The RPG Duelling League
Social Forums => General Chat => Topic started by: Grefter on January 01, 2014, 12:01:22 PM
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FO:NV - More used to the engine, less frustrated. Having places unlocked for fast travel also helps immensely. Got to the Strip, took Black Widow so I could try and steal Maria off Benny after sleeping with him. None of this works. End up shooting it out of his hand running up and snatching it up and shooting him in the face with it.
Going for the ending where you end up ruling Vegas mostly because I really want to get that challenge of killing Mr House with a golf club.
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Brig:GE- Virtue of the Empire, yo. DisD2 looks neat as well, will have to play that at some point.
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FO:NV - More used to the engine, less frustrated. Having places unlocked for fast travel also helps immensely. Got to the Strip, took Black Widow so I could try and steal Maria off Benny after sleeping with him. None of this works. End up shooting it out of his hand running up and snatching it up and shooting him in the face with it.
Going for the ending where you end up ruling Vegas mostly because I really want to get that challenge of killing Mr House with a golf club.
That's what he gets for not laughing at the "chip outta luck" joke!
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Odo never laughed at jokes either. I don't know why you're surprised.
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Perfect World: New expansion where you go back to level 1 and start leveling again with more stats. New skills are nice. Pretty much given up on blademaster and only play mystic now.
Lots of free games on Xbox recently:
Ms Splosion Man: This is extremely unfun.
Aqua: Not bad.
Shoot Many Robots: Fun, will probably be playing this a bit.
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FONV: Based on the furniture arrangement in Dr. O's bathroom, I conclude that he does his best thinking while taking a shit. Lack of brainial power in robot form explained.
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Wonderful 101: I smashed a giant robot Dragon that was formed by a giant space warship with a large yellow hammer...repeatedly...
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Grefter, thanks I think. In the FFX stuff's case though it was more like I myself couldn't help but be taken in by a sense of horrid fascination at what was coming out while I was poking around about FFX/X-2 HD stuff~
Isn't Early Game Rose's whole thing being "I'm better than all of you at everything...except HP...and Shana's speed...DEAL WITH IT!" <_<?
Yeah :)
Feels more pronounced or something on the version I'm playing though since attack items aren't as effective so Shana doesn't have as much to do with her speed. At least offensively Rose has the edge and Shana isn't really competing any this time. I mean a Spark Net only did 28~ damage to Jiango >_> I used Dart/Lavitz/Shana in order to get Shana more up to date with levels/EXP like I've been doing whenever I've had the chance but this time it feels hard to justify that other than for I like her/might want to use her later and don't want her to fall terribly behind, like she might have done if I'd just used the more effective character all the time, I used Dart/Lavitz/Rose for Frugal 2 + minions though, due to levels gained from beating that Rose now has a new addition to work on, so yeah it feels hard to justify continuing to use Shana. It's not like she's been especially more effective as a healer yet either, items and/or Rose w/th Special + Astral Drain have been good stuffs so far~
Edit - Though maybe the fact I have no monies is a good reason to be/for using her for heals!~
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Fallout: New Vegas - Started this. Not quite sure what I'm doing. Made it to Primm though. Interface is indeed a little wonky and bothersome, but I was getting used to it.
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Fallout: New Vegas - Started this. Not quite sure what I'm doing. Made it to Primm though. Interface is indeed a little wonky and bothersome, but I was getting used to it.
If you're playing it right, what you're doing is GETTING REVENGE. On anyone who ever crosses you.
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Accidentally posted this in the old topic. :)
General thoughts on Phoenix Wright - Duel Destinies:
The first case is unusually weak for a PW game. I feel that due to their short nature, there is only so bad the first case can be, but this one isn't very good. Juniper is Maggey Byrde level pathetic(more on the bizareness of her a bit later) and it's not all that exciting or funny. Reminds me a bit of JFA's first case with a better and more stylish villain. Some interesting foreshadowing to the last case there too.
The second case is pretty good. I love the defendant and we get introduced to the hamtastic Fulbright and the interesting Simon Blackquill. These two alone make the case brighter than the first, and the whole unravelled mystery of what exactly happened on that day was fun. The antagonist is a bit weaker than case 1's but is still fine. Filch is ridiculous.
Case 3 is definitely the weak link of the game. Teenage drama plot dominates entirely too much of it and the killer to me was brutally obvious. I also disapprove of the Wild Armsesque beating over the head with the 'incorrect' legal philosophy. Juniper as the defendant AGAIN made me want to flip a table and they do a terrible job of making you believe or even attempting to reconcile the character in case 1 and the one in case 3. Uh okay. Robin and Klavier steal the show for the one case wonders, and Athena gets a notable amount of character development. Hugh is pretty stupid. I also think that the case is very unfunny.(spoilers for DLC within) The killer has that strange and unfortunate mixture of bad serious character, unfunny funny character, and a very weak opponent. Which is weird considering that he is a defense attorney. Good lord, man, you get owned in a testifying duel with a rapping animal trainer. Shame on you, buddy. He's probably my least favorite character in the game! Fulbright and Blackquill continue to be solid, though.
Case 4 is weird. I think it starts quite poorly, with excess amount of Solomon Starbuck, but ends pretty good. Reminds me of 3-4 a bit but less brutally snooze worthy and it has Yuri! Blackquill vs. Yuri is a sight to behold. Yuri is fantastic and takes Blackquill's hatred of liars to a new level. Aura is also introduced here, and she is pretty awesome. That family is fucked. In some ways it feels like case 4 and case 5 should be one case, but I am fine with it the way it is because it makes it less obvious that the stuff going on in the fourth case is a Big Deal.
Case 5 is a great end to the game. The case starts with ROBOT OVERLORD AURA being a supervillain which is hilarious. Simon ends up being a pretty damn sympathetic character and he and Athena don't have the weird animu rivalry I was dreading. Simon seems like he might have been a decent guy before Metis's death The case has lots of twists and turns and the big plot twist is fucking fantastic. One thing I really like about it is that it keeps you wondering what is going on and pretty much everyone in the case except Phoenix is involved in at least one of the murders in some way. I understand why they decided to make it two cases because the fifth case primarily focuses on Metis rather than Clay, although his death is still important.
I want to let out a big supervillain laugh every time i think about it. Bonus props for evil Phoenix as the final opponent. I think I will call the villain that from now on. <_< I loved the way that the mood matrix was used in that case. First there's Blackquill, who just lies you to you to make it more confused until he says something that you can catch him on lying. Then there's Evil Phoenix who first tries to jam the Moon Matrix, then has ALL THE EMOTIONS, and then tries to psych Athena out about the Mood Matrix stuff, which mostly addresses my concerns about it. I loved his constantly changing expressions and how he says “Whoops, I mean...” and starts displaying mass emotions. :)
DLC case is also fucking fantastic. Hilarious, very filled with suspense, good final adversary. Adorable. Is definitely the original trilogy 'case 3', which tend to be consistently strong cases. <3 I have a particular soft spot for Herman Crab and his silly penguin. The Dissin' of Phoenix Wright is my favorite testimony ever. <3)
Bonus points to the game for no spirit medium bullshit plot and lacking in Maya in general. Nice to have a female protag who isn't mentally challenged. Edgeworth cameo was 10/10, would play again. "This robot might be more human than you, Edgeworth!" Pearly cameo I can take or leave, she looks very silly but I have a soft spot for Pearly so those two offset. :)
Blackquill is like putting Godot and Klavier in a blender and getting a product that is better than either. Fulbright is the Gumshoe of the game but is less incompetent. I approve. The attorney team works great and is gasp like a real legal practice. In some ways Apollo feels like the Maya/Trucy/Kay of the game rather than Athena which I initially expected which makes me happy. He definitely seems to be on the sidelines for good parts of the game.
Aura, Yuri, and Tenma win the awards for the best single-case characters(if you count 4 and 5 as one case ;)) in the regular game, and the DLC adds Herman and Marlon, both which are awesome. :)
Cases are: 5 ~= DLC > 2 > 4 > 1 > 3
AAI > JFA > DD > AA > T&T> 1-5 can eat a dick yo for my series rankings.
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FONV: Did you hear that, Betsy? Richie Marcus likes BALLS.
Hit level 50 just before finishing OWB. Have maxed every skill but Melee and Unarmed. Gogo high intelligence, the only way to fly. I let Mobius keep his Mentats stash because seriously what do I need it for now? Took a bunch of movement-related perks I never had before, can stealth around at basically full normal speed and not be penalized for it. Also supposedly I can keep the Pip-Boy light on constantly without taking a hit to Sneak, but I'm not convinced this actually works as advertised.
Added to the arsenal for Lonesome Road: Mercy, Pew Pew, Gauss Rifle. One I never had the strength to use properly before, others old favorites. Weapons taking up a lot of inventory space, but I am resolute in my decision not to slow the final missions down by looting! Because seriously Cid you don't fucking need any more loot at this point, no put the weapon repair kit components down you've got like two hundred of them in storage.
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I also completed NSMB2 on my trip. It's definitely the lost inspired Mario game I've ever played besides LL (I try to avoid games which sound bad as a rule though) but it is fine. Romped through the game.
MK7 - Picked this up again since I was at home with only a 3DS. It's a great game with great track design and great choices for old tracks. Love it.
Kid Icarus Uprising - Started this. Controls are a little strange but the game is fun so far.
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FONV: Did you hear that, Betsy? Richie Marcus likes BALLS.
Hit level 50 just before finishing OWB. Have maxed every skill but Melee and Unarmed. Gogo high intelligence, the only way to fly. I let Mobius keep his Mentats stash because seriously what do I need it for now? Took a bunch of movement-related perks I never had before, can stealth around at basically full normal speed and not be penalized for it. Also supposedly I can keep the Pip-Boy light on constantly without taking a hit to Sneak, but I'm not convinced this actually works as advertised.
Added to the arsenal for Lonesome Road: Mercy, Pew Pew, Gauss Rifle. One I never had the strength to use properly before, others old favorites. Weapons taking up a lot of inventory space, but I am resolute in my decision not to slow the final missions down by looting! Because seriously Cid you don't fucking need any more loot at this point, no put the weapon repair kit components down you've got like two hundred of them in storage.
I am terrible about that, and the house mod I use doesn't help things.
http://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/37884/? (http://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/37884/?)
Yeah, a customizable bunker with mannequins and weapons displays and shelves you NEED to fill up with boxes of bullets because if you don't have all the spaces filled it looks uneven and like you didn't do a very good job of stockpiling for the apocalypse! And then what will your homies think when you invite them over?
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Wonderful 101:
This is all that needs to be said.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZ-Cg0LvPVg#t=1m15s)
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Goodbye Deponia - played through
It was less terrible than Chaos On Deponia. Not that that's difficult.
Thomas Was Alone - played through
Pretty enjoyable. I feel like it could have used a bit more closure.
Bravely Default - In Eternia again
[...] Meanwhile here I'm probably somewhere between 1/2 - 3/4 done with the game and three characters are still in the first jobs I've put them in, and the only reason that the fourth isn't is because the fourth is still a freelancer. [...] Laughably, freelancers have an inherent ability which causes their stats to raise by 1% for every mastered job the character has. Unless JP gains slam through the roof shortly, that is never going to matter.
So JP gains did essentially slam through the roof at that point. Furthermore, while I thought I had been allowing a lot of leeway for the game to expand its plot (regarding how much time I though there was left in the game to get JP in), it looks like it's expanded far more than that.
Still have to deal with the fact that you only get one slot for a separate class's skillset (even freelancers), and only five slots for support abilities. So even though it is actually feasible for characters to master a good deal of classes, they generally can't actually DO anything with them (unless you're willing to micromanage things). There's that bonus the freelancer gets as classes are mastered but if you do go freelancer you're stuck with the Miscellany skillset which is pretty useless.
My characters are currently partway through their fourth classes but only because I am finding it generally pleasant to grind outside Eternia City. Moreso the first time I was there than now, because at that point all the daytime enemies could be killed with two amped compounded bomb arms, which is very cheap to begin with but also all the daytime enemies can be killed with exactly two amped compounded bomb arms, so if that's all you use you get the sweeper bonuses for every battle and get even more money out of them.
Unfortunately, while most of the enemies currently operate the same way, there's been a new enemy added which can't be killed with exactly two amped compounded bomb arms so this doesn't work as well. Still works pretty nicely when it doesn't show up for a while!
(Also, anywhere you do need to go, for the main quest and for side quests, is marked on the map, so it's not like you ever need to find anything. I don't remember any points at which the characters didn't know where they needed to (directly) go next.)
It turns out you can actually turn the markers off. I'm not going to do that though, since as I said earlier the game doesn't let you do anything that it doesn't want you to do anyway (Although given the amount of things it seems to want me to do currently, maybe that's been relaxed by now...).
The plot has been edging closer and closer to reverse Golden Sun territory with confirmation that awakening all the Crystals is supposed to be a Bad Thing, for all that nothing apparently untoward happened the first time we did it (assuming you don't consider being sent back in time/to alternate timeline a bad thing). But there's still been no time devoted to explaining the actions that pretty much any of the enemies were taking in pursuit of this purpose. Personally, ever since Olivia didn't appear to know what a Cryst-Fairy was, I've suspected Airy, and some of the details in Vampire Castle make that look even more likely - but nothing has come of that yet. Maybe later.
Vampire Castle is awesome, plotwise, and the way the game locks it up is criminal. I ended up using a 1xDark Bane, 15xAmped Compounded Shadowflare combination on everything to get in (and I have no idea how anyone is supposed to guess that the monuments which looks like they're teleportation targets/waypoint stones/whatever are actually guarding the castle keystones). Then disabled encounters in the castle itself. (I don't know what encounters in the castle are actually like but I didn't care enough to find out after the previous). Unhappily the aforementioned combination isn't enough damage for the boss of that area. Unless you change the difficulty to Easy for that fight!
So currently, I'm pretty interested in seeing where things are going. But I'm also pretty apprehensive that most of the current sidequests available to me are going to turn out to be exactly the same as they were in the first cycle. I haven't done any of them yet, so I'll see whether that's the case when I see.
But in the meantime I've been distracted by the 'missing' Pokémon having become available in X/Y GTS and so on.
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FONV: Did you hear that, Betsy? Richie Marcus likes BALLS.
Hit level 50 just before finishing OWB. Have maxed every skill but Melee and Unarmed. Gogo high intelligence, the only way to fly. I let Mobius keep his Mentats stash because seriously what do I need it for now? Took a bunch of movement-related perks I never had before, can stealth around at basically full normal speed and not be penalized for it. Also supposedly I can keep the Pip-Boy light on constantly without taking a hit to Sneak, but I'm not convinced this actually works as advertised.
Added to the arsenal for Lonesome Road: Mercy, Pew Pew, Gauss Rifle. One I never had the strength to use properly before, others old favorites. Weapons taking up a lot of inventory space, but I am resolute in my decision not to slow the final missions down by looting! Because seriously Cid you don't fucking need any more loot at this point, no put the weapon repair kit components down you've got like two hundred of them in storage.
Hahaha you're 50 already? I need to stop putzing around and spending inordinate amounts of time just making ammo.
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Really, a personalized sand with mannequins and weaponry shows and racks you NEED to complete up with containers of principal points because if you don't have all the areas loaded it looks irregular and like you didn't do a very excellent job of stockpiling for the apocalypse! And then what will your homies think when you encourage them over?
Beautiful.
FO:NV - Realised game was on Very Easy for some reason. No cares given. oh noes not the terrible gunplay being missed out on.
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Paper Mario Sticker Star - Super Boot and Frog Suit stickers are -storebought-? WELP, there goes the game.
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Warcraft 3: Beat Reign of Chaos, started Frozen Throne. I am at a weird point where Normal difficulty is easy to the point of being boring for me, but Hard difficulty is just obnoxious. I played most of RoC on Normal because of this, though I'm trying to avoid that for Frozen Throne because I actually want to have fun playing the game instead of just maxing out while my units crush everything else. Writing is still ridiculous but yeah.
Immediately Frozen Throne feels like a better game game. RoC was kind of held back by withholding units from you until you get to the last chapter, then by that point you just want to mass that last unit and ranged units. SC2 did it too, but then gave you a slew of chapters where you have access to all of your units so it's not nearly as poorly done. Upkeep is also a stupid idea, and FT boosted upkeep thresholds. I guess it adds an element of "do I want fast upgrades or a large army right away" but after SC2 the whole idea is just blah, particularly since your mines deplete at the same rate. I guess it encourages building towers and expanding, so that's something... except only rarely are there ever expansions you want to take, at least on Normal.
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Wow bot ... and I thought the one about Yu, Yosuke, Chie and strikes was good~
Wow I forgot how badly Doel mocks Albert, 300+ damage/2HKO with Rose Storm -up-
Legend of Dragoon JP-
Disc one complete. Went ahead and stuck with Dart/Albert/Rose for Black Castle though I used Shana/Haschel on the map getting to Kazas (forgot to mention I used Haschel some on soldiers in the return to Hellena prison, etc as well) I think there was another merchant in the Black Castle of the English version that wasn't there in the JP version, I couldn't find anywhere selling stuff so backtracked to the Magi men for the free full healing between the two boss fights. Final two bosses of the disc ... Kongol didn't seem to have much HP even here, kind of unimpressive overall though he did hit hard times he finally did get a turn, Doel was fun though, had to break up Angel's Prayers/heals - cue facepalm moment when I have Albert use Rose Storm, he uses it, reverts back to human form, Doel gets a turn, hits him for over 300~, Albert ded >_>
Final stats for the disc. Dart L16, Dragoon L3, Double Slash L5, Volcano L5, Burning Rush L5, Crush Dance L1 (11/20), Rose L15, DLV2, Whip Smack L5, More and More L3 (40/60), Albert L14, DLV2, Harpoon L5, Spinning Cane L5, Rod Typhoon L2 (23/40), Gust of Wind Dance (0/20), Haschel L15, DLV1, Double Punch L2 (26/40), Flurry of Styx (0/20), Shana L12, DLV1.
Accessories of choice were DEF boosters, Attack Badges, and later I used Bandit's Ring and Therapy Ring on peeps. Think I used the anti poison accessory on the snake boss early as well. I also found the SP regen ring in the Black Castle so I might stick that on Shana in hopes of getting another DLV soon (want Rose to master More and More first though I think)~
Highlights for me this run were getting a Bandit's Ring off Drake first time and also getting Meru's Morning Star first time from the first soldier fight on return to Hellena (however I then lost that because I had to reset because I accidentally ran into the soldier trap before I was done collecting dungeon treasures, and I forgot I could go back after Jiango anyway >_>, so I then had to fight the RNG to get another Morning Star <_<) ~
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NieR- A ending. More when not on phone. Done for now, maybe do B later.
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I hated everything about Nier's endgame story, but doing ending B was still definitely worth it. It's filled with extra scenes, and it's short enough.
D's ending is really cool, but really don't bother if you've been spoiled about it already.
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Wonderful 101: I know I just did this gag but screw it, I'm doing it against because I can't it justice! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqRXOWDn17I)
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I hated everything about Nier's endgame story, but doing ending B was still definitely worth it. It's filled with extra scenes, and it's short enough.
Oh, yeah, I read the whole LP. I started a new game and saw the words for Kaine's story, just I don't want to play the game for a while so going through all the bosses again to finish it out isn't appealing at this time.
That's really the thing though. Unlike a lot of games, I don't think Nier gained anything between reading an LP and actually playing the game. Which is weird because Laura Bailey knocked it out of the park, but... yeah. The gameplay falls into a very strange sort of blandness. There's nothing wrong with it, aside perhaps from a tendency to cheapshots and life bar being less prominent than perhaps it could be, and some clear thought went into how to escalate the game and the overall boss design. Just I played it and the only real reason I kept playing was not having much else to do and wanting to finish the game.
I'm just not sure how to feel about the game. It's weird and revels in weirdness. I've read that at one point in production, it was meant to be about walking into fairy tales, then much later shifted tone towards 'something appropriate for a follow-up to Drakengard', which yeah sounds about right. Certainly explains how a story about a sick little girl turned into a story about Kaine (Dadass might be calling the shots, but even in the A ending Kaine's the real focal point of the story). There's gameplay merit, but at the end of the day I just don't care very much. Even setting aside the core, the game routinely shifts up the rules of its current genre, going back to that fairy tale thing, so that makes sense.
I think the issue I'm having is that the game is too calculated. Like... what is the fewest number of steps, the shortest amount of script and tiniest variation of gameplay that we can use to prompt this precise emotion in our player. As a result it feels openly manipulative so my kneejerk is against it, even though it's really a very interesting and well thought out game with a lot going for it.
Ultimately I think I"m just going to give it an 8/10 even though that feels inflated. Perhaps when I sit down to the next ending I'll either justify that score or decide to hell with it and lower it. Hard to say at the moment.
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I still laugh when I think about how they took the standard video game babe and gave her a penis. AAA-level trolling there.
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I hated everything about Nier's endgame story, but doing ending B was still definitely worth it. It's filled with extra scenes, and it's short enough.
I think the issue I'm having is that the game is too calculated. Like... what is the fewest number of steps, the shortest amount of script and tiniest variation of gameplay that we can use to prompt this precise emotion in our player. As a result it feels openly manipulative so my kneejerk is against it, even though it's really a very interesting and well thought out game with a lot going for it.
This doesn't sound right.... Yokotaro came into this game with the very intention to troll the players in malicious ways (like he always do) with Japanese Anime as a medium and bunch of offensive idea that he can think of.
In other words, there is little calculation in plot writing, but more about openly trying to be a dick at the player as much as possible. If there is any calculation, it is solely because Yokotaro needs to escape the prosecution of the higher ups.
For example, there supposedly is no NieR dad in the first place, only brother NieR. Yokotaro was horrified when the higher ups intervened to add NieR dad in and remove brother NieR, as some of his offensive idea will be off this way. (For example on how brother NieR made a living off prostitution, and how Yokotaro spend the effort to reflect that into the character design). So he has to take precise measure to fit things in a way that he can make the game a painful experience to the player, but the same time make the higher ups shut up.
Though, the gameplay being calculated sounds about right, as in away it serve as a buffer to Yokotaro's malice and has to carry out specific functions or the game simply won't sale.
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I think we're saying the same thing in different words. NieR doesn't give a crap about narrative cohesion, but in provoking specific emotional response from the player. Using specific images and phrases to achieve an emotional end is more or less the essence of trolling, albeit NieR doesn't only go for horrifying/enraging the audience but runs up and down the emotional spectrum.
Rob- y'know, when the game was busy giving us lovingly rendered shots of Kaine's ass, I honestly wondered if they'd rendered a crotch bulge just for hardcore trolling extra credit. (they didn't, far as I could tell)
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Hahaha you're 50 already? I need to stop putzing around and spending inordinate amounts of time just making ammo.
I just picked up a file that was already in the mid-30s, so there wasn't that far to go anyway.
So my resolution not to loot anything, only sorta effective. I'm still reflexively searching every corpse and container I find, but mostly just taking ammo. And money. And healing supplies. And sellable things that have no weight. But in my defense, I've found a lot of missiles! And Annabelle is always hungry.
ED-E keeps breaking my sneak attempts. Dammit ED-E, stop that! I'm kind of optimized for stealth this time and it's pretty satisfying sneak attacking everything from a mile off. Mercy is also pretty boss, glad I brought it along. One-shotting groups of tunnelers, yesss. Now if only I'd stop firing the thing while within its blast radius.
Red Glare is still terrible. I don't get it, even with maxed explosives skill and all the relevant perks, it's less useful than weapons that the game says should deal half as much damage. What a waste of inventory space.
Ulysses's voice actor is still fucking perfect. Ulysses himself is still full of shit.
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How do you build up the willpower to go do the DLC? I am like level 30ish and was going to do them level appropriate, but need to do companion quests and then need to do this one before this companion quest because it will be locked out and while I am there I should do this other one as well and then E-DE is away for 3 days so I should go get Dog and Lily and then and then and then
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I did absolutely everything in the base game short of meeting Caesar before setting foot outside the Mojave proper, so when I felt like picking up the game again there were no distractions to stand between me and DLC! Left me at level 35 or so. Practically speaking, five levels makes little difference. Surprised at how sturdy roboscorpions were even at max level (I didn't bring the Pulse Gun because come on).
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I killed Caesar already because I had to go near Cottonwood Cove to free a Great Khan (so that I could finish the Great Khan side quest(so I did Camp Searchlight while I was nearby) and get the Slave Ledger oh and hey while I am there I may as well do the Bunker thing and then suddenly I am near the end of the game with so much of the game still to do and all the DLC again and oh my god my skin is like transparent
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Wonderful 101: So I gained the power to draw a heart and create a large freaking crossbow as a result. The character in question who did this is not in fact a Sentai Team member, officially. I also beat up the Shonen Rival by hitting him with a large pink whip a lot!
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I hated everything about Nier's endgame story, but doing ending B was still definitely worth it. It's filled with extra scenes, and it's short enough.
I think the issue I'm having is that the game is too calculated. Like... what is the fewest number of steps, the shortest amount of script and tiniest variation of gameplay that we can use to prompt this precise emotion in our player. As a result it feels openly manipulative so my kneejerk is against it, even though it's really a very interesting and well thought out game with a lot going for it.
This doesn't sound right.... Yokotaro came into this game with the very intention to troll the players in malicious ways (like he always do) with Japanese Anime as a medium and bunch of offensive idea that he can think of.
In other words, there is little calculation in plot writing, but more about openly trying to be a dick at the player as much as possible. If there is any calculation, it is solely because Yokotaro needs to escape the prosecution of the higher ups.
For example, there supposedly is no NieR dad in the first place, only brother NieR. Yokotaro was horrified when the higher ups intervened to add NieR dad in and remove brother NieR, as some of his offensive idea will be off this way. (For example on how brother NieR made a living off prostitution, and how Yokotaro spend the effort to reflect that into the character design). So he has to take precise measure to fit things in a way that he can make the game a painful experience to the player, but the same time make the higher ups shut up.
Though, the gameplay being calculated sounds about right, as in away it serve as a buffer to Yokotaro's malice and has to carry out specific functions or the game simply won't sale.
The fact the director was against using the Dad Nier is surprising, since that's like... the most insightful piece of localization I think I've ever seen? If the point of the story is to yank you around using the relationship between Nier and Yonah as a lever, then you should try to have it be as relateable as possible, hence, the father-daughter relationship in the West and the sibling relationship in Japan. Different family dynamics and different demographics at play, you dig?
Rob- y'know, when the game was busy giving us lovingly rendered shots of Kaine's ass, I honestly wondered if they'd rendered a crotch bulge just for hardcore trolling extra credit. (they didn't, far as I could tell)
There's a pretty large one on one of her costumes you get as a bonus in the DLC. I used to have a rather hilarious picture but I lost it at some point.
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Gone Home: The best character is Christmas Duck
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Dark Souls: Hey guys I just started playing this game and it's reeeeeeeally good! Have you ever heard of it?
Also: What? It's 2014? When did that happen? It was definitely not 2014 just a bit ago when I sat down to play--oh. Ooooooh.
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Hahaha you're 50 already? I need to stop putzing around and spending inordinate amounts of time just making ammo.
I just picked up a file that was already in the mid-30s, so there wasn't that far to go anyway.
So my resolution not to loot anything, only sorta effective. I'm still reflexively searching every corpse and container I find, but mostly just taking ammo. And money. And healing supplies. And sellable things that have no weight. But in my defense, I've found a lot of missiles! And Annabelle is always hungry.
ED-E keeps breaking my sneak attempts. Dammit ED-E, stop that! I'm kind of optimized for stealth this time and it's pretty satisfying sneak attacking everything from a mile off. Mercy is also pretty boss, glad I brought it along. One-shotting groups of tunnelers, yesss. Now if only I'd stop firing the thing while within its blast radius.
Red Glare is still terrible. I don't get it, even with maxed explosives skill and all the relevant perks, it's less useful than weapons that the game says should deal half as much damage. What a waste of inventory space.
Ulysses's voice actor is still fucking perfect. Ulysses himself is still full of shit.
I've been in my 40s since like 2013(whooo new year jokes!) I've burned nearly every quest and Dead Money scares. Maybe I should finally go raid Dry Wells, that outta be FUN.
Red Glare just rams into DT so hard for some reason. I blame Robo-Scorpians for it even though they are no way relevant. It at least turns whatever you target into Mr. Cripple though.
How do you build up the willpower to go do the DLC? I am like level 30ish and was going to do them level appropriate, but need to do companion quests and then need to do this one before this companion quest because it will be locked out and while I am there I should do this other one as well and then E-DE is away for 3 days so I should go get Dog and Lily and then and then and then
That's why you design character builds around getting upgrades from the DLCs. That solves everything/makes everything 10x worse!
Dark Souls: Hey guys I just started playing this game and it's reeeeeeeally good! Have you ever heard of it?
Also: What? It's 2014? When did that happen? It was definitely not 2014 just a bit ago when I sat down to play--oh. Ooooooh.
:dark souls:
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Paper Mario Sticker Star - The level design is pretty hit-and-miss and some of the logic leaps they expect you to make on sticker puzzles are nutsy. On the other hand, when the level design hits the mark, it leads to glorious things like the haunted mansion in 4-3 and 4-5's minecart ride. And then, there's the excellent base gameplay. Sometimes, this game can be infuriating unless you have no qualms with FAQing the shit out of it due to expecting you to -explore- the levels (I pretty much could imagine, say, Ciato shrieking in rage and slamming the 3DS towards the nearest wall on 5-1). On the other hand, I really like the exploration aspect and the levels are both short and oddly imaginative given the engine restraints on them.
I have no idea how objectively -good- I consider the game to be, but it's one of the funnest experiences I've had in general gaming in a couple years at least. I kinda regret putting it off for a full year out of laziness (I bought this pretty much on release). I really oughta play the rest of the series after I beat this, and I definitely see myself coming back to Sticker Star in and out of itself - it lends itself really well to weird challenges and oddball style changes, not to mention knowing how the game and stages work speed up the game immensely. I haven't tried over half of the Thing stickers, for starters.
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Fallout: New Vegas: Are enemies in this game really durable or am I just incompetent?
Wandering around Primm, because I'm not sure what to do! Tried to stay at a hotel, but it was full of escaped convicts. I ended up shooting most of them in their faces. It took me about a billion tries to get the leader. Saved a deputy.
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Fallout: New Vegas: Are enemies in this game really durable or am I just incompetent?
Wandering around Primm, because I'm not sure what to do! Tried to stay at a hotel, but it was full of escaped convicts. I ended up shooting most of them in their faces. It took me about a billion tries to get the leader. Saved a deputy.
If you're having trouble with enemy durability, check the condition of your weapons. The 9mm pistol you start with is in fairly poor shape so it does decreased damage and tends to jam when you're reloading. You can fix up your guns by paying lots of money to an NPC (don't do this) or consuming other copies of a gun to fix it yourself. If that's still not helping, I'm fairly sure you can scrounge up a single-barrel shotgun and ammo at the skydiving school north of Primm and east of Goodsprings. That thing is a fairly good early-game trump card, though it obviously doesn't work well at range. When you get in a jam, whip that thing out and blow a dude's spine out his back.
All the locals are holed up in the casino across the parking lot. There's also an NCR detachment camped across the highway. If you've cleared out the Hotel, though, they should come back out and do their thing again.
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MK7 - Just need to beat the Special Cup in Mirror Mode to get 2 stars on all of the races. Of course, I could have said this before I played the game for three hours too. :(
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Wonderful 101: I just did Vorkken's Inside Story, it eventually turned into playing Star Fox with an alien parasite.
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Fallout: New Vegas: Are enemies in this game really durable or am I just incompetent?
Wandering around Primm, because I'm not sure what to do! Tried to stay at a hotel, but it was full of escaped convicts. I ended up shooting most of them in their faces. It took me about a billion tries to get the leader. Saved a deputy.
If you're having trouble with enemy durability, check the condition of your weapons. The 9mm pistol you start with is in fairly poor shape so it does decreased damage and tends to jam when you're reloading. You can fix up your guns by paying lots of money to an NPC (don't do this) or consuming other copies of a gun to fix it yourself. If that's still not helping, I'm fairly sure you can scrounge up a single-barrel shotgun and ammo at the skydiving school north of Primm and east of Goodsprings. That thing is a fairly good early-game trump card, though it obviously doesn't work well at range. When you get in a jam, whip that thing out and blow a dude's spine out his back.
All the locals are holed up in the casino across the parking lot. There's also an NCR detachment camped across the highway. If you've cleared out the Hotel, though, they should come back out and do their thing again.
Ah. Okay. I'm just failing at exploring. I saw the NCR detachment, but wasn't really sure if that was an indication I should go dick around elsewhere or murder fuckers myself. I take it I should just cut loose and do whatever when I want?
Also, good to know. My weapon conditions are pretty low. Didn't think the damage would scale that hard.
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Fallout New Vegas: Instead of some sort of ramble interspersed with screenshot links, I'll just list things or something.
-I have no idea what this guy is talking about. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-03_00002.jpg)
-Doc Henry no. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-03_00003.jpg)
-Looking at where I shot some dudes. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-05_00002.jpg)
-Where said dudes parts ended up. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-05_00001.jpg)
-Bad dog. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-05_00004.jpg)
-Stop breaking physics. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-05_00005.jpg)
-More leik DAYkin (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-05_00006.jpg)
-BENNY'S EPIC ESCAPE! (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-06_00001.jpg)
-wut (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-06_00003.jpg)
-that is not how corpses are supposed to bend (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-06_00002.jpg)
-no they're multiplying (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-06_00004.jpg)
-Caeser's seen better days. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-06_00005.jpg)
-RANGER FIESTA! (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-06_00006.jpg)
-The long reach of the Legion. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-06_00007.jpg)
-??????? (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2013-06-20_00001.jpg)
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Super Mario Kart - Midget mode, trying to get 45 points in each cup.
Civ 5 - Beat the L6 difficulty (Emperor?) as the Japanese. Alexander insisted on having a millenium-long war with me so I nuked his capital and no shits were given by the rest of the world. Then I went to space. The AI of warlike countries on the higher difficult seems kinda obnoxious.
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There are only two real ways to deal with really aggressive AIs (The Celts, Egyptians, French, Songhai): Either level em or bribe them into going to war with other civs. The latter can be risky, as it can lead to some really unpleasantly large civs later in the game, but it does buy time and gets enemy civs to waste resources on military units.
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For the most part I just made sure my army was good enough to hold his eternal aggression at bay. Between being smarter than the enemy (Civ AI is amazingly bad overall), having a slight tech lead on him, the special Japanese property, and general advantages of being on defence I was never really in danger of losing a city I actually cared about.
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Fallout: New Vegas: Are enemies in this game really durable or am I just incompetent?
Wandering around Primm, because I'm not sure what to do! Tried to stay at a hotel, but it was full of escaped convicts. I ended up shooting most of them in their faces. It took me about a billion tries to get the leader. Saved a deputy.
If you're having trouble with enemy durability, check the condition of your weapons. The 9mm pistol you start with is in fairly poor shape so it does decreased damage and tends to jam when you're reloading. You can fix up your guns by paying lots of money to an NPC (don't do this) or consuming other copies of a gun to fix it yourself. If that's still not helping, I'm fairly sure you can scrounge up a single-barrel shotgun and ammo at the skydiving school north of Primm and east of Goodsprings. That thing is a fairly good early-game trump card, though it obviously doesn't work well at range. When you get in a jam, whip that thing out and blow a dude's spine out his back.
All the locals are holed up in the casino across the parking lot. There's also an NCR detachment camped across the highway. If you've cleared out the Hotel, though, they should come back out and do their thing again.
Ah. Okay. I'm just failing at exploring. I saw the NCR detachment, but wasn't really sure if that was an indication I should go dick around elsewhere or murder fuckers myself. I take it I should just cut loose and do whatever when I want?
Also, good to know. My weapon conditions are pretty low. Didn't think the damage would scale that hard.
Yeahhh I highly recommend building up Repair so you're mostly self-reliant for fixing up your weapons. Condition makes a big difference and it gets nightmarishly expensive constantly paying other people to keep the best gear fully repaired. Jury-rigging perk opens up at I think 85 or so repair skill and is definitely a worthy investment, massively broadens what you can use to repair what so all those junked up crud weapons enemies constantly drop can be consumed to keep your good weapons in tune. Probably saves you more money in repair costs than selling them would get you.
I'm pretty sure the bandit chief in Primm drops a flamethrower. I found it pretty boss early on the first time I played the game.
Doing whatever when you want is basically the game.
Fudo is that Benny running around like a headless chicken in the wake of Legion slaughter. He can actually live through that? Does the game acknowledge this in any way? Oh, and I've got the Doc Mitchell spinny head glitch before but never seen anything that fucked up.
Dark Souls: Hey guys I just started playing this game and it's reeeeeeeally good! Have you ever heard of it?
Also: What? It's 2014? When did that happen? It was definitely not 2014 just a bit ago when I sat down to play--oh. Ooooooh.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rY0WxgSXdEE
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Fudo is that Benny running around like a headless chicken in the wake of Legion slaughter. He can actually live through that? Does the game acknowledge this in any way? Oh, and I've got the Doc Mitchell spinny head glitch before but never seen anything that fucked up.
If you just wait until everyone's dead you can just free him then apparently. Feels like that got patched in because I have vague recolections of not getting the option with killing everyone first.. I have no idea why Caeser is just ignoring him though. Frankly I could have freed him anyway and fought because of Turbo boosts but whatever. You can free him for a giant karma boost, I didn't even know the Jesus pip-boy icon could show up for karma gains. He vanishes once he gets to the Fort gates though.
EDIT: Also my ammo weighs 160 pounds. And that's with its weight being cut in half.
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Re: New Vegas, Jury Rigging is the beeeeeeeeeeeest.
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Wiki crawl says game does react to Benny surviving. Also forget if it was flagged as cut content or not, but was something about it changing if you slept with him with Black Widow perk and letting him survive. Pretty sure it was cut content though.
90 Repair, level 14 perk. Jury Rigging is a game changer. Using it lets you avoid that disease El Cid has of looting all the things, let's you repair armour unlike relying on weapon repair kits and generates cash by letting you repair good weapons up to vendor instead of hauling around a bunch of cheap shit. Durability scale price up crazy good. My first game I got by without ranking Barter at all on huge strength of this. This play levelling Barter also helps pay for Gun runners Arsenal loot super easy. Burning caps like nobodies business and having a good time. As far as I am concerned every single build should get it unless you are pacifist I guess. Even then I would still consider ranking Repair because it pairs with Science as one of the more frequently used skills in the game. Repair stronk.
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I even got it on my Pacifist. I have no idea WHY but I had it!
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The Last Story: Chapter 28 or so (after sneaking around the castle and firing sleep arrows).
The game is fun but could use a hard mode. The combat is sufficiently tactical in setup but it is sometimes too easy to just power through it without real trouble. For example the game has a good set of enemies with healers and mages and guards, but you don't have to employ tactics to get through it, being able to just smash them just about any way you want. Nor is there any reward for being more tactical about it. The game could have done with only one spare 'life'... as it is you have to be KOd five times to lose a fight (and mind you this is refreshed between every fight). That is just too much for the enemy to overcome, usually.
I like the setting to be honest, mostly because I enjoy how many back alleys and shortcuts and such are in the Lazulis city. Walking through it makes it seem alive with all the conversations going on and crowds going about their business, which is a nice enough trick. The dungeons are short and to the point for the most part, lacking in labyrinth and relying more on interesting setups for enemies in areas with good varieties of cover/open spaces (though not exclusively so).
The character chemistry works very well. The merc band starts the game out feeling like an established family with good chemistry and interactions (Syrenne drunken antics, Mirania cuckooness, Dagran's raw charisma), and they get some character development that I liked. I like it when they all just sit around talking over options and voicing differing opinions on what their course of action should be. It kind of reminds me of the Greil mercs from FE9. Zael is perhaps a bit too much of an archetypical hero protagonist, but the game's more morally gray setting gives it a more interesting twist. I wasn't a fan of Callista either, as she seemed to cookie-cutter princess for my tastes early on. But she is actually a fairly reasonable take on an archetype I would normally hate, thanks again to the grayer nature of the game's morality/setting and her keen awareness of this.
A fun enough game thus far. I have a sinking feeling however that Dagran is the one who murdered Ashtar and framed The Prick for it. If that is true I still find myself rooting for him, as he is so damn charismatic and has been fairly reasonable throughout. I wonder why he would do it though?
Bravely Default Demo:
Free demo for Bravely Default. Jobs only go up to L4 but it is a good example of what the system should hold in store? It plays out like a quick fix for FF5 junkies. I like the Brave/Default mechanic, especially as it applies to the enemies since the enemy having the ability to bust out something really nasty is a good flipside to your team pulling out all the stops to bust up an enemy approaching death. The "Combine class abilities for cool effect" is still in play, which is nice! The game even gives you a particularly nice hint on a powerful little one. Buffs seem to have a strong effect as well, as the game looks like a subtractive Atk/Def system with multipliers. The weapon and armor system seems nice enough... most jobs can equip any equipment but the stat boosts they get from those equips differs depending on 'proficiency' (rank E to rank S). The demo features 3 mini-dungeons and 4 bosses. It has 0 plot and characterization though. Hoping the actual game delivers on that point.
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I even got it on my Pacifist. I have no idea WHY but I had it!
Because using a bunch of semi-worthless varmint rifles to max out the condition on an anti-material rifle is how you get DAT FAT WALLET SON!
But yes, doing what you want is what the game is about. You can kill literally everyone you see and still make it through the game. I think JE Sawyer's exact description was "when designing the main quest we needed an option where the main character was basically a giant fire-breathing monster."
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My giant fire-breathing monster run will be next, just you wait and see.
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WC3FT: OK, I give up. Back to normal mode. Second chapter of the Human campaign was just too much bullshit. SC2 is a better game anyway so I'll play that one on Brutal and just speed through WC3 on normal. Managed to beat the last Night Elf mission on hard, at least. I guess I was supposed to use casters to give me the upper hand on Illidan's side, but instead I just massed seige turtles, distracted the whole army, and just focused down buildings.
Blizzard writing makes me want to punch a puppy. What's that, another character is driven to madness due to obsession over their goal? It was neat when they did it with Arthas, but goddamn. In RoC, Grom, Tyrande, and Illidan all fall for the same shit, and in Frozen Throne Maiev has and it's pretty obvious that Kael'thas will as well. C'mon guys there are other tropes out there jesus christ.
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WC3FT: OK, I give up. Back to normal mode. Second chapter of the Human campaign was just too much bullshit. SC2 is a better game anyway so I'll play that one on Brutal and just speed through WC3 on normal. Managed to beat the last Night Elf mission on hard, at least. I guess I was supposed to use casters to give me the upper hand on Illidan's side, but instead I just massed seige turtles, distracted the whole army, and just focused down buildings.
Blizzard writing makes me want to punch a puppy. What's that, another character is driven to madness due to obsession over their goal? It was neat when they did it with Arthas, but goddamn. In RoC, Grom, Tyrande, and Illidan all fall for the same shit, and in Frozen Throne Maiev has and it's pretty obvious that Kael'thas will as well. C'mon guys there are other tropes out there jesus christ.
Based on WoW?
No. No there are not.
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It is originally based on Warhammer. True to source material.
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MK7 - Finally got my two stars on Special Cup. Attempt to get three stars on 150 cc has been less than fruitful, though...
Civ V(G&K) - Saw this being played, couldn't resist picking it up again. Played Siam on Prince and Elizabeth on King. Not a huge fan of the warlike AI on King, since I don't really build military all that much. Currently getting killed on two sides as Askia on King.
EDIT: The game needs some kind of option of "If you want to take my cities with a peace treaty, preemptively go fuck yourself and don't send me the message."
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PW5 - caw caw caw caw caw caw
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Final Fantasy Dimensions: I have seen a man named Eduardo. He is a bard overlooking a lake, wishing to see a lady. I am laughing inside and out.
This game rules, by the way.
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It is originally based on Warhammer. True to source material.
I was unclear. I was saying that, based on World of Warcraft, Blizzard does not believe there are other tropes.
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It is originally based on Warhammer. True to source material.
I was unclear. I was saying that, based on World of Warcraft, Blizzard does not believe there are other tropes.
And he's saying that WarCraft was originally based on Warhammer (which is true) and thus, Blizzard is just being consistent with that original source material.
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Technically same applies for SC obviously. Diablo is just about generic store brand demonic possession though.
Insert plot hype for Lost Vikings here.
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Heroes of the Storm will blow without Lost Vikings.
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90 Repair, level 14 perk. Jury Rigging is a game changer. Using it lets you avoid that disease El Cid has of looting all the things,
Hahaha not exactly. Actually it just broadens the array of random crap I feel it necessary to pick up! Does save plenty of money though, and makes even more. Being an arms dealer is the way to make the big bucks in New Vegas. I probably provide the Gun Runners more of their stock than they make themselves.
Anyway, Lonesome Road. Ulysses was all, "Grr, obliquely directed vengeance," so I had to be like, "No we should be bros and shoot zombies." So we did, and it was good.
God why did I not bring power armor for the Courier's Mile (principally missed it for the rad resistance). That place, so terrible. How many irradiated deathclaws were in there, like a dozen? And about as many Marked Men? Living in perfect harmony, no less! Interspecies cooperation an inspiration to us all in these troubled times.
NCR ending -> House ending all that's left on the agenda. Well, along with Arcade's quest and Oh My Papa (never properly finished either of them before). No Legion ending because hatred of a thousand suns. Anyway it's been a while but I think on this file I already re-pissed them off by murdering Vulpes Inculta outside the Tops to make Boone happy. I do kinda have an interest in playing a complete monster run someday, just to see the other side of the game, but I know myself too well to expect I'd actually be able to maintain that behavior for the duration.
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Civ5 - Immortal. Good lord does the AI cheat like mad on this difficulty. Fun enough but I doubt I'll be playing this one again, the disadvantage you're at just feels too ludicrous and while you certainly can win it feels reliant on luck with how the enemy civs do and if they're smart about not splitting the UN vote / building space stuff quickly. I'm sure there is perfect algorithmic play to make odds of victory high but I can't really be bothered.
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Diplomatic Vic is definitely the easiest way to win on Immortal IMHO, you rush the "top" edge of the tech tree and stockpile cash -> collect victory. Coups make this more annoying in G&K but you can circumvent this via doing your giant bribe on turn N-1 of the vote. And you collect modern Infantry on that route anyway to not die if a militaristic civ wants to screw with you. (Okay, barring some kind of Atilla / Monetzuma turbo rushdown, of course.)
I don't know if there's an "algorithmic" way to win Immortal exactly! That's a cool thing about Civ5, it clearly depends a lot on map type / resource density / civ diplomacy. The thing that you most need a good eye for is city placement at the higher level, and even then it's entirely possible to say "I could get an utterly ridiculous city right here but it will surely start an eventual war with the Romans that will be difficult to win and a big resource drain, is it worth the risk?" You are right about luck being important, but if you get screwed over you usually know it sooner rather than later, at least, and I like the different experience each time.
That said, I agree in general, Immortal is a bit TOO stressful. Emperor is more fun and has less games which get abandoned after 40 turns.
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90 Repair, level 14 perk. Jury Rigging is a game changer. Using it lets you avoid that disease El Cid has of looting all the things,
Hahaha not exactly. Actually it just broadens the array of random crap I feel it necessary to pick up! Does save plenty of money though, and makes even more. Being an arms dealer is the way to make the big bucks in New Vegas. I probably provide the Gun Runners more of their stock than they make themselves.
Anyway, Lonesome Road. Ulysses was all, "Grr, obliquely directed vengeance," so I had to be like, "No we should be bros and shoot zombies." So we did, and it was good.
God why did I not bring power armor for the Courier's Mile (principally missed it for the rad resistance). That place, so terrible. How many irradiated deathclaws were in there, like a dozen? And about as many Marked Men? Living in perfect harmony, no less! Interspecies cooperation an inspiration to us all in these troubled times.
NCR ending -> House ending all that's left on the agenda. Well, along with Arcade's quest and Oh My Papa (never properly finished either of them before). No Legion ending because hatred of a thousand suns. Anyway it's been a while but I think on this file I already re-pissed them off by murdering Vulpes Inculta outside the Tops to make Boone happy. I do kinda have an interest in playing a complete monster run someday, just to see the other side of the game, but I know myself too well to expect I'd actually be able to maintain that behavior for the duration.
Caesar's actually a lot of fun to talk to FWIW. Also the Legion mission Arizona Killer is probably the best quest in the whole game, I think?
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Disgaea 4- Fin. So in chapter 10 there's this map with archers. Who sit on enemy boost panels, can borderline OHKO without the boost, and I had to grind a bit to kill them in two hits. So basically rush guys over there, toss them into a formation, hope like hell they all die before enemies from above start chipping me down (it's an enemy panel map, albeit just one panel, so over time there are just going to be lower level goons that can finish me off before I pelt down the upper level debuffer mages). That one map really smacked of Disgaea 1 in a way that really pissed me off, which is s shame because all through chapter 8 and 9 the game really had my attention. Fortunately the immediately following map was tricky in less stupid way (enemies who OHKO.. because they have a bunch of magichange weapons, so taking out the most dangerous set first and reducing the total monsters on the field in turn 1 means maybe one death machine to put down. Much more reasonable) and the final boss's gimmick is about crowd control, but the AI isn't super aggressive so you have a couple turns to bring the stats down to reasonable. Probably the most interesting disgaea final boss really, faint praise though that is.
Game tends to recycle it's gags a bit, but not really offensively. It has a basic structure for most of them and comes up with new things to mad lib in, which the game is just short enough to use effectively. Probably the strongest ensemble among the four games, juggling six main characters and making them all actually relevant, compared to the trio in the original and duos (Adell/Rozy, Mao/Almaz) in the other two.
Still weaker than Disgaea 2 overall, but lacks some of the issues 3 had. Probably hangs around the level of the first, so 8/10 it is.
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It is originally based on Warhammer. True to source material.
I was unclear. I was saying that, based on World of Warcraft, Blizzard does not believe there are other tropes.
And he's saying that WarCraft was originally based on Warhammer (which is true) and thus, Blizzard is just being consistent with that original source material.
I dunno. Warhammer managed a few plots about people just being wankers too, I think. Not everyone was obsessed with obsession.
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In Warcraft some characters are wankers that are obsessed with obsession.
FO:NV - Level 30 woooo. Scraped together 50 sneak so I can take holdout weapons into casinos and go do those sidequests solo because I already lost a bunch of loot to a bug where you companions inventory of weapons don't respawn. Goodbye Maria, goodbye AMR Boone had that I was going to stockpile ammo for, goodbye random other stuff.
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God why did I not bring power armor for the Courier's Mile (principally missed it for the rad resistance). That place, so terrible. How many irradiated deathclaws were in there, like a dozen? And about as many Marked Men? Living in perfect harmony, no less! Interspecies cooperation an inspiration to us all in these troubled times.
The hilarious thing is they would actually fight each other if KILL THE COURIER wasn't their highest priority.
In Warcraft some characters are wankers that are obsessed with obsession.
FO:NV - Level 30 woooo. Scraped together 50 sneak so I can take holdout weapons into casinos and go do those sidequests solo because I already lost a bunch of loot to a bug where you companions inventory of weapons don't respawn. Goodbye Maria, goodbye AMR Boone had that I was going to stockpile ammo for, goodbye random other stuff.
Fuck, I've had that bug too. There's a safe inside the wall in Grommorah you can't access without noclip that should have everything.
Fallout New Vegas: Clearing up missions to hit 50 before Dead Money. Bye Bye Love is still awful and I only did it because I"M A NICE GUY~. Doing Beyond the Beef gave me one weirdass glitch though as I was chasing Mortimer out I drew my knife then suddenly Heck Gunderson and his bodyguard suddenly started to murder all the White Gloves.
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WC3FT: Not since picking up the game have I been nostalgiaing about Footmen Frenzy so much. Dark Ranger just brings back a lot of memories of massive summoned undead armies and hero sniping with Life Drain. Have to resist picking up League of Legends to get my fix. On top of that, Banshee possession is cool but completely useless mechanic, unless they force you to use it by arbitrarily gimping your own forces... which they do in all of the Dark Ranger chapters. It's actually a fun gimmick! Unlike boats. Why did anyone think transport boats were a good idea.
Speaking of fun gimmicks, I'm surprised that over half of the Blood Elf/Human campagn consisted of gimmick maps. Considering one was "Do nothing but micro Heroes and reminisce about Footmen Frenzy", I'm not complaining.
Shaping up to beat the Undead campaign and probably the Orc campaign this weekend and finally stop obsessing over 10-year-old RTSes that are not SC2, and move on to... obsessing about SC2. That is if I'm not compelled to restart FO:NV and actually try to beat it this time.
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Civ5 - Immortal. Good lord does the AI cheat like mad on this difficulty. Fun enough but I doubt I'll be playing this one again, the disadvantage you're at just feels too ludicrous and while you certainly can win it feels reliant on luck with how the enemy civs do and if they're smart about not splitting the UN vote / building space stuff quickly. I'm sure there is perfect algorithmic play to make odds of victory high but I can't really be bothered.
It really, really depends on the map type as Snowfire said. Tiny islands and playing with happiness off can certainly alter the balance. That said! I don't like playing immortal/deity without tinkering with the setup for those reasons, it really does make you play a certain playstyle.
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League of Legends: A Day in Ranked
Game 1: Karma Support. Do pretty evenly bot, right up until both top and jungle decided to try and tower dive Jinx for no reason whatsoever and provide her a double kill. Jinx ends up snowballing out of control and our Varus is too bad to survive teamfighting for more than 3 seconds. Team suggests reporting bot. I gnash my teeth a bit. 0-2-0.
Game 2: Nautilus Jungle. Game goes super smooth. Gold Morde mid dominates his lane with a little help and the enemy team isn't too competent. Crushing victory. 3-2-11.
Game 3: Leona Support. Good times. Paired with Jinx against Lux and Kog'maw. Go HAM all game, starting at level 2 and utterly crush lane, then game. 6-3-17.
Game 4: Ziggs Mid. Tremendous start. First blood in jungle invade. Pick up a kill in Mid as team is walking back to position. Dominate hardcore. Then Elise starts bitching she doesn't have any kills and starts playing increasingly stupidly as a result. Continues complaining she's being KSed. Team doesn't group up for teamfights. I start messing up and getting picked off. Defeat snatched from the jaws of victory. 12-4-11.
Game 5: Renekton Top. Eh. Die to an early Amumu gank, but do fine otherwise. Rest of team loses ever turret back to base. Not really much that can be done. 1-2-3.
Game 6: Leona Support. Should have dodged in selection. Game begins with annoying pinging of "go stand over there" and people bitching. Mundo dies to Brand mid at 2, giving him blue, and Nidalee won't shut the fuck up about it. Ezrael starts bitching about her bitching. Nid eventually AFKs, followed by Ez AFKing. Then either Teemo or Mundo doesn't let the surrender go through. Fuck me. /wrists.
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Caesar's actually a lot of fun to talk to FWIW. Also the Legion mission Arizona Killer is probably the best quest in the whole game, I think?
See, I was interested in talking to him the first time I played the game, at least to see what crazy justification he thought he had for this awful society he created (and reading the wiki it does at least sound there's some more thought behind it than standard megalomania, though of course I suspect a degree of that as well). But he wouldn't so much as indulge a Q&A session before I did him the minor favor of destroying all of House's plans, so I just shot him in the face.
In Warcraft some characters are wankers that are obsessed with obsession.
FO:NV - Level 30 woooo. Scraped together 50 sneak so I can take holdout weapons into casinos and go do those sidequests solo because I already lost a bunch of loot to a bug where you companions inventory of weapons don't respawn. Goodbye Maria, goodbye AMR Boone had that I was going to stockpile ammo for, goodbye random other stuff.
Yeah, I hate that glitch. Happened to me first time through the game, fortunately had a manual save near enough that reloading didn't cost me much. I guess the smart thing is to just leave your companions outside, but nowadays I'm just so paranoid that I dump all my valuable gear somewhere safe and walk in naked instead. Which is pretty much the best way for Girl Courier to deal with Benny anyway!
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Holy mother of god Second Virage~
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Caesar's actually a lot of fun to talk to FWIW. Also the Legion mission Arizona Killer is probably the best quest in the whole game, I think?
See, I was interested in talking to him the first time I played the game, at least to see what crazy justification he thought he had for this awful society he created (and reading the wiki it does at least sound there's some more thought behind it than standard megalomania, though of course I suspect a degree of that as well). But he wouldn't so much as indulge a Q&A session before I did him the minor favor of destroying all of House's plans, so I just shot him in the face.
See, the funny thing is that no matter what you do in the Bunker, Caeser just assumes it was destroyed because it rumbled.
Fallout New Vegas: Blitzed through Dead Money as fast as I could. Also that meant I hit 50. Which actually was kinda of a pain to do without any quests. I was actually grinding encounters in The Thorn for EXP before I just went wherever I wanted. Watching Rex and Veronica beat up Deathclaws was hilarious though. So in Dead Money I nearly die to the first Ghost Person I fought. Even the weakest ones have 450 H to my 570. Of course, I have God's 1750 HP to even that out! So, after I get the big guy I go and get my secret weapon.... THE FIST OF RAWR! THE FIST OF RAWR completely and utterly obliterates Ghost People. I can literally pop them in one hit. I actually managed to fully gib one. I didn't even know that was possible! Anyway, everyone saved, back in the Mojave, time to finsh up some loose ends before finishing my Hardcore playthrough.
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How'd you get an outside weapon into the Sierra Madre?
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How'd you get an outside weapon into the Sierra Madre?
Rawr's Talon is tagged as a quest item and those don't get taken.
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I am doing it now too actually (at level 30 on EZ MODO with Light Step perk). Recruited the 3 dudes and stopped for the night.
I don't understand the target design of this. The weapons you get are generally pretty low power on the curve, so presumably that helps ward off low levels coming in and getting good loots early. It is supposed to be targeted at level 20ish, skill checks match to that. But enemies scale with level, so if you go in high level you see situations like Fudo describes. Your damage doesn't scale up much past that 20 range (skillchecks are 75/80ish at most, your weapon skill should be assumed to be around the same if not maxed at that point), but enemies do.
So the longer you put it off post 20 the harder it is? The more you have to lean on team mates?
If you do it earlier it is still going to be hard, but enemy scaling won't be as impacting. Skill checks will be harder you will have a worse outcome. You will come out with maybe competitive items (game best durability Light armour, some good medium armour, the Assault Rifle looks okay?) and Holorifle.
?!??!?!??!?!?!?!? DO NOT UNDERSTAND.
I get that it is intended to be difficult, but the specific way that it is difficult is so inconsistent (Outside of the stuff that instakills you lololol) which is a shame because they are going for a pretty cool flavour mash up here. One part Saw, one part Ocean's Eleven with a zombie/body horror dressing (while riffing on hands down the most successful horror element Doctor Who has done on its low budget). Its pretty great except for the part where it isn't really fun to play and my game is starting to run like shit like everything does late in the game with this engine (THIS ENGINE SO BAD) and the Cloud effect chews GPU like nobodies business.
Also looking forward to the inevitable Last Crusade ending sequence with how much God/Dog talks about GREED.
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The real reward is the vending machine. Unless you didn't break the bank at the casino and thus only get 100 chips a day instead of 1000 herp! Police Pistol is beyond shit, it's probably worse than the 9mm even. Automatic Rifle has utter shit accuracy and during this run couldn't hurt the ghost people worth a damn. Even in my AMR Courier run where it was useful I was in melee range anyway so... hit'em with melee! Except the melee options all suck too. Cosmic Knives all blow within the DLC and once out in the Mojave Chance's Knife completely outdoes them, the spears are slow as all hell, and well the bear trap is awesome but is also pretty slow but it can actually hurt things so you let that slide. Holorifle is great and all but kinda blows against Ghost People in my opinion since they're so damn janky and you don't want to waste cells blowing off limbs so you go into melee anyway again. Heck, even the highest DT light armor isn't that impressive since if you're going light armor you're probably gearing up to be ~CRIT NASTY~ and want a duster. Any normal guns you find will have limited ammo, though I guess there's enough 20 gauge hulls laying around those might have some use.
I wouldn't say lean on teammates so much as lean on God having the fourth highest HP in the game. I used him to clear out everything before I shuffled everyone over. Dean's peashooter would be useless and Christine doesn't have anything going for her. She can't even help for the most obnoxious speakers(only three deaths to them this time!)
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I take it all back by the way. Shana's revival/healing was invaluable during the second Virage fight. Thing is another difference between the original and English versions of Legend of Dragoon is the amount of money enemies drop, JP version drops even less. At first I didn't think this was going to be a problem, I was wrong~
Increased enemy HP/damage output means I'm using items more often, I run out, then need more, I buy more stuff, then I don't have all the monies to buy all the basic/standard new equipment upgrades at places that I want either. Then factor in the limited inventory slots and that you have to try and preserve/conserve items because you have to do Valley of Corrupted Gravity, boss, then Home of Gigantos, boss without a merchant/shop and yeah (unless you want to backtrack all the way through VoCG to Fletz to shop, then go back through VoCG again to progress~)
Yaay Shana got DLV2 after that Virage fight though. However for Home of Gigantos boss Haschel was forced, and another thing was I had no MP restoring items left either except the one the Virage boss dropped (at least it was an MT one), two healing potions, and only three revive items, Shana is low on HP/DEF too and the boss is physical based so I decide to use Dart/Albert/Haschel (of course I forget to properly equip Haschel before he leaves to try and solve things himself, at least he had the armour from the Barrens though, then use the save point after) After staring at the game over screen two or three times anyway I eventually win through strategic use/timings of enemy targeting/Rose Storm/Speed Up/Material Shield (immune to physical damage for three turns), spreading out my restorative items, etc) Going after Gehrich first was the wrong idea apparently, not good to leave Mappi to his own devices or there for Gehrich to combo with on JP version.
I am also appreciating those free firefly/springs/etc type healing places more now (I might have said this before but I have been noticing it even more so recently)~
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Dead Money is slow and snooze now. I am in the Casino. It looks like this part is shorter than I expected, but it will still have to wait for tomorrow to do.
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FFX- Replaying this. Just entered the second temple. FF10's a slow starter, which is unusual for an FF game. I appreciate all the effort put into the story/characters/VA/animations, but after blocks of text I just want to read quickly, jam X, and move on. It is reminding me that Square is dumb for having no sceneskip in FFX HD.
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Fallout New Vegas: And Heavy Courier run is complete! Got me some Hardcore achievement. All that's left is Independent Ending and 50 Pickpockets.
But what you're really here for is hot screenshot action.
-Paladin Todd is a sad confused man. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-10_00001.jpg)
-Up close and personal with Raul. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-10_00002.jpg)
-Hot reloading action. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-10_00004.jpg)
-CARNAGE! (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-10_00003.jpg)
-MORE CARNAGE! (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-10_00006.jpg)
-YET EVEN MORE CARNAGE! (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-10_00005.jpg)
-The only good sideview I could get! (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-10_00007.jpg)
-I was worried way back when about fighting Centurions because they have enough DT to block my shots, but all the guys at the Dam forgot their helmets so it didn't matter! (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-10_00008.jpg)
Up next will be Genocide Courier, that outta be loads of fun.
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Fudo you've gotta stop this. I'm seriously scheming builds for douchey sociopath Legion courier now.
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I will stop the day the whole DL plays the game /two-headed bear
Or the day the PS3 gets fixed and I can finally get back to Xillia.
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Fudo you've gotta stop this. I'm seriously scheming builds for douchey sociopath Legion courier now.
I keep a lot of Legion Denarii on hand at all times, so that I can put two of them on the eyes of whoever I kill.
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La Pucelle+Ragnarok: Hey, it's that Japan-only La Pucelle remake. It has an Overlord Priere sidestory. I rather enjoyed it and had a ton of time at work today. Decided to write up a summary of events as I translated the dialog (good reading practice!). Posted it in chat, but I cleaned it up and added screenshots for anyone who cares.
http://www.rpgdl.com/archives/556
Woo-hoo, new content on our main page~
It's kind of Niu's Corner-like, so I'm calling it applicable.
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Overlord Prier's combo attack with the rest of the team is absolutely great.
I was squeaking in joy when N1 brings back Light & Dark in DD2
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FO:NV - Finished Dead Money, moved on to Honest Hearts. It is a little different than I expected it to be. I was trying to smash out all the Survivalist terminals tonight before I went to bed but the game keeps fucking crashing randomly. So I just read them on wiki. Live up to the hype, nice little post apocalypse short story there.
It is terrible that it took until 2012 for this story to be told while this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-Xs1tm-9-U) got made back in 2004. At least the series got a run back in the hands of people that can do it justice again.
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From my experience the most crashing happens around that southern bridge with the beartraps. Something about it just makes everything more crash prone than usual.
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La Pucelle+Ragnarok: Hey, it's that Japan-only La Pucelle remake. It has an Overlord Priere sidestory. I rather enjoyed it and had a ton of time at work today. Decided to write up a summary of events as I translated the dialog (good reading practice!). Posted it in chat, but I cleaned it up and added screenshots for anyone who cares.
http://www.rpgdl.com/archives/556
Woo-hoo, new content on our main page~
It's kind of Niu's Corner-like, so I'm calling it applicable.
Fun read.
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Fallout New Vegas: Our dear friend Genocide Courier wakes up after being shot in the head, he's a lucky son of a gun ain't he? After going through some tests to make sure things were all alright, he gets told that old Doc Mitchell went through his stuff. A Burning Hatred never felt before whirls up inside him, and he unleashes the fury of a thousand boxing glove fists.After learning if someone gets knocked down while blocking their prone form still counts as blocking, Doc Mitchell's head is capped by a 9mm. Justice has been served. FOR NOW.
As dear Geonicde steps outside for the second time he realizes that all of Goodsprings is at fault. They condoned this, and for that they must die. The initial attack begins promisingly and the field works and bighorneers are added to the death pool. But Old Victor is another story, a cheaty story. For he can magically shoot behind himself and kill poor Genocide Courier. But he's not one to let a thing like death stop him! No, that's why boxing gloves are for. And Victor falls to the NEW KING.
The only criminals left are hold up in the saloon and store. Chet doesn't last long, leaving the last holdout of evil in Goodsprings to be raided. The fight is fierce, as both Hardcore Peter and Moony Frowns fight to the best of their hellish powers, but eventually just prevails. SUDDENLY Trudy and Joesph Cobble appear out of thin air, confirming Genocide's true suspicions, the town was full of ghosts. After he preforms an exorcism, he learns the Ringo Leader is hiding in an old gas station. He soon joins his minions in the grave.
A good deed was its own reward, because not even getting a level sure wasn't one!
Genocide was at a conundrum. Destroying Goodsprings evil in a hail of RIGHTEOUS SLAUGHTER had been a boon on the wasteland. But for whom, truly was the wasteland for? Him, him and him alone he decided. He would be the sole King of the Deathlands once he was finished. His first goal was to head north towards Vegas, but his sense indicated great danger in that direction. South meanwhile, was a gentle curve and would give loads of opportunities for leveling and easy killing.
South was for pussies.
Charging north through Cazadors, Genocide retrieves Chance's Knife giving him so real killing power. Power that failed against both the Jackal gang, Giant Mantis' and Bighorners. But Genocide was nothing if not persistent, and he slowly used every tool at his disposal. He kited the mantis and killed them with small arms, he kited the bighorners and killed them with large arms. Then he took a sidetrip to the Great Khan armory and got some very large arms. Ones that allowed him to destroy his enemies in the Jackal gang and earn the power of Love and Hate. With such power, he could take on the world. His trip northwards was pocketed by Fiend Activity, including the demise of one Mr. Cooke-Cooke, but his adventures brought him to his one friend in the wasteland.
Vendertron. Exhausting the ally of justice's money stocked, Genocide headed back north to take care of evil he passed along his route. First were the devils at Crimson Caravan, so concerned with sleep they ignored the corpses already resting on the bed. Next was North Vegas, their independance would be their undoing for no one came to save them. The next fight would be the epic of Westside. Protected by the outregeously stupid Super-Mutant Mean-sonofabitch (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-11_00003.jpg) who was always able to immediately knock down Genocide, the epic fight of justice took hours to conclude. Eventually it was decided that stopping the mutant from running faster than a cheetah would solve things. It did, eventually.
With four locations cleansed of EVIL, it was time to continue backtracking to clear the south. The Fiends and the Great Khans would be next to taste the LOVE AND HATE OF JUSTICE.
Extinct Communities
It was a GoodSprings to Die Hard (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-11_00001.jpg)
Crimson Caravan finally lives up to its name (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-11_00002.jpg)
North Vegas is now the North Graveyard (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-11_00005.jpg)
Westside is Deadside (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-11_00004.jpg)
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FO:NV - Finished Dead Money, moved on to Honest Hearts. It is a little different than I expected it to be. I was trying to smash out all the Survivalist terminals tonight before I went to bed but the game keeps fucking crashing randomly. So I just read them on wiki. Live up to the hype, nice little post apocalypse short story there.
It is terrible that it took until 2012 for this story to be told while this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-Xs1tm-9-U) got made back in 2004. At least the series got a run back in the hands of people that can do it justice again.
*Cid looks at video, wow that looks awful. Cid looks at comments, immediately feels regret*
"I liked New Vegas more due to mechanics but Fallout 3 had a much better story"
Grefter. I was trying to get over this hatred of humanity thing. Why you do this to me.
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PWDD & LLTQ recap to come, but for now...
Ys: Memories of Celceta. Started this.
<RedHairedYouth> Damn, I've lost my memories in the magic forest.
<PanickedGuy> Oh no! Monsters have invaded the mines!
<Adol> Again? Okay, memories back, muscle memory too ingrained on this, right.
The last line isn't ACTUALLY what happened but it should be.
Playing on Hard, it's nice that you can actually reduce the difficulty in-game rather than restarting. Ys 7 was in an awkward spot where the bosses were insanely hard if you refused to use items but way too easy if you did spam healing items on Normal. We'll see how Hard plays.
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You can reduce the difficulty mid-playthrough, but you can't raise it again. Just keep note of that.
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FONV: Colonel Moore says, "It is my pleasure to introduce to you the President of the New California Republic, Aaron Kimball!"
*President Kimball bravely runs away before saying a word*
Hahaha. Ah, I'd forgotten about that bit. Had not forgotten why I hate the Hoover Dam portion of the final mission. Place is fookin' confusing. Since the interior contained only an optional objective on the NCR route, I ignored it altogether (does this matter. It looked like it didn't). Oh yes, NCR/House endings down now.
House was way more satisfying to work with! Oddly, while you're functionally a lackey in both these endings, it feels much more like it when working for the NCR. You can pretty safely assume General Oliver's going to take all the credit busting in all Big Damn Heroes style after you've already killed all the bad dudes. (Who closed that door, anyway? It was open when I walked into the camp!) House talks to you more like, well, an employee, but a valued one--he tells you everything, he trusts you probably more than he should (admittedly he has little choice since he physically can't get up and do his own dirty work), and the securitrons start acting real happy to see you return once you're into the quest. I feel bad turning on him in a way I don't when turning on the NCR. Possibly this is because individual vs. abstract distant organization. But y'know, while I routinely end up idolized by the NCR when playing this game, it's less due to active enthusiasm for their policies (although I'm obliged to support any organization that ideologically opposes the Legion) and more because their citizens routinely require defense that their government cannot provide. Their leaders are talentless politicos! Someone has to pick up the slack. Meanwhile, House actually has a long-term plan and the means to actually see it through.
Then I find out he kills all my bros in Freeside. Whyyyyy. Also, man, that's what happens to Arcade when you actually complete his quest? What a bummer! Sorry man, I'm going to have leave you unfulfilled from now on. It's for your own good! But you know, I'm fine with all that, unforeseen consequences happen, etcetera. None of the endings are perfect for everybody; realistically speaking, nor should they be.
Lanius got a sneak attack missile to the face. That was pretty great. Sneak is actually pretty great! Enemies in the DLC campaigns seem to be very alert even when you've maxed the skill, but maxed stealth in the base game and you're basically invisible. Something to remember for next time.
Speaking of, though I'll definitely be taking a break to play something different before doing it, looking at melee/unarmed focus for whenever I feel like picking this up again to do a rat bastard run (explosives for backup offense because no way is going toe-to-toe with deathclaws ever feasible, right?) Not going to just straight-up kill everyone I meet, because I am not Fudo and thus retain a tenuous hold on sanity, but instead try to take the worst genuine quest resolutions the game offers me. Any time there's a trollolol option I am obliged to take it! This has obvious ramifications for Come Fly With Me, that bit with the Boomers where the guy wants to get his girlfriend through the artillery range, probably lots of other stuff I'm forgetting. Elsewise, shoot for productive sociopathy whenever possible; constructively vicious opportunism, not directionless violence! I will probably avoid Veronica, Boone and Arcade altogether. I like them too much to realistically expect I could be a dick to them. Raul can be my bro, he doesn't much give a damn who you work for! Hm, to Hardcore or not? Honestly it just looks like a hassle adding a couple extra layers of resource management to the game.
New Vegas now past SO3 for hours verifiably spent playing, but still a couple hundred behind Dark Souls. Everything conceivably loses to various iterations of Civ, but Civ games don't track your playtime (it is a part of their insidious design).
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Just remember that you can find a missing teddy for a little girl Boomer town. You can tear it apart in front of her.
FO:NV - Finished Honest Hearts. Did a save before the final mission to get both achievements since there is a distinct chance I won't ever do this again. Moved on to Old World Blues. This is pretty great and a crazy shift in quality upwards. The game not crashing every half hour helps, but just the writing is so good and recommended level 15? Next time I play I might do it low level when I am near Nipton it is so good. Crazy thing noted you can use the Autodoc to take away Skilled trait and keep 5 to all skills, so I swapped to Small Frame. I can deal with more limb damage. If I was lower level I would just take the same trait again and get a sweet +5 to all skills for no damned cost.
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Far as I know the optional doesn't accomplish a damn thing. Maybe it makes less Legion spawn in one of those towers? I don't know. Oliver obviously closed it so he could explode it open for dramatic effect. It would be just like him. Arcade can get some happy endings at least. Veronica is always screwed.
Enemies are just very alert to Sneak in DLCs, they are literally more aware of sneaking than normal movement. Lobotomites will easily pick you up halfway across the map when standing would leave them clueless.
Deathclaw hunting in melee is viable if you manage to max out your DR and DT. 10 damage! From the absolute strongest Deathclaws!
Hardcore doesn't really do that much. Oh no, dehydration! Better drink one of my 50 waters. I only ever had to reset... thrice because of comp death. There's plenty of limb-healing to go around especially if you do Honest Hearts fairly early and get the Healing Poultices. Stimpacks being HoTs instead of instant just means chomping down on half your food to get back up instead. Ammo weight was honestly the real stickler. On the other hand, Hardcore let me try a bunch of perks I'd otherwise never consider so in the end, shrug.
The even more hilarious thing about Skilled? Take it at creation for +5, take it again at the character rebuild leaving Goodsprings for another +5, then go into OWB and take it again for a grand total of +15 to all skills for an utterly minimal experience penalty.
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WC3FT: Beat the Undead campaign. Hahaha the last map is called A Symphony of Frost and Flame (https://www.google.co.jp/search?q=a+song+of+ice+an+fire&oq=a+song+of+ice+an+fire&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i64l2.2275j0j7&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=122&ie=UTF-8). Well played, game.
Undead campaign needed way more Dark Ranger. Easily the best character, and that's ignoring the fact that I think she's the most fun hero to control. Perhaps the only one who isn't too holy for her britches but also isn't obsessed with obsession. Naga Queen is fun too.
Game makes me wish I had gotten into RTS years ago, because I could see myself really enjoying WC3 1v1... except that SC2 is way better in every way except for its lack of Heroes (which arguably makes for a better 1v1 RTS anyway).
Compared to Reign of Chaos, Frozen Throne had a lot more gimmick maps... well, gimmick maps that altered your playstyle. This is to it's benefit. Straight macro games are boring against the AI on normal, and the Hard AI pulls a lot of bullshit that would be interesting in a better game but just makes things take longer in this one. The most fun maps for me ended up being the Alliance campaign maps, with the Tower Defense, DOTA/Footies-style You-Only-Control-Your-Heroes, and the last map where you control two teams down different corridors. Even the maps where you controlled two bases (last Night Elf/Sentinel, and the last Dark Ranger) maps were thoroughly enjoyable. The only gimmick I didn't like was the ship transport maps, which felt like they took over the majority of the game.
Will play the Orc campaign and then move onto SC2 WoL, and after that HotS. Since Starcraft 2 is a way better game, I will play that on Brutal. Assuming that my internet connection doesn't make it unviable, I will be streaming this nonsense at the behest of certain benefactors.
EDIT: Orc Campaign is a boring man's Diablo so I am bored.
SC2WoL: Jim, Jim, Mengsk isn't inside the TV. Shooting the TV won't help anything. You are from the future you should know how television works.
Also how does Tychus pee? He is sealed in his marine suit.
Is that what stimpack is?
How... how does he go #2?
Already SC2 has raised far more questions than WC3 ever will.
(Too bad there ever won't be WC4 since WoW is such a cash cow... SC2-level multiplayer with WC3-style Hero mechanics? I'd be all over that shit in a hot, sweaty, Scottish minute.)
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The final moral is, in FONV, the only ending where you'll probably get what you want is the Independent ending, because the only person you can completely trust is yourself.
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It's like what they say about secrets, three men can keep a secret, if two of them are dead. Except in this case its more like the entire population of the Mojave.
Genocide Couriers adventure returns him to the Red Rock Canyon and his arch-nemesis the Great Khans. Despite supposedly having legendary toughness, the Khans die to an endless storm of their own knives. They drop some nice trophies for Vendortron to take a gander at. Following the righteous extermination of the Khans, the next target would be the Vile Fiends. Lady Dame Vioeltta nearly managed a kill with only a single dog, but true grit prevails. World Championship Driver Nephi takes his swing at stopping Genocide, but he fails and his 9-iron falls into the right hands. With my tools for the task, South Vegas falls beneath a slaughter of epic legal murder. Vault 3 is breached, and all of its occupants slain to the last again.
With the west won, Genocide sets his sights on taking care of more of the north, the "Freeside" area. Already does the den of evil recognize his heroism. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-12_00004.jpg) But after clearing the streets and the one store peddling its evil wares, the sight comes into view of a FORT OF EVIL. Inside are a dozen battle-hardened monsters, including a white-clothed demon who somehow survived a sneak crit and rallied its forces. But brave Genocide was not to be overcome! And he won out the day, once again.
With the north secure, for now, sights were set east. The Sharecropper farms, who now only raise corpses, and the Aerotech Refuge Park are both wiped out. An attack on a small water post to the south is interuppted by the first-ever Ranger Hit team. Cowards that they are, they run in fear claiming "Ohhhh we're letting you live". Well Genocide didn't let them live. Following that, the last bastion of the Followers of the Apocalypse fell to Armageddon. The sole remaining member died valiantly at the 188 Trading Post, but he was only the first of many casualties at the post.
Needing to repair his weapons, Genocide headed to the REPCONN HQ to find some scrap electronics. But no robot held such guts. On leaving, Genocide encountered the one enemy even he could not defeat, crashing.
Extinct Communities
Red Rock Canyon gets its name from the Khan blood spilled on all the rocks. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-12_00002.jpg)
Vault 3 had its second run in with Genocide. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-12_00003.jpg)
Old Mormon Fort's current occupants went the way of the original occupants. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-12_00005.jpg)
The only refuge in the Aerotech Office Park is from the harshness of living.
NCR Sharecroppers only share in death now. (Both of these were too dull to capture.)
The 188 Trading Post is enacted at the crossroads of Death and Die. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-12_00006.jpg)
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Guacamelee: Goddamn I want a burrito right now.
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Paper Mario Sticker Star - Annnd finally done! The Bowser fight was quite nasty, mainly due to the second fight -requiring- you to end a high-defense Whomp rather quick lest he overwhelms you, and the first phase's MT emphasis can also seriously hamper you. Bowser being spiky-class doesn't help matters either! Still nothing some preparatory measures with stickers couldn't do. Boom Box is a lifesaver in the fight.
In the end, the game sorta lost a bit of steam by the last stages, but the bases it works off are way too strong. Very elegant, efficiency-emphasizing battle design and some really fun boss fights (at least until the third stage: the fourth and fifth boss are quite disappointing, though Bowser Jr. has a cute gimmick and Bowser himself is a -great- fight). The biggest problem I see with the game besides the hit-and-miss level design (even though I freaking love the idea itself - the stage division makes the game really friendly to play in short bursts) is how sparse the writing in general is. Seriously, a game where Bowser gets no screentime? It's not even particularly humorous, though it doesn't take itself seriously either.
On the other hand, the sheer fourth wall breaking with emphasizing the paper world even further just makes the game's atmosphere five kinds of surreal. The sticker idea makes the entire quest flaunt a strange aesthetic dadaism, and that's charming as fuck. The Thing sticker descriptions are also golden. Anyhow, I can see how I could -dislike- the game having played former entries in the series, but the fundamentals in battle design are way too solid and I enjoyed the weird game structure anyway. 7/10 works, and if this is a bad entry in the series, I can't wait to play the rest.
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Picked up a Vita and PS+, so I grabbed:
Sonic & All Stars Racing Transformed - Surprisingly good racing game. Reaching the point where I have to clear things in Hard or Expert to get enough stars to progress, which is annoying. Hard is doable on some challenges(Race, Battle, Duel, Pursuit) but on others...not so much. Hell, I can't even complete Medium on most Sprint maps. Still, game is a pretty fun time waster. Vyse has been my main, followed by Tails, Alex Kidd and Knuckles. I wanted to use BD Joe, but even with mods that increase his handling he is just so hard to control. Now that I have Vyse maxed out, and Tails/Alex are right behind him, I think I may start using Joe Musashi and Beat.
Gravity Rush: Interesting game, though not enjoying it too much thus far. Maybe once stuff picks up or the plot becomes comprehensible at all it'll get better?
