Well it’s good you enjoyed the game, it’s not a terrible little game overall, but as an oldbie fan of the franchise I can’t help feeling a little bitter that they didn’t do a better job on it.

Of course why the original was amazing is a factor of nostalgia and the time it came out, but it really was a unique game. It is being re-released, both the original, the original with new graphics, and the Christmas NiGHTS stand alone demo/expansion whatever it was (no one can seem to agree) all on the same disc for the Playstation 2. Right now it’s Japan-only, and considering JOD flopped in sales who knows if it’ll ever make it outside of Japan, but it’s something to keep in mind.

Of course it’d be in Japanese if you got it and modded your system, which is fine by me cause I know the game like the back of my hand so it doesn’t matter what language the text displays in.

http://moonlitblood.deviantart.com/

sorry for all of my long useless rambling

I got the PS2 back in 2 triple-zero, whipper-snapper! Back then it was hi-tech! And expensive!

Hehe… Between the Saturn and the Wii, my sister and I got slow on the console uptake. It took us quite awhile to finally get around to buying a used PS2… must’ve been 2003-2004 or so when we did. My sister only just bought a Gamecube last year.

I think the disc has to be used in concert with the card– you put the disc in first, it overrides the region, and then you use the card to hook the disc out while the PS2 still thinks the disc is in it, and replace the disc with the game. But yeah, it wouldn’t be a huge loss with what PS2s are priced these days. X)

“Haha, true. I forget how old PS2s are sometimes.”

I got the PS2 back in 2 triple-zero, whipper-snapper! Back then it was hi-tech! And expensive!

I know a friend of mine once gave me a DISC I could just put in there to override the region but I never tested it out. Considering I can pick up another old PS2 for about 80 bucks I guess I can consider risking mangling mine now, still, old girl’s served me well.

YES. I ran straight off the platform too. The next time around, I accidentally jumped over part of the railing while trying to chuck blue chips at a switch. Oops. Took me awhile to get over my falling problems.

Yeah, I mean, I thought WILL was a wimp, but HELEN.

Seriously. There was one part at the beginning where I was all “YAY HELEN” as she rushed wily-nily into Aqua Garden to help NiGHTS, but she became more and more pathetic over the course of the game.

Either way it was dumb.

Yep. Whatever the reason, it was so cliched it made me sad.

Think about. Pink + Blue = what? Purple. Ha!

True! And I liked Claris’ color scheme, whereas Helen’s pink and frilly doily costume was waaaaay too much for me.

There must be something wrong with the girl characters in NiGHTS, lol.

Yeah, the girl Visitors all seem to suffer from chronic dream-injury problems. At least the “female” Marens were pretty sweet… Queen Bella’s theme was rockin’. That spider had class.

XD I don’t think I need to worry about voiding the warranty on a 7 year old machine, but it does sound like less of a pain.

Haha, true. I forget how old PS2s are sometimes. Also, I think the card/disc combo is cheaper than sending it off to be modded. You just order it online and it gets sent to you; you don’t have to pack your PS2 up and send it off into the unknown.

It took me a few attempts to figure out Helen would follow along underneath the grating during that one part, hurrrh. The first time I did it I also immediately plummeted Will into the abyss because I ignored the on-screen instructions.

“AUGH. You just hit on one big gripe I had about JoD’s storyline. I may be overreacting, but I felt that JoD played up female stereotypes just a leetle bit much. There was too much “Helen (the pink flouncy female) being weak and relying on the stronger Will (the soccer-playing sporty male) to help her out!” for me.”

Yeah, I mean, I thought WILL was a wimp, but HELEN. She’s 12 and still afraid of the dark. Pssh.

Though the “ow my ankle *dramaqueen*” crap was probably just because they couldn’t figure out how to give her good enough AI so that she’d just FOLLOW you across jumps. Or they wanted to make it more puzzle-y. Either way it was dumb.

“Though Claris and Elliot did have a few gender stereotypes going on (Claris’ orange-pink outfit and her singing, and Elliot’s blue outfit and his basketball-playing skillz)”

It makes SENSE with Claris and Elliot though. Think about. Pink + Blue = what? Purple. Ha!

“all he did was, er, move her unconcious body?”

How can you be unconscious in a dream for that matter? There must be something wrong with the girl characters in NiGHTS, lol.

“I recommend the swap-disc/slide-card combo. It doesn’t void the PS2 warranty because you’re not actually tinkering around with the “brains” of the machine”

XD I don’t think I need to worry about voiding the warranty on a 7 year old machine, but it does sound like less of a pain.

You should play Beautiful Katamari on the 360

Oh man, I’ve been wanting a 360 badly, if only for Beautiful Katamari and Assassin’s Creed. Perhaps sometime next year once my budget recovers from the chunk my new Wii took out of it.

I’ve never been good at the “roll up certain items” challenges in We Love Katamari, so I bet I’ll fail pretty miserably at Beautiful Katamari. I love the King of All Cosmos, but he clearly doesn’t love us or his son very much. XD

True but.. they seemed to forget they were MAKING A GAME ABOUT DREAMS. That leaves you up with alot of convenient plot devices and surreal nonsense at your disposal, which was really under-utilized. So they didn’t really have to struggle to explain so much. Granted they did come up with some creative ways to get NiGHTS caged, the Reala fight in Delight City being the most fun one.

