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Exit Fate review, a free console-style RPG for the PC

Eyeball

Arcane
Joined
Sep 3, 2010
Messages
2,541
The world of indie RPG games is generally a mixed bag. Unknown gems like Mount & Blade, Evil Islands and Restricted Area have to rub shoulders with utter pieces of shit like Metalheart, and nowhere is this more true than within the RPGmaker community.
RPGmaker is an easy to use software that allows you to craft your own JRPGs in the style of Chrono Trigger or Final Fantasy. Understandably, a large number of wapanese Final Fantasy Faggots flood the game dev community, churning out Final Fantasy 7, Naruto and Pokemon ripoffs. These games make up about 95% of RPGmaker projects and all look and play like shit. The remaining 5% is what redeems the entire community, and Exit Fate is perhaps the best of that 5%.

Exit Fate is set on your average everyday Fantasy World At War, where the latest war between the ancient enemy nations of Kirgard and The Zelmony State Union is just about to start. You play the role of Daniel Vinyard, a Kirgard army colonel and pacifist, Daniel opposes the war and only fights out of obligation to his friends. This makes him unpopular in the army, and he is soon set up as a traitor, having to flee for his life from his former allies. Daniel now has to embark on an epic quest to clear his name, discover who set him up and restore peace between the two pointlessly warring nations.
EF1.jpg


Exit Fate is very much inspired by Suikoden. You start out initially with only a small party, but can during the game recruit up to 75! additional characters spread out across the huge gameworld, six of which can be in your active team at once. This allows for an almost infinite number of different parties you can potentially create. Many of the characers are funny and most are well-written beyond a free indie RPG, including a feminazi mercenary, a cockney zombie, a hilariously gothick female enchanter, a snobbish talking cat, an alcoholic ninja master, a lawyer, a gangster, a mad scientist, a McDojo artist, a Bruce Lee clone etc. Characters also like or dislike other characters, making it possible to form buddy teams that give each other stat bonuses or putting archenemies together for stat penalties.

Battles are also inspired by Suikoden, with the 6 party system making terms like "formation", "tanks" and "support characters" actually meaningful. What sets the combat engine apart from most RPGs is the magic system. Individual spells are bought or found and can then be cast by all characters and each character starts out with only a few MP but gains some every turn, amount depending on their magic ability. This adds to some nice strategic thinking - should I cast a cheap spell now or wait a few turns for my MP to build up so I can cast a bigger spell? Should I spend MP healing my tank or hope he survives another round and cast fireball instead?
Fights are therefore nice and tactical and generally not too hard, which I like.
EF2.jpg

The best part about the battle system is that there's very little grinding involved. Both money and XP is reasonably plentiful, so unless you want to powergame beyond what is really needed, you don't really HAVE to grind. And best of all, if you bring a low-level character along with your high-level group, he levels to about 5 levels below you in one battle due to a nifty XP scaling system. My lvl 1 recruit thus leveled to 25 in one, easy battle, making new characters actually useful and minimising grind.

As it's a JRPG, our old friend Random Encounters make an appearance, only in Exit Fate you don't actually have to fight a single one of them. Every time you hit a random encounter, you get the opportunity to pay 1/4th of the money that encounter would yield and get away without fighting. A great idea that should be implemented in more RPGs as random encounters really break the flow of JRPGs.

As the story takes place during a war, there are also some Final Fantasy Tactics-y large battles. They're very well done, considering the engine, but ultimately not my cup of tea. Might be yours.
EF3.jpg


All important characters have a handdrawn full-size portrait and well-written personalities, adding tons of depth to the story.

And the story is fucking LONG. I finished this after playing for a couple weeks, it took me a total of 35 hours to finish. It's also pretty good - while starting out simple, there are more twists in the plot than in a pile of garden hoses, it's well written and features a lot of hidden content. You gotta be really obsessed to find all 75 hidden characters.

Only major complaint: All music has been blatantly ripped from other console RPGs like Suikoden, Chrono Trigger, Xenogears and so on. While the Chrono Trigger victory theme is nice to listen to after beating a difficult boss, you get REALLY fucking tired of hearing Frog's theme every time you return to your home base for a cutscene. Could have been more creative here.

Overall, Exit Fate is the cream of the crop of FREE indie RPGs and can easily match most commercial console RPG titles as far as gameplay and story
are concerned. I highly recommend it to anyone who likes late nineties JRPGs, beautiful hand-drawn portrats and don't want too harsh a challenge.