P4 Golden: It's Persona 4. 10/10 and all that jazz.
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PW5: Just beat first trial of Case 2! This game is...well...PW...with shinier graphics...what's not to love?
Bayonetta hard Mode: Just beat Chap 2. It's a typical DMC-ish Hard Mode, so yeah, I know what I'm getting myself into. Glad to know I haven't lost all my skills in this game despite a hiatus.
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Fallout Genocide: Following his deadly rematch with Crashing, Genocide makes his way east, towards stuff! But then heads north, for the loot. Eventually his wilely ways wrap him around to the west again, west in need of armor. Armor that helps, during his brutal no-hold barred assault at the Great Camp McCarren. The NCR's deadliest sharpshooters cannot do anything to what they can't see. Those trapped inside the main building are separate, weak, easy pickings to being exploded. The handful of troops left cower in watchtowers, but the NCR's own weapons turn against them, and the only thing left, is silence.
Seeking to stop this madness, a second Ranger Kill Team is dispatched during Genocide's travels. After he deals with them, he learns a shocking truth! He's too feable to get the Unstoppable Force perk! Oh noes, to the robot land he must go to get a point of strength! But what does he do with this level perk now? Why, remember he's actually a cannibal! Hmmm mmm Ranger flesh give him your powers.
Speaking of rangers, hello Boulder City! Goodbye inhabitants of Boulder City! You'll be remembered as delicious.
Following that mighty segue. Genocide has to pass south. Along the way he comes across a few scattering of folk, who all join the wasteland dead. Though some dogs give him a good run for his life, No-Bark doesn't, and becomes the first death in Novac. He wasn't the last. The residents were unable to figure out their assailant, even when they were having husbands eaten right around the corner. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-13_00005.jpg) A stealthy extermination campaign is brutally waged, even against a new Victor robot, but eventually Vac is secure and eaten.
Continuing on south, Ranger Station Charlie is dealt with, before a mysterious Blue Beam Teleports Genocide to a new place. A lifeless place. Well, once he was done with it. Death ruled the day at Big MT. Genocide saw fit to that.
Extinct Communities
Genocide managed to solve Camp McCarren's food problems twice over. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-13_00001.jpg)
The Last Thing First Recon Never Saw Wasn't Me. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-13_00003.jpg)
Genocide topped Hanlon's Strategy at Boulder City by leaving no survivors. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-13_00004.jpg)
Newly renamed town "Vac" holds its first dinner. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-13_00007.jpg)
Ranger Station Charlie was exterminated ahead of schedule.
The Old World Blues are played over the gravestone of the Big Empty.
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i n d i e g a m e s
Hack, Slash, Loot: obtuse 8-bit roguelike, only reason to play more is TRADING CARDS
Lume: 3 minutes in, stupid wire puzzle, lmao point and click
Madballs: A TPS where you're a ball, kinda boring but not offensive. Actually beat this one
Blocks That Matter: Alright game in the brand new uncharted indie game genre of puzzle platformer, easily the best game here. Pretty hard, I'm 2bad to get all the special blocks
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Rogue Legacy - played through
Beat the game with the 200th child.
Highly entertaining. Not enough to make me want to do any new game plus material, though.
Bone: Out From Boneville - played through
Crushingly mediocre. Actually makes me kinda relieved that they stopped making the series after only two games, assuming that the other one isn't going to have a dramatic jump in quality.
I especially dislike how the game doesn't lock the mouse into the window, even in fullscreen mode, and there are minigames where you need to move characters left and right by waving it left and right and jump via clicking. They move slowly enough to begin with, I don't need the further obstruction of the game losing focus when other applications end up being clicked on.
Bravely Default - Got what I'm going to call the early ending, as I don't know what people are calling them and I don't know what the other is like.
Endings aside, I guess I like the idea of where the game's been going, but the implementation is terrible and just make it feel like it's dragging horribly, and the payoff so far has been far from worth it.
Currently in world T minus 2, they've changed things up a bit, but it's not really helping. I guess at least it looks like there might be one plotline resolved here. Maybe.
Floods of Shadowflare are continuing to serve me well. Salve-makers for best class.
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Fallout Genocide: Fresh from his adventures in Genocide Mountain, Genocide Courier sets his sights on getting himself a new weapon. One that requires taking care of the rest of "Freeside" in the process. It's a tumultuous plan, as the speedy MISTER SOREN escapes thrice, before the swift fists of genocide reach him. His half-dozen guards fall easily right after. But from their corpses Genocide learns of something even greater, the KING OF EVIL. Inside his SCHOOL OF EVIL he waits behind loked door for the confrontation a long time coming. It is swift, it is brutal, but before long the KING OF EVIL is slain and devoured. His minions following him to the grave.
But evil, would have one last laugh, as the secret weapon Genocide was searching for never appeared...
Seeking a way to vent his frustrations, Genocide headed north, through a land of explosions that never hurt him. His assailants thought to ensnare him with words of control, but he ensnared them with fists of death.
Finding no true solution to his problems here, he returned to the center, to face the truth once and for all. The Robotic Minions protecting the stripe fell like all those before. Fearing for their robotic lives, they opened the way to the Lucky 38 in a last desperate bid for defense. It failed. But Genocide was a form of mercy that day, he wouldn't go for the kill immediately. No, the arms and legs of the stripe would be cut off first. The Omertas were the first target of the day. They wouldn't be the last... but the day had ended.
Extinct Communities
The only thing that rules Fresside is death. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-15_00001.jpg)
The only thing about the Boomers that explodes is their heads. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-15_00002.jpg)
Never play with fire, and never fuck with the Courier. Two lessons the Omertas failed. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-16_00001.jpg)
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Civ 5 - Hooray, 2/2 on Emperor difficulty. I keep telling myself I'm done with the game but it never seems to happen.
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All the more turns.
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Just N+1 more turns than intended (For very large values of N).
Fallout: New Vegas - Finished Lonesome Road then finished the game getting No Godes, No Masters. Good ending. Mostly good things happen if you let them.
Ulysses was pretty great. Lonesome Road really ties together themes from the other DLCs pretty well, its neat seeing someone do a series of DLC that have their own narrative arc and the pay off in Lonesome Road really shines. There isn't much to say, its a boat load of flavour slowly drizzled to a peak at the end of it. It does kind of make me want to reread the Odyssey but I remember how fucking long it is, so that may not happen. Its a smart chunk of writing that doesn't hold your hand through it too much. It makes reference to a lot of things and lets the player get the reference or gently nudges you along the gist of it without getting super explicit about it or beating you over the head with the references (unless you are Otter then you will probably eyeroll infinitely because its talking directly at areas of his expertise).
They would all work fine standalone really. Honest Hearts feels like the weakest link narratively, while Dead Money I think is the worst gameplay wise. At least Dead Money is interesting, but Honest Hearts is frankly kind of boring. May be coloured by the fact that it crashed a billion times. Old World Blues is probably the most consistently good. It also benefits from being the one for lowest level. The stupid gameplay of Dead Money doesn't get frustrating and annoying. You always feel like you are being rewarded for what you are doing, unlike Honest Hearts (Dead Money you don't feel rewarded either... but just progressing is a thing there). Lonesome Road just throws new gear at you like candy because fuck it, its the end of the game's lifecycle and by the time you beat it you are functionally done, even if you went straight there. OWB on the other hand always feels like you are being rewarded with crazy weird new stuff and doing something new. It only really drags when you are opening up higher ranks of the Stealth Suit and some other stuff. Otherwise it works really well. Props to it for having minor endings unlock based on discovery on the map to and directing you to most of it but not all of it. Fun DLC all round.
Replay of the game makes me unsure if I will replay though. The writing is still top notch, but the gameplay really grates a second time, especially after yet one more Beth game that I kind of didn't hate coming out making me realised the only time I enjoy this engine is on super easy when you totally skip the gameplay really puts a damper on it. Sadly the Fallout variant of it is still probably the best with limb damage letting you influence the combat somewhat more. Just ARGH this engine is always so unstable and both teams that have worked with it make combat feel like really slow number generators bumping into each other until one of them is empty. At least Skyrim is a little less fragile (from memory?). But all three of the ones that used this specific iteration of the engine are crazy crazy buggy (Oblivion, FO3 and NV) and not in the fun (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITOrKb5HP6s) way, but in the crash to desktop need to restart the game way. Some points I was doing it every 10 minutes or so on average.
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Fallout Genocide: Genocide's adventures continue in the Stripe, clearing out more and more of its population. Next is the fabled White Glove Society, in another life they might be brothers-in-arms of him, but in this life they're just another feast waiting to happen. Along the path of carnage, Genocide has a brilliant idea! Try and pickpocket before brutally murdering them all and get that stupid achievement out of the way! If would eventually succeed, far, far into the future. After dining on delicious comrade flesh, Courier heads out to his next goal... THE HIDDEN VALLEY BUNKER.
The Brotherhood of Steel DARES him to try anything. HE CALLED THEIR BLUFF. Then he called them dead. That's another 20 dog tags to add to the growing pile with the NCR ones. With the Brotherhood's evil wiped out, next was finally dealing with Mr. House and Benny. First came the man in the checkered suit. His goons attempted to stop Genocide, but they were no match for being cut apart at lightning speed. Benny's attempt backfired so spectacularly that he ended up dead by his own gun. Genocide cleared the rest of the tops, including the destruction of some odd robot in a backroom. Probably nothing.
Leaving the Tops, Genocide is accused by two factions vying for his favor. One of those does not take a single step further. But using his foresight, Genocide knows he must use the other to ensure one of his TRUE targets even arrives. But before that is taking care of another, so seeped in EVIL it had wrecked his mortal form. But what applies to wine applies to flesh as well. Mister House was utterly delectable. Speeding on, Genocide hurries through the NCR villainy, until the President of EVIL arrives. He soon leaves. THIS MORTAL COIL.
With another Champion of Evil devoured. It's time to make SMILES appear on a big screen. This returns robot soldiers to the Stripe's surface, but not for long. With the Stripe clear again, Genocide heads south to target the last Champion. Taking care of outliers at Nipton, Raid Camp and the Camp Searchlight, Genocide approaches the feedpost of Cottonwood Cove. Attired in Legion garb, he slips in after learning all he can from some guy on fire. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-16_00006.jpg) What he learns is that everything will die. Some family members will even get to watch their beloveds be devoured in front of their eyes. With the feed camp eaten, Genocide makes for his true goal.
THE FORT OF ETERNAL EVIL. Still hidden by his armor, Genocide sneaks in effortlessly, but a mistake with explosives results in him getting spotted eating someone. Popping all his MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS, he charges in with a blistering endless wave of knife slashes. Genocide strikes so quickly that he somehow manages to knock someone unconscious using a knife. Following this, he attacks the final Champion. His knife strikes true, earning him a great EXP reward and more importantly, Light Armor that isn't garbage for DT and health. His next goal is activating a robot army. The guards accost him, staring in wonder at the President's Assassin despite the utterly ridiculous contrivance needed to even get that message to appear. They then die. In the bunker, the Rads push him on quickly, the bunker starting to explode make him move even faster.
More... for a later time...
Extinct Communities
The White Glove Societies Bathes are heating up with Genocide's special ingredient; fiery corpses. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-16_00002.jpg)
Professor Genocide gives a lecture on "Exterminating the Brotherhood of Steel" at Hidden Valley Bunker. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-16_00003.jpg)
Benny took a gamble on ruling New Vegas, but he and the chairman lost it all instead. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-16_00004.jpg)
The Stripe was cleansed of all living things.
President Kimbell's Speech was interrupted by a sudden case of everyone dying. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-16_00005.jpg)
Nipton is now an even bigger ghost-town.
The Legion Raid Camp was raided by the reaper.
Everyone went together to death at Camp Searchlight.
The Feeding Pens at Cottenwood Cove were all full up. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-16_00007.jpg)
Genocide Rules the Fort atop his Throne of Corpses (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-16_00008.jpg)
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Tales From Space: Mutant Blobs Attack - played through
Fun little game. I was never really able to get used to the controls though, which made some parts more difficult than they should have been.
Bravely Default - Got what I'm going to call the circle ending.
Unhappily, the game never really got out of its slump.
It feels like half the storyline isn't listening to what the other half is saying either, which bugs me. For examples:
* The party keeps saying things like 'This crystal has reverted' long after the point at which they know they're going to parallel worlds, and getting surprised by there being ghosts on the ghost ship when it's the third time they've gone there, and so on.
* The angel apparently somehow visited every world, which doesn't really make sense given that it's supposed to be a single entity. I can't really imagine that X of them managed to pull the same thing off and they all managed to visit the worlds the party ended up in, especially since it can be assumed that parties normally 'awakened' at least one world, and there should consequently be less of them than there are worlds for them to visit.
* EDIT: Wait, I'm just going over the post-game notes additions, and apparently DeRosso's final speech was supposed to be him granting immortality to himself in the past? That makes even LESS sense because there's DEFINITELY only one DeRosso doing this. What the heck is this.
* Parallel parties exist on the parallel worlds belonging to 'Friends', which can't be true unless there are multiple Airys (because any worlds she's been to, she's either killed the party of or took it to subsequent worlds.) One of the friend worlds actually has Ringabel and Alternis show up together!
Of course every parallel world has every chest/gate you've opened still opened, most of the time you never find out what happened to the parallel versions of the party members, no-one cares that there's a second Grandship in the world...
Some of the theories I had were right, some of them were wrong. So it goes. None of the minor asterisk holder plots ever really get fleshed out, unhappily. It's never explained why so many people are being allowed to be so reprehensible.
Medication still the best ability set. Sadly, the final circle boss went on for so long that I ran out of dragon fangs. I ate a couple of bravely seconds that I hadn't been using and threw some of the absurd friend summons I had on hand at it, dealt with that problem fairly handily. Good times.
I'm not going to bother trying to take out the superboss. Never really bothered with any of the nemeses either, and that's also something I'm not planning on doing.
I want to know what Airy's wings looked like back when she had ~10,000 worlds to go.
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KH 3DS - What an incoherent mess.
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You misspelled Glorious.
(The scenes will flip, more or less at random, between complete dud, surprisingly effective, and glorious trainwreck. It's kinda great.)
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Doesn't that sum up the Kingdom Hearts series as a whole though?
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Dream Drop Distance is basically distilled essence of Kingdom Hearts, yes.
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Ys Memories of Celceta: Yeesh they could have named this game "Ys 7: Part 2." Same controls, same system with Slash / blunt / pierce typing & weakness hitting, same annoying skill usage grinding, same super-move system, same beat-the-snot out of resource piles to pick up goodies. Also Adol starts with a big burly punchy dude to provide dialogue due to Adol's crippling larynghitis, and then proceeds to promptly recruit a spunky orange-haired princess. Luckily, I liked Ys 7, so this is okay, just surprised they didn't insert some kind of new gimmick.
I will say more generally that the dodge button in Ys 7 / MoC seems a bit overcentralizing. To compare with Ys Origin, for example, only one character has a dash in it - and he's the short range only character that often needs to use it to *close*. A nice long dodge/roll here seems a generic "get out of trouble free" card if you time it up with the enemy attack, so you rarely get yourself into trouble with bad positioning. Then again, it's still early yet (~3-4 hours in), so we'll see.
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Fallout Genocide: Flush with his victory over all the Champions of Evil, Genocide heads up a charge along the west bank of the colorado to clear more enemies. Ranger Stations, Echo, Delta and Alpha all fall, while the camps at Forlorn Hope and Nelson break as well. Though during the rampage at the Nelson, some things happened. Attempting to cut down the troopers crucified at Nelson (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-18_00001.jpg) ended up freeing them in odd, odd ways. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-18_00002.jpg) But it was no matter as they soon died like so many others.
With the banks cleared, Genocide spied the mighty Camp Golf in the distance. It was time for Nephi's 9-Iron to return to its true home. Ingress unto the green was quick and easy and Genocide began by eliminating the command tent then removing the outer sentries. Once finished, he dealt with the camps primary threat, the Misfits. Magically able to tell when one another was hurt, Genocide's sneak attempt failed, and thus forced a mad assault on the resort proper. The Ranger Vets would not give up without a fight, but MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS could win all fights.
Next came securing the Lake edge itself. Lakelurks, cazadors and various wildlife attempted to stop the attack, but nothing could. Not even the next targets, the Bitter Springs area, or Ranger Station Bravo. Their resources now aided the Genocide. Taking his views in a different direction, he struck at the final bastions of energy for his enemies. El Dorado Substation fell easily, but obnoxiousness at Helios One's entrance forced two restarts. But MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS solve everything. It wasn't long before another location fell to Genocide's decrees.
Extinct Communities
Ranger Station Echo is just an echo.
Nelson is back in my hands.
Camp Forlorn Hope has finally given up the Ghost.
Ranger Station Delta is no more.
Ranger Station Alpha was not first into the grave.
The misfits aren't the only ones up for review on under-preforming at Camp Golf. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-18_00003.jpg)
Bitter Springs Massacre 2: Courier Boogaloo (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-18_00004-1.jpg)
Ranger Station Bravo no longer has to worry about Legion Raiding parties.
El Dorado Substation's power is being used for the righteous cause of death.
The AWESOME POWER OF THE SUN at Helios One was nothing compared to the AWESOME POWER OF MY FISTS.
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Bsldur's Gate - I wasn't sure what to play after FO:NV so when I scrolled past the Enhanced edition in my steam library I defaulted to it. Tweak pack with assorted changes is the only mod installed. Bhallspawn is a Halfing Kensai using daggers. I wanted to get some use out of 2D4 throwing daggers in BG2 and because I am sick of hearing about how great certain weapon types are because after your +15 damage a swing from enchantment, Strength and Expertise omg this one can totally do 2 more damage sometimes!!!! Smaller weapons are totally viable. The only thing that really sinks a build is weapon availability. So anyone that has played can tell you there is annoying fucking daggers you always vendor aplenty.
Also I get to run around as a naked halfling fucking people up with a knife, so you know, a fantasy of mine.
Party picked is Imoen, Khalid, Jaheira, Viconia, Khivan. A pretty stock party and I already regret not trying the new PCs, but I missed them on the way down to Nashkel so didn't get them and I am obsessive about committing to a team. It is weird not having a Mage at all. Imoen is nearly level 7 where I will swap her over though. I cleared most of the map already, up to Cloakwood. Durlag's Tower still not done or any of the expansion dungeons, but otherwise it is BG and Cloakwood left to go. Of course the run where I have no Mage an Ogre Mage drops a scroll of Fireball in a random encounter. Normally you either have to clear Firewine Bridge with it's annoying suicide lightning bolt Mage or get to the city itself to get it. So getting it from some trash random encounter was lucky.
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Soul Sacrifice: Picked this up today because PS+ had it on a p.big sale. Still getting the hang of it, early in the game and all. Not entirely certain what I think of it, to be honest. It's kinda fun, but also kinda clunky. Will probably require greater action game reflexes then I possess(outside of musou) but even if the late-game gets frustratingly hard I doubt I'll feel like it was a waste of 10 bucks so whatevs.
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FFX- Halfway through the highroad or so. The AP system annoys the hell out of me (Let PC's you don't rotate into battle get EXP, thanks), but I'm finally just starting to get into fights. The beginning part of FFX is super light on combat and heavy on plot, but that is shifting now finally.
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I was going to buy FFVI for my phone because I only get to carry so many portable electronic devices on myself at my age. I'm glad the store has screenshots right on the page cause I totally would have bought it otherwise. Barkley Shut Up and Jam Gaiden looks better than that, and it was made to look intentionally shitty as a joke.
e: Also it has an unavoidable freeze in Thamasa when playing on several of the more popular Android phones, including my own, so dodged another bullet. NeoGAF delivers this zinger:
"Final Fantasy 6 on Android is, technically speaking, the first version of the game where General Leo does not die."
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Fallout Genocide: Following his victory at Helios One, Genocide clashed again with his true enemy, Crashing. After a half-dozen times, he finally makes it through to victory. The Bright Cult at REPCONN Test Sight get devoured, the Mojave Outpost falls to superior force, Primm's is cleared of all convicts, townspeople and troopers, NCR Correctional--somehow ignorant of Joe Cobb's death--become the next victims. Unfortunately, their stance in live brutally changes Genocide's karma, reflecting it from the depths of extreme to nearly the positive opposite. Even stealing all he could accomplished nothing. The attack on Black Mountain and Sloan achieved no change either. Enraged, Genocide charged into the Quarry Junction, ready to hurl himself into combat with Deadly Deathclaws, but none could stand before his blazing sword. Back in the west, Genocide cleared out the criminals in Vault 34, ending the threat of the Powder Gangers forever. The Khans, now eradicated to the last didn't even bother to show up again, leaving only one last target. Heading north, then swinging back south, Genocide finishes off Ranger Station Foxtrot, ending the final NCR outpost in the Mojave, and very nearly one of the last settlements left period. The last was Jacobstown, fresh with Pushy on his hand and Legendary Cazadore blood all over, Genocide waged a brutal assault on the last refuge of everything in the Mojave. The Super Mutants attempted one last defense, but like all others they were nothing before Genocide's might. Standing above it all, Genocide debates whether to clear out all animal life, or investigate odd signals coming from beyond the Mojave...
Extinct Communities
REPCONN Test Site now contains ghoul bones amongst its scavenge.
The Mojave Outpost is no longer the NCR's border post. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-19_00001.jpg)
The only thing inevitable in life is death and taxes, and the first certainly applies to Primm. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-19_00002.jpg)
The only thing corrected at NCR Correctional was that pesky living problem for the inmates. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-19_00003.jpg)
Red Mountain sends no more signals.
Sloan is even less relevant with everyone dead.
Vault 34's current inhabitants are just as dead as those who left.
The only thing bleeding at the Thorn is the patrons.
Ranger Station Foxtrot Uniform Bravo Alpha Romeo.
Jacobstown is now safe from anti-mutant reprisals, because there are no mutants left.
Or in short, all of them.
Genocide has cleansed 2272 enemies from the Mojave. L39, OWB DLC, 32 Hours.
Heavy slew 1947 enemies in his long travels. L50, all DLCs, 75 Hours.
AMR anti-materialed 1627 enemies in his life. L50, all DLCs, 45 Hours.
Pacifist Courier has never killed anyone, scouts honor! L42, OWB, LR DLCs 35 Hours.
Return of Courier returned 1806 enemies to non-existance. L47, all DLCs, 66 Hours.
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KH 3DS - Still an incoherent mess. The Drop mechanic is a goddamn pain in the ass, it continuously breaks the momentum of the game and makes keeping track of whatever the hell you're doing annoying as fuck. Whoever approved its implementation should be shot in the back with a BB gun until the end of time.
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Fallout Genocide: Following his victory at Helios One, Genocide clashed again with his true enemy, Crashing. After a half-dozen times, he finally makes it through to victory. The Bright Cult at REPCONN Test Sight get devoured, the Mojave Outpost falls to superior force, Primm's is cleared of all convicts, townspeople and troopers, NCR Correctional--somehow ignorant of Joe Cobb's death--become the next victims. Unfortunately, their stance in live brutally changes Genocide's karma, reflecting it from the depths of extreme to nearly the positive opposite. Even stealing all he could accomplished nothing. The attack on Black Mountain and Sloan achieved no change either. Enraged, Genocide charged into the Quarry Junction, ready to hurl himself into combat with Deadly Deathclaws, but none could stand before his blazing sword. Back in the west, Genocide cleared out the criminals in Vault 34, ending the threat of the Powder Gangers forever. The Khans, now eradicated to the last didn't even bother to show up again, leaving only one last target. Heading north, then swinging back south, Genocide finishes off Ranger Station Foxtrot, ending the final NCR outpost in the Mojave, and very nearly one of the last settlements left period. The last was Jacobstown, fresh with Pushy on his hand and Legendary Cazadore blood all over, Genocide waged a brutal assault on the last refuge of everything in the Mojave. The Super Mutants attempted one last defense, but like all others they were nothing before Genocide's might. Standing above it all, Genocide debates whether to clear out all animal life, or investigate odd signals coming from beyond the Mojave...
Extinct Communities
REPCONN Test Site now contains ghoul bones amongst its scavenge.
The Mojave Outpost is no longer the NCR's border post. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-19_00001.jpg)
The only thing inevitable in life is death and taxes, and the first certainly applies to Primm. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-19_00002.jpg)
The only thing corrected at NCR Correctional was that pesky living problem for the inmates. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2014-01-19_00003.jpg)
Red Mountain sends no more signals.
Sloan is even less relevant with everyone dead.
Vault 34's current inhabitants are just as dead as those who left.
The only thing bleeding at the Thorn is the patrons.
Ranger Station Foxtrot Uniform Bravo Alpha Romeo.
Jacobstown is now safe from anti-mutant reprisals, because there are no mutants left.
Or in short, all of them.
Genocide has cleansed 2272 enemies from the Mojave. L39, OWB DLC, 32 Hours.
Heavy slew 1947 enemies in his long travels. L50, all DLCs, 75 Hours.
AMR anti-materialed 1627 enemies in his life. L50, all DLCs, 45 Hours.
Pacifist Courier has never killed anyone, scouts honor! L42, OWB, LR DLCs 35 Hours.
Return of Courier returned 1806 enemies to non-existance. L47, all DLCs, 66 Hours.
Remember, there are still people to kill. After all, you can't kill General Kimball or Lanius before the final mission!
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Oh, they'll get theirs soon enough, mwhahahahaha.
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Fudo how in the hell did you get corpses up on the light fixtures.
I'm really curious what your ending's going to look like on this run. >.> I mean, does even the independent Vegas route function with Yes Man dead?
Also oh fuck it.
FONV: Azula has landed in the Mojave. All shall be reduced to minion status or to red paste!
The road to conquest starts in Goodsprings, where we encounter an enterprising young man with dreams of modest temporal power and encourage his gang for our own personal benefit. During the course of the ensuing battle for the town we personally kill Easy Pete, Trudy, Doc Mitchell, Sunny Smiles, and finally Cheyenne. In short, everyone of consequence (read: named) in town. Despite apparently contributing nothing to the fight, two of our allies die. These "Powder Gangers" are worthless even as fodder! But their ringleader tells us he has a boss he wants to impress somewhere and directs us to the nearby prison to meet him. Perhaps this time we'll find a man of better caliber?
Alas, no. The first thing he asks us to do is beat some of his own flunkies into compliance. You shouldn't expect anything from a man that can't keep his house in order, so when the local authorities move in on the prison, we quietly slip away south. Maybe the forces of law and order will have something to offer us instead? However, though we find many and more of them along the road, almost to a man each officer begs us to complete some task that they are too weak to see through themselves. Disappointment abounds! Why is it so difficult to find reliable friends underlings these days?
So we follow the plume of smoke in search of anyone with real vision. Amidst a barbecue with all the crucifixin's we find a nice man with a dog on his head that shares with us his vision of a world set ablaze. We are interested in his views and wish to subscribe to his newsletter.
Though promising, we have reason to doubt the worthiness of his friends. As a test of their skill and readiness, we infiltrate one of their minor camps and untie a couple prisoners. The prisoners flee in broad daylight, and their captors do not pursue evidently just because they did not see us untie the prisoners. One wonders who the guards thought was responsible for releasing them? Clearly they earned freedom by untying their own bonds.
Also, we hear that Dog-Hat's friends are very keen on repressing women. Well, if any of them tries repressing us, we'll just repress them back with interest.
We stop in Novac to convert a useful if somewhat emo sniper to our cause, and here the fatigue of the journey must be telling because we do not in fact give him the name of some totally random civilian to murder by way of purchasing his loyalty. [Look this whole evil thing's a little awkward for me okay, anyway since I pickpocketed Jeannie May on a whim and wound up with her key I figured I might as well use it.] We make up for this lapse by promptly directing the spacecraft of a gang of trusting evangelicals on an express trip to the ground.
~
Mechanical stuffs:
-I was planning on taking the Skilled trait anyway, and eagerly abused the opportunity to use it twice once I heard of that. That + high INT + Educated = I'm probably maxing all skills this time. Not that it matters because I have zero intention of ever using guns or energy weapons, but I have to have the skill points, all the skill points. That said, Science/Lockpicking have been ignored so far and it's really weird having to actually use the many workarounds the game gives you instead of just hacking through every obstacle.
-S.P.E.C.I.A.L.: 8/1/8/6/8/8/1. Add 1 to everything but PER post-implants. I thought I'd be able to nab every implant this time, but apparently the game checks only your starting END to determine the limit, not your boosted END. Not like I care about PER at all on this run, but it still annoys me missing only one of them. I was also curious what effect extremes of LUC would have on the game but haven't noticed much of anything.
-Implants are of course where pretty much all my money has gone. Now that I have all the ones I can take (outside of OWB), there is basically nothing to ever spend money on again and I'm maybe a third through the game. Not even on weapons! I mean, there is a super-expensive fist weapon at the Gun Runners, but it looks worse than Gehenna and I've already got that.
-Speaking of Gehenna is sooo good (perhaps the same could be said of ALL religious weapons!) Melee is actually pretty stellar if you can just avoid getting shot to pieces before you close range! Prioritized Sneak for this purpose, Love and Hate main weapon for a large portion of the game so far and I could reliably one-shot pretty much anybody from stealth. You punch people in the chest and their heads fall off, it's pretty great. Also, fun fact: if someone can't see you, they also can't hear or feel you cutting them in half with a chainsaw. Look this is 2014, there's no Listen/Spot anymore, it's all just Perception.
-Animal Friend is hilarious when it kicks in (nightstalker posses, tribes of happy little R.U.S.s romping around Vault 11!) but in practice that isn't very often. So many areas just don't contain animals. Also for some reason fire geckos still hate you, and since it's not Insect Friend the most terrifying enemies in the game remain the physical manifestation of eternal hatred for all that lives and breathes. I guess there are worse things to spend a couple perks on than novelty value, though.
-Hardcore mode mostly just a minor nuisance. The limb damage not healing normally thing bugged the shit out of me early on (especially since I'd killed Doc Mitchell and had no way to get fully healed until hitting Novac) but now people tend to not see me until it's too late so whatevs. And the ammo weight thing doesn't even matter since pure melee. I honestly just sell whatever ammo I happen to accidentally pick up (except for grenades and missiles, stockpiling for the possibility of nuking people lategame. Damn missiles are heavy though).
-Of course, I still savescum to keep allies alive, just like I did in Fallout 2. Look I need a packmule around okay? Hm? What for since I basically don't need money ever again? Don't ask stupid questions.
-Wait companions can get poisoned? Did not know that. Takes its sweet time going away, too.
-Level 22 and Dead Wind Cavern/Quarry Junction still terrify. I've chopped up a couple stray deathclaws, but a whole pack's something else altogether. Definitely getting Slayer and probably Purifier before even making the attempt.
-Actually talking to the Legion officers for once only makes me want to punch their heads off even more. That said, I wonder if I can reach Idolized with both NCR and Legion simultaneously? I'm betting I can!
-We Will All Go Together went off without a hitch for the first time ever. Camp Searchlight still had its revenge by shifting my karma positive through all those ghoul kills (in fairness, Vault 3 probably contributed too). In spite of razing Goodsprings, Come Crash With Me, talking the Khans down in Boulder City and then instructing the NCR troops to massacre them, I'm still classified a bloody saint by the game. Karma's so messed up.
-Man there is like nothing different clearing Vault 19 in Cooke's favor. Lem just locks his room instead of him, then they all wind up with the Khans anyway. Which is fine since this time I have no intention of talking the Khans out of their eventual enslavement. Enjoy your deathtrap, girls!
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Getting the corpses on the light's was a giant pain in the ass. Eventually I had to get lucky with enough of the body pressed flat against the ceiling so I could slide it over. Though honestly getting the corpses in the Hidden Valley desks was harder. At one point one of the bodies was literally orbiting the desk by itself without me doing anything.
You can kill Yes Man's securitrons but he'll always pop back up. Once he's in the system he can't die even more.
-Guns skill is actually required for two perks that can increase certain melee weapon damage.
-The SPECIAL point from completeing Loansome Road should always go into Endurance. Waaaaayyyy back when I actually smacked myself for not realizing that. If you wanna see Luck's power go gambling.
-Two-Step Goodbye has okay damage, a whooping 4! crit damage, swings slow as hell makes its DPS pretty bad. Now, despite that lovely 4 crit damage, it has a 4x crit modifier, so you can crit on every hit if you stack high enough. And that's where it's real power comes in, anything crit-killed by Two-Step Goodbye will explode after like three seconds. You can even do this on Sneak Crit Kills and no one will ever notice even when a corpse explodes right in their face.
-Gehenna has like, the highest melee DPS in the game or something. Melee sneak is at its best when you kill a dude next to another dude and you're only hidden because of the dude you just killed. WHO COULD HAVE KILLED HIM DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA GUY WITH A KNIFE? NO? WELL I'LL JUST STAY HERE, FEEL FREE TO STAND BEHIND ME I TRUST YOU.
-Not working on Fire Geckos is a shame because apparently they hit like trucks when they're not wasting time spitting fire.
-The true value of Packrat shines on Hardcore!
-Hey, if the comps are carrying stuff for money, then they can be used as money sinks! Or something.
-At one point if you stimpaked a poisoned comp they'd drop dead.
-I forgot Purifier was a thing. Slayer is amazing though. Attack so fast and confuse the game for a fighter.
-Totally possible. In so many hilarious ways.
-Genocide's killing spree through NCR correctional bumped him from Very Evil to Good. Karma sooooo bad.
-Wait that was Vault 19? Well, whatever, they all died in the end anyway.
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All this talk about FONV has made me want to do another Caesar's Legion run. I haven't tried that since the newest version of the Caesar's New Regime mod came out (a mod which I highly recommend, even if you don't play Legion, because it also makes them much more dangerous foes!).
My courier's name? Times New Roman.
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Not Comic Sans? 0/10
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Helvetica was into murder before it was cool (http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=218841318).
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Ooh, Grefter has the Pimp-Boy 3 Billion. I should try and snag that this time, never knew it existed before this run. How do you take in-game screenshots anyway? I seriously wanted to when the Khans suddenly learned to air-walk. And when the giant radscorp corpse started breakdancing (although I guess the strangeness of that one wouldn't carry into still images).
I also never, ever take off the First Recon hat.
-The SPECIAL point from completeing Loansome Road should always go into Endurance. Waaaaayyyy back when I actually smacked myself for not realizing that. If you wanna see Luck's power go gambling.
Yeahhh I was planning on actually getting all the achievements this time but the gambling ones probably wouldn't be feasible because of that. Have to load up an old file I guess.
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The Legend of Dragoon JP- Finally hit Kadessa. Bosses, etc have continued to remain interesting with Lenus, Magician Bogeys (Albert/Dart/Kongol -_-), Kamuy, etc all causing game overs. Also first time I won against Lenus/Regole it ended with Meru finishing off Regole solo because the fight kept owning Dart and Albert so hard with the magic, Dart's weakness and Albert's low magic defence. Kamuy ... I used Kongol without a speed booster. Yeah -_- I wanted to see how much damage he would do with his Golden Dragoon Special physical attack so I had an Attack Badge on.
I am appreciating the worth/value of Rose Storm so much more on this version. Also Rainbow Breath. Except with the up in difficulty Meru is having to use more turns on healing rather than just Freezing Ring spam, which is different from what I'm used to, to say the least. I got Rainbow Breath before the end of disc two, and Diamond Dust in the forest at the start of disc three which is normal for me anyway though I did gain Diamond Dust slightly quicker than usual because I equipped the War God's Sash at the start of disc three, so she actually got it before the Kamuy fight as opposed to after. So Meru is DLV3 now. However there is a definite gap in the rate at which she gained her first two dragoon level ups and her third/DLV4 since I'm in Kadessa, having collected all the treasures and saved at the save point and she still doesn't have her DLV4. That is also normal for me though. I usually have to train a bit to get her final dragoon levels while in Kadessa, taking advantage of the free heal pad/save combo. I don't know whether to go ahead now and take on Grand Jewel now in the hope that with the combo of War God's Sash and higher enemy HP she might get DLV4 after it this time without the extra training for DLV4/5 or just do stop and do it now. I want to have DLV5 for the Super Virage at least. Kadessa is the first real place in the game where I can really advocate stopping for a while to train additions, etc up because of the accessibility of the heal pad/save point combo, and the fact that the enemies might drop interesting things like Dancer's Ring. Well there is other places like this but this is my favorite and where I like to stop for a time and do that~ I also desperately need some training time to practice Dart's Madness Hero and Albert's Gust of Wind Dance because I am completely failing at them ;P
Items/equipment continues to be a thing. Still have to routinely stock up on items and having no monies, and needing equipment, and actually actively seeking out special monsters this time like the Treasure Jars and the Red Birds for monies and stuff to sell for monies, which like the Red Bird still drops less money than on the English version anyway, but it still helps (at least Treasure Jar Ruby Ring sells for 500 gold~), but at least they also drop nifty things like rings, and Phoenix Plumes for Dart/Albert, which I would never be able to afford otherwise~
Team is currently Albert/Dart/Meru. I'm not sure using Albert is the best idea since I am being so bad at Gust of Wind Dance but it has been a while since I had a main team with him in, and I didn't want to use Haschel or Miranda again. Meru has her weapon from the Wingly Shop, Jewelled Crown (+20 SP when physically attacked), Dancer's Shoes and War God's Sash (50% extra SP from additions), with the alternative options of Magical Ring (MAG+30), Amulet (Double MP), and Therapy Ring (HP regen) as accessories, and has her first two additions maxxed, Dart has the Mind Crush from Kadessa, best available armour (non Armour of Legend that is), Phoenix Plume, (prevents Fear, Bewitchment, Confusion, and Dispiriting), Bandit's Ring, and all his additions so far except Madness Hero maxxed and I have like one successful use of that >_>, Albert is more or less the same <_<, and I have the weapon from Deningrad for him~
Sometimes I also opt to use the stat up accessories like Attack or Defence on badges. There is also the Spirit Ring (+20 SP a turn) in general but that's not as useful now that the War God's Sash is around. I hope I get a Dancer's Ring~
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Ooh, Grefter has the Pimp-Boy 3 Billion. I should try and snag that this time, never knew it existed before this run. How do you take in-game screenshots anyway? I seriously wanted to when the Khans suddenly learned to air-walk. And when the giant radscorp corpse started breakdancing (although I guess the strangeness of that one wouldn't carry into still images).
F12 takes screenshots as a function of the Steam UI overlay.
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FONV: Cass is dead. Jesus Jean-Baptiste you shot her right in the junction box. Was that entirely necessary?
Hm, what's that? I should watch my back? Ghost sniper Cassidy, you say? He's just a myth!
Killed Benny in the arena. He was such a good sport about losing that it seemed only fair. I actually felt bad telling him I blew up the securitron army!
Talking to Caesar and understanding his reasoning behind the Legion actually only makes him more unpleasant. Good show, guys.
EDIT: Mister Cuddles is also dead. I am still a saint.
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Wonderful 101: When reading this review, it is imperative that you understand this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvHKxnMv04k) is playing at all times!
So I finished the game. The ending manages to out over the top Bayonetta, though not Asura's Wrath...I don't think anything will out-over the top THAT.
Game is a rare breed, in that it's a New Nintendo IP that is not really comparable to any other single game. ((Bayonetta + Okami) * Pikmin^Sentai + V. Joe)/Battletoads = Wonderful 101. Yes, I've checked my math, I'm certain this is indeed the equation. It's Colorful, it's unique, and the game is just a blast from start to finish. This is the kind of game that deserved a lot more attention this year, but alas, it'll be a cult classic at best.
Anyway, first off, some flaws. Notably, while I don't mind the constant shifting of styles, a few of the gimmick gameplay segments were just dumb. You often get a new health gauge independent of what you have, and it's lower than what you're use to, and you tend to not be use to controls until about half way, when you've already lost 2/3rds of your health. In some cases, you don't have a health gauge, so it's "one shot or you're screwed" which given how this game avoids Instant Death in most QTEs, really is a kick in the balls. The worst part is this game, like most of Kamiya's stuff, has a rating system, so screwing up one of these segments can kill your ranking. The "dodge the forcefields by going through the holes" thing was probably the worst, and you can't cheese them out with items like you can other segments.
Speaking of items, an interesting design decision W101 has is like DMC, Bayonetta, etc., using items hurts your ranking...except not all items do. Notably, the healing items can be used without any penalty, which actually makes sense after I thought about it. "Damage" is one of your criteria for ratings, so using a healing item implies your Damage Rating is tanking, so you'd have been doubly penalized for using healing items in a sense, as both your damage rating and a "used item" penalty kick in. I tried avoid using items when I could, but there were times I did anyway. Game is also forgiving on game overs; when you die, after choosing continue, you respawn exactly where you left off. Again, rating system exists, and the game has a harsh "You died" penalty to your score, so it's not a case of "Death has no consequences."
If you've played Bayonetta, DMC, V. Joe, etc., you know how ratings work, I'm sure, and how you get currency to buy items, what have you. Really, it follows Kamiya's general standards for his kinds of games in that regard, only with a game that only vaguely resembles that style instead of clearly being part of it. Again, W101 is kind of in a genre of it's own; I guess it falls under "Action Game" but it can't be directly compared to anything.
But who cares about gameplay? Really, what needs to be talked about is...
PLOT AND WRITING AND CHARACTERS!!!!
(http://www.foxsearchlight.com/media/blog_post_images/atomic%20explosion%202.jpg)
The plot is an incredibly deep and complex story. So the Guild of Evil Alens Terrorizing Humans with Jiggawatt bombs, Energy Beams, Ray guns, and Killers lasers attacks Blossom City, trying to destroy 5 reactors to get rid of Margarita, the global planetary defense system stopping their armada from invading. Centinel leader Laurence Nelson, with the aide of Alice Macgregor, on the Virgin Victory sends out it's elite force, the Wonderful 100, led by Wonder Red, to stop said aliens! What follows is an epic tale of...well...everything really, so let's get into the characters themselves!
(http://videos.videopress.com/Gru9KjG5/01_e383ace38383e38389_e_0730-2_scruberthumbnail_0.jpg)
I was going to label him myself, but it seems the pic I found did it for him!
As with all Sentai teams, Red is the leader, and his special move is the Unite Hand, where in he punches something...very hard. He can also open those pesky large pickle jars that you need a good grip to get. So if you're having guests over and need jars opened, he's the super hero for you! Red's character is overly heroic, and he can memorize all the details of a character, and he WILL repeat it anytime you confront him. Yes, that is a legitimate running gag, and he gets called out on it, and it is amazing. He's also got a knack for making up attack names even when there's no reason for it. I won't spoil what it is or the nature of it, but he does come up with the single most EPIC ATTACK NAME EVER!!! Naturally, tragic backstory because ALL HEROES NEED A TRAGIC BACKSTORY TO INSPIRE THEM!
Unite Hand, in combat, is your go to raw power attack. Use it to dish out large damage to big enemies fast. Of course has the problem of being close range only, but everything needs a flaw.
(http://videos.videopress.com/5yNOlCvn/02_e38396e383abe383bc_e_0801_scruberthumbnail_0.jpg)
The Dude Bro Swordsmen of the team! Of course, he's the team lancer, so he exists to argue with Red, and get into fights with Green. Also he has a Valiantium Blade. Do you have a Valiantium Blade? No? WELL GO GET ONE NOW! Then you can slice aliens and they will feel the sting of your blade! Not for long though...they'll be dead...from the blade...
Unite Sword is your crowd control attack. It can also pick locks no matter how large. Yes, Wonder Blue is an LAPD Agent who is the team's Rogue character that fights like a Samurai. Oh, and he has a rose! Actually, that's another aspect of him; he's clearly a parody of Dante, at least a first, being "If Dante were not as cool as he thinks he is." He also has a tragic backstory because, you know, foil to Wonder Red, he needs every parallel possible. Also his primary rival is female because...well, dude bro, what'd you expect?
(http://brutalgamer.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Wonderful-101.jpg)
Yes his image is bigger, but to be fair, he probably has more body mass than Red and Blue and thus it is necessary! ...I am sorry, that was a horrible fat joke and I should be smacked for that. Anyway, the big, fat, french kid with a gun. I swear they tried to shove every french stereotype they can have in one character, realized that some of them conflict with one another, said screw it, and just went with it, and that's what we got. He wields a gun named after the female lead from Phantom of the Opera, because really, don't all kids have something like that these days? ...ok, with school violence, that may have been a tasteless joke, but hat's more important is Unite Gun SHOOTS OTHER MEMBERS OF THE TEAM AT THE OPPONENT. In a higher level, IT IS A SUPER SCOPE 6! No, I am not kidding, that's actually what it turns into.
Green is the 3rd most prominent character after Red and Blue of the team, and he never misses a chance to mock Blue, especially when Blue fails with women. This leads to Blue responding with a "shut up" one liner that usually involves something related to french ("Stick a tube in it, Foie Gras!") This happens so often, the game gave them their own "Blue tackles Green" portrait.
Unite Gun mostly exists to hit things that are legitimately out of reach, either because they fly or because they are far away. As such, it's either a crappy option or your own option to hurt something with! It also can suck up objects, like conveniently big spherical bombs, and shoot them at the opponent.
(http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/HYFmWXxQt88/hqdefault.jpg)
You know, I could go into detail about her character, but...I think her intro (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRbKFdaEX8A) sums her characterization up, the nature of her character, Kamiya's sick mind, among other things far better than I could. It also gives a little bit of insight to Wonder Red's CHARACTER ANNOUNCEMENTS, a transformation sequence with the character, and Wonder Green's exaggerated accent. Pink also is a fangirl of Vorrkhen (will explain later), hates Wonder Green, and if it's not obvious, is what happens when you splice a Valley Girl, an Anime Girl, and a Vampire. Somehow, she is STILL the emotional one on the team, being the only person who actually shows any sort of care about Luka, the annoying little kid I'll address later. No, I don't know how they pulled it off either...only someone as messed up in the head as Kamiya could make this character.
Unite Whip is one of the best attacks in the game, to my surprise. It's a lot stronger than you'd think, making it a good substitute for for Unite Hand that is a little more flexible due to range, and is the only way to deal with Spiky Foes...which is annoying because the whip only grapples when it wants too, unless there is a way to insure it which I never quite figured out. Oh yeah, also a parody of Bayonetta at times, if it wasn't obvious in her intro.
(http://videos.videopress.com/Ak4D3qTL/05_e382a4e382a8e383ade383bc_en_0808_scruberthumbnail_0.jpg)
A Russian dude who doesn't understand the concept of catch phrases, with practically no self esteem whatsoever, and he carries a big hammer. Unfortunately, he is underutilized, which is ashame as when he does say something he's amusing. Unite Hammer mostly exists for guard crushes, and if used in right areas, can bring up hidden spots.
Yes, they gave the BIG BURLY RUSSIAN GUY a the Pikohan, not the Tsundere. PROGRESSIVE? MAYBE!
(http://static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20131212020146/the-wonderful-101/images/3/3d/The_Wonderful_101_-_Wonder-Eyes_Transformation,_Wonder-White)
The Proverb speaking Ninja with Ice Powers who climbs walls and doesn't know how to shut up...except they forgot to give him much dialog because half the hero dialog is Blue, Green and Pink arguing over something completely meaningless. It's ashame, a Ninja who doesn't know how to stop talking has a lot of potential, but I guess they ran out of time in development or something. Whatever, there's always a POTENTIAL SEQUEL in the works, maybe he'll get more then!
Unite Claw gets combos...lots and lots of combos...you will get a Platinum Ranking on your combo rating just by using Unite Claw. It also can freeze enemies if powered up enough, is used to climb walls, and apparently has a projectile feature that I never found useful. Yes, this game has climbing segments ala God of War, but they are more fun because you climb faster, there are less of them, and combat is more than "press one attack and throw guy off." Ok, it is still one button, but who cares? YOU'RE PLAYING AS AN ICE NINJA INSTEAD OF A MEGA DOUCHE. Automatically superior!
(http://henshinjustice.com/hjublog/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Wonder-Black.png)
If Niu were a super hero, he'd be Wonder Black. The world could be blowing up around him via giant robot, and he'd STILL be on his 3DS trying to finish his game. No, really, this happens. Black barely speaks at all; even when he speaks, he mostly mumbles his dialog such that only Green can understand him because...uhh...kids? Apparently they had a bet regarding Wonder Pink in terms of who blows up most aliens, Green claims to have won but I call bollocks because I totally used Unite Bomb more often once Black joined!
Unite Bomb is not what it sounds like...I mean, yeah, it's a bomb, but it's not about crowd control explosions. It's about crowd control "Slow time down of everything hit by it." You will only get one powered up version which extends duration and radius before you downgrade to a basic version, but a way to beat a number of tougher enemies is to just spam Bomb on the guy, and use the Team Attack button, possibly doing a multi-unite with another character to add more damage. Bomb lock downs work incredibly well, really.
That's it for the MAIN TEAM, but onto OTHER CHARACTERS!!!
(http://static4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130822022450/the-wonderful-101/images/7/73/PStar.jpg)
This guy's name is P-star.
The convenient "has answer to everything because Robot Computer" helper, he is like Alpha-5 except follows you everywhere, and isn't annoying. Apparently he has lasers too but he never uses them outside of one segment because...uhh...reasons. Really, not much to say about P-star, he's exactly what he looks like!
(http://hydra-media.cursecdn.com/thewonderful101.gamepedia.com/7/7d/Nels.jpg)
Unfortunately, I cannot find his INTRO ID CARD, so I'll have to just tell you this is Laurence Nelson, the token Zordon character of the team! He's the boss, he tells you what to do, your team does it, and he's got an awesome mustache and is never not drinking coffee. He also was Wonder Red over 10 years prior, and had Unite Drill with one of the most rocking hair styles ever. You seriously have to see this thing!
For those who read the spoiler, watch this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=856u0-Ahvfc) to see what I mean regarding the hair!
(http://hydra-media.cursecdn.com/thewonderful101.gamepedia.com/7/7a/Alice11.jpg)
Alice Macgregor, a character who only exists for Technological Exposition. "There is large amounts of Jerk matter in the atmosphere." That kind of stuff. It doesn't matter how horrible the situation is, how dire the problem is, she will always say these kinds of things, with absolutely no emotion whatsoever, unironically. Talk about being dedicated to your job!
(http://i.imgur.com/tWGrGhUl.jpg)
Her name is Immorta. If you can't tell that she's a Pink Alien Chick with a Heart Motif thing going on...well, she is, so shut up. She's the token "Good guy who at first doesn't like the team but forges an alliance because why not work for common cause, thus becomes honorary member of team" character. At first, I thought this was just a plot thing, but next thing I know, you get Unite Bow, an attack you can use select chapters wehre she joins, so yay! I didn't really find a use for it, often forgetting it exists, but hey, at least they put it in. Also, she's the last of the space cops apparently...I don't know how that works, but just go with it.
Immorta's character is basically her going after Prince Vorrkhen, because he's the bad guy, and having the questionable relationship with Red that both of course blush over. But enough about the good guys, I think we should talk about the bad guys, and since I keep bringing him up...
(http://www.cf-network.com/cfan/local/cache-vignettes/L500xH281/Vorkken-3927c.jpg)
Heir to the throne of the comet Rhullo, leader of the Space Pirates known across the galaxy as the Guyzoch, Prince Vorrkhen! He is the Shonen Rival of Wonder Red, has his own team of 100 alien soldiers that can unite Morph, has a cliched evil European accent, and is basically Ciato's method of super villainy. As in, he checks guide books for details, calls his rival "Blunder-Red" not because it is insulting, because he misheard it and believes that is truly his name, and when asked to explain himself, he will tell you his ENTIRE LIFE STORY, even polite enough to warn you it will take 15 to 30 minutes and will only tell you it if you are ok with that.
His fights are amusing because he uses Unify Morphs on you, and the key is figuring out how to dodge them and best count (I still don't know how to avoid Unify Gun or Unify Boomerang; thankfully the former is rare and the latter is not TOO damaging), and of course he gets his own battle theme because SHONEN RIVAL EPIC!!!He also joins later in the game with Unify Boomerang, which is COMPLETELY BROKEN, which makes up for the Unify Boomerang being so stupidly annoying when you fight it. You can also use Unify Naginata, which is Chewgi's attack, and that's pretty damn awesome too, though Chewgi isn't a big enough character to bother singling out here. Don't think he even gets a proper intro!
(http://static2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130903020852/the-wonderful-101/images/1/19/Planet_Destruction.png)
Jergingha, the villain. He is super if super were a 100 foot tall Alien Robot thing from 1000 years in the future. That is all.
(http://static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130731060241/bayonetta/images/archive/1/1a/20130901172616!Luka_(W101).jpg)
Annoying little kid who you want to punch in the face, won't leave you alone, and insists on being a little bitch. Blue's response to him is basically what I'm sure most players are like when they see him. Alas, he's an important character who won't leave and needs punching.
So...yeah, kind of have to wrap this up fast but all the important stuff are covered. Game is quite fun with some hiccups, music is good, characters are great, and anyone who actually gets a Wii U should give it a shot.
And thus...
Unite....RANT!!!!...end....
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Bravely Default demo: Finished, got all the play bonuses. Game feels more like FF3 than FF5 as it is hyped. Hard to tell what the actual game will be like because the demo specifically tells you 20 times that the stuff in the demo is totally different than the actual game. Which kind of defeats the purpose of a demo. At any rate I'm interested in the actual game so will pick it up.
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RSMS- Having problem.
Current ER is 16. Hawke/Guella Ha/Diana/Sif/Claudia. Average HP is around 400 (with Claudia well behind due to being a recent pickup). Around 50 defense, class levels of 3 generally. 170 G, 243 jewels in the bank. No real inventory.
I've been poking at silver's cave and can't beat the boss- breath attacks are OHKO, can't mount serious offense. Tried pirate invasion, not killing Butcher's pet fast enough to outrun the RNG. Clearly underpowered. How the blue fuck can I fix this.
Quests Complete: Valhalland Monsters, Plain Treasure, Free the Gecklings, Eule Gives a Hoot, Test of Courage, Monsters of Mt. Tomae, Stolen Nymphs, Oh, Mummy!, A bodyguard for Louie.
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Ys Memories of Calcetta: picked this up as a shiny thing to distract myself from recent events. Really fun so far, but I haven't played an Ys game since that one on Steam, Oath of Felghenna or something like that. This plays so very different the two can't even be compared.
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What difficulty did you start on? I'm about 3-4 bosses in and Hard is seriously disappointing me, so if you're not too far in, might be worth playing on Hard rather than Normal.
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On Normal, but I'm not exactly playing for the challenge. Just playing to have a fun mashy action game to distract myself with, and it's working well enough for that.
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Mirror's Edge: So many dead Faiths in five hours, it's fun though. First person platforming actually working, what a thought
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Mirror's Edge: So many dead Faiths in five hours, it's fun though. First person platforming actually working, what a thought
Look, if you had any problem with the controls in Turok on N64 it was only because the fog kept you from seeing any ground you might be standing on.
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Fallout Genocide: Genocide's tales across the Loansome Road continue. Many tears are shed along the way. Some by virtue of being straight one-shotted by Deathclaws, some by randomly beng knocked down by Rawr for no reason whatsoever, others still come from the hilarity of playing Deathclaw baseball with some MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS. Carving through the path eventually opened the deadly Courier's Mile to challenge, but in the wake of MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS challenge was irrelevant, and Genocide cleared the Mile without taking a single hit. But fighting through enemy after enemy after enemy at the behest of a madmen didn't sit well with Genocide. Forsaking words, he used all his powers to cut apart his enemy, turning the other Courier's head into meatloaf before he could even fire a single bullet. His plan ended there, but Genocide's reached a new level, unlocking great hidden potentials, and plenty more enemies to murder. The Long 15 and its occupants, both inside and at the Mojave Outpost were slain. Dry Wells, died as well. Nothing could match the Courier's Blades, not even the strongest of the Legendary beasts, the Bloatfly. Like all before, it too fell apart.
Hiking north for new challenge, Genocide reached the Happy Trails Caravan Company Expidition. Finding they were somehow immune to his attacks, Genocide followed them, watching, waiting for a time to strike. His arrival in Zion proved the chance, and they all died at his hands before those of the White Legs. After a brief near encounter with death in the form of two Anti-Material Rifle White Legs, Genocide meets a slow-witted Tribal. Recognizing when to hold back to ensure more slaughter, Genocide let the fool guide him to his masters. A few menial tasks later, and Genocide was in position to exterminate them all. First came the head of that whiny git Daniel, then, Genocide finished what the world could not and ended Graham's life, Waking Cloud slept eternal next, and White Bird joined his tribe in the grave. Moving to exterminate the Dead Horses, and Follows-Chalk was somehow still around! He wouldn't be for long. Zion, cleared of all evils, was abandoned by Genocide. The Sierra Madre called... tomorrow...
Extinct Communities
The Divide is just a bit more of a Loansome Road
The Long 15 reaches into the grave.
Dry Wells is dry from all the flayed corpses.
The only Hearts in Zion are those Genocide ripped out.
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RSMS- Having problem.
Current ER is 16. Hawke/Guella Ha/Diana/Sif/Claudia. Average HP is around 400 (with Claudia well behind due to being a recent pickup). Around 50 defense, class levels of 3 generally. 170 G, 243 jewels in the bank. No real inventory.
Go to the Vulcano and blink some tech by fighting Flame Tyrant, retreat, repeat. Just make sure you don't kill him. This is the easiest way to become powerful without raising ER.
Or just try some other area for quests, like Knight Dominion or Frontier. Aquamarine quest should be opening up too, you might want to tackle that first.
Or recruit Aisha and do some underground journey, and picking up few loots on the way.
KH 3DS - Still an incoherent mess. The Drop mechanic is a goddamn pain in the ass, it continuously breaks the momentum of the game and makes keeping track of whatever the hell you're doing annoying as fuck.
You can drop right back if remembering the progress is what you are worried about.
At least making things a little less annoy.
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MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS
Turbo is soooo great. I'm seriously contemplating taking a perk just to make it last longer (I'm sure there is such a thing). Have already got addicted to it three times on this run. Please tell me you can genuinely do that to deathclaws and it isn't just the game glitching out.
Is the Happy Trails gang actually set unkillable just so you can't access Zion without talking to them? I didn't think anyone had plot immunity.
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MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS
Turbo is soooo great. I'm seriously contemplating taking a perk just to make it last longer (I'm sure there is such a thing). Have already got addicted to it three times on this run. Please tell me you can genuinely do that to deathclaws and it isn't just the game glitching out.
Is the Happy Trails gang actually set unkillable just so you can't access Zion without talking to them? I didn't think anyone had plot immunity.
Chemist + Day Tripper + Implant GRX = MATRIX COURIER on demand. The thing with the Deathclaws is swinging so fast that they get hit by Super Slam and knocked down, but because they're being slowed down they're still in the air when the next hit of Super Slam happens, knocking them up again, and again and again until their inertia sends them flying and out of reach. Some of them even hit the game boundary and rocketed back to the High Road in response. I did it on other things before, but Deathclaws were the only ones durable enough to survive so good screenshots could actually be taken.
Less unkillable, and more couldn't be hit at all. Hilariously Jed actually thanked me for killing MacLafferty.
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Apollo Justice - Playing Duel Destinies made me want to see more Apollo/Trucy/Klavier, so I decided to pick this game up.
Case 1's plot twist is definitely a good one. The game reels you in with the typical Case 1 narrative and then boom.
Case 2 is definitely a bit on the weak side. I like the defendant(he is annoying, but it is in a funny way) and the killer, and Plum is pretty amazing, but Stickler is a weird misfire on humor and Eldoon is pretty annoying. The case is pretty simple in its execution. It's alright, but not my favorite case in the series.
Case 3 is weird. I want to like it, it has Ema/Apollo/Trucy being awesome, but the absurdity of the defendant, as a small 15 year old boy, setting up this whole thing with firing the gun made for large people and the dragging of the body onto the stage is just beyond my suspension of disbelief threshold. I'm at the beginning of the Day 2 trial. And the witness that says she heard the guy committing the murder mysteriously is nearly killed right after Darayn shows up to the complex???? Yeah, he is clearly not involved. It's also fairly obvious from the start that he probably did it, the messing up of the note is a big glaring clue.
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Ys Memories of something that starts with C:
Question for any folks who've played this. What is the deal with reinforcing weapons? I throw something that says it adds 3 in the "attack" icon on a weapon, but it doesn't increase the weapon strength at all? And what about the status icons, do adding those give the weapon a chance to inflict status or increase the power of status the weapon already inflicts? Like with the Fire Sword, it has a 30% chance to add Burn already, so should I reinforce it for more burn or would that be a waste because the weapon already has burn?
Sorry if this is kinda incoherent, I can't think of a better way to explain it.
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Ys Memories of something that starts with C:
Question for any folks who've played this. What is the deal with reinforcing weapons? I throw something that says it adds 3 in the "attack" icon on a weapon, but it doesn't increase the weapon strength at all? And what about the status icons, do adding those give the weapon a chance to inflict status or increase the power of status the weapon already inflicts? Like with the Fire Sword, it has a 30% chance to add Burn already, so should I reinforce it for more burn or would that be a waste because the weapon already has burn?
Sorry if this is kinda incoherent, I can't think of a better way to explain it.
They're just flat bonuses. So if you add some points to say, Poison, the weapon can now inflict Poison. Even 1 point gives a non-negligible effect, so in general it is good. If you have the Fire Sword and add some Burning onto it, it stacks. But 30% burn is already good, you don't need to add more. Better statuses in the game are Paralyze and Freeze. HP Absorb also is pretty tits. Don't spend TOO much money and good items reinforcing, though. Generally you get new weapons pretty quick. Best plan is to throw on one of your best monster drops or flowers that gives you good coverage and leave it at that. Same with armor.
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MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS
Turbo is soooo great. I'm seriously contemplating taking a perk just to make it last longer (I'm sure there is such a thing). Have already got addicted to it three times on this run. Please tell me you can genuinely do that to deathclaws and it isn't just the game glitching out.
Is the Happy Trails gang actually set unkillable just so you can't access Zion without talking to them? I didn't think anyone had plot immunity.
Chemist + Day Tripper + Implant GRX = MATRIX COURIER on demand. The thing with the Deathclaws is swinging so fast that they get hit by Super Slam and knocked down, but because they're being slowed down they're still in the air when the next hit of Super Slam happens, knocking them up again, and again and again until their inertia sends them flying and out of reach. Some of them even hit the game boundary and rocketed back to the High Road in response. I did it on other things before, but Deathclaws were the only ones durable enough to survive so good screenshots could actually be taken.
Less unkillable, and more couldn't be hit at all. Hilariously Jed actually thanked me for killing MacLafferty.
Hey, did you play nice with Caesar long enough to get Arizona Killer? I don't think President Kimball can be lured out to be killed (and eaten) without doing that or the NCR chain.
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MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS
Turbo is soooo great. I'm seriously contemplating taking a perk just to make it last longer (I'm sure there is such a thing). Have already got addicted to it three times on this run. Please tell me you can genuinely do that to deathclaws and it isn't just the game glitching out.
Is the Happy Trails gang actually set unkillable just so you can't access Zion without talking to them? I didn't think anyone had plot immunity.
Chemist + Day Tripper + Implant GRX = MATRIX COURIER on demand. The thing with the Deathclaws is swinging so fast that they get hit by Super Slam and knocked down, but because they're being slowed down they're still in the air when the next hit of Super Slam happens, knocking them up again, and again and again until their inertia sends them flying and out of reach. Some of them even hit the game boundary and rocketed back to the High Road in response. I did it on other things before, but Deathclaws were the only ones durable enough to survive so good screenshots could actually be taken.
Less unkillable, and more couldn't be hit at all. Hilariously Jed actually thanked me for killing MacLafferty.
Hey, did you play nice with Caesar long enough to get Arizona Killer? I don't think President Kimball can be lured out to be killed (and eaten) without doing that or the NCR chain.
I got my NCR forgiveness popped after killing Benny, so since I had every other faction the NCR wants dealt with destroyed, I just rocketed to doing the NCR version where I instead murdered Kimball and ate him. I didn't do Caeser's version because Caeser is much bitchier about things, and the messenger that delivers the Mark is a unique compared to the generic nobody the NCR sends.
Then, for some baffling reason, the legion guard inside the securitron bunker complimented me on killing Kimball, despite the sheer absurdity of what needed to transpire for that to occur.
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Super Mario 3D world: Fantastic. Everyone who has a Wii U should get this game as soon as possible. The levels are astoundingly creative and so far each one has had a new little powerup, or platform type, or enemy to deal with so the gameplay always feels new and innovative. They've kept the same style from the 3DS game, but the stronger graphics for the Wii U avoids the problem that the 3DS game had where the levels felt really empty. Music is also really good too, and I like the Green Stars better than the Star Coins in the New Super Mario Bros Games. The only problem I have with it is that they changed up some of the mechanics a bit from the other mario games, so it takes some getting used to some things like the way wall jumps work. Another example would be they had a level where they had those gates that you could cling on from Super Mario World and the New Super Mario Bros series, but here only characters with the Cat Suit can grab on and even then only temporarily. Still though, these are minor complaints, and the game is shaping up to be my favorite Mario game if it can keep delivering with the creativity in level design.
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Ys Memories of Cuttlefish:
Hey, knife girl got a new tech. "Napalm Shot" eh? Sounds promising...though the rest of her stuff has been crappy, lets see if this is any better.
*uses Napalm Shot a few times*
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......................
Welp, that's certainly a thing. A thing that does massive damage over a huge spread that you can chuck at long range.
I'm trying to think of something to compare her to, and Dynasty Warriors 5 Ling Tong is the only thing coming to mind. Moveset of "mediocre, mediocre, crap, okay, crap, crap, crap, *SINGLE BEST MOVE IN THE GAME*, crap, crap, okay". Granted, way too early to tell if there is anything better then Napalm Shot, but it's setting the bar pretty damn high.
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There is for other characters, and some of her later techs are good too, but Napalm Shot is her money skill. She's more about relentlessly quick knife spam.
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FONV: I told Veronica to go home and be a family woman, knowing full well there's only outcome for the BoS on this ending path. I am bad Cid.
Also got Euclid's C-Finder for the first time ever. LIGHT OF JUDGEMENT.
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Yeah, Napalm Shot is a 40 SP skill, so you expect the damage to spike. Didn't seem notably different from, say, Adol using Blade Rush on damage. Her other techs are fine, 10 SP to inflict Poison is pretty good and Homing Knives are okay for brainless random clearing. As Sopko noted, the real reason to hype knife girl is regular attack spam from range backed by dodges with lots of prep time thanks to the range. When I made my previous post, it was after using her on both the bosses in that dungeon and basically never having to huff items because despite the bosses 3HKOing me or something, they only got 1 hit in ever.
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Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition - Finished like 4 or 5 days later, knowing tons about this game makes it go by quicker. Done pretty much everything in it this run. All of Tales of the Sword Coast. Durlag's Tower is worse than I remembered, but so it goes. Removing Flesh Golem spawns lowers my level curve a bit, hadn't realised how high a bit of time spent in that cave does it, but still clearing all the content is more exp than cap, so you can easily skip the dumber shit like Aec'letec and Durlag's Tower. Werewolf isle and ice caverns are relatively harmless albeit pretty boring. Ranting below I did remember one thing I forgot to do, which was get the Gauntlets of Ogre Strength on the Low Lantern, I never went in there. That was stupid. Khalid could have been even better than he was.
Halfing Kensai with daggers got by just fine. A few times throwing on a sword with no proficiency or the +2 throwing axe once I got it to handle Jellies, but otherwise, just stabbing stuff in the face with Dagger of Poison +2. Getting Book of +1 Str turning Halfing 17 Str into 18 Str with no exceptional Strength was incredibly underwhelming and really hit home shitty stat scaling is in 2nd Edition. Like most stats the scaling is pretty low and doesn't have much impact. Dex is kind of blech in that 18 Dex is amazing, less than 18 dex is kind of painful especially early on, but 19 and 20 Dex are pretty fucking meaningless. So Dex has a peak of balance issues.
Strength on the other hand is kind of shitty all the way up to 18. 17 Str is +1 damage per swing and 5% chance to hit effectively. 18 is +2 damage and 5% chance to hit. Then it scales up with Fighter specific sections from +3 damage and 5% chance to hit 50% of the time, +3 damage and 10% chance to hit 25% of the time, +4 damage and 10% chance of hit 15% chance of the time, +5 damage and 10% chance to hit 9% of the time and +6 damage and +15% chance to hit 1% of the time. Determined at character creation. 19 Str is +7 damage and 15% chance to hit.
So in BG you generally don't care about Str other than carry weight on other toons, Fighters that come with 16 Strength are terrible unless they are taking drugs (You should be mainlining potions in real combat situations). It is a good thing there is a whole line of potions to throw down their throats in a steady stream. Going into a tough fight? Potion of Storm Giant Strength for 24 Strength and start hitting 30% more often for +12 damage. That is flat out more boosted damage than that 2 handed sword you might be using gives. You easily double your damage ouput per round at -least- with these drugs before the extra chance to hit.
BG2 it really gets out of hand with Belt of Hill Giant Strength setting you up with 19 Str fighter right out the gate. It isn't a huge jump if you spent hours getting that 18/00 Strength roll, but in most cases? You are looking at +3 damage if not more and a free +1 to hit. That is with more swings just piling up for Fighters. It is just a crazy stat that keeps scaling so much and is so prevalent for buffs. If you don't run a fighter heavy party and go lots of ranged attackers and magic users I am actually pretty confident you can pretty easily keep your a Fighter buffed on drugs for every single fight after the opening dungeon if you focus on bankrolling their habit and make sure not to rest highly frequently (probably only really matters on your third fighter in a party. That said with careful planning you could make it your -fourth- fighter that needs it with an imported Bhaalspawn fighter).
It isn't like terrible or anything and Fighters do need it to compete with Mages, but it is clunky and weird and shits over anyone who didn't roll an 18 (or can't like Halflings in my case). Its a weird way to balance a game. Fighters need buffs. Okay lets make them potentially really strong in edge cases and for them to be truly outrageous we need them to be on the most extreme situation. Hope your GM is liberal with magic items that will scale your damage to crazy new heights! Oh and don't mind all the monsters that get massive Strength bonuses...
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Well, similar damage to blade rush, sure. Just, uh, blade rush generally only hitting 1 maaaaaybe 2 folks, Napalm Shot hitting a pretty wide range. When you see Skill Finish pop up 6 times from one move, you know you have a winner. Of course I am only playing on Normal, maybe it's less impressive on higher diffs.
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Fallout Genocide: Genocide's final task lures him to the treasures of the Sierra Madre casino. Forced under threat of death to let others live beyond an initial meeting, Genocide reluctantly did so, knowing deep in his heart they would get theirs at the FIST OF RAWR. Eventually, on his assault on the Casino Proper, he succeed in his claims. With all the inhabitants dead once again, and at the peek of his power, Genocide returned to the Mojave to finish things once and for all.
The Second Battle of Hoover Dam saw all involved reduced to bloody red smears, save two people and a handful of TVs on wheels. Genocide raged furiously at the sheer bullshit he witnessed, but nothing short of loading state would save him...
Extinict Communities
The Sierra Madre is a city of the dead because of a Courier
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MAGIC SUPERSPEED DRUGS
Turbo is soooo great. I'm seriously contemplating taking a perk just to make it last longer (I'm sure there is such a thing). Have already got addicted to it three times on this run. Please tell me you can genuinely do that to deathclaws and it isn't just the game glitching out.
Is the Happy Trails gang actually set unkillable just so you can't access Zion without talking to them? I didn't think anyone had plot immunity.
Chemist + Day Tripper + Implant GRX = MATRIX COURIER on demand. The thing with the Deathclaws is swinging so fast that they get hit by Super Slam and knocked down, but because they're being slowed down they're still in the air when the next hit of Super Slam happens, knocking them up again, and again and again until their inertia sends them flying and out of reach. Some of them even hit the game boundary and rocketed back to the High Road in response. I did it on other things before, but Deathclaws were the only ones durable enough to survive so good screenshots could actually be taken.
Less unkillable, and more couldn't be hit at all. Hilariously Jed actually thanked me for killing MacLafferty.
Hey, did you play nice with Caesar long enough to get Arizona Killer? I don't think President Kimball can be lured out to be killed (and eaten) without doing that or the NCR chain.
I got my NCR forgiveness popped after killing Benny, so since I had every other faction the NCR wants dealt with destroyed, I just rocketed to doing the NCR version where I instead murdered Kimball and ate him. I didn't do Caeser's version because Caeser is much bitchier about things, and the messenger that delivers the Mark is a unique compared to the generic nobody the NCR sends.
Then, for some baffling reason, the legion guard inside the securitron bunker complimented me on killing Kimball, despite the sheer absurdity of what needed to transpire for that to occur.
Just so long as you're being sure to eat all the right people, that's okay.
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The right people is everyone. NOM NOM NOM.
Fallout Genocide, A Retrospective: Let it be said, that to the best of his abilities did Genocide Courier attempt to scourge the Mojave of all life. Unfortunately... it is just a straight up impossibility in the first place. In regards to one Vulpes Inculta. Killing Mr. Fox at Nipton, results in NPC A spawning at the Stripe. Killing Mr. Fox at the Stripe however, causes NPC B to spawn at Nipton. It's a no-win scenario. In addition to such a contradiction, the NPCs in the various safehouses survive as well, due to the safehouse keys only existing in the ether until thrown into your inventory. In addition killing either Moore or Crocker causes the other one to despawn. Silus at MacCarren also escaped because of key bullshit and Cicerio and Nero of the Omertas never spawned period(same for a couple other quest created NPCs). Also only killing comps instead of recruiting them never gave me their ending slide--except Lily and E-DE's for some reason.
I also forgot to destroy the Legendary Nightstalker and Fire Gecko on accident. Need to clear out the real Vaults too.
The biggest load of crap was choosing to attack Oliver's group at the end, I get stuck on some geometry while Oliver potshots at me and the Securitrons kill the Ranger Vets. Once the Vets were all dead, Yes Man came up and forced the ending on me with Oliver still alive.
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If you wanted a true genocide ending you should have allied with Elijah in Dead Money (presumably your character's first action post-epilogue would be to kill him as well)
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If you wanted a true genocide ending you should have allied with Elijah in Dead Money (presumably your character's first action post-epilogue would be to kill him as well)
I was totally gonna do that and even had a joke prepared for when I reloaded to headsplosioned him, but you can apparently only ally with him if you chatted about him with Veronica.
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Apollo Justice -- Finished the third case. The case ends up being a bit of an incoherent mess. LYING IN A COURT OF LAW TO COVER UP FOR A MAGIC TRICK IS NOT OKAY, WHY WOULD YOU EVER DO THIS. The copious amount of lying done by the defendant and the witness made me want to throw a wine glass. The villain also makes no sense. So... you framed the person who knows about your criminal activities for murder? And then you attacked the witness who said things about you because that's totes not suspicious? And you risk carrying the body up on the stage so you can fake the script of a song because... reasons? It is definitely among the most poorly put together cases in the series. Its main saving grace is the Apollo/Trucy/Ema trio which have generally brightened the game.
Started the fourth case. I definitely agree with Apollo that he seems to have gotten the short end of the witness stick. Emo manipulative asswipe, wannabe criminal, lying smuggler, and now someone who doesn't talk. Joy joy. (Also, caw caw in Dual Destinies. :D)
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(http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mdkcycbwBw1rcgyrwo1_1280.jpg)
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I was definitely thinking of hitting a tiny child with the wine glass, like I Wanna Be The Guy.
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Heroine Quest: Well this game is QfG1 as fuck.
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Heroine Quest: Well this game is QfG1 as fuck.
YOU NEVER CATCH THE DRAGON.
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That's Heroin Hero, not Quest. Also note the extra e. Trying too hard there.
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That's Heroin Hero, not Quest. Also note the extra e. Trying too hard there.
The use of similar words for comedic effect makes up an entire genre of humor. Please don't act like you need it explained to you, Mr. Tryhard.
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My apologies for expressing a clear lack of humor towards inelegantly shoehorned South Park references, in the future I will try to find them utterly hilarious.
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Soppy was just living down to the thread's standard of posting statements that nobody cares about.
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Ladies, ladies, please. You're just confirming stereotypes by fighting over me.
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Heroine Quest: Well this game is QfG1 as fuck.
Being a fan of the QfG series, I am now compelled to look this Heroine Quest up.
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Sophia thinks she's a melee character (that's her throwing her staff in off from the side) ~
(final boss spoilers)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FO6qEGvHGM
Playing around. Thinking of recording a mandatory fight only run~
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http://www.crystalshard.net/hq.htm. Heroine Quest, linked it in Misc Links the moment I heard about it pretty much aimed at you, but um you may have been busy with stuff.
Heroes of Might and Magic 3 - So I had picked this up for cheap after listening to some people talk about it. I had in my head that this was the best one, but starting up the campaign and cheating through it just to get a taste without committing many many hours to it, i had forgot how minimal the original campaigns were for this. They might get bigger and more involved in the expansions though, but like the Knights one is 3 maps long and in my memory Heroes campaigns are huge 10+ map commitments with a good chunk of progressing plot. This is not that. I may be conflating 2 and 4 and theirs broad plots with 3s superior gameplay.
For anyone interested though there is a Russian made mod to scale resolution up that is a bit clunky but does the job.
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Phoenix Wright Dual Destinies: Finished, including the DLC. The game is Phoenix Wright, you know what to expect, and it's a good one at that! Compared to the rest of the series, don't really have any complaints for this game that weren't in the others. Good things though? Streamlined investigations, removing Penalty system for things like Psychelocks just saves time, "Notes" system in case you get lost, the multiple PC angle, Mayor Tenma, last two cases showing how you handle an over-arching plot thread in the series without being too convoluted, and Simon Blackquill is certainly worthy of being a Phoenix Wright antagonistic Prosecutor, being unique and amusing.
I guess one thing I was disappointed about was the DLC case having Simon though. Make no mistake; I like him and he's a good character, but being a DLC case, I felt it was a missed opportunity to use someone else as the opponent, as you paid money for it, they should have rewarded those who bought it with a guest star by someone like Fran. Again, I like Simon Blackquill, and he this case was certainly good usage of him, just felt like a missed opportunity.
Valkyria Chronicles: So...in December, I bought a PS3 because there was a stupid good sale on old used PS3s that with coupons, I could knock the price to below 3 digits. Given this is one of the few exclusives I wanted for the PS3, it made sense to go for this game first. Completed and game didn't really disappoint. It's not perfect, but it certainly is a good game through and through. Combat is different, writing is good, plot is pretty basic but in a way that keeps the game from overstepping it's boundaries, so yeah.
I won't go TOO into depth because I don't want to devolve into unintelligible garbage but might as well say thoughts on individual things:
-Welkin worked for a "nerdy protagonist" type. He was a brainy person, but he wasn't a loser about it, which is something I notice happens a lot. It was more "has a weird passion for nature that his squad thought was weird", though because he found unique means of making use of it, the team rarely mocks him. Also, despite a large number of females in the main cast, the game deserves props for NOT turning into some harem experience, as really only one female develops feelings for him in this way...
-Alicia. A character who well illustrates a bunch of positive female qualities that aren't geared around "pretty face for men to fap over." She's a kind, motherly figure who is capable of standing on her own two feet. Her relationship with Welkin felt legitimate, and game deserves points for actually making it go somewhere and not leaving it in the "Yes, they hook up after game!" ambiguity thing. Also, being a Sergeant, and the second in command of Squad 7, helped keep her seem relevant.
-Isara managed to sidestep the "weak female childhood friend/sibling" archtype as well, illustrated early on when she is forced to kill a soldier to save someone else. Yes, she hesitated, but she still had enough resolve to pull the trigger. It's enough of an establishing scene to show "She's capable for war, though probably not best for wielding a gun", so the Engineer who DRIVES THE TANK was certainly a good way to keep her useful. The interaction with Rosie early on was kind of annoying, though at least it served a purpose other than "Darcsen's are hated, Isara feels bad for being hated, don't hate!" And Her Death was probably one of the better handled murder scenes in the genre. It accomplished what I feel Aerith's scene failed to do. First off, it didn't rely on overly dramatic music for force out an emotion, just a simple vocal that was actually tied in with the plot. Next off, it happened at a very shocking moment; nice feel good moment completely turned upside down. It just felt handled very well, and didn't try to force the emotions out, thus more natural...also montage flashback during the funeral does get me at times. YES I NEARLY CRIED AT THE BYE BYE BUTTERFREE MOMENT IN POKEMON ANIME, DEAL WITH IT!
-I'll just be brief with Rosie, Largo, Zaka and Varrot and say they all handled their roles pretty adequately with decent enough personalities. I guess I might as well note that Rosie is one of the better "Racist who slowly realizes how dumb that viewpoint is" characters out there (an archetype that is usually boring and silly pulled off; Wakka's the only one to mind who made it work otherwise.)
-I was not a fan of the Valkyrur aspect of the game. It felt kind of shoe-horned in to make the setting more interesting other than just a simple fictional version of WW2. It felt out of place and "Hey look at our super powered females, cool, right!?" Sorry, but the moments I found myself not enjoying the game as much was anytime they'd go into the Valkyrur stuff, and it never was actually fully meaningful either. The Marmota, for example, could have been handled through, say, some special weapon developed by Isara's dad that was kept under-wraps for years and decided to use it NOW because all other options were exhausted. The Final boss? Just some science-y explanation of "He's drawing power like a Lightning Rod into himself from the ship." It felt like the writers had this idea they were fond of and felt they had to put it in somewhere and forced it. Would have preferred the Valkyrur just being invaders from centuries ago, rather than mysterious people from north with something resembling super powers.
