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Rance Series

Jaedar

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Later sequels make references to them, though. In fact, if you skip them, you'll be left wondering at the start of 5D about where the fuck Rance is and what he's doing there, things that are explained in 4.1 and 4.2. If you want a continuous story, you cannot skip them.
Can not confirm. As I recall 5D just starts with Rance doing a random adventure ("random adventure that leads into big things" is a common start in the rance series), and IV ends with Rance landing back on the continent, safe and sound.
Crucially, for me at least, Kichikuou Rance plays perfectly fine after Rance III
Dude. III ends with rance being reduced to level 0 and dumped in a mysterious place with no idea where he is. It's the most "To be continued" ending in the entire series.
Sengoku's UI is massively better, which is what I meant by Kichikuou's age showing.
Every time I try kichikuou, I bounce off because it just feels like worse sengoku.
Operation Bird is ofc significant
Damn, now I feel like I'm missing something because I haven't played 4.1 or 4.2. But I really don't know if I have it in me to survive more IV gameplay.
It's also where Rance bags Copandon, IIRC, which is a crucial character in later games.
5D. No worries, I assume you just repressed all memory of that game ^ ^
Copandon is kind of a random nobody in 5D though, she doesn't become important until VI. She's also kinda pathetic in 5D, I liked her more before I played it.
 

Lucumo

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Sengoku's UI is massively better, which is what I meant by Kichikuou's age showing.
I wouldn't say massively better but definitely better...which, well, isn't surprising considering that Kichikuou came out in 1996.
 

thesecret1

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Can not confirm. As I recall 5D just starts with Rance doing a random adventure ("random adventure that leads into big things" is a common start in the rance series), and IV ends with Rance landing back on the continent, safe and sound.
That's my point. 5D does not start with a "random adventure". Said adventure is the focus of 4.1 and 4.2, with 4.2 ending directly tying into the start of 5D. I guess their events aren't terribly important, but you do meet some new characters there that reappear later, and Operation Pervert Bird is downright amazing.

Damn, now I feel like I'm missing something because I haven't played 4.1 or 4.2. But I really don't know if I have it in me to survive more IV gameplay.
They're quite short, at least.
 

Jaedar

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That's my point. 5D does not start with a "random adventure". Said adventure is the focus of 4.1 and 4.2, with 4.2 ending directly tying into the start of 5D. I guess their events aren't terribly important, but you do meet some new characters there that reappear later, and Operation Pervert Bird is downright amazing.
As I recall 5D starts with Rance and Sill adventuring in the woods with an unstated goal, at which point they stumble onto the trap dimension, and escaping from that takes up the rest of the game. Am I forgetting something important or is it just something you would always miss if you haven't played 4.1 and 4.2 ?
 

thesecret1

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As I recall 5D starts with Rance and Sill adventuring in the woods with an unstated goal
Don't they start off in a maze of tunnels? It's been ages since I've played 5D, apologies.

Am I forgetting something important or is it just something you would always miss if you haven't played 4.1 and 4.2 ?
Just the characters and some cool events from them, no specific event that'd be too important
 

Longes

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Can not confirm. As I recall 5D just starts with Rance doing a random adventure ("random adventure that leads into big things" is a common start in the rance series), and IV ends with Rance landing back on the continent, safe and sound.
That's my point. 5D does not start with a "random adventure". Said adventure is the focus of 4.1 and 4.2, with 4.2 ending directly tying into the start of 5D. I guess their events aren't terribly important, but you do meet some new characters there that reappear later, and Operation Pervert Bird is downright amazing.
4.1 and 4.2 are great and I recommend playing them, but they have nothing to do with 5D. 5D does indeed start with Rance and Sill lost in a cave.

4.1 and 4.2 have some absolute banger lines.
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egDz4f5.png
 

La vie sexuelle

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Isn't Rance a spinoff of Little Princess/Vampire not the other way around?

From Rance wiki:

Little Vampire is an adventure-style visual novel (ADV) published in Japan by AliceSoft's predecessor company, Champion Soft, in 1988. The game was later included as a bonus on the PC-98 release of Rance IV. Little Vampire is the direct sequel to Little Princess, and continues the adventures of Kurusu Miki and Ogawa Kentarou after their escape from Dracula's Castle. The events of the game would later be retconned into the timeline of the Rance series, with Dracula developing into the Demon King Gi, and the game's central antagonist, Ramon C. Burksham becoming one of the earliest-appearing Dark Lords.

Unlike the game's predecessor, Little Vampire is an all-ages title, one of the only such titles in the Rance series.

