Game Finished In 2024 #16:
I miss Flash, man. The Wild West of the internet was defined in a huge chunk by this one programming language. Back before there were three websites, Flash allowed for creatives in games and animation to make things and share them easily in a way that isn't really the same today. Perhaps the tools for those creatives, like Godot, are better now, but something got lost after Adobe killed Flash in 2020, for stupid dumb idiot corporate reasons. I still have Flash installed. I get a notification every couple weeks asking me to uninstall it and every time I tell the notification to go fuck itself. But anyway.
The raw creative potential of Flash led to a veritable boom in independent art on sites like Newgrounds. As we've seen with success stories like Smiling Friends, the talent on these sites was very real, and converted to the mainstream seamlessly. While it wasn't all GOOD, with some pretty tasteless edginess at times, art born from the Flash boom has a certain unfiltered energy to it. These are the things the creator wanted to make, uncompromised. The Epic Battle Fantasy series is one of my favorite examples of this. The first three games were things I appreciated a lot even when I was younger, and I felt the need while tackling some shorter games to give this one the full playthrough it deserved.
The Epic Battle Fantasy series is characterized by a couple of things. The distinctive art style with excellent hand drawn animations, the tonal focus on comedy and references, the horniness, and the simple but effective RPG battles. These combine to create a package of pure Soul, if you will, with the full knowledge that everything in here is because of unbridled author appeal. Despite this, it somehow avoids the regular trappings of overindulgence. The series is fairly approachable for any RPG fan, and the independent spirit of it all makes the appeal evident.
EBF4 continues the overworld from 3, and expands the systems a fair bit, with the addition of a fourth party member, Anna. I didn't find the solution to juggling four party members as elegant as I would have hoped, with only three party slots meaning Matt usually caught the bench as i liked Lance and Natalie more, in both gameplay and character. Summons are now given their own meter which greatly expands your options. The core gameplay loop from 3, with battles, upgrades, and exploration remains much the same, with the addition of progression-based items allowing you to find new things when backtracking to previous areas. When the systems are this innately satisfying, it makes for a very fun experience.
It's not all perfect, as I did encounter a bit of fatigue with the battles. I felt like I was missing something and it made them drag significantly more than it seemed like they should. Combined with a longer runtime than 3, and I felt like I was dragging a fair bit near the end. This was compounded by me overestimating how much game I had left, which is on me, but once I realized I was in the second to last area, and turned on the assist mode option to make elemental weaknesses more pronounced, I got to the end pretty handily. The final boss is a bit of a stat wall, sadly, and I had to turn down the difficulty to get through it because I really didn't want to deal with adjusting my build to retry it. Skill issue, perhaps, but at that point I didn't really care.
I greatly anticipate getting to 5 at some point, and I greatly appreciate finally making the time to get around to this installment in a series I enjoy a lot. While the series holds nostalgic value to me, it's evident that the merits this series stood on were genuine.
I miss Flash, man. The Wild West of the internet was defined in a huge chunk by this one programming language. Back before there were three websites, Flash allowed for creatives in games and animation to make things and share them easily in a way that isn't really the same today. Perhaps the tools for those creatives, like Godot, are better now, but something got lost after Adobe killed Flash in 2020, for stupid dumb idiot corporate reasons. I still have Flash installed. I get a notification every couple weeks asking me to uninstall it and every time I tell the notification to go fuck itself. But anyway.
The raw creative potential of Flash led to a veritable boom in independent art on sites like Newgrounds. As we've seen with success stories like Smiling Friends, the talent on these sites was very real, and converted to the mainstream seamlessly. While it wasn't all GOOD, with some pretty tasteless edginess at times, art born from the Flash boom has a certain unfiltered energy to it. These are the things the creator wanted to make, uncompromised. The Epic Battle Fantasy series is one of my favorite examples of this. The first three games were things I appreciated a lot even when I was younger, and I felt the need while tackling some shorter games to give this one the full playthrough it deserved.
The Epic Battle Fantasy series is characterized by a couple of things. The distinctive art style with excellent hand drawn animations, the tonal focus on comedy and references, the horniness, and the simple but effective RPG battles. These combine to create a package of pure Soul, if you will, with the full knowledge that everything in here is because of unbridled author appeal. Despite this, it somehow avoids the regular trappings of overindulgence. The series is fairly approachable for any RPG fan, and the independent spirit of it all makes the appeal evident.
EBF4 continues the overworld from 3, and expands the systems a fair bit, with the addition of a fourth party member, Anna. I didn't find the solution to juggling four party members as elegant as I would have hoped, with only three party slots meaning Matt usually caught the bench as i liked Lance and Natalie more, in both gameplay and character. Summons are now given their own meter which greatly expands your options. The core gameplay loop from 3, with battles, upgrades, and exploration remains much the same, with the addition of progression-based items allowing you to find new things when backtracking to previous areas. When the systems are this innately satisfying, it makes for a very fun experience.
It's not all perfect, as I did encounter a bit of fatigue with the battles. I felt like I was missing something and it made them drag significantly more than it seemed like they should. Combined with a longer runtime than 3, and I felt like I was dragging a fair bit near the end. This was compounded by me overestimating how much game I had left, which is on me, but once I realized I was in the second to last area, and turned on the assist mode option to make elemental weaknesses more pronounced, I got to the end pretty handily. The final boss is a bit of a stat wall, sadly, and I had to turn down the difficulty to get through it because I really didn't want to deal with adjusting my build to retry it. Skill issue, perhaps, but at that point I didn't really care.
I greatly anticipate getting to 5 at some point, and I greatly appreciate finally making the time to get around to this installment in a series I enjoy a lot. While the series holds nostalgic value to me, it's evident that the merits this series stood on were genuine.
el unico jrpg bueno
first rpg I really got into, love this franchise
So apparently this games getting a mobile port + pc update that adds some more qol and makes the game run a lot better so i think im going to wait for that to come out because the insane slowdown was really turning me off
A further development and improvement on EBF3's systems. A fun RPG to pick up and play whenever you're idle, but still with a pretty deep battle system.
I wonder if Matt can make bad games
peak turn based combat
decided not to listen to myself and played this before the patch. slowdown was horrible but the game was so good it didnt matter. highly recommended, especially if you have the patience to wait.
this games combat is so fucking good but i will not lie only being able to use 3/4 characters made me not want to use lance at all. matt is the invaluable meat shield and natz is insane magic damage + versatility. that just leaves anna and lance and lance joined too late for me to really consider utilizing him. these games are legit my main steal of this sale and im glad i finally have the time and patience to play and appreciate these. idk if ill play 5 next, i'll probably wait until im done with other games.
decided not to listen to myself and played this before the patch. slowdown was horrible but the game was so good it didnt matter. highly recommended, especially if you have the patience to wait.
this games combat is so fucking good but i will not lie only being able to use 3/4 characters made me not want to use lance at all. matt is the invaluable meat shield and natz is insane magic damage + versatility. that just leaves anna and lance and lance joined too late for me to really consider utilizing him. these games are legit my main steal of this sale and im glad i finally have the time and patience to play and appreciate these. idk if ill play 5 next, i'll probably wait until im done with other games.