Fiend Hunter?

[VenomMacbeth]

Any good?  Also, is any Japanese required?

[esteban]

Any good?  Also, is any Japanese required?

I didn't get too far in it, IIRC. I don't think I had fully figured out the basics—like, for example, the platforming! (what abilities/moves were at my disposal?)

I keep saying I'll tackle it one day, but a decade has passed...

ASIDE: Bonknuts ripped some chiptunes (PSG) from Fiend Hunter, but I can't seem to find them at the moment.

[HailingTheThings]

From what I've seen, this game looks fun. Had my eye on it for a little while. Also wondered the same as Mr. Macbeth.

[PunkicCyborg]

I like it! Great anime art and cutscenes and very unique game play. You have to kill like 45 mini bosses or fiends. You get a gem after every boss which you can use either for health or powering up. Interesting thing though is you can save at any point in the game. So basically you end up saving before a fiend and try o beat them with the least amount of damage possible. If you use up all the gems for health you will be too weak. If you use all the gems for powering up your health can get so low that you cant beat a fiend and will get stuck.
It's hard in a way because you can get stuck halfway through and have to start over and it's a several hour game.

[geise]

It's kind of like Flashback in terms of gameplay but is way better to me.  It really isn't that hard to figure out.  The graphics are quite nice and I had fun with it.  Well worth the price since it is so cheap.

[PunkicCyborg]

The price for that game is so weird. Most people dont know anything about it. You see copies for $80 but then it'll sell for pretty much nothing in an auction. I got mine for $2 on ebay in an auction a couple years ago with spine 

[EmperorIng]

I'm bumping the topic on the occasion of picking up the game for myself.

Pros: Fighting all the demons is very fun, as each feels like a unique encounter, though fighting can often devolve into a mashing affair.

Mehs: Thus far (15 fiends in) the platforming is not bad, but not stellar

Cons: Boring, unskippable cutscenes. Blah blah blah, sheesh. I think you could go out to dinner at a fancy restaurant while the opening cutscene/town segment plays out. It's scandalous that you can't speed up all that spoken dialog. I like the two henchmen fiends though.

Thus far, I'm digging it. It's not an exceptional release, but it has enough charm to have me see it through till the end. I love how many different tunes it has for fiend fights; it keeps things feeling fresh.

[esteban]

I'm bumping the topic on the occasion of picking up the game for myself.

Pros: Fighting all the demons is very fun, as each feels like a unique encounter, though fighting can often devolve into a mashing affair.

Mehs: Thus far (15 fiends in) the platforming is not bad, but not stellar

Cons: Boring, unskippable cutscenes. Blah blah blah, sheesh. I think you could go out to dinner at a fancy restaurant while the opening cutscene/town segment plays out. It's scandalous that you can't speed up all that spoken dialog. I like the two henchmen fiends though.

Thus far, I'm digging it. It's not an exceptional release, but it has enough charm to have me see it through till the end. I love how many different tunes it has for fiend fights; it keeps things feeling fresh.

Write up a beginner's FAQ/Guide! Even if just a simple post here...

This is a game that rarely gets any notice. I would make a page for it.

[VenomMacbeth]

I'm bumping the topic on the occasion of picking up the game for myself.

Pros: Fighting all the demons is very fun, as each feels like a unique encounter, though fighting can often devolve into a mashing affair.

Mehs: Thus far (15 fiends in) the platforming is not bad, but not stellar

Cons: Boring, unskippable cutscenes. Blah blah blah, sheesh. I think you could go out to dinner at a fancy restaurant while the opening cutscene/town segment plays out. It's scandalous that you can't speed up all that spoken dialog. I like the two henchmen fiends though.

Thus far, I'm digging it. It's not an exceptional release, but it has enough charm to have me see it through till the end. I love how many different tunes it has for fiend fights; it keeps things feeling fresh.

Write up a beginner's FAQ/Guide! Even if just a simple post here...

This is a game that rarely gets any notice. I would make a page for it.

Seconded!  I want this game, and I'll probably get it since it's cheap, but a little guide would be helpful!

[EmperorIng]

Playing through it a bit more (over half the 45 fiends are dead).

As for the beginning, it is essentially what nullity said. You hear a lot of boring talking, go to the shop, go to the hotel in the upstairs room and hear a reeeeeeally long conversation, and after another long and boring conversation (all unskippable), you buy some things from the shop (it doesn't seem to matter what).

I will have to revise some of my initial impressions as I play more. I am starting to like the platforming a bit more, because the fighting is starting to get into a very drawn-out affair. There doesn't seem to be much rhyme or reason between enemy blocking, and they seem to chain into their attacks randomly, elongating the fight. This is especially so given your character's snail pace in the battle mode. The enemy designs and music are good, and sometimes in the fight you get into the zone, but it is hampered by the deficiencies of the game's own engine and having only two buttons to work with.