Characters from this game appear in Party Game Hopper alongside characters from Chotto Meitantei and Gakuen Senki.

Little Vampire was the first game released to make use of the System platform. The game was later ported to DOS as a 16-bit application by WAO, who remembered it as both "very memorable" and "very difficult." The DOS port was eventually developed through fan efforts to be playable on modern-day Windows systems. It was given an English translation in early 2020.
 

Jaedar

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Current translation status:
Rance X – Showdown
Translation: 72% – Editing: 5%
The translator says he's aiming to finish within a few months https://retrospring.net/@SteinerTL/a/111736432977203572 but considering how far behind the editing is lagging there's no reason to think it will release this year. Or even 2025 honestly.

Rance 03
Translation: 65% – Editing: 41%
Seems that they're actually pushing to get this done, but I'd still be surprised if it comes out this year.
 

Lord of Riva

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Current translation status:
Rance X – Showdown
Translation: 72% – Editing: 5%
The translator says he's aiming to finish within a few months https://retrospring.net/@SteinerTL/a/111736432977203572 but considering how far behind the editing is lagging there's no reason to think it will release this year. Or even 2025 honestly.

Rance 03
Translation: 65% – Editing: 41%
Seems that they're actually pushing to get this done, but I'd still be surprised if it comes out this year.
The shitty manga gamer site has payment processor problems on my end (doesn't accept my card), is there an alternative? Apart from :Piracy_is_wrong: of course, I would rather support the series.

I'm looking forward to actually playing them from 01 to X I have only played 5D, 6, 7 and Kichikuou and stopped playing the rest after hearing about the remakes, never told me it would take fucking ages.
 

Lucumo

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Yikes, imagine paying for Mangagamer "translations". Not to mention the utter disdain for the people that buy their stuff.

Also, series is done. Alicesoft is done. If you want to support mobage maker Alicesoft, buy the digital Japanese (DRMed) version or import a physical copy.
 

Jaedar

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The shitty manga gamer site has payment processor problems on my end (doesn't accept my card), is there an alternative? Apart from :Piracy_is_wrong: of course, I would rather support the series.
Gog sells most/all of the titles by this point I think? Although I think not in all countries.

Yikes, imagine paying for Mangagamer "translations". Not to mention the utter disdain for the people that buy their stuff.
Imagine believing there will be translations of stuff if no one pays. According to https://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sr1tu4 most MG stuff sells only a few thousand copies, so each individual sale kinda matters here, this isn't EA sitting around making 10s of millions.

If you don't buy the games, you kinda lose all rights to complain about slow release schedules (I didn't see you do this, but there may be others reading).
 

Lord of Riva

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The shitty manga gamer site has payment processor problems on my end (doesn't accept my card), is there an alternative? Apart from :Piracy_is_wrong: of course, I would rather support the series.
Gog sells most/all of the titles by this point I think? Although I think not in all countries.

Yikes, imagine paying for Mangagamer "translations". Not to mention the utter disdain for the people that buy their stuff.
Imagine believing there will be translations of stuff if no one pays. According to https://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sr1tu4 most MG stuff sells only a few thousand copies, so each individual sale kinda matters here, this isn't EA sitting around making 10s of millions.

If you don't buy the games, you kinda lose all rights to complain about slow release schedules (I didn't see you do this, but there may be others reading).
I'm from germany, I was not aware that Rance is on GoG and quickly checked, of course it's not available here, only real women can behave like disgusting whores at any time any day, any second. As soon as something is drawn is child abuse.

The shitty manga gamer site has payment processor problems on my end (doesn't accept my card), is there an alternative? Apart from :Piracy_is_wrong: of course, I would rather support the series.
https://jastusa.com/search?search=rance

Thanks, I will check if that works :salute:
 

Sigourn

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I'm looking forward to actually playing them from 01 to X I have only played 5D, 6, 7 and Kichikuou and stopped playing the rest after hearing about the remakes, never told me it would take fucking ages.
The only remake still untranslated is Rance 03. I've been playing Rance III myself and I have to say it is very playable. The combat is a bit braindead, 80% of the time there's no reason not to resort to Auto Battle, but apart from that the story is very fleshed out. All in all I think it is very much worth playing it, since the remake is a very different beast.

So far I've spotted very very few mistakes in the translation, all regarding editing (e.g. "bro" being used to refer to companions when they heal you, in spite of all companions being girls instead of men (and consdering who speaks this line, it makes more sense for the dialogue to read "darling"). This is really the only mistake that genuinely bothers me.
 