-Speaking of which, while I feel the Heroes were all good, and the females do a good job at bucking negative female stereotypes, sans princess Cordelia who I don't feel like covering because lazy, the villains left something to be desired. Not enough screen time outside of Maximillian and Selvaria, and those two are summed up as "Megalomaniac driven mad because he lost what he feels is his birthright" and "Super Powered Female who is completely subservient to her master, no questions asked." Selvaria especially rubbed me the wrong way, because while the females were all pretty good at bucking trends on the good guys side, Selvaria was a straight up female stereotype henchman villain. "I'll do anything for him because blind loyalty!" But it's cool, because they gave her super powers and made her a general right? No, not really; that's just adding more TO the stereotype, as it's saying "despite her super powers, she's still Maximillian's complete and total bitch." You could argue she's Alicia's foil, hence the contrast I guess, in that Alicia talked to Welkin as an equal (Welkin outranked her, but that rarely came out as meaningful other than "Welkin attends War Meetings"), and was not defined by such things. Sorry, but just not feeling her; feels like they just wanted to make a badass female soldier with her, and fell into all the traps. Again, it's ashame as VC was doing so good at making competent females.
-If you're wondering, I never lost a character permanently; I did get a lot of wounded characters, but no one perma-died. I also played every skirmish available once, on Normal Mode, and got every chapter I could unlock via Ellet done as well.
So yeah good game, sounds like VC2 does compromise a fair amount of what I liked from VC1 in terms of writing, which is ashame. Dunno if I'll try it or not, but regardless, good game. Thinking 8/10 offhand?
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KH3DS - Completed The Grid. The game remains brutally incoherent - particularly gameplay-wise, where all the subsystems make the fights so chaotic I don't even understand what they were aiming for at times, though the normal enemy design actually -tries-, which makes fighting randoms pretty fun in the midst of madness. Magic being good like in BBS is also nice. Boss designs are strange, though - the fight with Rinzler is pretty decent (rewards you for actually blocking attacks, which the series -rarely- do), but the upside-down gimmick is a pain in the ass. Meanwhile, Riku's fight with Crimmantis is downright trivial: the existence of a rail in the arena means you just jump into it and press A until it dies f- Reality Shift pauses when the game prompts you to notwithstanding - without you even getting noticeably hurt.
The Drop system remains a goddamn rhythm-breaking blight whose very existence is nothing short of inexcusable.
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Sophia thinks she's a melee character (that's her throwing her staff in off from the side) ~
(final boss spoilers)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FO6qEGvHGM
I know it's been ages since I played SO3, but how did I never realize Luther is in fact Manos Hands of Fate.
~
FONV: Abusing NCR trust for Legion rep. Still can't take Quarry Junction. Sneak attack almost killed momma deathclaw in one hit, but then the alpha ran over and ripped my head off. Will have to come back later with the perks, all the perks.
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The Banner Saga: A couple hours into this. Pretty fun. Gorgeous art, a neat setting and a battle system that has a lot going on, but comes together well. I just wish there was some way to heal, even a rare or expensive one; your current HP is also your attack power, so when enemies start to whittle you down a battle can go south very fast and very irrevocably.
I can't figure out whether I like the story segments or not. There are a metric shit-ton of dialog choices between battles that may or may not lead to stuff like bonus items, extra money/exp/resources, optional characters joining you, that sort of thing, but the choices aren't very clearly delineated - a lot of the time it's more like rolling dice than role-playing. Not unlike life, I guess. And the game does make it easy to save-scum if you really want to go back and undo a bad choice.
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KH3DS - Completed The Grid. The game remains brutally incoherent - particularly gameplay-wise, where all the subsystems make the fights so chaotic I don't even understand what they were aiming for at times, though the normal enemy design actually -tries-, which makes fighting randoms pretty fun in the midst of madness.
What Nomura has always been doing with KH, cramming everything in regardless it make sense or not. Which is something he really should stop doing. He toned down a little bit in BBS, yet revert back to his old ways in DDD.
But in the end I decide to let it be. After all, DDD simplified a portion of skill system and have the decency of putting good skills in chest, which really reduce the necessity on grinding. The dreameaters are actually worthwhile companions (A Holy or Dark Firega spamming legion? Hell yes!), more so than Donal and Goofy, so it actually feels rewarding to devote time on raising them despite the system is pretty stupid.
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Besides, you get to tummy rub dream Pokemon. Can't say no to that man.
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Half Minute Hero: Super Mega Neo Climax Ultimate Boy - Finished Hero 30 and all of the 'Neo' modes outside Hero 3 (assuming there are no hidden modes after it)
Okay.
'Neo' graphics mode, the default, is so disappealing it actually repels me. That doesn't happen often! Swapped to 'Retro' graphics mode after the first map.
Hero 30 is fairly entertaining. Not spectacular. Maybe a little long, but not too much. I was looking forward to seeing what would be different in the other two modes which had become available when I swapped to 'Retro' graphics, which I initially assumed was a bug.
Calamity! They're both nothing like Hero 30 and I hate both of them. I wouldn't enjoy the first of the two even in without the time limit, and while the second is better it suffers from the fact that for some bizarre reason the default key mappings have S and X as left and right, and C and Z as up and down. It's possible the keys can be rebound, but I didn't try as I didn't care for it anyway.
And of course the remaining three modes are locked. Do I really need to play through those to unlock them? The internet says that the modes are completely different in 'Neo' graphics mode, which sounds stupid, but I go check those out. And they are. What. Who does that. Probably the same people who set up the key mappings mentioned earlier.
They seem to have tried to shoehorn the modes in question into Hero 30 style gameplay, except that they've taken all of the speed out of it which makes them terrible, albeit not as terrible as the 'Retro' versions of the modes because of one single saving grace - they've compressed the modes down to a single level each. Which is good because I don't know if I could have taken more than a single level of those graphics each. Beat both the modes there, and both of the modes which were unlocked following those, and went back to Retro to see if the following modes had been unlocked there.
Of course they hadn't.
I tried Hero 3 in 'Neo' several times, but my reflexes aren't up to it... there were numerous times in Hero 30 that I only avoided failing because of the comparatively generous time limit.
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FF13-3: Played the demo. My response: lol
A more in depth commentary: The plot make absolutely no fucking sense (A tradition of FF games of late). Lightning is Jesus, Snow is the evil villain who rules over a city of eternal partying before the end of the world while being emo and wearing all black. !NotSerah summons the demons, laughs evilly. Square is still desperately trying to turn Lightning into Cloud and FF13 into FF7's world. It was incredibly not subtle here- the demo video even ended with the game shilling a fucking Cloud DLC costume for Light for preordering the game! Of course, FF7 had a fascinating world that they explored to you and told you about, rather than flinging you from point to point with no coherent plotting. Ahem.
The gameplay was a mix of FF13's system and 10-2's system. You flip between classes, you can customize classes as well. It's interesting enough, except that Lightning is your only PC. The game is trying to go for a pseudo action game feel in general. Battles are real time, you don't automatically heal outside of battle and you have limited item slots. I thought the gameplay was fun enough, but it definitely felt shallow to me.
Square is trying to sell the game as a big budget movie title/action game, rather than RPG. Everything from the gameplay to the overly cinematic intro point to that. *shrug* not going to spend any money to play this, that's for sure.
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Several good RPGs (and the Witcher 2) on sale for ~$5.00 on Xbox for the next couple of days.
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Bone: The Great Cow Race - played through
Bone: Out From Boneville - played through
Crushingly mediocre. Actually makes me kinda relieved that they stopped making the series after only two games, assuming that the other one isn't going to have a dramatic jump in quality.
And... it did dramatically jump in quality. Damn it. Now I'm annoyed that they stopped making it.
The main improvement is that Smiley Bone is considerably more involved in this episode than in the previous episode, and he is great. There's more characters to interact with in general, and they're typically more interesting than the ones from the first episode. There's less minigames, and none of them are as terrible as the ones in the first episode.
Of course it's still not on the level of TTG's S&M games or anything... but definitely feels like it was worth playing, unlike the first episode.
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FONV: A man chooses, a Securitron obeys.
Aw god Courier 6 why you gotta hold the Pimp-Boy 3 Billion at an angle like that. Well fine a little neck strain is a small price to pay for fashion.
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Half Minute Hero: Super Mega Neo Climax Ultimate Boy - Finished Hero 30 and all of the 'Neo' modes outside Hero 3 (assuming there are no hidden modes after it)
Okay.
'Neo' graphics mode, the default, is so disappealing it actually repels me. That doesn't happen often! Swapped to 'Retro' graphics mode after the first map.
As a fan of the PSP version of this, I was surprised to hear there was a re-release with updated graphics! *One GIS later* Kill it with fire.
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Fallou new Vegas: New character time because I clearly don't have problems. Gonna do a VATS-centric character with Cowboy guns/badass preacher type. So looking through the wiki for AP+ armor, I see the Legion Duster doing that. Huh. So Cowboy Legionnaire go.
Anyway, level 1 run to the clinic. Ended up with an extra thousand since I only needed to sell one combat armor. Trying to shoot some fiends winds up with me dying because having 2 strength means I can't use crap. Also I got stuck on geometry. So I instead go and grab the Abilene Kid LE BB gun and use its 1 STR requirements and crits to deal with enemies. It is surprisingly workable. After scavenging enough I go and gamble at the Atomic Wrangler to get a Luck implant. Then I break the bank there. Then I go run around doing weird things like palling with Powder Gangers. I do some stuff at Cottonwood Cove to get some Legion rep before going and bothering Benny back in the Stripe. He's somehow at the top of the stairs instead of by his corner but whatever, I talk to him and leave and gain access to the Fort. I die once in the Arena because Stella's a boss, but then I go chat up the tent dudes. Next stop, the bunker... tomorrow. And I'm only level 8 lol.
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You should do a run doing as few quests as possible sometime just to see what level you get. I assume its go straight to the Strip, get in via money from spending 1 dollar at the Wrangler on a chip, assassinate Benny then do House ending? You thinking like level 6?
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You should do a run doing as few quests as possible sometime just to see what level you get. I assume its go straight to the Strip, get in via money from spending 1 dollar at the Wrangler on a chip, assassinate Benny then do House ending? You thinking like level 6?
Oooo good idea. Yes Man ending since House would require you to gain cooperation or kill and Yes Man let's you get away with just meeting dudes.
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RSMS- Beat with Hawke. Don't really intend to play more stories.
This game is goddamned infuriating. Like, one of the reasons I stuck with it was I felt sure if I didn't beat it now, I'd never go back to it.
That's unfair though. Romancing SaGa not only does a lot right, but everything I disliked about it was very much intentional design. It is exactly the game it wants to be, and for the right person it's probably the absolute best game in its vein you're likely to find. There's quite a lot of polish going on, and the SaGa-ness of the game has a lot of thought put behind it, compared to SaGa Frontier which often feels like it's functioning entirely on accident. While I do think the magic system is a bit wonky (it's all storebought, in a game very much built on resource starvation? Aside from a token healer, the only use for the stuff is the FAQ-bait rather broken fusion spells) and something akin to Frontier's Gift system would have really balanced out character builds, there's generally pretty clear patterns to what's going on and the game makes sense as you go.
Trouble is the quest system is completely counter to anything that makes sense to me. Like any SaGa game, how many battles you fight and how strong yoru characters are will beef up enemies throughout the game. There's a mechanism in-game that gives you a hint when this happens beyond enemies themselves even. Trouble is that quests open and closer based on this system, meaning that if you get distracted by a quest too high of level for you, you might lock yourself out of vital early quests that open up good midgame/endgame quests. the game expects you to a) open up the entire world map before really doing many quests and b) to immediately upon game start invest in the evade enemies skills (once you're in an encounter, running from enemies is both difficult and an immensely bad idea ANYWAY, so straight up not getting in fights is vital and generally you're not going to be very successful at that without the proper skills). As my earlier post will attest, I legitimately thought I'd screwed myself over because I'd levelled past most of the early-midgame quests and couldn't tell if bosses were truly fixed stats or if they were getting stronger, meaning any further grinding or questing would leave me underpowered forever. Fortunately boss stats are indeed fixed. Still, I very much felt the game was just punishing me for playing normally rather than immediately picking up on its rules, which is just not fun.
For all that it didn't click with me though, there's just a lot of charm to the game. Some of it is clearly leftover from the original SNES game, but even then it's kinda like playing a late-era PS1 game more than anything and it's just kinda goofily earnest. The endgame, once you're actually in a position to stand a chance with it, is pretty good as well, and unlike earlier bits of the game it was generally the right kind of hard, where you would lose, and lose a lot, but never because nothing you did mattered: you just made a mistake, or didn't anticipate something, or attrition got to you. Stuff you can rework strategy around.
I pondered the score a bit, but despite the game finishing reasonably strong I spent a little too much time ready to pitch a controller to tweak the score up for it. 5/10.
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Banner Saga - This is game full of horny giants with amazing beards.
I am so in.
Unfortunately it is another good seeming PC strategy game that I think Elf would dig (pending further play! But it hits some of the right beats mechanically) that you can't undo movement and movement is important and finicky.
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Apollo Justice - oh my god
you should DEFINITELY as an adult man pawn your eight year old off on someone you barely know
This actually happened to my great grandmother! It was terrible!
Fuck you with a spiked dildo Zak.
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Why do you know about your grandmother getting fucked with a spiked dildo? Tell her to keep that shit to herself from now on.
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Honestly, she would have totally told me that if it were true. >_> I shall change the order of that post though :)
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RSMS- Beat with Hawke. Don't really intend to play more stories.
Nothing is vital, your OCD just got in the way. You're not really supposed to do everything in one playthrough.
(I still hate this game though)
FF2 (PSP): The story of Yattaf, Dead, Deader and XDead.
Just got Minwu's canoe. Also Minwu. But he teleported himself away immediately during his first random battle. Huh! Pretty weird guy!
Yattaf is such a perfect waifu she already excels at everything. I'm trying not to do the usual total FF2 smashing but it's hard. I don't think I ever played the game the normal way.
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Bravely Default Demo: So decided to try this game out and see if it actually worth my time.
Well, it does seem to have fixed like all of FF4HoL's issues, that's for sure. You can target, no limited inventory, job system actually remembered that sharing abilities is part of the fun of a job system, game actually tells you necessary info like weapon proficiency, even taking them into account when equipping stuff (So Sword Q may be better than Lance Z on a Knight, but the attack powers would be inverted on a Valkyrie...by the way, WHY IS IT A VALKYRIE!? You've been liberally using Final Fantasy terms everywhere else, and that's fine if you want to buck the trend even if the job is blatantly a Dragoon, but VALKYRIE WAS NOT A GOOD CHOICE OF WORDS! Last I checked, Valkyrie require 2 X Chromosomes, something half your team lacks!), speed up option for random encounters so you don't have to sit through enemies attacking you a bunch of times with boring animations...
...ok, this game may actually be worth paying attention too. Dunno if I'll buy it at launch or anything, but I'll at least keep an eye out for it or something. Definitely seems like it at least has potential to be decent.
Also, it's more of a Final Fantasy game than FF4HoL thus far. Not only does it use FF Terms everywhere (except Bard is Performer, which I guess is "Bard + Dancer in one job", Samurai is Swordmaster, and...see my Valkyrie thing above <_<), but actually remembers "FF games have good polish." I'm not getting "Dragon Quest game in disguise" vibes here.
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Nothing is vital, your OCD just got in the way. You're not really supposed to do everything in one playthrough.
(I still hate this game though)
Well, what I really mean is, missing out on Aquamarine and Moonstone makes a first playthrough noticeably harder and I probably could have beaten the game with less frustration had I not locked myself out of them because I didn't know the rules of the game.
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I check misc links like once a week at best, really. Grabbed it and will give it a playthrough when I'm less fuzzyheaded.
Bravely Default Demo - decided to grab this to see what the game's like. Oh, it's the offspring of FF5. I am 100% okay with this.
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Bayonetta Hard Mode: There were only 3 Gracious and Glorious pairings in the final chapter. I was expecting like seven. Still died plenty!
Final Bosses weren't any harder, frankly. Jeane was improved, and I'd love to fight her again but GRAH to Chap 14's first half. Pope Vader I should have done better against but I screwed up a QTE defense against the building and took a lot of damage, so I think that knocked me down from a Gold to a Silver ranking. Final Boss...well, first deaths was remembering how to not die in the platforming sections. Then I died a bunch to the stupid instant death attack due to activating the wrong move (NO! DO NOT TURN INTO BIRD! I WANT PANTHER!!!), and died a bunch to the STUPID PLANET SECTION GRRR!!
...yeah, it's about what you expect from a Hard Mode in these games. If you played DMC1 Hard, DMC3 Very Hard, or any "Son of Sparda" mode, you know what to expect. No, I don't think I'll be doing Climax Mode. That scares me <_<
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Nothing is vital, your OCD just got in the way. You're not really supposed to do everything in one playthrough.
(I still hate this game though)
Well, what I really mean is, missing out on Aquamarine and Moonstone makes a first playthrough noticeably harder and I probably could have beaten the game with less frustration had I not locked myself out of them because I didn't know the rules of the game.
Missing out on fire magic that Flammar teaches is even worse, frankly. I'm assuming you missed out on it because you were saying that only synthesis magic is good instead of talking about how awesome Bird of Flame and Revive are.
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Flammar sells you magic? Huh.
But no, I didn't have any Pyrology users. But I don't think "one school of magic plus fusion spells" is significantly different from "just fusion spells" in terms of making magic a good option throughout the game, just adds to its "pure FAQ-bait" status. I feel like if you could spark spells and thus not have to drop serious money to get a new spell every time it'd help balance the game out. But it's not a huge knock on the overall design, just an area that probably could have been better.
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The gameplay was a mix of FF13's system and 10-2's system. You flip between classes, you can customize classes as well. It's interesting enough, except that Lightning is your only PC. The game is trying to go for a pseudo action game feel in general. Battles are real time, you don't automatically heal outside of battle and you have limited item slots. I thought the gameplay was fun enough, but it definitely felt shallow to me.
The gameplay is actually pretty fun, probably better than both FF13 and 13-2 combined.
Despite the game's small arsenal of enemies, they are actually distinct enough that you have to adjust your set according to the enemies you are fighting. Eons better than FF13 that constantly puts me into sleep.
The combat is also much more rewarding thanks to the constant drop of new skills and materials, which in turn also makes you utilize the system. Which is another area FF13 and FF13-2 failed to do so.
BTW, you might not believe it, but FF13-3 actually has the most sensible plot and reasonable story progression than both FF13 and FF13-2. The character actually stayed true to themselves too.
While I do think the magic system is a bit wonky (it's all storebought, in a game very much built on resource starvation? Aside from a token healer, the only use for the stuff is the FAQ-bait rather broken fusion spells) and something akin to Frontier's Gift system would have really balanced out character builds, there's generally pretty clear patterns to what's going on and the game makes sense as you go.
Being store bought is another balance to the lightbulb system.
It allows you access to spell like Fire Bird and Psycho Blast early if you are willing to spend the cash. And they can bail you out in a number of situation in early game if the player happens to be underpowered or tech depraved.
And out side spell fusion. There are things like Revive and Illusion Body, which can lead into a different world of brokenness.
Magic in SaGa is something you have to have to tackle it in a different perspective to make it useful, and it often is a beast once you do.
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FF2 Yattaf solo:
Shit, I couldn't resist.
Wandered around the world map exploring every town as usual. Got to shield level 5 and thunder level 4. Spammed some Blink and Protect until level 2.
Went back to the undefeatable captains at the beginning with two shields + best armor. Blink, Protect, Thunder thunder thunder etc, lol OP gear is mine. I'll try not using it too much.
Still haven't entered the first dungeon.
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DDS2 - Finished Airport, want to fight Michael, had tried to do before Airport and just didn't have the motivation to do knock down drag out use all my items to get through boss gauntlet just to see hi in motion. So Airport done, I think I got like 10 levels in here or something. After finishing I did a bit of grinding to round out skillsets bagging Lightning Resist for Gale and Bufudyne on Cielo so I should see an easier time getting through Uriel and Raphael. Gabriel also should be fine as long as I remember the order to void again. Will stick with Void Charm in phase 2 for her over Death because Charm worse than dying and Gale has Resist Death, so that plus Skull Ring should make it manageable.
Should get to Michael with only Fire weakness able to be hit and I rock Drain Fire for Raphael anyway.
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Tales of Vesperia: So Yuri wins Godlike as long as there are throwable rocks nearby?
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Tales of Vesperia: So Yuri wins
That's good enough right there.
The Last Story: Completed.
The Last Story is a rather generic JRPG that puts a few interesting twists on the formula such that it turns into something unique and enjoyable. It does not excel in anything such that the game warrants high praise, but it does make for an enjoyable romp that plays and feels different than a standard JRPG.
The formula: Young inexperienced protagonist who is naive and good-hearted.
The twist: Is in a world where this does NOT tend to work out well.
Zael checks in as a protagonist with a dream, a True Love interest princess, and a super-entity granted special power. This is rather standard stuff for a JRPG, but it is explored from a very different surrounding then standard. Zael is part of a mercenary squad that aims to make it big for themselves and has allied with the Count of the island they are staying on to do so. As Zael succeeds and puts rightfully earned notches into his belt he falls more under the not-so-benevolent control of Count Arganann. Zael becomes a hero that serves to further the ambitions of the Count as opposed to one who protects and serves people in need. This was fairly well done as a plot point and Zael's unease over the situation contrasts nicely with Dagran, his boss', desire to secure a steady life for his band of mercenaries that has been through hell.
One credit to the game's plot and writing is the character interaction. The mercenary group (which doesn't actually have a name) is composed of people with differing goals and friendliness, but from the start it is clear that these people work well together. As you traverse a dungeon, the team will constantly talk about the ongoings and discuss strategy for handling whatever obstacles/monsters may be in their path. The banter is written well enough, and as the game goes on it changes appropriately to reflect character development (this is especially apparent for Yurick, who starts the game off rather cold towards everyone). This flows rather nicely with combat and plot scenes. My one complaint would be that sometimes you can cut off the discussions if you screen-change while they are ongoing. But the fact that I found myself waiting at doorways and such to finish hearing the discussions is a testament to how much I enjoyed them. I was even surprised by how much I enjoyed the 'true love designee princess' character, as after her eyeroll-worthy introduction was likable enough.
The game's over-arching plot is extremely standard JRPG 'save-the-world' stuff, with a poorly characterized nonhuman villain. This was extremely disappointing considering the fact that the human cast was quite strong. More focus on a competent villain cast would have done wonders for the game. In some respects this is like a Tales game as far as the value of PC/villain casts go... excepting one twist at the end.
The combat system is fairly interesting in concept but suffers from a crippling lack of difficulty for a large section of the game, owing to the fact that the PCs auto-revive 5 times before they are finally put down. That said the game was not without strategy and required one to utilize the various combat systems to leverage easier/faster wins. The gameplay is one part ARPG and a larger part SRPG, with commands given to allies playing a large role in the outcome of the battle. The game emphasizes team synergy moreso than most ARPGs do, with positioning bonuses, the ability to combine magic and physical techs to have zone effects, and Zael's 'special power' being extremely team oriented. Zael's special power doesn't do much for HIM perse, but it does attract enemy attention to him and speed up spellcasters in his team. Utilizing this cleverly makes the difference between an easy battle and one that acts as a total slog. The game also encourages strategy in terms of how to start off fights or engage groups of enemies. Rushing in headfirst is rarely a wise decision even if you can make it work. Sniping enemy mages or paralyzing specific nasty targets usually saves some of those 5 lives you have. The game really picked up at the end when the last few bosses started putting up quality fights that required managing often hectic battlefields against bosses who could one-shot PCs.
The largest complaint I can level against the combat system is: Why the hell can't you switch PC control? The game has every other PC than Zael be controllable at some point (except Mirania the healer). It would not have been difficult to include the ability to switch control to other PCs. This was quite egregious!
An enjoyable game, but a bit too easy right up until the endgame.
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A Link Between Worlds: I started this up, after about a 5 minute intro, which was probably only that long because I spent a lot of time murdering bushes and pots because DAMN IT! THEY WERE MOCKING ME! (...and had rupees, that may have had something to do with it too...), I get my sword, do tutorial dungeon and...game actually begins!
It really is refreshing to play a game that doesn't waste your time and lets you get actual gameplay pretty fast. About an hour in and finished the first real dungeon. Not much else to say because early and such.
Well, I guess I should say here what I said in chat:
Why the hell do Royals in Hyrule keep thinking it's a good idea to name their princesses Zelda? Every time there is a Princess Zelda, something always goes horribly wrong, requiring a savior. Obviously, that name is cursed, and the entire issue can be prevented if they JUST STOP NAMING HER ZELDA!
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Fallout New Vegas: Stuff happened. Ran through the Fort Bunker effortlessly since my Science was just high enough to disable everything. That got me to Liked with te Legion and thus getting me some Lucky Shades. Hunted down ghouls with Maria for the challenge, and found out Feral Ghouls have no damage whatsoever apparently as they were constantly hitting my wondrous DT of -2. Broke the Casino banks then went and implanted up. Scourged up enough caps through other ventures to get Medicine Stick. Went into Loansome Road to get phat caps. Did so. The ambush at the Laser Detonator was a brutal clash that nearly destroyed me and halved my medical supplies. Then the game crashed and attempt two was effortless. Killing dudes with a BB gun continues to be hilarious. Went and grabbed a Ranger Sequoia and La Lounge Carbine to finish off what guns I want. Yay.
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The TLS comments strike me as largely spot on. I was a little more enamoured with the non-mercenary characters (Arganan, Calista, Jirall, Dagran) and a little less enamoured with the mercenaries relatively but otherwise I agree with pretty much the entire post. Good game (mostly on the writing front where it cheerily subverts some JRPG plot tropes), could have been better.
Ace Attorney Investigations - Beat this again. It's a very fun game, though I now think I do slightly prefer Dual Destinies... can certainly see the case for the reverse though! AAI's new cast isn't really that great (although all the killers save case 3's are solid at worst), but Edgeworth is wonderful to play as. The writers really nail the right balance with him; at times his genius borders on Gary Stu-ish, but his deliciously awkward social interactions keeps it from ever feeling grating. (<Larry> Hey! Keep saying things like that, and your already incredibly small number of friends will drop by one!) Franziska's also really excellent to watch in this game; the relationship the two of them have and how it relates back to their (horrible) upbringing at Manfred's hands is quite effective. The cases themselves (outside case 3) are all good fun, and the last case is pretty great, falling just short of the absolute top tier of cases for me. The last case being great is important because, checking my DS' clock, it's about 40% of the game. <_<
Civ 5 - Not much to say except I am still playing this (rate has fallen off though certainly).
Xenoblade - Also posting to note I am playing this. Leaving town after getting Dunban in my party. I'm not sure what I think about the game yet.
Xenogears - In what will probably be the final entry (for the near future) of "turn-of-the-century RPGs I have been intending to replay for ages", it will be interesting to see how this one holds up. Currently one hour in; Lahan just went boom. Dan is really something (hatch plan to have some random dude abduct your sister because you like him more than her fiance, try to tempt said dude with descriptions of your sister's bust size, okay then). My favourite scene in the first hour is probably the one where Citan plays a music box which is a relic from an ancient civilization and muses about all the very different people who would have heard this music. It's a surprisingly touching little scene and it and ones like it really help act as a contrast to the Citan we see increasingly later in the game who often comes off as a manipulative jerk. Even early it's pretty obvious there's some nuance in this game's writing which 80% of the genre (minimum) wishes it could reach. It's not all good, though, as a few scenes in an attempt to be cryptic end up just kind of ineffective; I've never really liked the scene where Fei destroys Lahan; it was confusing as hell on a first playthrough and even now feels awkwardly directed. Of course the scene prominently deals with giant robots and I am the weird XG fan who doesn't actually care for giant robots. (see also: my relationship with Evangelion)
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Ys Memories of Celcetta: What's worse: Having your brother kidnapped and mind controlled to beat the shit out of your dad and do unspecified other evil tasks in the future, or inferiority complex sibling drama? Apparently the latter? Okay, I'm fine with a light tone & humor even when the villainous plot is theoretically super-evil, but if you're gonna introduce some light-hearted angst, let's get our priorities straight about what to angst about.
Also I have totally failed in a mission but everyone acted like I succeeded and I got a PS Vita Trophy so hey I guess I did. You do realize that Our Hero *lost* in that cutscene battle, right? I guess "I'll kill you later" means "and I'll also stop doing my evil plan for a bit 'cause I'm a nice guy."
Defender's Quest: This game was a ton of fun if you're okay with an indie tower defense game. I'm not a big player of the genre but I do enjoy it. Features a script/plot authentically written by an English major (so it says on their website), is amusing and gets to the point, and has weirdly good music for a tower defense game. (The guy who did it is allegedly collaborating with Uematsu for Project Phoenix. I doubt it's that much, but among "fan composers grabbed off the Internet" it's absolutely top tier.) The Steam description mentioning Final Fantasy Tactics is a little overblown - it's more like Diablo 2 in its mechanics for leveling up your characters. There's a skill tree with 1 point per level-up, and you can invest multiple points in certain skills, but there isn't usually THAT much value in mixing up builds. Sure you should build the archer that inflicts a really good poison, and the archer who inflicts a really good bleed, and maybe a straight damage-cannon archer based around crits, but the differences are fairly minute in general aside from straight-up misbuilding your character (e.g. Knights are about knockback & stun to tie enemies up for your other units, not damage, don't mis-invest.)
If I had a complaint, it's that within any one mission, the difficulty doesn't normally spike as hard toward the end as I'd expect - e.g. the final huge huge wave that Plants vs. Zombies will throw at you before closing out. I usually felt like either I just plain lacked the DPS to deal with even the initial waves (and thus should go back and do other missions on Advanced or the like for fun-grinding where you're getting actually new stuff and they change the levels up a tad), or else survived the initial rush and the game didn't throw quite enough later to break me. There were exceptions where units were trickling through to the bitter end, of course, and that was great when it happened, it just didn't happen quite enough.
On the bright side, the "boss" missions were totally great, if a tad too easy. Your average tower defense game just makes a "boss" mission a DPS check against one uber-enemy; there's 1 mission like that, but the other boss missions are far more interesting and fun, except that as noted above, they don't quite punish you as much as I'd like for stalling. Play 'em and see.
Anyway, good times.
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Xenogears is just made by crazy people. Like, the music box? If you go back there on disc 2, you'll find out the thing has a dedication written on it.
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Xenogears is just made by crazy people. Like, the music box? If you go back there on disc 2, you'll find out the thing has a dedication written on it.
And yet Yui completely disappears from the game without a trace. They had some strange priorities after their budget got cut. Also, I don't know who thought "zoom in super-close on the sprites so you can see how blocky they look up close any time there's a scene in a gear rather than have a different sprite" was a good idea but they are the craziest person of all.
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Xenogears - In what will probably be the final entry (for the near future) of "turn-of-the-century RPGs I have been intending to replay for ages", it will be interesting to see how this one holds up.
I kind of wish we could get Torment on this list. Yes that does mean I wish you would play it twice.
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Xenogears is just made by crazy people. Like, the music box? If you go back there on disc 2, you'll find out the thing has a dedication written on it.
And yet Yui completely disappears from the game without a trace. They had some strange priorities after their budget got cut. Also, I don't know who thought "zoom in super-close on the sprites so you can see how blocky they look up close any time there's a scene in a gear rather than have a different sprite" was a good idea but they are the craziest person of all.
Isn't Yui psychic or something? Clearly she just had the presence of mind to know she didn't want to be associated with Xenogears Disc 2 in any way.
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FFX- Highroad. Game is well put together but is definitely on the slow side to replay. Also Kim's stating stat build is such shit. Nice Aurontastic speed there.
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Xenogears is just made by crazy people. Like, the music box? If you go back there on disc 2, you'll find out the thing has a dedication written on it.
And yet Yui completely disappears from the game without a trace. They had some strange priorities after their budget got cut. Also, I don't know who thought "zoom in super-close on the sprites so you can see how blocky they look up close any time there's a scene in a gear rather than have a different sprite" was a good idea but they are the craziest person of all.
Isn't Yui psychic or something? Clearly she just had the presence of mind to know she didn't want to be associated with Xenogears Disc 2 in any way.
I think her hidden talent was that she was a really good sword fighter? If she could read minds she could have saved us a lot of fucking time by coming along.
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Yui was a better fighter than Citan at some point in the past, having beaten him when he was on a mission.
Their daughter is psychic because of Citan's telepathic link to the Emperor being somehow made more generalized and passed down with his genes.
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Did they ever say she actually read minds? I thought she didn't talk because she was all traumatized by the village being torched at the beginning.
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She doesn't talk even in the scene before the village gets torched, for what it's worth.
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Largely, the idea that Midori is psychic comes from this scene in Shevat, while Fei is frozen in carbonite:
Dan:So this is where Fei's being held!? He deserves it! Let me pray on his
weeping face as if it were an idol! Heh heh... As if I would! Yech...! What, what is this...!?
...This is terrible... No matter what, this is going too far... He's still... alive...?
How could you possibly be!? You're human too, aren't you!? Darn...! ...Fei... Oh, Fei...!?
Midori:Crying...
Dan:Huh...!? Midori, it's you... Phew... Don't scare me like that! Crying...?
Who's crying? ...!? You mean our friend is crying?
Midori:Angry... Hurt... He'll wake up soon... It's calling him...
Which implies either a) that she knows what the Zophar is, Fei's relationship to it, and can accurately guess when the thing is active or b) she can read minds. the second option seems a bit more likely, hence the fans assuming she's psychic.
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I wouldn't be surprised if she was supposed to read minds and that was another plot point that got dropped except for one oblique scene that could be an indicator. Perfect Works is like three hundred giant pages of things they dropped.
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I'd say it's more like 100 pages of dropped plot points, 50 pages of backstory that's not really relevant to the game but a super fan might care about (ie the stuff that got turned into Xenosaga), another 50 of clarifying plot points that were really obtuse, and 100 pages of artwork, but yeah more or less.
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FONV: Ranger Station Charlie's one of the last map locations I get around to visiting, and when I get there it's in the middle of the Legion raid. !!! I didn't know that could even happen. I walked inside mid-fight (I'm still liked by both sides), grabbed the Legion holotape, walked back out to see the rest of the fight. Quite in spite of what the Legion message stated, I watched one lady ranger waste three legionaires and then walk away. Considered myself fortunate that day I hadn't yet pissed off the NCR.
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Dan:So this is where Fei's being held!? He deserves it! Let me pray on his
weeping face as if it were an idol! Heh heh... As if I would! Yech...! What, what is this...!?
...This is terrible... No matter what, this is going too far... He's still... alive...?
How could you possibly be!? You're human too, aren't you!? Darn...! ...Fei... Oh, Fei...!?
It is likely because of the translation, but this is so bad it makes me want to strangle a puppy.
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Well,
(a) If I recall that scene properly, there's a reasonable amount of action/body language between the lines which makes them come off more naturally than they do in the script
(b) while Xenogears has a pretty good translation for a Playstation game, that's uh not praise
(c) it is Dan; he is a moron
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A Link Between Worlds: I got Sword Beams. NOTHING ELSE MATTERS ANYMORE! THE SWORD BEAMS ARE BACK! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!
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The Guided Fate Paradox: oh my god this is the most anime. Pretty good game so far, up to chapter 5. Bosses are nice and creative, translation is stellar, and the plot I'll have to reserve judgment because it is tropetastic for now but could easily be pretty good or really bad depending on where they are going with it. I am not a fan of the dull character designs, and the personalities to match, but it *may* be building toward something good.
Risk of Rain: fun little roguelike side-scroller. throw it in the category of Diablo 2 and Ys Origin: an extremely satisfying hack & slash (& shoot) affair where enemies quite satisfyingly burst like powerup-filled pinatas. hard game, quite unforgiving, short (successful run will take 90 minutes) filled with randomized items, passive powerups for the most part, requires quick tactical thinking. Good times.
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(a) If I recall that scene properly, there's a reasonable amount of action/body language between the lines which makes them come off more naturally than they do in the script
There is literally no way for an ellipse followed by an exclamation point and a question mark to come off natural.
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It's trying to communicate both trailing off and surprise, or at least that's how I always read it. These things got easier once video games gained (competent) VA.
Regardless, I should probably have said "less unnatural" instead of "more natural".
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Brothers: A Tale Of Two Sons - Played through. Short and simple (doesn't help that I missed all the optional stuff because I didn't know there was optional stuff), but really really good at what it does, as long as you can wrap your muscle memory around the controls. Which caused more than a few deaths on my part, but nothing too frustrating. The ending is just....dang. Really well done, in storytelling, gameplay, and the way the latter feeds the former. It's free on PS+, too.
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FONV: Ranger Station Charlie's one of the last map locations I get around to visiting, and when I get there it's in the middle of the Legion raid. !!! I didn't know that could even happen. I walked inside mid-fight (I'm still liked by both sides), grabbed the Legion holotape, walked back out to see the rest of the fight. Quite in spite of what the Legion message stated, I watched one lady ranger waste three legionaires and then walk away. Considered myself fortunate that day I hadn't yet pissed off the NCR.
Wow that's amazing. Even if it somehow wasn't a scripted event the sheer number of coincidences that had to occur was crazy.
Fallout New Vegas: Dying in one-hit to Satchel Charges is now my number 1 hatred over Dead Money Speakers. I did thrice to one that wasn't actually visible! Not Rawr or Courier's Mile combined have killed me as much as the Satchel Traps.
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SRW J - Doing a replay of this, using Calveena+Festenia in the Bellzelute(last time was Toya+MMM in the Broketeed). The Bel is actually....reasonably balanced, which is surprising. Enemies can actually hit, it doesn't OHKO everything, etc. If it had Focus I could prolly pull the old OG1 Excellen trick of sending it out alone and countering everything into one more shot kills range, but lack of that means I need to keep it back and snipe.
Since this is a carry over game, my Aesti squad is a bundle of roving death, the girls and Akito all having fully upgraded weapons. And let's not even talk about the Layzner squad who has full upgrade for mechs and weapons. So of course I'm holding these guys back and letting others get the kills as much as I can.
Favorites this run are: Layzner/Originals/Nadesico(Carried over from last time), G Gundam/Mazinkaizer/Zeorymer(this run's picks).
If the lack of Seed and the presence of Zeorymer in the favorites didn't give it away, guess what secret I'm going for this run? Think I'll try to FUB Zeorymer just for maximum broken/hilarity, prolly only doing this once even if I replay again, since getting Great Zeo locks out so many other things I want to use.
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Brothers: A Tale Of Two Sons - Played through. Short and simple (doesn't help that I missed all the optional stuff because I didn't know there was optional stuff), but really really good at what it does, as long as you can wrap your muscle memory around the controls. Which caused more than a few deaths on my part, but nothing too frustrating. The ending is just....dang. Really well done, in storytelling, gameplay, and the way the latter feeds the former. It's free on PS+, too.
I bet one of the brothers dies
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They both do. Frequently. One time an invisible yeti picked up the older brother and used him to beat the younger one to death.
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If it's invisible, how do you know it was a Yeti?
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Don't try to tell me what an invisible yeti doesn't look like.
(but seriously, it left bigfoot footprints and lives in the ice world)
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Fallout New Vegas: Dying in one-hit to Satchel Charges is now my number 1 hatred over Dead Money Speakers. I did thrice to one that wasn't actually visible! Not Rawr or Courier's Mile combined have killed me as much as the Satchel Traps.
Fudo did you gimp your endurance as much as your strength or something.
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Fallout New Vegas: Dying in one-hit to Satchel Charges is now my number 1 hatred over Dead Money Speakers. I did thrice to one that wasn't actually visible! Not Rawr or Courier's Mile combined have killed me as much as the Satchel Traps.
Fudo did you gimp your endurance as much as your strength or something.
No, since I needed so many Implants my Endurance was at 6 which had me around 300 HP for the explodey parts of Loansome Road. Very Hard just ramps up the damage of them to stupid levels and they're impossible to disarm. I only ever survived the explosion of two of them. Hell, just from basic enemies I preferred the guy with the Anti-Material rifle over anything else since my DT was so ass everything got through it anyway and the AMR's rate of fire sucks so bad that they did less DPS than literally everything else.
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The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past Massive Fanservice Edition: Now IN 3D!!!!: 3 of the Lorule dungeons beaten. The 3rd one I ended up completing not realizing I was doing one of those dungeons because of how it's set up.
I'm enjoying this game a fair amount. I could easily have already finished it, but the game has found a way to make the exploration aspect fun due to how it's structured. Combine that with the nostalgia trip (I played a lot of ALttP when I was younger; I'm seriously considering getting the VC version on my Wii U after this), and I can see why this game got so much praise.
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The Walking Dead- Season 1, Episode three. Just got off the train after cutting Clem's hair. I will have to second rob and say this is the first game I've ever played that had QTE's that didn't make me want to punch someone in the nose. The writing is excellent though the various splitpath options are limited due to budget and time constraints. I don't mind though, this is hands down one of the best written and darkest games I've played. I chose Doug and sided with Kenny over Lilly.
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The Legend of Zelda: Now We Have a Dark Haired Zelda Named Hilda!: Finished!
Died only once officially, got over 20k rupees throughout the course of the game. Could not get the ultimate sword because finding the last hint was me smacking my head against the wall repeatedly and didn't want to FAQ it, at least not until I completed the game. Also, only 2 hearts away from full gauge, though, dunno how many heart pieces. Found 84 of the 100 Maimais, and I wasn't even looking THAT hard (oh, I did some actual searching make no mistake), so I guess that qualifies as a well done world-wide treasure hunt. Only thing I didn't upgrade was the Hookshot.
This game is really good. I discussed this in chat, but the thing I think what this game did exceedingly well was just managing to find the perfect balance of "Familiar" and "New." By making it an ALttP sequel with ALttP fanservice all over the place, it hits every nostalgic chord well, and you definitely have a sense of familiarity with what you're doing as a result. Yet, with the new gameplay ideas (rentals, wall-art, etc.), it gives a new feel to the game. The ability to do dungeon sets in almost any order you want was nice, and the game doesn't feel like it's holding your hand either. Simply goes "here's the dungeon, now figure it out."
While Dungeons did eventually become gimmicked around an item, a big difference is that because you have the item BEFORE going into the dungeon, the dungeon starts off with item related puzzles from the outset. Normally, Zelda dungeons will start with a bunch of general switch hitting, key finding, etc. until you find the token treasure in the dungeon halfway in. Then it takes a huge shift and now is focused entirely on that item to reach all the unreachable areas. At least, the Zelda games I played were like this, and seeing what little my brother played, it didn't seem to shift from this (and Oracle Games certainly followed this route too.) This leads to dungeons being highly repetitive, and being both larger and taking way longer than they need to. Its fine at first, but by the 4th dungeon out of like 10, it starts to feel very samey.
ALBW, however, because of it's style, it basically cuts out the entire first half of the dungeon, and it doesn't force a lot of filler. So dungeons are just long enough to feel fulfilling, and don't overstay their welcome. This makes the game way shorter as a result. ALBW is a very short game by modern Zelda standards, but honestly? It's really fun from start to finish, so I can't complain. I'd rather a game be a brief, enjoyable experience the entire way through than a long adventure that rollercoasters between "fun" and "tedious" which many modern adventure games and other similar things (like jRPGs) stumble into. The game has only as much as it needs, and being short, it's replay friendly, which is complimented by Hero Mode.
The other thing this game does well is it's story. No, it's not a highly original story. No, it's not even a particularly stand out story. What I praise about it, however, is the game doesn't waste your time with it. It tells the entire story in only a handful of scenes, which for a story as simple as this, gets the point across. No needless exposition, no in-depth backstory talks, just straight and to the point. I respect that they were able to just cut out the bullcrap, and give you only the essentials, and the game is all the more enjoyable for it. It also deserves props for having a half-decent sympathetic villain. From my understanding, they tried this with Ganondorf in The Wind Waker, but ultimately it was "dude, you're still trying to murder everyone because you're angry" which uh, yeah, you can't make someone be super evil then try to make them appear sympathetic. ALBW's villain, it has an understandable motive, and while there is a "going too far", feel (they're the villain after all), you do feel bad for the character by the end and it makes the situation all the better that the game actually finds a sensible way to make Hilda and Ravio have a happy ending too, rather than simply leaving them to rot, which honestly, the game could have gotten away with. I'm not kidding either; it's nice to see a game, in this era of over cinematic, highly dialog driven scenes, to be able to tell a full, complete and satisfying story in as few scenes and time as ALBW did.
This also has the benefit of the game taking about 5 minutes to start with actual gameplay. You wake up, walk a bit on the overworld, get Not!Sword, walk to location, get sword, do tutorial dungeon, watch cutscene, and now the game actually begins. This is done within a 5 minute time frame, I'm not joking. Even ALttP didn't begin this fast, as ALttP had a considerably longer "tutorial" dungeon (Hyrule Castle), and ALttP was by no means a game slow starting game either. It's stuff like this that really shows they really captured the charm of older games, that you can start a new, fresh game and not have to worry about all the intro stuff.
Yeah I could go on singing this game's praises, but really, it earned it's high marks from all those reviewers. If you liked ALttP, and have a 2/3DS, I can't recommend this game enough. I know, I don't usually hype Zelda games like...ever , but I did grow up playing a lot of ALttP on the SNES, so being able to go back to a new Zelda game that brings back that nostalgic sense and is legitimately fun is something that feels great.
I kind of want to replay ALttP now after playing this, and it was just put on the Wii U VC, so maybe I will! Though I did just Download 4 Swords for free on 3DS, so maybe I'll try that because...free game?
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Things I learned from the Dark Souls artbook:
-Apparently at some point someone wanted the gargoyles in the iron golem fight to spit fire.
-Taurus demons have no eyes.
-The demon greataxe is actually a femur + hipbone still joined together by ligaments and shit. Ew.
-The Effigy Shield is 100% screaming Gigerface. I'd never actually looked at it before (because it sucks).
Not coincidentally, sorcerer NG+++ is go.
...
Well that was easy. Probably not even NG+++++++ would have much chance of standing up to a nigh inexhaustible stack of Crystal Soul Spears. (Admittedly I did call in help for Oreo Smalls and Bed of Chaos, because seriously fuck those guys). Two (non-invader) deaths with the only boss left being Manus: one running through New Londo post-4K to tell Ingway he's done a man's job sir (because that's just how I roll), carelessly get caught between two darkwraiths. Double darksword penetration. Also later I get killed by Demon Firesage somehow. Fucking really, Cid?
Seriously want to ram through a total co-op run before DS2 hits. Fudo, Fenrir?
~
So taking a bit of a break from FONV before jumping back to the DLC missions (because I just did those like a month ago on a different file). This one's Grefter's fault (all manifestations of my lack of impulse control are someone else's fault, you know?) I thought it was gonna be ages before I played this again, but reading BG1 posts, I start to wonder, "How well do monks work out in BG?" There aren't any NPC monks to try out, after all. So now I am discovering how well monks work out in BG. Running lawful good because gotta be lawful something, there's not much opportunity for creative evil in BG (like there basically isn't in any game without Obsidian slapped on it somewhere) and lawful neutral is for twits. Look forward to eventual epic punching match with Balthazar. Of course fiddled with stats until I could get 18 STR/DEX/CON. INT/WIS/CHA are pretty trash but come on you don't need any of those things to attain cosmic harmony. Punch, kick, it's all in the mind.
Intent for party lineup is to include no permanent companion that was part of my final group in the previous run. For BG1 so far this amounts to Jaheira (to run through the whole shebang), Khalid (because they're a package deal), Branwen (easiest cleric to get), Kivan (Grefter-recommended, ultimately Cid-approved), Safana (easiest non-Imoen thief to get). Pretty obviously my wish is to compile permanent party as early as possible. This leaves me pretty gimped on arcane magic, only having Khalid to provide any of it but he's a terrible mage and in practice the only spells he ever uses are Identify and occasionally Horror or Prot/Petrification...but that doesn't matter because archers. Holy shit you guys archers are fantastic in BG1. Why are they so good, man? Point the artillery at pretty much anything and it's dead in two seconds (well unless it has DR/magic or whatever the 2nd ed. name for that is).
Punching dudes is pretty rad, though the damage range gets so crazy. I can do like three damage or I can do 4-5x that from one hit to another, even excluding crits. The middling AC is also kind of a liability. I know it'll only get better as the game goes on, but still lagging consistently behind the people who can actually wear armor. It's a good thing I went for a ton of HP because MC eats up like all the party's healing. And god fuck poison in BG1, I wish that immunity kicked in at low enough levels to actually be useful. Still, there's something very satisfying about taking everything apart with your bare hands in such a loot-focused game. Also from the outset I already move like twice as fast as everyone else (which is actually a liability sometimes). I have to kill fast and bullets too slow.
Anyway, been more thorough clearing out wilderness areas than I was before. The game's less of an irritant going in expecting that so much of it will just be random wandering, and while the enemy respawn mechanic is still incredibly lame, understanding how it works makes this less of an issue. Now able to go to the city proper but instead contemplating the horrors of Durlag's basement. Oh, a couple notable things happened while I was out meandering:
-Uncarbonite Branwen and for a second it's like holy shit I just found my long-lost twin! Then the game thinks better of this plot twist and changes her portrait to someone else's, except in the status screen where it's actually a dude's portrait and even then it only takes up like a ninth of the frame for some reason. Um. I guess this is how the game deals with you selecting the portrait of someone you recruit later. That's nice work, Lou.
-Driz'zt shows up out of nowhere and he's all like hey guys help me kill this horde of hyena dudes! Then he runs around at Matrix speed one-shotting everything. Dude you did not need help at all. You were just kiting these losers around until you had someone to look all flash in front of, weren't you? Oh, look at me, I'm such a fancy badass! Fuck you and the apostrophe you rode in on.
-Wait, there's an NPC named Sendai in BG1? You're supposed to be a drow matron!
Clearly I haven't spent enough time in the past few months replaying games I've already played to death. I should round this out with more FFT and VP and SO3 and BoFV and SC2 and SOTN and augh
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I have lots of game suggestions for you Ciddy! (Note: Will not even jokingly suggest Eternal Sonata.)
The Walking Dead- Episode 4, just about to raid Crawford.
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Seriously want to ram through a total co-op run before DS2 hits. Fudo, Fenrir?
I would totally be down for that if the PS3 weren't broke. And I think I'm the only one with it for PC?
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That would be cool but really too damn hard to set up. I don't have a lot of free time right now, we live in different time zones, and Dark Souls itself makes co-op a pain (Dark Souls 2 looks like it will make co-op easier though)
FF2:
"You see the Dreadnought's engine"
Yattaf : *raises arms, really excited* "Let's blow this thing up!"
Deader: "We can't. Not yet. We have to rescue the princess first."
:( :( :( :(
I now get enough in battles to not bleed money even if constantly using spells and drinking ethers.
Really soloing this is the easiest challenge. You have no idea. Total opposite of Romancing SaGa 3.
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Order of Eccelsia - Okay, this game is pretty rad. Enjoy the platforming and fighting mix and the game's bosses are so so mean. Reminds me a bit of a Metroidvania spliced with a Megaman X game (and I like it better than either overall).
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Enhanced Edition brings in a Monk (DLC in portable version), so they do fill that gap, he is just in Nashkel, so an easy pick up in that.
As a monk, I can't rec Shield Amulet nearly enough. It is the secret to playing Kensai and is a good item for forever pretty much until you can start rocking Spirit Armor forever. Bark Skin is a poor man's replacement. Just sell and repurchase one you find to recharge it and have Armour on for nearly every fight. It isn't Full Plate +1 but it will give a naked character a 6 point reduction in AC (and +2 to saves!) and it lasts ages. Spirit Armor has shorter duration, but is like platemail and stronger save boost. Those stacked with most armour buffs that Kensai and Monk get can easily make you have lower AC than your Full Plate and Shield fighters for a long time. Carnival has a pendant for sale, but easy to find on a corpse somewhere.
Didn't need more than 16 Con on Monk. 2nd Ed strikes again. You don't even start getting bonuses for exceptional Con until 20 because we couldn't have Dwarves regening 1 every 6 turns. +1 save vs poison isn't a big deal (and I don't know if that to was implemented in BG) and you have trouble hitting 20 Con. On the other hand it does give you 2 point easy buffer for stats to sacrifice in BG2 plot sequences. Mostly just saying 18 Charisma is a leisure, but it's a pretty nice one to have if you don't mind rolling for a while! which is pretty easy to do with characters not rolling for exceptional strength.
The damage range on your fists will matter less once you get Str manual from under Candlekeep so much to the point that I would be heading to BG and doing the main quest there ASAP and doing sides later (especially Durlag nonsense).
Poison in low level BG great, they are like highly random crits. Roll to see if you got hit, roll to see if poison applies, roll to save lololllllolol got reapplied as soon as you drank antidote!!! Now die just as much, not quite as fast but way more annoyingly.
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Marvel Heroes is a pretty good game. The company behind it is mostly people who left Blizzard North after Diablo 2, and it shows. On the other hand, the IP they're using means less of the super-dark Diablo aesthetic and more of characters that actually pop on a background. Also, a seven-key hotbar so you can use more than two abilities at a time. The launch was pretty rough and so the metacritic score is kinda shit but kudos to them for sticking with it and making a lot of big improvements, because it's really a lot of fun now. Iron Man plays kind of like a Vanguard from ME2, and Luke Cage can pull out cars to throw at people. They also really capture the essence of Jean Grey in that you turn into Phoenix and everything dies when you look at it.
So that's what I've been playing.
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Oh man they converted Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake theme to 8-bit and put in FF2?
And it's the "IT'S A TRAP" theme? Hahahah
Never recognized it before.
Why has no one used Ride of the Valkyries as a boss theme yet
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Oh man they converted Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake theme to 8-bit and put in FF2?
And it's the "IT'S A TRAP" theme? Hahahah
Never recognized it before.
Why has no one used Ride of the Valkyries as a boss theme yet
I'm pretty sure Little King's Story did.
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The damage range on your fists will matter less once you get Str manual from under Candlekeep so much to the point that I would be heading to BG and doing the main quest there ASAP and doing sides later (especially Durlag nonsense).
After way too many deaths to B1 boss and ultimately kiting them away one by one, that is exactly what I am doing (jesus and I entered that place two levels higher than last time). I forgot there actually was a STR manual in the game (dump stat for MC last time) or would've gone straight for it.
Not wholly decided on BG2 lineup. Mostly set: Jaheira, Nalia (because non-Edwin wizard), Jan (because non-fail Thief), Mazzy (because I need another heavy and I feel bad about leaving her in the pocket dimension last time), ??? Unsure on last slot. I kind of want a more dedicated healer than Jaheira, but also a third person who can AC tank (I realize Anomen fits this description but Anomen is not fucking getting into my party). I am aware that Korgan is a fabulous engine of destruction, but avoiding ze evils this time and anyway drunken angry dwarf berserker is a majorly un-Cid archetype. Aerie can get the heals in but unfortunately she is also Aerie, and oh god I don't want to deal with 2x spell list at level 30 or whatever. I don't know. It's hard to resist grabbing Sarevok again because you guys he is so fucking metal (and I didn't manage his alignment shift last time).
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Mod change Aerie to a Cleric or something? Find: Cleric (http://modlist.pocketplane.net/index.php?ax=list&cat_id=5=) since there is a few listed? Viconia going through redemption arc is good if you haven't done it/not done it for a while.
CERND is a possible choice. Maybe you should pursue that option. Be one of the few, the many, the bored because Cernd is laaaaaaaame. (Related, google for "Shapeshifter Baldur's Gate" brings up a thread asking if Shapeshifter has been fixed and is just a page long argument about the value of Jaheira. Cernd so boring people can't even talk about him for 3 posts). I would seriously think about turning him into a Totemic Druid (http://www.gibberlings3.net/totemic_cernd/), which is still not a great class, but is way more fun than Shapeshitters and one that I suspect you haven't played with before.
Edit - And if you don't use Mazzy this time I will cut you.
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I used Viconia last time. In fact, I've always used Viconia. It is kind of a struggle not to since she's plainly the best at her particular niche. And I couldn't entertain using Cernd even as a joke. I will probably just not talk to him and leave him in his cell if the quest lets you do that. [/Lawful Good]
I had 50,000 gold and nothing of consequence to buy with it, so I bought all the magic arrows in Baldur's Gate. I will probably still keep using regular arrows because oh my god you guys I might run out of the good stuff I only have like 3,000 +2 arrows on hand. Still this does present me with a slightly different plan for Sarevok than last time: 3x hasted archer spamming Fireball arrows because fuck you, game.
Oh, I forgot this bit. You're doing this fetchquest chain to get yourself cured of lethal poison, right? You need to get this book from a priest. Tell him you're dying and he's all like nah dude, pull the other one, it has got bells on it. So instead you offer him 500 gold and he goes, "500 gold?! Holy shit, you really are desperate!" I don't understand D&D economics.
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It is a Charisma check I believe, but yes, the game treats gold like it is a hard to get thing. 1000 gold pieces for Akheg plate? Get before going to Nashkel only after a few side bits. Rare gem? 7 gold. Worth taking up an inventory slot.
Seriously try out Cernd. He is less annoying than Aerie right up until you find out about child abandonment. At least you hear about him abandoning his kid instead of hearing all about everyone everywhere forever abandoning Aerie every five minutes. Especially if you get in a relationship. Boring and class you never touched before is better than clingy and boring class to play if you don't handle BG spellcasting.
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Xenogears: hour 2, completed the Blackmoon Forest.
This is pretty much distilled Xenogears. The forest is a short dungeon that in most games would probably lack 10 minutes, 15 tops. Here it takes the entire hour because the game insists on lots and lots of writing. (I'm observing rather than complaining.) We meet Elly, who certainly isn't the normal run-of-the-mill RPG love interest, and we get scenes of every pair of the three main characters interacting. There's a Fei dream scene which is kind of weird; Sophia is in it so I assume it's something Lacan-related but I don't recall specifically why this scene is here at this point.
Best scene of the hour is probably the one between Fei and Elly in which Fei breaks down about how he destroyed his village and foists the blame onto others, then Elly (who is of course responsible, which we learn just a few minutes later if we couldn't figure this out) lays into him and calls him a coward for not taking more of the blame himself. We then see her lines a second time spliced with some memories of her own bloody past. Really lets you know there's going to be interesting character stuff here.
Least favourite scene of the hour is probably Elly getting DiD'd twice in a row. It's okay in isolation; shows Fei still cares about people and has things that motivate him despite being down, but it's still an annoying cliche.
Also man, Citan talks a lot when he's on-screen. He makes some crack about this at some point so at least he/the writers are self-aware! I wouldn't be surprised if he has the most lines in the game despite being only the #3 character for importance. Also loved his interaction with Elly: our first look at Citan, international man of mystery.
Also a dinosaur got punched in the face by a robot. I could totally have taken it without the robot; it would just have taken a while!
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Also man, Citan talks a lot when he's on-screen. He makes some crack about this at some point so at least he/the writers are self-aware! I wouldn't be surprised if he has the most lines in the game despite being only the #3 character for importance. Also loved his interaction with Elly: our first look at Citan, international man of mystery.
We must have played different Xenogears games. I thought it was a really aggressive and interesting take on storytelling to make the POV character the boring B Plot character with the shitty love story while your hero disappears for a chunk of the game.
An interesting experiment, but XG would have benefited from having a more traditional storytelling structure of the spy stories that are its roots. It would have been interesting seeing the take on a James Bond character who is a scientist and a married man (to another brilliant scientist!) instead of bogging it down with dudes that hates Gears (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyJItQYPXQc) and fighting.
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The Walking Dead- Finished Season 1. Episode 5 was about what you'd expect. I marathoned this (I stopped at the event where Mark gets shot for the longest time and finished the rest in about a week). Good stuff.
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The Walking Dead- Finished Season 1. Episode 5 was about what you'd expect. I marathoned this (I stopped at the event where Mark gets shot for the longest time and finished the rest in about a week). Good stuff.
Did you realize you could stop choking the guy? Because the thought of not killing him didn't even cross my mind.
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Least favourite scene of the hour is probably Elly getting DiD'd twice in a row. It's okay in isolation; shows Fei still cares about people and has things that motivate him despite being down, but it's still an annoying cliche.
Pretty much, although my complaint is a little different. The Fei / Elly love story hits a few too many cliched let's-be-forced-to-fall-in-love situations for my tastes, the forest arc damsel-in-distressing being part of it. To back up a second, some dude tossing Rohypnol into someone's drink at a bar is like a negative 5 out of 10 on the romance scale. The same is usually true with your average fantasy love potion, although this sometimes gets played straight. Anyway, if you have a "destined" romance, it's important that the story actually sells me on the romance part and doesn't have "destiny" just play the part of a love potion. XG gets perilously close to "and someone spiked Fei & Elly's drinks and now they're just totally hot for each other because" combined with repeated "stuck on a desert island / boat together because the plot said so" parts. I still can't complain TOO much because your average VG romance is even worse, and both Fei & Elly end up good characters, and there are some nice touches when not being cliched (talking Elly out of bloodthirsty drug-induced rage is a tad unbelievable but is sweet) so I'll cut XG some slack.
If I'd been in charge, I'd have eased off on the cliche situations and had the destiny elements be more limited to straight "knows your name already" and less "instantly sharing secrets with each other because of our Speshul Connection."
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Rob: Why would I stop choking him? I will get 400 days at some point (Looks interesting). Also I left the arm in episode 5. I don't think it wouldn't made a difference?
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It doesn't.
Don't replay TWD, the illusion of your choices actually mattering is paper thin.
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I was aware of that, just was wondering if the arm choice mattered at all. I can't imagine how long it would have taken to make TWD with several true branches (Going off with Lilly for one). The only way that type of pathing could work would be in a pure text based game, and even then it'd still be a metric ton of writing.
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FeixElly OTP
You mean it is kind of creepy that they have an inexplicable predisposition to falling in love with each other? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_sexual_attraction) I agree completely.
Replay it if you enjoy seeing execution of minor differences. Don't replay it if you have some kind of attachment to the purity of a personal story. I think outright never replaying stuff like that is the same stance as refusing to read a mystery novel again or not watching something like Memento a second time because you know the twist. It is a different experience the next time, especially if you watch things for the craft as well as the raw experience the first time through.
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Dark Souls
With Dark Souls 2 right around the corner, the only logical answer is to finally replay Dark Souls since I hadn't actually done a second full play of it. Grabbed the Artorias of the Abyss DLC (another thing I'd been meaning to do, fuck you Sony store).
Forgot how quick the early game flows if you know what you're doing. Despite being fairly rusty, the progress of Harkan has been pretty smooth. Cleared up to Bell Gargoyles and unlocked the path down to the Lower Undead Burg. Decided to do a spellsword style build using thrusting swords/shields since my previous play was all Zweinhander all the time.
Magic is pretty awesome. Rapier is taking a bit of getting used to. Rescued Rickert and grabbed Heavy Soul Arrow and Enchant Weapon.
Think I'm gonna track my deaths just for kicks. Didn't think about it until after last night, so these are a bit hazy.
1: Missed the platform I was trying to roll down to.
2: Landed on the aforementioned platform, only to remember that was the tunnel where the Black Knight hung out.
3: Trying to practice parries against the Hollow Warriors in the Taurus Demon area.
4: Aggro'd the Balder Knights in the chapel and decided to take the fight outside because of the channeler. Forgot the Hollows outside were still alive.
5: Was trying to get from point A to point B, forgot there'd be rats at the bottom of the ladder. Whoops.
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Rob: Why would I stop choking him? I will get 400 days at some point (Looks interesting). Also I left the arm in episode 5. I don't think it wouldn't made a difference?
Well, I didn't realize it at the time but watching it, it's really obvious that he's completely unconscious and not moving at all. Of course the thought of him walking out of the room alive didn't even cross my mind at the time, which is a testament to how mad the game made me at him.
400 Days is actually the one chapter that I found gets more interesting on a second playthrough. It's a series of vignettes that interweave in ways that are sometimes obvious but sometimes subtle, and you won't notice all of them unless you play it a second time and pay really close attention to the environment.
Not that it's not an enjoyable experience the first time, but they were clearly looking at doing something different with 400 Days.
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Magic is pretty awesome. Rapier is taking a bit of getting used to. Rescued Rickert and grabbed Heavy Soul Arrow and Enchant Weapon.
If you're lucky enough to get a Balder Side Sword drop, it is an amazingly good match for weapon enchanter build. Basically any high-DEX light sword with that setup is optimal melee DPS in Dark Souls (well until you hit AotA where everything laughs at multi-element offense).
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Seriously try out Cernd. He is less annoying than Aerie right up until you find out about child abandonment. At least you hear about him abandoning his kid instead of hearing all about everyone everywhere forever abandoning Aerie every five minutes. Especially if you get in a relationship. Boring and class you never touched before is better than clingy and boring class to play if you don't handle BG spellcasting.
Alright, I'll give it a shot, geez. But I can't make any promises about what I'll do once I get to ToB!
Anyway, trial detonation arrow barrage carried out on goons at top of Iron Throne building. It's so beautiful. 24d6 before anyone could even cast a spell or move to melee -> mop-up operation. Of course, I can't go hog wild with these things because there's a finite supply, but somehow I imagine 60x hasted Fireball is more than I'll need to muscle through the game's bitchier battles.
19 strength! Why is there even fractional strength in the first place 2nd ed. I don't get you at all.
BG1's dream sequences are sooooo booorrriiiing. I know I can skip them, but since I have like no recollection of them at all I figure I should let them run and see if that was just me being prematurely senile or what. Wander off to do laundry or something within five seconds every time.
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A shot with Shape Shifter or are you going to change him to another kit (I would seriously not recommend using base...)?
Arrow of Detonation is crazy broken yeah. BG:EE from what I saw reduced them to having like 2 in Sorcerous Sundries and others can only be taken from the last two fights. So much harder to use them as gameplay skip by using them as an alpha strike.
Ranting on Str was my immediate response to using the book on my Halfling. So mad. At least Good/Neutral characters still get to use Draw Upon Holy Might to jump over it. But for the whyyyyyyyyyyyyyy? It was apparently supposed to be because warrior classes needed some more scaling to keep up with Mages, so better make it only apply on people who can roll an 18.
Only reason I listen to dream sequences is to hear more Kevin M Richardson because your encounters with Sarevok are so sparse. Hearing him say "You will learn" gets me right in the right places.
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If you're lucky enough to get a Balder Side Sword drop, it is an amazingly good match for weapon enchanter build. Basically any high-DEX light sword with that setup is optimal melee DPS in Dark Souls (well until you hit AotA where everything laughs at multi-element offense).
Not slashing (and staggering/knocking everything over) just feels so... wrong though.
I think I'm gonna have some trouble when I hit AotA, since I've never done it before and this isn't really how I normally play Souls games.
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A shot with Shape Shifter or are you going to change him to another kit (I would seriously not recommend using base...)?
Pretty sure the bundle of mods I ran included werewolf rebalancing. Could confirm details but lazy. I guess we'll see!
Anyway, everything BG1 done outside of endgame plot...well, and bullshit werewolf island. Which I think I am going to actually do this time just because How Bullshit Is It?
Detonating the fuck out of the chessboard fight was immensely satisfying.
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I would still think about making him a different type. Shapeshifters are boring as fuck even after applying fixes.
Actually holy shit here is how boring druids are. I was talking about Totemic Druids and the whole time I actually was thinking of Avengers. Goddamn pureclass druid SO BORING. Jaheira master race.
Avenger
Avengers are druids who are specialised in fighting those who are willing to defile nature and they have gained more abilities than normal through rituals, which are physical draining
Bonuses
May shapechange in normal forms, as some additional ones, like Sword Spider, baby wyvern and fire salamanders.
They have 6 spells from the Wizard Spellbook (Baldur's Gate II), up to level 6. They spells are: Chromatic Orb, Web, Lightning Bolt, Improved Invisibility, Chaos and Chain Lightning.
Penalties
May only wear leather armor as body armor
When the character is created, it receives a -2 penalty to Strength and Constitution.
I don't know if there is a mod to do it, but Cernd's base stats are shitty enough that I would think of Shadowkeepering him to the class and leaving stats the same. His shitty stats is just One More Reason to not use him. Literally and mechanically worst character in the game. Amazing.
Edit - On Avengers, the spells they get aren't amazing or anything, Lightning Bolt is like third best offensive spell at level 3 Wizard, Web is pretty shitty in practice (Level 2 ... kind of meh long term in both spell books though SLOW POISON might be best in slot), Chain Lightning doesn't see much use in Wizard stuff and I am pretty certain off the top of my head that Druids have a better direct offensive spell in L7 let alone any HLA spells. There is a lot of really significant stuff in L7 Druid though that is more utility stuff. Chromatic Orb is always fun though (though its scaling off Druid level lol) and Improved Invisibility is a truly amazing spell for a level 4 slot.
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Xenogears: hour 3, Dazil, the desert, and the Aveh transport vessel.
No Elly! Sadness. This hour still had Fei and Citan, though, but it's not Fei's best showing. The lowlight of the hour is probably the sequence where he chases Citan into the desert. Basically, Citan rents a buggy to go exploring in the desert for parts. Then, about three seconds later, Fei is all I GOTTA FOLLOW HIM BECAUSE REASONS and proceeds into the desert on foot. Pretty stupid! It feels like that section of the plot could have been written more naturally. Fei also steals a motorcycle from someone apparently because he's a jerk?
Dazil's a pretty cool town at least. Plenty of the townsfolk are memorable in their goofy way, and the music really sells the location. Citan tries to buy parts and has a nice pleasant exchange with a shopkeeper; this is... actually weirdly unusual in the genre. Too often this type of minor NPC will talk at the party instead of with them.
We meet Grahf. While a bit of a strange scene I am inclined to slap it with the "best of hour 3" label, because Grahf is just such an audacious fucker. Like, seriously, check out the distilled Grahf here (http://lparchive.org/Xenogears-%28by-The-Dark-Id%29/Update%2010/63-grahf74.jpg). Rides a black mech backlit by a giant blood-red moon, taunts Fei with how he destroyed Fei's village because HAHAHA GRAND PLOTS and then tells him he is going to kill god. Oookay. Plus we get Grahf's lovely puppy-hugging theme playing the whole while. It certainly makes for a memorable setpiece, and this section lacked any truly compelling character work for me to put above it.
We also meet Cain. The scene is weird and does suffer from overuse of quotation marks in that Xenogears way (-Time- of the -Gospel-) but I still like it well enough. In case you weren't yet wondering about Citan's agenda, you definitely are after that scene. One subtle thing I like about Xenogears is that while it has a long, twisty plot, it does not (for the most part) just drop random drama bombs on you. I can imagine many games doing the inevitable CITAN IS A TRAITOR (kinda) scene in Solaris with hardly any foreshadowing; with Xenogears, you certainly know something is up, and just have to puzzle out exactly what.
And finally we meet Bart. Thinking on it, Bart kind of amuses me. He's actually a pretty decent guy all told, and most of his actions actually make at least some sense... but he seems designed to annoy the player as much as possible and I totally get why some people loathe him. He attacks an Aveh craft to try and get his hands on a fancy mech rather than let it fall into the hands of his enemy? Reasonable! YOU STILL ALMOST KILLED ME YOU ASSHOLE. And oh man, it gets worse. But more on that later!
Also random WTF moment: Aveh soldiers attack you as you're trying to escape from the sandcraft as it sinks into the sand. Why not you all just try to get out alive?
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Grefter you talked me out of it talking me into it. Anyway I got impatient about moving on to BG2 and skipped werewolf island bullshit again. It will continue to be a mystery.
Even prepared for it, BG1's final battle makes me want to put my fist through the monitor. I see no way victory could be logistically possible if you ever tried to make this a stand-up fight. Even dropping like a dozen fireballs on the gang didn't kill anyone (and barely even scratched Sarevok). And if they start getting turns, lord help you. They've got their own goon spamming detonation arrows (which kill you much faster than you could them), the party mage init casts full-party ID that basically cannot fail barring immunity (and even then I didn't have enough castings of Death Ward for the full party) and Sarevok himself is basically guaranteed to one- or two-shot anything. And he's got a chibi-Sarevok ogre in tow too!
So I just can't imagine how this is even reasonable as a legit fight. I just wound up doing what I did last time: kite Sarevok away from his friends and tie him down with summons the whole time. Well, Tazok followed him, but that's basically okay, he's the least bullshit of Sarevok's buddies (and it let Kivan get his REVENGE). Sarevok's so lethal that I burned through two whole wands of summoning keeping him busy while the archers plinked him to death--he comes pretty close to murdering an entire summoned group a round, so literally the only thing Khalid had time to do was call more goons. Slower fight than last time because archers instead of mages and archers have to contend with his AC. Tried to have bhaalspawn wade in to speed things up, but Sarevok immediately focuses on you if you're in range (which I guess is a neat AI touch) and constantly threatened to murder me in two hits despite near party best HP. What the hell, Bioware.
Khalid party kill leader this time around. Yeah Super can just shut right up, if you're using Khalid for melee you are doing it wrong.
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Nonononono, Super can shut right up because if you do use Khalid for melee he is your tank and won't get kills as much as some, but is the only Fighter with competitive mix of Constitution and Dex that doesn't sacrifice something for a lot of parties. The only other pure Fighters in the game are Kagain and Shar Teel who are killing machines, both with great Str, but Kagain's Dex is the pits and Shar Teel can do okay with good Dex but has 9 Con (which isn't that big a deal, but is 3 HP per level gap). For Good aligned characters there is Ajantis has 16 Con so only has 1 less HP per level but has 13 Dex, so ties up your 18 Dex gauntlets for certain where Khalid can pinch hit with Str gauntlets. Minsc who gets 2 less HP per Level and worse Dex or Kivan who can get some leverage out of his 18\12 Str if you turn him into a melee guy, but neither has proficiencies to do the work really and that is a terrible waste of your Kivan.
Everyone else is a Multi-class fighter so eats it in level progression and ties up functionality a fair bit (Making your Fighter/Thief a tank is doable but again a bit of a waste of your Coran or you are using Montaron which is actually pretty reasonable, its a shame he has to be a Thief too). BG1 Jaheira's 14 Dex makes her really struggle in that role and is literally the only Neutral aligned warrior type (Neutral is full of casters and thieves).
Khalid is just a good character and fits most parties either as a ranged character or a melee tank. Comes with proficiencies for both at level 1 and grows into both without sucking up your magic items.
Also surprised you took so much damage from Sarevok, my Kensai was able to last a couple of rounds toe to toe and was the reason I was able to blitz him down without dealing with his support as much. Might have been rebalanced for BG:EE though or I took better drugs maybe? Did you make sure to case Spirit Armor first like I hyped?
You could do Totemic Druid too all things considered, they are just normal druids with summons instead of shapeshifting. That sounds like a winning trade to me. My only real issue with Druids is that you either have Jaheira who is really quite good, Cernd who sucks or have have Bhallspawn be a Druid to see them in full swing and I consider them significantly less interesting than other mixes you can use Bhallspawn as (even the old Cleric/Ranger Multi/Dual class is more interesting to me). It isn't that druids specifically are bad, it is that they are more boring than every other choice in the game. Even Wizard Slayer's who are at least interesting in their suckiness. I have been meaning to give an Avenger a real hands on spin, but the prospect is not that appealing. Maybe I should make Jaheira one sometime.
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Tales of Graces F: Was going to do an abridged series of this but then realized I'd focus too much on what is "good material" and decided to say **** it. Also means I won't have to worry wehre I end. SO INSTEAD I WILL DO EVERY UPDATE IN ONE LINE!
Asbel, shut up...oh wait, you just grew up, maybe now he will shut up!
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Asbel, shut up...oh wait, you just grew up, maybe now he will shut up!
Hahahahahahahahaa.
Fallout New Vegas: So apparently leaving Veronica in Hidden Valley when you self-destruct it doesn't kill her. LAME.
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FF2 Yattaf solo:
Anyway I got Ultima. First time I see it doing actual real damage.
More people died in FF2 than when the world was destroyed in FF6.
There are all these little cities that get bombed by the uber airship Dreadnaught, with only like two kids left being all "Everybody's dead".
Then a fucking mind-controlled cyclone appears and kills the two kids too!
http://pbfcomics.com/archive_b/PBF012-Marthas_Orphanage.gif
Anyway Yattaf has perfect evasion and she never gets hit by status. Her magic defense is crazy high.
There is no way to die at all, so offense is the only thing that matters.
Magic damage took a real nosedive a few dungeons ago compared to physical damage, but I've started messing with instant death and DAMN. The multitarget hit rate for instant death spells is roughly 0-10% at level 0-4, then it skyrockets at level 5-7 and is pretty much 100% on everything that isn't immune from level 8 on.
Teleport is really really easy to level too (Enter dungeon, teleport, enter dungeon, teleport, etc)
Toad's way more fun though. I levelled it to 9 already, just because. The last 3 bosses have been killed on the first round by Toad.
So now Yattaf is running around, casting rains of frogs Magnolia-style, that make everything turn into frogs. Ruining ecosystems with frogs.
She has turned the other party members into frogs because carrying their corpses is much more convenient now. Her new favourite pastime is getting to the desert, turning scorpions into frogs and watching them slowly wither and die. She is the Frog Witch, an unstoppable force of nature.
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Bravely Default: One of the characters is William Shatner. This is epic win.
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Bravely Default is currently sold out in the entire city. Damnit.
Tomb Raider - Giving this a spin. The gameplay is rather plain but it's extremely immersive so has definitely been an enjoyable experience thus far. It reminds me a fair bit of Arkham Asylum, only "survive visceral threats to your life" is apparently something that engages me considerably more than "be Batman".
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Xenogears hours 4 & 5: stuff with Bart.
Now I remember another reason I don't like Bart much; there's a lot of plot about him and he's just not very interesting. These first two hours also let us see more of his shining personality of wanting to fight Fei because reasons and Fei having to be all "okay seriously let's just get out of this cave first please?"
We meet Balthazar. He's a weird dude. I don't actually remember his plot or why he's here. He mainly serves here as exposition to let you know humans aren't native to this planet and for the first time you hear some things about "god" (i.e. Deus) which if you're very savvy you might be able to piece together with that creature in the opening, although I certainly didn't. Important setting work for the game but it doesn't really make me care too much about Bal. Then he sees Weltall and flips out (again, I forget his connection to this gear) and tells us to get the fuck out and Calamity will totally kill us (but he'll still sell stuff to us anyway).
After beating up Calamity and escaping, we meet Sigurd and Maison. Sigurd obviously knows Citan although the nature of that part of Citan's backstory isn't elaborated on. He also completely bosses Bart around, literally dragging him off by the ear in one scene. I approve. Maison is amusing, and completely out of place working with a bunch of pirates; he is very obviously the main connection to Bart's Fatima past, as a character. My favourite scene of this section is probably where he and Citan have a chat and explain the Bart backstory and how he turned to piracy. I like that Citan obviously disapproves but still gets that you gotta do what you gotta do. The two also chat about the current Aveh politics and Margie is mentioned, and the PCs' next objective starts to become clear. Still, there's a real lack of standout scenes in this arc of the game. Needs more Elly and/or villains.
Random WTF moment: the entry to the stalactite cave. Falling through quicksand into a huge underground cavern? So uh what keeps the quicksand above us suspended in the air? That's not how quicksand works! Someone who designed this game clearly played too much Super Mario Brothers 3. (okay, video games have a horrible track record with quicksand in general)
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Tales of Graces f: "Asbel, now that you're grown up and I haven't seen you for seven years, I am going to be incredibly grumpy and cold to you for a while! Please ignore how I'm joining you in these caves now..." </Cheria>
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Also surprised you took so much damage from Sarevok, my Kensai was able to last a couple of rounds toe to toe and was the reason I was able to blitz him down without dealing with his support as much. Might have been rebalanced for BG:EE though or I took better drugs maybe? Did you make sure to case Spirit Armor first like I hyped?
I totally forgot that spell existed. And it was more like 3HKO unless, you know, he crits or something. It seemed unwise to stick around and risk losing the whole fight due to one bad RNG result when I could more safely just spam summons and shoot him. So bhaalspawn just stood around spectating through intense showdown with broooootheeeeer.
Decent ways into early BG2 quests now and Monkspawn develops into a highly efficient killing machine. I am pleased! Not up to punching dragons to death yet, though, tried fighting Thaxawhatsit at like level 9 and it went poorly. Specifically, half the party died immediately upon breakout of hostilities (does dragon fear effect outright kill low-level goons or something?) Valygar serving as the party's sixth wheel at the moment and probably going to stay there. He is also Mr. Boring, but at least he's not a twit. Never really used him before (or even dual-wielding at all; I had briefly considered recruiting HAER DA'LIS to mess with that but god no I'm not that desperate for something new) and he's working out pretty well. Party's pretty gimpy for healing but whatever, mash Z more.
Jesus I forgot how needy your companions can be early in the game (didn't really come up last time because I ran to Spellhold as quickly as possible). Constantly have to drop everything because "Oh, I have to go to my dad's funeral," "Oh, I got kidnapped," "Oh, my childhood sweetheart's daughter is terminally ill," "Oh crap, my sister's poisoned," "Oh shit, I got cursed by a vengeful slaver and have only days to live." Come on you guys I'm trying to power level here.
Want to join up with vamps for that sweet sweet amulet you get from shadow thief massacre, but memory says Mazzy deserts if you do that. Well, I guess nothing's stopping me from murdering them all independently later (she wouldn't object to that, of course).
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Bravely Default: I have gained the power to change into Flavor Flav.
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Tales of Graces: No, Pascal, you can't hide it from me; you are a complete Anime Character in every sense of the word.
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You get Amulet of Power sooner for siding with Thieves rather than killing them. Aran gives it to you before you to clear out the Vampire lair because that thing is custom made for fucking up Vampires.
Companion quests are just them helping you power level. They are walking quests that come to you instead of having to walk all over the map.
Thaxawhatsit probably just hit you with its dragon breath. I think that shit autokills anyone lower than level 10 maybe? Not sure. I wouldn't bother until you are level 14. Walk up to it with the Ward Stone and Quivering Palm that shit because it is fucking awesome to do. Don't care if you have to save scum. One punch killing a dragon is always worth it.
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Dark Souls
6: Capra Demon
7: Capra Demon
8: Capra Demon
9: Being sloppy against Hollow Thieves. Lol blood loss.
10: I am really bad at Capra Demon
11: Camera (aka Capra Demon)
12: Fooling around with a Butcher
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Capra Demon
Dark Souls!
