|
 What is Front Mission? Front Mission is a near-future mecha themed strategy role-playing game for the Nintendo DS. It focuses on build customization and medium-scale turn-based combat between teams of wanzers (The in-game name for mecha). The game is also known for its focus on a "realistic" story set in a future earth in which super-states vie for domination of the globe, and shadowy organizations develop new weapons using morally questionable means. Front Mission was developed originally by Toshiro Tsuchida and the team at G-CRAFT, a small developer that was responsible for the Front Mission and Arc the Lad SRPG series before being purchased and integrated into Square in 1997. Development on Front Mission began in 1994 and the game was published by Square in 1995. The Front Mission series was conceived of as a grand project by Tsuchida and his colleagues from the start, with a series story plan being devised that was largely realized in six games: Front Mission 1-5, and Front Mission Alternative. The series story was also told in manga and short novels. Front Mission laid the ground work for the series, and because of its central role in the series it was revisited and added to twice over the years. The first additions to the game were made in Front Mission 1st, a game on the Sony PlayStation that was released in 2003 in conjunction with Front Mission 4. Front Mission 1st added an entirely new campaign featuring the perspective of a member of the opposing USN side of the Second Huffman Conflict. This new campaign added new details to the story of Front Mission, and also filled in linkages between Front Mission and Front Mission 4. Like the original Front Mission on SNES, Front Mission 1st never saw a release outside Japan. Front Mission for the Nintendo DS (Also called Front Mission 1st in Japan) was the second remake of the game, and was released in 2007, two years after the final numbered entry in the series Front Mission 5. It was the first time that Front Mission was officially localized for overseas markets (There was a fan translation of the SNES version released in 2001). The DS version of the game added nine secret missions and various other minor plot points that tied it to the other games in the series. It also features UI optimizations for the DS, and various weapons and parts from other Front Mission games. The DS version can therefore be considered the definitive version of Front Mission, which is why I will be playing it for this LP. How does this game compare to the others in the series? Front Mission is, with a few exceptional levels, a fairly easy game. It is much easier than the truly epic Front Mission 2, and considerably easier than Front Mission 5. It is maybe roughly around the same level of difficulty as Front Mission 3. Being the first entry in the series, *Front Mission* has some rough edges to its game systems, but like Final Fantasy Tactics it is a game that is fun to break. Being fairly forgiving, it is a good game to get into the series with. Unlike Front Mission 5, FM1 has no link system, so the tactical considerations in this game are in many ways simpler. It does however have some battles with more units on larger maps, so maneuvering around the map is often tactically important. Consumables also really shine in this game, and we will see them put to good use. Who are you? I was the lead translator on the Front Mission Fan Translation Project, and you can find my complete video LP of Front Mission 5: Scars of the War here at the LP Archive. What's the concept for this LP? My intention is to follow up on my FM5 LP in terms of thoroughness and bring a more complete picture of the Front Mission universe to western viewers. The first Chapter of FM5 takes place during the events of Front Mission, which itself contains two concurrent campaigns. Therefore in addition to playing through the two Front Mission campaigns in chronological order, I will provide hyperlinks to episodes of my Front Mission 5 LP that happen before, during, or after the episodes of this LP, as well as hyperlinks between the OCU and USN campaigns of this game. Once this is done, we will have a complete chronology of the events of the Second Huffman Conflict, spanning both Front Mission and Front Mission 5. Where possible, I will also provide links to the "wanzer roundup" episodes of my FM5 LP, that go into detail about the wanzer models that appear in that game. There is a considerable