Retro Strategy Guides

>>3759369
I have a lot of the Official Nintendo Power Guides starting from N64 era on. You always got one for resubbing for years so that's mainly why. I'm finishing up my NP magazine collection and then I'll start trying to own every NP guide.

I agree, Brady always has a lot of typos and misinformation, but some of their mid-2000s guides were better than Prima's.

I'll buy them if I already have the game and they are cheap. I rarely use them though and seem to find them after I already finish the game. The strategy guides from the 90s are great for nostalgia trips too.

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I like old japanese guides. Don't have much of a collection yet but I'm thinking about getting more this year.

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>>3759369
This is the worst FFVII guide ever
I'm pretty sure they based it off of the Jap version because the terms and item names don't match the localization at all and it's extremely confusing.

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>>3759369
I love 'em. I have quite a few.

Versus Books was, indisputably the greatest publisher of strategy guides. They were as in-depth as you could get without actually spoiling anything and only touching on the important things you needed to know to not miss anything. They always had great page layouts and high-quality printings of official art, which you usually couldn't get anywhere else (which was actually one of the biggest reasons I bought strategy guides back in the day, before art books were a thing). Also, posters.

They also did hand-drawn maps of EVERY area for most guides, especially Zelda. They were always organized well and had straightforward appendices for collectibles and items. They were wicked funny sometimes, too. They were written very casually and always had jokes and anecdotes about the game, or things that happened to them while they were working on the guide.

These guys making a guide always seemed so cozy to me. Imagine a few friends, holed up in an apartment, playing an advance copy of a game around the clock to discover everything. On second thought, it might also be miserable. Still.

Pic related is my favorite. I found it on the checkout rack at Stop & Shop just after I got the game for Christmas. I still use it to help round up heart pieces and skulltulas when I play the original or the remake.

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>>3759675
Also their FFVII guide is based. Absolutely zero plot discussion (and an amusing anecdote about that in the foreward). Some great official art that I have never seen anywhere else, too.

I still want to know what happened "that fateful night at Popeye's" detailed in the special thanks section. I asked Casey Loe on his Twitter, but no response.

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I have a bunch of RPG guides, but I'll admit that none of them are very good. They all either completely miss things, have bad layouts, or are made up of vague and shitty hints.

The Pokémon Red guide I have is actually pretty good, but is missing all the item finder items and doesn't really cover Pokémon stats. The Final Fantasy guides I have are all wholly incomplete, and the FFIX Playonline bullshit was probably the worst idea I've ever seen in a strategy guide, especially at a time where people still had dial up and gamefaqs existed. (Pic related.)

>>3759681
I remember the Brady guide didn't even have anything about how damage worked for the characters ultimate weapons.
Imagine my shock to find out that vincent's weapon didn't suck, I just needed more death blows or whatever.
Man that Brady guide sucked.

>>3759675
>Versus Books
No joke, their Alpha 2 guide taught me how to do Zangief's 360 and 720 moves. Which I still had it around. Whatever happened to Slasher Quan anyway?

>>3759369

I love strategy guides. I picked up the Starcraft strategy guide at a garage sale for a dime when I was a kid and read that thing front to back at least a dozen times. I had it for over a year before I finally managed to get the actual game. I recently completed my collection by getting the Brood War strategy guide and the map making guide. You can find these fuckers anywhere, I swear every damn used bookstore I've ever been in has a Starcraft strategy guide. Hell, last week I saw a Starcraft strategy guide in a used home improvement store.

I looked into buying an OoT strategy guide because that is another one I loved as a kid but they are pretty expensive.

Can anyone comment on the price of Japanese guides compared to English guides?

>>3759838
It was good for the card game at the ABSOLUTE FUCKING MINIMUM

I have a huge collection of retro guides. I used to buy them for like every game I got even though I never used them as guides, I just wanted something with all the character art in it.

Imagine my joy when I discovered art books were a thing the whole time.

>>3760467
Brady and Prima are both pretty shitty. I never understood why many of the legitimately good strategy guide publishers went under, but those two are still in business.

Anyone know a decent site to pick up some of the versus guides?

>>3760671
I think like coolroms had pdfs of them.

>>3759681
That guide was so fucking good. I lost mine years ago. Still bums me out sometimes.

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The versus guide to Phantasy Star Online was amazing. The whole back section was devoted to the entire history of the Phantasy Star Franschise and decked out in so much art for those games. Whoever wrote that guide was a huge PS fan and it showed.

>>3760997

I think there's a pdf of it on nicoblog, i know it's not as good as a physical copy but it's something.