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We meet Balthazar. He's a weird dude. I don't actually remember his plot or why he's here. He mainly serves here as exposition to let you know humans aren't native to this planet and for the first time you hear some things about "god" (i.e. Deus) which if you're very savvy you might be able to piece together with that creature in the opening, although I certainly didn't. Important setting work for the game but it doesn't really make me care too much about Bal. Then he sees Weltall and flips out (again, I forget his connection to this gear) and tells us to get the fuck out and Calamity will totally kill us (but he'll still sell stuff to us anyway).
Weltall is apparently what Grahf's gear looked like before it was combined with an anima relic, so probably he sees it and he's like "oh shit this motherfucking shit again." What doesn't make any sense is why he doesn't make the connection before since Fei looks exactly like Lacan. But hey, it's Xenogears, it wouldn't be the same without plot holes.
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6: Capra Demon
7: Capra Demon
8: Capra Demon
9: Being sloppy against Hollow Thieves. Lol blood loss.
10: I am really bad at Capra Demon
11: Camera (aka Capra Demon)
12: Fooling around with a Butcher
Circle around him to the right instead of breaking left straight for the stairs. Counterintuitive, but I basically don't die in that fight after realizing that's what they meant for you to do (too likely dogs will box you in going left).
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Weltall is apparently what Grahf's gear looked like before it was combined with an anima relic, so probably he sees it and he's like "oh shit this motherfucking shit again." What doesn't make any sense is why he doesn't make the connection before since Fei looks exactly like Lacan. But hey, it's Xenogears, it wouldn't be the same without plot holes.
Well, y'know. Once is a coincidence, twice is an ancient sky-nazi conspiracy.
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Circle around him to the right instead of breaking left straight for the stairs. Counterintuitive, but I basically don't die in that fight after realizing that's what they meant for you to do (too likely dogs will box you in going left).
Right is definitely the route least likely to cause insta-death. The main problem I end up having with it is, depending on how the dogs follow, the few precious seconds where it is insanely difficult to actually see Capra Demon. That said, my deaths were a bit different at least. 3 of them were the LOL got boxed by dogs, insta-death mid roll. The first one I actually did kill the dogs, but died misjudging his distance vs cast time on a spell. The camera one was me at the top of the stairs failing to notice he had started his jump attack before I attempted to kill the dogs with R2.
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Legaia 2: Fin. Well that only took ten years.
So... mmm. I kinda said fuck it and made Tireless Ribbons. Game not scaled for that so much. Not really that much to say. One of those games where the developers clearly were like "holy shit look at all this SPACE and GRAPHICS we can do now!" so the game's inflated a lot by dead time. Makes it a bit hard to play now, but eh, it's fluffy. I had it a 6/10 for years, which still sounds right.
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Mana Khemia 2 - Just did the school festival. So yeah, I guess if you do no levelling and avoid all randoms solo Sasalina kills you before you get 2 turns. Good to know. Anyway, after that embarrassment, I levelled a bit, won the school festival!!! which pissed Flay off, and now I am trying to make enough money to buy all of the recipes while trying to get to only modestly underlevelled instead of super underlevelled.
The game definitely walks the fine line between humorous and creepy quite effectively. Battle system is pleasantly enjoyable but not too stressful until I got massively underlevelled. Goto is a really terrible PC and a horrible human being.
Order of Eccelsia - Final boss! I've gotten him down to about 1/3rd of his remaining health, but the below half HP form is a real bitch.
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Bravely Default: Started this up. It's very good so far! FF5-esque Job system although it seems that you gain jobs a bit slower. Music and graphics are also pretty nice and the writing is fun. Playing through on hard mode and the difficulty is very swingy so far. In particular the second dungeon with the orcs was brutal, but picking up the black mage helped a lot and the next dungeon was much easier. I tried to do the Thieves Cave sidequest on the second continent, but I think I'll need to get a bit further before I try the boss because I just don't have enough offense to deal with them right now. Enemies love their status effects which can be pretty annoying when you Brave 4x with your Monk and then the asshole Sandworm blinds him before you get your turn. (I am not a fan of the sandworms.)
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Bravely Default: William Shatner has discovered a Strange. Alien. City whose entire population is female. He Must. Make. The noble sacrifice of having sex with all of them.
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Bravely Default - Merchant Ringabel is dapper as fuck. Dark Lord...I mean Time Mage Tiz is kinda dorky looking, though(seriously, is it just me or does the BD Time Mage outfit look more appropriate for a dark knight? Or maybe some kind of warlock class?)
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Mana Khemia 2 - Just beat Sasalina for the third time. Girl has serious issues.
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BG2: A druid decided to challenge a monk to a punching match. I won't spoil anything but Stunning Fist.
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Takes 15 Charisma to be a Druid but only 12 Wisdom, just saying.
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Xenogears - Falling behind with the posts here. Or I've just been playing a bunch.
Hour 6: The setting here is Bart's hidden base. To some extent this part of the game remains kinda slow because Bart plot just isn't as interesting as the game wants it to be. In this arc, Fei goes from not wanting to fight at all to getting over that, as Elly's troops attack the base. I'm torn on what I think of Fei's conflict here. Part of me thinks it's a bit ham-fisted, to have Fei be shown the "right" way to go (and we can debate how right it is that he get involved with a country to whom he owes no obligation) mostly because Gebler soldiers are fine with killing children apparently (which, to be fair, isn't just "enemy soldiers are jerks", as the game implies the behaviour is drug-induced). But part of me has respect for the game realising that, even if the game had to bring Fei's inner conflict to a rather predictable resolution, it deserves props for dealing with this conflict at all. The best scene of the hour, somewhat surprisingly, comes from Bart, who appeals to Fei to do something with his life, and with his ability as a gear pilot - not just to run away. That the best thing he can do to atone for destroying his village is to oppose the warmongers who cause such villages to be destroyed, and will continue to do so. It's a simplified view of things but it's heartfelt and probably what Fei needed.
Also Schpariel, the boss here, is worse than Calamity unscaled while you get a third PC and new upgrades, okay Xenogears whatever.
Hour 7: Bledavik. Let me start by saying that I love this city. When I first played the game this stood out as my favourite city in any RPG. Given the game's graphical limitations, I just adore that first look of the bustling market street you see upon entering town; it really made me buy that this was a big city in a way that a few wandering sprites in the old SNES-style maps never remotely managed to convey. Ultimately the city actually isn't even -that- big (which honestly is a positive, since otherwise it could be overwhelming), but it creates the feel of a big city which I have a lot of respect for.
Almost immediately after entering we meet a bunch of new characters! Ramsus and Miang's introductions are almost insultingly normal on a replay; you would never guess that Ramsus would end up to be the total headcase from the way he takes charge of the situation, and you would never guess that his innocent-seeming female flunky is in fact the game's main villain. While these transformations don't take long to begin, I think it's amusing how XG establishes expectations with these characters, then takes both in completely different directions from those expectations. We also meet Margie, who obfuscates stupidity rather nicely as Ramsus interviews her (the first time I played the game, I legitimately believed she was a moron in this scene... or possibly just a young child, since her art makes it difficult to say). Shakhan's also pretty interesting here, as he appears loyal and obsequious before his Gebler benefactors, but is in actual fact spying on them and incredibly suspicious/frustrated with their involvement in Aveh politics. I like Shakhan. He's refreshingly straightforward in his villany, but pretty competent at it.
Other than that most of the rest of this hour is spent exploring town and figuring out how Margie will be rescued. Citan hatches a plan in which Fei will make a distraction by entering the tournament and Bart will sneak into the castle. This distraction feels unnecessary to me when the tournament would have been a distraction with or without Fei and Bart could really have used some help on the mission (as later events would prove!) but oh well, gotta get that RPG tournament in there I guess...
Hour 8: The rescue. So the plan that was set up in the previous hour is set into motion. Not much to say here, it largely goes according to plan. On the Fei duel side of things, we see that Miang recognises Fei (uh oh!), and he fights Wiseman in a confrontation which is kind of weird. I... could probably have done without Wiseman being in the game, I think; why would Kahn be this stupidly cryptic? If Grahf is constraining him in some way it would have been nice to have that elaborated on. Either way I don't think the character adds much. Also there is Dan. How the fuck does that kid make the semi-finals anyway? Where'd he learn that ether? You better not be trying to make Dan appear competent, Xenogears, that would be unforgivable.
Meanwhile, Bart rescues Margie and gets interrupted by Ramsus, so the two must fight it out. Fei miraculously breaks into the castle and joins (which doesn't make much sense but sure whatever). The womenfolk offer friendly healing support to their side because that's what they do! (see: Miang, expectations) I'd be kinda annoyed if the Miang thing didn't make it so funny.
Also Ramsus recognises Fei's martial arts as those of Id. I could complain about this - surely there are other people who have learned this martial art style in the world, so it would be foolish to jump to conclusions about Fei and Id - but to be fair Ramsus acknowledges they need not be the same person. He just has such a complex about Id that it's already starting to drive him up the wall, just being reminded about this. The first cracks in the Ramsus facade appear!
The PCs escape through the Gebler barracks, running into Elly. Yay! Elly shuffles all three into her room until the commotion dies down, while Bart squawks about being unable to trust her! Dude, she's hiding you in her room instead of just calling for the guards. Use your brain. When Elly arranges a gear for them to steal so they can escape (nicely paralleling how Fei saved her life earlier, though the game doesn't dwell on this), Bart doens't even offer a word of apology or thanks. I'm remembering why I don't like him much. Anyway, Fei obviously wants Elly to come with them, hoping she's better than what he's seen of Gebler, but she refuses. It's pretty hard to blame her. Elly also confesses to her role in the destruction of Lahan and apologises for her earlier behaviour to Fei, who forgives her immediately. D'awww.
Ramsus is pissed and orders a pursuit of the escaping trio, but a soldier interrupts him with a message from 'Hyu'... this is one of those things which is so blatant but I didn't catch my first time through. The game just outright said Citan had the clout to order around Ramsus! But surely that's not the case...
Oh, and we meet Chu-Chu. "There is a doll in front of the door to the bridge! Let's find Margie so she can move it!" may be the most ridiculous line in Xenogears. I tell ya, this game takes itself so seriously normally, and then it throws in things like this...
Hour 9: Nisan. After the actually-somewhat-gameplay heavy (for early XG) previous hour, this one has none at all! I'll take it. :) After some exploring around town and learning about the war that is brewing against Shakhan, the PCs visit the Nisan cathedral. Citan talks a lot, as usual. Margie is also surprisingly fun in these scenes. She's a character I mostly was drawing a blank on before this replay but she has a surprisingly quick tongue. Maybe I just like anyone who ribs Bart at this point.
Fei sees a painting of Sophia, and decides she looks just like Elly. Fei is getting kinda obsessed now, it's cute. I do appreciate how in the couple of scenes the two have had the game has sold me on their interaction enough for me to absolutely buy this attraction.
Finally, it's time for major Sigurd and Citan plot. At the start of the hour Fei and Bart eavesdropped on them in a scene which revealed to him that they knew Ramsus and Miang from military school. Now, Bart confronts Sigurd about it, and Sigurd confesses everything, explaining his past as a Solarian and his role in the Gebler army, as loyal followers of Ramsus, whom they hoped would change the rotten Solarian system. Sigurd assures Bart that his loyalties now lie definitely with the surface world (while Citan is for once completely silent!). In this scene we learn a lot about how Solaris operates, its class system and reliance on slaves from the surface world to support its way of life. Good stuff. I'm also quite impressed with Xenogears that this reveal comes now instead of way later, as XG continues to keep its secrets from the player, but never too many, or for too long.
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That reminds me that I always thought the war subplots of the game were grossly underserviced, considering the war is the main way that Solaris, through Gebler and the Ethos, are manipulating things on the main continent. They could have stood to spend a little more time on it before shifting the plot focus away from Aveh and really never coming back to it except when Bart needs an Omnigear. And of course Kislev in general could have stood to have another addition or two.
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Bravely Default: Just freed the wind crystal. Still very enjoyable, the forest sage guy was pretty great, Orthrus was a huge pain. I probably could have dropped back down to normal difficulty, but I decided to be stubborn and beat it on hard. Really his breath attacks did not need to crit that was the biggest obstacle (Breath attacks are a 2HKO/high 3HKO on mages and other frailish classes. They can crit to make that a OHKO, oh and he's a multipart boss with two heads that both get an action.)
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BG2: Firkraag isn't immune to petrification. Next!
(Well, okay, I reloaded that because stoning and shattering him didn't give me his scales. Strangely, killed Thax via petrification as well and he just fell over dead in his usual animation.)
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Bravely Default: This game really can't decide if it's supposed to be serious or humorous. It does the serious pretty well for a jrpg, but then it's back to comedy 5 seconds later.
Starting to fight the Black Brigade. Edea has been attack mage (Black Mage, Time Mage, Summoner), Tiz has been my super-defense cleric with no offense whatsoever (White Mage, Merchant, Red Mage). Agnes has been physical tank (Monk, Knight, Valkyrie). Ringabel did a bit of Freelancer and has been in Thief ever since. I keep waiting for an ability to open locked chests to show up in Thief but it hasn't, I'm assuming it's back in Freelancer instead.
Norende weapons break the earlygame pretty hard. Bastet Claws on a monk destroy everything in Chapter 1. Angel Bow on a Thief beats most of Chapter 2 and Lu Bu's Spear on a Valkyrie finishes off the Chapter (Jump hitting bosses for 5000). Chapter 3 is where the game catches up to you and you have to use more resources to win battles. Black magic really shining now.
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Donkey Kong Country Returns: 3 Temples down, 4 to go! Game decides it wasn't hard enough and thus gets harder, because clearly that's what this game needed: HIGHER DIFFICULTY!
(...as I've ranted a while back, it's actually refreshing to have games as difficult as this.)
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13: ffff Basilisks
14: Ambushed by giant rats while cursed.
15: Entered the Basilisk room the wrong way. It is amazingly hard to tell where Curse will abruptly kill you and where it will not.
16: I was apparently not out of range out of Gaping Dragon tail swipe. Damn you cursed HP.
17: Part the second. That tail's range is deceptively long.
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Xenogears -
Hour 10: Well, fittingly after just learning about Citan and Sigurd's past as elites in a military officer school, it's time to plot a military expedition as the game does its best Suikoden impression. (Xenogears sometimes just wants to do a bit of everything.) Citan concocts a plan to retake the capitol. Fei, interestingly, is now all in for participating, volunteering for a rather dangerous job in part of the plan. The game tries to sell it as both a sign of the friendship he has built up with Bart after some of the talks they have had (and of seeing the people he is fighting for), and that he has done a better job of figuring out what he wants to do compared to previous. Things are starting to go pretty well for Fei, actually... which means that of course we get to see that dashed soon!
The operation begins. Margie remains behind, and she has a brief scene with Sister Agnes, which would be where the game finally passes the Bechdel test except they talk about Bart. <_< Margie now takes her exit from the game's plot for a long time. One definite annoyance with Xenogears I have now (which I'm certainly more sensitive to these days than I was as a teenager) is how slanted it is towards male characters, especially during this arc when there are frequently scenes with 3-5 males and no females at all. Kinda odd. The female characters do have important roles when they're around, but they're just not around very often!
There's a scene in which Sigurd says that he doesn't care about who is on the throne, but wants to see Bart made king just "because it belongs to him". Now hold up a moment! That's an awful reason, Sig! You guys are waging a war which will kill innocent people because you think Bart belongs on the throne, and you have definite reasons to do it such as "Shakhan is an autocratic warmonger", but the reason you give is just a horrible excuse for taking lives. I'm rather surprised at the game tacitly approving his comments, but then I remember Sigurd says something much worse along these lines later in the game. So at least he's consistent? Sigh, I like his character well enough past these bits...
Pan instead to Ramsus and Miang. Wow they are in bed together they may be engaged in a sexual relationship is this truly a video game acknowledging this? When I first played Xenogears I was very impressed that the game was acknowledging this. It's not lewd or tacky about it, it is just telling it how it is. I figured this was a notable stride for video games and I can't tell you how depressed I am that games haven't progressed much since 1998 as scenes like this are still rare as hell. Some of it is just Japanese shyness about the subject but there's still no excuse for the overall collective immense shyness the game industry has about the subject.
... anyway the scene takes on a much more sinister turn quickly. After Ramsus wakes up from a nightmare (about Id, of course; Ramsus be obsessed) and takes a bathroom break, Miang has a chat with - oh shit - Grahf. If you hadn't yet figured out that Miang was bad news from Sigurd's comments earlier, well, this kinda does it. Miang reveals that Fei looks a lot like Grahf (!), Grahf reveals that Miang plotted to be set up with Ramsus. It's clear both have some villainous agendas which don't exactly overlap (Grahf's concerning Fei, which we already knew), but they promise not to interfere with each other for now. The plot thickens.
Finally, there's a scene in which the five Gebler special forces from the secret base assault are assigned to Elly's command. They obviously aren't happy with a female commander - actually, they aren't happy with anyone as a commander. They're a pretty dickish group, especially the Drive-addicted Vance. I'm surprised that they never get their comeuppance and actually end up on your side later.
Hour 11: The mission is well underway now. On the battlefield, Fei and Elly chance to run into each other. With drugs fuelling their emotions, Elly's soldiers ignore her orders and attack Fei, who, as Fei always seems to do, kick their ass. Torn on what to do, Elly opts to stay true to her role as a Gebler officer and protect her underlings, however scummy, and takes some Drive herself to motivate her to fight Fei. There's a rather sweet scene in which Fei is able to talk Elly out of her tortured state, which yeah, is not the most likely thing in the world perhaps, but not wholly improbable either, especially given the drug's nebulous effects on one's emotions. He also begs her to leave the army, as he is clearly bothered by being her enemy. Elly's thoughts on this aren't dealt with at this time (which is fine, as for her, the decision is far more life-changing and she seems paralysed by them) but she out of respect for the kindness Fei has just shown her, she does let him pass.
Fei joins up with Maitreya, captain of Bart's gear forces, and his troops, and launch their attack on Vanderkaum's forces. (Maitreya, incidentally, is a total bit character, but I still kinda like him for reasons I can't wholly defend; they probably just sell me pretty well on the "father to his troops" and genial personality pretty well.) Vanderkaum proceeds to be maddeningly incompetent, ignoring all the (good) advice of his underlings and literally gets his forces routed by like six enemy gears. What the fuck, dude. It's played as comic relief and Vanderkaum has been previously established as awful at his job, but holy shit Gebler, if it was so obvious this guy sucked why was he still at this post? I'd probably have appreciated a nod towards his parents being super-important in Solaris or something like that. Vanderkaum finally fights you as a boss and spoiler alert the boss fight is terribad because Vanderkaum sucks.
Just when the player might be rightfully about to complain that things went way too well for the PCs, Grahf shows up, and grants Vanderkaum "the power". Anyone who's played this game more than once has these scenes etched into their memory, I'm sure. My fist is the divine breath, blossom oh fallen seed and draw upon thy hidden powers, grant unto thee the power of the glorious Mother of Destruction! All with Grahf's puppy-love music playing all the while. Gotta give the dude his due, he has style points. Vanderkaum uses his newfound power to murder Maitreya and the other soldiers. Seeing his new friends murdered puts Fei under a lot of stress while pilotting a gear. That never ends well. End scene.
Speaking of things not ending well, Bart's plan has been anticipated and is entirely unraveled by Shakhan and Miang as they set an ambush. Bart's interested in talking shit to Shakhan, but Miang makes it very clear she's the one in charge, even offering Bart the kingship if he swears loyalty to her because really she doesn't give a damn which pawn Gebler can control on the Aveh throne. She even has the audacity to say this right in front of Shakhan who is not happy but smart enough to realise he has very little leeway to stand on (one can easily imagine how long his reign would last without Gebler right now). Fortunately for him Bart gives her the finger. The party seems certainly doomed but Maison to the rescue what the fuck. Maison is memorably badass in a cheesy way here as he threatens Shakhan with a giant gatling gun long enough to rescue Bart, Citan, and Sigurd. Completely unbelievable but sure let's give the old dude his time in the sun.
In full retreat, Bart and company plot their next move... except of course, they have been anticipated. Ramsus thoroughly defeats them and is clearly about to end their miserable little rebellion... which of course is when Id shows up, proving that this day is not to go well for anyone (except Miang, who laughs gleefully at Id's appearance once Ramsus has is out of earshot). Ramsus goes ballistic, deploying to try to take down Id, who defeats him in mere seconds. Ramsus babbles like the Black Knight of Monty Python fame about how he's not giving up!!!... despite his gear having lost a leg and an arm. Dear, sweet Miang rescues him as Id is distracted one-shotting Bart in an unwinnable battle. Meanwhile, Sigurd comes up with a plan to drop the Yggdrasil on top of Id, crushing him. Id, then, utters his best line: "Dropping a warship on me is cheating. Take it back!" and hurls the Yggdrasil back at Bart. The fate of the Bart and the Yggdrasil crew is left unclear (and while the genre savvy would assume they all lived, the game's text should certainly leave that open for doubt during the coming arc). Only Citan escapes, at Sigurd's urging. Alone in Heimdal, he heads north, discovering the smoldering wreckage of Vanderkaum's gear. There's really no doubt at this point that the one responsible is Fei, and indeed that Fei is Id, although this was one of those revelations I refused to believe at this point on the first playthrough. What type of game makes the main character an unkillable plot fight villain? That's just too crazy!
And so ends the first main arc of the game. It's definitely a bit of a downer ending. Lots of characters may be dead, the bad guys (Shakhan and Ramsus) won, and the badder guys (Miang and Grahf) won even more. Onto the Kislev arc, which I remember being one of the game's weakest, but... well, I'll see soon!
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Project A11- Fin. After burning up like all 90 days trying to complete Assignment 10 satisfactorily, I said to hell with it and just puttered around in dungeons to finish up the game.
Rorona is technically competent and all, but I can't say much else for it. Lots of dead time in the game, pretty much boring to play, and once you get past the opening it just doesn't really have any charm. Rorona's main element is all moe all the time without Pie, and there's a pretty huge gap between when you can muck about with pie. It also feels needlessly unforgiving, although part of this is the limited nature of the battle system. I mean, no mistake, Ayesha had similar jumps in enemy competence between dungeon areas, but not having such a stripped down battle system meant you have options besides "hope like hell you have good items in inventory" and "die".
So yeah. Not bad per se, just lacks in good. 5/10.
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What type of game makes the main character an unkillable plot fight villain? That's just too crazy!
A game made by madmen. So, Xenogears.
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13: ffff Basilisks
14: Ambushed by giant rats while cursed.
15: Entered the Basilisk room the wrong way. It is amazingly hard to tell where Curse will abruptly kill you and where it will not.
16: I was apparently not out of range out of Gaping Dragon tail swipe. Damn you cursed HP.
17: Part the second. That tail's range is deceptively long.
You know you can skip the entire basilisk area, right? Slide down from the giant rat's room, hugging the wall to the left, and you'll land right outside the door linking the upper and lower Depths. Makes the entire zone take like two minutes unless you're looting thoroughly (and the only thing braving basilisks gets you is a crappy ring).
Also props to NEB for narrating XG so I don't have to replay it myself (something I'd been considering since the OST topic reminded me of its fitfully laudable existence).
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My favourite part is noting how little gameplay there is in this and how much he seems to be enjoying it (and how much I still eye roll at this being touted as competition in writing quality to Torment. "Dropping a warship on me is cheating. Take it back!" Really? I will take me "What can change the nature of a man?" to the bank in comparison to that).
Citan for real main character hype goes here.
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You know you can skip the entire basilisk area, right? Slide down from the giant rat's room, hugging the wall to the left, and you'll land right outside the door linking the upper and lower Depths. Makes the entire zone take like two minutes unless you're looting thoroughly (and the only thing braving basilisks gets you is a crappy ring).
I did, in theory, know that. I just honestly could not remember my way around the depths at the time so I decided to just confront my issues head on.
Don't Starve: Right, I've been playing this. Gothic survival game about not starving. I've done pretty well at that part. It is not getting killed by wildliefe that seems to be my issue. Longest survival yet is 24 days (ended when I tried attacking a Pengull). The game is kinda neat conceptually, but I can easily see getting bored midgame with it. No real objectives beyond survive and all that.
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Bravely Default: This game really can't decide if it's supposed to be serious or humorous. It does the serious pretty well for a jrpg, but then it's back to comedy 5 seconds later.
Starting to fight the Black Brigade. Edea has been attack mage (Black Mage, Time Mage, Summoner), Tiz has been my super-defense cleric with no offense whatsoever (White Mage, Merchant, Red Mage). Agnes has been physical tank (Monk, Knight, Valkyrie). Ringabel did a bit of Freelancer and has been in Thief ever since. I keep waiting for an ability to open locked chests to show up in Thief but it hasn't, I'm assuming it's back in Freelancer instead.
Norende weapons break the earlygame pretty hard. Bastet Claws on a monk destroy everything in Chapter 1. Angel Bow on a Thief beats most of Chapter 2 and Lu Bu's Spear on a Valkyrie finishes off the Chapter (Jump hitting bosses for 5000). Chapter 3 is where the game catches up to you and you have to use more resources to win battles. Black magic really shining now.
quick FAQing shows that blue chests are unlocked later in plot by something.
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Tales of Graces f: So Richard is starting to act suspiciously different in all the bad ways...nah, I'm sure it's just a phase and it clearly won't be a CRUCIAL POINT OF THE GAME IN ANYWAY!!!
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My favourite part is noting how little gameplay there is in this and how much he seems to be enjoying it (and how much I still eye roll at this being touted as competition in writing quality to Torment. "Dropping a warship on me is cheating. Take it back!" Really? I will take me "What can change the nature of a man?" to the bank in comparison to that).
Citan for real main character hype goes here.
Planescape gets hype for writing, Xenogears for...plotting, I guess? Direction? Definitely not the actual lines, with the occasional exception for something like Grahf's speech.
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See Shale, more or less. XG's translation is "good for the time" but certainly not great overall, so you're not going to get much hype for the nuance of individual written lines here; that's not where the strength of the game lies. The line about the warship is uh not serious writing, and should not be viewed as a "good line" through that lens (which I assume is what the Torment line is?) but it is memorably ridiculous and punctuates the scene nicely.
ps. If you actually want me to play Torment, saying "the story-heavy games you enjoy suck" is about the worst way you could possibly go about doing it.
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Updated my journal.
Updated my journal.
Updated my journal.
Updated my journal.
Updated my journal.
Updated my journal.
True confession to make Grefter rage: I played Torment and got bored with it and stopped. Partially my fault for being a tad too sidequest completionist early on when it's the most boring, and I know the story is good later. Kind of out of character for me since I'm pretty happy with story-heavy novelistic games usually!
That said I loved loved loved loved the fact that Torment let you say the same thing with (lie) and (truth) behind it, and adjusted your alignment accordingly, something that Bioware games bafflingly tended to leave out years and years later. Now if only the Torment earlygame could involve things other than planting trees or whatever.
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ps. If you actually want me to play Torment, saying "the story-heavy games you enjoy suck" is about the worst way you could possibly go about doing it.
Welcome to why I refuse to play any WRPG outside of the Baldur's Gate series.
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My favourite part is noting how little gameplay there is in this and how much he seems to be enjoying it (and how much I still eye roll at this being touted as competition in writing quality to Torment. "Dropping a warship on me is cheating. Take it back!" Really? I will take me "What can change the nature of a man?" to the bank in comparison to that).
Citan for real main character hype goes here.
Planescape gets hype for writing, Xenogears for...plotting, I guess? Direction? Definitely not the actual lines, with the occasional exception for something like Grahf's speech.
I would say something like "ambition." It's got a lot of ideas and it wants to do so much with all of them, even if we can look at it now and say "yeah there's no way you would have put everything you wanted into this game regardless of how much time you were given." The end result puts so much stuff out there that there's probably at least one thing in it you're going to like. Like, as much as I think the main plot is pretty much nonsense I still really enjoy seeing the way Ramsus completely degenerates.
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That would be the best summation I've heard of XG (And a lot of Square's early to mid PSX titles). I don't care for the gameplay much and roll my eyes at the plot pretty often, but it's hard to not respect the effort and scope of Xenogears.
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Indeed. A lot of games degenerate into mumbo-jumbo because they run out of ideas and don't have anything to put in the latter part of the game. See: the last 1/3 of almost every Tales game. Xenogears is filled with mumbo-jumbo because there's so much they want to do that it gets jumbled as they try to squeeze it all in. Game swings for the fences every time, and connects on some tough pitches. And also strikes out a fair amount!
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I kind of admire how they refused to change their planned story when they were told they had to get their shit finished and out the door by a specific date. I don't think that was the smart thing to do by any means, but it was very bold of them.
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18: Fighting a Black Knight and I walked off a cliff.
19: Drakes are really durable and Lightning hurts like a fucker.
20: The above statement really remains true.
21: I guess I wasn't ready to face the Hydra.
22: Trying to recover souls from the Hydra.
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ps. If you actually want me to play Torment, saying "the story-heavy games you enjoy suck" is about the worst way you could possibly go about doing it.
I have kind of given up on it to be honest >_> and I know for a fact that you will hate the gameplay there, so it goes. It is less that XG is bad and that they are completely different (noting that this is like... before we had things like Shadow Hearts 2 even out) . Most people that used to put them head to head missed that and did actually tend to hype things like Id and Grahf for being the greatest ideas instead of stuff like really delivering on their Make Room! Make Room! references, villains that plot behind 2 or 3 layers of puppets that the game lets the player in on instead of being Zenormous. To this day I still love that the party heals themselves by rubbing reprocessed human bodies on their wounds and continue to do so even after the reveal. I only poke and prod about it because I like reading your views on things and a man should work towards his dreams even if they are futile. Grahf is in fact not the bestest and is a charismatic curtain that both Miang and Krelian hide behind at various points. Id is even less amazing and is even more a force of nature than Grahf. They are fine in game, but when you are going to be talking about subtle character presentation (because you are comparing to Torment...) you could focus on Miang and Citan and maybe stay away from things like Jesse Cannon. Back in the day people repped the game entirely the wrong way (Like I apparently do for Torment now!).
Edit - None of this is directed at Elf's current recap! It is fun and covers the points fine. Only point of Elf's that I mean to note is really how little you mention the gameplay, both as a mix of how sparse it can be at times. Also amusing that the stuff you feel the need to comment on the most is Gear battles.
I can't even be mad at you for getting bored with Torment and stopping playing Snowfire. It is a hard game to play these days and it isn't the story that does it. The gameplay is significantly worse than XGs that is for sure, which is really a thing.
"What can change the nature of a man?" isn't so much a line as a mission statement, a theme and the line delivered at the climax of the plot. It has a lot going on with it in game.
ps. If you actually want me to play Torment, saying "the story-heavy games you enjoy suck" is about the worst way you could possibly go about doing it.
Welcome to why I refuse to play any WRPG outside of the Baldur's Gate series.
That is fine, you can deprive yourself of good things that you can pick up incredibly cheaply because you don't like the way the wind blows if you like.
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Some people can't be fixed, Gref.
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Blackwell Convergence & Blackwell Deception - played through both
Both fairly good. Not sure which I prefer, but I'm reasonably certain that Blackwell Unbound is better than both.
I'm not sure why Deception doesn't stand out as clear best of the series? It blasts the rest of the out of the water ghost-count-wise, for all that a couple of them hardly count (not like there aren't ghosts which hardly count in the previous instalments though), and it has a portion of the game where you have multiple things you can be doing like Unbound does... it does have mediocre portraits in comparison to Convergence, but that's not much of a reason (and I think they're supposed to have been replaced late last year anyway, which I found out about too late to update my install). I didn't have a problem with the ending like some people seem to have had either.
I should be all set for when Epiphany comes out.
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ps. If you actually want me to play Torment, saying "the story-heavy games you enjoy suck" is about the worst way you could possibly go about doing it.
Welcome to why I refuse to play any WRPG outside of the Baldur's Gate series.
#donttreadonme
so it goes.
#InappropriateVonnegutQuote
Xenogears stuff
#GoingToRefrainFromBeingSnarkyBecauseThenYouMay(#StopTheRecap)andIMayActuallyHaveToPlayXenogearsToGetThatNostalgiaFix
#ToBeSuccinctRegardingXenogearsAndSloggingThroughThatMessOfGameplay:
Ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew.
It's not even like you can skip it in most gameplay-bad-story-OK games. Pretend that's a hashtag.
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Civ 5: What year is it? Actively had to prevent myself from playing the game at all yesterday because I needed to be rested for work (#responsibility), but this weekend? Ohhhhhh, this weekend is totally blown on this game.
I've played about 5 games now that went past 10 turns and... well, I keep playing with Laggy and we keep winning before I see any of the endgame content. #Laggytoogoodatgames
#OpinionsAboutVideogames
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I kind of admire how they refused to change their planned story when they were told they had to get their shit finished and out the door by a specific date. I don't think that was the smart thing to do by any means, but it was very bold of them.
It's not like they ever really gave much of a shit about the gameplay to begin with. I have never seen anything that made me doubt the XG team was trying to tell a story, not make a complete, well-rounded game.
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Civ 5: What year is it? Actively had to prevent myself from playing the game at all yesterday because I needed to be rested for work (#responsibility), but this weekend? Ohhhhhh, this weekend is totally blown on this game.
I've played about 5 games now that went past 10 turns and... well, I keep playing with Laggy and we keep winning before I see any of the endgame content. #Laggytoogoodatgames
Spoiler: The endgame is you fighting 3 civs at once while Laggy dicks around on another continent wonder whoring. </bitter>
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don't be bitter mang
building the statue of liberty in 1000 AD is crucial to world conquest
(besides we started doing pangaea exclusively to avoid that)
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Who the fuck were you playing to get that much science?
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The answer to "how did you get that much science?" is almost always Nebuchadnezzar with the full Rationalism tree.
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You shall not pass!
Poking around in those little plotless areas at the south of the map, Small Teeth Pass/North Forest/Forest of Tethir. Just killing some dudes for random EXP/loot, knocking out pretty much the last possible distraction before PLOT. Finish up down there and try to head back to the city. Denied! Clicking on no map icons but those three areas accomplishes anything. What the Christ, game?
I had a manual save just before leaving the city, fortunately, but still, pretty goddamn annoying. That is some weirdness right there. (Aren't those areas normally only accessible in like chapter six anyway? Maybe the game got confused.)
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Spoiler: The endgame is you fighting 3 civs at once while Laggy dicks around on another continent wonder whoring. </bitter>
Let's not forget, there's also games where Laggy has beyond terrible capital start locations, or early wars that go terribly wrong. They deserve to be counted too!
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Donkey Kong Country Returns: Golden Temple time! ...I should probably start packing the painkillers...
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Edit - None of this is directed at Elf's current recap! It is fun and covers the points fine. Only point of Elf's that I mean to note is really how little you mention the gameplay, both as a mix of how sparse it can be at times. Also amusing that the stuff you feel the need to comment on the most is Gear battles.
There's been at least one 100% gameplay-free hour in these recaps! That's probably the best thing I can say about XG gameplay. The main reason I have mentioned gear more than on-foot is because there's been hardly any on-foot gameplay so far, with the only thing so far large enough to really be called a dungeon being a locale for gear fights (Stalactite Cave).
The other reason the recaps have focused more on plot (and will continue to do so) is because that is why I am replaying the game. I already know what I think about the gameplay (it is bad) but watching XG's story unwrap itself and taking a look at what I think works and what doesn't is interesting to me (and hopefully others enjoy the ride too).
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Who the fuck were you playing to get that much science?
When you play co-op on Immortal tech research moves extremely fast, you don't even have to pick a science civ.
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You shall not pass!
Poking around in those little plotless areas at the south of the map, Small Teeth Pass/North Forest/Forest of Tethir. Just killing some dudes for random EXP/loot, knocking out pretty much the last possible distraction before PLOT. Finish up down there and try to head back to the city. Denied! Clicking on no map icons but those three areas accomplishes anything. What the Christ, game?
I had a manual save just before leaving the city, fortunately, but still, pretty goddamn annoying. That is some weirdness right there. (Aren't those areas normally only accessible in like chapter six anyway? Maybe the game got confused.)
If you still have a file in that area that is furthest along try deleting your Temp folder. It is common with that kind of error in IE games that it is a corrupted map file or something storing where you dropped shit that it stores in Temp. You won't lose anything that drops from the ground, my shitty understanding is that Temp is only used to cache area information for quicker reference when loading areas (so when you first go to an area that is why it takes a little longer to load).
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23: Testing enemy durability a bit in Blighttown went badly.
24: Fire dogs
25: Toxic + Fire Dogs + Normal baddies
26: Face eaten by surprise jump
27: Practicing parries
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Grefter: nope, that didn't do it. In fact, when I tab over any destination on the world map to check the travel time, what it actually says for everything but those three zones is "Destination unreachable." Crazy stuff. Oh well, have to do some random stronghold stuff again I think, nothing major.
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Civ 5: What year is it? Actively had to prevent myself from playing the game at all yesterday because I needed to be rested for work (#responsibility), but this weekend? Ohhhhhh, this weekend is totally blown on this game.
I've played about 5 games now that went past 10 turns and... well, I keep playing with Laggy and we keep winning before I see any of the endgame content. #Laggytoogoodatgames
Spoiler: The endgame is you fighting 3 civs at once while Laggy dicks around on another continent wonder whoring. </bitter>
Nah the way it ends is
laggy holds hand until the end
laggy tells me to fuck around until we get nukes
laggy lets me nuke the last civ. fun is had.
laggy nukes me
laggy nukes all his own cities
laggy gives cities to last civ
i ragequit
#best
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ToGf: I believe Act 1 has been finished...then an shonen battle between a bishie and a little girl was had.
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Bravely Default - Really appreciating the polish in odd places this game has. Adjustable difficulty in game(started on normal but finding it too easy? Jack it up to hard! Started on hard but this one boss is murdering the fuck out of you and you don't want to grind? Slide down to normal, then back up after the asshole is dealt with). Encounter control not as a skill but as a part of the basic system both in letting you turn encounters off entirely or just turn them down, or even get more if you're looking to grind in a certain spot. Starting with the Scan equivalent and it works on everything including bosses, and anything you've scanned before you can check the weaknesses of again. Adventurers blatantly telling you when a boss is coming up, and also providing a resupply point if you need more items deep in the dungeon. I don't even mind the lack of tents/party healing items, since if I need more MP I can just buy ethers.
Just finished the Fire Crystal area, picked up the last of the sidequest jobs from there as well. The bosses are fighting back a lot more, which is fun. Randoms still mostly roll over and die, but they can be dangerous if I let them get turns.
Plot and Chars are nothing special, but not offensive either(for the most part). Gameplay alone is shaping this up to be...probably 8/10 material, could go up to 9 depending on how much fun I have mixing and matching class abilities. Could drop down to a 7 if the plot takes a nosedive into the actively bad.
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Played SotN over the past couple of days because I have it on XBLA and it's been like five years or so. I'm realizing now that weapon progression feels very off. There's a lot of weapons with interesting effects but, for the most part, they are effectively given to you all at once, since the inverted castle has no gating mechanisms. They really needed to introduce more gimmicky weapons in the first castle, I think. The elemental swords are about as "out there" as weapons get in the first half of the game and I think that's a shame. It's a good game but I think it would be much more enjoyable if your weapons didn't play basically the same for the first half of the game and then suddenly it gets crazy. That's one of the things that the Metroid games did much better, you start getting different beam functions much earlier.
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SOTN is unbalanced in sooo many ways but weapon availability is definitely one of the wonkier ones. There's a lot of quirky, cool-sounding stuff that you can pick up in the second half of the game, but there's really no compelling reason to actually use most of these items once you've hit on one earlier find that has the most efficient combination of attack power and speed. It feels like a waste, you know?
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BG2: I can punch through adamantium. Bite me, Logan.
Tried fighting Kangaxx before hitting Spellhold. It went poorly. Last time I could just throw Minsc at him, but this time I have no rockheaded Imprisonment-immune berserker to hold his attention. So the only apparent plan was to distract him with summons while I pelted him with Minute Meteors constantly. Because Kangaxx takes 1 damage from like everything, I ran out of meteors before he ran out of HP. Oh well, will have to come back later with more meteors. I can get by without his nifty ring for a while. Basically everything I engage in combat explodes instantly anyway.
Wait how do the apprentices in the mage stronghold know Dimension Door. You can't get that until you're like level seven! I was saving nations at that level! Just how long does someone have to stay an apprentice in Amn, anyway? This place is such a drag.
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SOTN is unbalanced in sooo many ways but weapon availability is definitely one of the wonkier ones. There's a lot of quirky, cool-sounding stuff that you can pick up in the second half of the game, but there's really no compelling reason to actually use most of these items once you've hit on one earlier find that has the most efficient combination of attack power and speed. It feels like a waste, you know?
That's my sentiment exactly. I think if the inverted castle was gated off similarly to the start of the game, or you started seeing the more niche weapons in the first half, I'd have a lot more of a reason to use it. Makes me wish there was a hacking community for PSX games that extended beyond FFT.
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I don't think the weapon curve takes to much to resolve really in SotN if you can accept that it is going to be inherently broken. Take the weakest quarter (maybe a third?) of stuff from the Clocktower onwards and mix it starting from the Normal Library onwards while moving the Shield Rod to the inverted Clock Tower instead of the normal Colosseum and you will be doing an okay job.
You could totally have taken Kangaxx. Thing to always always do, Helm of Vhailor lets you cast Simulacrum. Simulacrums can use items in their quick item slots. Scrolls of Magic Protetction are rare and super valuable and will make one person at least immune to Imprison. Scrolls of Protection from Undead are cheap and plentiful from Temples. Scrolls of Protection from Undead make Kangaxx ignore that person as a target. This should give you all the tools you will ever need to beat him in any party. Magic Protection can be used just fine on more than one person. If you are going to send someone within 30 yards of Magic Protected party members you will want to have Death Ward on them because Wail of the Banshee will be cast periodically (Spell Protection: Necromancy also works but is more niche).
DDS2 - So finally pushed through and finished this, been sitting on the final dungeon for a couple of weeks now, but it turns out it was shorter than I was expecting. Layer 5's force you into human form section got a ragequit late at night with getting 2 party members charmed by Vanity on a Kingu being my first two members. Just fucking rude. Shit like that and enemies that have multiple hitting MT physicals (random number of hits...) critting really shows the volatile weakness to the combat system. It has some interesting potential with unique things it throws at you with caring about party turn order and conservation of actions of when you want pass with someone or do something else to eke out an extra minor useful action (may as well throw a healing item here because I have a press turn that I am going to waste otherwise because next person will kill enemy anyway).
I don't really have to say anything about that though because there is nothing new I can really add to the discussion here that hasn't been said before other than noting that now having finished it, I still definitely fully capable of seeing why I hated the combat system so many years back when I played DDS1, it is craaaaaazy high swing potential and I have been wiped by the likes of a Narasimha going on a crit spree a couple of times tonight, but they are the exception rather than the norm. It is an interesting experiment and one I am glad they did, now if they could just stop imping it that would be great. Even as they scale it back in the likes of Persona series of Strange Journey it keeps being not so great. Oh well!
What I really loved though is as always the visual design. I continue to dig the aesthetic they use even with the humans (they are very clean and while very samey at times, the costume design is always impeccable). The final boss is just great. You finally get to the centre of the sun to meet "God". It is a giant floating brain. Then when Seraph starts talking to it it unfurls both lobes like a pair of wings and envelopes the part in a pocket dimension while revealing an art deco style head that is the bottom half of a face with a prayer wheel for eyes. Then as you get into a fight with Brahma it is an endless pillar with 5 of these art deco prayer wheel heads that you sort of distort around in space as you defeat. Just so great.
There isn't much to say other than it is interesting seeing the Shin Megami script done to the exploration of Buddhism as a personal journey. Before I mentioned that I thought the game could have dropped Serph and just had Gale as the main protagonist, but that was me reading it like a standard narrative instead of SMT style exploration of a theme through the same singular story that they keep using. They didn't need Serph really, but they did need Sera and Sera did need to merge with something (become one with her own creations) and doing that with Gale wouldn't have worked so well. So Serph can survive the cutting room floor for now I guess.
Something that I really think Atlus do that is somewhat unique is they are really the only studio I can think of that seem to approach video games in a particular way that some artists seem to. They are the only studio that I can think of that as a whole really push this one style and theme so constantly while trying to sort through something. Like Francis Bacon did series preoccupied with death or Andy Warhol on mass production, Atlus are all about exploring as many different things they can through this lens of the end of the world, distorted reality (Whether it be another dimension or a virtual one or both at the same time), all myth being real and coexisting and humans making bargains and choices throughout all this.
That isn't to say there isn't other people in the industry that do that kind of thing, but they are more auteurs rather than a collective company (your Miyamoto, Sid Meier, Suda 51 or Warren Spector types), they do often investigate a broad range of topics through their various games, but it is specifically (at least marketed as) their vision rather than a large encompassing thing that goes beyond them. It is far more personal to them as individuals and transcends company for some of them.
Nor is it to say that there isn't companies that reiterate previous concepts and go over them or reuse stuff over and over. Bioware and Blizzard both cop flak for this (undeserving at times I think, reiteration and repetition in your works is a sign of progression in your piece sometimes, does give your public a sense of safety/familiarity sometimes, establishes a brand or style and sometimes you do just have a similar plot structure) and I have already talked before about how I really enjoy the fact that Gust seem to be constantly trying to experiment with small individual things each game, shifting up their focus from game to game to experiment the different things. None of them have nearly the same all encompassing drive to this one "style" that Atlus have in their Megami line. It transcends visual style, gameplay elements and even narrative, it is sort of this all encompassing framework to view various themes and ideas through.
They have been doing it for nearly 30 years now and have run it through so many different iterations even just in the last 10 years where we have seen high school slice of life, dating sim, Noir detective story set in WW2, DDS's overarching examination on the nature of modern existence and Buddhism (if I had to pick a theme it would be wrestling with the concept of reincarnation in a modern scientific world).
What I really look forward to seeing is what they do when they decide they are done and move on to something else. Persona 4 feels on the cusp of moving on maybe and Catherine really feels like it could be the first off shoot of really breaking that mold (it is still clearly the same style, but the formula has changed. It is significantly more personal. It could be just an examination of relationships but they change up the formula so much that I do think it is something legitimately different). I need to get around to it. SMT4 did come out though, so they clearly aren't done (and there is always going to be a business element to it), but here is hoping we get more things from these people that are interesting and different now that they fall under Sega's umbrella.
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I don't think the weapon curve takes to much to resolve really in SotN if you can accept that it is going to be inherently broken. Take the weakest quarter (maybe a third?) of stuff from the Clocktower onwards and mix it starting from the Normal Library onwards while moving the Shield Rod to the inverted Clock Tower instead of the normal Colosseum and you will be doing an okay job.
Oh, I totally get that SotN is going to be broken because the game is hella easy. I just think that they jam the vast majority the fun weapons into the very end of the game and don't give you many before that.
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Yeah we are on the same page, I mean you could do it without modifying attack power of weapons to try and balance it by like giving Crissaegrim -10 attack power or anything boring like that.
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Xenogears - Kislev. In which the game decides it needs to intersperse gears and fighting into a game which, as Fei observed, did not need more gears and fighting.
Hour 12: The section opens with several main plot scenes. There is some stuff with Sigmund. I'll withhold judgement since this dude does have, like, one more scene after this, but he's always a weird character to see. He's barely in the plot and we hardly get any sense of him. I remember that he's Rico's dad apparently and this is barely touched on at all. Blah. Anyway the important thing here is that he's taking assistance from some mysterious military force... kinda like what's going on in Aveh! It's not clear at this point if this force is the same as the one in Aveh or different, although it's certainly no major surprise when we learn they are in fact the same. It's somewhat amusing that not only is it the same organisation, but the same person giving the orders in this case.
Finally we refer to Fei for the first time in a while. He's having a dream which doesn't have much meaning the first time through, but has a lot of significance on a replay. In it there are three versions of himself: a young child watching a video of himself playing with his mother over and over, the adult Fei who is confused by the spectacle he sees, and a very evil-looking adolescent version of himself who interrupts them both and tells Fei to GTFO. Some pretty clear symbolism for the Fei backstory here.
Okay, now for boring stuff. Fei wakes up in Kislev, where he has been imprisoned. A bunch of thugs round him up so we can have a manliness contest (I think one of them is a woman, but XG sprites make it hard to tell~) because apparently those are all the rage in this world. We also meet Rico. I have... remarkably little to say about him for now.
Apparently everyone wants Fei to fight things, since a woman named Rue Cohen shows up and tries to recruit him to fight in the gear battling arena. He basically tells her to fuck off, as he's pretty fed up with fighting at this point. I can't say I don't sympathise here. A bunch of thugs may have been able to force him into this nonsense but political types have nothing on him. She even promises him a place in the Kislev military instead of prison if he succeeds. She probably has no idea what a terrible piece of bait this is.
We meet Hammer. Hammer's in general one of the brighter spots of the Kislev arc, since he gets some quite funny scenes. He is an admirably pushy little salesman, and for some reason he has been promised freedom if Fei can earn his. He tries to push Fei into the gear competition as well, blathering about living in luxury with all the power he can want, and Fei just goes "... is that all? Are you done?" I must say I do like how Fei just cuts through Hammer's bullshit here; he's not kidding around, and it will take a plot contrivance to change his mind.
Citan then appears! I guess that qualifies. Of course, Citan being here isn't contrived at all, as following Fei is his job, after all! He finally succeeds where Rue and Hammer failed, luring Fei with a promise he made Bart: to look after things if Bart should fall. Well, Bart is gone. Memories of those happier times with Bart do resonate with Fei and he agrees, he has to hold to his promise.
We also meet the Gazel Council, in a cutscene as Fei sleeps. Man these guys are dicks. Their first scene and they're already talking about purging the Lambs, oh boy.
Hour 13: Now that Fei has agreed to become a battler, we get a lot of that. There are three days of gear battles. I kinda like this minigame... when played against other players anyway. In this game it's very straightforward and easy. Which, well, is fine, I don't need a mini-game in the way of my plot. It still eats a fair bit of time. Fei is given Weltall to use, which is no shock as earlier scenes (and Citan's musing) make it clear that Kislev wants to gather data on him using it (though exactly what data is left vague IIRC).
There are some complications to these days of battling, which concern setting up the next dungeon. On the first day, Fei battles one of Rico's flunkies, who triggers a bomb (?) on Weltall. Fei is almost killed and lies injured in the prison clinic. Two of the flunkies then meet that night in the sewers, and we watch as a red-soaked point of view murders both of them. The next day, Fei is cleared to continue onto the next round, as wouldn't you know it, the two murder victims were the other two competitors from his side in the draw. Convenient. I'll say more about this later.
Anyway, Fei finishes up his battling, winning through two more days. After that, Rico confronts him. Rico says that Fei is suspected of the murder of his flunkies, because the flunkies set the bomb for him on day 1. Fei doesn't like being suspected of murder, so he tags along with Rico as they go to investigate the sewers. I still don't have much to say about Rico.
Hour 14: Sewers. Okay, okay, Xenogears gameplay. For the first time since the Stalactite Cave, we actually get a decent chunk of it at once. They are tring some things like "you can't target sharks until they jump onto land" and "this dude counters deathblows" but none of it is very interesting. I guess I can derive some small pleasure in trying to work out whether I can afford to use non-deathblows on randoms and still kill them in the same amount of turns but objectively this is just really terrible. Systems where you lower your power now to get more later = go jump off a bridge plz.
Rico is a horrible, horrible PC, getting instant doubled by Citan, having like 60% of his HP, and taking way more from magic (though hey a bit less from physicals!). This is despite my leaving the Speed Ring on him when Citan makes the best use of it, probably. (Citan swipes his Power Ring S instead.)
Hour 15: We finally track down the boss of this place, Redrum, who has apparently been doing the murders. One neat touch, though: you see things through Redrum's eyes several times in this dungeon... through a green haze, when the murders of the Rico flunkies were through a red one. On my first playthrough I don't think I caught the significance there, but yeah, it's pretty clear that we actually go off and murder the wrong monster. Citan feels strangely bad for Redrum and even stays back alone to bury it, which is also a nice touch.
Speaking of which, Redrum is a pretty good boss in theory whom I steamroll every playthrough; this time is no different.
As we leave the sewers, we get a second scene with Emperor Cain, and it becomes more clear that Citan's job includes tracking Fei. He also reveals Fei has "awakened" three times (Lahan, Vanderkaum, and... hint #3 as to who the real murderer is...). The scene ends with Cain announcing that the council has ordered a "Purge". We cut to Elly and her troops, who have just received their orders to participate in this mission. Elly isn't happy about this, and is visibly on edge throughout the scene, alternating between being nasty to her subordinates and apologising to them as she struggles with what's going on. She finally reveals to her troops that she's just not happy with genociding humans. We learn that her troops, as third class citizens, are sympathetic to this view (huh, these guys are much nicer when they're not all drugged up) but are surprised to see it out of an upper-crust elite like Elly herself.
Anyway, the battle arena stuff gets wrapped up, Fei beats a bunch more dudes. Right before the final battle, Wiseman shows up! He wastes some time by blathering about YOU CAN'T BEAT STIER BECAUSE MASS IS IMPORTANT AND HE HAS THE MOST MASS don't give me this bullshit when Rico/Stier are such bad PCs and then challenges Fei to a fight because fucking everyone does this in this world. I am all ready to just throw a brick at Wiseman for being a waste of space, but after the fight Fei asks him who the fuck he is and what's going on?
... and holy hell, Wiseman gives him an answer. Thank goodness. We learn a fair bit about him here, and about Fei's past: he tells Fei about how his mother died when he was young, that his father was an officer from the flying kingdom of Shevat, and that Grahf coveted Fei and fought his father. He actually tells most of the truth here, though doesn't reveal (of course) that he is actually Fei's father or that he is fused with Grahf. That he doesn't reveal the second is obvious - I wouldn't expect him to - but the first is odd. I guess because he knows he's Grahf he doesn't want to risk Fei finding that out and thus shattering his psyche when he realises this means Grahf is his father, kinda? Still yeah, this is another one of those scenes where "holy shit Xenogears just revealed a lot of key stuff instead of sitting on it for longer", good to know. Hammer sends off the scene with some comic relief, blathering about "what the hell just happened" while Citan and Fei discuss things.
The final battle with Stier happens, it is easy like all the rest. Rico accepts his defeat gracefully and continues to be boring. After this we finally get a scene which hints at something more from this bland character, as he heads off to Stier resolving to "get him, myself!" We later learn Rico's gear, in a later fight, "malfunctioned" and crahsed into the kaiser's box seat. What connection do these two underdevelopped characters have?
But meanwhile, the plot is trying to catch up! We see Elly and her troops again, as they have been ordered to participate in the purge of Kislev. We also meet Dominia, who is something of a rival to Elly, a fellow female officer. The two are rather obvious foils and I'm surprised I never noticed: Elly is a first-class citizen who feels bad for the Lambs, while Dominia is a former Lamb herself who has risen up and will have no mercy for those that her commanders have ordered her to take action against. Dominia reveals that the plan is to essentially detonate a nuclear reactor, destroying most of the city and rendering it uninhabitable for years, something she has no qualms about. And so the stage is set for the wrapup of the Kislev arc and for Elly to finally make her expected jump to the PC side...
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FF2 Yattaf solo: Finished. Emperor died in 3 hits.
The easiest challenge.
I was surprised to see that fists, swords, daggers, staves, spears, axes are pretty much the same thing. No sword supremacy at all in this game. So it's obvious that you should go for the cooler weapons, i. e. staves and daggers.
Shields are perfect evasion vs lower damage. You just really don't get hit anymore with one. You can also achieve that by just training with a shield for a while then not equipping the heaviest shit you find.
Bows are kinda lame. Front row shield, back row double shield seem like much better options if you want some defense on your mage.
Toad and Teleport were still pretty much near 100% multitarget instant death for the rest of the game.
Fire, blizzard, thunder are the same spell. Fire hit more weaknesses.
Scourge sucks. It's also the same spell but gotten later, and basically nothing is weak to poizn.
Holy sucks. Its big thing is that it relies on spirit rather than int. No one has more spirit than int unless they're roleplaying a white mage or something.
Flare is kinda stronger than the basic spells, but gotten too late to really be worth it.
Ultima sucks unless you're overleveling to hell, or are soloing. It was the strongest spell by a very small margin in my game.
Berserk is the "Now I kill everything in one hit" button.
Haste is like Berserk but worse. Both can be used together for fun results though.
FF1 Anniversary Yattaf solo: Black mages are girls.
I tried a red mage before but he took no damage from anything + did less damage with spells than with physicals. Black mage is a more interesting challenge.
Early on most enemies kill you really really fast and you have to put them all to sleep, then pick them one by one (With physicals or fire/thunder) Incidentally that's how I killed the pirates.
Then you get the multitarget spells and ^_^
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I was surprised to see that fists, swords, daggers, staves, spears, axes are pretty much the same thing. No sword supremacy at all in this game. So it's obvious that you should go for the cooler weapons, i. e. staves and daggers.
Shields are perfect evasion vs lower damage. You just really don't get hit anymore with one. You can also achieve that by just training with a shield for a while then not equipping the heaviest shit you find.
Bows are kinda lame. Front row shield, back row double shield seem like much better options if you want some defense on your mage.
Most of this sounds pretty much correct. Swords do get quite a bit better than other weapons late, though, as Defender is pretty great for an evade boost (lets you use heavier shit, mostly, while still maintaining crazy high evade... probably doesn't matter on a solo as with even more levels you probably just dodge everything armour can protect you from, and you no longer care about armour which resists status since you just use a Ribbon on your one PC), and Excalibur/especially Masamune are quite a lot stronger than other weapons at the very end.
Still fun to read about as always!
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Fenrir: PSP version of FF1, or PSX?
FF1: Playing this, PSX versions. Thief/Monk/WM/BM team. Thieves are terrible. They are more than terrible, they are White Mages *with no magic* till you get Rune Blades at the end of the Elfland arc. Monks are also total garbage during this timeframe. There were entire random battles where my white mage did the most damage. This is just beyond pathetic.
Marsh Cave was really easy. I got lucky (I think PSX version made running easier which helps tons) and was able to run from almost all the randoms. Wizards were also cake. What was *not* easy: getting to the Marsh Cave with enough resources to beat the Wizards. It took me several tries (augh) because my team was completely inept against randoms without Black Mage clearing things. Thieves are sub Edward and need to burn in eternal hellfire.
Just got to Melmond. went to Crescent Lake for a Buckler. Party level is 10 right now.
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BG2: Spectator, you are the best beholder ever. See you in Throne of Bhaal, buddy!
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I'd just like to say that I totally caught the red sight / green sight hint when I played Xenogears. Fun times, I really wish more games had the balls to give you a murder mystery and have the PCs "solve" it and let the player in that they weren't really right. (Even if Redrum probably was a threat anyway, so it's not like the PCs are super unsympathetic.) It's one of XG's more random arcs that ends up having a very very nice touch.
Remind me, was there any particular reason that the Gazel Ministry wanted to do evil shit in Kislev? I had vague recollections that it was because they feared the Kaiser or something, but from what Elf said, Kislev is also influenced by Solaris, so dunno. They just stick on their villain hat?
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Because Fei is there and manifesting as Id. Remember, the reason they're all dead is because of Grahf, and later scenes very deliberately use Id's sprite to represent Grahf at his "triggered a ~95% human depopulation event" genocide peak.
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There's also some vague explanations used about how the Ethos are using prison gear battles for nebulously defined "experiments" if I recall.
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Yeah, the purge is ordered explicitly because Fei/Id is there and the Gazel want him dead. It doesn't succeed in large part because the other major villains do not share this motive.
There are clearly experiments on people going on in Kislev (by the Ethos/Solaris) and certainly lots of weird mutations (Rico, Redrum, a weird random NPC you meet in the sewers), and gear battling does seem to be tied into this but yeah the details are annoyingly not really specified.
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Bravely Default: I just fought Jay Leno and then he became Gandalf.
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I was surprised to see that fists, swords, daggers, staves, spears, axes are pretty much the same thing. No sword supremacy at all in this game. So it's obvious that you should go for the cooler weapons, i. e. staves and daggers.
Shields are perfect evasion vs lower damage. You just really don't get hit anymore with one. You can also achieve that by just training with a shield for a while then not equipping the heaviest shit you find.
Bows are kinda lame. Front row shield, back row double shield seem like much better options if you want some defense on your mage.
Most of this sounds pretty much correct. Swords do get quite a bit better than other weapons late, though, as Defender is pretty great for an evade boost (lets you use heavier shit, mostly, while still maintaining crazy high evade... probably doesn't matter on a solo as with even more levels you probably just dodge everything armour can protect you from, and you no longer care about armour which resists status since you just use a Ribbon on your one PC), and Excalibur/especially Masamune are quite a lot stronger than other weapons at the very end.
Still fun to read about as always!
Thanks!
Yeah I didn't notice the evade boost from the Defender since it's not mentioned in the description. (unlike the main gauche's)
Status only hit me earlygame really, the ribbon wasn't necessary. I don't know what's the status defense stat but it was probably Insanely High endgame. Physical attacks similarly never ever hit.
The final dungeon dropped a ton of ribbons, I went through it extra quickly (Didn't even find the masamune) and got 6 ribbons out of it.
By the way, the added content to the Anniversary Edition (Not Soul of Rebirth) is really terrible. You're not missing anything.
Oh yeah I forgot a few spells.
Blink, Protect, Shell: Useless here
Cure: Also useless
Aura: I got it to level 6 and haven't even seen it do anything
Osmose: Ethers > This
Oh I also need to mention the hilarity of one of your party members randomly speaking beaver. FF2 is amazing.
Super: PSP version. I have ethers.
Fira on everything, Blizzara on Astos. He went down in 3 turns.
Marsh Cave was intense but it looks like they vastly reduced the encounter rate. I only died around 6 times? Didn't use in dungeon saving (too cheap really)
Anyway I'm really thrilled to open all these chests full of equipment I can't use
Edit: SILVER ARMLET OMG
How can an armlet protect that much
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If you think the Silver Armlet's amazing, wait until the Ruby Armlet and protect ring. Your black mage will dominate Chaos with his mighty physical!
Also you got lucky. The Marsh Cave's encounter rate is really streaky- I am playing the PSX version and had next to no fights in it this time. The Earth cave more than made up for this.
FF1- Just beat Kraken. Had a few resets in the castle of ordeals because thieves fucking suck.
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BG2: Onward to ToB. Nalia why do you have two different voices now. I don't understand what's happening.
Greater Whirlwind Attack is so amazing. I mean, monkspawn's pretty amazing under normal circumstances! I regularly toss out like thirty damage a hit, get four strikes a turn, and basically never miss. Clearly I needed to be able to bump that up to ten attacks a round, right? I mean, it's all of one round a day you can do this, but seriously nothing's living through that.
Gromnir's speech is pretty great. He's 100% right but you have no reason to listen to him because he's a paranoid twit who is only kind of coincidentally accurate with this particular accusation and ultimately just makes the person he's trying to accuse look better by being a nitwit. Worst townie ever.
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There isn't much to say other than it is interesting seeing the Shin Megami script done to the exploration of Buddhism as a personal journey. Before I mentioned that I thought the game could have dropped Serph and just had Gale as the main protagonist, but that was me reading it like a standard narrative instead of SMT style exploration of a theme through the same singular story that they keep using. They didn't need Serph really, but they did need Sera and Sera did need to merge with something (become one with her own creations) and doing that with Gale wouldn't have worked so well. So Serph can survive the cutting room floor for now I guess.
A slight correction. It is Hinduism they used here, not Buddhism.
This is also why they used Brhama instead of Vairocana Buddha (which is already in SMT's rooster) as the last boss.
The reoccurring theme on the unison of the both sex is also something rooted from Hinduism.
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Fair point, my knowledge of Hindu stories are pretty shallow at best and I am also used to Megami Tensei using various things interchangeably enough to not focus excessively on where they come from so much as what they are doing. The various theologies and myths tend to be trappings used to explore a broader topic, so I really should broaden it to Reincarnation than a specific religion. That it sounds like they go the trappings fairly thematically consistent is worthy of note, but is expected level of polish from these guys at that point onwards. They may have sparse plots at times and some missteps in gameplay but setting and flavour is always incredibly slick.
Edit phone auto correct to Megamo Tensei. Would play.
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Dark Souls
28: Snakemen are surprisingly durable. My rapier seriously does no damage outside of backstabs. Good lesson.
29: Messed up the first fireball platform by missing the stairs.
30: Boulder spitter switched back to the outer stairway at an inconvenient moment.
31: Clipped by a pendulum.
32: Clipped by a different pendulum on the same bridge.
33: Surprise elevator shaft while fighting a mimic.
34: Rolled off a cliff while fighting Iron Golem.
35: Holy shit torch hollows at the Undead Asylum do a fuck load of damage with their charge.
And since I haven't actually really clarified what I've beat...
Dead'd
Stray Demon: Lulz.
Taurus Demon: His archers have killed me more times than him.
Bell Gargoyles: Sunbro too good.
Capra Demon: Fuck you and the dogs you rode in on.
Gaping Dragon: You scare me, but now you are dead.
Moonlight Butterfly: One of the best tracks in the game. I almost always feel bad killing you. That's why I let Witch Beatrice do a good bit of the murder.
Quelaag: I have no idea why Maneater Mildred takes so little damage from fire.
Sen's Fortress: I finally let Iron Tarkus solo the Golem. That was way funnier than it should have been.
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Lightning Returns- I might be over confident but I think I'm going to be able to get three more main story missions wrapped up by the end of the fourth day. I already have Noel's done and am working on Snow and Caius/Yeul and am about to head off to initiate Sazh's Memory/knowledge/hindsight/etc from the JP version is serving me well even though I'm playing on Normal now~
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9.03m - went through
It's definitely something you can go through. I think that anything it made me feel was just due to wishful thinking with regards to the concept rather than anything within the piece itself, though. Disappointing, but it's not like it was expensive (and the money supposedly goes to charities).
Titan Attacks! - gotten up to the final, dropped
Space Invadery style game that's pretty fun. Until you get to Titan, and there's far too much stuff happening to comprehend and I'm reminded of shoot-em-ups and why I don't play them.
Managed to get to (what I assume is) the final and got beaten fairly handily. Replayed the game from the beginning with more skill so that I had a bunch more upgrades by the time I got to Titan, eventually managed to get to the final again and got beaten pretty much as handily as before. I had full shields going into the level both times, and there's no other way to increase your defence, so I'm not bothering with retrying.
Good times while they were good times anyway.
Zen Bound 2 - played through the first tree, dropped
Seems pleasant enough throughout the first tree, then in the second tree they go and drop statuettes on you which require you to wrap in particular ordering so that you don't block parts of them off with your rope. Nothing wrong with that if that's what you're looking for, but it's not what I was looking for. :shrug:
Considered playing the Steam version of Phantasy Star 2, but I ended up deciding that I couldn't be bothered mapping everything out again. Mostly due to memories of that terrible expanding-basements level (http://www.pscave.com/ps2/dungeons/ikuto.shtml). And playing with someone else's maps might as well be throwing out half the gameplay, for all that I did that with PSg2.
VC Super Mario Deluxe - played through Original 1985
I game overed a couple dozen times, but I guess I can say that I've beaten SMB1 now. If it counts to be playing a version where you restart from the same level after game overing.
Eventually I figured out that the trick is that you need to walk 90% of the time and only run 10% of the time, whereas later games have conditioned me to run 90% of the time and walk 10% of the time. It's still difficult to bring myself to not hold the button down after realising that, unhappily.
I hate the physics in the game so I see no reason to look into any of the rest of the modes.
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If you think the Silver Armlet's amazing, wait until the Ruby Armlet and protect ring. Your black mage will dominate Chaos with his mighty physical!
Indeed.
While the earlygame had a lot of strategy with sleep/fire and money/HP/MP resource management, it turned into cathartic OHKO-every-random-enemy-at-once mode as soon as I got the Silver Armlet really.
By this point I had multitarget murder of three kinds, enough defense/HP to survive at least two rounds in most battles, and ethers were cheap.
Enemies have shown no sign of less dying since then. I got level 3 spells plus a ton more defense. Bahamut just gave me his Extremely Fancy Class Change Stripped Pants and I have every spell including Flare.
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Game is toast, yeah. Wait until you laugh at Chaos's puny physicals (Defender's blink works wonderfully for this) and you outslug him easily with tempered Masamune smitings. It will be glorious. Since it's solo you are going to be massively overleveled to boot, so good luck to any randoms trying to blitz you!
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Slowra works reaaaally well to make boss physicals laughable already, that's how I just beat Cerberus. But I still have that Defender just in case.
Plus a ribbon now!
Level 56 with only Lich dead. I'm doing Soul of Chaos content, wondering if Kary can be OHKOed by a Wizard's staff physical after Saber/Saber/Saber/Haste. (Edit: Answer is probably. This just did 2400 damage to Twin Headed Dragon. Jesus)
Character rating
Black mage 10/10
Fighter 1/10 Murders things waaay too slowly, but he can use defend in battle to not waste precious black mage time, and he can revive the black mage
Thief, red mage, white mage, black belt: 0/10
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ToB: Rival sighted!
Oh hey monk magic resist stacks with Ring of Gaxx and BG2 endgame's goody-two-shoes bonus. Looks like it'll top out at 98%. I'm practically a golem! Look forward to mocking enemy casters for the rest of the game.
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FF1: Ninrako is no more! Beat Chaos. That was an ugly fight, had two PC's down at the end and both of my fighters were at low HP when it ended. I had resets in the temple of fiends.
1st: Lich. He opened with Nuke, this killed most of my team off.
2nd: Six water elementals. Didn't pay attention and tried to run, my team got pummeled into the dirt.
Kraken: Lucky motherfuckre OHKOed two PC's. Didn't want to have to backtrack to revive them.
Thief and Black Belt are beyond irredeemably awful in this version of the game. BB is as inept at Thief at offense till after the Earth Cave, can't take a goddamn hit and is only good in the late game when challenge wanes. High defense gives Master issues as well and can't even use the pro cape, boo. This was a *hard* run of the game. I missed Fighter's tanking constantly and RW's all around competence badly.
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36: Underestimated a Painting Guardian's damage.
37: Those two stupid Silver Knight archers.
38: Those two stupid Silver Knight archers.
39: Those two fucking Silver Knight archers.
40: Invader!
41: Titanite Demon's one-shot me, apparently.
42: Sloppy while trying to melee a Silver Knight.
43: Sloppy AGAIN while trying to kill a Silver Knight.
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Xenogears - Finishing up Kislev, finally.
Hour 16: With victory comes freedom! Freedom to work for the Kislev military. Fei and Citan meet the kaiser, Sigmund, in what is pretty much his last appearance. He proposes that Fei work for him. Fei never gives a chance to give him an answer, no or ever, as Rico breaks in for... some reason. He flees to a room where only those with the kaiser's DNA can go and has flashbacks about his mother. We shortly after learn that the kaiser's wife ran off (apparently to the slums), the same slums where Rico was never born, to a single mother. So okay the plot twist is that Rico is the kaiser's son. Why his mother ran off is never stated that I can recall. Anyway don't expect Rico to address this ever again because I'm pretty sure he never does. Ugh, this character.
Anyway aside from that the main thrust of the story at this point is for Fei to steal Weltall and then escape. He's gotten pretty attached to that gear of his for all that he claims not to like it. Citan is very encouraging of this plan of action too. I forget if having Weltall is important to Cain's plans or if the doc just figures that Fei in the gear he naturally pilots well has a better chance to survive.
A plan is formed, leaning on Hammer's ability to gather information (the guy does make himself useful as an NPC, for comic relief). Before the plan can be put into effect, some battlers loyal to Rico show up and tell Fei that Rico is going to be executed! Man that kaiser is a dick, I guess (it's implied he figured out Rico is his son). Since Weltall is been held at the execution site (the battle arena), Fei decides to speed up the plan, and retrieve the gear / rescue Rico ASAP. It's interesting that Fei cares enough Rico to do this. Maybe it's respect for the way Rico handled the murder situation, and the manner in which he accepted defeat later? Maybe Fei just wants to feel like he is doing something useful again. He's about to get more chances, regardless.
Hour 17: There's a dungeon I almost completely forgot about in which Fei and Citan sneak around, beat up a bunch of Kislev soldiers, and reclaim Weltall. Following that, Fei takes an elevator up to the arena, and defeats a dragon which was about to eat Rico (in a clear callback to the scene in the Blackmoon Forest, way back when). Apparently nobody is watching this execution and/or Kislev doesn't want to send in a bunch of gears to fuck with Fei and generally stop him from both stealing a gear and breaking a prisoner free? I dunno, this scene is kinda weird. Fei tries to act all cool like saving Rico is no big deal, Rico talks about having nothing to live for (possibly because he just learned what a big dick his dad is. If that's not the reason then I give up).
Fortunately at this point Gebler attacks! The plot have started to move! Citan correctly guesses (or more likely, already knew) that Gebler is planning to trigger a nuclear explosion in the town by attacking the reactor. Fei, glad to have something to do, goes off to stop them from doing that. He appeals to Rico to do the same. Rico is initially all "fuck this town" but then realises he's being a complete dumbass and goes to help Fei out.
We get one final gauntlet with Elly's soldiers. Elly obviously doesn't want them to attack Fei but they ignore her orders. This is kinda weird; worst subordinates ever? A moment ago they were quite sympathetic but now they're simultaneously ignoring orders WHILE participating in a mission which they had said they disliked and are only doing because... they have to follow orders. Maybe they're drugged up again but I get the annoying feeling this is not supposed to be the case and this is some weird sort of manly face-off the way only anime seems to know how to do it. Hopefully I'm wrong, but that's the vibe I got. Whatever, that's not what we're here for.
Fei vs. Elly mark 2. Not even a battle this time, just as well. Instead the two just shout it out. Fei's position is pretty obvious here (he's very clearly in the moral right), Elly's is the interesting one. She acknowledges what she's doing is wrong but is still struggling not to obey the orders she was given. She talks about being envious of Fei, who is free to fight for what causes he believes in; she is trapped and either has to fight for a cause she knows is wrong, or throw away her entire life. I'm quite glad Xenogears has the sense to acknowledge that what is (obviously) about to happen represents an incredible sacrifice on Elly's part.
Fei challenges Elly, though, all but calling her a sadistic coward. In a somewhat unlikely (but poignant) sequence the two descend down to the Kislev streets and get out of their gears to survey the carnage as the citizens are fleeing in terror. Fei almost slaps her, and then the tone of the scene changes suddenly, as if Fei is suddenly overcome with realising that using violence to convince Elly isn't the answer here. Instead he just talks about wanting to help people, and that he's going to stop Gebler here. Elly is at least suitably convinced by his words not to stop him.
Fei reunites with Rico and they defeat Dominia, then try to manually move the bomb-ship she was pilotting away from the nuclear reactor. They succeed, but it's still going to hit town. Elly to the rescue, at this point, as her turn from Gebler is complete, she joins the two to try to push the ship further from the city. The only real surprise in this scene is that they actually fail. Elly, desperate to redeem her previous actions, stays attached to the ship the longest and thus is unable to flee from its crash, but she is saved by... Grahf? So Grahf wants to protect Elly... we don't know the reason yet, but it's the first thing he's done which isn't total baby-eater mode. Interesting.
One final scene of note: Elly and Hammer meet. It's a small thing, but it's clear they know each other. You might miss it the first time (I probably did), but not the second. First Grahf, and now Hammer... game's starting to build up some secrets after all...
It's kind of embarrassing how much more relevance/plot importance Hammer has than Rico, actually.
Hour 18: On the Rico note, he rejoins, saying he has business to take care of so he'll tag along until Fei and company leave town. I don't remember what this business is, which is a bad sign. Enough about him.
Random Big Joe appearance! Earlier I paid him 5000G to check out an alley he was standing guard over because I am a sucker. He assures me he had a deep reason for doing what he did, deeper than the deepest ocean. This guy is pretty ridiculous. XG has a bizarre sense of humour at times and he's definitely a good example of it. Anyway Big Joe also teaches me about character switching. I'm amused it took the game 17 hours before this became necessary.
The rest of the hour consists of a dungeon which isn't too large but not negligible. It's a gear dungeon and Weltall has somehow slipped to become the worst PC now. When did that happen? (Vierge and Heimdall are both faster, Vierge is more damaging and Heimdall is more durable.) At the end of the dungeon we steal a plane! I'd say I'd expect it to be better-defended but I guess we did just beat up a bunch of Kislev soldiers to get it. Go us? An entire military base defeated by four gears? Oh video games, you so silly.
Next time: mad skillz!
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ToB: Valygar do you absolutely have to die in every boss fight. You do don't you. Learn to wear something better than leather armor bro.
Clearing out Abazigal's lair then ---> Watcher's Keep.
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It's also a plane owned by the same kislev that just had a battleship-sized bomb dropped on a major population center. Wouldn't be out of line to think that the stuff you fight in the factory there is a skeleton force and automated defenses.
Honestly once you get to gear-stuff in Kislev, Weltall stops being top three until it upgrades. Steir, thanks to its attack bonus, will generally OHKO things Weltall cannot (though you'll obviously have to stuff it's accessory slots so it can hit things... then again, this is true of Weltall, Heimdall, and Brigandier as well), and while Weltall is overall better than Heimdall, by the time you get your next upgrade set you'll have recruited Billy. Vierge is your best gear until ones that come with disc 2 upgrades show up, unless you nab an Ether Doubler in which case it's your best gear until it leaves the party on disc 2 >.> (even without that, though, Power Magics and E Circuits are a worthy investment of course.)
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Good point about the Kislev base, yeah.
What is Weltall (1)'s advantage over Heimdall anyway? They have the same engine output multiplier (i.e. attack) and Heimdall has higher agility and seems to fairly consistently be getting higher-HP frames.
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Mm, does it? I remember him consistently having less HP. Could be faulty memory. I generally absolutely never upgrade Heimdall, because you're at no point required to have Citan in your party during a gear battle so it's an easy place to save money.
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I honestly remembered Heimdall as worse than it actually is too. I suspect we just collectively overreacted to Citan's gear not being as good as Citan. <_<
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Valygar should have access to Black Dragonscale Armour which is like third best AC or so in the game? Leather doesn't really lag that far behind plate. Lack of shield is a bit of a killer and he probably is behind in other protective stuff though. Not a fan of stalker for a few reasons, squishiness as a trade off is one of them.
I also have in my head that Heimdall isn't impressive, but I used it anyway because fuck Rico.
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Pity I left Thaxskin armor in storage back in Adventure Mart right this way squire (didn't know he could use it, fighter girls had something slightly tougher). Blue or white scale armor work?
He's actually really good at murdering people (Celestial Fury is so great), but unfortunately people also happen to be extremely good at murdering him right back. The AC wasn't such a liability in BG2 proper but now he just dies all the fucking time. Making me wish I'd just grabbed Sarevok again. Oh well, not switching it up now. Monkspawn could probably solo the game with relative ease anyway.
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Monkspawn was the first time I played BG2, and I get the impression that it would be one of the easier solos in the game. I imagine it would be tricky at first but once Monks get going, they're nuts. It would help if you had old, cheesy version of the cloak of spell turning or whatever but as you say, you get close to magic immunity by the end of SoA. Naturally it would be harder to solo Ascension but I'm not sure if you're bothering with that.
Has anyone played BG:EE? I was just wondering if the new characters and their quests were worthwhile.
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Pretty sure it is White that thieves can use, so I think he can (forget if Stalkers interact with Elven Chain or not and whether it counts as that or not). It is 1 AC better than Black iirc.
I played BG:EE over January, but I didn't use the new NPCs. If you like BG and are happy throwing another $15 at it then the slightly more professional polish of a bunch of stuff mods can do is actually pretty nice, it just generally makes it a bit more user friendly. If you are happy with base BG and don't want to spend money then you can skip it. I don't regret buying it or the sequel.
PS:T - UI scale for this is kind of ugly. Base graphics look nice at higher res, but the interface is just not a pretty one. Doing an evil play through as a Mage. I should do Fighter or thief some time, but Mage gets to use the tome. Up to Dead Nation now. Became Evil when I refused to give Kyu-Yin his tattoo back.
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Mana Khemia 2 - Just beat the final boss. Whew. Both he and Tetri were very difficult; almost died about midfight vs. her and almost died about two turns from the end against him. The game, without item creation shenanigans at least, is pretty limited in its healing which makes Ulrika's MT healing timed card so amazing. She was definitely the team MVP to me; strong healing, strong group attack in Cannon Ball, common skill boosting which made Flare Rain vicious. Enna's good too with the timed card cancelling move and the general piling in damage with the timed card skill, especially the cheap and easily spammable Vertical Cannon. Chloe is the stereotypical black mage, pretty solid but is eclipsed by Ulrika in even her niche late. Scan's always nice though. Pepperoni is the standard hard hitting, high HP tough guy but manages to be better than most of them. Goto is every bad thief stereotype merged into one; awful damage, no timed cards, no MT, and stealing is of dubious value in this game. I ended up giving him Teraheal and had him spam it and items against all the hard bosses, utilizing his uh speed???
The highlight of this path plotwise is Ulrika and Chloe's interactions, s well as Flay and Tony being awesome. Tetri is a pretty amusing main villain; she is probably nicer than everyone in your party and just loves cute things. Also, she's so rational and Ulrika hurts her brain. I agree, Tetri, I agree.
After the final boss was over, the main villain comes to your house and pets the final boss. Alrighty. Also, Ulrika using Mana Guidance against the final is... awkward~
Ended up getting Chloe's ending, where she body swaps Ulrika and Uryu.
Thoroughly enjoyed the game in its later stages but much like MK1 it is a slow starter. I'm gonna tackle Raze's path next in order to do the combined path.
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Bravely Default: Huh, I guessed wrong on that plot twist. And that one as well. Good job of not being too obvious, game.