amount of overlap in wanzer models between FM1 and FM5, but some models in FM1 do not appear in FM5, so they will unfortunately be left out. I feel like I'm missing a lot not knowing the rich lore of Front Mission universe. What are all these factions, what is the state of the world? Here is a very rough world map of the game world:  The USN is in fact a union of North and South America. At the time the series was first created there was some talk of moving towards such a union, and it reached its zenith during the Clinton years before the whole thing fell apart and was forgotten. As we will see later in the game, the USN is very much a union of unequals, and the USA maintains a basically colonial relationship towards South America. If you want to learn more about it check out FM4. The OCU is a union of Australia, Southeast Asia, Japan, and Korea. Again, there has been from time to time talk of forming some kind of umbrella organization like this (deliberately excluding China) but nothing much has come of it in reality. It also never has really been about independence from the US in the way that the EU was in the time of its formation. And talk about them going to war with the USA has never even remotely been on the table. The EC is basically just the EU. All the big super states are facing separatist struggles. The EC also has a rough relationship with Africa because of the colonial exploitation they tried to maintain there, as covered in Front Mission Alternative (Chronologically the first game in the series). The USN more or less muddles through things, but the OCU is in a state of near constant crisis. The apex of their power was when they defeated the USN in the First Huffman Conflict, but ever since then they have had to deal with separatism, corruption, infighting among members, and generally poor organization. This gets covered quite a lot in Front Mission 2 and to some extent in Front Mission 3. The OCU is dominated by Japan and Australia, and their colonial hinterland in SE Asia is very rebellious. The only organization they have that really is strong and unified is the Central Intelligence Service of the Union (CISU). In this way I think of them as somewhat similar to Pakistan, which has a similarly powerful intelligence agency and a similarly weak government. The EC has troubles not only with Africa, but also with Zaftra (Russia) as well. This gets covered in FM4. For more information, check out the Wikipedia entry, which was largely written by leader of the fan translation project. Episodes: Introduction 2089 Episode 01 - Tutorial/Royd 0 Episode 02 - Kevin 1 Episode 03 - Kevin 1 Redux Episode 04 - Kevin Event 1 Episode 05 - Kevin 2 2090 March FM5 Tutorial/Walter 0 May Episode 06 - Kevin Event 2 Episode 07 - Kevin 3 June Episode 08 - Kevin 4 Episode 09 - Royd 1 Walter Event 1 Episode 10 - Kevin Event 3 Episode 11 - Kevin Secret Mission 1 Walter Mission 1 Episode 12 - Kevin 5 Episode 13 - Kevin 6 Episode 14 - Kevin 7 Episode 15 - Kevin 8 Episode 15.1 - Addendum Episode 16 - Kevin 9 Walter Event 2 Walter Mission 2 Episode 17 - Kevin Event 4 Walter Event 3 Walter Event 4 Episode 18 - Kevin Secret Mission 2 Episode 19 - Kevin Secret Mission 3 Episode 19.1 - Addendum 2 Episode 20 - Kevin 10 Walter Event 5 Episode 21 - Kevin Event 5 2091 June Episode 22 - Royd 2 Episode 23 - Royd 3 Episode 24 - Royd 4 July Episode 25 - Kevin 11 Episode 26 - Royd 5 Episode 27 - Royd 5 Redux Episode 28 - Kevin Event 6 Walter Mission 3 Walter Event 6 Episode 29 - Royd Event 1 Episode 30 - Royd 6 Episode 31 - Royd Secret Mission 1 Episode 32 - Kevin 12 Episode 33 - Kevin 13 August Episode 34 - Kevin Event 7 Episode 35 - Royd 7 Episode 36 - Kevin 14 Walter Mission 4 Episode 37 - Kevin Event 8 Episode 38 - Royd 8 Episode 39 - Royd Secret Mission 2 Episode 40 - Royd 9 Episode 41 - Royd 10 Episode 42 - Kevin 15 Episode 43 - Kevin 16 Episode 44 - Kevin Secret Mission 4 Episode 45 - Royd 11 Episode 46 - Royd 12 Episode 47 - Kevin 17 MaterialConceptual fucked around with this message at 13:39 on Feb 16, 2017 |
#
?
May 25, 2016 15:11
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 2, 2024 07:22 |
|
|
That cover is AMAZING
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 15:33
|
|
|
JcDent posted:That cover is AMAZING Yoshitaka Amano does "gritty" military simulation and this is what you end up with 
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 15:39
|
|
|
Go OCU! Australian Pride!
