.
A 10% CP ring IS still a CP item whether you buy it from a baazar, got it as a gift from cybersex or whatever!
Read this if you are that retarded to have not figure out how economics work here.
If you want to argue that “technically CP can be picked up in the bazaar for virtually nothing”, buy me a Rei from the bazaar then or do you even KNOW what Rei is/does?
“With the modding system it is very easy to make a weapon much more powerful than CP equivalents. ”
Again, this is what YOU typed and I asked for a non-cp equivalent to Avalon. Avalon only adds +20% shot damage, surely it’s easy to make a weapon more powerful than it, right?
+20% from Avalon, +10% from a ring, hey, that’s 30% damage from only 2 CP item! 30% is very little for only 2/13 slots, right?
Please tell us the non-cp equivalent to them. Please. Not “go buy CP items off the baazar” as that still makes them CP items.
People actually HAVE to gear up though CP items because it is the only way to attain the gear level required to proceed onto gold.
The gap between silver and gold is huge; not easy like what you claim.
Oh wait, you are obviously too powerful and/or retarded to notice that, right, Mr level 4x?
Just admit that you know nuts about how the game functions already.
It isn’t difficult, to mod a weapon to do 30% or more damage. Sure you can always mod an Avalon, but unless you’re up to loosing it, that is pretty difficult (finding insurance items and all)
Again I appreciate the updates, so I’ll respect your question this time. Not wanting to carry on a conversation or anything.
Avalon adds +20% >>SHOT< < damage. Kindly show me a modification that adds >>SHOT<< damage, and 30% worth of it while you are at it.
You seriously have no idea on what the heck items do in this game.
If you’d posted the stat in Japanese I would’ve known specifically what you meant. To “>>SHOT<<” is pretty broad, but you’re still just dealing whatever affinity your gun actually is. I know you can’t mod for more exotic affinities, but geez it’s just a game??
Now you’re just being an abrasive ****. Before “Finella” was just a name to me, but now I pity
anyone not embarrassed to be amongst your company. Nice meeting you I guess??
Dear Michael,
Again, I’m repeat the same thing as what I did for the last 3 weeks.
Let me make this ridiculously simple since things don’t sink into your head.
Your premise was that “CP equipment is not much more powerful. If anything players are always shocked that all equip is relatively virtually identical stat wise.” and “It isn’t difficult, to mod a weapon to do 30% or more damage.”
Till now, you have yet to show me 1) a +10% damage ring 2) something that match Avalon.
In fact, you have just prove that you don’t even KNOW what Avalon does.
Want the JP text for Avalon? Here you go, the entire description:
ＡＶＡＬＯＮ－２４ – 射撃: 33 魔法: 31 補助: 2 必殺: 7 耐久: 50
市街戦用の量産品を高性能化したカスタムライフル。高威力だが製造コストが高く､扱いも難しかったため製造数は少ない。
ショットの威力が２０％上昇する。※破壊魔法も含む
Don’t understand? It means that Avalon adds 20% to EVERY skill that use the shot movement time, regardless of the damage type it does, IOWs it affects the entire madan tree. Heck, why are you even trying to argue about CP equipment when you don’t even know what Avalon does and didn’t even bother to find out?
Let’s put this aside and look at your argument of “It isn’t difficult, to mod a weapon to do 30% or more damage”
Do you know the success chance for going from slot 3, fire 2 to fire 3? Answer: 20% with a 50% chance of a major failure and 3.6% chance of a great success.
Do the maths and if you still think it “isn’t difficult”, check into the nearest elementary school to learn what percentage does.
Again, for the 235235253th time: If CP items aren’t overpowerful compared to non-cp items, please tell us the alternatives to them or if that’s too much trouble, just tell us what the non-cp alternatives to the +10% damage rings and Avalon are.
If you can’t, just admit that you are wrong and there are no non-cp alternatives to them and that yes, CP items are overpowerful compared to regular items.
I’m totally okay in arguing this with you for another year since the response you give shows the whole world just how ignorant you are and that provides a good source of entertainment.
I really pity whoever befriends you since you are obviously unable to form a coherent line of thought towards an argument or actually have something to base your arguments on.
p.s. This is just my blog, why so serious?
Since most crafted weapons aren’t incredibly difficult to make(in fact only a few melee weapons are and not even worth it), slot 3 percentage buffs are rather easy(don’t forget big success can give +20% on a level 3, like my lovely lightning blade*hugs*). Yeah you’re gonna break few weapons but that’s the point.
A 5 slot fully mod kotetsu is still going to do significantly less ice damage than a Rei, since you need to enchant an aquans to it for ice damage, and you can enchant a +20% racial enchant on Rei.
A 5 slot fully moded ranbus SVD is still going to do significantly less magic damage than a Gamic since you need to enchant chu chulain to it for magic damage, and you can enchant a +20% racial enchant on Gamic.
My point is that CP items offer a relatively huge advantage over conventional items, and Michael, in his infinite wisdom denies this.
Other than zan/lightning, how are you going to get a +35% fire elemental weapon before level 81, without using CP? Same goes ice, magic, nerv etc…
Same goes for guns which has no “easy” special enchant alternatives, unlike melee weapons.
This is which is why I used Avalon as an example, as there really isn’t a realistic alternative to it, other than another CP weapon.
This is nuts. Yes I understand everything, and have from post one in this thread. I don’t understand why you think there should be an alternative to CP items when it is just a matter of degree you speak of.
+20% +40% it doesn’t all that much matter. If people wanna spend money to lower the difficulty of the game, then that’s their business.
Come back to me when you run gold dungeons on a frequent basis, and learn the true nature of the economy.
My looks:
http://dbdb.digitaldevildb.com/wiki/index.php?title=Char:マカェル アルケヂア
Please support the community, and fuck corporate communities. Let them make the games, let us enjoy them in peace ok! Right on :D
Why the heck are you trying to use my blog to promote your site?
Do you mean asking for help at digitaldevildb.com? I’m sorry you feel used. Just delete the comment if so (like the likes of Gamefaqs and Aeria Games & Entertainment)
Btw, it’s not *my* site.
If it’s not your site, why are you asking for help?
Or do you fail in the English language so badly that you couldn’t comprehend the term “your site”?
Here’s a retarded analogy:
I worked for company A.
Company A is not my company.
When a visitor comes to company A, I’m going to say this: “Welcome to company A. Not *my* company, but it’s famous for making cars.”
Logic completely okay here.
Great review/preview, so far I have played up to level 20. I am a big fan of the SFC SMTI and II games, and so far the act stories are fairly intresting. I think i’ll play through them, but yeah the bugs/control issues and other things mentioned are annoying. That said it is f2p so might as well try it out a bit right?