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Lightning Returns - Yeah I was overconfident, only managed to finish off one more main story segment Sazh's on Day 4, did manage to get to right before the boss for the other Wild Lands story section though but had no items/EP left and by the time I'd left to restock I didn't have any time left by the end of the day. I didn't get Yusnaan Snow story cleared like I wanted to either. Oh well did manage to clear a semi main quest Mog as well as get a bunch of subjects and Chocolina/Canvas of Prayers quests done while in the process of working on things. Also managed to extinct a bunch of monsters and get a huuge giant pink sword w/th 900/900 ATK/MAG + Auto Regen (15 secs) aww yeeah~
Other shinies include Skeleton's Earrings (Status Ailment Damage +100%) and Warrior's Hunter Mask (STR +15%, steals the effect of Bravery, Faith, Haste cast on any enemy struck by Heavy Slash)~
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After the final boss was over, the main villain comes to your house and pets the final boss.
This isn't even slightly misdirecting or misleading. MK2 is great.
Xenogears -
Hour 19: Hey we're almost twenty hours into the game, about time we got an airship! The music that plays here is the same as when you get your actual (more ridiculous) airship later in the game which is a nice touch since it is a very "airship-y" theme for lack of a better way to put it. I definitely actually bought that we'd reached that point in the game. Of course, things have to show up and ruin your day...
First is Grahf. He shows up so the PCs go fight him in a suitably ridiculous fight in which he punches your gears while on foot because that's just how he rolls. (He also has durability of wet tissue paper, so as far as badass moments go, it's not too badass.) He won't ever target Elly, in case you missed the fact that the gear which protected Elly during the Hecht detonation was his, and while the fight is short enough that might not notice this, Elly remarks on the fact afterwards.
Xenogears, of course, knows that the best way to trump ridiculousness is with more of the same, as Citan orders Hammer to fire the main guns at Grahf, and Hammer does, and Grahf is dealt with (at least for the time being). Hammer of course is super-excited and offers his famous MAD SKILLZ line, and goes on to brag about how awesome he is before Rico shows up and clubs him in the head. What the hell dude. Rico's just getting on my nerves this playthrough!
More ridiculousness ensues as Bart catches sight of the Goliath and shoots it down in a scene which is almost word-for-word identical to the one where we first met the guy. I find this scene hilarious, honestly. Like, I just got my airship and who shoots it down, destroying it and generally ruining my day? Oh yeah, it's that asshole. AGAIN. asdjsadadalkhf well played, Xenogears. I go back and forth on Bart and I get why he gets hate here but it is amusing.
Rico goes and punches someone in the face for a more deserving reason. Bart goes to apologise thereafter and Rico is all "hey bro whatever I already punched you in the face and I don't hold grudges. btw I've changed my mind and I'm joining now". Well... sure I guess? (I guess we never do learn what that business he wanted to take care of out of town was?)
Grahf appears before Ramsus, marking his first overt appearance before Gebler, informing Ramsus that "he" (obviously Fei) was on the crashed Goliath, over the ocean. Ramsus flips out and goes to follow. Miang then confronts Grahf alone, marking the second meeting between the main two villains. The two remain on rocky terms, as Miang tries to understand why Grahf would "help" Ramsus that way, and hints that the connection between Ramsus and Fei is something she is abusing for as yet unknown gain.
The Gazel also get their second scene, with Cain this time, as we get reintroduced to most of the major players who were missing for the past few hours (not Shakhan I guess). They talk a lot about how they've discovered this lost city called Zeboim which some dude named Krelian is really excited about, and are alarmed that Fei is still alive (which Cain kinda mocks them for. I knew I liked him for a reason) and that things seem to be unfolding similarly to 500 years ago. Even on the first playthrough, if you thought this was the last time "500 years ago" was going to be mentioned, then you aren't very genre savvy!
Fei and Elly meanwhile are stranded on the ocean together. Arbitrary sure but hey it works. I definitely appreciate more character scenes between the two. This one focuses more on Fei, as he examines his reason for helping people. Fei thinks that he isn't such a good person as he seems, and that he has just been helping people (Bart, Kislev, etc.) because it makes him feel needed and good about himself. It's a pretty honest appraisal and fun to watch, even if the game doesn't provide many answers. For Elly, the game establishes she is still thinking about going home (and why shouldn't she? That's where her family and life are), confident (or at least convincing herself) that she would be branded MIA rather than a traitor, and talks about returning to Solaris but... just not being part of the army she can no longer stomach.
They also see Shevat, and in general Shevat gets talked about by both parties a bit here as it becomes clear we'll be visiting at some point. One thing I totally never caught until now: the reason Shevat was so much lower when you see it near the start of the game is because it was picking up the Lahan survivors at Yui's request. A nice touch.
Fortunately, before the two of them can starve to death, they are rescued! By men! Of the sea!
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Been catching up but woah that Redrum /Id thing is cool.
Poor Redrum.
FF1 Black Mage solo: I already steamrolled through an early FF, I'm stopping now. Nothing can really be interesting anymore at this point.
Kary did die to one single puny black mage staff physical attack.
Parasite Eve 3:
At the very beginning of the game everything is already fucked up like it's Disc 3 or 4.
Earth is fucked and you time travel to the past to collect data or something. It's pretty vague. You get no context and have to read through files FF13 style to get the story.
My boss is this guy:
(http://files-cdn.formspring.me/profile/20110331/n4d94d9f4f065b_large.jpg)
His name is Hyde.
Slightly suspicious?
There's a lot of rampant gross sexism, most obvious being Aya's clothes gradually getting torn off. Better than lolis but terrible.
I started on hard and the difficulty can only properly be described by this smiley: O_O
Seriously grinding right now to get past a boss named Emily.
Gameplay is "PSX weird". RPGish third person shooter with no aiming? And lots of weird systems like teleportation between NPCs? This is no Mass Effect but it is certainly... something.
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44: Silver Knight
45: Silver Knight
46: Silver fucking Knight
47: Silver. Knight.
48: O & S
49: SILVER KNIGHT
50: O & S
51: O & S
52: O & S
53: O & S
54: O & S
55: Giant Knight
56: Silver Knight
Pretty much all the non-O&S deaths are just impatience. My current build takes forever to kill Silver/Giant Knights, which has started to make me rush, which is making me fail, which is getting me more annoyed, which is making me rush harder, which is creating an infinite fail loop.
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If it's of any use, I found silver knights to be one of the easiest enemies to practice parrying against due to the predictable rhythm of their combos (well, silver sword knights at least; silver spear knights are just dicks who I can only backstab after blocking their spinny slash). Shield bash + thrust = parry thrust, three-hit combo = parry second hit. Don't really need lightning reflexes to parry when they telegraph their moves so clearly.
Giant knights I just run past. Or shoot with arrows from the stairs if I want to safely summon Solaire, they don't even react or bother to heal up if you stay out of aggro range.
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B-but inefficiently grinding titanite chunks!
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Better than lolis but terrible.
Oh man wait until you get to the last plot twist! If you didn't already think Toriyama was a creep...
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ToB: So I kicked Demogorgon in the head(s) until he was dead, nyah-hah!
Hey, you want to be a god? No thanks, it didn't work out too well for the last guy. Game (re)finished, and this--
Monkspawn was the first time I played BG2, and I get the impression that it would be one of the easier solos in the game. I imagine it would be tricky at first but once Monks get going, they're nuts. It would help if you had old, cheesy version of the cloak of spell turning or whatever but as you say, you get close to magic immunity by the end of SoA. Naturally it would be harder to solo Ascension but I'm not sure if you're bothering with that.
--I believe would be very true. It'd be rough at first since at low levels you're basically just a quirky, slightly squishier Fighter, but the fantastic unkillability of a high-level monk is just terrifying to behold. And with EXP focusing, you'd get the good stuff a lot faster! With magic resist bonuses from BG2 endgame and Watcher's Keep and various equips (why would you ever NOT be using Ring of Gaxx?) all stacking on top of monk base, you do get genuine magic immunity; even before that happened, saves were good enough that I could reliably run right through crowds of status-spamming goons to harmlessly soak up all their spell charges before bringing in the rest of the team; Deflect Arrows bonus eventually gets so high that it is functionally impossible for ranged attackers to hit you; need to run away to heal up? You're faster than everything; and the raw AC! I hit -13 by the end of the game, optimally could've been -15 but I prioritized accuracy/damage bonuses with accessories. You'd easily hit level 40 in a solo to get that last boost, so maximal AC of -16? That is just crazy. And solo you might get immunity to normal weapons early enough for it to actually matter!
Honestly I started to just feel bad for the game after a while. I guess I could've turned up the difficulty! Past a certain point the only thing that could pose a serious threat was Imprison (because it ignores immunity) or non-magic instakill shit like mindflayers have.
And I haven't even talked about how astonishingly good you get at murdering the fuck out of everything. I figure endgame PC numbers should demonstrate that pretty clearly!
Io: level 35 monk!
Percentage of party kills: 43%. This isn't even due to carryover from BG1, the number held steady throughout individual chapters of BG2/ToB.
Most powerful foe vanquished: Bodhi. This is BS. I killed way nastier enemies than some random vampire who just happened to have a name! I do wonder how the game determines this. I guess it's just by raw EXP dump and since she's a big plot boss there's a lot for her? Also I figure game doesn't count stuff like Demogorgon or Irenicus because the enemies lapse into cutscene teleports rather than properly exploding like everything else monkspawn touched.
Jan: level 18 illusionist/level 23 thief.
Percentage of party kills: 2%.
Most powerful foe vanquished: Shade Lord. Yeah, that's right, the most fearsome thing he ever killed was the early chapter 2 quest boss. Jan, you suck at killing things. I know, it's also important having someone around to nuke enemy defenses, but seriously, you suck at killing things. Can't even learn Horrid Wilting!
(But with enough monkeys, anything is possible.)
Nalia: level 26 mage/level 4 thief.
Percentage of party kills: 7%.
Most powerful foe vanquished: Firkraag.
I actually totally ignored offensive magic and summons for broad swaths of BG2 just because it was so much less efficient than personally punching the shit out of everything. So Nalia mostly sat around chucking Fire Tooth a lot. The old standbys are good when there's a genuine horde to deal with, though.
Mazzy: level 32 fighter.
Percentage of party kills: 11%.
Most powerful foe vanquished: Ogremoch, elemental prince of drow linen closet. Seriously, what is he even doing there?
Jaheira: level 20 fighter/level 21 druid.
Percentage of party kills: 17%. A lot of this actually is BG1 carryover, she's not hugely efficient melee-wise.
Most powerful foe vanquished: Draconis.
Valygar: level 27 stalker.
Percentage of party kills: 16%. Respectable!
Most powerful foe vanquished: Saladragon! (The one in Watcher's Keep.)
Man Valygar has the charisma of a log. "Hey monkspawn, tell me about your dad." *Awkward evasion, what about yours?* "I had to kill him after my mom turned him into a zombie, thanks for asking." Was this a conversation we needed to have in the middle of fighting vampires?
Not having a proper cleric was pain sometimes. See: vampires, what do you mean druids don't get Restoration?! So I spent a lot of money on those scrolls. But in practice, everything died with such a remarkable speed to monk cheese that party longevity was much higher than it has previously been with more deliberately balanced parties. I have to say, it is extremely satisfying ripping through dragons, the prince of demons, and would-be gods basically naked and with your bare hands. (Take note, From Software: give me viable unarmed fighting!)
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Jeanne D'Arc- Can't remember if I mentioned that I was playing this. Up to chapter 4. Shockingly better than I was expecting. Solid enough (it not particularly inspired) SRPG gameplay + interetsing use of history. Good use of plot twists which are well supported by historical data which makes you care on some level despite the game not going too deep into character. I also like that they made Jeanne have a stereotypical bone-headed RPG main character type that is enough attached to male main characters...and then making it work far more with her situation. At this point, it's at worst a 6 game (which again, is higher than I was expecting).
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If it's of any use, I found silver knights to be one of the easiest enemies to practice parrying against due to the predictable rhythm of their combos (well, silver sword knights at least; silver spear knights are just dicks who I can only backstab after blocking their spinny slash). Shield bash + thrust = parry thrust, three-hit combo = parry second hit. Don't really need lightning reflexes to parry when they telegraph their moves so clearly.
Giant knights I just run past. Or shoot with arrows from the stairs if I want to safely summon Solaire, they don't even react or bother to heal up if you stay out of aggro range.
Yeah. It really is just impatience combined with the fact that they can two-three hit me making things a little annoying.
Giant Knights are just because I'm summoning Solaire. Unfortunately, I do tend to be in aggro range because lulz magic. Maybe I'll try sniping them just to end the irritation.
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Nier: Finall did B ending. While seeing the extra scenes with Shades and such was nice, I can't say it really added anything to the game. Kaine's novel stuff felt more tiring than actually meaningful because it wasn't as well written as Lost Odyssey stuff and it just kept dragging on as there are 4 of them in quick succession; maybe if they were legitimately spread out, that'd be one thing. The Tyrann thing seemed completely pointless given how underused he was; could have been a neat addition if he was consistently there, but instead we just have an extra snarky voiceover during fights that isn't as amusing as Weiss.
Also the gameplay is even worse on this because you're just overpowered and cutting through everything effortlessly, redoing the exact same things you saw before. Also because you are overpowered, you tend to kill bosses too fast before you can see their own dialog you missed in A Ending, so it legitimately clashes.
I dunno, still not impressed with the overall quality of the game. I can see why some people like it, but to me I found a bland hack and slash with some good music and occasional decent moments, but overall not a very engaging experience, and B Ending did little to change my opinion.
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Jeanne D'Arc- Just beat C24 (The fight with Superba). Very nasty but well setup fight. Had 1 reset because my PCs just didn't have the steam at the end to take him. Obvious flashbacks to the FFT Gaffgarion fight, for all that it didn't play out that way.
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3rd birthday: Chapter 4.
WTF is going on??
Seriously what is going on.
I don't understand anything at this point.
Also I guess there was a boss battle that was cut at the last minute at the end of Chapter 3?
Also. Maeda. Is this for real?
Game on hard is true survival horror. I'm running from every enemy I can go past. Troops/Meatbags/Health points are dying left and right. Music is appropriately scary.
If it weren't for random Haste activation at exactly the right time (during Liberation) I'd have never been able to get past that 6 or so Snatcher battle in Chapter 3.
Slackers are the only non dangerous enemis, except nevermind, even slackers can be dangerous.
This game would have a delightfully hellish atmosphere if not for all the nonsense.
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Pokemon Soul Silver: Mandy is holding me at Kyogre point to replay this so I can get her a Groudon (which I accidentally transfered to later games) such that she can get Rayquaza.
Started with Totodile, because only Gen 2 Starter I never used, and Fera's actually good in Gen 4+, so why not? Dunno what else I'll be doing from here.
I did start the game twice because first I saved after getting Totodile, later realizing it was Timid Nature (+Speed, -Attack), which is just BAD so I reset, got a Naughty Nature (+Attack, -SDef), which I'm totally ok with! Just beat Falkner, in Ruins of Alph, early game options are bland as usual in Johto (well, early Geodude, Gastly and Bellsprout for some typing variety, but still kind of :\)
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3rd birthday: Chapter 4.
WTF is going on??
Seriously what is going on.
I don't understand anything at this point.
Welcome to Toriyama's writing. 3rd Birthday's plot is the most disastrous thing I have seen since Chrono Cross.
No, it is exactly like Chrono Cross.
After studying the plot thoroughly and read all the supplemental material... the end result is that it is making even less sense.
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This is why you STAY AWAY from supplemental materials. If they're not in the game, you can assume they're not canon, and in cases like this, it makes things better.
Well, ok, they're fine for behind the scene info and maybe cute little tibits, for extra plot details? Yeah, "if it's not the in the game, I am going to ignore it" is the best way to approach it. These are the kinds of things that can be changed on a whim in more public sources...not that I expect 3rd Birthday to get any follow up for a number of reasons...
...and no, I am not defending 3rd Birthday, for all that I don't think the plot (AS THE GAME PRESENTS IT) is as bad as many (though it certainly is a big middle finger to fans of Aya.)
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Honestly I think Chrono Cross is better written. I mean, in that game you go from one objective to the next and it makes sense until you look at the game as a whole and think "wait, what the hell is this suppose to accomplish". 3rd Birthday dumps you in the middle of a story and every moment of the game is "what the christ? Oh god monsters gotta kill them twisted going to eat me".
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Fallout: New Vegas - Remembered I was playing this and opted to tackle it instead of Dark Souls last night for a break. Finished up in Novac and got Boone on my side, did the whole Repconn thing, and made it all the way to New Vegas. Boone is lethal. As am I, now that I have a Plasma Rifle.
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Boone can and will murder most overworld randoms before they can enter your sight range. Your plasma rifle is irrelevant.
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Honestly I think Chrono Cross is better written. I mean, in that game you go from one objective to the next and it makes sense until you look at the game as a whole and think "wait, what the hell is this suppose to accomplish". 3rd Birthday dumps you in the middle of a story and every moment of the game is "what the christ? Oh god monsters gotta kill them twisted going to eat me".
This is Chrono Cross
Create a stupid plot hole out of nowhere so we can have things to do -> We are made to do things that's meaningless because or else there won't be enough content to make a game -> Stuff even more meaningless was thrown in to make the meaningless things we do to look meaningful -> repeat indefintily
This is 3rd Birthday
Create a stupid plot hole out of nowhere so we can have things to do -> To cover the said plothole, another plot hole was thrown in to let us work on -> yet another plot hole was toss in to cover up the previous one - repeat indefinitely
They are essentially the samething, just CC is less stupid on the surface.
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I prefer goat shit to dog shit personally. YMMV though!
PS:T - Evil play through is hard. Writing too good. I sold Dak'kon into slavery and now can't easily swap back to Mage from Class Changing. That is going to get annoying a little I think. Ignus can't train you in that, so fuck that guy. I was banking on that a little. Oh well, that means I get to use Nordom at least.
As much as I try to pick Lawful options where I can, Lawful and Good options group together and Chaotic and Evil tend to a bit more than I expected, so I keep bouncing between Neutral Evil and Chaotic Evil.
At least I finally got to use Tome of Pestilential Thought. Ask it for advice. Every piece of advice gets written to your Journal. Updated My Journal.
I was listening to a podcast that played this a while back. They talked about how the combat is annoying and pointlessly difficult. My too much knowledge of the game errors because you have thousands of Copper super easy just by the time you get to the Underground Village and Blood Charms heal 18 HP for 36 Copper each and game pauses in inventory. You can buy a hundred of them super early and they will last you the entire game.
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They are essentially the samething, just CC is less stupid on the surface.
Pretty much what I meant, yeah. CC looks okay until you think about it, 3rd birthday is all crazy all the time.
Although there's something about infinite plot hole recursion that makes me smile.
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THE MULTIVERSE BREATHES. IT GROWS. IT STAGNATES. IT FORGES ITS CHAINS AROUND THE PLANES LINK BY LINK. IN TIME, EVEN ENTROPY MAY BE CHAINED.
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This is Chrono Cross
Create a stupid plot hole out of nowhere so we can have things to do -> We are made to do things that's meaningless because or else there won't be enough content to make a game -> Stuff even more meaningless was thrown in to make the meaningless things we do to look meaningful -> repeat indefintily
Tales of Chrono Cross.
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57: O&S
58: Invader
59: O&S
60: Silver Knight and now I'm out of humanity. Guess trying to beat O&S is over for the moment. I'm kinda annoyed, which leads to...
61: Silver Knight
62: Giant Knight
63: Snakeman at the base of the shortcut cage
64: I finally stop being annoyed enough to actually make it back to Firelink Shrine. Which leads to a death from Stray Demon. His explosion attack straight up murders me through blocking after I land.
65: Same thing.
66: Same thing. I finally wise up and roll TOWARDS him after landing after this.
67: Bloated Hollow fireball murder.
68: Crow landed on my headed and pecked me to death.
69: Bonewheels are the devil.
70: Toxic after I run out of magic to kill the bloated hollows.
71: Those javelins from the baby Phalanaxes hurt like a bitch.
But whatever. This detour got me Velka's Rapier, +8 soul levels (42 -> 50), and enough souls to upgrade Velka's and shore up my spells. Hopefully that'll see me through O&S.
I'm not optimistic about Artorias of the Abyss.
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Stealth Bastard Deluxe - Beaten
When I first started the game some time back, it was suffuse with slowdown and half-unplayable. I recently checked to see whether that had been improved at all and found that it doesn't seem to have any slowdown at all any more (unless it was all in the first world or something). Nice nice.
Anyway, it's fairly entertaining. Similar to the Oddworld platformers in some ways, which was what caused me to buy it in the first place, but sadly not really up to the standard of Exoddus. Doesn't have mind control in case anyone was thinking that might be involved, and you also rarely ever need to save anyone else (actually I was unable to progress for a short while the first time you had to because I didn't even consider the possibility). You do get to push things around a lot though. Sigh.
Ending was pretty great. I had no idea where the game was going, but on balance I guess I should have had.
Had 411 deaths all up. Didn't collect all the helixes in any world, didn't completely S-rank any world. Not sure if I actually got any S-ranks outside the first world for that matter.
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72: O&S. Then, with the power of prayer and the sun, I beat them.
73: Derp. Fang Boars hit hard.
74-87: Sanctuary Guardian
Sanctuary Guardian takes no damage from anything. My life is pain.
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72: O&S. Then, with the power of prayer and the sun, I beat them.
73: Derp. Fang Boars hit hard.
74-87: Sanctuary Guardian
Sanctuary Guardian takes no damage from anything. My life is pain.
And he probably has the lowest defense in the DLC.
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You're running a sorcerer, right? Given how high boss defenses are in AotA, multi-hit spells like Homing Soulmass are especially worthless so don't even bother with those. Your rapier's not going to see much use either given how badly AotA boss defense nerfs elemental weapons, so just stock up on the best single-target spells you have and totally twink out your magic power before walking through any fog gates. Bellowing Dragoncrest Ring + Crown of Dusk + either Oolacile Catalyst or Logan's Catalyst (depending on INT, latter best at high INT) = optimal sorc output. And try to avoid spells that keep you immobile for too long (I never use the Heavy Soul Arrow spells).
You might also want to clear out the rest of the base DS endgame before hitting AotA, just for the extra levels (not to mention Rite of Kindling). The bosses only get meaner after Sanctuary Guardian.
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You just reminded me of my near victory over Artorias that turned into a lose because my rapier broke mid-battle.
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I just beat Sanctuary Guardian for the first time last night--the only way I was able to do it was memorizing his patterns and taking 1-2 safe swings. When he does the swooping ram attack, wait until he's close and roll backward. Sometimes I could get 4 hits on him after that one. The problem with getting greedy on him is he can counter with that poison tail swing, which you really don't want happening.
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You're running a sorcerer, right? Given how high boss defenses are in AotA, multi-hit spells like Homing Soulmass are especially worthless so don't even bother with those. Your rapier's not going to see much use either given how badly AotA boss defense nerfs elemental weapons, so just stock up on the best single-target spells you have and totally twink out your magic power before walking through any fog gates. Bellowing Dragoncrest Ring + Crown of Dusk + either Oolacile Catalyst or Logan's Catalyst (depending on INT, latter best at high INT) = optimal sorc output. And try to avoid spells that keep you immobile for too long (I never use the Heavy Soul Arrow spells).
You might also want to clear out the rest of the base DS endgame before hitting AotA, just for the extra levels (not to mention Rite of Kindling). The bosses only get meaner after Sanctuary Guardian.
Oh riiiiiiiiight. Wow. I don't know why, but I have totally forgotten about upgrading my Catalyst. I should do that.
That aside, though, Homing Soulmass actually deals the second most damage out of my spells if it connects fully, oddly enough. Soul Spear beats it cleanly, but it definitely beats Great Soul Arrow and possibly Heavy Great Soul Arrow?
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Getting a better catalyst pales in comparison to getting more high-end spells, which I gather you're still somewhat short on. Also you should totally use Beatrice's Catalyst because it looks awesome. (You just have to beat 4 kings. No problem amirite)
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You just reminded me of my near victory over Artorias that turned into a lose because my rapier broke mid-battle.
Hahaha. Something that similarly occurred to me when you were posting bundles of FONV screenshots: wait what you mean there are people who don't compulsively top off their equipment every time they rest anywhere?
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Parasite Eve 3: Finished the game.
It all makes sense now!!
The game got gradually easier, which is often the case in unbalanced hard modes. Oh well! I'm not sure I would have liked Emily level difficulty for the entire game.
Weapon rating:
- Pistols: LOL
- Assault Rifle: Like in every shooter, assault rifles are everything. I got the best "power +, impact - one" and upgraded it forever.
- Shotgun: Really fun to use but not enough ammo
- Sniper rifles: Fun concept, the only weapon that can snipe weak points, unfortunately the speed kills them. I only used them against beans, which are extremely easy to cheese with sniper rifles.
- Launcher: Also suffers from atrocious speed but you don't really have to aim. Ubar damage, ubar expensive, no ammo, I eventually replaced my shotgun with one and fed it all my money.
Skills didn't actuallmy seem to matter that much. Obvious ones were Restock and Kill Boost. Energy Defense might have been allright? I kept it all the time so I don't know. Haste is so awesome when it triggers, which is never.
Every overdrive skill sucks pretty much.
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Better than lolis but terrible.
Oh man wait until you get to the last plot twist! If you didn't already think Toriyama was a creep...
By the way I don't know what you were talking about there? Maybe a rape from Bohr to Eve metaphor, but that's it. Admittedly pretty fucking bad but not anywhere near Xenosaga bad or anything.
Meanwhile the Maeda/Aya relationship was really terrible, with Maeda saying the creepiest shit you can think of about her and Aya barely ever looking bothered.
So why did SWAT jerks attack Aya at her wedding anyway?
That should be really obvious? But I really don't have any idea. I mean, I didn't understand anything about the story, but at least this should have been an exception.
PE3.
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88-91: Sanctuary Guardian
Bellowing Dragoncrest Ring made the difference.
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Pokemon Soul Silver: Totodile just ate some Team Rocket members, Geodude punched one in the face, and Hoothoot lost a staring contest with a Slowpoke.
...some of that may be major exaggerations/bullshit/etc., but should give you an idea what I just did!
Tales of Graces F: Holy crap, Hubert is fun to play as!
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Knytt Underground - Picked this up on Alex and RICHARD endorsement. I have been playing it obsessively since it finished downloaded. Most of the map explored in chapter 3, only 2 bells to go.
General thoughts: HOLY SHIT this game is fun. It's not action packed or really hard or anything, but it's a great little(well...maybe not so little) exploration platformer. Finding all the hidden rooms, trying to get to the items that are right there in plain sight but will require some REALLY tricky platforming to get to, enjoying the banter between your fairy sidekicks, it's all fun.
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92: Wood Knight
93: Harvest golem
94: Cliff
95: Artorias
96: Artorias
97: Artorias
98: Artorias
I think I'll win sooner than I did against Sanctuary Guardian.
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You just reminded me of my near victory over Artorias that turned into a lose because my rapier broke mid-battle.
Hahaha. Something that similarly occurred to me when you were posting bundles of FONV screenshots: wait what you mean there are people who don't compulsively top off their equipment every time they rest anywhere?
Normally I'm utterly neurotic about repairing things, but I never recovered my souls for so long the rapiers pitiful durability wore out after a dozen fights.
The funniest thing about Preacher Courier I never got around to posting about because he was kinda boring was burning the Ranger Sequoia's durability apart so much. The gov't rounds had a large condition degradation so I was losing about 15% condition per fight. Worth it for the sheer class of the gun though.
All the Dark Souls talk, and my coincidental watching of LPs has really gotten me in the mood for the game. But I won't be able to accomplish a thing before 2 comes out and RUINS EVERYTHING.
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Better than lolis but terrible.
Oh man wait until you get to the last plot twist! If you didn't already think Toriyama was a creep...
By the way I don't know what you were talking about there? Maybe a rape from Bohr to Eve metaphor, but that's it. Admittedly pretty fucking bad but not anywhere near Xenosaga bad or anything.
Meanwhile the Maeda/Aya relationship was really terrible, with Maeda saying the creepiest shit you can think of about her and Aya barely ever looking bothered.
So why did SWAT jerks attack Aya at her wedding anyway?
That should be really obvious? But I really don't have any idea. I mean, I didn't understand anything about the story, but at least this should have been an exception.
PE3.
"Speaking of lolis" because the whole game you are actually a young girl in Aya's body. It's the opposite of what they did in SO4 but it's not any less gross.
Also I recently found out that the original work was mostly about condemning people who receive donated organs for "defiling corpses" so fuck that too while I'm telling things to get fucked.
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Also I recently found out that the original work was mostly about condemning people who receive donated organs for "defiling corpses" so fuck that too while I'm telling things to get fucked.
Y'know, that makes the original game a hilarious fuck you in a way...
And this is why people miss PS1 era square.
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Also I recently found out that the original work was mostly about condemning people who receive donated organs for "defiling corpses" so fuck that too while I'm telling things to get fucked.
Y'know, that makes the original game a hilarious fuck you in a way...
And this is why people miss PS1 era square.
Square actually took out all of the material that was really blatant in its condemnation of people who got donated organs rather than, you know, just dying. I'm talking about the Japanese novel.
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Jesus, you're right.
Fuck Parasite Eve.
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I have played PE1 and played nothing else from the series and am happier for that.
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I was getting at the fact that, in PE1, you basically gain superpowers and fight off Eve because of a corneal transplant. While the initial transmission of Eve is also due to a transplant, there's also a lengthy bit where it's clear she'd have never been able to take over except Melissa, inexplicably, ODed on immuno-suppresants. So the net message is more "Transplants help people live better lives, just don't work yourself so hard you become a horrible monster".
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I was getting at the fact that, in PE1, you basically gain superpowers and fight off Eve because of a corneal transplant. While the initial transmission of Eve is also due to a transplant, there's also a lengthy bit where it's clear she'd have never been able to take over except Melissa, inexplicably, ODed on immuno-suppresants. So the net message is more "Transplants help people live better lives, just don't work yourself so hard you become a horrible monster".
The two halves of the statement make no sense when put together. Like "a diet low in LDL cholesterol will help you live a longer and healthier life, just don't drink and drive." Still it's an admirable cleaning up from "people who sign organ donor forms for their loved ones deserve to be raped and then burned alive."
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Bravely Default - Been playing a lot of this lately. Currently up to the Miasma Woods, early in chapter 2.
Holy crap this game is polished! It's like they read some sort of wishlish for this. I mean...
-Adjustable difficulty, with Hard Mode being right in that sort of pleasantly challenging area I enjoy
-Encounter rate control
-Ability to control what you gain from battles if you want to grind without gaining certain things (or just want to do a LLG I suppose)
-Instant help and generally good, precise documentation on everything (e.g. Stomp is "do 1.25x damage, defence -25% for two turns" rather than anything vague)
-The ability to see all stats of previously scanned enemies
-Ability to speed up (x2 or x4) or pause battles on the fly.
-Ability to revise earlier choices for PC actions in the round without needing to cancel all subsequent actions. I don't think I've seen another traditional turn-based game do this; it's great.
-Scene skip! And the flipside of it, ability to rewatch scenes as in FFT, etc.
-Autosaving on each floor of a dungeon. Nice if you die (and on HM the game is hard enough to merit this).
-Lots of language and sound options for those of you who care about such things.
Aside from that the game is very much the spiritual successor to FF5. It's hard to find ways the game isn't better than FF5 though, and from a big FF5 fan that says quite a bit. My only real concern is the game's slower pace, but that feels awfully controllable; for now I'm watching all the scenes, doing the optional content (at least that I'm aware of), and reading the encyclopedia a lot... I imagine the game can slim down a lot on replays (which I'm already thinking of; obviously a good sign). The other possible complaint is that traditional turn-based (with somewhat randomised speed) is a bit of a strange choice in 2014, and not one I'm personally a huge fan of... but it's hard to fault the game too much, as the gameplay design is solid and the brave/default system puts a great new twist on the old system. Randoms on hard mode are pretty nasty and generally don't quite roll over and die to a brave rush (unless you spend oodles of MP) so how you approach them does matter, and the bosses... actually, boss design reminds me most of BoF1, just with a very modern/polished spin on it: unusually durable and relatively straightforward, but the game expects you to execute well and use the system against them properly to win.
The game's writing is the best of FF5 and its other successors (FFD and Blue Dragon) which is damning with faint praise to be sure, i.e. it's not a game I'd play for plot but it's not horrible at it. Tiz sucks and generally feels thrown into the game (reminds me of what I've read about Vaan from FF12; "We can't have Agnès be the main! Make some bland yet heroic teenage dude!") but I like the other three PCs. Edea is the favourite because she says the things I am thinking of.
Right now it feels rather transparent that Ringabel is Dim, somehow tossed back into the past bereft of memory, since the diary seems fairly obviously Dim's and the game went painfully out of its way to keep those two from meeting. The main thing that gives me pause on this theory is a post Captain K made last week. Hmm.
Also I am surprised how few shits are given at the PCs committing regicide. I'm sure nothing horrible will happen with that power vacuum we created.
I'm a bit surprised by just how much of a Final Fantasy this game is; all it really lacks is the name. The classes (the first five are Knight, Monk, Black Mage, White Mage, and Thief...), the items, the equipment, the crystals are all pulled straight out of FF. I guess "Flying Fairy" does sound awfully like "Final Fantasy" in Japanese...
I'm generally enjoying the game a lot! Certainly a must-play if you're still into RPGs (unless you really didn't like FF5, i.e. you're Super). If you still don't have a 3DS for some reason go change that because this system keeps getting better and better.
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BD spoilers:
I guess it wasn't as obvious to me, I guessed DeRosso.[/size=1pt]
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Elf, Flying Fairy and Final Fantasy is meant to work in a subtraction.
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Niu why would you even say that
Ittle Dew - played through
Decently entertaining classic-LOZ-lite. (By classic LOZ I'm referring to Awakening/Oracles-style in case anyone has a different concept of that).
Advertising gave the impression that there was going to be a lot more incidental humorous dialogue than there actually was, annoyingly. What there was, was probably the highlight of the game more than the gameplay.
Gameplay's main issue was mainly that a) Ittle's sword has barely any reach and that b) she can't hit anything on a diagonal, unlike how Link's sword would swing across it and be essentially as long as his body. Of course, a lot of the time you weren't fighting anyway. Feels like the game has a much greater emphasis on puzzles than LOZ tends to.
Ended up using a guide for help in around half the puzzles in the Master Cave. Most of the times ended up relating to using magic on other magic or on moving things, although a couple times it turned out I had been right in my approach but I wasn't pulling it off well enough.
Simon The Sorceror 3D - Stalled around the chapter 2/3 border
Seems like I forgot to talk about this last time.
I was aways into Chapter 3 and the game crashed, and the last time I'd saved was near the end of Chapter 2. Every time I've since tried to re-complete Chapter 2, the game has crashed on me after a couple minutes. I should probably take this as a sign. Especially since Chapter 2 ends with a minigame that's twice as long as it needs to be that I'm not looking forward to doing over.
Anyway it's not very good. Not terrible or anything, just terribly mediocre. The chapter 2 and 3 maps are unnecessarily expansive with comparatively little to interact with, although there is a something like a fast-travel system at least. You also need to be facing someone's front in order to talk to them, which is more annoying than you might think because that's often a narrower margin than you might think and sometimes the game thinks that the front of the person isn't where a human would think that the front of the person was. There was a person in a hole who I went for a while assuming I just couldn't initiate conversation with because they refused to show up as interactable, until one time when I was standing offset from where I considered their front to be. Another example: there's a person who has a book in their back pocket - which is technically optional, but lets you avoid having to do as much grinding for money as you'd have to do otherwise - that you're extremely unlikely to see because why would you ever go behind someone when the game is so strict on you being in front of them, and there's no indications that there'd be any particular reason to go behind this one.
There was several times where the camera got confused and stopped focusing on Simon, so I couldn't see what he was doing unless I put him in crawling mode (which changes the viewpoint to first-person, but also generally prevents you from interacting with things). Normally it ended up being possible to fix the camera if you went to the edge of somewhere where it changed, got out of crawl mode, and crossed said edge, but that didn't always work.
The situation set up at the end of Simon 2 is, assuming that it isn't brought back up later, mostly handwaved away. The game starts as Sordid comes back from the regular universe, decides he doesn't need Simon's body any more and leaves it for a robotic one. Somehow the body is recovered by Melissa. Simon somehow changed from being stuck in Sordid's old robotic body to being a soul in a bottle, and Calypso has taken it and his body to some experts to have them recombined. I find it hard to believe that Sordid could have blended in, but whatever I guess.
Mega Man 9 - Only Tornado Man left
Unfortunately I suck at his stage
The Shivah: Kosher Edition - Oh right, I played through this too.
Fine enough for what it is, but what it is is very short. Possibly shorter than Blackwell Legacy?
The dialogue was pretty enjoyable.
Because I'm completely oblivious, it took me several runs at the final sequence before I realised what you were supposed to be doing. After that it was a little disappointing because you end up saying the same things multiple times to complete it. Oh well.
Got what's presumably the best ending, can't be bothered replaying to get the others right now though. Although I probably do have a save in that general vicinity I could start from...
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X-COM Enemy Within: I finished the first new... uh, event, I guess you'd call it, that EW added. A town in Newfoundland went silent and the government teams that got sent in all vanished so of course they call in X-COM. At first it's just a chrysalid infestation, then you find out they have a hive on a freighter that crashed there. Once you get within a certain number of squares to the freighter the hive starts spawning chrysalids at a rate of 1 per turn, with the occasional extra exploding out of one of the tuna onboard, Alien-style. To finish the mission you have to fight your way onto the ship, get to the bridge to activate the transponder and call in an air strike, then you eight turns to fight your way all the way back to the LZ. Anyone outside the LZ at the end of the eight turns dies. Did I mention chrysalids are still spawning from the ship, and at least three of them spawn between you and the LZ? What I'm saying was it was a fucking war.
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Bravely Default - Been playing a lot of this lately. Currently up to the Miasma Woods, early in chapter 2.
Holy crap this game is polished! It's like they read some sort of wishlish for this. I mean...
-Adjustable difficulty, with Hard Mode being right in that sort of pleasantly challenging area I enjoy
-Encounter rate control
-Ability to control what you gain from battles if you want to grind without gaining certain things (or just want to do a LLG I suppose)
-Instant help and generally good, precise documentation on everything (e.g. Stomp is "do 1.25x damage, defence -25% for two turns" rather than anything vague)
-The ability to see all stats of previously scanned enemies
-Ability to speed up (x2 or x4) or pause battles on the fly.
-Ability to revise earlier choices for PC actions in the round without needing to cancel all subsequent actions. I don't think I've seen another traditional turn-based game do this; it's great.
-Scene skip! And the flipside of it, ability to rewatch scenes as in FFT, etc.
-Autosaving on each floor of a dungeon. Nice if you die (and on HM the game is hard enough to merit this).
-Lots of language and sound options for those of you who care about such things.
Aside from that the game is very much the spiritual successor to FF5. It's hard to find ways the game isn't better than FF5 though, and from a big FF5 fan that says quite a bit. My only real concern is the game's slower pace, but that feels awfully controllable; for now I'm watching all the scenes, doing the optional content (at least that I'm aware of), and reading the encyclopedia a lot... I imagine the game can slim down a lot on replays (which I'm already thinking of; obviously a good sign). The other possible complaint is that traditional turn-based (with somewhat randomised speed) is a bit of a strange choice in 2014, and not one I'm personally a huge fan of... but it's hard to fault the game too much, as the gameplay design is solid and the brave/default system puts a great new twist on the old system. Randoms on hard mode are pretty nasty and generally don't quite roll over and die to a brave rush (unless you spend oodles of MP) so how you approach them does matter, and the bosses... actually, boss design reminds me most of BoF1, just with a very modern/polished spin on it: unusually durable and relatively straightforward, but the game expects you to execute well and use the system against them properly to win.
The game's writing is the best of FF5 and its other successors (FFD and Blue Dragon) which is damning with faint praise to be sure, i.e. it's not a game I'd play for plot but it's not horrible at it. Tiz sucks and generally feels thrown into the game (reminds me of what I've read about Vaan from FF12; "We can't have Agnès be the main! Make some bland yet heroic teenage dude!") but I like the other three PCs. Edea is the favourite because she says the things I am thinking of.
Right now it feels rather transparent that Ringabel is Dim, somehow tossed back into the past bereft of memory, since the diary seems fairly obviously Dim's and the game went painfully out of its way to keep those two from meeting. The main thing that gives me pause on this theory is a post Captain K made last week. Hmm.
Also I am surprised how few shits are given at the PCs committing regicide. I'm sure nothing horrible will happen with that power vacuum we created.
I'm a bit surprised by just how much of a Final Fantasy this game is; all it really lacks is the name. The classes (the first five are Knight, Monk, Black Mage, White Mage, and Thief...), the items, the equipment, the crystals are all pulled straight out of FF. I guess "Flying Fairy" does sound awfully like "Final Fantasy" in Japanese...
I'm generally enjoying the game a lot! Certainly a must-play if you're still into RPGs (unless you really didn't like FF5, i.e. you're Super). If you still don't have a 3DS for some reason go change that because this system keeps getting better and better.
There is nothing in this post about Xenogears. hate u 4ever
Also all those things you said made me consider getting Bravely Default. hate u 5ever
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Bravely Default - Been playing a lot of this lately. Currently up to the Miasma Woods, early in chapter 2.
Holy crap this game is polished! It's like they read some sort of wishlish for this. I mean...
-snip-
I believe what happened is that they surveyed players of the original version of Bravely Default in Japan for what sort of improvements they would like to see, got a list of 100, then made an updated rerelease ("For the Sequel" in Japan) that implemented most of them, and the western releases were based on this updated version. I think every polish feature you mentioned was added in For the Sequel except the in-game documentation, as were multiple save slots; the original BD only had 1, like a Pokemon game.
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On the plus side, what I've read is that the whole survey was intended for features in the sequel, but they also backported it into the original, so whenever that comes out (which is most likely will because most indications are that Bravely Default was a bit of a hit) it should maintain this basic level of quality.
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Bravely Default - Been playing a lot of this lately. Currently up to the Miasma Woods, early in chapter 2.
Holy crap this game is polished! It's like they read some sort of wishlish for this. I mean...
-snip-
I believe what happened is that they surveyed players of the original version of Bravely Default in Japan for what sort of improvements they would like to see, got a list of 100, then made an updated rerelease ("For the Sequel" in Japan) that implemented most of them, and the western releases were based on this updated version. I think every polish feature you mentioned was added in For the Sequel except the in-game documentation, as were multiple save slots; the original BD only had 1, like a Pokemon game.
Yay, now all my desire to buy Bravely Default is gone since I can only get the JP version. Love you 6ever
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Nah, there's just two versions of the game. Flying Fairy, which was the initial release, and For the Sequel, which is Flying Fairy with all the polish added. For the Sequel is the version that was used for localization, but it is available in japan.
Proceed immediately to nearest store and give them your 6000 yen yip yip yip.
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If I told you my dick was Aggressively Generic would you love it 7ever?
Planescape: Torment - Up to Clerk's Ward. It has been so long I forget how to start so many side quests. I should just play without doing them. It gnaws at me focus though and I struggle to keep doing what I am doing. Also I am being lazy and avoiding try to fix a crash bug I get when I enter the art gallery (only really need to go there to get Styx Ice).
Otherwise I am listening to a podcast about Dark Souls while I still try to understand it and play
Pokemans - you really do go a long way between badges 1 - 3 in this.
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I'm starting to get really fond of all the stupid names present-Square gives to its games. I'm looking forward to their next game titles more than to their next games.
Gungnir (PSP): That game doesn't even appear on the PSP/Vita store if you don't search for it.
Unlike Yggdra Union and Knights in the Nightmare (which come from alternate dimensions where videogames are completely different), Gungnir feels like a traditional SRPG... at first. Then it starts introducing all the more and more crazy Sting systems.
Jesus the mechanics. So many things. Elemental affinity, delay, range sweet spot, capacity, scrambling, tactics points, alchemy, weapon leveling/weapon skills, war gods, recruiting people at the guild or at the other place, etc.
The most important weird mechanic is that, while the enemy army acts like a regular CTB army, you can choose to keep using the same unit over and over with some penalties. The penalties aren't huge; you can use only two units and have no penalties. The game does encourage teamplay with combo attacks though, and leveling doesn't have much of an effect.
Like other Sting games there should be stress involved, in that there are way too many mechanics and every decision feels like it has big risk vs reward consequences (much more than in say FFT or FE when you can relax at times) and no option to grind.
The balance is weird though. You get rewarded for finishing battles quickly and not having your units die, by treasure chests appearing on the next stage.
Sounds legit, but treasure chests basically take FOREVER to open, nuking your chances of a high score next mission.
So now I do well in one battle, get the treasure in the next, then do well again, etc.
About not-gameplay stuff, story is fairly standard (I was surprised at the beginning though with Teresa/Noah) and character design is moe shit.
You can equip some bamboo sticks and throw them at the enemy though so that's something.
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Nah, there's just two versions of the game. Flying Fairy, which was the initial release, and For the Sequel, which is Flying Fairy with all the polish added. For the Sequel is the version that was used for localization, but it is available in japan.
Proceed immediately to nearest store and give them your 6000 yen yip yip yip.
This is also why the game took forever to come out in the west. Bravely Default: Flying Fairy was a 2012 release, I believe, but they held off and instead gave us a superior version. Pretty much same thing that happened with Star Ocean 3, all things considered, and Capcom just announced they're doing the same with Monster Hunter 4 (aka skipping original release for western release, and going straight to localizing the superior version.)
Honestly, I am ok with this practice. Waiting longer does suck, but if it means we get a better version and don't get suckered into buying a game twice, then I'll wait the extra time!
SPEAKING OF GAMES THAT WE ONLY GOT THE ENHANCED VERSION OF IN THE STATES!!!
Tales of Graces F: Malik and Pascal are hiding something...wait, no they aren't, and by no they aren't, I mean "yeah, there is still a lot more than meets the eye because seriously, these things don't resolve themselves that fast!"
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y no PS3 ToV ;_;
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I'm starting to get really fond of all the stupid names present-Square gives to its games. I'm looking forward to their next game titles more than to their next games.
Gungnir (PSP): That game doesn't even appear on the PSP/Vita store if you don't search for it.
Unlike Yggdra Union and Knights in the Nightmare (which come from alternate dimensions where videogames are completely different), Gungnir feels like a traditional SRPG... at first. Then it starts introducing all the more and more crazy Sting systems.
Jesus the mechanics. So many things. Elemental affinity, delay, range sweet spot, capacity, scrambling, tactics points, alchemy, weapon leveling/weapon skills, war gods, recruiting people at the guild or at the other place, etc.
The most important weird mechanic is that, while the enemy army acts like a regular CTB army, you can choose to keep using the same unit over and over with some penalties. The penalties aren't huge; you can use only two units and have no penalties. The game does encourage teamplay with combo attacks though, and leveling doesn't have much of an effect.
Like other Sting games there should be stress involved, in that there are way too many mechanics and every decision feels like it has big risk vs reward consequences (much more than in say FFT or FE when you can relax at times) and no option to grind.
The balance is weird though. You get rewarded for finishing battles quickly and not having your units die, by treasure chests appearing on the next stage.
Sounds legit, but treasure chests basically take FOREVER to open, nuking your chances of a high score next mission.
So now I do well in one battle, get the treasure in the next, then do well again, etc.
About not-gameplay stuff, story is fairly standard (I was surprised at the beginning though with Teresa/Noah) and character design is moe shit.
You can equip some bamboo sticks and throw them at the enemy though so that's something.
This is actually the most forgiving Sting game, as they made the status in this game so very much overpowered. When worse come to the worst, you can just build a legion of sorceress class and have them spam Ice Rod none stop because the freeze status is ridiculously good. Not to mention magic ignores height completely, making it even more ridiculous.
As for the chest, 80% of them are trash, only a couple of them has good stuff. I suggest you use a guide here and aim for the chests that are valuable (aka, those with none suck 4 star weapons or accessory that reduce charge time).
The plot has a huge cut in its script due to the writer was not satisfied about something in the original draft. Thanks to that, Marietta lost her appearance in this game, and the new Grim Angel that suppose to show up also got removed.
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y no PS3 ToV ;_;
Apparently, Microsoft actually made a deal with Namco that if ToV is released stateside, it will be exclusive to the 360 in the states.
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y no PS3 ToV ;_;
Apparently, Microsoft actually made a deal with Namco that if ToV is released stateside, it will be exclusive to the 360 in the states.
I would imagine that porting over most JRPGs to the Western console market at this point is a question of whether or not you can get a publisher to give you money to do it. It's probably not the most inviting business forecast.
Anyway, XCOM! Anybody played with the second wave option "training roulette" enabled? Basically all the skills that aren't directly related to one of your on-use skills like run and gun or whatever can show up in any skill tree. I have a sniper who has the skill that gives her two shots per Overwatch now. Ho ho ho.
e: Of course I named her Natasha "Black Widow" Romanova because I'm re-reading Brubaker's run on Captain America/Winter Soldier/Captain America and she sure does shoot a lot of heads with a sniper rifle in that.
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I would imagine that porting over most JRPGs to the Western console market at this point is a question of whether or not you can get a publisher to give you money to do it. It's probably not the most inviting business forecast.
You would think. But we still get, like, every Atelier game, so apparently there must still be money to be made.
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Anyway, XCOM! Anybody played with the second wave option "training roulette" enabled? Basically all the skills that aren't directly related to one of your on-use skills like run and gun or whatever can show up in any skill tree. I have a sniper who has the skill that gives her two shots per Overwatch now. Ho ho ho.
Haven't done it myself but my older brother ragequit a run with it after getting shitty skills and 3/4 of his recruits being heavies. He doesn't even hate heavies like I do, but when you can't get an Assault shits kind of fucked.
Planescape: Torment - My evil Mage play through has taught me two new *regrets*. I regret forgetting that Vhailor is resistant to Piercing damage. Sitting there for 10 minutes punching him to death once was pretty painful. Then forgetting to save and fucking up absorbing the Paranoid Incarnation is my second regret.
Things to remember. If you are going to melee himm you should memorise more melee buffs if evil before that fight. Put some more points in to Str so you can get some mileage out of Improved Strength. Learn Fists of Iron so you have sommething other than normal punches. Don't bother trying to be Lawful Evil, so much good Evil is tied to Chaotic and you will just end up Neutral Evil. I could have got the Entropic Blade to help with Vhailor.
Making players fight a Piercing resistant enemy with 100% magic resist is all kinds of fucked in 2nd Ed rules game where mage weapons are restricted to Daggers only.
On the other hand Missiles of Patience work on him, so if I was able to rest I could have just filled up my 16 or so level 1 slots with that and face tanked him while shooting him to death with that just fine. Missiles of Patience is a ridiculous spell.
The writing in this game has only get better as I got older and have a better appreciation for theme and can actually appreciate and see resonance in story telling etc. There is even just stuff I appreciate more now than I used to. I knew Juliette and Montague was an obvious reference, but enjoying seeing Morte recommend the application of DENNIS system to Montague to get back at Juliette for trying to play mind games with him. Apparently that totes Chaotic Good.
Ignus sucks I regret using him the whole game. I really missed Dak'kon after selling him into slavery. Morte still thinks you are a bro no matter what you do.
Torment supports Evil play through the quests, but it really doesn't fit too well in the narrative. I had my evil dude unmake himself rather than go to the Blood War because fuck all this shit. 0 fucks given that all companions lifeless corpses will float in the Negative Material plane forever.
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I would imagine that porting over most JRPGs to the Western console market at this point is a question of whether or not you can get a publisher to give you money to do it. It's probably not the most inviting business forecast.
You would think. But we still get, like, every Atelier game, so apparently there must still be money to be made.
If jRPGs required an outside publisher, than we wouldn't have gotten ToGf or ToX. I think they're still planning on releasing Tales games here. Also stuff like Ni No Kuni
It's a pretty unfound statement frankly. No, jRPGs are not mega money makers, but, FF13 aside, they also don't have colossal budgets so they only need to be moderately successful, which I suspect there's a strong enough fanbase that they break even on localization costs at least.
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Modern HD console development is inherently pretty expensive. That's the whole reason that the industry is headed in the direction that it is.
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Bravely Default:
The Elf said it quite nicely, but let me add one aspect that I think Bravely Default compares favorably to FF5: The steady flow of new jobs and abilities into your hands.
Thus far the game has CONSTANTLY been delivering new shiny abilities and jobs at a nice pace. It takes a very long time to master class because of the JP involved (17000+ JP to JL16). Earlygame you play around with combining the low-level abilities of classes and this is fairly interesting when combined with the fact that you constantly get new classes. As the game ages you get fewer new classes but in exchange you start to access the high-level class abilities, and those things DELIVER. Examples include things like 'make damage ITD', "Everyone gets +1 BP every turn", "Automatically revive someone as a free action if they are dead when you take your turn", "4x damage to all enemies upon a KO"), and so on. Also at this point you can see what the classes have to offer and start really making plans for how you want to combine the classes to do horrible and wonderful things.
Basically Bravely Default deserves high praise for the ability to balance the exploration of the class/ability system with the management of a team that has to compete against competent enemies.
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Yes, I'm still alive even though I have posted in a few months >_>. Mostly been replying WA games. Goal is to learn every WA game in the series between myself and a fellow WA runner by 2015. This will likely end in tears.
Wild ARMS 4 - No news here. Got a god luck run with shitty execution. Clocked in at 5:23. Pretty sure that 5:30ish is basically the consistent time. More practice before C4L likely though
Wild ARMS 3 - Preliminary route is on GameFAQs. A nico runner recently clocked in 9:30. Time to review his run later this week to scrutinize for changes.
Wild ARMS ACF - Need more practice. Generally know what I'm doing although I'm not sure if there are any major skips that I'm missing out on. Block puzzles need to die. Need to learn to move quickly on invisible platforms without using the Tinder staff. Pain. But not as painful as...
Wild ARMS XF - This is a bad speed game. How bad? To our knowledge, the Japanese runners have refused to speedrun this game. And these are the guys who do Dragonquest RTAs. But sanity is overrated, so I started to do some routing yesterday. Took me 5 hours to get through Chapter 1. Promising >_>. The general strategy for most of these early battles has been to use the item dupe glitch to get money, then get three generics with good base RFX and MAG set up in Excavator with Elementalist EQ, Gadgeteer EQ and Elementalist OC. These three units proceed to sweep random enemies with the power of gems. Meanwhile, Clarissa and Levin spend time in varying classes to prepare for their set up towards the end, namely moving towards getting Widespread and Elementalist EQ. No idea what to do with Felius and Labby really although I've kept Labby as Fantastica for Rush because against elementally resistant enemies, Clarissa is my best source of quick killing things through Sacrifice. If NEB is correct, the enemies that spawn for every stage are the same every time you play the stage so I'll be making Excel maps and charts when I get the chance. There may be a faster way than using Excavators with gems and aprons. I could use a second hand looking at this.
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I was getting at the fact that, in PE1, you basically gain superpowers and fight off Eve because of a corneal transplant. While the initial transmission of Eve is also due to a transplant, there's also a lengthy bit where it's clear she'd have never been able to take over except Melissa, inexplicably, ODed on immuno-suppresants. So the net message is more "Transplants help people live better lives, just don't work yourself so hard you become a horrible monster".
The two halves of the statement make no sense when put together. Like "a diet low in LDL cholesterol will help you live a longer and healthier life, just don't drink and drive." Still it's an admirable cleaning up from "people who sign organ donor forms for their loved ones deserve to be raped and then burned alive."
Look, officer. Doctor's orders I drink 5 glasses of red wine a day. It's my heart, you see. You can let me go just this once, right? Check my license, I'm not even an organ donor, so you know I'm trustworthy.
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Trust me, I am a business owner.
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99-108: Artorias. So I'm not gonna beat him faster than Sanctuary Guardian.
109: Giant Knight. Derp.
110-111: Holy shit crystal hollows hit hard. Archers can one-shot me.
112: Channeler. I regret this low durability.
112-113: See 110-111.
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Trust me, I am a business owner.
The term they prefer is "job creator" and they deserve to be worshiped as gods.
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Fallout: New Vegas - Forgot to mention I've been playing this. Made it to New Vegas. Despite generally being a good guy, I concluded that Mr. House wasn't doing a good job being in charge of New Vegas so he met with an unfortunate end. Now Yes Man has been installed. I'm not really sure what to do now. I feel like the remaining plot is kinda short, so I should actually just spend time dicking around?
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Probably 80-90% of the game is dicking around. In practice though, remaining plot varies depending on who you're working for. Yes Man should've tasked you with dealing with the various minor factions hanging out around Vegas. Each one of those will be their own quest chain (which you could have activated without being prodded by the main plot though, hence why I say the majority of the game is just random sidequesting). And almost every place you go to knock out one quest's minor objective opens up other quests! (The interconnected nature of the game's locations is of course one of those things I love about FONV.)
You are weirdly on task with the rushing right to Vegas to deal with the plot, man you must still be thinking this is a short game or something crazy like that.
Dunno if you got the DLC or not, but it's varying shades of worth it. Dead Money rules for atmosphere (not so much for gameplay, but it does get you an outstanding energy weapon + optimal light armor); Honest Hearts is pretty bland aside from the survivalist journals you find while exploring (these are great though); Old World Blues is every flavor of win; Lonesome Road I think had more potential than it lived up to but is still decent.
~
Shadowrun Returns Returns: Oh right the new campaign came out. I started up an ork melee specialist, because it seemed the farthest thing from All-Natural Elfgirl Machinegunner (don't need no implants to frag you from across the map). This time, I intend to become a robot as soon as finances allow. Still, it's difficult to resist loading up the base campaign MC just to slaughter that first boss before he can run away.
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I'm starting to get really fond of all the stupid names present-Square gives to its games. I'm looking forward to their next game titles more than to their next games.
Gungnir (PSP): That game doesn't even appear on the PSP/Vita store if you don't search for it.
Unlike Yggdra Union and Knights in the Nightmare (which come from alternate dimensions where videogames are completely different), Gungnir feels like a traditional SRPG... at first. Then it starts introducing all the more and more crazy Sting systems.
Jesus the mechanics. So many things. Elemental affinity, delay, range sweet spot, capacity, scrambling, tactics points, alchemy, weapon leveling/weapon skills, war gods, recruiting people at the guild or at the other place, etc.
The most important weird mechanic is that, while the enemy army acts like a regular CTB army, you can choose to keep using the same unit over and over with some penalties. The penalties aren't huge; you can use only two units and have no penalties. The game does encourage teamplay with combo attacks though, and leveling doesn't have much of an effect.
Like other Sting games there should be stress involved, in that there are way too many mechanics and every decision feels like it has big risk vs reward consequences (much more than in say FFT or FE when you can relax at times) and no option to grind.
The balance is weird though. You get rewarded for finishing battles quickly and not having your units die, by treasure chests appearing on the next stage.
Sounds legit, but treasure chests basically take FOREVER to open, nuking your chances of a high score next mission.
So now I do well in one battle, get the treasure in the next, then do well again, etc.
About not-gameplay stuff, story is fairly standard (I was surprised at the beginning though with Teresa/Noah) and character design is moe shit.
You can equip some bamboo sticks and throw them at the enemy though so that's something.
This is actually the most forgiving Sting game, as they made the status in this game so very much overpowered. When worse come to the worst, you can just build a legion of sorceress class and have them spam Ice Rod none stop because the freeze status is ridiculously good. Not to mention magic ignores height completely, making it even more ridiculous.
As for the chest, 80% of them are trash, only a couple of them has good stuff. I suggest you use a guide here and aim for the chests that are valuable (aka, those with none suck 4 star weapons or accessory that reduce charge time).
The plot has a huge cut in its script due to the writer was not satisfied about something in the original draft. Thanks to that, Marietta lost her appearance in this game, and the new Grim Angel that suppose to show up also got removed.
Nooo I don't want to know the pro strats
Anyway I'm really not into checking guides to know everything anymore.
Interesting about the story. I heard there's an Yggdra Union like cliffhanger!
Anyway what would SRPGs be without their idiot escort NPCs?
I present you Valerie:
- Charges into a group of 6 enemies alone with her -crossbow- and quickly gets pounded by combo attacks
- Targets the 2000 HP low threat enemy instead of the 2 HP high threat one.
- Runs into the AoE of an enemy spell. I have no words. At that point she died.
Harborym and Rafa are geniouses next to her.
Fortunately an NPC can die with no consequences after you've talked to them. So that's that.
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Bravely Default - Holy crap is this game good.
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Order of Eccelsia - Beat it! I guess this was last Sunday, but I forgot to post~ Great game.
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I always play OoE legit then break down and use potions against Drac.
Oh yeah I've tried some FF7 hard mode hack. Man i love those hacks.
Actual thoughts I had:
- "Potions. I need more potions."
- "YES that robot in this tutorial dungeon just missed. I just avoided a game over"
- "When will Guard Scorpion die??" I should have stolen more grenades"
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SR mk 2.: Glory is more machine now than woman, twisted and emo. :( (Seriously pretty sure the only organic thing left is her head, she could've walked out of a Masumune fantasy.) Alas, roboticizing the MC remains prohibitively expensive, and I constantly feel like I should wait 'til later to graft anything on because you guyyyys there might be superior versions later I don't want to waste money. Oh well, all-natural katana shanking is still pretty effective.
I'm still baffled about the original version of the game not having manual saves in 2013, but at least they fixed that now and I no longer need to stress out about dying in the middle of an hour-long mission.
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ToGf: So obligatory tower dungeon is next or something!
Pokemon Soul Silver: Just beat Whitney. Took me two tries:
First attempt, I have Geodude, who is female thus immune to Attract, go and spam Defense Curl and Rock Polish on the Clefairy, hoping Metronome doesn't kill me and luck out! Kill the Clefairy with Magnitude 10, then get Magnitude 10, 9 and 7 on the Miltank. Seems great right? She proceeds to critical a Stomp and murder Geodude, and things go downhill from there. Sadly, I could have won it as I realize as soon as I sent Gastly out, I basically lost the fight as I was thinking "if Gastly survives one turn, I can Curse and hope to use Hypnosis with Hoothoot and such from there!" forgetting that he's probably getting OHKO'd and that Crocanaw had Scary Face, probably CAN survive Rollout and that would insure Gastly a 2nd turn. So I lose, naturally!
The second attempt, try the same strategy. This time? Clefairy's first 2 Metronomes are Psybeam and Seismic Toss, so Geodude dies. From there, I muscle out the Clefairy, manage to Scary Face the Miltank twice despite Attract, and the Curse strategy works well, yay!
...also, Voltorb Flip is still the most addicting thing ever.
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Bravely Default: GIRL POWER!
What the hell is this I don't even...
Anyways, mostly just filling out my class skill list by mastering classes I had dropped midway through. I have found a very powerful MT offensive setup (that I am eschewing in favor of exploring the remaining classes for the time being). Team bosses are making that MT more valuable than I had thought. Boss speed is starting to rise relative to 'average class' PC speed and I need to focus on methods of surviving blitzkreigs from the ENEMY side to a much greater degree. There are certainly methods of doing so, but I never feel invincible for several reasons, one of which is the rather brutal penalty on dying in BD (you don't get Brave Points the turn you go down, OR the turn you get rezzed). This has been present since the beginning, and one good strategy to mitigate it is to always keep 2-3 brave points in reserve so that if a PC goes down and is revived they can act immediately.
Discovered a nice Compounding mix that might help with that 'surviving', but one of the ingredients is 5K a pop, which is a bit much except for the most severe situations (in which case it is 20K pg to significantly buff up the party).
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Bravely Default - Three crystals down, only one to go! Clearly the game is almost over even though there are at least -seven- job asterisks left to grab, rite?
Regardless, this has been crazy, crazy good. I really like the overall design and my class setups are now getting into their own (Tiz as a Pirate/Spell Fencer/Knight, focusing on hitting hard, debuffing and hitting weaknesses, Edea as a Thief/Ranger/Freelancer, focused on hitting hard, fast and accurately with some off-the-wall utility, Ringabel - WHO THE FUCK THOUGHT THIS PUN WAS INTELLIGENT - as a Black Mage/Red Mage/Summoner with an emphasis on speed twinking for optimum randombusting [which suddenly turned godly with the rise of Aspir and M. Attack +20%] and Agnés as a White Mage/Time Mage/Performer, being pretty much useless for randoms but crucial against bosses). I'm considering using Salve-Maker, but I don't yet have the item depth to work them out, though Mug+Prayer should see that fixed decently quickly for the time being.
EDIT: Also, the boss you fight to get the Salve-Maker asterisk is like just a Yuna away from being Bluelike. Holy crap, limit boss that starts dealing unresistable ITD overkill damage as soon as he loses 10% of a nearly 4x PC HP pool. Go fish.
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Ringabel - WHO THE FUCK THOUGHT THIS PUN WAS INTELLIGENT -
The people of Caldisla gave him that name. "A bit cruel, eh? Well, humor is appreciated when you haven't a clue as to who you are".
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Jazzpunk - This is a surrealist first person adventure game where you are a spy in a world where everyone is a kind of robotic abstraction of a person. It is fun and kind of funny in a "sick reference bro" kind of way pretty consistently. It is completely mind bending and fucking weird the rest of here time and that is when it is at its best.
It's top three influences seem to be Ren and Stimpy, The Milkman Conspiracy level in Psychonauts and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
The visual aesthetic is always pretty consistent but the nature of hype game lets them be pretty broad with it so everything is always pretty visually interesting for a 90 minute game.
There is a lot of things I could describe from the game, but they don't really say much that would entice someone I think, really if you enjoy any of the three things that I saw as influences will inform more about it than an individual example.
Anyway it is short, weird and is really pushing for what you can do as a "comedy" game outside of your normal game as joke delivery mechanism (which is fine). It isn't just Haha here is thing from other game! In its references most of the time, it is almost always interactive with it. Not to mention puns, many puns. I don't think it is a destination for comedy in video games, but it is a pretty worthy part of the journey. The humor is really informed by the fact that it is published by Adult Swim Games, it wasn't made by people in that circle (so it is fresh input to them) as far as I know but it is the kind of thing those guys push.
I don't know if I would say everyone should throw $15 at it like it is at the moment, but I don't regret $15 being thrown at it as a late Christmas present for me like it was. Try and keep it in the back of your mind when it is on steam sales if you are interested in this kind of experimental indie thing.
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FF Dimensions: Finished chapter 2. I've been playing the game in 30-60 minute chunks, which is about all I can take before it gets too monotonous. The last Dark Warriors segment shook things up some, which was appreciated, but overall the structure of the dungeons (and the encounter frequency, even with my fastest character equipping Flee) is fairly grating. But hey, it's a touch game, they're made for shorter sessions anyway. Running Dragoon/Monk/Red Mage/White Mage on the Light Warriors, and Warrior (switching to Dark Knight)/Ranger/White Mage/Black Mage on the Dark Warriors.
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SR: At last, I am the robots. 1 Essence. On that note, nice plot/gameplay synergy with Glory's backstory: she deliberately shredded her essence with cybernetic prostheses for the express purpose of eradicating all personal magical potential. You know, as far as excuses to be all withdrawn and stoic and distant go, I'm inclined to accept "I used to work for Satan and accidentally incinerated my mom" as a pretty reasonable one.
But perhaps more importantly, doglike recruited.
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Bravely Default: beaten. Final levels were 60-ish. Roughly 2 jobs mastered and 3 others 3/4 complete on each character.
I basically loved the game for most of the reasons others have mentioned*. The best part was the boss fights; each one felt really unique and clever.
*And then Chapter 5 happened. I went from loving the game to nearly hating it. At that point I turned off all random encounters and just said fuck it, I want this game to be over. Perhaps a bit of an overreaction, but I definitely wasn't enjoying myself anymore.
I predicted final boss twist fairly early on, although the game led me to believe I was wrong in my prediction midway through.
Maxed out Norende after about a week and a half of leaving my DS on all the time. Didn't even bother Updating Data after a while, it was growing quickly enough. Norende gear is way better than what the game gives you in general. Storebought equipment is terrible in this game. A storebought-only run would serve as a quite decent challenge. Also the game seems to be curiously lacking in armor. There are almost always new weapons but rarely any armor upgrades. Usually just accessory options (of which there are way too many, really needed two slots FF6-style). Also those locked chests in dungeons are so not worth the wait.
I won't spoiler-initiate any discussion until more people have played it.
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Cap'n, you're not going to like this but you should read it (spoilers obviously)...
I suspect you did not, actually, beat the game! You got the False ending. To get the TRUE ending, you need to buck what the game tells you to do and keep soldiering on until the count on Airy's wings goes to 0 (i.e. do worlds 2,3,4, and 5). You don't HAVE to do the sidequests, but if you care they flesh out the cast a little (Not so much in world 2 where it is just a rehash, world 3 is a bit more interesting, world 4 is completely different and zany and you SHOULD do those. The game is going to get a lot harder though... and you're likely to finish at higher levels
Interestingly I had the reaction you did through ALL of world 2, and then in World 3 I started loving the game again.
It'll be understandable if you don't want to keep at it, but should be manageable in bite-sized chunks. Also grinding is so easy it is laughable if you feel like doing that and avoiding sidequests to blitz the game.
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Tales of Graces f: So the game says we're going to get a flying vehicle, but what it really means is going to a bunch of landmarks, both before and after finding the thing, because...padding?
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Yeah, knowing about Chapter 5 is the big reason I don't feel any urge to go out and buy a 3DS for BD. It's like they consciously tried to recreate the fail of FF3DS' endgame.
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@Pyro: Yes, I suspected as much. That doesn't make it sound any more palatable however.
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SR: Rogue AI confronted. Where will the newborn go next? The net is vast and infinite*.
Grueling mission. Wish I'd brought more than one plot NPC along for the airing of dirty laundry, but I'm not about to rerun it just to see different dialogue. Way too tower defensey near the end.
(*The newborn immediately trolls decker bulletin boards as people it killed. Ludicrous risk totally justified.)
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Xenogears - Back from vacation, so back to playing this. Picking it up having just reached the Thames.
Hour 20: The Thames is pretty big, with a bunch of stuff to do. Not much plot and no battles at all, this hour. Instead there is exploring and doing some puzzles for treasure chests, and lots of children's card games.
The only real plot that does happen here is meeting the captain, who has more of that silly Xenogears style ("I am! A man! Of the sea!" with him turning to face a rapidly shifting camera at each step) Actually my favourite part isn't even him, it's a child who tries to imitate him, but faces the wrong way for the camera change at the final line and then complains about screwing up. Anyway the captain offers this line as the sole explanation for why he went to the trouble of rescuing Fei and Elly, and repairing their gears. He also talks about doing a lot of salvaging work for the Ethos church, who are about to become more important.
The card games are hard, man. My reflexes aren't what they used to be and I spend the better part of the hour on them, finally netting the rather badass Deathblower1 for my troubles.
Hour 21: Meanwhile, the villains have noticed us. Dominia leads an attack againsdt the Yggdrasil, and the battle is such that it can be seen even from the Thames, leading Fei and Elly to rush to the Yggdrasil's defence. A boss fight ensues in which Dominia recognises Elly and is enraged. She spouts off all sorts of self-righteous racist bullshit which Elly cuts through. The boss fight ends rather abruptly as Dominia decides that abducting Elly is worth abandoning her mission for.
On the Gebler battleship, Dominia prepares to take out her anger on her rival, but is interrupted by Miang. Oh yay, I'm saved by Miang! Miang puts Dominia in her place, pointing out that Dominia attacked Elly and therefore there is no proof Elly is a traitor. Dominia is furious at this but there's not much she can do. Miang, meanwhile, says some cryptic comments about Elly (I forget how much Elly is part of her plans at this point; I have to presume she is because otherwise why save her?), then brainwashes Elly and gives her an opportunity to escape. She returns to Ramsus and observes that while Dominia looks up to her, it is Miang's "job to be hated". This line has always amused me for its double meaning.
Meanwhile, Bart meets the Captain and decides he has a new role model in life. I guess it's an improvement? Margie shows up and tells Bart not to leave her behind. Bart tells her to be a woman and get back in the kitchen ship, so Margie responds by letting Fei know just who is responsible for getting his plane destroyed. I like this girl. Fei, meanwhile, is "so disgusted, he doesn't have anything to say...". Fair enough, Fei, fair enough.
Elly returns! Bart initially thinks they can't trust her (and does cite a good point, that Elly may be manipulated by Gebler because of her family back home even if she is a nice person at heart) but then decides he is a perfect judge of character at age 18 and says he can trust her thanks to looking in her eyes. ... well I guess that is pretty 18 of him. Elly, of course, promptly goes and tries to blow up the Yggdrasil. Bart is all "but but but her eyes!" while Citan reveals she was hypnotised. He also already suspected this because Citan knows everything, but didn't want to interfere since interfering with someone during hypnosis can apparently destroy their mind, and didn't want to let Bart in on the game because... well, would you?
In the meantime, Gebler uses this opportunity to attack. The fight with Dominia is pretty easy, but the one after it against Ramsus and Miang is easily the best boss fight in a long time, possibly thus far. It's still not that hard if you know the system of course. As with the earlier underwater Dominia fight, the battle ends with the boss indiscriminately attacking one of the PCs, as Ramsus unleashes all his rage on Fei (who still has no idea what Ramsus is talking about), damaging Weltall and flooding the cockpit, incapacitating Fei before he can even turn into Id. The only reason Fei doesn't die is because Elly learns her shiny new Aerods skill and barrages Ramsus with it, forcing him to retreat. I guess that's the end of any last hope she won't be seen as a traitor.
Hours 22-23: Fei's out of the team now. Far from the first RPG to do this, but Xenogears does it for longer than most games I can recall. Two dungeons and plenty of plot. I approve in principle of getting some of the other characters to interact without Fei around, but I'm not sure how much the game really takes advantage of this? The first focus is on introducing Billy.
Actually we meet Jessie and Primera first, so a few words on them. Jessie... there's a lot wrong with him, I feel. What we learn of him from this opening set of scenes is that he's a drunkard who basically left his children to all but starve, almost driving Billy to prositution. Now he shows up and chastises Billy about his choices in life. Yet the game seems to exhonerate him on the fact that he's a "good man" whatever the hell that means, and of course he ends up being right about Ethos. It definitely rubs me the wrong way.
I don't have much to say about Prim except that did we really need two different silent girl characters? Granted it's for very different reasons but still! Also her design is weird.
Anyway Jessie's first scene involves him putting a gun to Elly's head because he misreads a scene so bad that he thought the woman who just chased off a couple thugs and said "there there you're okay" to his daughter was a kidnapper. Oh man, that's a start.
Enough about him, we get to meet Billy! Billy's a pretty fun character. Admirably nice, and incredibly chartiable even to those of "rival" religions, and he does a good job of explaining what he does, and how he came to do it: because he had needed help himself so badly as a child that he wanted to make sure nobody ended up like he and his sister. He has an understandably very strained relationship with his father, and though he tries, can't keep the jealousy from his voice when he talks about how his sister seems more attached to her dad than to him.
Also somewhere in this he arranges to get Fei treated at Ethos. The visit to the Ethos highlights a lot of what they do: salvaging lost technology but also a lot of protecting people with their "Etone" templars. The initial view of them seems pretty darned positive! How novel for an RPG. Guess we knew that was too good to be true.
We also meet Bishop Stone, who is Billy's mentor and the man who saved his life. Xenogears rarely does complete swerves with perceived character morality; he's about the only one? (Hammer I guess, but that feels very different.)
Anyway, after all that introduction, as well as a visit to Billy's orphanage, we get thrown into a dungeon (a transport ship infested by monsters which stone sends Billy to investigate, with the party tagging along to help repay him for saving Fei), the first since... gosh, the Kislev base about five hours ago. Not much to say here, Citan feels ever more overpowered gameplaywise as he pads his lead in deathblows and speed. The ship itself is our introduction to reapers, once-human monsters who are reponsible for the death of Billy's mother. They're reminiscent of Redrum (who I suppose was one himself, actually?), kinda zombie-like but without the part of actually being dead so less completely illogical. Not much to say about them past that. We fight a couple of them as bosses, and Billy gets to show off his gear which is launched in that over-the-top ridiculous way that only Xenogears among super-serious games could get away with, as the children use SEESAW POWER to unearth it from beneath Billy's orphanage. Sure whatever!
Next time: oh shit the church is evil after all
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I don't get the need to have a swerve in the Church. Doesn't the opening scrawl about the war establish that the Ethos are manipulating both sides to keep them at a stalemate and prolong the war?
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Pretty sure reapers are indeed to supposed to be the same deal as Redrum. It lets them both use Redrum earlier as a swerve with Fei like you noted and also retroactively make Solaris (? Ethos? I forget who you should really blame there) look mega shitty because that stuff isn't just isolated just to that one region aaaaaaaaaaaaaaand it makes the sequences on that wreck that little bit more survival horrorish because of the stuff you saw in Sewers with Redrum POV and stuff.
Also I forget if you got Ether Doubler or not? I assume you didn't because Elfstyles, but if you did, can you test and remind me if it double Billy's Square on foot as well as in Gear? Because in gear with Magic Amps it makes his Square attack a ST Aerods, but I can't remember if it makes Square, Square, Square, Triangle any better than just deathblowing shit on foot.
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It's been a while but I'm about 90% sure it worked on the gear attack too.
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Yeah I remember it works in gear because the Magic Amps make it really dumb. I can't remember if it works on foot though because it could be gear battles being special. There is enough other things with Billy's magic guns that don't work that I wouldn't guarantee that part is consistent.
South Park: Stick of Truth - This is fun enough. The combat is a step behind SH2 for timed hits and the menus are kind of shitty (selling stuff blows). Oh well.
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Oh right, I misread the question because mornings. It definitely works on foot but isn't as broken for whatever reason. Xenogears math.
Edit: Tomb Raider. Been slowly working my way through this since picking it up on an XBL sale. It's fun, the atmosphere is really good and I like the exploration. Pity all the puzzles are shunted off to the side in secret areas, because it'd be nice to have more than exploration to break up the combat.
The progress meter says I'm at 50% through the game, but I seem to be farther than halfway through the plot so I guess that counts bonus stuff? Anyway I just climbed a ridiculously huge burning building only to discover for the second time that air travel is a terrible terrible idea in this game. Maybe we should escape by submarine.
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I think the idea is to establish why nobody really suspects the Ethos of being Solaris. They may be on both sides of the war but it's just to fund their charitable endeavors. People aren't vanished just at other branches etc.
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I think the idea is to establish why nobody really suspects the Ethos of being Solaris. They may be on both sides of the war but it's just to fund their charitable endeavors. People aren't vanished just at other branches etc.
They don't need to establish why nobody suspects them of being Solaris. Neither Aveh or Kislev know Solaris exists. Also, neither of them know that the Ethos are manipulating the war to keep it going. That's something we get told in the opening text crawl, not by NPCs in game.
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Shadowrun Returns: I committed genocide* but you guys it was for a purpose, you gotta believe me. Anyway my AI buddy said it was the best plan and I'm sure the fact it was programmed for murder doesn't signify at all.
Dragonfall finished, and a marked improvement over the base campaign (Dead Man's Switch) on basically every level. DMS was pretty barebones in comparison, an alright timekiller but largely just functional on the storytelling level. This time you have a gang of companions who actually have things to say and are worth listening to**, your adversary is effectively built up as being all kinds of bad news, while the story remains fundamentally linear you do have choices of consequence within the straightforward narrative, PC skills contribute much more broadly to dialogue options***...so, you know, all that stuff PCRPG enthusiasts like to tout PCRPGs for being good at, they actually did it this time. Not top-tier writing or anything, but definitely satisfying.
And technically, mission objectives are much more diverse...although the challenge level is about the same, which is to say that while things might feel tense sometimes so long as you're not stupid generally nobody will die. I had one reset due to appallingly bad RNG-screwing with 70+% hitrates failing so consistently that I got overwhelmed by enemy reinforcements. Melee build worked well enough, nowhere near as terrifying in its raw stopping power as assault rifle specialist was though (probably nothing else could be). Sniper rifles are weird, hitrate directly proportional to distance from the target? So toss Haste on Eiger, plant her in corner then watch her murder everything from across the world. Excellent. They actually give you less total karma to spend despite this campaign being longer, though, which is weird.
Anyway, if anyone was on the fence with interest, Dragonfall at least is recommendable.
(*Then I reloaded and took a more ethical option, which felt much better until Computersis turned on me in thoroughly disturbing fashion.)
(**One of your buds is a stoic lesbian cyborg with Wolverine claws, which is like so many Cid tropes smashed together that I don't even know where to start.)
(***Though I kinda regret statting up a brute, as my particular build got little mileage out of this beyond occasionally breaking stuff or threatening people. Tempted to someday import my DMS character to smash the hell out of everything and take all those other options, also shoot for a TIME PARADOX on that first mission.)
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I started it up the other day and haven't finished, but did mean to comment that the big guy in the opening mission seems to feel when you get his health down low enough. You can do it with using summons that one of the party members have. Might be able to kill him as he leaves, but I was in rough enough state and lost control of the elemental that I had summoned so I couldn't manage it.
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That is one of many reasons I don't summon elementals. I sorta got use out of one being a good doorstop in the Aztechnology mission, but that's about it.
EDIT: in fairness I guess they could be of more use when you have 3AP per turn to throw around, but before that docking Dietrich 1AP a turn to keep a summon running means he can't cast Haste, and no Haste is sadface.
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These ones are generally pretty okay chance of doing what you are after. Mine only failed on like fifth turn of use when I was starting to push 24% chance of failure when going for 4 AP for it. I was rolling big to try and win the encounter and the odds are stacked in your favour.
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Soul Silver: Morty is still owned by a Normal type who has a non-damaging move. Also, I randomly caught a Tauros and impulsively decided I'd use it because it's a Gen 1 Pokemon I never used before that isn't total crap. This honestly feels like a thing with this playthrough...I blame Gen 2 Pokemon sucking.
ToGf: So we've entered Celestia Tethe'ala Fodra recently, and went to an abandoned lab because that's kind of a requirement in these games.