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2016 16:52
|
|
|
Onmi posted:Go OCU! Australian Pride! We will see the Canyon Crows kick some rear end for sure! Anyhow, here are the first two episodes! Be sure to check the OP for the timeline. Episode 01 - Tutorial/Royd 0 Episode 02 - Kevin 1
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2016 15:58
|
|
|
Time to take down that mobile weapon...here's the next episode! Episode 03 - Kevin 1 Redux
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2016 15:43
|
|
|
I remember having this game and starting both campaigns. I beat the original back on an SNES emulator, but I can't remember why I didn't finish Kevin's campaign when I picked this version.
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2016 17:38
|
|
|
Lotish posted:I remember having this game and starting both campaigns. I beat the original back on an SNES emulator, but I can't remember why I didn't finish Kevin's campaign when I picked this version. There is one particular mission you might have got stuck on somewhere in the middle of the campaign. The difficulty curve in this game is very uneven so it might have been frustrating.
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2016 17:54
|
|
|
We get some important character development in this next episode! Episode 04 - Kevin Event 1
|
|
#
?
May 28, 2016 14:04
|
|
|
I think I tried playing this once but got a bit overwhelmed by the number of units I had to control in one of the early missions. Anyway, main character called Kevin, eh? Crazy Achmed fucked around with this message at 14:17 on May 30, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 30, 2016 13:23
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:I think I tried playing this once but got a bit overwhelmed by the number of units I had to control in one of the early missions. Just be glad that you didn't play FM2, that game has insane numbers of units on the field. It goes beyond a "tactics" game on to the level of a proper strategy game. Here's the next mission, another tough one! Episode 05 - Kevin 2 MaterialConceptual fucked around with this message at 16:22 on May 31, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 31, 2016 16:16
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:Anyway, main character called Kevin, eh? No, see, Kevin is his callsign. Which means back in basic he was probably like "call me Maverick" or "Call me Ace" until someone shouted at him "Hey, Kevin, shut up about callsigns!" and boom. Callsign is "Kevin."
|
|
#
?
May 31, 2016 16:20
|
|
|
From what I understand, that happens pretty frequently in the forces.
|
|
#
?
May 31, 2016 16:32
|
|
|
Oh man, I wish there was a updated/new version of FMO, that poo poo looked pretty rad! Also RIP those USN dudes in the trailer. 
|
|
#
?
May 31, 2016 16:58
|
|
|
Koorisch posted:Oh man, I wish there was a updated/new version of FMO, that poo poo looked pretty rad! Front MIssion Evolved was originally supposed to be that, but it was totally botched due to terrible mismanagement. The closest thing we got was Armored Core V, which had a lot of former Front Mission devs on it and borrowed many concepts from FMO. Unfortunately that game has its fair share of flaws too.
|
|
#
?
Jun 1, 2016 01:10
|
|
|
MaterialConceptual posted:There is one particular mission you might have got stuck on somewhere in the middle of the campaign. The difficulty curve in this game is very uneven so it might have been frustrating. Kevin's is the inverse of that: it generally follows the original's overall curve but it throws challenges first and then access to tools that would have made those challenges easier. Both campaign's difficulty peters out at the end game once your characters have crazy skill levels.
|
|
#
?
Jun 1, 2016 06:38
|
|
|
EponymousMrYar posted:The original campaign has a decent and natural difficulty curve where it gives you access to tools and then gives you incremental challenges based on those tools until it gives you access to better ones. My memory of the OCU campaign is that it has a fairly gentle downward sloping difficulty curve, and the USN campaign is quite easy with 2 hard missions at the start and one in the middle. We'll have to see how that plays out this time.
|
|
#
?
Jun 1, 2016 17:06
|
|
|
And here are a few more episodes! This takes us up to the start of the OCU campaign, so I'll be starting that next! Episode 06 - Kevin Event 2 Episode 07 - Kevin 3 Episode 08 - Kevin 4
|
|
#
?
