Now. Now. I know I'm like the only one who prolly played this. =P
Whatever, though. =) What do you think went wrong with game? Not the series, but jus' this one title. Graphics. It's perfect. We all know this. The battle and characters we're pretty smooth. Was it because the gene system was no long about? Or was it because Capcom released the title too fast for people to notice it?

Failed short somehow. I can't really say. The challenge and some parts was really interesting. Characters were okay. Some were pointless though. I think the main character--- NOT Ryu. Fou-Lou was pretty much the reason I continued to play the game.

Whelp, how about you allz?

Hmmm, this one really did come in unders the radar so to speak didn't it. I think I found out about it just by chance one day when I was looking for something to buy and play. As for the game itself...it seemed...kinda rushed in parts to me. I hated not having full control over my dragon forms like in 3 plus there weren't even a lot of dragon forms to get like in 1 and 2. I think there were only like 5 or 6 right? Anyway, it really fell through at the end in my opinion. The whole ending levels were kinda lame and didn't inspire me to go beat the snot outta Fou. Besides, I'm kinda like you dude, I just continued playin for Fou. He kicked so much ass and he was so cool. Ryu was good but...eah. I'm still a fan of the first 3.

You're joking right? Did you honestly just walk onto a Breath of Fire board and expect to be the only member of the community that played #4? >_>


Actually, not a whole lot. I had a great time with the game and the only complaints I have are minor, such as most of the towns being a tad bit too small and there not being enough visually variety in Ryu's transformations. Everything else I remember was either really cool or not a big problem.

Too soon? What? Do you mean too soon after BoF3? I hope not, cause that's far from true; 4 was released 2 and 1/2 years after 3 (BoF3 - April 1998 , BoF4 - Nov 2000).

I didn't notice anything that felt underdeveloped. IN fact, things like the Fairy Village and Master Syster actually worked *better* than they did in BoF3.

Booooo.

It was fun. I don't think it fell too short in any places. Then again, I might not be comparing to the other games.

Are you?

Yesh I agree With Loomis. It didn't miss anything at all. I love everything about BOF4. Including Fou-lu, Kaiser,Tyrant, Infini Dragon.

The only issue I had with the game would probably be the gene system being not the same one with BoF 3. Although I do find it as a minor issue actually seeing that this is BoF 4 and I was kind of hoping it would be even better than its predecessor. But other than that, I had a great time with the game. ^^

I've enjoyed what I've played of the game (Cray friggin' rulez!), but I do have a few minor gripes about the game, mainly dealing with the camera and the buildings being too tall and smashed together so you can't see yourself on the town map. But that's about it really. Like you said Val, grapically it's amazing and the combat system is a lot smoother (III's battles sometimes got to be too long for me), and Fou-Lou pwns everyone.

But I don't think that they released it too fast or anything like that. To me, it's always seemed that BoF has been a niche series that hasn't gotten a lot of fanfare from Capcom alongside there other series (Megaman, Street Fighter, Resident Evil, etc etc etc). It's a shame though, because they are wonderful games (except for V... I really didn't like what they did with that one, but I won't go there now).

-Ben

I just have to say that if Breath of Fire IV is a game that fell short on the series, then I have to play the other three right away.

Other than Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter, part IV is the only other Breath of Fire game that I have played in this series, and personally, I found it to be one my favorite games that was on the PS1. I do agree that there were a few problems the game had, one being the camara view, and another, which is a big one, being a lack of character development for some people. Ershin is really the only character of the heros that had great depth involved. That isn't to say that the other characters had none, but they sure could of been better.

But even though the game had some flaws, I thought the pros made up for it. The storyline is the big one, I personally loved it. Not only was this an RPG where you were seeing the struggle of the heros, but you were seeing the struggle of the character Fou Lou, the person who ended up being the enemy, and who is peronally, my favorite villain I've ever seen in an RPG. Even though any player could probably guess Fou Lou was going to be your last boss and all, the game did a good job on showing why he became that. And finding out what happened to Nina's sister has to be one my favorite twists I've ever seen in an game, it was pretty unexpected, sick and depressing.

As far as the gameplay goes, it had a pretty good battle system. Anyone could understand how to play, but yet it was still a bit tougher then just an average RPG. Bosses were usually a bit tough to a degree, heck, the last boss had to be one of the hardest ones I faced in almost any RPG. And if anyone wanted to level up it would take a bit of time to do so.

The musical score was another thing that I thought was great in the game. Just about any tune that played in the game was something I would find myself enjoying.

Another plus about this game was how they did the final dungeon, I thought it was pretty unique.

I could probably go on and on about why I loved this game as much as I did. Like I said earlier, if this is a game that fans found to 'fall short' compared to the past BoF games, then I am really missing something.

I thought it was completely lacking as far as character development goes, and the storyline was pretty weak as well. I put about 20 some hours into this one before calling it quits and giving it back to my friends, it was as much of a let down as the third one was.

Come to think of it, the whole series suffers the same problem... Lack of good characters, development, and plot. I love the graphics in the series, the traditional battles, and the oldschool RPG feel... They just need to work on putting together a better game.

I wouldn't say this was the worst though, I think I enjoyed it more than the third simply due to cooler looking characters.

Nah, I think the only problem with BOF4 Is Ryu nv speak much...
That the Problem, because i really liked the sound effect of Ryu when he Fights, Oh an Ryu need to let down his hair more often, remember the scene when Kaiser Appeared and Ryu's Hairband let lose and Ryu Become Long Hair, i really liked that part.

The other thing is that, i dun get the games inside fairyworld, the one on the music thingys where u have to catch the drum beat game.

The rest is alright.

I was jokin'. See the '=p'? Thank you. =)



Oh, boy..