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I think the idea is to establish why nobody really suspects the Ethos of being Solaris. They may be on both sides of the war but it's just to fund their charitable endeavors. People aren't vanished just at other branches etc.
They don't need to establish why nobody suspects them of being Solaris. Neither Aveh or Kislev know Solaris exists. Also, neither of them know that the Ethos are manipulating the war to keep it going. That's something we get told in the opening text crawl, not by NPCs in game.
Frankly by this point in the game I had completely forgotten what a text crawl some 20 hours earlier had told me. Also, if it's something we only got through the text crawl before the twist, it sounds more like the text should have been omitted from the crawl rather than the twist omitted from the game.
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Dark Souls: Being two years out of practice means I get my ass beat by everything.
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I think the idea is to establish why nobody really suspects the Ethos of being Solaris. They may be on both sides of the war but it's just to fund their charitable endeavors. People aren't vanished just at other branches etc.
They don't need to establish why nobody suspects them of being Solaris. Neither Aveh or Kislev know Solaris exists. Also, neither of them know that the Ethos are manipulating the war to keep it going. That's something we get told in the opening text crawl, not by NPCs in game.
Frankly by this point in the game I had completely forgotten what a text crawl some 20 hours earlier had told me. Also, if it's something we only got through the text crawl before the twist, it sounds more like the text should have been omitted from the crawl rather than the twist omitted from the game.
I have always wondered if the opening crawl is a relic of a version where the war is much more important to the story than it ended up being.
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ToGf: So we've entered Celestia Tethe'ala Fodra recently, and went to an abandoned lab because that's kind of a requirement in these games.
Wait until the next dungeon for the real ~treat~
Tales of Symphonia Chronicles/ToS- Colette Dog Lover title get. Oh wait no she didn't. Really it was Lloyd getting the Palmacosta Prof title from Orienteering. Why you lie to me game. Hope this doesn't mess up getting actual Dog Lover title later. So yeah I am playing this now, first time run~ Current team is Colette, Lloyd. Kratos (hnnghh ^-^) and Raine/Genis. Was Raine for the Water Seal place and Palmacosta boss then Palmacosta ranch and boss, Genis earlier in the game inc Fire Seal place, now I am using Genis again for randoms so he can get new stuffs. Everyone is L21~
Colette Para Ball and Raine Photon combo is <3
Oh yeah mostly been playing this on Normal so far (some Hard earlier in game) because I am trying to get titles for not using gels and for not getting knocked out for Genis and Colette.
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First time playing through ToS, eh? Well, I suppose the game may have a chance to breathe then!
The second playthrough of ToS (if you do one), I really pity the game, given CT style of replays <_<;
Also, I might consider replaying ToS somepoint in the future on Hard Mode because...reasons? I dunno. Been a while and wonder how the game holds up given how many advancements in the franchise have occurred since.
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Bravely Default: Assault on the tower of Team Boss Fights.
The enemies cheat. So, so much. This calls for all the broken you can bring to bear, whether it be cripplingly awesome offense, borderline "I Win" buttons via field damage reduction tricks, or buying your win via HP doubling and other stuff. "normal" tactics just will not work at all against that much enemy offense.
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Dark Souls: Being two years out of practice means I get my ass beat by everything.
Haha. I just made one last NG++ run with my Darkmoon Blade (because it's the kind of build I expect to shoot for in DS2) and actually had my first ever death to Gaping Dragon. I'm still not sure what happened! He's doing his whole "I'm gonna charge into a wall trying to trample you" thing like he always does, I run after him to cut him up once he halts and suddenly *DEAD* from full health. I guess in my eagerness to exploit buffs while they lasted got caught in the last tremor of his charge, but 1100+ damage? That's nutty even for NG++. The only thing I can figure is he was somehow still under effect of trident dance buff (I ran to the fog gate immediately after killing the channeler, who definitely did activate the buff before dying). I also managed to backflip to my doom off the Anor Londo rafters while cutting the chandelier chain (accidentally triggered curved sword evade instead of regular attack) and fall off the first Crystal Cavern invisible platform (this has never happened before). Altogether embarrassing death run, not encouraging.
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Simon The Sorcerer 3D - finished
Through copious amounts of saving, I slowly managed with the incessant crashing. The worst times was when there were longish cutscenes, because the game has no sceneskip. Typically, it took the whole PC down during the credits, so I looked up the rest of those on youtube rather than kicking off the ending sequence again in case there was anything entertaining in what was left (there wasn't (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gib4Ja9MWOk&t=6m33s)).
In opposition to my earlier complaints about needing to be positioned precisely to talk to people early on, later on there are a lot of people you can talk to from any direction (including at least one where you're actually required to do so to solve a puzzle). Then you've still got people like Calypso who you have to speak to from across a table and can't speak to from next to him. The heck is your problem, game.
Another thing that's quite annoying - the game keeps re-ordering your inventory for no apparent reason. So you can either (forwards-only) scroll through your inventory and probably miss the thing you're looking for because it's not in a consistent place, or you can fall back on going to the subscreen all the time. In theory you can use the mouse in the subscreen, but in practice you can't (unless you only have a single monitor) because the game firstly doesn't trap the mouse pointer within itself, and secondly runs the mouse at a different 'resolution' than the one Windows does so by the time you've moved the in-game mouse pointer 2/3s across the screen the Windows cursor is outside the game, and clicking will consequently swap you out of it. Terrible.
Anyway, the ending is easily worse than the ending for Simon 2, mainly because there's no closure for the established villain and a new villain is introduced out of nowhere then the game immediately ends on cliffhanger. Specifically: Sordid escapes the collapse of the world (a problem you had nothing to do with, essentially you just showed up as he was inflicting it on himself while trying to take control of it)... somehow, given that there doesn't seem to be anywhere to escape to. You put the boot disc in the computer and then an evil version of yourself jumps out (of the computer) and cackles about how you now have control of the universe. THE END.
A puzzle near the end of the game requires you to open the CD drive on your computer because 4th wall puzzles are just the best things ever, right, especially for anyone who had to remove their CD drive after installing the game or something (I don't know if the original release required the CD in the drive or not). Typically, actually opening the BR drive doesn't actually work. I mounted an ISO in a virtual CD drive and that didn't work either. Then it inexplicably worked when I unmounted it.
Back to dumb things the plot does, in Chapter 5 you're tasked with acquiring the services of 4 heroes. After doing this, two of these heroes disappear from the game after doing literally nothing, and a third of them doesn't disappear from the game but doesn't actually do anything either. Well that was completely worth everyone's time then. Also, it eventually turns out that the Melissa Leg you see in the early parts of the game is actually Runt in disguise, which does explain how she retrieved Simon's body from Sordid at least, but it also turns out that Calypso knew all along that she was Runt and he just had you go along with what she wanted you to do despite the fact it was playing into Sordid's hands. Who even wrote this. (Probably one of the Woodroffes, I wasn't paying attention during the credits.)
In conclusion, monopoly (http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/simon/simon3-4.jpg).
I assume it's possible to find the english versions of Simon 4 and 5 around somewhere despite the companies which sold them having gone under, but I'm not going to bother with that for some time.
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Little Inferno - Replaying this triggered the emotional response it originally did the first letter I go. This game still destroys me.
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FF7 Hard: Is easy. Cure still exists and is still full healing for next to no cost.
Stats including HP are cut by half and there are a ton of other nerfs and I don't even care.
Just beat Reno.
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Dark Souls: Being two years out of practice means I get my ass beat by everything.
Haha. I just made one last NG++ run with my Darkmoon Blade (because it's the kind of build I expect to shoot for in DS2) and actually had my first ever death to Gaping Dragon. I'm still not sure what happened! He's doing his whole "I'm gonna charge into a wall trying to trample you" thing like he always does, I run after him to cut him up once he halts and suddenly *DEAD* from full health. I guess in my eagerness to exploit buffs while they lasted got caught in the last tremor of his charge, but 1100+ damage? That's nutty even for NG++. The only thing I can figure is he was somehow still under effect of trident dance buff (I ran to the fog gate immediately after killing the channeler, who definitely did activate the buff before dying). I also managed to backflip to my doom off the Anor Londo rafters while cutting the chandelier chain (accidentally triggered curved sword evade instead of regular attack) and fall off the first Crystal Cavern invisible platform (this has never happened before). Altogether embarrassing death run, not encouraging.
I think I've died to everything in the game except Nito and NPCs I never aggroed. I'll still never wrap my head around my lose to Pinwheel. It's FUCKING PINWHEEL. I've gone into him with nearly no health and won before!
It's possible Gaping hit you during your attack animation gaining that Counter Hit damage and royally screwing you over.
Dark Souls: Know what's a good idea for getting back into the groove? Trying to parry kill Havel! It only took me a dozen or so deaths too. I can't believe the Red Tearstone Ring was useful...
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Silly Fudo, Red Tearstone Ring is of course for OHKOing bosses: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amTDfMtGyDY
I've died to Nito on NG+ or higher with PCs woefully inadequate for beating down an enhanced skelemob in melee and lacking the stats to do anything competent with divine weapons (basically sorcerers). I have no particular excuse for dying to Pinwheel either, though.
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I'll have you know before this I only had two modes, full health or dead. In betweens were for other people and that one pinwheel fight.
Since my faith guy was the only one I really ran through NG+s with he had even less trouble with Nito. Lightning Bolts helped too.
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Yeah I died against Pinwheel too.
"I think I've died to everything in the game except Nito and NPCs I never aggroed."
Dude don't tell me baby shrooms, tree lizards, frog rays, Priscilla, Crestfallen Warrior, Solaire, Hollowed Oscar, Rapier guy in Sen's Fortress and those two guys in Dark Anor Londo killed you, and not Nito ever
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Yeah I died against Pinwheel too.
"I think I've died to everything in the game except Nito and NPCs I never aggroed."
Dude don't tell me baby shrooms, tree lizards, frog rays, Priscilla, Crestfallen Warrior, Solaire, Hollowed Oscar, Rapier guy in Sen's Fortress and those two guys in Dark Anor Londo killed you, and not Nito ever
Baby shroom got a kill by a lucky follow-up after a daddy. Tree lizard got me with poison because of the ambush. Frog rays.... nope! Don't think I ever died to them, you got me! I've purposely died to Priscilla-chan due to tail failures. Never aggroed Crestfallen... I think... Maggot Solaire never killed me either, but MY HEART DIED. Hollow Oscar did kill me once and I was really annoyed at that. Ricard in Sen's did so once or twice as well. I think he actually got off a riposte. I don't think I've ever actually made Dark Anor Londo so they haven't killed me either.
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Bravely Default - Currently doing the Vampire asterisk sidequest - I have a job mastered for all my characters as of now (Black Mage for Ringabel, Ninja for Tiz, White Mage for Agnés and Ranger for Edea) and I'm approaching a second job for Edea in Thief. Arcanist + Group Cast + Black Magic makes for a horrifying random sweeper with Hermes Shoes on Ringabel currently: Sleep is pretty much perfect accuracy even MTed with a magic-twinked setup (as in I haven't seen it MISS since setting it up) and very few enemies even resist Death. Pondering getting Utsusemi for my whole party in order to cheese the boss as well, which wouldn't take long.
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Bravely Default - Up to what I assume is the C2 boss; it is a bastard. I approve.
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Fudo you are terrible.
....I think I've died to frog rays ans yes that's pretty pathetic >_>
You get to fight Crestfallen Warrior (Hollow) near the New Londo entrance if you talk to him enough so you've probably already fought him.
No Dark Anor Londo? Hmm. You missed those two (rather pathetic) dudes (best souls farming place until the patch for what it's worth) and Gwyndolin's two >:-( fun speeches (After killing fake Gwynevere + after entering his boss room after killing fake Gwynevere)
Things you might not have died against also include the crystal warrior in Duke's archives, NPC invaders (IIRC Mildred, Kirk, Leeroy, Xanthous, Chester), the witch near Bed of Chaos, those humanities in the DLC, Ciaran and the blacksmiths if you've killed them for their equipment, and the Shiva of the East / ninja duo. (At least I hope you've never died against this duo, for your sake)
Maaaaybe the fire breathing statues in Lost Izalith and the skeleton babies near Nito (They've both killed me though)
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Oooooh right, I did make Crestfallen go Hollow in New Londo once way back in my first playthrough. So that's another 1-0 victory for me.
Crystal Warrior is another no deaths. NPC invaders: Leeroy and Jeremiah both scored kills, and I'm pretty sure Kirk got lucky with kicking me off a ledge once. Mildred and Chester I never died too. Eldest Sister.... no, never died to her either. Humanity Ghosts managed to get me once after a bad fall. Ciaran and Blacksmiths never died too either. I think, Ciaran might have got a kill off me. Shiva/Ninja managed to get me a few times because I fight in honorable combat. Also I was in single-digit Soul Levels and taking off that much HP is obnoxious.
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Bravely Default- Fin. Took... ~67 hours. Did both endings, but didn't do the division fights (and by extention Central Command) in Chapter 8.
This is a very interestingly designed endgame in general. It's a game where levels go up to 100... and for the endgame, I got to the late 80s/early 90s and the final bosses still put up a fair fight (indeed, while the final boss is pretty slow paced, the other fight down there gave me a couple resets because Slaughter is pretty mean). Also thanks to the parade of fights that are pretty easy but drop 999 JP you're actually likely to master 3 or 4 classes even with no grinding. It's neat.
The game lulls majorly from early C5 to mid-C6 (when you can finally get the Conjurer sidequest). It's a little bit just too much recycling, but much more because there's just a huge waste of teh concept. Once you go past THAT into the much more meta final chapters there is something a bit closer to the first half of the game in overall quality. Which is around 8/10.
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Speaking of Dark Souls, due to catching a terminal case of lazy, I will not be finishing my replay pre-DS2 =(. I am p. much human garbage.
Speaking of Dark Souls 2 though... apparently that gets a midnight release.
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Speaking of Dark Souls, due to catching a terminal case of lazy, I will not be finishing my replay pre-DS2 =(. I am p. much human garbage.
Speaking of Dark Souls 2 though... apparently that gets a midnight release.
Totally getting it at midnight myself.
Now if the PS3 gets fixed before then it'll be gravy! fuck world
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I'm actually surprised there is a chapter 8. I'm already 25 hours in and still in chapter 2 (though at the very end, I believe). Does the game just speed up as it goes along, or is hard mode causing me to take way more time on battles than most people?
Also still playing Xenogears of course (update pending when I am non-lazy) and Tomb Raider (a bit past where Shale is).
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I'm actually surprised there is a chapter 8. I'm already 25 hours in and still in chapter 2 (though at the very end, I believe). Does the game just speed up as it goes along, or is hard mode causing me to take way more time on battles than most people?
Also still playing Xenogears of course (update pending when I am non-lazy) and Tomb Raider (a bit past where Shale is).
From Ch.5 and on, most quests become optional, so you can blitz your way to the end fairly quick.
The quests in ch.5 pretty much worth nothing and should be skipped so it won't harm your enjoyment of the game.
Ch.6 has the conurer quest and most other stuff don't really worth that much too. And this is where you might want to peak at the fake ending first.
Ch.7 and on is where things become really different and better not to skip.
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Bravely Default - Up to what I assume is the C2 boss; it is a bastard. I approve.
Are you talking about the Watery looking guy? I'm doing it on normal because Hard was just too frustrating for me so things will be different, but I found that a Mage Knight with 2 hands could just demolish his hp. If you use Examine on him before he splits, you can keep track of which one is the real one too, although the copies hp was low enough that 2 Crescent Moons from a Valkyrie and some a MT Thundara were enough to wipe them. Obviously in hard they would probably have too much hp for that, but I think having a Summoner Brave 3-4 times should be enough. Also, you might want to look into beelining towards the special moves from the town builder minigame. I think hard was sort of balanced around using them before you get some of the crazier class options.
In none handheld games: Earth Defense Force 2025! This game is amazing and everyone should experience it.
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Oh Fudo, you also probably haven't died to a vagrant >_>
So do Shiva and Ninjabro disappear forever from your game if you fight them and lose?
I'll have to wait until monday for DS2. Avoiding everything until then.
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After chapter 4 there's fewer dungeons. I also turned off encounters and just turned them back on at +100% if I needed to level (or more often, get money) at around that point: I ended up having to do major grinding to finish the last sidequest in C4, and subsequently had enough levels for C5 and 6 on that alone more or less. So some of it is playstyle, but the later chapters are legitimately a lot shorter with or without sidequests.
I should note I played the entire game on Normal, which turned out around where I like RPG difficulty; punishes screwups and bosses might take a few tries to work out strategies, but very little chance of wiping out of nowhere and very rarely roadblocking you for sheer levels even on harder fights.
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@ Meeple I don't know about that.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-hByduxuU4&list=UUN_Z2daAn2_YX2c03vEog4A
I am having fun. Tales/Star Ocean are mostly about gameplay for me so I don't mind getting the battle boots on for them. Mind you I'm sure there's things I haven't discovered yet and I can tweak/improve on things next time through too~
I saw the thing with the coffee. Neat. Lloyd seems to be agreeing with me overall mostly so far, and he's even been in my party the full game so far (barring alternative teams in forced team splits) breaking my don't using the main character if possible first run rule. I miiight still switch him out later but we'll see.
Currently still rolling with Colette, Lloyd, Kratos, Sheena, been to get Undine and heal Pietro, can go to Tower of Salvation now, but going to do some optional stuffs (dunno if I'll put Genis and/or Raine in any or not)~
Sheena is slowly growing on me after the rocky start (I am a sap and it doesn't take much to break me)~
(did you do Emotive Pianoist and the play yet :))
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Oh Fudo, you also probably haven't died to a vagrant >_>
So do Shiva and Ninjabro disappear forever from your game if you fight them and lose?
I'll have to wait until monday for DS2. Avoiding everything until then.
Can't die to nothing I haven't seen! Or however that goes.
Nah, once they're in-game they're there to stay. If you die to them in Blighttown they'll move back to the Forest though apparently.
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(gameplay spoiler warning, woo)
Bravely Default - Up to what I assume is the C2 boss; it is a bastard. I approve.
Are you talking about the Watery looking guy? I'm doing it on normal because Hard was just too frustrating for me so things will be different, but I found that a Mage Knight with 2 hands could just demolish his hp. If you use Examine on him before he splits, you can keep track of which one is the real one too, although the copies hp was low enough that 2 Crescent Moons from a Valkyrie and some a MT Thundara were enough to wipe them. Obviously in hard they would probably have too much hp for that, but I think having a Summoner Brave 3-4 times should be enough. Also, you might want to look into beelining towards the special moves from the town builder minigame. I think hard was sort of balanced around using them before you get some of the crazier class options.
I think things have 50% more HP on hard? That said you kinda hit on a lot of my ultimate strategy, Two-hand Thundara Spellblade Crescent Moon x2 to wipe the minions immediately was a big part, and of course I examine everything - knowing when you can afford to brave-blitz a boss is crucial. The real issue with the fight on Hard is that Dark Flow does 900+ MT default-ignoring damage which is nuts; I used a combination of Protect, Spirit Barrier, and my lone Ice Charm to make it doable. Onto chapter 3!
I had assumed Norende was part of the weird online nonsense which pervades most games these days; maybe I should actually look into it...
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Bravely Default: Beaten all the way through. Final level was ~80 something and at ~70 hours.
The main plot past chapter 6 disappears or is worthless. I strongly suggest avoiding/ignoring it by doing a certain act at the last available point in C6. The (Blue exclamation marked) sidequests however are great stuff, as in Chapter 7 and Chapter 8 they become more unique and challenging. Chapter 8 especially features some of the nastiest JRPG enemy setups I've seen.
Spoilers for plot.
The good points of Bravely Default's plot are the solid execution of the relatively 'ordinary' story in World 1 and the character interaction/development therein. The Duchy is painted as clearly wrong and the game doesn't try to equivocate on this point too much. The Summoner sidequest is a pretty good example of the solid execution, eschewing a happy ending in favor of a darker one more consistent with the story of that chapter. In general, the characters discuss their actions with each other and they respond to situations in some fairly flawed but understandable ways, which is especially apparent in Chapter 3. Edea is charming and amusing as a character (often saying what the player is probably thinking), Agnes is rather believable as you get acquainted with her and is far from a 'perfectly nice girl' that someone in her archetype normally gets shoehorned into, and Ringabel is rather endearing in his constant stream of jokes (except for a stint in chapter 2 where JRPG boob-joke flaws rear their ugly heads). Tiz is just kind of there, and wasn't worked on very well at all.
I greatly enjoyed paging through D's notebook, even if it proved too much of a spoiler for the most part (it's very very easy to guess it's Alternis Dim's early in the game, as well as what that and the late writings in it entail). The book helped with Alternis' characterization.
The big flaws in Bravely Default plot is... well let's get it out of the way. The 'multiple worlds' thing is not handled well past Chapter 6. At all. The game just kinds of goes two iterations without any discussions at all, despite very big causes for concern amongst the PCs. And then the entire final sequence is just flat out retarded and makes no sense. This is especially bad in comparison to a fairly competent 'bad end' storyline which retains Airy as the primary villain. She works much better as one than the Space Flea Ouroboros (whose design sucks, by the way). The game would have been better served by even more focus on the pre-C6 plot rather than including this silliness at the end. (The final battle music is pretty good though)
More minor flaws include the fact that the villains could have solved the problems WAY more easily had they not been dumbarses and insisted on keeping their mouths shut about what they knew in regards to the situation. Also the failure of Duchy forces to recognize Ringabel as Alternis. Why was this never touched upon? Little things here and there prove to be annoying. And the 'True' ending featured living alternate Light Warriors, which made no sense as there was only 1 Airy who was implied to have killed all the other Light Warriors in the worlds she had been to.
Bravely Default's battle system and job system have gotten a lot of praise and for good reason... So I'll just give classes a lowdown of how I thought of them.
Freelancer: A fairly useless skillset and no good reason to be a carrier class, except for the analyze skill! Being able to see boss HP is useful because it lets you decide when to go balls-to-the-wall offense and take them down by going negative on BP. It would have been nice to have this be a 1-point passive skill option, but you have to dedicate one of your 8 skillsets to it, which is unfortunate! Otherwise the Freelancer has the 'raise probabilities of chance-based skills by 1.5x' which can be fairly cool if utilized correctly, and the ultimate skill, Mime, which does the traditional set of allowing you to use a skill that someone else has without actually having the skillset, OR you can quadra-act something nasty and only pay the price for it once. Finally the class gets a decent passive skill in the ability to survive otherwise fatal attacks with 1 HP at a 75% chance (assuming they were not already at 1 HP). But the cost is 3 Ability Points, so it is quite expensive. The default passive class skill is only useful at endgame, and only very, very slightly useful... washed away by the lack of S's in offensive weaponry. Oh, and Earned JP up is still rather cool for mastering more classes faster.
Monk: A competent enough physical class. Being able to use combat saves means that you can have a solid physical slugger who doubles as a healer with an awesome MT healing/revive/MP restore/BP+ move! The early skills are a bit of a turnoff though, and the lack of good defense hurts even if it is offset by the high HP. The ultimate skills are amusing in the sense that you sacrifice all semblance of defense/equipment versatility for raw amazing attack power. The passive class ability honestly feels kind of wasted when good fists are available for puchase.
White Mage: It is a healer class. You want one, possibly two of these ability sets. White Mage's buffs are rather pitiful (ST 25% Pdef/Mdef for all of 4 turns, oh wow), but Dispel and Esunga are priceless, and competent MT healing is highly desirable. The damage is lackluster to say the least, lacking elemental variety and magic attack power/damage buffing skills. Default passive skill is rather worthless (heal status on winning battles), but the "Angelic Ward' skill you learn is sweet and serves to improve team survivability by a lot!
Black Mage: Elemental canons with status. Early on the MP-reliance hurts a lot since MP restoration is harder to come by. Lategame (especially after learning Pierce M.Def) they turn into impressive damage dealers without much setup/fuss. Their skill to group-cast magic that is normally ST only can be rather cool when combined with other magic types... MT Reraise? MT Reflect? MT Dispel? MT Quick... several possibilities. That magic defense ignoring skill is where the damage is at, though.
Knight: Two-handed makes for an awesome offense skill and is easy to learn. Beyond that Knights tank rather well and Stomp does good damage. The "two Shields" skill makes for a neat way to improve raw and elemental durability on casters/healers/utility builds.
Thief: Speed boosting abilities are always useful and that is what Thieves do. Stealing doesn't usually get you too much good stuff. Beyond that they make surprisingly good damage dealers because Bows are a fantastic weapon type. Their utility skills (Rob Life, basically) isn't bad because Parasitic healing is always cool. Mostly the class is good for speed boosting skills that you can set up how you see fit.
Merchant: Generally a weak class, to be honest. They are for money boosting really, which I'll admit is something you probably do want some of, but as combat PCs they aren't terribly good. Special mention DOES go out to their second-to-last skill, Low Leverage, which reduces all damage dealt/healing done by 50% for friend and foe alike for 5 turns. When facing down enemies that multi-act and have lots of damage, this sort of skill is a godsend. It is rather endgame for use however, as attempting to use it a lot may just prolong otherwise faster battles you would win anyway.
Spell Fencer: Nail weakness on enemies more commonly, and inflict statuses with fair accuracy, all while saving on the MP a Black Mage would expend... the Spell Fencer is an appealing class. The Brave/Default system makes them much better for blitzing then the Magic Knight ever was in FF5, since one spell followed by three blades in a single turn makes for much better quick offense. Drain Sword is a nice way to keep afloat for physical classes too. Generally a competent class.
Time Mage: Time Mage was one of FF5's best classes, but here it is rather underwhelming. Time SLip would make for a better support ability if Autosave wasn't on and bosses didn't have save points before them all. The speed boosting doesn't generally last long enough (4 turns) and there are other ways of getting what you need on that front. The damage could be good if it is twinked for but it isn't something to write home about.
Summoner: The MT magic damage canon of many elements, but Summoner's MP costs are prohibitive early without some kind of gimmick and the damage late isn't something you write home about. Still probably a good randomsmashing class with the right setup. Passive skills aren't worth discussing.
Hunter: ST damage class. The accuracy boost is nice and the skillset allows for plentiful Bow specials (anytime you hit weakness) but ST damage is all the class really brings to the table. I mentioned Bows were good weapons in this game (albeit you eschew a shield, an innate 2-hand property of the weapon type) and Hunters bring an S in that weapon. Does great damage throughout the midgame, although not having a skill to hit weakness against humans is a pain (stuck with a 1.25x mult instead of 1.5x, and no bonus to the Super-move count for bows).
Valkyrie: An interesinting variety of Dragoon that does nice things with MT physical damage. Jumping is always kind of a mixed bag. It could be rather nice if you set it up on multiple PCs I'll grant, as the damage on it ranges from "Quite solid" to "WTF". It is all ST and that 'losing a PC for 1-3 turns is a turnoff. But it still has that MT physical skill, which is good for randomsmashing. The default passive ability is rather decent as well.
Red Mage: Red Mage has a series of interesting passive abilities, but the primary skillset kind of blows. White/Black magic up to L4, when L5 and L6 are where you want to be at endgame. Still it is competent enough at physical offense, and some of the passives make very nice combos with other classes, such as negating MP costs below 20% HP and getting +1 BP whenever an attack is dodged. The default '25% chance of +1 BP whenever receiving an attack works WAY better on the enemy end than the PC end.
Salve-Maker: Bravely Default's Chemist. All of the job's abiltieis are geared towards item usage and it kind of rocks. Skills to double healing effectiveness (that is the default spend-no-points skill!), Auto-Potion, Auto-Phoenix (Phoenix Down as a free action if someone is KOd when you take a turn, and this has no detriment on their BP so is the best revival there is!), can use any regular item MT for an extra BP, has plentiful ITD damage of any element that ranges from astounding (when you first get it) to competent (at post-lategame) and costs only 400pg a shot, stat buffs, mt revival, can grant ST one-element immunity or force a weakness on an enemy ... And the class IS a healing class, with full revival, MP restoration, and ST HP healing. The only thing the class is lacking is infliction of status ailments and more MT options. Truly a ridiculous class, this one.
Pirate: Single-target physical damage and debuffs are what you'll find here. They have means of blowing MP to do lots of damage but this is generally a bad idea (1/4 or 1/2 max MP a shot for a 2x or 4x damage attack). Combine it with some kind of 'zero MP cost' trick and you have yourself a mean damage dealing machine. But they are slow, and their preferred weapon (axes) are inferior to swords on account of lower accuracy/speed/hits. The debuffs are nice, but the really competent ones (-25% enemy attack stats) are kind of late on the class.
Performer: Support skillset that is quite good. +25% MT buffs of every stat kind (speed/str/mag/def/mdef...), and a way to transfer BP to another PC (while not quite as good as 'turn shifting', this improves your long-term offense if used appropriately, or to 'recover' someone whose BP went negative). Compact that with good base class speed and acceptable stats and you have yourself a highly competent support class. The best passive ability in the class is the one that doubles buff duration for 1 ability point, albeit only on the PC that is using it.
Ninja: This class specializes in low-power-high-mult damage and evasion. Both are solid enough niches, and there guarenteed 'dodge 1 attack' skill can be quite a lifesaver vs. certain bosses and enemies who bring to bare very powerful physical skills. Their speed is excellent of course. The damage isn't that competent to be honest, and their skillset aside from the guaranteed dodge leaves much to be desired. The passive abilities are geared toward getting some boon upon a dodge, whether stat boosts or an auto-counter to evading an attack. this makes for some fun times vs. entirely physical opponents.
Swordmaster: The counter class! This works much better on an enemy that is facing a party than it does a party facing enemies. Beyond that the swordmaster has competent enough stats (Speed isn't special though)... and Katanas are the best weapon type (high crit rate) so having the skill that grants an S in that is nice. Being based around counters just tends not to work too well. Although at least the counter skills halve damage and work on MT attacks. So not too bad if you know what your foe will be spamming MT-attackwise (although it can still waste a turn far too often).
Arcanist: Most of the Arcanists skills are for assisting in randomsmashing, and it requires inflicting status ailments on them first. In general this is not an impressive forte. Their skillsets can be abusive towards enemy and friends alike, so that is another point against them. Not actually being able to INFLICT those status ailments with their own skills is another mark... All dark damage which isn't TOO bad except they are soon to be competing with... well... something better at that particular niche. A point for coming with a solid enough default passive, insta-healing 30% of any suffered magic damage. This combines in interesting ways with some other skills like Healing Lore/Angelic Ward, I think. But that is about the only point for the class.
Spiritmaster: This is a support class. Primarily based around manipulating the party's elemental attributes (skills to grant omni-element absorption, skills to grant MT elemental immunity, skills to enhance one PC's elemental offense, and so on). It also features the skills Fairy Ward, which grants MT full status immunity for 5 turns (including stuff like Doom and such that would normally be non-immunable), Stillness, which makes the entire field immune to damage for 3 turns, and Convert BP, which spends 1/4 Max MP for 2 extra BP. The class is balanced by requiring extra BP to use most skills (only the ST elemental absorption doesn't), but that Convert BP along with some MP healing can give you some absolutely ridiculous results. Elemental absorption is extremely valuable and Fairy Ward nips some things in the bud that would be otherwise very frustrating (some bosses like ST status). Stillness is a FANTASTIC 'oh crap' button for when everyone but the Spiritmaster has died or something like that. This class' element nulling is nice for another reason too...
Templar: The Templar is a 'holy Knight' class that is geared towards defense, boasting the best survivability of all classes. It also features a skill to reduce damage while defaulting to 25% instead of 50%, which is solid. Other boons of this class include Rampart, a skill to give everyone a barrier that blocks 1 physical attack (including a lot of POWERFUL enemy MT moves like dragon breaths and so on). The class is extremely slow, and while they have good offensive skills their offense suffers from that speed some. But it never hurts to run a tank PC for emergency situations where enemy offense is overwhelming you some. Helps to buff the speed somehow to make them able to DO something in such an event!
Dark Knight: This class does damage. Not healing, not tanking, not utility... Damage. Usually while sacrificing HP to do so. The default skill boosts stats whenever 20% HP threshholds are crossed (this helps to keep buffs on longer). The class starts with Dark Bane, which is a 1.25x mult ST dark attack that consumes 20% HP. Then it gets Black Bane, which a 1.5x attack that consumes 30% HP, and is MT. Then it gets a passive skill to boost dark damage further. Then it gets a skill that boosts all stats (sans Speed) 50% for 5 turns at the cost of inflicting Doom. But a prize move for this class is the Dark Nebula attack. For 20% HP it does an MT 4x attack. Unfortunately this MT includes your own party. But combined with a Spiritmaster or plentiful use of Dark Shields (of which there are 3 in the game) you can spam it, and it is utterly devastating to enemies. For maximizing damage, there is Rage, a 2 BP move (costs as much as 3 actions) that uses Dark Bane 5x (or until HP reaches 1). A little twinking such as Sword Magic and you have reliable 50K damage for 3 BP, albeit it ST. And this can be used 2 times in a turn. When facing down boss teams there is nothing better than this class for putting them down in a hurry via the MT stuff. Fun fact: If they use the Doom-inflicting move under the Spiritmaster's Fairy Ward, they get the stat buffs without the Doom status!
Vampire: The blue mage class. But while the majority of their skillset is from getting hit with enemy magic, they also feature highly competent things like a skill that serves as a physical attack with parasitic healing, one for magic, and one to steal enemy BP. Then a skill to steal enemy stats (inflict -25% on them and +25% on you), and a skill to boost the effect (damage) of drain skills. They also feature a skill to instaheal 30% of any physical damage received. Their actual blue magic is primarily status stuff, but with some elemental MT and so on in the mix too. The class stats are very solid. Basically a good class, although the default passive is not useful due to being the one for learning new blue magic.
Conjurer: The last class, and not a terribly good one. Their skillset is ST buffs that last 10 turns, which is not terrible but not all that impressive either. Most of their skills are geared towards helping Summoners, which isn't exactly a selling point for this class.
Gamebest classes are... Spiritmaster (Utility of win and awesome), Dark Knight (DAMAGE), White Mage (Dispel, Esunga, MT healing), Performer (more utility of win and awesome), and Salve-Maker (Healing and utility!). Black Mages also get competent on damage with relatively little fuss lategame.
Think I'll go for a 'Normal Mode' stat topic of some kind.
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Norende is basically fueled by online connections yeah. Whenever you streetpass or online check the game, you'll get about 3 new profiles, which adds them to your Summon Friends list, gives you that many new villagers (to build stuff faster) and gives you some new bonus monsters in teh village menu. THe actual village building can be done without going online at all, just it'll take you forever to get anything out of it. Basically it builds stuff in real-time, just leaving the DS in sleep mode counts towards the total as well as play-time, but later levels of the buildings take 99 hours at base. So without other villagers from online connections you'll basically never get anything.
(You only reallyi need about ~15 villagers to get everything meaningful but with 1? Yeah no.)
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Ah cool, about the ninja. I thought dying against them = No DWGR until NG+
I've seen one vagrant once, before I even knew about them.
It was extremely creepy (What the hell is that thing and why is it there in that area I've been through several times???) but weak.
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I've had all of two vagrants. First one I killed immediately not knowing what it was. Second I toyed with enough to recognize that they can be incredibly damaging with missile spam (if you don't block this for some crazy reason, they're extremely slow and predictable).
I've still never had to deal with gravelord phantoms (outside of encountering them as a phantom in someone else's world).
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Saw in vagrant in other's world. Think I posted about it here once even?
You don't know true terror until you fight black phantom bonewheel skeletons.
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Saw in vagrant in other's world. Think I posted about it here once even?
You don't know true terror until you fight black phantom bonewheel skeletons.
That's my nightmares for the rest of the week covered.
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Well my stupid obsessive brain is still trying to understand this game without actually playing it, so I have been made aware of this mod (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDbu5aY6wr8) existing which sounds terrifying.
On the other end of the spectrum though there is this that you can play co-op with a fixed partner apparently. (http://steamcommunity.com/app/211420/discussions/0/828935269278734403/)
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Soul Silver: Fighting Gym was harder than expected but then I lacked psychic types, and my only flying type was Noctowl, so was kind of RNG mercy here...that and Jolteon, Magmar and Tauros had to eat up a lot of earlier EXP to play catch up, so my levels were probably a little low too!
Also, seriously considering punting Noctowl for an actual thing capable of doing stuff in combat, and using it only when I need fly, but dunno what yet. Crocanaw and Gloom are the rest on my team (starter + Surf (eventual Waterfall) user, and Grass-Type-I-never-Used-before-Will-Eventually-Evolve-into-Vileplume-because-screw-you-useless-Bellossom-evolution)
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Ys Memories of Celceta: Finished. Fun game! Already said it, but it truly is Ys 7-2. Lots of nice interfacey things ironed out since Ys 7 though, so probably more pleasant to play overall. Nevertheless, it's actually probably worse than Ys 7 due to, of all things, the story. Notably, the villains are lame. Yeah yeah YS PLOT etc., but no, it really matters if you're going to actually spend time watching cutscenes & exploring villages & talking to people & all. Zelda plot is no great shakes, but the Zelda games usually spend far less time on said plot than Ys, so it's going to be graded more harshly for Ys.
Anyway, here's what I expect out of a Ys game: a hammy, even melodramatic plot that doesn't have to exactly make sense (although that is a plus), but should deliver continuous dramatic confrontations and the like. Throw in some CRAZY PLOT TWISTS and you're good to go. Example: Oath in Felghana. Chester hams it up as the villain, you get to beat him up twice, there's a PLOT TWIST with a new villain who hams it up instead, dramatic betrayals, heroic sacrifices, etc. Memories of Celceta has some of the ingredients lazy scriptwriters use to juice up a plot (WARNING SPOILERS) - amnesia, a mind control villain, etc. which allows you to write twisty plots that wouldn't work if played fairly. And then... they fail to make use of any of it? It's weird. You have a hero with amnesia and he didn't forget about how he murdered the final boss before the game even started, or unleashed the doom comet, or anything. The conflicts they set up are mostly lame. Normally I'll take a good human villain over a god / entity villain any day, but they like forgot to write anything approaching a motive here for our human villain. "Most humans are scum, only elite awesome dudes like me & Adol DO anything." (sage nods that the villain is right from the party) "So that's why I'm going to test humanity by blowing it all apart." Uh huh. Got it. Eldeel has his problems, but at least he felt like an actual threat and had something approaching an actual dramatic conflict (cozy humans with "guidance" vs. smash them in the right direction). His music is way better, too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEaXvBhD1jg
But yeah. The actual villains suck, so meh. The original Ys 4 plotline sounds like something along the lines of Ys 1 - totally incoherent, but THINGS ARE HAPPENING constantly, with lots more kidnappings & rescues & other stuff going on. They might have managed to make the plot actually worse in Memories of Celceta (even if all the side things like townspeople dialogue makes it in effect better, of course). Wat.
So, some random comments:
* Like Ys 7, skill level for the various moves is important, skill level still increases based off # of uses, and you have too many characters to sanely build moves for all of 'em. Seems to very much encourage a "pick 3-4 characters and use 'em, ignore the rest" style which is a tad meh. On the bright side, there are accessories that speed up skill learning... kinda lame since it's like Earned JP UP in FFT, you basically have 1 less accessory slot than it appears, but better than encouraging a massive grind and/or sticking with the one skill you got to level 3.
* There isn't an item cap on healing items like Ys 7, nor any "can't spam items forever" rule a la Tales. So... you can't really lose boss fights unless you want to, healing items are pretty cheap, and even if you refuse to ever buy healing items, they give you some in chests, so I'm pretty sure it's legit to use those at least.
* And this is fine, actually, the boss fights are pretty fun, and you can make them as hard as you like by setting some item limit on yourself. ...except toward the end of the game, where boss difficulty randomly DIVES. It's weird, they went from making me learn 'em a bit in the mid-game and still having to use some items to just sucking and being no-item cleared on the first or second try. To be sure, I always thought Oath / Origin bosses were too tough relative to the randoms, but this is too far the other direction.
* As noted before, the existence of a ubiquitous "dodge" button makes the characters play a wee bit too much the same IMHO.
* Can I mention again that the villains are lame? Because they are. I don't ask for much, "MWAHAHA I WILL REVIVE THE DARK GOD AND GAIN INFINITE POWER" would have been just fine, but you didn't even give me that. Oh and there's some dumb animal rights thing for one of the side villains that makes no sense. Sigh.
Despite all the whining, it was pretty fun. Still worse than Ys 7, since Ys 7 has challenging bosses / a decent plot twist / marginally better characters (not that this says much). Oh well.
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Also I started writing the post above a week ago, just as I have a giant Phoenix Wright post I started writing a month+ ago. This one will be quicker!
Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds: Was awesome! Nostalgic throwback so it's cheating, but it's fine on its own. I really like that you can just explore nearly everywhere from the start, and can do the dungeons in whatever order you like. Most importantly, LBW has really solid dungeon design - they took lessons from the Portal people of introduce you to the tricks you can do with the item du jour, then actually force you to master them later on. I loved the dungeons, they were all flavorful & interesting. LBW also has a plot twist worth a damn, unlike Ys Memories of Celceta, despite spending way less time on its chatting. Sweet.
Nitpicks:
* Aw, young Link? I'm always a fan of using adult Link, for all that it was cute when they played up the angle. (It was fine in OoT because it drew a contrast, please skip straight to adult Link in games without that.)
* Boss difficulty was super-erratic. Some were good (Ice Ruins boss!), some were okay (Dark Palace boss), some were total jokes (lots of 'em). Oh well.
* The final boss sequence needed one extra part to it. I'm sure it's obvious what it should have been to those who played it.
* Unlike LttP, the final dungeon leads directly to the ending. Thus when I beat the game, I lost all my progress in the final dungeon, including getting the Red Mail for the Treacherous Tower. Oh well.
* On that note, the Blue Mail / Red Mail are BROKEN AS HELL. (Damage halving / quartering ahoy.) I didn't have them until the final dungeon basically but yeah, skip these if you want anything approaching challenge.
Did Dark Palace -> Skull Woods -> Turtle Rock -> Ice Ruins -> Thieves' Hideout -> Desert Palace -> Swamp Palace. Ended up a good sequence, I thought.
I have lots to say about some games I enjoyed, but not this game particularly. Maybe because it's short. Play it, it's great.
Bravely Default next, I suppose.
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Dark Souls 2!: I have died 14 times in 3 hours of playing. I have achieved the equivalent of making it to the Undead Burg Bonfire.
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Dark Souls 2!: I have died 14 times in 3 hours of playing. I have achieved the equivalent of making it to the Undead Burg Bonfire.
So it is easy mode for scrub casuals? Good to know.
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Jesus I can't wait.
So what's going to be your build?
I think I'm going with dual wielding since it's new. (Well, dual wielding being apparently marginally useful is new)
And I'm totally a Souls pro so I'm probably not going to ever need shields lol
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26 deaths before I even fight a boss. Swell.
Actually went with Swordsman duel-wield start myself. It's been uh, "interesting". Just sort of meandering at the start getting levels to get HP. Picked up a new sword that might become cool though.
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I think things have 50% more HP on hard?
25% boost to all stats, if the FAQs are correct. Regardless, I haven't even touched Hard mode and I've found the challenge very much fine.
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26 deaths before I even fight a boss. Swell.
Actually went with Swordsman duel-wield start myself. It's been uh, "interesting". Just sort of meandering at the start getting levels to get HP. Picked up a new sword that might become cool though.
While I mean to not read much about stuff I haven't encountered yet...
...do let me know if you find a whip.
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FF7 Hard Mode: The Rufus boss trio was actually pretty cool!
First time I used my last phoenix down (I had bought a few ones before and still ran out!) on the elevator fight since the propeller could drop OHKO attacks on Nanaki and Aeris. Then Motor Ball had his doubleact 2HKO attack and I had no way to revive.
In the end I had on both fights Cloud or Aeris on bolt spamming duty while the two others sat there and spammed Cure + their limit breaks.
Rufus either does 5HKO damage or laughs. Doggy has 3HKO Bolt. Could have been threatening? But both are weak to Sleep and I had all these items around...
Shinra building spear dudes (those you can steal a neat sword from) were relentless. Lots of damage + Sleep aaand you fight two or three of them at the same time.
Main party is Cloud/Nanaki/Barrett. Aeris lacks HP and steals kills (Healing Wind is pretty nice for boss fights though), Tifa is subpar at everything. I want to use mostly Yuffie and VINCENT.
Shinra building is still the best part of the game but all these people inside are so shockingly incompetent. Rufus' speech was hilarious!
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26 deaths before I even fight a boss. Swell.
Actually went with Swordsman duel-wield start myself. It's been uh, "interesting". Just sort of meandering at the start getting levels to get HP. Picked up a new sword that might become cool though.
While I mean to not read much about stuff I haven't encountered yet...
...do let me know if you find a whip.
Info screens do say whips exist, so there's that.
Also the second boss has killed me like 20 times. Many of them without me even landing a hit. DARK SOULS 2!
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Bravely Default Hard Mode boosts enemy HP by 35%, boosts P.Atk and M.Atk (really Int, which x2 is M.Atk) by 25%, and Mind by 25%, which boosts enemy M.Def by a smaller amount than 25% (maybe ~10-15%).
Speed is unchanged, and P.Def is not affected. The 25% offense stats have a HUGE effect though, given that you can, conceivably, get a fair number of PCs that have P.Def stats higher than enemy P.Atk stats.
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26 deaths before I even fight a boss. Swell.
Actually went with Swordsman duel-wield start myself. It's been uh, "interesting". Just sort of meandering at the start getting levels to get HP. Picked up a new sword that might become cool though.
While I mean to not read much about stuff I haven't encountered yet...
...do let me know if you find a whip.
Info screens do say whips exist, so there's that.
Also the second boss has killed me like 20 times. Many of them without me even landing a hit. DARK SOULS 2!
The end of the day is still too far away. THE TRUE DARK SOULS BEGAN HERE.
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Andrew died once trying to get his copy of Dark Souls II. Hardest game ever.
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I think things have 50% more HP on hard?
25% boost to all stats, if the FAQs are correct. Regardless, I haven't even touched Hard mode and I've found the challenge very much fine.
My biggest problem with hard mode is that it made things a bit too luck reliant. Take the fight against the Summoner boss or the Wind Crystal guardian. An inopportune hit with confusion or a critical hit on normal mode is a setback, but on Hard mode it can be an almost guarenteed reset. I also like doing sidequests immediately, which was just a huge pain on Hard mode.
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What Hard mode does is require you to alter your aetup to tailor it for fights that are particularly nasty. Summoner fight wasvery doable... just needed to prep fpr the turns that the MT nukes fly out.
Hard is a little odd in that it rebalances the cast ... Higher enemy attack makes the tanky PCs worse relative to the lightweights (though it can sometimes bring OHKOs up)
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Mephillia is very predictable as well in her pattern. In fact, it's her support that makes her dangerous on normal, because MT 2HKO every three turns or so is kinda not so awesome with BD's easy-come MT healing.
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Mephillia is very predictable as well in her pattern. In fact, it's her support that makes her dangerous on normal, because MT 2HKO every three turns or so is kinda not so awesome with BD's easy-come MT healing.
Yeah it's the confusion that makes the fight a pain. In normal, someone getting confused can force you to play defensive for a while, but that's about it. On hard that Mt 2HKO is more like a MT 95% PCHP without default, if someone gets confused before the blast turn they're fucked unless they're like a knight or something with full health. The summon will one shot your squishier characters or come very close to it.
And again, the Wind Crystal fight on hard is irritating because a critical breath + normal breath can easily KO a mage through default.
Although granted, I'm still fairly early on in the game so I don't have too many defensive tricks. The next set of classes looks like it will have a lot more options to limit the extreme damage bosses do on hard.
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Jesus Fudo what are you doing man. I've died once and it was to dogs in Limbo before I had any weapons. (Well okay three more times as a summon. But I don't count those. And two of them I got killed by friendly fire!) Edit: LET ME GUESS you were trying to kill the Obviously Too Bad For You Noobs big dudes in Limbo.
Killed first boss and did some unlocking of random doors. I don't even know what kind of build I'm going to wind up with at this point. See I was going to go with a swordsman and shoot for a light weapon + enchanter setup, but then I noticed that if I went explorer I'd get a nifty hat, a monocle, and a goddamned bird on my shoulder.
I prioritize responsibly.
Immediately the foolishness of this decision becomes apparent when I realize my starting weapon is the dagger. Oh my god it takes me a million hits to kill anything. So I grind out five levels so I can at least use the SHORTSWORD and then get a nifty lightning sword and chunk through more levels to use that. I don't like powerleveling but I like being unable to kill even less. Using this thing will probably become a bad habit just like lightning was in DS1. Oh well. Now levels are going into HP/stamina/carry weight instead. I want to access healing magic because healing is potentially kind of bitchy in this game, but I'd need to sink like ten levels into Attunement + Intelligence or Faith before I could even cast a single anything. Goddammit explorer! Why are you so bad.
(Okay it did let me grab a titanite slab & Cloranthy Ring early, latter being very nice to have practically out the door...but in the long run saving me four thousand souls on a key isn't that great a prize for starting with gimpy stats.)
I'm actually reminded a lot more of Demon's Souls by this than of Dark Souls 1. I wasn't a fan of Demon's Souls. Environments are sprawling fuckhuge zones with multiple bosses instead of basically self-contained linear area + 1 boss; healing is a fusion of both games' handling but so far finite resources play a bigger role than renewable ones due to the latter being so limited (and you can use anything as a phantom); losing max HP in hollow form is just ugh, was bad enough in Demon's Souls, being gradually phased in here is only moderately less annoying; control feels stiffer and less precise than I'm used to after way too much DS1 (granted, my starting armor set is too heavy for fast roll, and while I'm comfortable running around naked in DS1 because I've memorized the goddamn game, I'm not doing that in terra incognita). I'm trying not to be all they changed it now it sucks but there is some questionable design backsliding. Why do I need to button mash through dialogue again every time I want to level up?
Let's see, what other random stuff sticks out on first impression:
-Seems like dropping items now makes them vanish from reality. No more trading?
-Inventory management so much easier. God, finally guys.
-Dear god weapons degrade quickly in this game. My starting dagger actually broke before I reached the hub zone.
-Why does the blacksmith sell a finite number of titanite shards. Auuugh. I hope vendor inventories restock periodically or something.
-I found a regeneration ring but the item description makes me afraid to use it. Like it'll break or something.
-My starting gift was the petrified lump. Because always pick the most useless starting gift.
-One of the pre-order DLC weapons is a dead baby club. Like seriously straight up dead baby club.
-The global death counter is great.
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Bravely Default: Up to chapter 5 now. I've nothing to add about the gameplay mechanics to date, so instead here's some comments on the classes I've used significantly up through the end of C4. Right before the point of no return I did some level grinding for the Vampire quest dragons so my PCs could survive without relying completely on Utsesumi, so that feels like a good cutoff point for commenting.
Monk: Main heavyhitter earlygame, faded for a while due to Knuckles not upgrading much and then made a bit of a comeback when I got the Diamond Staff near the Fire Temple (S rank in Staff actually matters for once!). Skillset isn't the greatest, but Invigorate/Hidden Dragon/Qigong Wave all got decent amount of use againt bosses, while Pressure Point helped to OHKO some grunts who counter phyiscals. HP+10% and P Atk+10% have gotten a low of use as fillerish abilities.
White Mage: Main healer class in a game where MT healing is priceless, so it's pretty much the MVP class by default. Widen Area means it's not the only game in town, but it's definately the main one. Angelic Ward is a pretty nice support ability for 1 SP, the others I haven't gotten much use out of.
Black Mage: Hitting lots of weaknesses is nice and bypassing physical counters is situationally all-important, but I didn't feel like relying heavily on MP for randoms this run so I hybridized my WM and used attack magic sparingly with her instead of running someone as a primary attack mage; I'll have to give that a real shot if I even replay BD. Having passable offense in a pinch on my fourth PC was still important for one-rounding a number of randoms, plus the obvious counter-bypassing importance, so I still felt like I got a lot more milage out of BM than, say, Knight, which I ditched as soon as I got Spellfencer.
Knight: Two-Handed is practically free and I eventually got it on 3 separate PCs at separate points in time. Didn't use the class much otherwise, though.
Thief: I mainly used this for the A rank in Bows, to take advantage of Angel Bow ASAP. Never got much use out of steal/mug, but life steal was nice. Raid was kinda pointless until I got Crescent Moon; pumping out one more MT attack on every First Strike/+1 BP encounter was nice.
Spellfencer: FF5 Mystic Knight with an easier time applying elemental weakness vs randoms thanks to Brave. Drain and Sleep sword have their uses as well, and I like the balanced stats, at least for now. My personal favorite class to use to date.
Valkyrie: A class built around Jump, which always feel like a mixed bag in a fairly balanced team. All-jump team sounds like it might be fun (especially with Hasten World from Time Mage), but definately isn't something I'll go for on an initial playthrough. Crescent Moon, on the other hand, is great for pretty much any physical attacker, and singlehandedly justified running Acrobatics as a secondary skillset at times. Judgment is terrible for long term BP management but OHKOing randoms with frontloaded damage is nice at times, and Spirit Barrier is nice if you don't need the MP for something like Sword Magic and Qigong Wave.
Ninja: Great damage against non-tanky enemies and Utsusemi-Transience is amazing vs physical bosses, especially with Turn Tables from Red Mage and Comeback Kid thrown in for fun. Kairai is another option for all-ST bosses if you have a good tank to redirect everything to, but MT bosses are usually the real threat so it's not that great in practice. Frenetic Fighting sounds amazing on paper, but only at much higher levels than I'm at currently.
Spiritmaster: Holy One is outstanding, skyrocketing the MP efficiency of your healing for a penalty that's meaningless for most healers. The support moves like Fairy Ward and Greater Spirit Ward are really good as well, although the BP costs are generally too high to be abusive without BP pumping party setups that I don't have yet.
Templar: Too slow to be anything more than mediocre at damage, but the tanking capabilities are fantastic. Some of the offensive skills look like they'd be pretty nice if carried over to classes that aren't so dog slow, but with Dark Knight just obtained I have much more abusive combos on-paper to try out first.
Lots and lots of interesting classes and class combos that I haven't had a chance to try out yet. Salve-Maker looks especially potent on-paper, I just didn't feel like bothering with item management this run. Not sure how the rest of the game will fare, but I'm definately interested in replaying the first four chapters at least to try out some of the stuff I didn't use this time.
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Soul Silver: Oh, right, Fireblast is storebought *gets for Magmar, proceeds to massacre Jasmine*
Ok, actually, Crocanaw did kill the Steelix, in an amusing method. Surf twice, Sitrus Berry kicks in, and pushes Steelix into that really sweet range of still KO-able by Surf, but too high to consider using a Hyper Potion or whatever, so yeah, victory or something.
Time for the epic section that is...the Team Rocket stuff all the way up to Gym 8, where enemy levels are laughably bad, whoo?
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(BD gameplay spoilers)
Mephilia's pet archer can be controlled be sleep (which I don't consider particularly obscure because hey those are randoms she is summoning, and non-undead randoms tend to be uniformly status-vulnerable), and there are storebought confuse blockers as well if Chaos Arrow is really ruining your day. While she is certainly a brutal fight on hard, I found her quite fair and not at all luck-reliant at all once I refined my strategy, in no large part because her own turns are completely non-random. Actually that's somewhat my experience with Bravely Default hard mode in general so far, the right strategy should remove all luck (and this is ignoring Norende).
Meanwhile I'm in Chapter 3. JP gains seem to have spiked up, which is kinda nice... let me grab Staff Lore for my main fighter since the best double-grippable weapon at the moment is a staff. Also I think I know what five classes I will be getting this chapter. And Ringabel = Alternis is seemingly confirmed, but my initial guess was a bit off.
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Dark Souls 2: Beat the Last Giant. Pretty minimal deaths so far. The weapon durability thing came as a huge shock. Holy hell weapons wear out now.
Started soldier, also with Petrified Lump. Managed to get a Bastard Sword off one of the hollow soldiers, so woo.
No more dodge frames on rolls is REALLY throwing me off. Enemies are kind of interesting. Their individual hits don't seem too bad for the most part, but getting caught by certain attacks results in a LOT of damage as they combo you or knock you down or something.
Consumables are definitely super helpful, but now with three Estus flasks things are improving. Kinda burned through most of my Lifegems already, but they seem common enough as I've found a bunch more.
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Meanwhile I'm in Chapter 3. JP gains seem to have spiked up, which is kinda nice... let me grab Staff Lore for my main fighter since the best double-grippable weapon at the moment is a staff. Also I think I know what five classes I will be getting this chapter.
JP gain spikes are pretty regular (and pretty huge!) in BD so far. This is particularly nice later on because all class JP requirements are uniformly the same. I'm at the end of C4 and the typical JP spill from a single random battle ranges from 200 to 300 - more if you're good at ending fights fast and efficiently. 300 JP jumps you straight from L1 to L4 within a -single- fight, for instance. It keeps job shuffling viable throughout.
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Dark Souls 2: OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG From you beautiful bastards you take my everything.
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Dark Souls 2: Beat the Last Giant. Pretty minimal deaths so far. The weapon durability thing came as a huge shock. Holy hell weapons wear out now.
It's crazy how quickly this happens. Combined with the three weapon slots, I am guessing the intent was to have the player rely on a broader array of weapons. But that runs afoul of the smith selling finite upgrade materials and my nasty suspicion that we might be looking a recursion of Demon's Souls appalling ore scarcity.
Then there's shields. Most classes don't start with one and I've yet to find one that blocks 100% of physical damage. Add to this the heaviness of starting armor and the implicit suggestion the player will need to carry multiple weapons (just in case) and I can only conclude the devs' intention was for players to try and dodge everything at medium/fat roll speeds. Which is a strange way of trying to upset the previous Dark Souls metagame (a laudable goal in itself, but also something that the changes in stat functions probably would've done anyway).
Listened to the OST in the car to/from work today. Incredibly disappointing. We are in stock Sakuraba territory except he mashes an orchestra instead of an organ. It apes the same basic style as the first game's music, except there's no sense of energy or dynamism to anything (with the notable exception of one direct holdover from DS1). It's like the directors told him, "Hey, we liked what you did in the last game, but can you make it less distinct and tuneful? We want vaguely menacing sounds that will loom blandly in the background and not draw attention in any way." There is nothing like the diversity of moods covered between Sif's theme, Gwyn's, Nito's; here, I cannot distinguish one song from the next. It's depressing to realize that once you've reached the first boss you have already heard everything the game has to communicate aurally, and to know that all I have to look forward to hearing all game is negligibly minor variations on the same combination of strings/tubas/drums/chorus. It saddens me how unmemorable it all is considering it was the soundtrack that made me want to play Dark Souls in the first place.
It is an established fact that I overemphasize the significance of music in games and movies, but it is difficult not to infer that the overall blandness of the soundtrack stems from uninspired source material. It really drives the nail into my developing impression that the game constitutes some longtime From Software staff looking at Dark Souls 1 and saying, "They changed it now it sucks." So they changed it back.
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Dark Souls 2: Beat the Last Giant. Pretty minimal deaths so far. The weapon durability thing came as a huge shock. Holy hell weapons wear out now.
It's crazy how quickly this happens. Combined with the three weapon slots, I am guessing the intent was to have the player rely on a broader array of weapons. But that runs afoul of the smith selling finite upgrade materials and my nasty suspicion that we might be looking a recursion of Demon's Souls appalling ore scarcity.
I will say I haven't had too much trouble since I upgraded to a bastard sword. Weapon generally seems to be living from bonfire to bonfire without too much trouble. Will have to see how that holds up, though.
After talking with a friend, it appears I somehow completely avoided the Pursuer encounter despite being in the right area.
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I found my first 100% shield after the second boss of forest of fallen giants. Another 100% is near the Blue Sentinels.
The songs come across even worse when fighting the bosses. I only heard my OMG boss clearly, everything else was minimalistic background tune.
In other news, the worldwide death counter broke 2,000,000 deaths in one day. That's 83,334 deaths an hour, 1389 deaths a minute, and 23 deaths a second. Dark Souls 2!
Dark Souls 2: Anyway, five bosses dead now: Last Giant, Jackass of the Forest, The Sentinels, OMG and Effortless Garbage. Hopefully I'll have a sixth one down soon enough. Completing the Bell Covenant invasion got me a titanite chunk for my one win. My half-dozen had most end because Poise is garbage now and randomly leaping in another direction than my target when locked on. These controls are so much worse than Dark Souls 1 except for the jumping. My old standby of only bringing my shield up exactly when to block doesn't work because the animation gets locked for way too long after blocking something. I had to switch to shields because the bosses are just unfun and dull frankly. At least summoning is way, way better.
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Listened to the OST in the car to/from work today. Incredibly disappointing. We are in stock Sakuraba territory except he mashes an orchestra instead of an organ. It apes the same basic style as the first game's music, except there's no sense of energy or dynamism to anything (with the notable exception of one direct holdover from DS1). It's like the directors told him, "Hey, we liked what you did in the last game, but can you make it less distinct and tuneful? We want vaguely menacing sounds that will loom blandly in the background and not draw attention in any way." There is nothing like the diversity of moods covered between Sif's theme, Gwyn's, Nito's; here, I cannot distinguish one song from the next. It's depressing to realize that once you've reached the first boss you have already heard everything the game has to communicate aurally, and to know that all I have to look forward to hearing all game is negligibly minor variations on the same combination of strings/tubas/drums/chorus. It saddens me how unmemorable it all is considering it was the soundtrack that made me want to play Dark Souls in the first place.
It is an established fact that I overemphasize the significance of music in games and movies, but it is difficult not to infer that the overall blandness of the soundtrack stems from uninspired source material. It really drives the nail into my developing impression that the game constitutes some longtime From Software staff looking at Dark Souls 1 and saying, "They changed it now it sucks." So they changed it back.
That's a shame about the soundtrack. I'm not a fanof Sakuraba at all, but I felt that Dark Souls really emphasized his strengths as a composer. Shame that the music is more generic. I wouldn't mind bringing back the Demon Souls composer either. A lot of the boss themes in that game reminded me of something you might here in a 1960s Greek/Roman epic movie, but it worked pretty well for the game.
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Sakuraba on sequels "I have to do the same thing again? Zzzzzzzzzzz mode engage"
Pokedudes X - I need to rotate guys more often, I sunk into a team that doesn't evolve and they are all stupid high level. Just beat Fairy gym after spending way too long running around Lumiose City for a few days working at hotel and ranking up price reduction O Power so that I can max out my style and then find out I want to spend half a million dollars on an outfit. #girlproblems
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I heard that weapons all have very low durability but are automatically repaired at bonfires unless broken.
Back to trying to ignore posts.
FF7 Hard: Is the boat the shortest real dungeon in an RPG?
There is a save point.
There is a shop.
There are two different random enemies, that you don't see anywhere else. And three different random battle fomations.
The dungeon is two rooms big including one room you've already visited before. You can go from the savepoint at the beginning to the boss in like 10 seconds and the only thing of note is one little side trip that gets you one item.
Nanaki/Yuffie/Cloud worked very well but now they've unlocked their level 2 limits and those suuuck.
They're all fighter/healer/mages, but Nanaki is the magiest (He gets ALL-POIZN!!), Yuffie is the fighteriest (with auto-haste shoes and a thunder elemental physical) and Cloud is Support/Steal/Sense and stuff. Mostly.
Bosses aren't that good but ATB weirdness and status can make them terrifying. Usually things go well as the team unleashes a barrage of elemental magic on the boss, then the boss uses Stop and kill another PC or something and I spend like 10 turns healing and defending in panic. I sometimes have to kill then revive allies, so the extremely delibitating and long lasting status they have goes away.
Edit: Kaim flashback + Junon = :(
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Dark Souls 2: Anyway, five bosses dead now: Last Giant, Jackass of the Forest, The Sentinels, OMG and Effortless Garbage. Hopefully I'll have a sixth one down soon enough. Completing the Bell Covenant invasion got me a titanite chunk for my one win. My half-dozen had most end because Poise is garbage now and randomly leaping in another direction than my target when locked on. These controls are so much worse than Dark Souls 1 except for the jumping. My old standby of only bringing my shield up exactly when to block doesn't work because the animation gets locked for way too long after blocking something. I had to switch to shields because the bosses are just unfun and dull frankly. At least summoning is way, way better.
The stickiness of the controls is just maddening. How in the world did we get a less polished game when they had such a smooth template for movement and combat in its predecessor? Like, I bought a rapier, right? Because I wanted a backup weapon in case lightning sword broke, and rapier's B-rank in DEX gets me passable damage. I try it out, decide I like the thrusting attack, dump the last available ores (because the blacksmith sells only a finite amount goddammit people fucking really, this shit again?) Then I try it on actual enemies and see it constantly fly like three feet off the mark even locked on. What the frigging christ? I am locked on and facing my target, why are you turning 30 degrees to try and stab that target. And there's all this piddly shit like lock-on staying tagged to dead enemies just a split-second longer than you want it to and augh why. ::effort::
Even the intro! I mean, I don't expect story in these games, right? But at least you knew what you were up against in previous installments, there was some semblance of a task and an ominous presence or four that you were presumably going to have to do something about. DS2 intro is just all, "There was this kingdom and it was ruled by a king. Crazy coincidence, huh? Anyway, that place is all fucked up now and cursed people are drawn to it for some reason. You're Gimbels cursed! So get on that." Why am I even going anywhere? At least some random dude told me to do this specific shit last time!
Okay I'm done complaining for today. Actual game progress stuff: got a pretty good guess what OMG is just based on that one recycled tune in the OST. Accurate?
Anyway, Sentinels are down. Still haven't died in my world! (Phantom deaths: probably a dozen or so. Admittedly I use summoned mode to scout things out once I'm far into a zone and start wondering whether that next fog gate is a boss door or just another area transition). That said: that was a bitch of a fight even with too much grinding behind me, and if not for the explorer bonus of 6x aromatic ooze doubling my damage output, I almost certainly would've failed. I needed every one of those just because difficulty in finding any window to attack (this would've been much easier if the first sentinel hadn't fallen off the damn platform before I could kill it).
I dumped half of my reward on the Fall Control ring (falling damage is really a thing in this game). Fudo, I'm just going to go ahead and ask rather than perform the experiment myself: know if this makes jumping down the pit in Majula safe?
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Heh, El Cid, your thoughts on DS2's soundtrack remind me eerily of mine on DS1's.
More Xenogears!
Hour 24: The party returns to the Ethos HQ so that Billy can file his report and... oh shit stuff is happening! Wandering the halls we learn that someone has ordered a purge of the Ethos. The party guts a few assassins without learning who they are working for. Finally, they reach the mainframe computer of the facility. (And while it sounds odd for a church to have one of these, in fairness the Ethos is the church of technology, more or less.)
We learn several things here, written in Solarian (as a nice touch, Elly has to translate... obviously Citan could too, but well y'know). One, Ethos has been supplying Solaris with much of their salvage, making it clear that they're just another arm of the empire. This pretty much confirms that Solaris has absolutely manipulated both countries and caused their war. We also learn that they've been using the battler data of Kislev and information on the demihumans there as part of their research. And finally we learn that Shakhan is, secretly, still an active agent of Ethos. As Citan says, "the plot thickens", although for Kislev it's really more a form of closure at this point.
The immediate concern is that Ethos is a client organisation of Solaris. Shortly after, Billy's immediate superior, Verlaine, shows up and confirms that Solaris itself is behind the attack on Ethos. It seems that Ethos wasn't a very good little client organisation and was secretly witholding much of their salvaged technology in order to make a stand for world domination, baby. It seems a questionable decision on their part (since how would they reasonably compete with Solaris unless they got one hell of a trump card), but I can still buy it readilly enough as Ethos was powerful enough that some of them probably got too powerhungry. Also, they may have in fact had a trump card, as they had secretly discovered Zeboim, which is pretty much the height of technology in the history of this world.
But too late for them; Solaris figured out their betrayal and has eliminated them. Verlaine blathers for a shocking while for a minor PC, revealing his disgust for Ethos, which in a bit of a real world callback, had sheilded child-molesting priests. And further, we learn that the leader of the Solarians who are purging the church is none other than Bishop Stone, Billy's mentor. Swerve. We find this out because he murders his underling Verlaine for talking too much, just to establish that yes this guy is a colossal dick.
Stone goes on to talk about how faith is all a big lie and that Billy should feel bad. He also reveals he has more terrible things to tell Billy but is too big a jerk to say now. Billy in general is obviously incredibly shaken by this and I have a hard time not feeling for him. Despite some bad things that Ethos was involved in, Billy was a true believer, and from the dying cries of some of the people you find in the church, he was far from alone. As hard as the game is on the church here, it at least paints a pretty glowing picture of faith itself, which is a little relieving (especially in contrast to the bungling Xenosaga has of the issue) and makes sense in the context of Japanese approach to such things.
Jessie also shows up. It's revealed that Stone is his "rival" though not really more than that yet. Needless to say, Jessie turns out to be on the side of good, opposed to the evil Solarian agents of Ethos. At this point Stone decides that maybe fighting a whole lot of people at once is a bad idea so he runs away in a giant, named gear. I'm sure we won't have to fight that soon!
Meanwhile, things are going from bad to worse, as Solaris makes an overt attack on the Thames. We see the Gazel ordering it, and speaking their thoughts on the Ethos (a bunch of foolish greedy mortals... of course the Gazel want the things they want but they have GOOD REASONS trust them). We also meet Krelian, who is established as man extremely interested in the technology of Zeboim. For now, he seems a decidely evil (he orders reapers to be released on the Thames as part of the attack) but also competent, in a bit of a contrast to Ramsus. I actually quite like him in his early scenes; too bad with the direction they end up going with him.
Fortunately, though, Krelian isn't too interested in destroying the Thames fleet, just crippling it so it can't compete with his salvage operation in Zeboim. We learn that Ethos had recently ordered them to go participate in the slavage of Zeboim, so I guess Krelian really doesn't like competition. Fair enough, you dick.
The party decides that it wants what Solaris wants, and so heads for Zeboim. En route, we get a scene between Grahf and Miang, who apparently don't want to be outdone by the appearance of this new villain. Miang reveals that there is something in Zeboim which both Grahf and Miang need (i.e. nanotechnology), and entreats him to go get it. This line is interesting. Miang wants the nanomachine colony because it is part of the plan to get Deus operational again (same reason Krelian does), but Grahf? Though it's never stated and not explored further, I have to imagine that he has inherited memories of one of his past selves... the father of Emeralda. And doesn't want to see that handed over. Though I'm not certain how his motive syncs up with Miang's in this case. Regardless, he too heads for Zeboim...
Hours 25-26: Into Zeboim. I take Billy and Elly with me, which matters for story reasons. As advertised, Zeboium is a ruined city, although for now we only explore a research lab, after one view of the city. Visually they probably could have done a better job of presenting this, but so it goes.
This is really more of a gameplay section, despite the significance of the location; Zeboim is probably the largest on-foot dungeon thus far in the game, and features two of the game's more competent on-foot boss fights (though this isn't really saying much). The first is against Tolone and Seraphita. They come across as comic relief bosses: Seraphita remarks on Tolone's quick thinking due to her "gin and tonic futon brain" while Tolone just hopes some of the game doesn't get in trouble for cribbing things from "Star Trech". That said Elly identifies them as dangerous, elite fighters, and they do in fact live up to that pretty well.
Also interesting to note, when Elly arrives at the core of the research lab, she starts acting really weird, both remembering the password to get in and freaking out about blood and death. The game designers definitely want us to feel the magnitude of what is here, even though it's not obvious for now, as it's just... a green-haired girl who for now doesn't even appear to be conscious. Stone shows up and reveals that she is a nanomachine. He also has some unique dialogue with Billy here. Interestingly he's still quite interested in getting Billy on his side and tries to convince him that what Solaris is doing is just. He uses some arguments based on the Ethos creed that "only the chosen will be saved". Billy does the perfect choir boy equivalent of flipping him off, saying that he believes everyone should have a chance of becoming "the chosen" through faith, not just Stone and his buddies. Unfortunately, Stone still escapes (again!) with Emeralda because Tolone and Seraphita cover his retreat. They reveal that they don't give a shit about Stone or his boss Krelian, but that they're loyal to Ramsus.
Meanwhile, Fei wakes up, and we get a cutscene of two people looking like Fei and Elly in Zeboim, as soldiers besiege their lab, and the Elly lookalike talks about not handing her child over. Creepy scenes occur with a creepy child appearing to awake and the cross neckalce. We've seen this before and it's never good...
The party chases Stone all the way out of the research facility and back into the city, catching up with him there. But oh shit, Id shows up! This is actually the first time he gives his name. He insists Stone return the nanomachine colony. But for some reason, rather than fight Stone, he fights the party (at least he is nice enough to get out of his gear first). This never made sense to me and still doesn't! Needless to say Stone escapes after the fight (for a third time!). The fight itself is interrupted as Wiseman shows up and engages with Id, so the party can escape chasing after Stone once more, but too late...
The previous scene offered yet more evidence for Fei = Id, which anyone more savvy than younger me who first played the game should really have picked up by this scene if not previously, but it's also noteworthy for the first solid Wiseman = Grahf evidence. And both have a connection to Emeralda... the parallels are certainly increasing!
Hour 27: The party returns to the Yggdrasil, and finds Fei in the gear hangar. Interesting! Of course it's brushed off as Fei just walking around confused shortly after awakening.
Meanwhile, after Stone has dogged our steps and generally been a big ol' dick, it's time for the throwdown with him. Okay, cool, 'sup Stone... wait. Wait wait wait.
What the FUCK happened to your face, bro? I mean Grahf even shows up and grants him "the power" a moment after his appearance (this time, it manifests as an invicible barrier instead of the power boost it was for Vanderkaum) but that's not nearly as weird as Stone's face.
He says he got a new body. I guess it... makes him better at piloting gears? Something? I dunno man, Stone seemed kinda sane if very evil, now he just comes across as weird as fuck. His personality's not much different, though. He finally tells Billy the secret he was holding: that reapers are in fact just humans which Solaris has modified with experiments (which, incidentally, were homeless humans Billy had "rescued" and sent into Ethos care)... so in fact Billy has been killing humans all this time! Ha-HA! Stone furthermore reveals that he always desired Billy's mother until she was "dirtied" by Jesiah, and that the reason he adopted and raised Billy was to make him suffer by having a pious, kind man like him butcher all those reapers HUMANS! Oh Stone, you charmer.
Jessie shows up and actually does a pretty good job of cheering Billy up, pointing out that in a way he was "saving" the reapers, who lived in agony and could only find release in death. He also rides a mech which turns into a gun which Billy fires... and apparently Jessie is in the bullet, killing him! Whoa. Citan tries to warn him but does so only just too late. Fortunately, the attack destroys Stone's barrier, so the party can take him out. Stone becomes the first actually important (if secondary) villain to bite the dust. I guess he was only really a villain for less than 3 hours, but he was a memorable one.
The party does a sendoff for Jessie... which Jessie breaks up by showing up still alive. Billy gained the ability to use that attack as often as he wants! Well I guess given his opinion of his dad, maybe he won't feel so bad about doing so.
At this point, the party needs a new objective, and it gets one. Jessie finally reveals why he's been away all this time... he learned about the reaper experiments (and reveals Krelian to be their author) and its connection to Ethos. He also reveals that the key scientist who participated in the plan sent his daughter and gear away with information on the project, so he spent all this time trying to track her down. ... A bit weird but it wouldn't be Jessie if it didn't kind of rub me the wrong way. Anyway, he reveals that he believes that girl is in Shevat. Well, what isn't at this point?
A Shevat agent who had been captured by Ethos and saved during the crisis now pipes up, confirming the presence of the girl, Maria, but not knowing much more... and in particular, not knowing how to get back to Shevat herself. (Inconvient...) She suggests climbing the Tower of Babel, which is where Shevat used to be located and still -maybe- has the ability to communicate with it. Quite a climb for a maybe, but a now-healthy Fei is psyched to go to Shevat and learn more about himself, and it's not like they have anything better to do. So off they go. Terrible platforming awaits!
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The stickiness of the controls is just maddening. How in the world did we get a less polished game when they had such a smooth template for movement and combat in its predecessor? Like, I bought a rapier, right? Because I wanted a backup weapon in case lightning sword broke, and rapier's B-rank in DEX gets me passable damage. I try it out, decide I like the thrusting attack, dump the last available ores (because the blacksmith sells only a finite amount goddammit people fucking really, this shit again?) Then I try it on actual enemies and see it constantly fly like three feet off the mark even locked on. What the frigging christ? I am locked on and facing my target, why are you turning 30 degrees to try and stab that target. And there's all this piddly shit like lock-on staying tagged to dead enemies just a split-second longer than you want it to and augh why. ::effort::
The ores still haven't replenished by my point; though a covenant dude sells the lightning ore unlimited. Just need to find out where to turn weapons lightning to make that usable!
The lock-on is at its absolute worst when you're using a big honking two-hander and missing means a gigantic recovery.
Even the intro! I mean, I don't expect story in these games, right? But at least you knew what you were up against in previous installments, there was some semblance of a task and an ominous presence or four that you were presumably going to have to do something about. DS2 intro is just all, "There was this kingdom and it was ruled by a king. Crazy coincidence, huh? Anyway, that place is all fucked up now and cursed people are drawn to it for some reason. You're Gimbels cursed! So get on that." Why am I even going anywhere? At least some random dude told me to do this specific shit last time!
Emerald Herald says you should meet the king but that's about it.
Okay I'm done complaining for today. Actual game progress stuff: got a pretty good guess what OMG is just based on that one recycled tune in the OST. Accurate?
OMG uses a new song. I think I know where the recycle is at though. Gonna try it tomorrow because it's one of only two paths left open to me at the moment and both scare me.
Anyway, Sentinels are down. Still haven't died in my world! (Phantom deaths: probably a dozen or so. Admittedly I use summoned mode to scout things out once I'm far into a zone and start wondering whether that next fog gate is a boss door or just another area transition). That said: that was a bitch of a fight even with too much grinding behind me, and if not for the explorer bonus of 6x aromatic ooze doubling my damage output, I almost certainly would've failed. I needed every one of those just because difficulty in finding any window to attack (this would've been much easier if the first sentinel hadn't fallen off the damn platform before I could kill it).
You're on track to get the ring reward for no deaths in a playthrough!
I dumped half of my reward on the Fall Control ring (falling damage is really a thing in this game). Fudo, I'm just going to go ahead and ask rather than perform the experiment myself: know if this makes jumping down the pit in Majula safe?
Yeah, just did it myself recently. Now, is whatever's in the pit safe? That's for you to discover Mwahahahahaha.
Wordwide Death Counter Day 2: 5.4 million.
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I always liked Id's dialogue in that scene. XG is occasionally too wordy and bland for its own good, so Id was short and to the point. "You have something that's mine... give it back." That said...
But for some reason, rather than fight Stone, he fights the party (at least he is nice enough to get out of his gear first). This never made sense to me and still doesn't! Needless to say Stone escapes after the fight (for a third time!). The fight itself is interrupted as Wiseman shows up and engages with Id, so the party can escape chasing after Stone once more, but too late...
I just watched the scene again ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cirQD3cIWa8 ). Yeah the fight doesn't make tons of sense, but they don't even set it up, it just goes to fighting - so it's plausible to even assume that Citan is picking the fight? Or that Id thinks he's such a badass he can handle both sides at once. In fairness, Wiseman interrupts, then Stone runs off - it's implied I guess that after some warm-up fisticuffs with the party, Id would probably have smashed up Stone and taken Emeralda if Wiseman hadn't been there to intervene. Anyway, good stuff.
The Jessie Cannon twist was really stupid and blatantly a writer going "we need a fake heroic sacrifice to show Jessie's a good guy and I love giant robot special attacks so let's combine them nonsensically" bit, but it also doesn't really matter or is ever brought up again, so I'll let XG off the hook on that one.
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Dark Souls 2: Started. Deprived/No Gift/Not using the DLC items because this is Frue Dark Souls. I smash things like Hulk with my unbeatable two-handed fist technique.
Highlight so far: crawled into a coffin and grew breasts.
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You're on track to get the ring reward for no deaths in a playthrough!
Are you kidding. That's a real thing? I did die to dogs in Limbo once pre-chargen, so that's probably already out. The important thing for my priorities was that I haven't died while human (because that means I still have full max HP goddammit people why did you have to pull this punitive crap again again).
I dumped half of my reward on the Fall Control ring (falling damage is really a thing in this game). Fudo, I'm just going to go ahead and ask rather than perform the experiment myself: know if this makes jumping down the pit in Majula safe?
Yeah, just did it myself recently. Now, is whatever's in the pit safe? That's for you to discover Mwahahahahaha.
I'm sure that can't end badly considering I almost died to the pigs hanging around the pit when I first arrived in Majula. (Not badass mecha boar, you guys. Regular runty little piglets. That is how bad dagger and starting explorer stats are).
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Dark Souls 2: Started. Deprived/No Gift/Not using the DLC items because this is Frue Dark Souls. I smash things like Hulk with my unbeatable two-handed fist technique.
Highlight so far: crawled into a coffin and grew breasts.
So that's how I suddenly became a woman!
You're on track to get the ring reward for no deaths in a playthrough!
Are you kidding. That's a real thing? I did die to dogs in Limbo once pre-chargen, so that's probably already out. The important thing for my priorities was that I haven't died while human (because that means I still have full max HP goddammit people why did you have to pull this punitive crap again again).
There's also a ring for not using bonfires~ I mean, both of these are third-hand information but it's so DARK SOULS it might be true.
I dumped half of my reward on the Fall Control ring (falling damage is really a thing in this game). Fudo, I'm just going to go ahead and ask rather than perform the experiment myself: know if this makes jumping down the pit in Majula safe?
Yeah, just did it myself recently. Now, is whatever's in the pit safe? That's for you to discover Mwahahahahaha.
I'm sure that can't end badly considering I almost died to the pigs hanging around the pit when I first arrived in Majula. (Not badass mecha boar, you guys. Regular runty little piglets. That is how bad dagger and starting explorer stats are).