Jun 4, 2016 18:05
|
|
|
That's a bit of a schzophrenic difficulty curve we're seeing there. Unless you go heavy on missiles, you lose a random body part every time you attack, and if you roll a hit to Kevin's body it's game over  Having only played FM3 and a bit of 4, how similar are the weapons and associated game mechanics? The handheld grenade launcher with infinite ammo looks interesting, but I hope that giant robot knuckledusters are in this game as well, they're probably the most iconic weapon of the series to me. And one thing I forgot to ask in the FM5 thread (I think, anyway, my memory's rubbish), how much are the different wanzers intended for different roles stat-wise? Like, in FM3 most wanzers fell into one of three categories: terrible movement/HP but high power and accuracy, great for missile launchers; high HP/light weight/awesome movement/mediocre accuracy melee mechs; and mid-movement, mid power, slightly fragile but great accuracy upgrades (machine gunners/snipers). There were a few oddballs that deviated from this but the vast majority followed this pattern. Is FM1 like this or was this one of the many simplifications they made? This flurry of questions comes off the back of seeing those Pheasant parts, the only drawback seems to be that their weight stat was higher, which means lower melee damage (I think).
|
|
#
?
Jun 5, 2016 13:59
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:That's a bit of a schzophrenic difficulty curve we're seeing there. Unless you go heavy on missiles, you lose a random body part every time you attack, and if you roll a hit to Kevin's body it's game over The weapon selection in this game is fairly limited. As I said before rifles count as short range weapons in this game, and other weapon classes are more limited too. The only melee weapons are rods. There was a LOT added to the series in Front Mission 2. While there are some tradeoffs in FM1 between HP/Power/Weight/Accuracy, probably more than in other entries in the game you switch wanzers more frequently and price is a significant tradeoff. You get wanzers like the Pheasant where the only real tradeoff is price. This is significant because in the OCU campaign you get a lot more units than you do in FM3 or 4. Speaking of which, here's the first mission of the OCU campaign! Episode 09 - Royd 1
|
|
#
?
Jun 10, 2016 17:16
|
|
|
Huzzah, I started playing this in my free time and hopefully this will give me a few hints on what to do myself.
|
|
#
?
Jun 10, 2016 18:15
|
|
|
Onmi posted:Huzzah, I started playing this in my free time and hopefully this will give me a few hints on what to do myself. Cool, I hope it does! Here's our next episode! Plenty of important plot stuff on the move this time as the Second Huffman Conflict gets kicked off! Episode 10 - Kevin Event 3
|
|
#
?
Jun 12, 2016 15:19
|
|
|
Here's our next mission, with hopefully some more to come tomorrow. Episode 11 - Kevin Secret Mission 1
|
|
#
?
Jun 17, 2016 17:18
|
|
|
Unfortunately, OBS screwed me on this recording session and the game audio track was not recorded.  I'm really sorry about this but I don't have the time to re-record 4 episodes, so I'm going to publish these as-is. Maybe try playing some good VGM alongside the LP? Episode 12 - Kevin 5 Episode 13 - Kevin 6 Episode 14 - Kevin 7 Episode 15 - Kevin 8
|
|
#
?
Jun 18, 2016 17:13
|
|
|
Thank you. Bummer about the game audio, but it's way better to lose that than your commentary track. Here's a soundtrack suggestion for anyone else in a retro mood: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRSyELsRGl8 Crazy Achmed fucked around with this message at 07:20 on Jun 19, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jun 19, 2016 06:49
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:Thank you. Haha I remember that sorceress painting from one of the AD&D 2nd Ed. sourcebooks.
|
|
#
?
Jun 19, 2016 08:08
|
|
|
I've never played a Front Mission game but it looks interesting. Are all of the games in the series done player phase/enemy phase? Or are there games where each unit has its own wait time, like FFT?
|
|
#
?
Jun 20, 2016 03:05
|
|
|
They're all pretty traditionally turn-based with the exception of the terrible, terrible foray into 3rd person action that was front mission evolved. 2 (I think), 4 and 5 do some interesting stuff with letting units who have already finished their turns spend their extra leftover AP by helping attack the target of a teammate if they're both in range and assigned to the same squad or something. So the flamethrower is a big single-shot short range weapon now? Is there much that distinguishes it from a rifle? Juicy bit of intrigue you got there from the aftermath of that secret mission, weren't you suspiciously close to that factory that got blown up when you intercepted the chopper? I like the future politics and stuff from this series, but if I remember what you told us in the FM5 LP then we're in for a depressing ride. War stories, I guess, aren't something you can expect to be fun and games - but I always find that strangely at odds with how nobody in this series really seems to be worried about two global superpowers going to war. Or seems to understand that being a career soldier in this kind of environment might mean that you're at risk of, you know, actually dying. Or realising that the people you're shooting at with your giant robot machine gun might also actually die. But maybe the naievete is deliberate so they can play up the loss of it for dramatic effect?
|
|
#
?