As in released, I meant was it wasn't noticed by the public.. BoF4 was released then and I'm saying many people may or may not have notice it. I've never stated it as a fact or anything. See my topic title? "What went wrong?" as in many questions.



Nope. But as a "Breath of Fire" title. I didn't like it as much as the others. =)
People tend not to read others post and then assume crap.

Oh, well. Expected here. =)

I do have to agree that BoF IV was rushed in certain places. After the incident at the hidden village, where Ryu went insane, the game seemed to lose some of it's push. Only Fou-Lu's journey had any real drive.

Still, I enjoyed #4. I, personally liked the idea of having only a few dragon transformations. I thought the gene system in Breath of Fire 3 was innovative, but at times it became something of a pain to find the combo which would preserve the most AP, which Ryu had a slight shortage in, if you kept him a front-line fighter.

Bof IV wasn't colorful like the first 3. IV looks like it took place on a faded pair of jeans. Secondly, the extreme lackage of a world map was depressing. BoF was a series about going out and exploring. With a tactic game style map, it seemed to die there. No world to explore; just a map to move a chess peice around on.

Next, the plot was irritating and pointless. The storyline was excellent, but the plot was terrible: no matter what the characters set out to do, they failed. If they wanted to get to a town to save it before it blows up, by they time they'd get there, it'd blow up anyway. If they wanted to rescue someone, that someone will have died of starvation by the time the heroes reached them. It just made the plot goals feel "pointless" because nothing was really accomplished, other than fighting a bunch.

The battle system brought back the original Bof's system of all characters being useful and being able to swap them in, which to me is the biggest redeeming quality to this game and would inspire me to continue playing.

I played this game recently after my friend tried to play it... I'm almost through with the game, again after 40+ hours, and so far, I had fun with the game... Mind you, BoF 4 is the only one I played, I saw somebody play BoF 3 at a rental, but I didn't take much time to observe it...

I kinda like the Dragon Transformations, though there are only 6... But it's quite hard to upgrade them... I've only gotten Weyr & Knight (which is my personal favorite)...

The ability learning system is quite fine with me... They are wuite fun to find and also nice to use... Like "Transfer", I gave it to Ershin who recovers 20+ AP while in the back row, thus he is able to give 20 AP to whoever needs it... "Shadowwalk" for Ursula, hehehe, shooting all targets with this is great... "Fairy Charge" & "Fairy Attack", for good damage, given to Nina & Ryu...

The Fairy Village is a good way to waste some time... Building shops, hunting animals and playing games...

Mini games were not too hard and not too brain damaging... Of course, they're not my idea of "fun"...

And (probably) like anyone else, I like Fou-lu a lot... Yeah... Cool Sword... And ridiculously high level... Yeah, It'd be fun to use him as replacement for Ryu...

What I didn't like? Well, Ryu for one, what's with his clothes? Can't they find anything better than that white sleeveless shirt and plain old pants? And for his Dragon transformations, why is it that they all look the same? The least they could do was change color or add a few thingies on him, like claws or wings or whatnot... You can only actually see the "Dragon" when using breath attacks...

Fishing can be quite a drag, but of course I never liked fishing in any game I played... I hate the fact that the fishes actually like many kinds of lures, thus making it hard to choose a lure to use to catch a specific kind of fish... Like if I wanted to catch a Dorado (which I find hard to catch), I'd try to use a Minnow, but the other fishes in the water like it too, so I tend to take too long just to catch a fish I need to trade...

But then again, those were just minor rants of mine...

I thought BOFIV was awsome. This is pretty much differing opinions though. Sometimes you like a game and sometimes you don't that's all. If you didn't like the game though it may be because you had yourself all psyched up about it.
Never assume how good a game is or you may be disappointed in the end. That's one reason I did like it because I didn't get my hopes up. I just waited for it to come out and when it did I just liked it...a lot.

Shadow walker. As for fishing man you can try fishing in a specific spot. It's easy to a specific fish if you know where they hang around at. Ryu's clothing is actually just the basic Martial artisits uniform. He has the white sleeveless shirt, a sash, a nice pair of Kung Fu pants, and the cotton Kung Fu shoe. Easy to wear and fight in. That's just my opinion though since I am into that sort of stuff.

Not sure really... I could never get into it like I could with some of my favourite RPG's, like it's prequel.
The main problem I had is hard to describe; I found it to be tooo Jap in the world, story, music, everything. I guess to some that isn't even a bad thing, I don't get why I see it as a bad thing either. Maybe it's just that my expectations were too high after BoFIII.

Is it just me, or did BoFIII seem similar and at the same time different? =P

It's a good thing that trader practiced Kung fu. lol
I thought this game was brilliant. From the world map to the storyline. I would not go as from as saying it's the best game or even RPG ever, but In my opinion it's definitly up there. Probably the only reason this RPG got as many bad reviews as it did was because it was being directly compared to the other games, mostly BOF III. As far as I've seen anyone who was played it and hasn't played anyother Breath of Fire (except Dragon Quarter) thinks it's a good game.

I think so, too... I haven't played BoF III, and I don't think the game is bad... I guess, people who have played the earlier BoF's expected so much... I think I should try looking for a copy of BoF III (and good luck to me)...

The world map was fine indeed, and all those free items lying around comes in handy... I even pick up Ivory Dices once in a while...

What went wrong was the lack of general interest the title failed to develop. It was pretty boring most of the way through the game, all of the little quests people had you doing seemed pointless, and the only reason you continued to play was because Ryu's destined meeting with Fou-Lou.

True. However it was still additive. Playing through it. You. The player had to know more. I admit the countless stalling quests here and there was VERY annoying, but I still didn't give up. The game got much better in the middle and towards the end. Thing that kept this game from being thrown in the trash was the battle system. It was entertaining. =P