Definitely agreed. While I enjoyed some of the crazy stuff they came up with (persona masks, roller coaster, etc.), they could’ve pushed the madness further. Hehe, I loved the surprise Reala fight at the start of Delight City. Sonic Team seems to like doing that… I remember one boss fight in Shining the Holy Ark where you turn a corner, totally oblivious and seeing no obvious “BOSS IS FORTHCOMING” indicators, and BOOM, out pops the Blader to screw you and your unprepared party over. The Blader was a fun fight, yes.

Yeah, the kids had no sense of physics

The kids’ movement engine also seems to whig out when they’re doing anything that isn’t running on a flat surface. For example, in my game Will keeps looking like he’s seizing as he gets teleported up those neon lifts in Delight City. It’s pretty funny, actually.

Took me a little while to figure out the switch system in Delight City, but after that it was straightforward. I wish they’d put some harder, slightly less linear puzzles in the kids’ sections.

Stupid Helen pulling some MATRIX shit and hurting her ankle. How do you even DO that in a dream? Luckily the awesome music kept me sane, it was so catchy.

AUGH. You just hit on one big gripe I had about JoD’s storyline. I may be overreacting, but I felt that JoD played up female stereotypes just a leetle bit much. There was too much “Helen (the pink flouncy female) being weak and relying on the stronger Will (the soccer-playing sporty male) to help her out!” for me. Though Claris and Elliot did have a few gender stereotypes going on (Claris’ orange-pink outfit and her singing, and Elliot’s blue outfit and his basketball-playing skillz), Claris acted independently of Elliot, not needing his aid, until the final battle and the secret ending. And even when Elliot “helped” her in the secret ending, all he did was, er, move her unconcious body? XD A bit stereotyped, yeah, but not nearly as much as Helen hurting her ankle, or Will having to rescue Helen because Helen lost her Red Ideya and fell.

Helen’s levels were also decidedly more girly than Claris’. Jewels and carousels and picnics, oh my! For example, as fun as Memory Forest was, Mystic Forest was more gender-neutral IMO (Mystic Forest had cars! And urban decay! And fog!).

Selph was probably something named but never really finalized or designed.

From what I understand, Selph was only named and had music. And apparently there was one render of an object that fans extracted from the Selph file on the Saturn disc, but yeah, that’s it. Iizuka himself said that Selph was just a discarded concept. Let the fandom speculation fly!

I’ve never modded my PS2 but here’s a pretty damn good reason. Oh also, the disc apparently is going to contain Christmas NiGHTS too. Joy~

I’m psyched that it includes Christmas NiGHTS. So cool to have all of the old NiGHTS stuff in one updated packaged.

“The King of All Cosmos is never satisfied by mediocrity. Katamari: When Your Best Just Isn’t Good Enough! What a picky father, really.”

You should play Beautiful Katamari on the 360, not only do you have to roll fast and make it bigger than he asked for as usual, but in nearly every level you also have to pick up a vast amount of a particular type of item (which I’m not good at XD.)

I’ll think I’m doing good and then he gives me only 60 points for the level and I’m just like “WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME!?” The King of All Cosmos is such an abusive father.

“Nowadays, with everyone expecting plot and coherent explanations in their games, I have a feeling Sonic Team wouldn’t be able to get away with caging NiGHTS repeatedly sans explanation.”

True but.. they seemed to forget they were MAKING A GAME ABOUT DREAMS. That leaves you up with alot of convenient plot devices and surreal nonsense at your disposal, which was really under-utilized. So they didn’t really have to struggle to explain so much. Granted they did come up with some creative ways to get NiGHTS caged, the Reala fight in Delight City being the most fun one.

“I didn’t hate all of the platforming bits — I liked the neon maze-puzzle thing in Delight City — but compared to the rest of the game the platforming sections lacked pizzazz. They needed, I dunno, more depth to them: either more moves the kids could do, more puzzles, better physics/dynamics, etc. Or they needed to not be there at all.”

Yeah, the kids had no sense of physics which was kind of bothersome, no matter if they were jumping or falling their torsos always remained unnaturally straight. There’s a million movement engines out there now, I’m sure the Wii could handle some of them. It is kind of like they only had a year and a half and built the whole game from scratch which… which is probably what lead to all the problems and mistakes.

The Delight City one took me like.. 5 tries to complete. Stupid Helen pulling some MATRIX shit and hurting her ankle. How do you even DO that in a dream? Luckily the awesome music kept me sane, it was so catchy.

“Oh man, like Selph. XD Gotta love fandom mysteries.”

Haha, right! Selph was probably something named but never really finalized or designed.

“I hope that Sega has the good sense to release the NiD PS2 remake in America. I’ll be importing it anyway (yay for modded PS2s), but it’d be good for the fandom to have a domestic release.”