Jun 20, 2016 13:19
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:They're all pretty traditionally turn-based with the exception of the terrible, terrible foray into 3rd person action that was front mission evolved. 2 (I think), 4 and 5 do some interesting stuff with letting units who have already finished their turns spend their extra leftover AP by helping attack the target of a teammate if they're both in range and assigned to the same squad or something. I don't think there's anything that really distinguishes the flamethrower from the rifle, it's just a flavour thing. This is a very very basic game, but that's part of its charm. You can mostly just breeze through it once you get past some of the speed bumps. As for the story, yeah it is not a cheery one, especially when you take into account what happens in FM2. I think the reason why the characters seem kind of calm about the war is that they grew up in the shadow of the First Huffman Conflict and constant border tensions between the two powers. It's the sort of thing that everyone expected to happen but just didn't know when.
|
|
#
?
Jun 21, 2016 15:12
|
|
|
Sorry for the lack of posting lately, but I have been busy, and trying to psych myself up to do this mission because it's the hardest one in the game! Episode 16 - Kevin 9
|
|
#
?
Jun 28, 2016 18:36
|
|
|
And we've got another couple videos to watch, this time with an epic duel with the Hell's Wall! Episode 17 - Kevin Event 4 Walter Event 3 Walter Event 4 Episode 18 - Kevin Secret Mission 2
|
|
#
?
Jun 30, 2016 16:22
|
|
|
A short fix to episode 15, and then we've got a very challenging secret mission! Episode 15.1 - Addendum Episode 19 - Kevin Secret Mission 3
|
|
#
?
Jul 2, 2016 15:27
|
|
|
This game seems to have an unkind difficulty curve.
|
|
#
?
Jul 2, 2016 20:55
|
|
|
SIGSEGV posted:This game seems to have an unkind difficulty curve. That's mostly because Kevin's scenario is the Hard campaign of this game, you're supposed to know what you're doing by this point compared to the other one. That said, holy poo poo, a Frost HW AND a K.O.N.G? 
|
|
#
?
Jul 2, 2016 21:32
|
|
|
That explains things. Overall, I'm pretty glad that my introduction to this series was FME, it makes everything else a refreshing step up from the video game equivalent of a B-movie.
|
|
#
?
Jul 2, 2016 21:42
|
|
|
SIGSEGV posted:That explains things. Yeah, there's nowhere to go but up! As for the difficulty, yeah we're in the hard mode right now. Normally I would do the OCU campaign first, but instead I'm doing this crazy chronological thing!
|
|
#
?
Jul 3, 2016 05:29
|
|
|
This wraps up the first leg of the USN campaign! After this we'll be leaving Kevin for a while and going on to start the OCU campaign for real. Episode 19.1 - Addendum 2 Episode 20 - Kevin 10 Walter Event 5 Episode 21 - Kevin Event 5 MaterialConceptual fucked around with this message at 15:24 on Jul 6, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2016 15:17
|
|
|
Still catching up on videos here due to being out of town for work, but those missile enemies are assholes, not just because of the relentless ranged attacks, but rather that their base punch damage is ridiculous, leaving you screwed no matter how you choose to deal with them.
|
|
#
?
Jul 8, 2016 08:22
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:Still catching up on videos here due to being out of town for work, but those missile enemies are assholes, not just because of the relentless ranged attacks, but rather that their base punch damage is ridiculous, leaving you screwed no matter how you choose to deal with them. Yeah "hard blow" in this game is surprisingly viable. In the end they're still dead though 
|
|
#
?
Jul 8, 2016 14:59
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 2, 2024 07:22 |
|
|
And I'm back with the start of the OCU campaign. The Canyon Crows are finally assembled and seeing some action! Episode 22 - Royd 2 Episode 23 - Royd 3 Episode 24 - Royd 4
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2016 15:28
|
|