Download it here: http://site.scfworks.com/?page_id=3
 

MisterStone

Arcane
Joined
Apr 1, 2006
Messages
9,422
Pretty slick review there. Not sure this particular is really my cup of tea, but feel free to do more of these reviews!
 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
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Jan 4, 2007
Messages
33,048
Location
KA.DINGIR.RA.KI
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Looks good, but somehow I just can't stomach the typical Jap RPG combat where your heroes just stand on one spot and you only have a small selection of options, and there's always some lengthy attack animation.

And before anyone says BUT BLOB COMBAT IS THE SAME, at least there I don't have to watch any animations and also you usually have more options (especially concerning spells).

I also don't like how most Jap RPGs don't have any to-hit-chances but every strike is a hit and you always do the same amount of damage. Boring.
 

Murk

Arcane
Joined
Jan 17, 2008
Messages
13,459
Looking over the screenshots I could tell it was heavily influenced by Suikoden... in no small part cuz the first screenshot's graphics seemed to be directly taken from Suikoden 2, then i saw the war screenshot.

anyway, I guess I'll give it a try and see.
 

zeitgeist

Magister
Joined
Aug 12, 2010
Messages
1,444
Given that there are 75 characters, can you at some point ditch the Sephiroth-with-a-mullet protagonist and completely customize your party or is he (and possibly other characters?) a forced party member?
 

Murk

Arcane
Joined
Jan 17, 2008
Messages
13,459
If he's the main character, you won't be able to ditch him. And assuming the battle system is like suikoden's as well, then you won't have to wait for everyone to attack on their own - basic attacks will happen simultaneously.
 

anus_pounder

Arcane
Joined
Mar 20, 2010
Messages
5,972
Location
Yiffing in Hell
zeitgeist said:
Given that there are 75 characters, can you at some point ditch the Sephiroth-with-a-mullet protagonist and completely customize your party or is he (and possibly other characters?) a forced party member?

This, though I'm certain the answer is no. :x
 

roll-a-die

Magister
Joined
Sep 27, 2009
Messages
3,131
Barkley Shut Up and Jam Gaiden is another of the good ones, if only for the lulz.
 

oscar

Arcane
Joined
Aug 30, 2008
Messages
8,036
Location
NZ
Pretty enjoyable. Not that I've played many jrpg's but it seems fairly low on grinding and has decent writing. Lovely sprites.
 

Nex

Cipher
Joined
Apr 26, 2009
Messages
1,343
Location
Tenebrae
Played it last year. Was good for what it is. Better than many games that you actually pay for.
 

Murk

Arcane
Joined
Jan 17, 2008
Messages
13,459
roll-a-die said:
Barkley Shut Up and Jam Gaiden is another of the good ones, if only for the lulz.

The battle system is actually pretty enjoyable, and despite the "lulz" of the game, the writing (dialog) is really good.
 
Joined
May 31, 2010
Messages
143
I just can't get into a game with ripped graphics, unless it's heavily modified so I can't recognize the source at all. I know the whole "it's just like a sample in music" speech but I still see it as a bad thing, and I don't get how anyone could find the motivation to write a full game around stolen art. Look up "Off", it's an Rpg Maker game with custom graphics and music, ugly as fuck but at least it's 100% original. It's also very weird, in a Suda51 kind of way.
 

Zed

Codex Staff
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Staff Member
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Oct 21, 2002
Messages
17,068
Codex USB, 2014
"console-style" more like japanese bullshit
 

Lumpy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 11, 2005
Messages
8,525
Hi guys, I ran out of Exit Fate unlock codes, could you give me some please?
 

betamin

Learned
Joined
Mar 28, 2009
Messages
626
The lack of grinding seems heaven but the lack of difficulty is a turn off. Is the story/writing worth it?
 

hanssolo

Educated
Joined
Apr 28, 2010
Messages
863
wow how about get some original content?
just another rpg maker shit for the rpg maker shit pile.
 

Eyeball

Arcane
Joined
Sep 3, 2010
Messages
2,541
betamin said:
The lack of grinding seems heaven but the lack of difficulty is a turn off. Is the story/writing worth it?
if you like many plot twists and a lack of superpowered demons, gods or dark warlords as the primary antagonists in favour of betrayal and political intrigue between warring nations, then yes, it is very worth it.

Oh, and not a lot of teenage angst either. This is not a JRPG, it just looks and plays like one.
 

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