I’m going to import too. If they do decide to release it domestically it’ll take at least a year and if that happens I’ll get the domestic release as well but… I know that game like the back of my hand, I’m sure I can play it in Japanse. There isn’t much text to be read anyway!

I’ve never modded my PS2 but here’s a pretty damn good reason. Oh also, the disc apparently is going to contain Christmas NiGHTS too. Joy~<3

Just missing the size by a few measly kilometers and running out of time on a 10 or 18 minute course is painful.

The King of All Cosmos is never satisfied by mediocrity. Katamari: When Your Best Just Isn’t Good Enough! What a picky father, really. Oy, redoing the longer courses was a huge pain. As much as I love making 1000-meter katamaris, they eat up time like whoa and are annoying to have to do over and over again just because your Katamari is marginally smaller than expected.

They didn’t even bother to explain it in the original

True. Then again, the original was a lot simpler and came from a legacy of games that Needed No Explanation (e.g. the Sonic Genesis games, old Mario games, etc.). Nowadays, with everyone expecting plot and coherent explanations in their games, I have a feeling Sonic Team wouldn’t be able to get away with caging NiGHTS repeatedly sans explanation.

Ahahaha the platforming bits. Will Fixes Breakfast, in which you have to navigate the maze of the fridge to free the milk in under five minutes! I didn’t hate all of the platforming bits — I liked the neon maze-puzzle thing in Delight City — but compared to the rest of the game the platforming sections lacked pizzazz. They needed, I dunno, more depth to them: either more moves the kids could do, more puzzles, better physics/dynamics, etc. Or they needed to not be there at all.

They could have stayed with the original structure and the game wouldn’t have been that different, really.

Agreed. I don’t hate the Chase Missions per se, but I don’t get why Sonic Team eliminated blowing up Mares, either. Big mistake on their part, since score attack was such a popular feature of the old game. This Chase Missions emphasize finishing as fast as possible, which decreases the amount of fun you can have exploring the course and circling it over and over.

They may only hear rumors themselves or could mishear or misunderstand any details they hear about a game secondhand from someone else with second or third-hand information.

From what I gather, it sounds like this was the case. Still a bit of a blooper on Sega’s part, but yeah, the information probably got all mangled as it went through the grapevine.

Could also be just loose ideas they were kicking around in the beginning and were never developed, but since so-and-so heard about it from another so-and-so they might not have been aware that the development team didn’t follow any of these paths.

Oh man, like Selph. XD Gotta love fandom mysteries.

I hope that Sega has the good sense to release the NiD PS2 remake in America. I’ll be importing it anyway (yay for modded PS2s), but it’d be good for the fandom to have a domestic release.

***SPOILERS YATTA YATTA ETC.***

“Then BOOM, dead NiGHTS. It was like Bambi’s Mom version 2.0.”

Well still, therein lies the mystery. You see him after the credits, so what happened? Who knows =P

“Heck, compare that to redoing a katamari in one of the longer Katamari levels.”

Auuugh, don’t remind me of that. Just missing the size by a few measly kilometers and running out of time on a 10 or 18 minute course is painful.

“If the reviewers want to gripe about long cutscenes, they should take a gander at Kingdom Hearts II. It was basically a movie with some gameplay scattered inbetween”

But that’s what games are becoming these days anyways, a storytelling medium, so a game without some cutscenes or some kind of a story are actually becoming rarer.

“The developers may have run into problems trying to explain how NiGHTS could be dumb enough to keep getting caged more than six times.”

They didn’t even bother to explain it in the original. Maybe if they had made the game more epic and made it take place during more than one night of sleep it would have worked better. Of course that may have only encouraged them to make even more boring platforming levels for the kids inbetween… THE EXCITING ADVENTURES OF WILL FIXING HIS BREAKFAST CEREAL!

“I realized that there could be ways to squeeze extra levels into the game without relying on the “Chase Mission” structure each time. What about having some levels with Mares, possibly coupled to Chase Missions? Like, beat a Chase Mission, then the next gate that opens up is a level that’s Mare-based.”

They could have stayed with the original structure and the game wouldn’t have been that different, really.

“Sega PR also directly told the admins, in person nonetheless, that JoD’s release date would be globally delayed to late January. LIES!”

Well, people need to be certain who they’re speaking to is a member of Public Relations for the team creating a game. I mean game companies have other jobs, like desk clerks, graphic designers, advertising agents etc. Just because someone works at a game company doesn’t necessarily mean they have intimate knowledge of a particular game’s development. They may only hear rumors themselves or could mishear or misunderstand any details they hear about a game secondhand from someone else with second or third-hand information.

I mean NiGHTS: JOD wasn’t even made in Sega of Japan, it was made at Sega of America by the Sonic Team USA branch. Granted those developers are still, in the majority, Japanese, but the game was developed in San Francisco.

Could also be just loose ideas they were kicking around in the beginning and were never developed, but since so-and-so heard about it from another so-and-so they might not have been aware that the development team didn’t follow any of these paths. If they were ideas that were developed and later scrapped and a PR person assigned to the game had been openly talking about them, I’d think the big gaming news sites would have mentioned them.