While the platforming is not stellar, it's a serviceable take on the Flashback/Prince of Persia "weighty" platformers. Figuring out the "puzzle" of the room you are in can be satisfying, though it is very easy to die and you end up saving after every major obstacle - especially since you don't know when a fiend could pop out, force you into a fight where you die.

I have upped the stats on my Psycho Arrow and Spark, but cannot seem to use them. Has anyone gotten them to work, or should I just stick to my sword?

The one unforgivable thing this game excels at is ultra long redbook audio "cutscenes." Not the cool animated kind, but a textbox with a character portrait, with audio saying what the text is saying. As far as I can tell, you cannot skip these. I met some old lady 20 fiends in who proceeded to talk... slowly... for... fifteen... whole... minutes. This is simply unacceptable trash. I shouldn't be so bored with a game that I end up leaving, making myself lunch, and browse the internet in the time it dumps its lame exposition onto me.

[Necromancer]

Fifteen minutes?!?  That's ridiculously long for an unskippable event, even if it was really well drawn/animated/voiced/etc.

[A Black Falcon]

I have Fiend Hunter, got it for very cheap last year I think it was.  It seems like a decent game for its style.  The problem is, I'm not really a fan of the subgenre --it's a Prince of Persia-style game, and I've never cared too much for PoP or any of the games in the genre, not Flashback, Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee, Blackthorne, or what have you.  Somehow I've just never wanted to actually stick with any of these kinds of games and try to get good at them, I'd rather play other kinds of platformers like Mario, Sonic, Bonk, etc. instead.

As for the cutscenes, yeah, they are annoyingly long.  Maybe the cutscenes would be a little less annoying if I could understand what they're saying, but as it is they definitely drag on too long.  I wish you could skip them.  (Remember to save if you can after watching a long cutscene so you don't need to rewatch it if you die...)

[csgx1]

Cut scenes and the dialogue can be turned on/off in the title configuration screen or in the in-game menu (paper icon).  It's unfortunate that you can't simply hit run to skip them. 

I have upped the stats on my Psycho Arrow and Spark, but cannot seem to use them. Has anyone gotten them to work, or should I just stick to my sword?

I figured out the Psycho Arrow about midway through the game.  It doesn't seem very useful since it's slow to pull off and usually misses the enemy.  I think there was one fiend I was able to spam it to death with the Psycho Arrow. 

First, do a back flip by holding down (or down/back) and hitting jump.  Immediately after, hit the attack button and Feed will throw an arrow. 

As for the Spark, I haven't figured that one out yet. 

[EmperorIng]

Thanks for the info. I was not sure what the Config options did.

I like the cinema cutscenes; i wish those would stay and not the talking scenes. The game is clearly too in love with its derivative anime plot, but this is a charge leveled at probably 90% of all CD games.

 I will also ignore the other weapon choices; good to know they're shit!

[EmperorIng]

Finally beat the game. The final 15 or so fiends, not counting the final boss, went down quickly with a full-powered sword. However, as this highlights the lackluster combat in the game, in many fights I just pushed the boss into the corner the screen and mashed the attack button until they were dead. My favorite fights were where I didn't even have to move because it meant I had to do less to end the fight as quickly as possible.

The final area, this big spooky castle (in the middle of the wild west???) had one extremely frustrating segment that I considered giving up on - moving platforms that no matter what were out of your reach. I saw a longplay on youtube where the player somehow tanked falling from an impossible height and revived immediately afterward. Since I didn't know how to trigger that, I died over and over again. Eventually, I learned how to get through by what I can't tell is intentional or a glitchy exploit:

Using your fiend, Exy, and placing him underneath the moving platform right before it is about to change directions forces it, somehow, to collide against Exy and change its intended path. That way, by tediously switching back and forth between Exy you can glitch-move the platform into a safe jumping distance. You will need to do this again to push the platform down in order to land on the ground without killing yourself. Either I completely misunderstood the puzzle or it's just a final f*ck you from the devs. Best of all is that you can't save on this segment, meaning it's all or nothing.

The final fight is not very climactic if the boss hugs the corner of the screen, half-visible, for a majority of the fight. Then again, a fight with a stupid-looking worm with a giant cartoon mouth is probably not going to be climactic no matter how you slice it. At least there's a happy ending for those two comic-relief goons at the end.

Props to the game for letting me sit through a pregnant 60 seconds of this riveting dialog box while a VA gurgles his water bottle in the background:


Well that's the end of Fiend Hunter. It has an ok Jpop credits song (and hilarious sequel hook to a game that could have never sold well enough to warrant it) and it's telling to note that like, 3 people programmed the game. The platforming is... ok I guess, the fighting overstays its welcome by around fiend #8 / 41, and the story is dumb.

I don't think I have ever given less of a shit about a game's story on the Turbo before. Hell, Lepus's journey to save hisloved ones in Rabio Lepus felt more endearing because at least I could see that that little rabbit went through some f*cked up shit. Hell the Valis series has a more emotionally-engaging plot, maybe because all of its cutscenes are ~1 minute or less.

Expect to see this one in the sales forum or ebay shortly  O:)