Oh no, those pigs are deadly for anyone! They have like, 700 HP.
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I'm sure that can't end badly considering I almost died to the pigs hanging around the pit when I first arrived in Majula. (Not badass mecha boar, you guys. Regular runty little piglets. That is how bad dagger and starting explorer stats are).
Were still a threat after leveling and while using a bastard sword.
Those baby pigs are just straight up dangerous.
Dark Souls 2: Pursuer was a mother fucker and took me a fair few more tries than it should have. First few deaths were adjusting to the roll changes fully (which is to say making sure I rolled towards his shield when he attacked). After that it was just a matter of not getting clipped. The windows to heal in that fight are fairly narrow and a little hard to predict.
Up to the Ruin Sentinels who are proving to be absolute mother fuckers as well. Top platform is so goddamn narrow. Fighting two of them at once is awful. They do so much damage. Etc.
That said, if you'd just waited, Cid, the first one will jump back up on the platform. Also smash you with its warhammer while doing so.
I kinda feel like I must have options for other places to go and I'm just being really stupid about missing a path somewhere. Oh well. Wandered back around the Forest of the Giants and discovered Soldier's Rest. Kinda spinning my wheels to level/find some more gear.
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Boss durability seems to increase most dramatically with multiple players involved. Like I did twice the damage vs Sentinels with regular rapier pokes solo then I did supporting other people as a phantom.
What is Soldier's Rest even for? I stopped in there and didn't see any obvious exits so just warped back out. What in the hell putting a bonfire someplace where you'll get instantly jacked by multiple Jim Henson's Havel Babies just walking out the door.
Leadup to the boss in Sinner's Rise looked fucking awful from what I saw as a summon last night, kinda inclined to poke around for somewhere else to explore. I'm also gonna head back to Limbo and see what I can get out of Snuggly since this ore scarcity crap is seriously pissing me off. Want to experiment with other weapons--SMAAASH worked really well in Demon's Souls the one time I played it and this is basically Demon's Souls 2 so maybe I want to give greatswords a try--but there's no point because I already know they'll do less damage than what I have just by virtue of being unupgraded (and unable to be upgraded because of artificial resource scarcity). It makes experimentation impractical, which is just a dumb design decision in pretty much any context.
I must say, though, that the rapidity of chained bowfire is most gratifying. Wonder how archer mode would work out, I should go upgrade my bow OH GOD DAMMIT
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Not just boss health but their defenses as well. Split damage weapons will do like, half the damage to a phantomed boss.
Still haven't found a unlimited purchasable source of Titanite Shards and they've stopped popping up in the "world" as well. Don't think I ever saw them drop from enemies either.
Sinner's Rise is awful(SHOCK!) but it has nothing on what's below.
Dark Souls 2: Two more bosses done. Like I suspected, the returning OST boss was one of them, and the second boss I'd actually call good. Followed by the third in Grave of Saints! Then the boss in Black Gulch reminded me what pure bullshit is. All-or-nothing! 10,000 health against 300 damage a swing! Fuck you dad! Most tedious goddamn run over in any boss in any of the three games god dammit. Not even counting the Valley of Defilement 3.0/Blighttown 2.0 before Black Gulch.
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What is Soldier's Rest even for? I stopped in there and didn't see any obvious exits so just warped back out. What in the hell putting a bonfire someplace where you'll get instantly jacked by multiple Jim Henson's Havel Babies just walking out the door.
In the room next to the bonfire is a dead giant tree thing that can be interacted with. What you can do with it, I'm unsure (all it did was tell me that it was once a giant or something like that), but I assume something can be done with it.
While I'm asking though. Is there another path I can follow, or do I need to go Forest of Giants -> Lost Bastille?
Also is there a source of Effigies/humanization somewhere?
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FF7 Hard: Cosmo Canyon and Cloud+Yuffie already have their L3. No grinding but I had to backtrack in two dungeons due to a lack of tents. Yep.
Gi Nattak's pretty cool with this patch.
Yuffie is the best. She's all "This place sucks. When are we going to find new materias?" all the time while everybody else is brooding, and I can't find myself ever disagreeing with her.
The game's explanations for having only 3 characters in the team all the time are getting flimsier by the minute and it's pretty charming. "Huuuh there are roughly only three places in this room? Bring three people"
Bungenhagen basically just said "Cloud, could you accompany Nanaki to that dangerous place I want to show you. Also bring one other person I guess?"
I named Red 13 Nanaki, making the game more surreal than it already is. "Nanaki is Nanaki??"
If I ever replay FF8 or something I PROMISE I'll call every character "Malkovich".
I'll disagree with everybody:
I vaguely remembered disliking FF7's music and can now say it's downright unpleasant. (Boss music excluded) And not the good kind of unpleasant.
I'm pretty sure the entire soundtrack sounds to me just like Honeybee Manor sounds to those who like it. (the soundtrack) Basically, going back to these early-PSX-only-horn-things is not unlike going back to these early-PSX-only-polygonal characters. (Without the charm)
The world map theme is the worst since there's that piano on top of the PSX instruments.
So guys I know nothing about playing music. How do you call those piano double-notes that are all over the FF7 world map theme and Gwyn's theme in Dark Souls? I feel these exist to add some poignancy but have the opposite effect on me.
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What is Soldier's Rest even for? I stopped in there and didn't see any obvious exits so just warped back out. What in the hell putting a bonfire someplace where you'll get instantly jacked by multiple Jim Henson's Havel Babies just walking out the door.
In the room next to the bonfire is a dead giant tree thing that can be interacted with. What you can do with it, I'm unsure (all it did was tell me that it was once a giant or something like that), but I assume something can be done with it.
While I'm asking though. Is there another path I can follow, or do I need to go Forest of Giants -> Lost Bastille?
Also is there a source of Effigies/humanization somewhere?
The other option(and the one the game wants you to follow apparently) is going to Hiede's Tower of Flame after completing the Forest.
I think I had an effigy drop from a dog in Bastille but that's it for renewable right now.
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I named Red 13 Nanaki, making the game more surreal than it already is. "Nanaki is Nanaki??"
If I ever replay FF8 or something I PROMISE I'll call every character "Malkovich".
Marry me <3
I'll disagree with everybody:
I vaguely remembered disliking FF7's music and can now say it's downright unpleasant. (Boss music excluded) And not the good kind of unpleasant.
I'm pretty sure the entire soundtrack sounds to me just like Honeybee Manor sounds to those who like it. (the soundtrack) Basically, going back to these early-PSX-only-horn-things is not unlike going back to these early-PSX-only-polygonal characters. (Without the charm)
The world map theme is the worst since there's that piano on top of the PSX instruments.
So guys I know nothing about playing music. How do you call those piano double-notes that are all over the FF7 world map theme and Gwyn's theme in Dark Souls? I feel these exist to add some poignancy but have the opposite effect on me.
You aren't wrong on the instrumentation in FF7 OST grating as fuck. All those horns because 16 Bit era let them use a bunch more instruments. Unfortunately it uses Midi quality music so the instrument choices are still not a huge pool and the ones that they can pick are fucking shite. FF7 music is significantly improved with a full orchestra (like FFX is better the same or on the Piano album).
I forget the FF7 world map theme and don't have Dark Souls stuff. If you are talking two notes played at the same time that would be a chord. If it is two notes in quick succession that are short and sharp it is staccato or is just a shorter note of some kind.
Don't get too wrapped up in specific terminology though. "Sounds like" is normally good enough (if people know the source obviously...)
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Amusing thing about Elfboy's write up is I REALLY didn't remember Stone's character AT ALL. Like, I can't even picture the guy in my head or remember anything the dude did.
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What is Soldier's Rest even for? I stopped in there and didn't see any obvious exits so just warped back out. What in the hell putting a bonfire someplace where you'll get instantly jacked by multiple Jim Henson's Havel Babies just walking out the door.
In the room next to the bonfire is a dead giant tree thing that can be interacted with. What you can do with it, I'm unsure (all it did was tell me that it was once a giant or something like that), but I assume something can be done with it.
While I'm asking though. Is there another path I can follow, or do I need to go Forest of Giants -> Lost Bastille?
Also is there a source of Effigies/humanization somewhere?
I'm pretty sure one of the starting gifts was like seed of giant tree or something like that? Guessing this is what's needed there. That's not the first time a tree has had an interaction point I couldn't do anything with (there was one nearby white soapstone guy, too, in the branch just before the first Havel baby). My starting gift turned out to be a petrified dragon bone, thanks birdbrains. Also picked up my original bloodstain from dog mauling while I was down there. Sixty souls, woohoo!
Heide's Tower of Flame is a thing, yes. It's a branch off of Majula. Down that descending stairway, poke around the dead end until you find a pull-chain on the wall. Opens up a new area. If you've been spending time in the Bastile and level grinding, Heide's should be cake by now. It seemed pretty clearly to have been statted out for a lower level player than I am by now.
Speaking of, that's what I did today. O-man's seen better days, and I can only presume his neighbor was Effortless Trash (I took no damage against the latter). Then it was time for PIRATES. I would also recommend poking around down there, Andy, found my first proper greatsword. It is behind the most heinous ambush I have seen all game however. Johnny Longhands is sick of all the jokes about his gigantic hand, the first such incident occurred in 1976 when--okay that's pretty squarely my least favorite enemy in the game so far. They blend into the scenery so well. Extremely glad I packed a bow and tossed my last shards to upgrade it to +3, snipers everywhere and I'm getting a lot of mileage out of even close-range shooting now.
Good loot down there, got a nifty halberd (that is currently too heavy for my build) and an estus upgrade (proper +1 boost, not shard). Also a sorcery trainer if that's your thing. No Man's Wharf is the longest run I've seen without a bonfire though, and even the shortcut is after a whole lot of work. And poison is fucking brutal now you guys. I'm not even properly sure how to move on from the area. There's a deadend pier with a ship at the tail end of the place, and I can only presume this links up to the one at the bottom of the Bastile (I have assisted hosts that were clearly ascending from the base instead of starting from the Sentinels and moving down) but I see no way to activate it. Weird.
Anyway, I should have stopped for the night right there, but feeling all smug after making it human through repeated Johnny Longhands ambushes with a clean bill of health, I recalled there was a bit by the second forest bonfire I hadn't cleared. Jump across gap, get item, descend, oh hey it's a cave. So that's where the salamander lives! Experiment a little, think I've found a spot where I can shoot him but the fireballs will impact the ceiling, set down roots and start firing. Then he decides that in fact he can hit me there, and proceeds to do so four times. I figured after all this time the first proper death would be a stupid one. And after all that there was just a stupid firesword in there!
Effigies are indeed in perilously short supply. My brother informs me that completing tasks for hosts can make you human again, but after just now clearing the Sentinels twice in phantom mode and remaining undead, I am not in a position to confirm this. I dunno, maybe small soapstone tasks? I've not actually used that one yet. Re: Sentinels, incidentally, turns out there's an NPC phantom in one of the cells outside the fog gate. Sorcerer with what appears to be Soul Spear, rips them apart pretty badly if you can keep the heat off her.
I am actually enjoying the game in spite of all my bitching. I'm not near as impressed as I wanted to be and the regressive design elements remain regrettable. But you know, me and exploring. That's enough to keep me going.
Anywho, it's either Sinner's Rise or the pit for me next. I will say...the pit, since I'm not even able to unlock the bonfire just outside of Sinner's Rise yet and fuuuuck explodyface curse zombies. Also, ridiculous double-sword acquired. So that's a thing.
EDIT: anybody know what having your messages rated does for you, if anything? This one ambush message I dropped in the Bastile has been rated like thirty times today and the notification freaks me out every time. I'm used to there being an invader or something when a message pops up like that! (Have not been invaded at all yet, thankfully. And unsurprisingly since likely the Darkwraith analogue hasn't been broadly discovered yet.)
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Oh wow. I had been down there a few times and just missed the chain every time.
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Ditto. My brother pointed it out to me.
I mean to not read much about stuff I haven't encountered yet
Amazing how quickly that sentiment became obsolete.
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DARK SOULS 2!: The Giant Tree Starting Gift is an item that makes enemies attack PVP invaders. Apparently those giant trees spawn them? I tried looking for any fruit hanging on its branches and found nothing.
OMG-Man and Effortless Trash are bingo. Former's bout the only half-decent track I've heard beyond the returner.
Poison is now basiclly toxic. Wait until later mwhahahahaha. Anyway, at the very peak of NMW is a bell that'll bring the ship in closer for the boss fight. The NMW link to the Bastille just leads to that gate over by MacDuff, so it's all sorts of irrelevant beyond one nifty item.
Completing a summoning seems to randomly turn you human. Like, I initially thought it reversed Hollowing by one level but it doesn't. I just popped back to human after helping sometimes. Also I have 33 Effigies so... something. I think just getting gray-phantom summoned turns straight human as well? But I got like seven gray summons in a row so it's hard to tell.
Don't go into the pit. It's a billion times worse than exploding zombies. Not even kidding.
Rated messages don't seem to do anything I can tell. Both times I stepped into gray phantom zones I got invaded so....
Anyway on a progress note, finished off the boss in Black Gulch. Turns out the path I kept ignoring had a bonfire that dropped me right outside the door. So those actual hours spent getting back to the door were even more wasted than usual! Since I wasn't torturing myself with uselessness beforehand it only took three tries before I iced the bastard. After that I got an unpetrify dudes item and used it on the dude in the Bastille. He sells the Boss Soul weapons! For really cheap! And he vanished when I used the bonfire just like the miracle lady!
Ugh, whatever, Shaded Woods go. Cool, like, four new rings out of this. Another completely "HUH?" boss followed by some weird, weird area then then a meet and greet with the first enemies I recall dropping Titanite Shards. Farm here later future me. Another.... uhhh... "Boss" after that. Then more of the joys of playing bowman.
World Death Counter Day 3: 12.7 million. YIKES! What the hell happened today!?
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Bravely Default - Also playing this. Normal mode. Currently a bit into Chapter 5. Pretty happy with the difficulty. I've unlocked a lot of Norende stuff but haven't actually used any of it besides the special moves and some components, so I've just been using storebought/found equipment. Obviously no friend summons or anything either.
Current Setups
Agnes - Templar/White Mage
Tiz - Summoner/Time Mage
Ringabel - Salve Maker/Performer
Edea - Valkyrie/Pirate
Templar is a solid enough class. You can't really do much damage with it without sacrificing your defense, which is kind of the point of the class, though. (Disclaimer: Only job level 10 currently), using it with Healing Lore and a solid mind stat makes it a good bulky healer, though.
Summoner I think is underestimated. It's quite strong, and MT helps quite a bit in some fights. I wanted to abuse the Arcanist's Zero, since all of its spells MP costs end in multiples of 10, but the classes passive MP restore ruined that plan. Still not sure on a subjob. Have Time Mage for now. It's fine. Something else might work better.
Salve Maker is great. I haven't looked up a list of mixes but this game is actually nice and lets you know what the mixes will be before you confirm. Some simple ones have been very useful - Quarter Elixir is cheap and an excellent HP/MP heal, and Resurrect is a revive clone. Giving an enemy an elemental weakness helps Summoners damage, also. That's not mentioning Widen Item. Speaking of helping summoners damage, Performer's skills are almost all useful. Kind of wish he could do some damage, though, so I might rethink things.
Valkyrie is solid enough as a main. It has a decent passive, can equip armor, and basically carries around the Pirate debuff/Double Damage skillset. I use High Jump once in a while, and Spirit Barrier has helped a fair bit when a boss is charging up something dangerous. Good physical damage.
I've dropped a few classes that I tried but I probably didn't give them a fair enough chance to really review them, at least not yet.
Find this team to be working pretty well but there is room for experimentation of course. Difficulty has been solid, no complaints. Story has been alright. Interested in seeing where it goes from now, anyway, and the journal is fun to thumb through once in a while.
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Dark Souls 2: Wow. Heide direction is way better. Beat both bosses there. Surprise cameo boss was a surprise. Also cleared No Man's Wharf.
Bosses are weird in this game. Most of what I've fought have felt more like mini-bosses than actual bosses. This is actually a pretty big departure from both Demon's and Dark Souls
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Fudo: Gray phantom, what?
I am guessing the upsurge in deaths was a wave of players less obsessive and rapid in their progress than us bashing their heads against the Sentinels. Seems to be the fight everyone loves to hate (and certainly the only one that's scared me so far).
And aw god, really? I have to climb all the way back up NMW because I overlooked a goddamn lever or something?
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Yeah, the bosses are really lackluster. Some of them don't even get music! LAME.
Gray Phantoms are area-specific invader phantoms related to covenants. Ones in the Bastille and the others in the pit. Winning these fights gets you loot, the first one giving Titanite Chunks and the second giving out Pharos Lockstones.
Sentinels with summons are at least manageable. Lost Sinner's stupidly giant swing's means she can still hit you even if you're behind her.
Yeah, I missed it my first time through as well. Then so did the guy who summoned me, so I had to lead him up there too.
DARK SOULS 2: More bosses clear. Huntsman's corpse boss was spiffy enough, so was Harvest Valley/Earthen Keep. Harvest Valley has another vendor with 10 titanite shards for sale and enemies with a decent drop chance, go farming. Went and upgraded my miracle chime and bow! The promptly found a better bow with another merchant. Harvest Valley also has 2 unpetrify items so go it.
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Fudo: miracle chick relocates down the stairs in Majula.
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Fudo: miracle chick relocates down the stairs in Majula.
Yeah I know that now. She opens the way to Hunstmans Corpse.
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Botanicula - played through
Short, kinda whimsical I suppose. Somewhat entertaining.
There were several times when there were things you could drag on-screen that the game didn't do a good job of letting me know that you could. Essentially you need to actually try to drag something to see if you can do that, whereas most things are kicked off just by clicking on them. Still didn't hold me up for more than a couple minutes, I guess.
Weren't enough sections where you got to try to use the unique abilities of each character.
Gone Home - played through
Engrossing. Can't think of any specifics to talk about.
Broken Age - played Act 1
Pretty entertaining, definitely left me interested in how all the current mysteries are going to be resolved in Act 2.
Played through Vella's side first, then Shay's. My feelings on the split are that Vella's side is more interesting than Shay's.
Are some minor issues with the dialogue trees such as the druids going over their whole spiel about the Riddle of Yorn every time you select a different reason for getting into the temple, and your dialogue to ask about the riddle being something like 'Tell me about the Riddle of Yorn again' even though they haven't told you about it before.
Art style looks pretty good in motion, I didn't think I'd care for it too much from the screenshots.
People complain about it having terribly-convenient-unusual-item syndrome, but I don't remember that actually happening outside Grabbin' Gary? There's an argument for the art piece, but that does have a reason to be in that general vicinity at least.
So, given the ending of Act 1 (really, just playing the opposite side makes it look to be shaky ground, but it's the ending that confirms it) it looks like I was successfully tricked into thinking that Alex was Shay. Presumably people who start with Shay's side are intended to be tricked into thinking that Mother is a version of Vella. There is a part of me which is expecting them to flip it over and have both turn out to be true somehow though.
There are a bunch of other questions raised, such as:
* Alex is supposedly part of Operation Dandelion the same as Shay, but he's been in cryostasis for 300 years? How long as Operation Dandelion been going, considering that Lomura was supposedly on the verge of destruction (or course 300 years may not be much on a planetary scale for verges of destruction).
* The game wants to make you think that it was Shay making Mog Chothra take the sacrifices (and the rescues he makes do match up with the sacrifices in Meriloft/Sugar Bunting/Shellmound), but at one point it's mentioned that there have been at least six or seven cycles of sacrifices - so who conducted the previous cycles?
* Are the sacrifices actually in Shay's world now, or are the two worlds actually just mirroring each other in bizarre ways?
Dominique Pamplemousse - played through
Entertaining.
Pretty short, and unfortunately the singing is a tad bad at times, but all up I think it was worth playing.
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South Park: The Stick of Truth- fin. I am stunned this game only got an M. Great set pieces and solid gameplay though. Misses a 9 I think but an easy 8.
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DS2: Okay, deaths start piling up now that sense of invulnerability is shattered (though maybe that's what got me killed in the first place). Lot of running around today but it didn't feel like I got much done. Hunter's Copse first! Cake most of the run. Skip the skellie caves because how in the heck do you make them stay dead in this game? Eventually wind up in front of a giant fog door that screams boss fight. "I just got this key that unlocks that third bonfire, I should go back and use that first." "Eh, how bad could this be?"
A couple minutes later: "Well, I didn't think you could make a 3-on-one boss battle wussy, but here we are." About sixty seconds later: "Oh, there are little skellies now, that could be inconvenient." Shortly thereafter: "Wait, is that...No...No! NoooOOoOoOo!" Bonewheel mob, so much scarier than anything new they could cook up. I came back with an ally just out of sheer terror.
Visited Harvest Valley just long enough conclude that anyplace opening up with a bonfire behind a toxic pool isn't something I want to deal with right now. Bought out all the titanite shards and left. And then I promptly wasted all the titanite shards. See, I wanted something smashier than the old lightning sword (and don't want to be using a lightning weapon long-term anyway). Flip through the weapons I can currently equip, halberd looks mathematically solid. Take a few swings, yeah this seems like a viable option. Then, after upgrading it, I try the thing out in combat. Oh, the R1 is a different attack from behind a shield...and due to you lagging behind your shield just a fraction of a second longer than I'd like to after blocking an attack, I find myself doing the wussy shield poke more often than not. And even the overhead R1 is underwhelming damage compared to the tin unless you can chain it with the follow-up stab (not always situationally an option). God fucking dammit.
But hey, now I've got a pyro hand! That's something, right? I dump a few levels into attunement to give it a try since it appears to still not be stat-driven damage. It sucks anyway. :( Maybe I'll be able to fix that if I ever find a pyro trainer. Hopefully this time there's not a damage-boosting ring for it that's only sold by a sorcerer, because that punk won't even talk to me without me wasting a bunch of levels on INT.
So without other immediate options here I go back to Sinner's Rise and make my own boss run. The first time I try just running straight through and ignoring all of the (horrible, horrible) enemies along the way. This might have worked if I'd already opened the door at the end, but that slight hold-up means Lucatiel gets 'sploded by zombies. Stupidly, I go back to try and clear the basement area and maneuver myself off the bridge. Argh mk 1. Next time is actual boss run. Easy so long as boss is distracted! But Lucatiel dies and I can find no safe opening to hit him solo. Argh mk 2. Next time I'm genociding the basement to prevent a recurrence of argh mk. 1 and get 'sploded off the bridge when cursesplodey zombies follow me outside (they hadn't done this before).
Since I'm already hollow at this point, sick of burning effigies (how in the fuck do you have thirty+ of these, Fudo? I didn't even start needing them until today and still only had somewhere in the teens) and just seriously raging at this entire worthless zone, I say to hell with it, let's try the pit. Two more deaths for failed jumps on the way down. Think I missed a door, only took the lowest exit out and probably missed something but whatever man, crystal lizard sighted. Oh, look, now I'm climbing down rickety shantytown plank scaffolds, this...this doesn't look at all familiar...Eventually "The Gutter" flashes on the screen. Quite alone on the screen in fact because there's no ambient light down here and oh my god what is sniping me with poison. I don't realize it's the statues until later during a summon run, so I just jump blindly to evade my invisible enemies and somehow land right on a bonfire. Works for me! +1 death shortly thereafter for "Hey, is that step something I can jump to? ...No, it isn't." Almost wholly unsuccessful phantom mode makes it apparent this isn't some place I want to be right now (not as though I ever would, but poison cures why don't they exist). Valley of the Defiled + Blighttown + Tomb of the Giants, three great flavors that spell ipecac together. Running low on healing gems and want to pump up STR for LARGE CLUB abuse, so now it's grinding time.
Back to the Bastile, make some phantom runs for souls/humanity (but in fact I have not once yet seen humanity kick in from successful phantom mode). Poking through some newly-discovered secret passages, +1 death due to falling not immediately to my death but right in front of trio of dogs so just as well. Then figure hey, I got a lockstone from the pit, let's see what's next door. "Luna Belfry." Step in and immediately get invaded. Twice. "Okay, I'll go join the covenant, that'll probably keep me safe." *Invaded twice just going up a couple steps to retrieve souls after joining covenant.* Okay I can see I'll be running this zone in offline mode.
By this point I just have a list of horrible places I don't want to go.
And whoever thought it was a good idea to keep putting bonfires in immediate aggro range of multiple enemies needs to be punched in the face.
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DS2: Okay, deaths start piling up now that sense of invulnerability is shattered (though maybe that's what got me killed in the first place). Lot of running around today but it didn't feel like I got much done. Hunter's Copse first! Cake most of the run. Skip the skellie caves because how in the heck do you make them stay dead in this game? Eventually wind up in front of a giant fog door that screams boss fight. "I just got this key that unlocks that third bonfire, I should go back and use that first." "Eh, how bad could this be?"
If you kill the magicians in the caves they'll stop respawning. The Skeletons also drop titanite and effigies.
I also never found that third bonfire. I am really bad at exploring in this game.
A couple minutes later: "Well, I didn't think you could make a 3-on-one boss battle wussy, but here we are." About sixty seconds later: "Oh, there are little skellies now, that could be inconvenient." Shortly thereafter: "Wait, is that...No...No! NoooOOoOoOo!" Bonewheel mob, so much scarier than anything new they could cook up. I came back with an ally just out of sheer terror.
My weapon broke during that fight!
Visited Harvest Valley just long enough conclude that anyplace opening up with a bonfire behind a toxic pool isn't something I want to deal with right now. Bought out all the titanite shards and left. And then I promptly wasted all the titanite shards. See, I wanted something smashier than the old lightning sword (and don't want to be using a lightning weapon long-term anyway). Flip through the weapons I can currently equip, halberd looks mathematically solid. Take a few swings, yeah this seems like a viable option. Then, after upgrading it, I try the thing out in combat. Oh, the R1 is a different attack from behind a shield...and due to you lagging behind your shield just a fraction of a second longer than I'd like to after blocking an attack, I find myself doing the wussy shield poke more often than not. And even the overhead R1 is underwhelming damage compared to the tin unless you can chain it with the follow-up stab (not always situationally an option). God fucking dammit.
The best part of having Faith is having the poison cure miracle.
But hey, now I've got a pyro hand! That's something, right? I dump a few levels into attunement to give it a try since it appears to still not be stat-driven damage. It sucks anyway. :( Maybe I'll be able to fix that if I ever find a pyro trainer. Hopefully this time there's not a damage-boosting ring for it that's only sold by a sorcerer, because that punk won't even talk to me without me wasting a bunch of levels on INT.
You'll probably be finding the pyro trainer soon.
So without other immediate options here I go back to Sinner's Rise and make my own boss run. The first time I try just running straight through and ignoring all of the (horrible, horrible) enemies along the way. This might have worked if I'd already opened the door at the end, but that slight hold-up means Lucatiel gets 'sploded by zombies. Stupidly, I go back to try and clear the basement area and maneuver myself off the bridge. Argh mk 1. Next time is actual boss run. Easy so long as boss is distracted! But Lucatiel dies and I can find no safe opening to hit him solo. Argh mk 2. Next time I'm genociding the basement to prevent a recurrence of argh mk. 1 and get 'sploded off the bridge when cursesplodey zombies follow me outside (they hadn't done this before).
I think I cleared the path to the Lost Sinner like... six times? All for a dull boring boss fight that's apparently easier if you get a torch in and light up some places that I have no idea where.
Since I'm already hollow at this point, sick of burning effigies (how in the fuck do you have thirty+ of these, Fudo? I didn't even start needing them until today and still only had somewhere in the teens) and just seriously raging at this entire worthless zone, I say to hell with it, let's try the pit. Two more deaths for failed jumps on the way down. Think I missed a door, only took the lowest exit out and probably missed something but whatever man, crystal lizard sighted. Oh, look, now I'm climbing down rickety shantytown plank scaffolds, this...this doesn't look at all familiar...Eventually "The Gutter" flashes on the screen. Quite alone on the screen in fact because there's no ambient light down here and oh my god what is sniping me with poison. I don't realize it's the statues until later during a summon run, so I just jump blindly to evade my invisible enemies and somehow land right on a bonfire. Works for me! +1 death shortly thereafter for "Hey, is that step something I can jump to? ...No, it isn't." Almost wholly unsuccessful phantom mode makes it apparent this isn't some place I want to be right now (not as though I ever would, but poison cures why don't they exist). Valley of the Defiled + Blighttown + Tomb of the Giants, three great flavors that spell ipecac together. Running low on healing gems and want to pump up STR for LARGE CLUB abuse, so now it's grinding time.
I think I've actually broken fifty at this point. I never use them either and I'm somewhat further than you. I've used like... three effigies period. I usually manage with Ring of Binding and 75% health. Though I've learned a fun new trick that I'm gonna try out next time I play. If that time ever comes.
Did you go through Grave of Saints to get to the Gutter? Because the exit from the pit I took led that way.
Poison moss can drop from those butterflies in Huntsman's Corpse. Granted I didn't find that place until after was done down the pit so I made due with Ring/Heal/Gems/Crying.
Back to the Bastile, make some phantom runs for souls/humanity (but in fact I have not once yet seen humanity kick in from successful phantom mode). Poking through some newly-discovered secret passages, +1 death due to falling not immediately to my death but right in front of trio of dogs so just as well. Then figure hey, I got a lockstone from the pit, let's see what's next door. "Luna Belfry." Step in and immediately get invaded. Twice. "Okay, I'll go join the covenant, that'll probably keep me safe." *Invaded twice just going up a couple steps to retrieve souls after joining covenant.* Okay I can see I'll be running this zone in offline mode.
Apparently reviving to human from a summon is a bug. The best part about the Luna Belfry is the boss is a hellish bastard so you're taking giant risks either way! Anyway, that's the Covenant that gets you Titanite Chunks for winning so go nuts.
By this point I just have a list of horrible places I don't want to go.
And whoever thought it was a good idea to keep putting bonfires in immediate aggro range of multiple enemies needs to be punched in the face.
DARK SOULS 2!
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Apparently I fell right past Grave of the Saints.
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Well good to know where that other exit down there leads at least.
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South Park: The Stick of Truth- fin. I am stunned this game only got an M. Great set pieces and solid gameplay though. Misses a 9 I think but an easy 8.
You can get away with a lot when things are low res. Anyway, I just finished. Good stuff. Reminds me of Paper Mario in many (good) ways.
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How dependent is enjoying South Park game upon being familiar with the show? My interest in seeing Obsidian produce a thing in conjunction with the show's creators is countered by the certainty that I wouldn't get 95% of the references (generally not a South Park watcher, or TV watcher in general really).
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The Stick of Truth was made by Obsidian? That's going on a list of games to play.
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Bravely Default - This suddenly got very weird.
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How dependent is enjoying South Park game upon being familiar with the show? My interest in seeing Obsidian produce a thing in conjunction with the show's creators is countered by the certainty that I wouldn't get 95% of the references (generally not a South Park watcher, or TV watcher in general really).
I would say not particularly. I liked it and I haven't watched the show in years.
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For the most part the references are limited to item descriptions. Game does assume you know the basic personalities of the main four but that's about it.
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That and a bunch of different songs from the show are played in stores around town. It was a strange experience to hear Let's Fighting Love! play when I first entered the self-storage place.
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Mileage varies on getting the references. It certainly helps, but I could easily see the game being enjoyable without getting them all.
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As someone who only has a passing knowledge in hitherto last 10 years or so of the show it felt to me like they were more going over a greatest hits than references. Most stuff that is "this is just like the show!" is played through the same beats without nudge nudge wink wink just like that one time you guys.
So yeah if you don't hate South Park but don't watch it then it is still enjoyable. As an Obsidian fan I saw less of them in it than South Park to be honest, but it is still a solid game.
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I'm sure part of that is that Trey and Matt wrote the game rather than the Obsidian dudes.
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Even mechanically it doesn't really feel too strongly of Obsidian though I mean, it is a servicable system, but it definitely feels like something targeted to be functional with broad acceptance without much particularly unique about it.
Not that Obsidian really have had a chance to carve a niche like that particularly strongly with how many sequels they have got to do.
Game Dev Tycoon - Late on this, don't remember buying it and saw it in my Steam List (humble bundle?) it was fun to run through.
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DS2: Harvest Valley and Earthen Peak to start things out. Sounded like the least offensive option available and circumstances mostly bore that out. Three deaths to the horrible horrible ambush room in the former but otherwise clean run today (wait no I did some belated looting of Bastile secrets and took one fatal fall for an irrelevant item. Go me). Not actually entirely done with the latter for reasons about to be noted along with other stuff:
-Whatup, Gavlan, why don't you migrate to Majula with all the other cool kids already? I need to buy more antidote moss! (Jesus why is this shit so expensive.)
-Covetous Demon at first was just man, Jabba, you've really let yourself go. Then he ate my equipment. Moment of terror, "That shit better not be permanently gone, you fuckers!" Nope, just de-equipped. I stop just long enough to re-equip my bow and then finish the fight in my underwear. Mostly because convenience but also appropriate because Jabba.
-My diligence in attacking every treasure chest in the game is finally rewarded!
-The pit has ladders now. Even superfluous ones, ladders for all!
-Fudo, have you been here? I went on summon mode to the boss a couple times; one time the boss room (and the leadup to it) was filled with poison, the other time it wasn't. No idea what clears it! I keep seeing torch messages but there's nothing obvious to light up. Definitely not walking through the gate without clearing that gunk out first. Come to think of it, there were some places in the lower Peak that weren't accessible due to poison pits either...hrm.
-That black phantom is terrifying. I just straight up ran away when he did huge chunks of damage right through my shield and bleed and wall of HP and augh. I am guessing there's dark damage tied to his attack given how bad my shield is for that (I have nothing that covers both that and physical well, sadly). He must be guarding something cool! (Or not because Dark Souls.) Definitely not in the way of the boss gate, anyway.
Left to unpetrify dudes when I couldn't figure a way to deal with either of the above. Gave pyrogirl my starting armor set and dumped a bunch of souls to upgrade flame and buy pyromancies. This was actually pretty wasteful as I realize now pyromancy does in fact scale with intelligence and/or faith for damage--it only retains the DS1 trait of not having stat requirements for use--so it'll always be useless for me for offense. Oh well, can still lob fireballs to break poison jars, or use the buffs I guess. And where the heck does Straith go? We're having a nice conversation and I even bought stuff from him and then he suddenly calls me a twit and warps away...somewhere.
Poked around in Shaded Woods a little. Jesus you guys really like ambushes don't you. Bugged out when I hit the foggy area and hey that dude running around out there is that another player's phantom or an enemy? ...Exactly.
Running with large club +5 thanks to Harvest Peak haul. Damage and stagger power are great but it does that same bizarre attack redirection thing sometimes. I think I see why now: for weapons where a brief charge is part of the attack animation, if you have any momentum when you hit the attack button the game assumes that that is the direction in which you wish to attack even if you are already locked on and facing an enemy and will therefore reorient your character to have it charge in this new direction. This is infuriating. Did you people fucking forget what the purpose of lock-on was in the first place? So, every time I want to hit anything, I have to make sure to take a split second to release the movement button and remain motionless before I attack or I'll go veering off in undesired directions. Sigh.
Sticking with the weapon because LARGE CLUB but that shit has almost killed me so many times already and I'm sure it's only a matter of time before it does.
EDIT: ah, but how could I forget--*Cid cures poison* *Cid watches poison meter continue to rise* God dammit you guys.
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It was gonna be my next destination but the PS3 I was borrowing got taken back and mine's still in the shop. For over a week. Ugh.
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How long does it take to fix a PS3? Geez. Also I assume switching machines means you need to restart the game...
Totally forgot the most important discovery from yesterday: you guys, I found CHAMELEON. Aw yes. I also found the whip, but Earthen Peak is too far in to make full-game Indy mode possible even if I was interested in trying it (and I am prepared to state already that I won't feel inclined to obsessively tinker with different builds here like I did in DS1).
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Gref: Seems to be something wholy different from chors and stoccato ! Need to link it but DARK SOULS 2
Amazon predicted I was going to get Dark Souls 2 on monday. So I just checked friday and Amazon said "Surprise it's already in your mailbox!!"
We often separate gameplay vs plot but what would be more coherent would be challenge vs plot vs exploration.
Plot: Narrative
"Exploration": (in lack of a better world) The discovery of the game world + The cool shit you can do by poking around
Challenge: How satisfying mechanics are and how they test you
People are more inclined towards one or another. I'm totally a challenge person (w/ some exploration to enhance challenge at times), Gref is exploration / plot, NEB is challenge / plot. For ex.
Super Hexagon and Super Mario Bros are challenge games without anything else
Minecraft, Skyrim and GTA are exploration games without anything else (pretty much) There's nothing really mechanically interesting in these games, the point is just to be able to do what you're doing in the games ; the point is to be able to build a castle / destroy a castle.
Phoenix Wright and Virtual novels are plot games without anything else
FF is all over the place about this.
Anyway Dark Souls is like 2% plot 28% exploration 70% challenge, then only about challenge all subsequent playthroughs.
It's been a while since I've felt a truly Soulsian exploratory adventure. What this means is going to new places, getting murdered or witnessing something terrifying, saying "Hahah nope" and going somewhere else. A lot. And generally having a miserable and confusing experience. It's great.
Highlights:
- Getting eaten a few times by that cyclop at the beginning.
- Getting annihilated by piglets, then beating them after a grueling fight for like 30 souls
- Getting in the blue dudes covenant, then seeing that other covenant available with no explanation but a bunch of "DON'T DO IT" bloodmarks left by other players.
- That pit in the middle of the town
- Lightning torches for no apparent reason. I've been doing this for a while.
- This stone you insert into a mouth? That makes one terrible blue face appear? It helped in the Jack Sparrow level at least.
- 5x Crossbow trap
- The fight on the giant sword
- That surprise boss in the blue cathedral
Bosses beaten: Giant, red dude, blue cathedral dude, Double pirate, flying eagle badass, sentinels.
Areas available: Down the pit, farther below the pit, forest of hunter jerks, and waifu boss fight. (in the flooded area) I'm exploring before fighting "waifu" because girl is fucking insane.
I went with a dual wielding swordsman (no shields, no magic, two weapons, no summoning other players) and I only just realized (25 hours in) that I wasn't actually doing proper dual wielding stuff.
Turns out that if I held Triangle I could get into this awesome power stance and slash with bow my sword and my rapier at the same time (don't question this logic, this does a lot of damage)
I couldn't do it with my more exotic/bigger weapons I wanted to use though. So it's the only time I checked something on the Internet because hey at this point I deserved it. (Turns out you need 150% of the stat requirement to get into the dual wielding stance. WOULD HAVE BEEN NICE TO KNOW)
I still got a lot of mileage out of Fire sword R1 (stunning the opponent) + POKEPOKE with the rapier even without the awesome dual wielding stance.
Stats are 22ish vitality and 40ish adaptability. I can adapt!! Not sure this does anything but add i-frames to the roll (pretty nice, admittedly)
I want to use something other than my fire sword and rapier, so I'm focusing on dex next because str weapons are just too heavy.
I've bought the falcon set from the first merchant and haven't removed it yet. Except to wear a monocle.
As for the game itself, the change in mechanics didn't sound good to me before realse. But hey, more Souls I can't complain. So I was expecting something sub Dark Souls but still decent. I anticipated it much like I anticipated the yearly Metroidvania handheld releases (I miss these) But actually I welcome pretty much any change to the Souls formula except not being able to level up at bonfires.
- The return of consumable items doesn't have a major impact, they're just sometimes the extra push needed to beat a boss or get through an area. Meanwhile, estus flasks shards have become an AWESOME reward for exploration and beating bosses.
- Losing a little bit of max HP after every death actually changes the whole game and adds another dimension of risk vs reward. I'm trying (and failing) to be careful more often.
- Enemies are better, control is better, the roll is more interesting (less overpowered) than before, the controls are slightly better (they were near perfect for me but now I'm always rolling in the right direction after an attack, unlike in Dark Souls)
- I especially like the very intense early game fights when you only have a few flasks available, and the more personal boss fights against dudes of relatively normal size and width instead of giant dragons and golems.
- The things that make Souls games good that never get mentioned (level design & verticality, enemy design, atmosphere) are as good as always.
- I get summoned 15 seconds after putting a message on average. This is mind blowing after Dark and Demon's Souls.
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Bravely Default - Chapter 6 starts. I chose to do the optional fights on C5, but this time around I'm mostly skipping them after checking out what they hand me. The extra JP would be nice, but I already have an average of four jobs mastered per PC. The Blue Mage equivalent class is a barrel of monkeys, by the way. Physical mage!
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South Park: The Stick of Truth - Got this. Seems nice so far.
Also, hi everyone.
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Civ 5 - The best science victory is one where you destroy all the leaders but one and then go for the science victory because you don't have that achievement yet and can't reasonably get diplomacy for obvious reasons or social because your empire now spans the entire map.
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Bravely Default - C6 continues to be weird and to get subtly, but increasingly meta. I've been doing some of the optional fights again just for kicks, and it's actually kind of a barrel of monkeys.
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Sounds like I need to listen to the FF7 world map to look forward it.
Bosses beaten: Giant, red dude, blue cathedral dude, Double pirate, flying eagle badass, sentinels.
I would play this Megaman X game.
You would rate the controls that well? The way the others have been talking they sound less tight than the ones in Dark Souls though. Wondering on that. (Frankly controls in the games have always sounded bad to me. Any time you can be killed but lock on or clunky controls sounds sloppy to me...)
Also all this Bravely Default posts make me want pretty bad. Need to finish Pokedudes. Probably want to finish SMT: Strange Journey too.
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DS2: Chariot, skeletons, huge worm-thing, and lost sinner down.
Social life reduced to Dark Souls 2 + going to bars for one week.
I'm at the last bonfire of the Poizn fortress, trying to get all the treasure insides and trying to understand what the hell Pat is talking about. And anticipating the boss.
Dual wielding whips is really cool but I'm just not ready for this yet. Seems that you can only dual wield similar weapons. Mace + Sword is cool, Sword + Rapier is cool, Whip + Anything but a whip is not cool.
I've been neglecting weapons, all my souls are going into strength and dex. ... And cool looking armor.
Also joined every covenant but the scary one at Majula. I have 6 Medal Of Nice Girl, 4 Medal Of Jerk, and 1 Sunlight Medal.
Edit: I've had no problem with the controls at all. The roll in the wrong direction in a very specific situation from Dark Souls 1 is absent, and jumps are more precise. Otherwise they're still pretty much perfect for me or I wouldn't be playing really. Can't stand games with bad controls.
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I should mention that I try not to read into the meat of other Dark Souls 2 post just to have every surprise in the game intact.
Invading is really fun now! Since it's easy and there's a low barrier of entry.
Dark Souls is like an entire game out of the platforming levels in SSBM, with some optional PvP going on on the sides.
Players are mostly used to the way their character controls against AI enemies, and aren't particularly at ease with the PvP aspect. Everybody just plays badly, me included (I'm really terrible at Dark Souls PvP and never improve) Fights are messy and close, people try to use the environment in creative ways, people are inexperienced enough to fall into obvious traps, etc. Very fun stuff.
After a few months most people playing know PvP very well indeed and there's no way you can win against anyone. And nobody falls for traps.
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Not 100% sure what the roll thing you're talking about is. That when if you accidentally hit circle during an attack or jump or whatever sometimes the game would make you roll several seconds later? That was pretty annoying (if infrequent). Haven't seen it happen here.
I wouldn't call the control here bad, but there are some nervous tics that annoy me (blocking keeping you tied down just a smidge longer than feels comfortable, lock-on lingering on dying enemies just a tad longer than it should, the game occasionally ignoring lock-on and sending me in totally different directions when I happen to hit R1 while moving laterally). I'm getting used to it all by this point but there are times it still feels less natural than Game Cid Has Played Way More Than Is Healthy.
I'm also inclined to disagree with you about the enemies since the game's had plenty of scrub bosses so far. The environments are great, though.
I get summoned 15 seconds after putting a message on average. This is mind blowing after Dark and Demon's Souls.
Sometimes I don't even have time to close the menu before this happens! It's crazy. PVP and co-op seem much cleaner from what I've played so far. I've only seen backstabbery happen once (though it was the dreaded lagstab from across the room). It is good to be messing with this stuff when the game is new and nobody knows anything rather than later when everyone uses the same goddamn equipment (though I'm already getting sick of seeing the Sinner's mask).
Speaking of--(transitioning to progress report stuff that Fenrir wants to avoid, though the first paragraph at least is possibly within your experience by now. Up to you man, some of that part constitutes direct response to your post):
-Earthen Peak finished. Turns out the thing I needed to burn was right by the bonfire. Y'know, by the constant "Try Torch" signs. I hadn't reached the actionable spot because narrow ledge over fall to certain doom. Despite having stuck around here long enough to farm out the whole desert sorceress outfit (because I am nothing if not predictable, that is now my standard armor), there's some loot here I haven't figured out how to reach. The corpse on the broken central platform right past the first bonfire, and the one across the gap with the lone sorceress at the top of the zone...how the heck are either of these accessed? I ran all over mashing X for secret doors, nothing.
And Fenrir: all Pate wants you to do is run right past his room, hang a right, smash the railing to your right, and drop down to loot a chest. This is much less offensive than his first request!
-Anyway once the boss is dealt with and I've farmed the gear I want from this place we take an elevator from the top of the tower up to...a castle floating in a sea of lava. Wait what. How does this geography work you guys I don't understand--anyway this place isn't too bad because everything's weak to strike damage and I can smash the silver knight wannabes in two hits. I make one unsuccessful attempt at the first boss here (I summoned Lucatiel but she failed to follow me through the fog gate, meaning I boosted the boss's durability for no benefit. Thanks for that, Girl Fawkes) and then warp out with my loot because holy hell it's about time: now I can buy infinite large titanite shards! (And yet I still struggle to find regular shards, this is a mad world in which we find ourselves.)
Also, Zweihander found! (I have no intention of using it, though.)
-Shaded Woods explored! Oh my god that foggy area. That was real special. I basically ran around in a blind panic picking up what items I could and murdering anyone who cornered me before fleeing in terror. There's probably stuff in there that I missed but I so don't care, I got a Chloranthy Ring +1 out of the trip and it seems doubtful there's anything I could want more. Cursey area was, well, I'm just glad I left to buy that ring first. It's terrifying how swiftly that bar fills up even with the ring. And I dunno if I have any cures for that. Took the boss in one shot, Quelaag's cousin not too much trouble as long as she isn't using magic.
-Poked around in Doors of Pharros just enough to be very confused. I'm walking around fighting belligerent Ganeshas when suddenly "You are being summoned to another world as a gray phantom" what in the world. What kind of crazy covenant drags people to the host's own world to fight his own monsters which are apparently on his side for some reason? That is just crazy. I kill the host because he's a squishy sorcerer counting on bad footing to keep melee goons at bay and I can jump like ten feet with large club R2 leap. I get a Pharros' lockstone out of the victory but flee the zone out of sheer confusion about WTF just happened you guys for real.
-Okay I can stop complaining about ore now. Farm regular shards from Harvest Valley fatties, use gained souls to buy large shards from McDuff, keep bell covenant ring on to murder people for chunks (Would guess I manage a 50% success rate at this, which is decent for me and PVP!) Reasonably efficient process but armor set demands mass quantities. Yo dawg we heard you liked farming titanite so we put titanite in your invasions so you could farm titanite while you farm titanite. And now I have a +10 large club! Sitting on a cool 491 attack power and that's just at the minimum stat requirement. So then I just need to round out my rapier, my bow, my scandalous attire...
...except suddenly the normal enemies in Harvest Valley stop respawning when I hit the bonfire. Whaaaat.
Other random notes from today:
-There's a fast-ladder-climb input! The animation is 100% yakkety sax.
-I know you might want to attack the horrible harpy demon, but you must never attack the horrible harpy demon. I can't find her house like she told me to, though. I also have no idea what the scorpion dude is for in Shaded Woods. It was an act of will not to shoot him from the second floor, just happened to see other PC phantoms interacting with him and decided to give it a shot. Sum total dialogue = "...?" So he's Quelaag's cousin's sibling, clearly?
-Birdbrains gave me a whip! It actually looks pretty excellent, and trying it out I love the moveset. Want to add this to the standard lineup but it needs twinkling titanite and I have no notion where to reliably find that stuff yet (and I used all I've found on my shield). I guess this does make Indy mode theoretically feasible, I think explorers start with tradable stones so I could delete/restart until I get the whip (would probably require many levels to use the damn thing though).
-It turns out if you do the Warcry gesture on a sloping surface you go surfing. This is excellent.
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-Doors of Pharros: Welcome to ratbroing.
-Harpy Lady: She moves in to a spot past the Doors of Pharros.
-Not Quelaag's Sister: The cat in Majula will sell the Ring of Whispers to talk to him.
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Bravely Default - This is starting to get pretty danged meta.
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Disgaea D2: Beat. Unlike most Disgaea games, I played this the way N1 intended: apprenticed FLonne to a series of mages, manipulated enemies using pawns, and had her kill everything. Aside from the final boss (where I did break for an hour to get money for an endgame staff), this runthrough involved way, WAY less time grinding and frustration than any other Disgaea game. I am not terribly surprised by this.
(In absolute fairness, DD2 Flonne's ability is "If any allied unit is healed to full, gain 10% stat buff. Permanent, stackable." So basically in any scenario where Flonne is not killed in a single turn she wins, so her murdering her way through the game alone is much easier to set up than for any other character.)
Aside from Flonne, Harbinger of Love Death giving me a lot of undue amusement the game was pretty underwhelming though. Etna in particular was really bad in this, and the story is holy shit incoherent. The game has three 'story' characters after the Trio and only one ever, EVER matters (Sicily obviously), making this the smallest primary Disgaea cast in a series more or less defined by funny interactions between characters and their comments on the absudity of the plot... which as noted previously is incoherent. No mistake, it's still pretty funny with good character moments, just not as many as I expect, especially after Disgaea 4 did such a great job with its ensemble. Fun and breezy, but in a lot of ways the worst Disgaea game. 7/10.
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Tales of Graces f: Finished main game; guess I'll do a write up after I finish F Arc because it sounds like it has actual plot, development, etc. that may adjust some of my opinions or something. Personally, I blame this entirely on the person who posts directly after me!
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It was Meeeeeeeeee
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El Cid: In a certain context in Dark Souls 1, your character will roll in the direction that's related to her, not the player. Say she's facing left, if you roll pushing the analog movement stick down, she'll roll to the right of the screen and not towards the camera, tank-control style.
I don't remember when this happens but could probably predict it (unconscious memory) Maybe this was after blocking? If so then I actually can't praise Dark Souls 2 for this since I haven't used a shield.
Also you can get those both of these treasures by going on that ledge near the sorceress then:
For the first treasure: Jumping. As you might have noticed, easier said that done
For the second: Walking veeeeeeeeery slowly, falling on that wooden plank below, then falling down some more.
I think I have my two weapons: Rapier + Double Jack Sparrow's scimitar . Unless I get a bunch of rare ores that's it.
Edit: I like this new boss that basically exists as a big counter to the "Walk around him then stab in the back" strategy!
Edit 2: Couldn't beat it but PROTECTING THE BELL = AWESOME
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Sorry Cid. Totally ahead of you
I'm already dual wielding +9 whips, and incidentally didn't make any kind of real progress whatsoever.
They're still pretty bad but way better than in Dark Souls 1. They lost the shield bypassing property! You can actually win duels with them and it's so cool.
I saw lots of invaders with really cool magic/pyromancy/miracles. Need to try all those classes later.
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Man. You guys are getting too far ahead. =(
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And I have to start over from square one.
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You have no idea, Andy. I was snowed out of work today and spent my time as productively as you might imagine.
Fenrir: dunno which whips you've got, but the Old Whip actually looks pretty excellent. I've only got it +1 and it gets better numbers than the rapier (+9!) that I've had as back-up weapon all game. It's really the moveset that sells whips, though--the reach is outstanding on mine, it can sweep multiple enemies at safe range, and I now use it to deal with all the fragile-yet-lethal shit I'd rather not let close in ('splosion zombies, curse rats, toxic waste jars, etcetera). I've been thinking of making a poison whip for PVP. The major downside of them, though, is actually that whips are notably more fragile than like every other class of weapon. I've had mine almost break several times just today from relatively little use.
Better collection of bosses today, they definitely shake things up as you get later in the game (the 1-on-1 vs human-sized dude matches were actually the ones I found most disappointing). Theme of the lot split between claustrophobia and swarrrrm (sometimes working together).
-Doors of Pharros first. Rat Authority smaaaash. I liked this fight, had to resort to combined arms strategy to get through. Like most Souls boss fights with multiple targets, 90% of the trouble is just clearing out the goon squad. The winning formula turned out to be: snipe one with bow; toss Flame Swirly Swathe to nuke two more on approach; rapier stab the fourth (club slam leaves me too exposed to the boss). They absolutely all have to go before I can deal with the (incredibly hard-hitting) leader, because one clean hit from any of them inflicts toxic and that's just death. First time I try this out it looks like it's working pretty well, boss is at 15% health man let's just keep chugging away and he'll be down soon enough. Wait what's he doing what's that chartreuse spew pouring out of his mouth ohmygod--*Cid dies from radioactive barf at the exact same time he kills the boss* Unfortunately, such situations no longer count as a win. :( Had to come back and shoot him to death once he reached barfing phase. This fight was one of those few times the OST being an atonally menacing mush actually worked in the game's favor (there are times for atonal noise).
And oh man I was totally wrong about pyromancy being useless for me. I'm confused, the in-game stat description says INT/Faith contribute to fire damage, but I've got middling single digits for both and Flame Swathe still puts out sometimes over a thousand damage per shot (granted, I only get two). Practically speaking, its importance for me is less the raw damage (leaping R2s get me that much against some targets) and more its room-clearing capacity.
-Although it doesn't always work out perfectly. *Cid walks into cultist congregation, looks all smug tossing baby nukes that wipe two-thirds of the boss health meter. Watches surviving goons heal him back to full. D'oh.*
-Aesir spider was a no-damage victory. (After I died three or four times.) The first couple tries I kept seeing new spiders spawn at like half boss health, thought it was a scripted HP trigger but it didn't happen the time I won (maybe those guys just hang out on the far side of the room). Again, tossing nukes was the only way to be sure, boss is easy when it's on its own (still a pretty cool fight, though).
-Black Gulch is just the worst place you guys. Yes it's even worse than the Gutter. Even running full-bore to the boss gate is problematic with all that shit going on (my brother informs me there's a second bonfire rather belatedly, alas). Died almost immediately to the boss simply by backstepping into flaming environmental hazards. That's not the last time that happens today (not by far but not even in a boss fight).
-Back to the Iron Keep to finish up there after that. Apparently that opening bridge is like the PVP zone right now, red signs and dragon eyes gooddamn everywhere man. Unrelated news, Smelter Demon is still a douche. Had one death against the balrog, though he didn't really have anything to do with it himself--I sidestepped into the lava literally the first second of the fight. Whups, who put a hole there? Weird boss, feels more like he belongs in one of those awkward 3-D Castlevanias than as one of the big four goons you're tasked with murdering in a Souls game.
-Belfry Luna! I'd been putting this off for a while. Ultimately I decided to make the run online after all because man, I've killed plenty of people in PVP there myself, it's only fair I give someone a shot at me (they got two, of course, and the second time someone Fireballed me in the back as I was stepping through the boss gate). Boss fight itself went down on the first try. I can't brag because I went in at level 120 with 40 strength and a +10 weapon. I killed each of them in two hits. Still pretty damn satisfying, though! Would love to jump in as a summon for some people but, you know. It's the Belfry.
-Lost Sinner bites it last. Even overleveled with the room lit up and with the NPC phantom present to distract him, this fight just wrecks me. In the end it comes down to flying leap across the room at like 20% health because why not, every time I try to heal he stabs me in the face.
And with all of the old ones defeated, the world's titanite shard shortage is mysteriously solved and now I can go totally nuts with upgrading [regular] weapons. Well, up to +6 at least. Too bad what I really want at this point is twinkling titanite!
Oh and Grave of the Saints was in there somewhere too. Boss fight was just, man I'm gonna keep hitting people until something happens, so I did and eventually something happened. ...Chariot, too! That was pretty cool. Executioner gives no fucks about his friends. This is one of those fights that made me so glad for having dumped so many levels on HP, so many near-death incidents before I could make it to the necromancers.
So apparently there's plot stuff to handle now but who cares I've got looting and upgrading to do, the world can wait. After exhaustive mental catalogue of things I haven't been able to collect and extensive revisiting of those things, this is what I know is left and can't be bothered to try anymore to get:
-The tree in Najka's room.
-The corpse on the Brightstone Cove wall doorway that has no ledge for you to land on. Also whatever's in the house by the well (jump into the well, I guess?)
-The mushroom loot in the cave under the second bonfire of Huntsman's Copse. Need Jumping. :(
-The body on that tiny ledge over the 'splosion zombie room at the bottom of the pit. Arrrrgh.
-Magma chests in the Iron Keep*. Even with the fire resist ring and Flash Sweat up, I can only survive long enough to make it to the chests. If these were items on corpses, I'd just grab them and die, but no, I have to be able to survive long enough for the entire chest-opening animation to play out. Ack. Short of taking time to identify and upgrade the most fire-resistant armor set in the game, doubt I am ever getting these two (maybe it would help if my only upgraded armor set was something other than the harem outfit).
(*While I'm passing through Smelter Demon's room to get to one of these spots, Pursuer spawns out of nowhere and drops a cool ring when killed. Nice, makes me wonder if I should ever check back in on other old boss rooms.)
Oh yeah, I probably died 20-30 times trying to nail the platforming required to get that magma island item at the start of the Iron Keep. And I had to fiddle with my equipment extensively just to make sure I could survive long enough on magma islands to make those couple jumps without burning to death! Dark Souls platforming, man, you have to chain jumps here or die. And what is the reward for this entire ordeal? It is a Bonfire Ascetic--an item whose sole effect is to turn your NG into NG+ because you're just that hardcore, right? Dark Trolls!
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I'm using the only two whips I have, regular whip + notched whip.
The notched whip has bleed damage, which is pretty cool but worthless in PVP. (Pretty sure a poison whip would be the same? Players automatically panic and hide behind a shield + backpedal until the poison . But I'm no pro)
I can't change it with the blacksmith (Speaking of which, the upgrade system is so much better) Maybe i should go with two +9 whips, maybe one with elemental damage or something (This does a lot to annoy players hiding behind a shield)
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Old Whip is pro, trade enough rocks to birdbrains and hope for the best.
Yeah, I tried out the poison knife you get from Earthen Peak boss's soul and despite a lot of hits could not tell whether the poison ever triggered on the other player or not. And I took way too many hits myself trying, so shelved that approach.
The upgrade system is so much better. Much as the scarcity of upgrade materials annoys me early in the game, at least everything's so much simpler now. No more tracking a whole mess of upgrade trees, everything uses the same basic type and if you want extra effects or elements you toss one rock on it to alter the weapon's traits and you're done.
I was thinking about this at work today (huge shock) and I really like some of the things they did with online play. Something that wasn't immediately obvious until spending a decent chunk of time in DS2 phantom mode, but compared to DS1: in DS1, if you assist someone as a phantom, you respawn in your world afterwards with all your estus flasks and spell charges restored whether the host succeeds or dies; in DS2, this happens only if the host successfully achieves their goal, and if the host dies everything you spent as a summon remains spent (this basically holds true if you die as well, and in either event you respawn at wherever you left off instead of the nearest bonfire; I also approve of this).
The upshot of this is that you have a subtle incentive to make sure that they do in fact succeed (if helping people/having fun/bunch o' souls wasn't reward enough). Moreover, the effect of allies on enemy durability is so dramatically iincreased in DS2 (it barely mattered in DS1) that sometimes summoning people at all can be kind of a gamble. You can really screw yourself over if you go in with a gang that can't hack it. With a full gang of three PCs, overall boss durability seems to be something like doubled. Sure, you still basically have a numerical advantage that should make things easier, but the game's not about to recalculate boss defenses mid-battle if someone dies. This means that if a phantom dies right out of the gate, they have made the fight substantially more difficult for the host without providing them any benefit at all. So the game is basically punishing you for failure, but they are punishing you for failing someone else. This makes me smile. Also the successful co-op completion award item is a consumable item that heals your host while you're a phantom. They really wanted to push proper teamwork here.
Also, since there's really no mandated linear progression through areas, you can generally bet on finding a wide range of levels (and therefore co-op/PVP partners) in a broad variety of zones at any time. PVP is better without invader healing, no more douchebag runs away and chows down on humanity for full health. Allied phantom healing also locked out during invasion to balance this out. Fight to the death or go home!
And this far into the game it is really starting to tell how they overhauled the stats. A lot of them taper to giving modest but still useful rewards after 20 or so; STR/DEX look to still plummet for bonuses after 40. This is fine, even though it does delineate kind of a clear upper ceiling on physical stats for people who aren't shooting for frue tanking. I'm not sure where the carry weight borders are for movement, but they're definitely broader than they used to be--maybe there aren't any and it's all gradient, I dunno, but I seem to move the same speed naked and approaching 50% burden. Also, elemental weapons all scale with magic stats now, so they don't get to be the default option for people looking to invest a minimum into STR/DEX and just dump everything else on HP. Poise is also far less significant.
I am happy with changes that mean I don't see another entire game full of lightning katanas and giant dads.
So yeah, just to note in light of earlier bitching there is a lot of design stuff that works much better here (though the HP in hollow form thing still annoys me just for that sense of not being able to run at maximum capacity, much in the manner of irritation at being stuck behind a slow driver on the highway rather than being a gamebreaker. At least that damn ring only takes up 1/4 of your slots this time instead of 1/2.)
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Dark Souls 2: I have one more primordial soul as Fudo continues his despair into madness. Fire Keep was great fun. Boss felt easy but I still died like 6 times. Similar to Iron Golem in that he telegraphs all his moves very obviously but one mistake = Probable death.
Anyway Yattaf looks like this.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/12/1395192230-20140319-020537.jpg)
Yeah it's a mess but I love it. Dual whips!
I've done way too much bell PVP today and a few people sent me messages about how cool the build was.
I'm actually going with dual whips most of the time, but if I'm up against a jerk I switch to a rapier + fire sword which work extremely well in PvP. So far. Against low poise opponents. Run + L1 -> Extremely quickl slash, then you can combo that into Slash-slash-slash for huge damage.
Faces have been improved in Dark Souls 2, Yattaf is now total waifu material.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/12/1395192230-20140319-020334.jpg) (http://www.noelshack.com/2014-12-1395192230-20140319-020334.jpg)
Also here is what she looks like with the armor you get for doing insane amounts of PvP for three days. Please note that the whole set I showed above is just found in the open and that this one is ultra-super-rare and 1% of all players will get it.
Behold.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/12/1395192230-20140319-015807.jpg)
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I dig cowgirl Yattaf.
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BD: Hey, Chapter 7, I can finally get the last job. Oh. No I can't. Guess I should turn random encounters back on and grind a bit.
DS2: Found a boss! Probably easier than any DS1 boss but I still died once because I'm naked and rolled into a wall.
Still rocking the deprived look, except I now wear a monacle for extra item-findys and a Caestus because, yeah, bare fist damage.
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DS2: Dragging the Lake formally in progress. This place is great. It's dark and eerily silent, but that describes a lot of places in Dark Souls, right? But there's just enough life in the castle to suggest someone vacant leaving a light on to ward off prowlers. Neat inversion of Anor Londo. And that was...certainly not what I was expecting to encounter on the top floor. Spoiler mode for one particular thing: Given portrait of ruin on the lower floor, I strongly considered shooting the queen in the face. I did not. Someone else will have to be more adventurous than me!
Lady says go see the king, I figure he'll be in the next room, but alas. Instead, hey Cid, remember that boss you mocked as being total crap like thirty hours ago, how about fighting two of him at once? I died once because surprise, did not spot the sniper version upstairs. Once again Flame Swirly saves the day. Jesus you guys this spell is nuts, obliterated two-thirds of his health bar in one shot (+9 pyro hand, +10 by the end of the day! Still nutty).
Game dumped like three titanite slabs on me today. This is crazy. I have maxed out large club, Ricard's rapier, shortbow, 50% of scandalacious attire. And I've still got one more in storage! (Nothing to use it on because no titanite chunks. What is your deal, game.) Shield/whip still need work because twinkling titanite, where do you find it.
Wait a minute, the fast travel screen now shows an (inaccessible) list of all future bonfires in all future zones of the game (and missed past ones, hi Black Gulch). That...that wasn't always there, was it?
I forgot to mention, dual-wielding Avelyn phantom = just the best thing.
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FF10 HD: Started, on Expert Sphere Grid because seriously, if I wanted to just replay FF10, I'd have replayed FF10 normally on the PS2!
This playthrough I'm going to make note of certain plot details that people often complain about. Like the infamous "Tidus whines!" claim.
So far, Tidus' whining is mostly to himself or at completely justified instances (like...everything in Baaj Temple), and some of it is even kind of ironic style (monster comes out of nowhere right as his fire dies down, his reaction is "Oh COME ON!") It's notable that he doesn't whine at all when something is actually show a glimmer of hope. 2 obviouse examples are:
Rikku starts talking English, his composure changes entirely. Before that? "I can't understand you!" Then Rikku explains it and his reaction is basically "oh, fair enough, beats the alternative!"
Meeting Wakka in general; even when Wakka basically spells out that Tidus is SOL, Tidus takes it pretty well.
Now for something else!
The thing people tend to ignore? Tidus takes the attack on Zanarkand pretty well. He doesn't panic as much as you'd think, keeps a relatively level head despite the GIANT WHALE DESTROYING EVERYTHING IN TOWN, what have you. Yeah, Auron's presence and relative calmness I'm sure helps, but even then, just keeping anything regarding composure in an extreme situation like that deserves props.
Also, never clicked for me before, but Tidus saying "What are you laughing at?" at the Jecht Billboard is a nice little stroke of foreshadowing (for lack of a better term.)
Keep notes on things otherwise from here! No, don't know what I'll notice that I haven't noticed already; this is functionally like my 5th play-through of the game or something, but still! If someone has a request for stuff to look out for this playthrough that they're curious about (in plot), I'll try to keep that in mind too!
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Xenogears: In which the party visits
Zeal Shevat.
Hour 28: Actually some of Babel Tower happened in the previous chapter. I will talk about the platforming here because it is so rightfully infamous. First of all: the one really good thing is that the randoms are fixed, so at least you don't waste time with them when you fall (and also, more importantly, it avoids the problem where randoms kick in and interrupt your jumps, which is pretty much the worst thing about Xenogears gameplay and that's not a criticism I make lightly). But yeah still it's quite annoying. There's a tricky platforming puzzle in the first room, especially if you want a treasure chest (which to be fair is optional), and I can deal with that, but what I can't so easily deal with is this stupid swing rope you need to pass every single time you botch the jump and generally colossally wastes your time. Don't do this, video games, especially not to punish the player for making an error on something as mediocre and non-core gameplay as Xenogears platforming.
Moment of awesome, though: I totally perfect the second half of the platforming (jumping on various platforms for the final climb) which saves a lot of wasted time, at least!
As far as plot goes here, well, Ramsus attacks again! Interesting that he knew we were here (the party acknowledges that this is weird, so it's not just a plot hole)... Hammer? Anyway, Ramsus is all going to blow us up (after getting destroyed in a boss fight again since that's what happens to Ramsus) with his big ship's main gun but the party is saved by Shevat. There's another scene with the Gazel Ministry where they express disgust at Ramsus's failure and alarm at the party reaching Shevat, but don't worry, they have another evil plot that will take care of Shevat, oh yes they do~
Finally, at the top of the tower, we meet Maria. There's a boss fight against her which she later reveals is just her "testing" us. Oh RPGs. Then she, and someone called Queen Zephyr, invite the party up to Shevat.
On Shevat, before being able to explore the city, there's an optional scene with Maria which is actually quite touching, where she talks about her father who helped her escape Solaris even though it meant his own capture, how scared she is that now as the years go by she finds herself forgetting him as the years go by, and how she is motivated to save him as he saved her, now. Perhaps it's a bit silly that she would blather to some strangers about this, but I dunno, it worked. I am already officially more sold on this PC than Rico, let's all be impressed.
Hour 29: Shevat's big. I'd kinda forgotten how much. Not so much in raw size, but there are a lot of people to talk to, and most of them like to talk a lot. There's a fair bit of setting work here; some of it is specific to Shevat, but a lot also connects back to the war 500 years ago, which Shevat participated in and remembers well. Lots of significant setting details come out at this point, including:
-The war 500 years ago was between Solaris and Shevat, with Shevat allied with the land-dwellers (which they themselves were at the time) and Solaris playing the same douchey role they still do. (One nice touch is that Elly has a few responses to the slagging of Shevat, though doesn't really know how to feel obviously.)
-Some of the heroes on the Shevat side include their now immortal queen, Zephyr, as well as Bart's ancestor Roni Fatima (already mentioned), and three wise immortals called the Sages, who still live. The names Sophia and Lacan are also dropped at this point.
-Solaris is ruled by the Gazel (I think this is the first time the party formally learns about the council we've been seeing a bunch), 12 immortal jackasses, and by Krelian. Cain isn't mentioned at all, somewhat strangely.
-Krelian was a land-dweller who learned molecular engineering from one of the Sages, but after the war went to serve Solaris for unknown reasons. He was responsible for creating a "limiter" (what this is isn't clear, probably some sort of biological agent since Solaris wouldn't have been able to manually capture every one of their enemies obviously) which destroyed humans' memories of Solaris (hence why they're a big secret now) and also somehow limits their potential in some way though this is hazy and probably mostly a gameplay nod (hyper deathblows!).
-There are 12 "Anima relics" (previously mentioned by the Gazel) which can turn Gears in badass Omnigears. Solaris has some, Shevat has some; one is known to be Roni Fatima's gear, the treasure which Shakhan is desperately seeking.
-The Shevat/Solaris conflict ended with the appearance of a third party which people are pretty vague about: the "Diabolos". The heroes were able to fight those off, but they destroyed most of the world's population in the process, and afterwards Solaris licked their wounds and returned to the role they currently hold. I actually don't remember the specifics here... were "they" just Grahf?
There is also some Shevat-specific stuff, for instance that many of their citizens have been rescued from the surface (including, of course, the Lahan villagers, although at this point you don't run into any? Kinda strange but not unreasonable that you don't explore everything or have time to meet them), and their methods of growing food and dealing with limited resources. We also meet lots of Chu-Chus. Apparenty this is where they are from. Frightening. (It'll get more frightening later.)
We also meet two old friends here: Yui, who confirms her role in rescuing the Lahan villagers, and Wiseman, who is now confirmed as an agent of Shevat, watching the activities of "that man". And we meet Queen Zephyr, 522 years old, made immortal along with a few other Shevites to "atone" for the tragedy of 500 years ago, though she pointedly refuses to talk further about it.
Another scene with Maria, mostly expanding on the previous one, in which she reveals her frustration at not being allowed to go and kick Solarian ass and rescue her father. She has huge confidence in her gear Seibzehn (I see its stats before the hour is up; her feelings are justified) and is frustrated that others stop her, even if she kinda understands why.
Finally, there's a visit to one rather creepy place in the otherwise largely utopian Shevat: its old prison. It hasn't been used in years, but from the NPCs there you can gather it was once used in very nasty ways, so perhaps Shevat hasn't always been so nice. One blames it on war simply making everybody bad. Finally, one cryptic NPC, apparently one of the few alive since 500 years ago, talks of a woman who broke a man free of prison here, and how that man went on to cause the calamity of 500 years past. A savvy player could figure out that he is referring to Miang and Grahf; this will of course be confirmed later.
Interesting stuff! The game is definitely on the move now.
Hour 30: By contrast, this one's all gameplay more or less. An invasion in the lower levels of Shevat by a spy is detected, and the party is recruited to go find out what's going on. With Maria in tow, they head down to the gear hangar. The main elevator is out (that would be too easy), so instead we get the winding route throw the maintenance shaft. This dungeon is actually surprisingly longer than I remembered. The enemies are pretty defensively gimmicky which gives Maria's Controls a chance to shine (too bad about her speed), but otherwise not too much to say; it's XG gameplay and is boring. At least there's no platforming?
Hour 31: Reaching the gear hangar, the party meets the intruder, who turns out to be Dominia. Before making her escape, Dominia decides to taunt Maria about her gear, Seibzehn, revealing that its control circuit was made using countless sacrifices, both figurative (results of Kislev battle arena testing) and literal (humans turned into reapers) as it was supposed to be a better kind of sentient mech or something. Maria understandably freaks out, saying her dad would never do that, but Dominia insists. Jessie shows up and says some misogynistic things to Myuria because this character seems to enjoy pissing me off. She retreats, noting that her work is done; thanks to her efforts damaging the Shevat gate, Solarian forces will soon be invading.
Jessie also reveals that Shevat has gone and picked up the Yggdrasil. Well! If you guys had done that earlier I WOULDN'T HAVE HAD TO CLIMB THAT STUPID TOWER ahem. I guess it's plausible that they would only do so now that we've sought them out and have offered to assist them, though. But still!
Anyway, a battle sequence follows in which Shevat is defended by various solo PC gears against the Solarian army. Some of these fights are actually a bit tricky, in no small part because I just upgraded my gears after Alkanshel and now there are more upgrades, some of which I can't afford. Unfortunately at this point, Achtzehn shows up, apparently pilotted by Maria's dad Nikolai, who has become quite the baby-eater. He jams the engines of all the gears so all the regular PCs are useless. Not Maria though! But Maria can't bring herself to fight her father, and is still filled with doubt from Dominia's words to boot. So it's Chu-Chu to the rescue.
I'll just leave you all with a collection of Chu-Chu quotes, since I really can't do this part justice otherwise:
"Chu-Chu's not a good girl. I'm in that dangerous age right now."
"I'm not a low level animal. I'm Chu-Chu."
"Well, let's get ready chu rumble you bad boy! Get your butt ready chu be kicked across the other end of the horizon!"
"I did it! I did the big big churansformation!"
Anyway yeah, Chu-Chu beats down big bad Achtzehn despite all his plot hype (and Chu-Chu's subsequent complete in-game worthlessness). Still, Achtzehn gains the upper hand in the cutscene after the fight, revealing that Chu-Chus are native to this planet (unlike humans, as per Balthasar's comments early in the game) and that they were supposed to have Limiters implanted to prevent them from going all giant, but Chu-Chu is apparently special or something.
Midori, meanwhile, shows up, and cryptically tells Maria that her father isn't calling from Achtzehn, but from somewhere else. Maria infers that she means Seibzehn, and rushes to pilot it, being drawn into battle with her apparent father. Achtzehn!Nikolai tries to convince Maria to come to his side, spouting supervillainy even as he assures Maria he will protect her from the calamity to come and that that they can live together in perfect harmony even if he no longer has a body since he is a perfect being fused with a gear. Maria, fortunately, isn't fooled, and neither is her gear, which moves to fight Achtzehn.
As the fight continues, suddenly, Nikolai begins really talking. It's a nice touch; the game hasn't used a portrait for his lines up until now, but suddenly it does, making it clear this is the "real" Nikolai. He reveals that the real him is long gone, brainwashed by Solaris, but that he implanted this message in Achtzehn which would kick in in Seibzehn's presence. He says a fond farewell to his daughter, even as he takes control of Seibzehn and forces it to use a special secret weapon to destroy Achtzehn. Maria is understandably distraught, but the voice of her father assures her that he will always be by her side, as Seibzehn. D'awww.
EDIT: Also there is an implied Chu-Chu orgy. Argh.
The crisis averted, Queen Zephyr gathers the party and gives them some grave news: Shakhan has invaded Nisan. Guess that's our next destination!
Up next: Cleaning up the hanging plot threads from the first sixth of the game. Also lots of baldness jokes.
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Dark Souls 2: I have one more primordial soul as Fudo continues his despair into madness.
I'll have you know the PS3 is fixed now and I started a Deprived with the goal of dual-wielding Caestus. Awwww yeah. After pumping inordinate amounts of levels into Adaptability and getting my Agility to 100 I can roll good again! Also I think the natrual poise straight out lies because I was actually Poising through Forest enemies a few times which shouldn't happen with 1.8 Poise ever.
Last Giant down, Effortless rash down. Gonna go grab a secret weapon in NMW before attempting Pursuer solos.
Day 8+1 Hour: 59 Million deaths.
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Dark Souls 2: Found Huntsmen's Copse. Spent a little while trying to cross a bridge, only to have my face wrecked by dudes with... axes? I don't know, but enemies should not swing that fast. Went a different way and found a boss. Skeleton Lords was... not what I expected and almost went really badly really quickly. Thankfully I persevered.
Still no Ultra Greatsword =(
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Anyway yeah, Chu-Chu beats down big bad Achtzehn despite all his plot hype (and Chu-Chu's subsequent complete in-game worthlessness).
Fun fact! The first time I played the game (and the only time I had the patience to beat it), this battle, combined with Chu-Chu being the only Gear-character who could heal without using fuel, combined with a complete inability to manage fuel use, lead to me thinking Chu-Chu was a worthy PC in the endgame.
I also didn't learn many deathblows after Kislev or so, because I didn't realize how I was supposed to build them up.
You can extrapolate how difficult everything... basically past disc 2 was for me.
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Xenogears: In which the party visits Zeal Shevat.
I know you are kind of joking around here, but the clear Chrono Trigger link here has always kind of bugged me. I can't tell if they decide to make such a majour section of the plot a cute reference to Chrono Trigger just because or is there some broader myth here that I am missing the reference too constantly? I know obviously that the three Wisemen are reference to the three Kings/Magi, but why tie them to a kingdom in the sky ruled by a Queen? Is it just a literal nod to the kingdom of heaven not conflated with anything else? Why is it always a Queen? It feels like there should be more to it and I am just ignorant, but I have no idea what it is. Because if you take it at face value for CT I suppose you could see Lavos as like the object of worship (which then turns out to be false), but I don't see anything that really translates here. They don't have a link to Deus. Fei plot stuff is all after their time, they didn't really put any faith in him and have it fail (which is a pattern repeating from CT).
I just don't get tying a reference in so closely to the plot and that could just be lost on me.
As for Shevat referencing Gazel Ministry and not Cain at all, I assume CK has a better explanation for it, but I had always interpreted it as Shevat being far more of the way Solaris is actually running than the majority of Solaris itself does as outsiders. They deal with the outcomes of Gazel made choices, nothing seems to be ordered or directed by Cain himself, just in his name.
Another possibility is that to outsiders Cain just might not even be a thing that outsiders know about if Solaris are really good at housekeeping. I forget if anyone has made reference to Kain outside of cutscenes either yet?
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Still no Ultra Greatsword =(
You're on the right dungeon chain to find zweihander, at least. Only have to hack through two and half more to reach it! (There's an enemy somewhere else that actually drops it, but that's kind of on the other side of the world.) I could've sworn there was a lootable generic Greatsword in No Man's Wharf too (giant fuck-off Cloud buster sword basically).
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Tthe Zeal/Shevat similarities could be because Shevat was intended to be ZEAL originally. Xenogears was allegedly intended to be Chrono Trigger's original sequel, but mid development, they changed the game into something new (and subsequently, all blatant references sans Tutorial Lucca were removed, aka had their names changed), sort of like how DMC1 was going to be the original RE4, which explains why there are so many things that seem to point out to CT.
EDIT: Researching, seems the scenario may have been along the lines of two different projects entirely, just XG used a lot of the assets they held onto after CT2 was cancelled, probably as a cost and time saving measure. So XG wasn't originally intended to be CT2, but did indirectly spawn from it, if that makes sense.
Hard to say, but XG does have some link to a Chrono Trigger sequel, be it originally intended to be one and turned into an original project, or just sort of piggy-backed onto the assets of a non-created game, or what. Either way, combined with the team who worked on XG has a lot of the same guys who worked on CT, it explains the similarities between the two games.
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Dark Souls 2: Did some sunbroing in Belfry Luna because the boss there is really fun and I get some bonus souls when I get invaded. People are still trying to figure out the ideal builds, and my typical waiting to be summoned spot puts me in a position to blast them with a Great Soul Arrow before they get their bearings so I actually win most of the time! Also, I discovered that the shield I had been using was pretty shit so I upgraded to one with more stability and the effect was almost instantly noticeable. Probably going to do either Iron Keep or Blightown 2 next. I haven't really decided.
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Meep, there is more to the story.
Kingdom of Zeal is an idea conjured purely by the CC writer himself. The original draft of CT has no Zeal at all and Magus was suppose to be the one that's behind most of the stuff, until the CC writer was inserted into the project, where he inserts Zeal into it.
When the idea of doing something more to CT came up, XG was also proposed. In the end, XG was the project that Square wants to go with. The CC writer was also assigned to the project, because, well, Takahashi really needs to insert his lengthy and messy plot into the game.
But I never once thought that was a good idea. I mean, CC writer of all people.
BTW, even to this day. The CC writer still did not recognize what did wrong in CC and is still disillusioned in his own ego on what Chrono series should be.
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I can't even imagine CT's plot without Zeal; not only is it one of the best and IMO most fundamental parts of the game's story, but it serves as crucial development for Magus, the game's best-written character. Guess the CC writer was good for something!
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I can't even imagine CT's plot without Zeal; not only is it one of the best and IMO most fundamental parts of the game's story, but it serves as crucial development for Magus, the game's best-written character. Guess the CC writer was good for something!
Just seconding this because wow, rips the heart out of the game for me if Zeal isn't there.
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BTW, regarding Shebat jail.
I remeber that it was Miang that was held down there. She tempted Lacan, who was going psycho because of Sophia's death, to free her by letting him know about the Zohar.
The Diablos are Deus's minion bots, which later was known as Aeons.
After Lacan made it to the Zohar, he acuqired some access to Deus's function and unleash the Diablos all over the world.
As for the limiterm Krelian inserted that into human genes when rebuilding the human race post the calamity, making the land dwellers easier to control.