Lord of Riva

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I'm looking forward to actually playing them from 01 to X I have only played 5D, 6, 7 and Kichikuou and stopped playing the rest after hearing about the remakes, never told me it would take fucking ages.
The only remake still untranslated is Rance 03. I've been playing Rance III myself and I have to say it is very playable. The combat is a bit braindead, 80% of the time there's no reason not to resort to Auto Battle, but apart from that the story is very fleshed out. All in all I think it is very much worth playing it, since the remake is a very different beast.

So far I've spotted very very few mistakes in the translation, all regarding editing (e.g. "bro" being used to refer to companions when they heal you, in spite of all companions being girls instead of men (and consdering who speaks this line, it makes more sense for the dialogue to read "darling"). This is really the only mistake that genuinely bothers me.
I was unprecise, I am also waiting for the finale to finish.
 

Lucumo

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Yikes, imagine paying for Mangagamer "translations". Not to mention the utter disdain for the people that buy their stuff.
Imagine believing there will be translations of stuff if no one pays. According to https://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sr1tu4 most MG stuff sells only a few thousand copies, so each individual sale kinda matters here, this isn't EA sitting around making 10s of millions.

If you don't buy the games, you kinda lose all rights to complain about slow release schedules (I didn't see you do this, but there may be others reading).
Like I said, Mangagamer is utter garbage. The sooner they go out of business the better.

Hm? Oh, I don't care about the English translations. I also own all the games physically (in Japanese).

I'm from germany, I was not aware that Rance is on GoG and quickly checked, of course it's not available here, only real women can behave like disgusting whores at any time any day, any second. As soon as something is drawn is child abuse.
Not to mention the rabid approval of it not being available by the few creatures left in the German section of the forum.
 

Lord of Riva

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Not to mention the rabid approval of it not being available by the few creatures left in the German section of the forum.

Absolutely, Germans are completely captured by feminist Ideas, and this hate against sexuality in media is incredibly common. Everything remotely showing sexuality is problematic unless, of course, it's women itself.
 

Sigourn

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Finished Rance III.

My short review on the game, compared to the first two I played (whose remakes came after this one):
  • Fucking sweet storyline. It's nothing mindblowing, but when you contrast a simple "find a missing girl" story with a "save the princess of a kingdom and wage war against an army" story you can see how much AliceSoft raised the stakes.
  • Returning characters make this game so good, it really pays to play the first two games before this one. Incidentally, I will definitely play the original versions of 01 and 02 in the future.
  • Top notch art compared to that of I and II, judging from images on the Internet. Overall the franchise, up to this point, has seen a steady incline in graphical quality. Unfortunately, it appears AliceSoft took a turn for the worse ever since Rance 5D.
  • Sex scenes are rather short, which again, I view as a positive. There's also some level of interactivity, though not present in every H scene, with ultimately no genuine results.
  • A colorful cast of enemies is always welcomed. I can already see a few characters making a reappearance in future games.
  • Party-based combat! I hesitate to call it tactical because there's no tactics involved in this game; you can Auto Battle your way through 95% of the battles.
  • The humor is stronger than ever, I had quite a few laughs out of this game. Rance is simply a charming asshole, he is so full of it you can't help but cheer for him.
  • On the downside, there's the aforementioned lackluster combat, which thankfully goes far quicker than Rance 02's does.
  • There's also plenty of backtracking involved, but fortunately all battles (except forced encounters) can be escaped from.
  • Not on the game itself, but users of the English fan translation will have to deal with an annoying visual glitch that pops up very rarely throughout the game regarding the dialogue window with certain characters, which unfortunately becomes more common at the end of the game. Nothing game breaking, however. All dialogue is translated, and I only found a few hiccups in the translation (I can't vouch for its authenticity, however).
  • Overall, I give it :3.5/5:
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GIVE.ME.MORE.RANCE.
 

Vic

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how do people not get burned out playing the same shit

I've bean reading Higurashi and had to take a long break after 4 chapters which took me 58 hours total
 

Lord of Riva

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how do people not get burned out playing the same shit

I've bean reading Higurashi and had to take a long break after 4 chapters which took me 58 hours total

When you start learning to rad this is quite exhausting but you will reach a point when you enjoy reading more than it's exhausting. Then you will realize that it's actually fun, don't stop you are on the right path, go boy, go!




...




Rance is pretty innovative when it comes to gameplay, they are shaking things up considerably between the games (not that I have played all of them, as said) the rest is just a setting, a setting that can become quite complex and interesting at times, betraying that it's a rape-fantasy Eroge.
 

Maxie

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how do people not get burned out playing the same shit

I've bean reading Higurashi and had to take a long break after 4 chapters which took me 58 hours total
then play games instead of reading tedious visual novels
 

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