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Yeah, they say something about how people with Limiters become instinctively paralyzed with fear when confronted by Solaris or something along those lines. It's something we are only told and never shown in action. Bart, who still has his limiter until you get to Shevat, can fight Ramsus, who is both an identical duplicate of Cain and the leader of Solaris' army, without having any kind of reaction, so it seems like the idea of the Limiter is something that was conceived of midway through development and they never really thought it out very well.
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so it seems like the idea ... is something that was conceived of midway through development and they never really thought it out very well.
XG in a nutshell, folks.
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The Diablos aren't properly explained ever, so it's PW territory. Basically though, Grahf dug up some Eldridge relics, mechs meant to be fused with anima relics that he was able to directly control due to his Contact with Zohar. Basically it was Grahf and a dozen prototype omnigears.
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How many things ARE explained properly in that game? There's so many things that got dropped that even stuff about the main plot is missing.
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-Magma chests in the Iron Keep*. Even with the fire resist ring and Flash Sweat up, I can only survive long enough to make it to the chests. If these were items on corpses, I'd just grab them and die, but no, I have to be able to survive long enough for the entire chest-opening animation to play out. Ack. Short of taking time to identify and upgrade the most fire-resistant armor set in the game, doubt I am ever getting these two (maybe it would help if my only upgraded armor set was something other than the harem outfit).
Just got this one. By the sniper who attacks you when you're by the entrance to the big lava pit room there's a Pharros Lockstone that when unlocked releases a pool of water. Roll around in that and see if your footprints turn dark, if they do that means you have greater fire resistance for a while. Also you can drop straight by the chest from the draw bridge you lowered with the switches. You need the Silvercat ring or else you'll die from fall damage but it puts you right by the chest. Aside from that, Flash Sweat, Orange Burr, and any equipment that boosts your fire resist or health. You can also pop some lifegems to give you and extra few fractions of a second.
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DS2: Elvis has left the building.
Someone tells me hey, go to the throne already, finish it, but I have reason to believe that Someone doesn't have my best interests at heart. So instead I'm poking around this old mansion and oh my god you guys I found the snazziest witch outfit, it's unbelievable. I'm too dumb to wear the hat (and, hilariously, wearing equipment you don't meet the stats for slows your movement down even if the stat in question is purely mental) but it looks totally fabulous even without that. I would definitely switch this in as my standard armor set if only I could upgrade it! But I can't because that calls for more twinkling titanite than I've found in the entire game (argh, why is this stuff so rare). Will have to table that one for whenever I get around to running a mage.
Keyblade got! Keyblade lost. :( Will I dedicate a ring slot to looking all pretty and human even while undead? You better believe I will.
Shrine of Amana was creepy, but in a sorta different way? Unexpected use of torchlight! Frog granny was a no damage kill, though. Crypt was just dark, discouraged use of torchlight. The bells, the belllllls! Presently in dragon country, which really doesn't bode well considering how encounter with the last one turned out (survival only because HP tankin'). Other than this...hmm, there's still that big black door in the Forest of Fallen Giants (which I should be able to open now). And someone tells me there's something beneath Black Gulch, which is just...auuuugh.
If it wasn't apparent from volume of ::words:: expended over last several days, pretty much all my silly early bitching about whoamg things are slightly different turned out to be stuff that is almost wholly inconsequential and I am in fact very impressed.
-Magma chests in the Iron Keep*. Even with the fire resist ring and Flash Sweat up, I can only survive long enough to make it to the chests. If these were items on corpses, I'd just grab them and die, but no, I have to be able to survive long enough for the entire chest-opening animation to play out. Ack. Short of taking time to identify and upgrade the most fire-resistant armor set in the game, doubt I am ever getting these two (maybe it would help if my only upgraded armor set was something other than the harem outfit).
Just got this one. By the sniper who attacks you when you're by the entrance to the big lava pit room there's a Pharros Lockstone that when unlocked releases a pool of water. Roll around in that and see if your footprints turn dark, if they do that means you have greater fire resistance for a while. Also you can drop straight by the chest from the draw bridge you lowered with the switches. You need the Silvercat ring or else you'll die from fall damage but it puts you right by the chest. Aside from that, Flash Sweat, Orange Burr, and any equipment that boosts your fire resist or health. You can also pop some lifegems to give you and extra few fractions of a second.
I tried all that stuff except the water pool (somehow didn't make the connection at the time) and still died. Always croaked right before finishing the chest opening animation. Oh well. Unless there's a hoard of ore in those chests, I don't much care to go back for it anymore. The strange thing is, when I tried popping an orange burr while Flash Sweat was active, I actually died faster. It seemed like the item effect overwrote the spell effect.
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It's entirely possible that the two are mutually exclusive as I noticed something similar on one attempt. I think the water makes the biggest difference as I think it cuts the damage down by like half. The time I ended up getting it I even had enough time to fudge the landing a bit and lose a couple ticks of health and my build doesn't have a lot of health at all. My Vitality is still in the single digits. The chest has a shield by the way. It has really good fire resistance and decent enough everything else. It wouldn't surprise me if it had some hidden stat bonuses though. Apparently there a quite a few items with unlisted bonuses to certain stats.
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First off, I totally agree that CT without Zeal would be just off, seeing how big an arc it is, and how it legitimately plays a serious role in the storyline, not to mention so many things stem from it, and they don't even feel forced either.
If there's anything that felt remove-able from CT, it'd be 65 million BC. That felt like it was mostly there because "You have time travel, how can we not put in a Dinosaur Themed area and a Cave(wo)man PC?" more so than anything else. Not saying the game was hurt by this, just doesn't really add much to the game's overall narrative, contrast to the other major time periods which all play some sort of significant role.
BUT that's neither here nor there.
Soul Silver: Elite 4 time! I got me a Mamoswine too, making this my 2nd playthrough of Soul Silver having a Ground type from Sinnoh! That said, I am kind of scared of the E4 because my team is really awkwardly set up, and a little underdeveloped due to a number of changes. Also decided to replace Jolteon with Raikou, which I may regret because Jolteon has T-bolt...I might go and do like 5 hours of Voltorb Flip granted <_<
Also possibly should consider replacing Vileplume with something, though dunno what; lack of a decent attack is holding it back.
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Go ahead and keep Vileplume. If I can get through SS E4 with a Delibird, you'll survive.
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First off, I totally agree that CT without Zeal would be just off, seeing how big an arc it is, and how it legitimately plays a serious role in the storyline, not to mention so many things stem from it, and they don't even feel forced either.
If there's anything that felt remove-able from CT, it'd be 65 million BC. That felt like it was mostly there because "You have time travel, how can we not put in a Dinosaur Themed area and a Cave(wo)man PC?" more so than anything else. Not saying the game was hurt by this, just doesn't really add much to the game's overall narrative, contrast to the other major time periods which all play some sort of significant role.
BUT that's neither here nor there.
I always thought it was funny that the guy who wrote CC needed to ascribe not the development of language or technology (since the humans in Ayla's village have mastered things like fire, toolmaking, and rudimentary construction) but the development of grammatically correct syntax in the mere span of 64,988,000 years to Lavos exposure.
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Dark Souls 2: Fuck those enemies outside Undead Purgatory. Fuck that item sitting right next to the bridge on Undead Purgatory. Fuck Skeletons.
Tried Poisonville, not quite happy with the way the dark orb from those giant things murders me.
Found a Greatsword. Went to Tomb of Sinners. Used a Pharos Keystone and then was sad. Murdered some rats. Lost a bunch of souls misjudging a roll.
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Dark Souls 3: From the Future! Managed to solo Pursuer after a half-dozen deathes? Going back to Demon's Souls everything does half your health in damage always is still bullshit. Especially when the roll randomly decides to let damage through. Woo. Flex Sentry down as a joke. Ruin Sentinal down after three attempts and just as many summon success in 20 summons. I can't wait for the slog that is Lost Sinner.
On upside news, I managed to get my Caestus to +6 which means when I get another Lockstone I'm going to Bellbro it up. Also going to grab hexes as a secondary because lordie is my damage sad.
IN OTHER NEWS. The Ring of Life Protection aka this game's Ring of Sacrifice breaks when you die. Breaks. Like every other object. As in it can get repaired at the Blacksmith for 3000 souls. Enjoy never losing human form again. Unless Pursuer curses you ffffffffffff.
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Dark Souls 2: Fuck those enemies outside Undead Purgatory. Fuck that item sitting right next to the bridge on Undead Purgatory. Fuck Skeletons.
If memory serves, that is an item you really want to get, too.
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http://spookyskeletonpics.tumblr.com/ Skeletons just want to be loved you guys :(
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Tried Poisonville, not quite happy with the way the dark orb from those giant things murders me.
If you have a ranged attack, they can't angle their dark orb attack at all. Get angled either below or above them and their dark orb will whiff or get caught on a ledge.
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FF Dimensions: Into the paladin chapter. Dancer chapter was pretty good, and I was able to finally accumulate some cash reserves by gambling for a fuck-ton of X-Potions. Not sure what I'll do with the class, but hey. Experimenting is good, right? Paladin I do know what I'm doing with, since it seems about perfect for the Spellblade ability Sol is about to learn.
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Dark Souls 2: Fuck those enemies outside Undead Purgatory. Fuck that item sitting right next to the bridge on Undead Purgatory. Fuck Skeletons.
If memory serves, that is an item you really want to get, too.
Out of curiosity, you are supposed to just jump for it, right? Pretty sure I just keep failing at pressing jump correctly and then being mad that I have to walk back through the douche monsters.
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We're talking the item right outside Undead Purgatory entrance, right? On the stone ledge. You can make the jump, it's just kind of bitchy (I made it and died on the way back, meaning I had to make it again to recover souls. B'oh).
The presence of a wheel skeleton picture in that collection pleases me greatly, Grefter.
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Dark Souls 2: Do not play if you have arachnophobia seriously
So yeah I don't understand what happened here with the giant soul.
So there's a lot of plot hidden in the game and trying to understand the story will probably take a lot longer than in Demon's / Dark. I've noticed that you can sometimes hear faint female-ish voices when you do not move for a little while. Wonder whether they say anything not gibberish.
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Especially when the roll randomly decides to let damage through. Woo.
IN OTHER NEWS. The Ring of Life Protection aka this game's Ring of Sacrifice breaks when you die. Breaks. Like every other object. As in it can get repaired at the Blacksmith for 3000 souls. Enjoy never losing human form again. Unless Pursuer curses you ffffffffffff.
I'm fairly sure it's just more adaptability = more i-frames, not the roll randomly not working.
The difference between my first and second fight with Pursuer was night and day.
Oh man now I can't use that ring at all
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why not
you confuse me so much
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Doing a first playthrough as blindly as possible and that's just too much info. I wasn't going to use it except in emergency uses!
Honestly the regen is way too slow anyway. It is Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines level slow.
I'm in the obvious last stretch of the game.
Edit: Also, that ant. It will haunt me.
And that room in the castle. Jesus.
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FF13 - Replay! Got to Chapter 5. :D
Also finished my War of the Lions playthrough. Haven't been playing too much, though, been trying to do other stuff more~
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Dark Souls 2: Do not play if you have arachnophobia seriously
So yeah I don't understand what happened here with the giant soul.
So there's a lot of plot hidden in the game and trying to understand the story will probably take a lot longer than in Demon's / Dark. I've noticed that you can sometimes hear faint female-ish voices when you do not move for a little while. Wonder whether they say anything not gibberish.
I just had someone give me something almost resembling a plotdump! By Dark Souls standards. (Of course he stopped before telling me the important bit.)
I only just now noticed the voices in Black Gulch (which I was revisiting for...reasons). Also do not recall an obvious heartbeat being part of the ambient noise there before. God, that place.
And that room in the castle. Jesus.
Yes.
(Progress report Fenrirs would not want to read follows.)
Raided Dragontown. Wow that was probably like two-thirds of the game's crystal lizards accounted for right there. I now have like four titanite slabs I can't do anything with because no chunks. That is just crazy. Oh but it turns out the Black Gulch lamprey mouth monsters drop chunks at a decent rate I should go farming there fuck no. Anyway! Apparently Mr. Callback at the top of the shrine is an optional boss. I do not think that I will be initiating hostilities because: A) disinclined to attack someone who helps me unbidden without asking for anything (and Someone doesn't trust him, which is encouraging); B) jesus that's gotta be the biggest enemy I've seen in one of these games; C) I got to him with three estus flasks left. That walk is just brutal and there's apparently no bonfire save but the one at the start of the zone.
Also, Velka armor set found. Score! I think that it is even more stylish now. Pity the flashiest armor sets show up so late (when you have probably already spent the game's supply of twinkling titanite).
Navlaan are you seriously going to invade me in every zone I visit now. Is that what's going on here. Do you want me to come back and kill you in person for real?
Function of giant/tree things in Forest of Fallen Giants discovered! While I'm back there revisiting all of those, I notice there was a whole wing of the dungeon I never discovered on the first run. And there's a dude in there who gives you the key to the mansion in Majula. ...I've been wondering about that place the whole damn game! And there was an estus flask shard inside it! I also finally unlock the door just outside the Last Giant's boss room. Oh hey salamanders, they shouldn't be too much of a problem, right? *One dead Cid later* Okay, that's it for the night.
Looks like I could probably knock out the rest tomorrow night. Probably won't, got personal work to do with weekend deadline. Saturday!
EDIT: had my first PC invader today! While revisiting the first dungeon of all places. *Flame Swathe, rapier poke, dead* How does that spell do so much damage. Jeebus.
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Tomb Raider - Finished this with 81%. Pretty fun even if not necessarily my style of game. Generally I find myself comparing to Arkham Asylum but the comparison is pretty favourable overall: for me, at least, "survive this terrifying island" is more of a draw than "be Batman" even though I expect to be in the minority here, and the combat is definitely better. It's not really the main draw of the game but it takes you nicely along a challenge curve as time goes on, enjoyable enough third-person-shooter if simple. The plot occasionally felt a bit disjoined especially around the middle but a very strong start and it came together pretty well in the end; most of the characters were quite memorable. I'm not one for collecta-thons in general and I certainly didn't collect all the relics or GPSes and didn't finish a single one of the area-specific mini-quests, but I did enjoy tracking down all the documents (which shed a fair bit of light on the characters and setting) and did all the tombs as well since eh fun enough diversion.
Bravely Default - Continuing through chapter 3, currently running two Spellblade Valkyries since that skillset combination is so good (though I may switch one to Pirate), along with a Performer/mage and dedicated healer (Salve-Maker). Now that MP restoration is getting cheaper I may actually take a look at Summoner again, I dunno. Hit the damage cap for the first time recently! That happened kinda early. Fire temple boss was badass but not as badass as water temple boss. C3 asterisk bosses have been a bit of a step down from C2's though, at least so far.
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Dark Souls 2: For want of good bosses. Gargoyles, Lost Sinner, Scorpioness and Skeleton Lords down. Scorpioness was the only one to take more than one try(FOUR!). Garogyles went distressingly smooth, helped out by one of them randomly suiciding. Lost Sinner is the sad pathetic joke I envisioned her to be with light and a less shitty roll. Scorpioness got two kills due to being unable to tack her burrowed and the third off her being the only thing in the game faster than a casetus swing apparently. Skeleton Lords really, really hated Casetus though. They took only three hits to go down. Casetus really, really brutalized skeletons in this. The "shortcut" guarded by regular skellies would have been a cakewalk if I needed to run it.
I scrapped up enough Large Shards to finally get my right-hand Caestus to using Chunks. From there it was bell-guarding! Seven fights, five wins! And one time dying getting invaded myself due to talking with the covenant guy. Poise being useless means the Caestus' absurd attack speed and minor stamina drain allows me to fully control anyone I hit. FUN. For me. Anyway, Caestus+10 here I go and it only boosts the Dex scaling to A instead of Strength S BOOOOOOO. Leveling STR stat also gives +1 damage to the +10 Casetus but +2 damage to the +5 Caestus, LOGIC!
Got enough INT and FAITH for hexes. Frankly the damage boost from the Enchant Weapons Spells is so minimal I'd be better off just Soul Vessaling all my points into good stats for more consistency. Like, I actually thought I was doing less damage with a weapon buff up! Crazy. Though having Dark Orb as additional ranged damage is OK I guess. Still have a bow for that though.
Poking around in Lost Bastille I also managed to find Hush and that spell parry shield in load screen descriptions. Neat, I guess.
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Bravely Default - Continuing through chapter 3, currently running two Spellblade Valkyries since that skillset combination is so good (though I may switch one to Pirate), along with a Performer/mage and dedicated healer (Salve-Maker). Now that MP restoration is getting cheaper I may actually take a look at Summoner again, I dunno. Hit the damage cap for the first time recently! That happened kinda early. Fire temple boss was badass but not as badass as water temple boss. C3 asterisk bosses have been a bit of a step down from C2's though, at least so far.
I find that fairly accurate, since your options just widen considerably. The game at least does a decent job of keeping bosses competent even with the wide array of options you have available. I kinda wish I had figured out what makes Valkyrie good earlier, since the class is great once it gets rolling and its synergy with a few other classes is great, but its first few levels underwhelm me. As for Summon Magic, it started looking appealing to me once I nabbed Aspir, since the summoning costs become self-sustaining with an offensively-geared mage setup. You do need a dedicated attack caster for that, though (and staying in Summoner is -so painful-. At least you don't ever have to touch the class again once you hit L10).
The main draw of Summons is really the fact they're better than Black Magic L3 attack spells in -every way- (cheaper, MT, at least about as damaging and not brutalized by unfocusing), and that's actually notable once they become affordable. It's an amazing random-busting skillset and hardly bad against bosses.
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I kinda wish I had figured out what makes Valkyrie good earlier, since the class is great once it gets rolling and its synergy with a few other classes is great, but its first few levels underwhelm me.
Valkyrie has Crescent Moon as its very first ability, and that's fairly easily its best (so far), so I dunno about that! I mean Judgement and Spirit Barrier are nice enough certainly, and the Jump abilities are probably decent when spears are actually keeping up atk-wise (they aren't, at the moment), but really Crescent Moon is the reason to use Acrobatics. Eat it, randoms*.
*and some bosses
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That mostly fits in the "I wish I had figured it out earlier" part, since yes, the Crescent Moon synergy with Spellblade is amazing and I didn't even think to explore it. So, I got underwhelmed by the inferior stats on spears (which -do- admittedly skip ahead eventually) and the lack of job levels, and at that point I still hadn't entirely worked how to maximize BP-blitzing efficiently. Valkyries are easily the best iteration of Dragoon-like classes since FF3o, but they have some interesting nooks and crannies to sort to get it rolling. Kind of the class' caveat as your introduction to more layered BP management.
(Also, I kept half-assedly comparing a naked Crescent Moon's damage with WEAKNESS-HITTING L2S without making efficiency/synergy comparisons at that point, which is utterly unfair)
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Dark Souls 2: For want of good bosses. Gargoyles, Lost Sinner, Scorpioness and Skeleton Lords down. Scorpioness was the only one to take more than one try(FOUR!). Garogyles went distressingly smooth, helped out by one of them randomly suiciding. Lost Sinner is the sad pathetic joke I envisioned her to be with light and a less shitty roll. Scorpioness got two kills due to being unable to tack her burrowed and the third off her being the only thing in the game faster than a casetus swing apparently. Skeleton Lords really, really hated Casetus though. They took only three hits to go down. Casetus really, really brutalized skeletons in this. The "shortcut" guarded by regular skellies would have been a cakewalk if I needed to run it.
I'm pretty sure Najka can't burrow under the stone panel in the floor of the boss arena. I took to standing there after suffering horrible damage from GRABOID ATTACK and didn't have her emerge under me again, at least.
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Soul Silver: Let's try the E4!
*loses once*
Ok, what kind of things can I do to make my team suck less? Well, Magmar 2 levels from Lavaplume, that'll help for PP purposes and consistent damage move better than Fire Punch (Fire Blast is good but a bit unsafe due to accuracy), also high Burn Rate. Iron Tail on Raikou because SCREW YOU JINX...which I end up never using anyway, but shh! Also discover Sludge Bomb is available so Vileplume can get actual offense! I give Tauros a Muscle Band instead of Silk Scarf because I rarely use Strength, finding Zen Headbutt and Payback more useful. Mamoswine gets Mystic Ice for the slight damage push to Ice Shard. Ok that's all done, let's try it now!
Things don't go over entirely smoothly; I do Item cheese at points (but nothing beyond Hyper Potions), and a few stupid mistakes too ("Houndoom? I'll counter with my own Fire Type! ...wait, that's one of the stupidest things I could d-*gets Dark Pulsed to death* ...go Feraligatr *He OHKOs Houndoom after eating a dark Pulse putting him into Torrent Range* WHY THE HELL DID I NOT DO THAT IN THE FIRST PLACE!?")
Lance had me legitimately afraid because of the Dragonites with Outrage and such. How did that fight go?
Open with Raikou because I forget who his first Pokemon is, but figure it's NOT a Dragonite, so Thunder + Choice Specs will kill. Sure enough, it's Gyarados, he gets plastered.
Next, Dragonite #1. Mamoswine opens with Ice Shard, does about 55% damage, whee! *Sitrus Berry* CRAP! That's not very go-*Fire Blast misses* Ok, so I get another chance, yay! Probably won't Ki-*Criticals* ...NEVERMIND!
He brings out the Charizard, I bring out Feraligatr. It goes about as you'd expect it to go, as in, yay me!
Then comes another Dragonite; I keep Feraligatr in because Choice Scarf Ice Fang, clearly that should work! Two Problems:
A. I just had it beat Charizard with Waterfall
B. It's STILL slower than the level 50 Dragonite despite Choice Scarf.
Dragon Rush, Feraligatr dies. So I bring out Mamoswine again. Ice Shard -> Dragon Rush Miss -> Ice Shard -> Dragonite Dead. 2 Down!
Then the last Dragonite comes out, I pull Mamoswine out in hopes to chip him, and believing this to be the Outraging one. I use Vileplume as a sacrificial lamb...and it gets Dragon Rushed, and dies. Ok, Mamoswine, this probably will backfire, but damn it, I need to at least HURT THIS DAMNED DRAGONITE!
2HKO damage from Ice Shard, Dragon Rush hits...and Mamoswine SURVIVES, if barely. He finishes off the Dragonite. Yay! Onto Aerodactyl!
I keep Mamoswine in because I can pray for a crit to OHKO, and even if not, he at least can get one Ice Shard off. Ice Shard -> Aerial Ace -> Mamoswine falls. It's ok, buddy, you murdered the dragonites, you earned a good rest.
So Raikou could probably kill Aero but requires hitting with Thunder, which can backfire. Tauros can probably survive whatever Aerodactyl throws out, and can at least chip with Payback and hopefully knock him into "Spark kills" range, so I test that!
Survives Rock Slide as expected! *Tauros Flinches* *^*&@^. Tauros dies as expected. Ok, Magmar go. No, Magmar will not be effective, but he does have Flame Body, so I can hope that kicks in and maybe give me one last chance, or Rock slide can miss, I confuse Ray him, and hope for some confusion hax...except that doesn't happen, so Magmar was useless.
Out comes Raikou; ok, let's hope the RNG doesn't screw with u-*Flinch* GOD DAMN IT! Screw it, I'm Hyper Potioning til he's out of Rock Slides, because I doubt I'll get a lucky run like this again!
I do that, he starts THunder Fanging, I get a lucky Thunder off, I win.
And thus, main game done, onto Kanto before the entire DL comes after me with torches and pitchforks.
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Dark Souls 2: Dragons.
Beautiful game!
And long. Very long.
And difficult. This has somehow gotten way harder, bosses excepted.
I'm just going to spoiler tag everything.
I was 100% sure Vendrick was going to be the last boss. Souls tradition.
Then uh a dragon? Like the first dragon you see?
And right now I have absolutely no idea! No clue whatsoever.
I am extremely tempted to do the assassination quest but I know he'll ask me to kill too many cool people :(
I also wonder what happens if you attack the queen. Hmm. I'm fairly sure it's an illusion?
What's with the traitor? Why and how was she even a traitor, besides scamming people.
How did Yattaf know she was one. Unless she just noticed the orb shaking, used it then the traitor was all "OMG" with no reason... ?? That works. I'm probably wrong in assuming that everyone in this game is as dumb as me though.
In Velstadt's dungeon (by the way that second to last room was a nightmare) there's this dude who hates fire? Well I had a zombie bro with a torch from the beginning of the dungeon who didn't attack me and followed me around so I just didn't kill him and stayed with him.
So I really wondered how that dark dude would take it. Extremely not well, it turns out. He attacked me even though I had no affiliation with torch zombie dude.
I met the Bell Gargoyles really really late and had to fight five of them, including four at once. Maybe you fight more the later you are in the game?
Only reason I beat them was having the whips equipped.
Ornstein and Smough redux (under the Castle) should not be a very hard battle but I just can't beat it. The trick seems to be the way they take ages to recover after attacking. So: Lure one into attacking, make sure its combo string is finished, and make sure the other boss cannot hurt you at this point, then attack.
Waaay easier on paper.
In the Creighton vs Pate battle I obviously went with Pate. He betrayed me afterwards! The nerve!
Rat covenant doesn't seem to attract a lot of people at all. Too bad.
The game's starting to talk a lot more about Dark Souls 1 events, while giving visual cues to Demon's. I hope it bridges the two games in lore.
I've now replaced my fire sword+10 with a warped sword+4, dual wielded with my old rapier +10. The raw attack power isn't crazy, but as a curved sword it has an insanely good L2 attack when two handed. And the R1 is really fast and stylish. I love it.
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Dark Souls 2: Where progress goes somewhere else. Did Harvest Valley and killed the sad sad boss. Did Earthen Keep and sat on the sidelines as my Phantom effortlessly killed the boss there. Hello Iron Keep! Hello Allone Knights my new bane of existence! After a couple deaths and the last one being to an iaido prick I couldn't poise break I took my new Ember and ran off to MacDuff. Hello shiney new Poison Cestus. Wait... no... I think I went to Doors of Pharross first? Still can't find the boss there. Continued on and had another embarrassing death against the Congregation. The priests have ludacris blunt defense and I couldn't stun them. UGH. Whatever, they still die, hello Velka dude and bonfire. Now to McDuff for real! Hello Poison Cestus. Wow you are bad Poison Cestus.
Hello PVP for two hours! Got well over 20 wins! Still nothing compared to Fenrir's though haha. It turns out stacking over 1000 armor makes me durable enough to win the lagfest every single fight devolves into. This also resulted in three double KOs as well as an ACTUAL RED PHANTOM INVADER with a rapier hahaha. Won that fight despite them trying to lure me into the mobs. Also randomly got called over to Bellfry Sol from Lost Bastille, twice. But whatever! Just gotta punch all dudes.
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Fenrir: I guess I'll respond to spoiler text in spoiler text! This is all elaborating on stuff you've seen so I don't imagine you'll object:
-Did you pull the switch in Aldia? It disperses the fog wall before Navlaan and switches his personalities. I did this before talking to him, so I didn't even get offered the assassination quest (not that I'd do it anyway). He sells some glorious clothes man, Yattaf should totally check it out. He turns invader afterwards though. I've had to fight him off three separate times now! (And he is an utter bastard on offense.)
-I am absolutely shooting the queen next time I play through the game. Did you happen to wander too close to that portrait on the lower floor? That + her general tone & the current condition of the king (who I guess she wants me to replace one day? No thanks, bub) = I don't trust a word she says. Her position in the world and game progression paralleling Gwynevere so closely isn't helping her any either.
-Traitor = oh, does something actually happen if you use the Crushed Eye Orb? I totally forgot I picked that thing up for a long time, and then I forgot where I picked up so it hardly seemed worth trying to use it.
-The room just before Velstadt is horrrrible. First time I got killed by infinitely respawning ghosts. Second time I just tried running to the fog gate and was brutally reminded that in DS2 you are not invincible while walking through fog gates. Third time I finally figured out that someone had to be ringing that damn ghost-summoning bell, right?
-I fought the gargoyles at level 122 as one of the very last pre-Drangleic bosses and still never saw more than two in the field at once. Of course, I also killed each of them in two hits (LARGE CLUB). My guess is they spawn on a timer.
-The references to Dark Souls 1 are pretty cool (I haven't come across anything that clearly references Demon's Souls, though). Places things in the same continuity without necessarily being reliant upon events of DS1--or confirming either DS1 ending canonically. I think the suggestion is that given sufficient passage of time, either renewed age of fire or age of dark would each have to end as well in turn. Old life must give way for new life to grow, etcetera. There's a degree of fatalism in the way this is presented in-game, as any civilization being an unavoidable cycle of glory and decay, but I appreciate the sense of deep time entertained in the way past events pass from memory into myth (people seem to remember generally what certain Dark Souls 1 entities did, but not exactly who they were).
-Do you have any idea at all what the little shrine at the end of Shrine of Amana is actually for? To be clear, I mean past that last bonfire, the one where there's a door that only opens if you're undead, fight past a hexer and you find that creepy altar (attended to by one of the singing girls) that you can pray at...but so far as I can tell praying appears to do nothing.
Rapier pokes have worked out very satisfactorily for me (as backup weapon for SMAAAASH). Of course by now I have 40 in both strength and dexterity so I basically get optimal damage out of anything I pick up. Kirika living up to her namesake in being able to murder you with anything. Ricard's Rapier is very slightly more powerful than regular rapier at +10 and 40 DEX, otherwise inferior but who cares we use it for style and man that R2.
Fudo: Doors of Pharros boss is up on a ledge. From huge open room with mastodon + curse rat, hang a right and climb up the ladder in the next room, follow the ledge into second floor of huge room and bonfire + fog gate is immediately on your next left.
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Bravely Default: Still Chapter 1, but after the bosses were tending on the tanky side before, they've taken a turn for the glass cannon lately. Well, except not that glassy, just the BD system helping make it seem that way at times! I'm glad they figured out their own way to make turn-based combat interesting. Dragon was pretty badass and had an amusing gimmick, and I would *not* have survived too long against him, but he is blitzable, especially with a nice elemental weakness. Then Orthros is Dragon x2 - even less HP per part, but godlike offense - Blazzard is like 400-450 MT damage to ~650-700 max HP, so a 2HKO. I can knock it to a 3HKO with Default, but oh there's another action too, and that hurts a lot as well (anywhere from 180-300 damage). MT Cure does *not* keep up with it, and if Agnes tries it she can die quickly to everything, and if someone else tries throwing Hi-Potions they're eating the MT damage and general pain too. First boss I've wiped too! A turn 2 wipe on my 2nd try, no less. However, my third attempt I got lucky in that he didn't spam Blazzard too much, so Default 3 times or so (with luckily Thief Tiz drawing aggro, aka the person with Life Steal who goes first so can be sorta guaranteed to be back at full health), then UNLOAD onto the heads to get the situation under control. Then unload on the remnants just to be sure. Yeesh. Exciting times, certainly.
Also Norende Village is broken but we all know this. I can buy what is late-game quality equipment at reasonable prices in Chapter 1? Tempting but yeah I'm still gonna hold off. (Also getting StreetPasses is suprisingly easy in NY subways & train stations. Hooray for general good taste it seems.)
Now, on to the clock tower Grand Mill.
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Dark Souls 2: Just sort of wandered around a bunch. Gutter wasn't too bad. Black Gulch was terrifying. Got my first Great Soul from the Rotten. Went past the statue blocked door. Found two dead ends and invisible enemies and a talking head.
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Alright, gotcha RRA location, I'll do it later.
Dark SOuls 2: Because now is running through Iron Keep! Hello Bellfry Sol! Hello stupid greatsword assholes magiclly swinging faster than me! Hello bell keeper doing 95% of my life with an aoe spell. Whatever, make if over to the boss door and bonfire. Caestus are really good against Ironclads yay. Less great against the boss. Tried being summoned a dozen or so times, not a single victory. Decided to go solo! This was somehow an even worse idea. It took like... eight? Tries but I did manage it. He was yet another all-or-nothing boss and I had enough of that fucking shit back in Demon's.
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El Cid I had no idea about the "nice guy" switch or being able to kill the bell ringing guy in the crypt.
I went to the shrine but didn't know what was going on. It might have something to do with that locked door earlier.
I also went out of the way to light both torches in THE ROOM in the castle, but I haven't noticed anything changing.
And I don't know what is the deal with the giants.
Or those trees with faces that moan when you hit them in the fog area of the forest.
Or pretty much anything really.
I only know you should really teleport to Majula then walk back to Heide's Tower of Flame right now.
Demon's Souls references are more visual. Majula's blacksmith is pictured on one of the archstones in Demon's Souls. The useless shaking trailer in Aldia's Keep is another extremely obvious Demon's Souls reference, though I don't know if this means anything.
Note that Dark Souls never did this kind of thing with Demon's, as far as I remember.
I really need to finish the game to get another cutscene that explains nothing then being able to talk about the plot at length. But anyway, I definitely agree.
I think I'll actually do assassinations.
The first reward, for not even killing one guy, was very promising. Nothing could possibly go wrong!
Yattaf is already corrupted anyway. At first I ignored those white dudes with cool weapons who could be locked on but didn't move. They seemed nice! Then I just got too curious and started mass murdering them.
I've also killed the ant. I really hope the conclusion to all Dark Souls 2 lore analysis is going to be "that ant is keeping everybody alive. If you've killed it the entire world is doomed, you monster"
I also did the assassination quest on the first playthrough in Demon's Souls.
Oh yeah I really should have talked about the coolest part of the game yet: hidden/future bonfires showing on the list at one point. But you've mentioned this already.
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@ Meeple re; Graces, if the scenes I told you about (Emotive Pianoist sidequest, play/play related skits) didn't change your mind any then I'm not sure the F arc will help either. For other characters I don't know, well at least for F arc you get RICHARD as a PC and you can get the role play dolls so you can use him in Zhonecage and NG+ too, and RICHARD alone is worth the the F arc I think :) There is also more humor with combined Richard/Malik trolling if that's your thing, also some Pascal/Hubert humor, etc The gameplay potential/battle mechanics also improve with the additions of Accel modes which helps for making playstyles more unique/etc, and also the dolls for using two or more multiples of the same character if you want, etc, etc~
Tales of Symphonia Chronicles/ToS Cleared the Earth Temple. I am happy because I have Colette back and the gameplay/battle system is really gelling now. I've been playing Hard mode (but not really because Poison Hammer is sooo good~) My team -
Colette L44 (main)/Lunar Ring/Lunar Guard/Mythril Circlet/Bridal Gloves/Rabbit's Foot/Rabbit's Foot
HP - 2734, TP - 343, ATK - 687, STR - 187, INT - 160, DEF - 152, ACC - 109, EVA - 106, LUCK - 189 (w/th equipment and inn RNG combo)
Title - Little Pickpocket (from L21, but could have got it earlier)
Skill set up - Pow Hammer/Toss (Poison) Hammer (alternative Item Rover), Para Ball (alternative Grand Chariot), Whirlwind Rush, Triple Ray Satellite, Holy Song, S-Seal: Wind (Sheena) (alternative, Judgement)
EX Skills - Sharp Eyed, Vitality, Spirit, Stat Boost
Compound/bonus EX skills - Life Thief, Spirit Thief (alternatives with different 1/2/3/4 EX gem skill combos, Life Up, Pow Hammer (counter), Reprise, Item Getter (for 100% stealings~)
Zelos L44/Flame Dagger/Mythril Armor/Duel Helm/Mythril Shield/Stone Charm/Rabbit's Foot
HP - 2704, TP - 278, ATK - 748, STR - 218, INT - 203, DEF - 196, ACC - 122, EVA - 93
Title - Casanova
Skill pool - T Type
Elements - Attack - Fire, Defence - Earth (Reduce)
Status - Nullify Petrify, Nullify Heavy
EX Skills - Dodge, Vitality, Magical, Eternal
Compound/bonus EX skills - EX Defend, Life Up (alternatives Reprise)
Extras - Added damage to beasts
Regal L44/Bear Claw/Battle Cloak/Pointed Hat/Angel Bracelet/Aquamarine/Stone Charm
HP - 2814, TP - 262, ATK - 759, STR - 224, INT - 172, DEF - 174, ACC - 138, EVA - 124
Title - Battle Artist
Skill pool - S Type
Elements - Attack - Water, Defence - Water (Reduce), Earth (Reduce)
Status - Nullify Petrify, Nullify Heavy
EX Skills - Tough, Dash, Vitality, Eternal
Compound/bonus EX skills - HP Recover, Quick Turn, Life Up
Extras - Added damage to immaterials
Sheena L45/Card of Earth/Witch's Robe/Pretty Ribbon/Mythril Bracelet/Flare Cape/Stone Charm (alternate Card of Ice)
HP - 2359, TP - 350, ATK - 440 (630 w/th Card of Ice), STR - 200, INT - 173, DEF - 176, ACC - 116, EVA - 115
Title - Acrobat
Skill pool - S type
Elements - Attack - Earth, Defence - Fire (Reduce), Earth (Invalid), (Attack - Ice, Defence - Ice/Fire/Earth Reduce w/th Card of Ice equipped instead)
Status - Nullify Petrify, Nullify Heavy
EX Skills - Strong, Tough, Dash, Prolong
Compound/bonus EX skills - EX Attack, Hard Hit
Extras - Added damage to plants (w/th Card of Earth), Added damage to humans (w/th Card of Ice)
Summons - Fire/Efreet, Water/Undine, Wind/Sylph, Earth/Gnome, Lightning/Volt
**
Colette has better equipment for defense/defense boosting, DEF stat is 188 w/th Mythril Guard/Pretty Ribbon/Mythril Bracelet but I've mostly been running a Luck tinked set up with her so far~
**
All the other characters are pretty much all up to date with equipment more or less too (I think Lloyd still needs the more powerful weapon from the resort town though), all are equipped with four EX Gems of various levels, and have shinies like EX Attack/Critical Up (Lloyd), Magic Boost (Raine) and Randomizer (Genis) I am maxxed out on EX Gem L3s from stealing them with Colette and I also have 20 All Divides now from stealing them from the Fake in the sewers as well. I have four Devil Arms so far, for Lloyd, Colette, Zelos, and Sheena but their power has not been unlocked yet. Nuu~ Nuuu~ Nuuuu~ I'm having fun~
To the Temple of Ice!~
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I only know you should really teleport to Majula then walk back to Heide's Tower of Flame right now.
Will do! And I also have no idea what was up with the light-up golems beneath Drangleic Castle, also did that and also saw no change. I can tell you what to do with the giants if you want--you probably don't, but here it is in spoiler text just in case:
If you've been to the Ancient Dragon, head back to the Forest of Fallen Giants. Interacting with those dead giant/tree things should now trigger new zones (well, three of them do, in my experience, one by the Soldier's Rest bonfire still only gives items occasionally). The Queen actually mentions this herself if you talk to her first.
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Oh yes!, forgot to mention I've been rolling in Miracle Gels, Lemon Gels, Pineapple Gels, Energy Tablets, Rune Bottles, Super Pellets, Rare Pellets, and various other assorted goods and extra Gald thanks to Zelos's Personal Skill, and also Spirit Bottles too due to using Rune Bottles to transform Energy Tablets into them~ I currently have 10 Spirit Bottles and am maxed back out at 20 Energy Tablets again~
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ToG f: Started F-arc...did the ToV staff take over on writing skits or something? THEY ARE ACTUALLY ENTERTAINING NOW!
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Well I finished Dark Souls 2. The true Dark Souls 2 starts here, etc.
It was fantastic.
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Bravely Default: Beaten. Thoughts in spoilers below.
Plot:
Edea was the showstealer character-wise; she gets a lot of optional screentime and development, and even in main story/in the little discussions she's easily the most compelling person. Tiz was the loser, though not by too much; he's just a bit one note as Agnes' right hand man. Braev and Einheria get the "what the fuck are you doing" cat macro award; Braev for not dealing with Rosa/Profiteur/Qada from the getgo (though World "2" implies Rosa is why Profiteur and Qada are still on the loose) and in general being an "end justifies the means and also I'm going to sit on every goddamn piece of information I have no matter what", and Einheria for "this guy's orders have made Mephilia crack and Artemia even more unbalanced, just pull the fuck out and save them".
The plot itself, I've got little issue with, outside of the sequel bait/hooks; everything makes a pretty solid amount of sense to be honest. Tiz's fate (and indeed, Tiz's role in the endgame) is kinda sleazy to drop last minute when everything else has at the same time, and DeRosso is a mystery I want some answers about (that I doubt we'll see) but beyond that... yeah, this all ties up pretty well. Of note is that the game pretty clearly expects you to break the final crystal of World "3", and that anything past that is, while canon, also sort of added content - the optional battles just provide more backstory and challenge, and the crystal awakening dialogue reverts to "let's do this yeeey" sort of crap. I was expecting a lot more drama from Ringabel out of that.
Job thoughts and boss thoughts:
Freelancer: Decent early for Dungeon Master and Divining Rod, useless after that until Mimic.
Monk: Decent early, falls off later since weapon slots give precious, precious speed (or MAtk). Can't justify the class past a point.
WM: Tied for best healer with Salvemaker, and the two complement each other beautifully. Can keep a team going for a long time, especially with Healing Lore/Holy One/Save WM MP.
BM: I'll buy that the class is decent, but it saw next to no use for me (I used it/Arcanist for a bit for Sleep/Twilight abuse).
Knight: Everyone that wasn't my primary healer got Two Handed at some point. That skill is easily the best earlygame offense booster you can get and it stays relevant basically to the end of the game. The rest of the skills... you can probably find use for? I used Stomp as ST offense until better came up.
Thief: Excellent early offense (Bows + Life Steal), tapers off once other classes do its stuff better. Is useful in world "2" for stealing from boss sets, but then vanishes. Speed+% bonuses are very good, though, and saw use all game.
Merchant: Grab More Money, disregard.
Spell Blade: Probably one of the gamebest classes, Brave (as said by others) works wonderfully with this. Elemental weaknesses stay common, too (indeed, both final bosses have them!) so... yeah. Great class. Phantom Weapon could've been neat but it needed to cost 2 so you could have more options in passives alongside it, 3 is too restrictive.
Time Mage: I never once found myself thinking "You know what would be useful here? Time magic." Which says a lot about the active skillset. This said, picking up Hasten World was my best endgame decision, pretty easily.
Ranger: This is what obsoletes Thief. Excellent damage, gets S Bows which is gold, hits weakness on non-bosses. Wishes dearly that its final skill was a Humanoid slayer. Sadly it also drops off some lategame, though an Axe user has an argument to switch to this class for Hawkeye even at the end.
Summoner: Decent randomclearer, but Valkyrie kinda obsoletes it and it costs too much IMO for the times it'd be useful. I tried a Gaia Gear Summoner w/ Phantom Weapon build in the endgame boss rush, but it just wasn't impressive enough - Vampire skillset alone does better.
Valkyrie: Great for ST and MT damage for a long time thanks to Judgment and Crescent Moon. Sadly, endgame it falls off, though a gimmick 4 Valk skillset could do really well, possibly. So... yeah.
Red Mage: Christ this class kinda sucks. Basically all its skills are better for the boss than for you.
Salvemaker: Awesome, awesome class. Excellent healer, great debuffer/buffer, has MT revival near its peak... yeah. Definitely a class worth using, even if you don't use Norende. If you do it's even better.
Pirate: Great w/ Swordmaster, great for inflicting debuffs ST until Vampire comes around, still does damage+debuffs better, and is endgame support material. Amped Strike is too expensive, but if you've got Swordmaster you can spam it seven times over two turns at max BP, so I guess that's a win?
Praline Performer: WE! GO! WILD! The class is really easy to underestimate, I didn't seriously use it until the final stretch and then haed myself for it - Atk buffing MT is glorious, free BP for MP is awesome, the capstone is nasty as fuck when Mimic'd... yeah. Not an always class, definitely a sometimes class, but it shines a ton in its good points.
Swordmaster: bleah. katana lore is good, the final skill is niche but good with pirate.
Ninja: One of the more broken classes, quietly; bosses that are entirely phys/don't brave can be shut down with Utsusemi and Frenetic Fighting/Dual Wielding/Precision is one of the fastest ways to hit the damage cap. Can hit 9999 up to 8 times a turn, making it easily one of the best cannons if you're twinking for that. Its damage isn't that good without that effort, however, and if you're misusing it it can look pretty bad.
Arcanist: see BM for the one use I got outta it. Bonus: it looks silly.
Spiritmaster: The single best support skillset I have seen in any game, pretty easily. MT status immunity? MT element immunity? Damage immunity (for both sides) for two turns, which can be gotten around if you set up right? BP regeneration so this doesn't take many turns? It's reliant as hell on other classes to help it and support it in return, but this is basically my MVP vote.
Templar: Bleah. Useful but comes when your other classes are coming into their own offense wise, and really doesn't offer enough to counteract that.
Dark Knight: RAGE! The class is great until then (Drain Sword + Black Blade + Adversity makes a rolling monster of hate) and Rage + Drain Sword + some combo setup allows you to hit 10+ times for 9999, which is castbest. Don't have much else to say, the class is great.
Vampire: An awesome Blue Mage variant that uses physical offense for its skills. Since physicals are easier to twink this is great news, and the Vampire's skillset is excellent, if limited elementally somewhat (Wind/Fire/Ice/Earth, no Light/Dark/Lightning so can't hit human boss weaknesses)
Conjurer: Ugh. This class... needed something. Make the buffs MT (Protect/Shell style instead so they work with Performer)? Let them have two added class ability slots (to mimic Yulyana's use of BM/WM or Pirate/TM)? I don't know. As it stands this is a really bad final class and best used for Obliterate and then discarded.
Overall pretty good class balance, with mages getting the short end of the stick I feel (Conjurer being a bad capstone for mages doesn't help).
Boss thoughts (pretty simple, but in spoilers below still:
Crystal bosses. These don't significantly improve from world to world, so first showing for each is best p. easily. Gigas Lich has ID and solid damage, but multiple dangerous weaknesses; Chaugmar has parasitic healing and a very high 2HKO in Energy Blast that he loses turns for, probably not a great dueling combo (Notably, his barrier just sets his defense super-high; Fireball can still hurt him, e.g., so ITD is great here), Rusalka has the same weakness (lightning) but his split + rushdown kills ST opponents dead if you let him use Seep turn 1, and Orthros has action economy and can basically grind enemies in a duel down to near-nothing.
Human bosses. Probably either first or last forms; last forms often have different skills but lower durability. First forms will have much better durability and in some cases (Qada) be just as good if not better at relative damage.
Notable PC bosses:
Ominas: May want his form with Heinkel and Barras? He has MT 2HKO fire magic like his other forms, but manages a ST OHKO with lightning magic as well. Has some limited status options in all forms, too, IIRC.
Profiteur: His damage being a low OHKO when he focuses it sounds right; I was relatively high level on facing him and still only had about 500 HP on average. Probably one of the better duelers, annoyingly.
DeRosa: Definitely, definitely wants his first form, where his durability is notable and his damage isn't up shit creek. Charm is a powerful status, and Thundara and Cura are nasty to face at this juncture.
Qada: Dear lord this dude is dumb one on one. Dark Breath is cruel as a skill on bosses and he has it in every single form.
Kamiizumi: Given intelligent AI (aka knows what his enemies can do), could be very brutal against one-note opponents. Multitask physicals aren't too hot otherwise though.
Praline: I'd allow her to summon her fanclub, but she'd have to take a turn to do it and they're basically OHKO bait.
DeRosso: Uhhhhhhhhh. Taking him against his first form... he has three different ways to go about a 2HKO and excellent durability and none of his tricks work on bosses (Bone Crush, Graviga) so he kinda... doesn't work as well as he'd like. Excellent durability. Durable enough to win some slugfests, maybe?
Yulyana: Is bad on durability due to when you fight him, but has Amped Strike off 150% atkpow. May not care too much, that IIRC was a low ST OHKO.
Non-human, non-crystal bosses:
Dragon: Low durability (blitzable) but high damage and good followup against healers.
Elemental dragons: Mean as fuck but entirely walled by phys tanking/perfect evade. Earth is probably the most dangerous in a duel?
Airy: First form gets Slaughter which is a bunch of hits with ID attached, and not much else IIRC. Second form gets infinite defense+counters phys damage, which almost fucked me over as her AI can break and never goddamn drop the shield, and she also has MT stop and decent damage otherwise (2HKOish?). This form also gets the MT dispel+allweak -> massive magic attack combo. (According to FAQs the first form gets the infinite defense skill too? Sheesh.)
Third form (aka true end only form) has the MT dispel+allweak -> Zeta Flare combo, gets full healed three times (I would allow these as innate counters to hitting 0 HP), but lacks the defense buff skill. Probably her best blitzing form if her enemy has ITD stuff as she basically, at worst, is 4HKO'd in this form. A very scary boss.
Ouroboros... the problem here is he's plot and, if you know -how- he works, the fights end way too fast. The first form is his second most durable and it's basically pretty tame on offense; the second and third forms are beatable if you just Brave rush them down (they have less effective HP than any single human refight, for crying out loud!) and the fourth fight is entirely plot and ends on his third use of a skill. He makes for a worse fight than his minion in a duel as a result, but he can still basically MT 2HKO and disable PCs easily.
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Yaay Meeple, I recommend going to Gralesyde when you get the chance, since you get a shiny, and well visiting places in general for new stuff is a good idea before progressing with the F arc plot, since I don't remember/am not sure if you can do it later after advancing things :)
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BG1 - So a while back I felt like moving my Halfling Kensai in to BG2. I formatted my PC and didn't back up saves and lost it. So rolled a Kensai Dwarf that uses Halberds instead because I haven't used them before.
Halberds are boring.
I get +1 in BG1 from just south of Beregost. So at level 1. That lasts until you get to Baldur's Gate. This is all the enchanted Halberds in the game.
In BG2 it is, get a +2 one from somewhere (Either buy generic one or do Shadelord). Or Dragon's Bane +3 from Unseeing Eye. Then... Underdark. +4 Dragon's Breath with +1 of a bunch of elemental damage types. (Or +5 Blackmist if you are evil). Can build Wave over the whole game to have a pretty useless shiny that will wreck one area well in ToB!. From there you get Ravager in Yaga Shura's lair which is your end game choice.
Most of these you will ignore if you have special shops because Harmonium halberd gives +1 Strength.
It is better progression that Bastard Swords at least, but it is a steady slow progression of things that don't do anything of real interest and you are probably going to ignore because strength scaling too good. Ravager procs are pretty much the most interesting thing on there and by the time you get it everything is going to succeed a poison save. 10% chance to instakill is cute but that is about it.
I prefer stuff like Crossbows even (or daggers!) where your end game option is available early because that is more interesting than slow steady and you tend to need to at least save up for those or go deep diving in dungeons with some Risk:Reward play. Halberds progression is pretty passive in BG2 just in places you would naturally explore or are plot railroads.
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Dark Souls 2: Read a bunch of lore discussion on forums and did a whole lot of things in game.
Interesting!
Then started as a mage named Claire. (Doing everything: Miracles, pyromancy, sorcery, hexes)
I wanted to make her average looking on purpose but she looks exactly like Scarlet Johanson in game.
Spoilers, sorcery is OP as hell. I joined the "make everything harder" guild and stuff still isn't that much harder. I've died twice before the first boss though.
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Pokémon Battle Trozei: Huh, this is not what I was expecting. There's basically no rules, you can move any pokemon anywhere at (almost) any time to make combos. It's just a matter of doing it fast enough because the enemy pokemon is hitting you at the same time. Extremely frantic, not really my pace of game.
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ToS- I found a Mithos and returned to the first world
Ice temple was fun/I enjoyed it, but then not surprising for me considering the element. Skating around frozen pond and sliding down icy slope was fun~
The boss was interesting. Went in on Hard with my team but decided not to use Colette's poison this time. It .. was painful, even with all the ice/water resistance stuff I'd thrown on my characters while going through the dungeon/before the boss, Regal had the least resistance stuff on, so he kept on dropping like a fly, then by the time I managed to take out Fenrir after that once I got her health down Celsius starting dishing out serious physical pain to pretty much everyone, and between the two I ended up really going through the Life Bottles for the course of the fight. Eventually I had none left, all three AIs were down, but Celsius was on her last sliver of HP so I performed a save of sorts by having Colette perform Sacrifice to revive the other three for the EXP, then won, although Colette went down. Should have probably set up the Angel's Tear Compound EX skill for the fight or something.
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Soul Silver: So I decide to take on Sabrina and -*Espeon sweeps team*
...ok, my team isn't well set for that. Let's come back with a bit higher levels. Thankfully, Kanto is not straight up linear like Johto so we go to Celadon, and beat the crap out of Erika instead!
By the way, Erika, it's never a wise thing using Sunny Day AGAINST A FIRE TYPE. I don't care if you're spamming Sunnybeam, I'm pretty sure the Fire Type is hitting you back way harder <_<
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DS2: Beaten, but there were some odds and ends to deal with first.
First off was Pilgrims of the Dark covenant quest. Fuck this bit with a spoon. You have to pay an effigy to access the second and third segments of this quest. If you die, you have to pay again. After about ten times dying to either Darklurker and his cheap as shit area of effect badness or to unskippable Havel/Ricard/Nazgul/Bizarro Cid tag-teams en route, I told Tommy Lee "Fuck y'all," and blew his brains out. Wait no I just left Grandahl sitting alone in the dark forever (he likes it there).
Optional boss I did actually kill: Spoilers But Not the Spoilers You Expected. This takes several tries because of damage extreme even by the Holy Fuck Are You Kidding Me standards of Dark Souls 2. I have 30 vitality and an HP-boosting ring on you guys and some of his attacks could still flatten me in one hit. But at last, a time when whip damage is optimal! Old Whip +5 at 40 DEX puts out something around 450 attack power. This is amazing for a whip, but the strange thing was it did more damage than the (better on paper) smashy club and gigantic samurai sword I was also packing. I guess whips hurt more when you're naked.
And of course I found out what the Crushed Eye Orb was for. Yeah I have no idea why the traitor was a traitor either. Grifter and generally shady character? Sure. Cheapskate jerkass in battle? Definitely, as it turns out. But otherwise I don't get the connection at all.
Penultimate boss was mean. At first it looks like I might get this in one shot, kill the little one first because he's faster and then it should be easy to wear down his pal--wait what what's fatass doing kneeling down by his bro's corpse and chanting and glowing and full resurrection are you fucking shitting me. Okay. So fatass rezzes, kill him first. Wait what's tiny doing kneeling down and chanting and ARGLE BARGLE. Third try = you've almost got this, don't do anything stupid like heal right in front of an enemy and die! *Cid does something stupid like heal right in front of an enemy and die* Finally, Murakumo saves the day here! I wanted to use whip because reach but it actually broke in record time when I tried focusing on that (that must be the most fragile damn weapon in the game, try it on anything armored and it just falls to pieces). So giant fuck-off samurai sword, built it up to +10 on a whim (I always wanted to use it in DS1 but never had the stats for it) and was amply rewarded here. Almost as good as club damage, doesn't leave me vulnerable as long, hits an arc that can easily snag both the bosses (sometimes).
Final boss was just wait what is going on what are those floaty things curse curse curse. One death because panic mode. Come back and club R1 + estus spam basically wins the day. Equipped anti-curse ring ahead of this time and it contributed in no noticeable way. Bah. (I expected curse once the Emerald Herald told me who the final boss was going to be; what I did not expect was chained boss battles in a Souls game).
As for the ending, I obviously have no idea what Spoilers was trying to accomplish or why they were trying to stop me from doing whatever it was that I did. (Dark Souls.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQQdSwFgSec
But I have fragments of a possible chain of events, I suppose. Spoiler mode engage.
-Curse of undead takes hold in Drangleic because that's basically just the Souls world's way of telling a nation it's run out the clock and somebody else's turn is up to take the stage.
-King Vendrick understandably all "This shit is totally fucked," starts looking for ways to fix curse.
-Somewhere along the line he builds SOUL-POWERED ROBOTS. This is presumably a bad thing.
-Crosses the sea to steal something from the giants that presumably should be of assistance to his project.
-Unsure of when the queen enters the picture. She's supposed to be from across the sea; was it her that Vendrick stole, or did he embark on this ill-advised adventure at her urging? Is she in fact the Yoko Ono of Drangleic?
-Giants cross the sea to steal back the precious thing and everything is fucked, man, everything is fucked.
-Giants either lose (though so narrowly that Drangleic is left a wasteland) or get what they want and go home. Either way Vendrick fails in finding any way to break the curse, goes hollow and gets shipped off to the Undead Crypt. The queen rules in his stead, which is apparently what she always wanted anyway.
-And she's not keen on letting anyone else take over, but as to how/why she was Nito mk 2 and what this was supposed to represent, I have no clue whatsoever.
Unless I missed something, there was only the one ending possibility? Fog gate kept me from leaving the room, which I absolutely would have done given option. You go ahead and rule this blasted wasteland from your dingy little kiln underground, queenie, I'm not interested in usurping your position. I've seen what happened to the last guy.
But alas, I didn't see an option to walk out of the room. Maybe I should've warped? Maybe the Herald gave me that feather for more than just convenience! Or maybe I should've walked off the cliff, who knows.
As for the Herald herself, I don't understand anything she was talking about just outside of the final fog gate and have no idea how her or the dragon ties into anything or explains anything. But I'm pretty cool with the Ancient Dragon and will probably not attempt to kill him because unlike the Queen he points me towards backstory without acting like it's a huge gigantic favor I should be grateful for and geez woman.
I guess the Herald herself is the missing link there? Vendrick went to all this trouble of getting his kingdom wrecked in pursuit of creating a person who could break the curse, gave up and went hollow when it became apparent she couldn't do this after all.
Hm, I wonder, does the final boss's soul description explain anything? No, of course it doesn't.
Final character build: SL 150
VIG: 30
END: 22
VIT: 22
ATT: 13
STR: 40
DEX: 40
ADA: 26
INT: 5
FAI: 5
Right hand: Large Club +10, Ricard's Rapier +10, Old Whip +5
Left Hand: Dragonrider Greatshield +3, Dragonrider Bow +5, Pyromancy Flame +10
Armor: Desert Sorceress set (all +10 because DS2 just drops slabs on you like sky donuts)
Rings: Ring of Blades +1, Chloranthy Ring +1, Third Dragon Ring, [various]
Good game. The stuff that bugged me conceptually basically still does, but this ultimately didn't stop the game from impressing on the grounds it really needed to: presenting me with outstanding environments that it is absolutely terrifying to explore.
The severe nerf that dodgeroll took in DS2 is really perplexing to me. I always figured rolling in DS1 was your reward for properly observing enemy attack patterns--blocking is the easier, more reliable option to avoid taking hits, sure, but against hard-hitting enemies you'll lose more stamina blocking than rolling and/or take elemental damage right through your shield. DS2, though, rolling is just so expensive in terms of stamina, and even fast roll is a tad slower than it used to be. The crazy thing is, blocking chews through more stamina too unless you're using a greatshield or something.
I am happy to learn, even if belatedly, that fast roll threshold in DS2 is like 70%? Even allowing that they expect you to have more weapons equipped (and this is actually appreciated, as is the obviously necessary vast increase in swiftness of swapping weapons), this is generous. So apparently I didn't have to wear harem skirt all game just to ensure top mobility after all (but guys you know I'd do it anyway). There is a markedly smaller number of cool-looking light armors in DS2, I think (perhaps because of the above point), which is rather sad since I've tended to like them most aesthetically in the earlier games (and this is of course my priority because Dark Souls defensive stats. Also FASHION).
I will almost certainly not be picking DS2 apart with a series of crazy builds just to see how they work out, for a multitude of reasons, but I am interested in trying the casting classes (definitely cleric, probably sorc somewhere down the line, but hexing sounds like a pain in the ass and pyromancy is just found too far in to functionally be its own build this time). To this end, I have started up a cleric because holy shit I really want that destruction rains from the heavens! miracle I've seen people using. My general plan is to mine the Forest for souls, hit Heide's immediately post-Giant to grab all the miracles, and then kill Licia for her clothes (although recent experience suggests this may be more difficult early than anticipated).
The first thing that I notice is that I lack the requisite strength to wield my starting weapon one-handed. Oh you guys.
Two other things I notice: oh hey, you can summon Pate for the first boss (sorry I murdered you last time buddy, I totally won't do it again probably); and you can sometimes talk to Shalquoir right through the wall. While I'm doing this, she utters the following line which did not stand out quite so much the first time around: "All things must one day crumble and waste away, so that something new may be born."
I've now come to the conclusion that insofar as story is concerned, this is Dark Souls' mission statement.
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The difference between weights for the Fast Roll is now in length covered. At nearly 70 it barely covers more ground than the fat roll but comes up much faster. When you're nearly naked you cover scary amounts of ground. But because there's so many damn death ledges the short roll works better more than it should.
Defense can be less bad if you stock truly ludicrous amounts of it. With over a thousand I was taking like single digit damage from the Bastille dogs! Then Grym still two-shot me herp a derp. Guess my 8 VIGOR is bad for something!
Dark Souls 2: RRV, RRA and DDF all down. Only the Rotten left from my borrowed run. Also managed to open the Shrine of Winter with only two Great Souls and only 200,000 in my bank. Guess it works on total souls as well? Anyway, tried to Sunbro DDF, but lag makes the laser stupid annoying. Also apparently I triggered Vangral's summon sign and I have no idea where it is. Maybe the Castle? I dunno. RRA was basiclly my antethis made into rat flesh. Bloody hell it took me eight tries to beat him. RRV also took two because of a last second petrify as I killed him. Bah.
Found the Black Knight Greatsword. I heard the Greataxe is in game and I have the Halberd, so I'm on the lookout for the regular sword now too.
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CastleAbra - played through
Pretty terrible.
Occasionally has some good lines, but then it also has lines like "Even as a beta male, you recognise and respect the bro code."
Dive To The Titanic - played to dive 3, dropped
Fine enough for what it is, I guess? But it's not what I was hoping for, which was something more open-ended and less technical.
Especially when the technicalities extend to you having to be positioned exactly for several things, when you're using vehicles which can't turn around unless they're moving forward or backward and you get little help regarding what the needed positioning is. Two of the required photos on dive 2, I got to the object in question and then had to waste time finding the position in the next room over that the game for some reason had expected me to go through before it would bring up the cues to take the pictures, and as far as reconnecting the camera-system to the Nephron... I ate around a quarter of my air supplies circling the Nephon before the game finally decided that it was in the correct position. No interest in dealing with that again.
The outside-vehicle perspective, which I had been finding to be more useful for manoeuvring than the inside-vehicle perspective, also managed to get itself mucked up and positioned right above the vehicle so I ended up being able to see less than I could from the inside-vehicle perspective. Didn't find any way to fix that, although maybe it would have fixed itself on the next dive.
Vessel - played through
Fine.
Kinda reminiscent of the Abe games, except the controls are nowhere near as precise and here you're fixing things rather than breaking them. And all the fluid-based stuff exists.
I missed two blobs of protoplasm, one in the Orchard that I don't know where it was and one in the Mines that was seemingly out of reach. I intended to go back to the Mines after getting the level 2 pushback/hover nozzle in case it let you raise in the air, but by then it didn't seem like there was much point. (Plus it doesn't look like that nozzle lets you do that, for all that I didn't experiment with it much.)
The nozzle choices are pretty pointless all up? I got the firehose first and tried to use it a couple times, but there wasn't really anywhere that it was an improvement over the original/thin nozzle? I used the pushback/hover nozzle once, to avoid having to deal with a terrible jumping from ladder to ladder segment - in theory it could have other uses, but I can't really think of any. I never used the charged-shot nozzle, and while I did use the charged-seed nozzle a handful of times after getting it (after the Mines...) it's not really doing anything but saving a small amount of time over drop seed + apply fluid.
In some ways, the game feels half-finished? For example, half the protoplasm blobs in the Factory are just sitting there on the way out. Then there's the ones you get in the Mines, despite the fact there's barely any game left after the Mines for you to be bothered buying upgrades for. I wouldn't be entirely surprised if there was supposed to be another 'world' in addition to the Factory, Orchard, and Mines, where half the Factory's protoplasms were supposed to be (the Factory also has double the amount of protoplasms the Orchard and Mines have), and if there was supposed to be a more extended final sequence.
I don't know how you're supposed to work the accelerator, but I couldn't get having blue and red fluros in the hoppers to work at all. One or the other of them would always die before the accelerator could be activated. I ended up putting red fluros in both hoppers and applying blue fluid manually.
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"the Yoko Ono of Drangleic" made me laugh so much.
Might be all totally wrong but
I think Vendrick asked his bro Aldia how to break this undead curse thing and use any means necessary. Aldia then became the Soulsian mad scientist, creating the Emerald Herald out of dragons but needing extra ingredients including the giant king's number one dime.
Aldia failed anyway just like the Witch of Izalith failed and the Lost Sinner failed, you can't fight entropy, etc etc.
And Aldia was all "Oh well, I'll create golems instead. Golems are cool? And then I'm getting the fuck out of there" Presumably the queen had a big part in that since she's Manus' / The Furtive Pygmy's Want, whatever that means but it is called Want.
For me the biggest questions are:
- Who is the main character
- Is the Chosen Undead anywhere
- Did anyone use the gender change coffin (Might be related to the question above)
- Why is Ornstein still around
- Why was Seath still around
- Where is the fourth laughing old woman in red
- Why does the Lost Sinner fight like Astorias (As far as I understood, she inherited the Witch of Izalith's boss soul, tried to do the exact same thing but spectacularly failed, and punishes herself for this ever since)
- And what's with the traitor
I beat Darkghost thing by using a sticky white stuff equivalent and mashing R1 when he was at half HP. Darklurker talked some more about the dark and I got some probably OP spell with insane requirements.
The end.
I definitely agree about music being a massive disappointment, it might be even worse than Demon's Souls. I think it's a big part of what made the bosses less intimidating.
The Gargoyle fight with the DS1 music was so intense in comparison to the rest of the game!
Think about the penultimate boss with Crapa Demon's music, or the Pursuer with Iron Golem's. Man.
Anyway sorcerer w/ the champion covenant is a bit harder than I thought, because bosses OHKO or 2HKO. That's because I invested in faith just to get miracles and hexes later when I should have been way more serious and put all those points into HP. Not sure what to do next. Might drop out of the covenant.
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Dark Souls 2: RRV, RRA and DDF all down. Only the Rotten left from my borrowed run. Also managed to open the Shrine of Winter with only two Great Souls and only 200,000 in my bank. Guess it works on total souls as well? Anyway, tried to Sunbro DDF, but lag makes the laser stupid annoying. Also apparently I triggered Vangral's summon sign and I have no idea where it is. Maybe the Castle? I dunno. RRA was basiclly my antethis made into rat flesh. Bloody hell it took me eight tries to beat him. RRV also took two because of a last second petrify as I killed him. Bah.
Found the Black Knight Greatsword. I heard the Greataxe is in game and I have the Halberd, so I'm on the lookout for the regular sword now too.
I don't recall ever finding the regular sword (or the shield, much to my sadness). Greataxe is definitely present.
RRA is a bastard. Pretty sure he killed me more than any other boss in the game (relatively few killed me more than once, plenty didn't manage even that).
Fun fact: Aesir spider's laser totally ignores scenery and in fact can hit you even outside the fog gate (as I discovered once when running the fight as a summon and the host entered the room before I materialized).
EDIT: Oh, and I found Vengarl's summon sign outside of the final boss room. Dunno if he turns up anywhere else.
DS2 bosses are such a mixed bag, but I was at least happy there was no Bed of Chaos this time.
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Bravely Default - Holy -crap- these C7 optional fights are fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuun! Also brutal.
Also, mastered Swordmaster + mastered Piracy skillset = ten kinds of degenerate for ST offense. lol free amped strike strings
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I just restarted the sorcerer with no covenant in DS2 and am going to try to summon every NPC against bosses. This means staying human, which isn't hard. I beat five bosses already and have died twice.
So far these NPCs are pretty durable with little damage, they're perfect for distraction. (Except Belleclaire)
Theres Pate against the Giant, some cool dude with a sword against Heide's Tower's bosses, Lucatiel against the Sentry, and a female mage/astronomer named Belleclaire against sentinels.
Unfortunately, none of these NPCs react to emotes.
Nobody can help against the Pursuer as far as I can tell. BTW, if you beat him on the roof when he drops from his eagle, he won't appear as a boss. (And you'll still get all his stuff)
Stats are 20 Vit, 20 Int, 10 FAI, 30 ATT. Starting stats everywhere else. Not-Scarlet Johansson can't equip any shield, they're way too heavy man. In fact she can't even use a ladle properly, which might have lead her to lots of soup related misery in the past.
Investing into faith right now to get all those hexes.
Spells
- Soul Arrow/Great Soul Arrow are still your bread and butter as a mage.
- Unlike DS1 I didn't notice any major delay with Heavy Soul Arrow / Heavy Great Soul Arrow so they're pretty good.
- Shockwave doesn't work against bosses. Boo. And 3 charges only? I don't really see the point, though it's pretty fun to watch enemies fall on their face.
- Magic Weapon has been nerfed to hell. 8 charges, but greatly reduced damage. No more stabbity death from the sorcerer.
- Yearn is totally awesome. It distracts enemies for a short while (probably the same effect as an Alluring Skull?) negating practically any ambush
- Dark Orb so far has lower damage and lower charges than Soul Arrow. Way cooler looking though.
- Pyromancy is alltogether badly outclassed and meant for melee characters really.
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Snow has discovered that there is such a thing as a Free Lunch, and that it is glorious.
Now if you only knew the power of the Dark Side.
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I summoned a few of the NPC phantoms first run to see if any of them triggered any bonus stuff (I know Lucatiel at least has a quest related to her). They almost always died before the boss did.
Cleric up through the Sentinels. Man Heavenly Thunder sure looks cool but it kinda sucks. Imagine Firestorm if the same number of columns were spread over like twice the area and did 1/4 the damage. More often than not it doesn't hit anything, you have to have a serious mookswarm present for it to be any help at all (and you're probably not pausing to cast spells in that situation).
All healing spells are AoE now, which is cool (though sadly not all of my hosts realize this and they often run off to chow on lifegems instead). I want my Wrath of the Gods already, though (wait what 150 PVP victories required fuuuuuuuck.)
Bought everything from Licia. Took a couple swings at her and barely dented her healthbar (I didn't deal enough damage to even make her hostile). Um. *Cid looks something up* Oh she gives you her armor set for free once you hit 30 Faith. ...Okay! That's much easier.
Making a beeline to Harvest Valley for all that sweet sweet titanite.
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Lucatiel + The Moonlight Greatsword guy!
I don't think people like Belleclaire are mentioned anywhere else, but they're kinda cool.
Like Beatrice and Tarkus from Dark Souls 1.
The game is much easier on replays already not just because you know the maps but also because you know how areas are unlocked - You know you can go fight the Sentry before the Pursuer (and the way the bonfires work, this was probably intended), and can leave the sentinels until way later and go fight the chariot instead or something. This probably makes the penultimate boss the hardest for me as there are no other options there.
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Snow has discovered that there is such a thing as a Free Lunch, and that it is glorious.
Now if you only knew the power of the Dark Side.
That's also brutally powerful, but it's a bit more dangerous to use. Still worth abusing, though - a Rage => Life Thief/Blood Thirst under Life or Death Brave string deals positively -absurd- amounts of damage and leaves a Dark Knight still up and dandy for more punishment. Dark Knight is hilariously strong if you can keep its HP management in check.
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Try Rage with Drain Spellblade.
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Drain Sword completely negates the HP penalty of Dark Sword techniques (well, except vs undead) and just leaves you really overpowered against anything that doesn't resist Dark!
Dark Sword and Genome abilities have been my main source of damage ever since Chapter 5 started.
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Dominique Pamplemousse in it's not over until the fat lady sings
Beaten. Good game. It's a claymation musical adventure game with a gender-ambiguous main character (and it got nominated for lots of indie game awards this year; also: made by an acquaintance of mine). If this sounds interesting to you, you should play it; it's not very long, and not expensive.
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Dark Souls 2: I suck at this game. Getting stonewalled against bosses. Did a lot of wandering around instead of throwing myself at bosses who were stomping me.
Beat: Belfry Gargoyles, Covetous Demon, Executioner's Chariot, and Ruin Sentinels (I caved and summoned help to beat these fuckers).
Stuck on: Furnace Demon, Lost Sinner
Armor doesn't seem to be having as much an effect on defense as I'd assume. Might need to level it up more. Greatsword is pretty rocking. Not happy with Zweinhander's swing pattern. Picked up Pursuer's Ultra Greatsword, but it is kinda lacking without the level up items.
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Just got the fourth Great Soul in DS2. Guess I'm heading toward the final stretches. (though I can see there are many bosses I have not faced just yet, so maybe there's more to go than expected) I have loved the game, though I don't want to elaborate too much. The input lag is a real problem, but somehow not bad enough to detract from my enjoyment. Have been unable to connect to online mode since the 1.02 patch, which is very disappointing because I was looking forward to playing an active Souls game the whole way through. Favorite area was Huntsman's Copse up to this point. I am playing a DEX Build and currently have a +10 lightning Blacksteel Katana and +10 Poison Falchion. Still waiting on a good bow, using Lightning Short Bow in the meantime since it fires faster than the Sea/Bell Keeper Bows.
Also, I somehow played most of the levels in reverse order from what's expected. If you haven't been to Huntsman's Copse and have beaten Dragonrider, I highly recommend going that way early if possible.
Boss Tiers so far:
Mad Tough - Maneater 3.0, Smelter Demon (Probably one of the hardest bosses in the series for me)
Tough - Pursuer, Ruin Sentinels, RRA, Freja
Middle of the road - Old Iron King (All difficulty is Bed of Chaos-style randomness), Najka
Easy once you get the hang of it - Last Giant, Flexile Sentry, The Lost Sinner, Skeleton Lords, Mytha, Prowling Magus, RRV
Insultingly easy: Dragonrider, Mr. O, Covetous Demon, The Rotten
Overall, bosses have been easy and areas hard. I cannot imagine playing DS2 before the others, though.
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Hunter's Blackbow turns up in the zone that opens up once you've beaten the four old ones. It's basically Black Bow of Pharis (supreme range, S-rank in DEX) with shortbow firing time. Alternately, Dragonrider Bow is great if you have the stats to use it (high damage, part magic damage without an INT requirement, slow firing time though). Have I mentioned how great bows are in this game? Bows are great in this game. Lock-on bowfire rarely ever misses now (as opposed to DS1's firing at where enemies are when you release R1 instead of where they're going, you'd always miss anything with any lateral momentum), you can actually move (albeit slowly) with an arrow nocked and drawn, scope range is much more flexible (why was the vertical axis so restricted zoomed in in DS1? Ugh).
The input lag is weird. For me it only ever happens trying to bring up the status screen or mash through Herald dialogue to level (so thankfully irrelevant in combat), though chargen was also bizarrely clunky (sit and wait ~10 seconds for changes to character's physical appearance to actually show up).
The toughest Souls game is always the first one you play.
Andy: Smelter Demon's soul turns into a greatsword that actually looks pretty rad (though I haven't personally used it in combat because used all my dragon bones already). And yes, he is a bastard.
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I have noticed the most input lag/failure with trying to use jump attacks. It's especially bad if you have a slow r2.
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I actually found Dark harder than Demon's and played Demon's first. (multiple times)
Demon's had way easier bosses + infinite healing, basically.
The beginning was really rough though.
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I think DS2's the hardest for me. Just seems like enemies do a lot more damage than Dark Souls and especially Demon Souls and the Estus flask change makes it a lot harder early on. Slower recovery on being guard broken and after using Estus is a factor as well.
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Bravely Default - Took a peek at the bad ending. Welp, saw that coming some three chapters away. Nice touch on some of the dialogue, though. The game's brutally self-aware at that point. Now, to beat the fake final boss again and cleave my path to the true ending.
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FFD: Holy crap, randoms mean business once you get toward the end of C3. Thank God for MP-stealing abilities or I'd never have the healing to keep up.
Anyway, I'm up to the ninja chapter, specifically the Leviathan fight, which was almost certainly a terrible idea because (a) I don't have the ninja temp yet; (b) I didn't buy Thundaga back at town; and (c) healing and status curing is taking up so much of my time that I barely have turns to hurt him anyway (and nobody who does have that time has lightning offense). Maybe I should come back later.
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Honestly I sorta feel like the "bad" ending of Bravely Default was (spoilers from here) meant to be part of the good ending, but they decided that the game needed to go on for longer or that "properly" ending the game would require all 20 crystals to be turned on, so they split it into a "bad" ending that honestly feels more satisfactory to me and a "good" ending where you ignore half the moralizing and everyone pretends that Airy's a good guy until they can justify beating her up to get to the real bad guy. I don't know; I feel like the game was intended to just be three worlds (3-2-1) and got stretched at some point. The refights in worlds 4 & 3 don't add much, the "bad" ending right up until Airy's final speech felt so much cleaner... maybe I'm inserting how I would've rather seen it, but there's a lot of ways they could've trimmed fat and concisely done so much more/made both endings have so much more punch and impact.
It might say something as to how much I like the game that I'm thinking through the problems, as relatively small as they actually wind up being, and attempting to figure out how I'd make it even better.
Also, I'll still maintain that breaking the last crystal in world 3, after all the buildup, just feels so goddamn right. May be another part of why I think a three-world setup would've fit far better.
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Soul Silver: Beat Misty, powered up power plant, got Aerodactyl...and it's level 20, grah, gotta do a lot of raising it now.
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Finished two Dark Souls 2 playthroughs: One has a melee dualwield dex build, the other as heavy faith/strength spellcaster.
The Dex build was garbage. ADP stat is completely worthless outside of .5 second faster healing. It's the resistance stat from Dark Souls 1 aka the worthless dump stat. Too many things resist pure slash damage, so I went from dual katanas into Ricard's rapier + Sun Sword. Poise damage from light weapons is terrible but works well with the stone ring to stunlock any normal enemy within 2-3 attacks. The free medium shield that you get from Purse User is the only shield you need if STR < 30. Hardest boss on that run was Executioner's Chariot. Yay gimmick boss. Easiest boss was those skeletons in the church. 4 black firebombs aaaaaaand they're done.
Faith/STR build made the game waaaaaaaay easier, you can quickly boost faith up to 22 and get double lightning spears that can kill bosses in 5 shots. Since faith scales fire damage as well, you can throw a few pyromancy spells around. Flame Swaith does too much damage with no investment in the pyro glove. One of the hardest fights solo (Belfry Gargoyles) becomes one of the easiest with Chaos Storm and some herbs. Final boss was a total joke. Toss a super lightning spear, dodge laser beam, repeat til dead.
The main difficultly of Dark Souls 2 comes from overwhelming the player with lots of enemies at once. Exploding mummy hell marks the area with my most deaths. They even put a bunch of these assholes next to an important NPC and bonfire. They show up in the most unexpected areas, flop, blow up, and either break all your gear or all your HP.
The next portion of difficulty comes from mandatory platforming. Jumping controls are shit. Add in the platforming with total darkness, poison darts, and more goddamn exploding mummies and you get the Gutter, the new Blighttown only with a slightly higher framerate. Kitty cat ring is a must purchase.
Overall, didn't like the game as much as Dark Souls 1. Shitty mandatory areas, quantity > quality bosses, and nonexistant lore and interesting NPCs. The cat has one sexy voice though. PvP is probably better, but I'm not interested in that. Outside of rat hell and bell towers, I got invaded a grand total of 3 times. One guy did nothing but throw toxic mist at me and broke all my gear. Thanks.
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I take
Kitty cat ring is a must purchase. Overall, didn't like the game as much as Dark Souls 1.
As the entirety of Eph review.
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Bravely Default - C4, making pretty good progress I think. I have settled into Crescent Mooning all randoms into oblivion in one turn while Ringabel beckons enemies to come hither so they go very smoothly. Bosses still have definite potential to be badass though. C3 boss was definitely legit (better than the fire temple boss I thought), and the two three-way-split bosses I fought were certainly also respectable enough. The first C4 asterisk boss fight was also better than a lot of recent ones though it definitely went on too long (there are two, defeating the durable undamaging one after the less durable more dangerous one dies is very easy but long).
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I dunno the lore was pretty similar to DS1. Big difference is that the intro cinematic in DS1 told about the old myths, and the intro cinematic in DS2 told about how you're going to a fucked up place for no reason because you just want to.
I'm right before Covetus Demon.
Magic build continues to be cool. Hex guy gave me these totally sweet robes (Flowy like Dragon's Dogma robes) and ridiculously awesome magic staff with auto-rotating circle shiny things.
There are so many spells. Since I inexplicably get more and more magic charges, I only have to use three spell slots for regular damage spells (2 Soul arrows + 1 Dark Orb) and can use the others for stuff like Make Dead Bodies Explode. Which is just cool, but I really haven't found a real use for it yet. Was it really necessary to make this require two slots?
I thought I couldn't possibly beat anyone in PvP, but I won my first and only match. Machinegun spell, dark weapon, dagger +7. Stuff works.
Also Chameleon has been vastly improved, unlike DS1 you have fast moving speed when turned into a vase. I'm not sure you can turn into anything but vases and boxes though :(
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I don't think there are any non-dangerous bosses in C4 as far as my money's concerned. I'd definitely be interested to see you tackle the Vampire asterisk boss gauntlet, though - I found it reasonable enough, if somewhat tricky, but if you're willing to pad out Vampire's skillset early instead of very late, it definitely pays off (mainly because Fireball is a badass skill).
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The backstory is explained lategame in optional areas. Just some of it. The rest you got to buy the 29.99 US strategy guide.
I'm not sure you can turn into anything but vases and boxes though :(
Go to Grave of Saints, use the spell there. Inflict major psychological damage to your enemies.
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Spells DS2 needs. Summon Animated Vase and Box.
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DS2: Okay, two things Heavenly Thunder is actually good for: frying the shit out of invaders lured into those tiny Hunter's Copse huts; and Skelemob boss. There's so much shit going on in that fight that you almost can't help but hit all of them.
Hit 30 Faith and got Licia's clothes. Oh look they upgrade with twinkling titanite ffrrzgt. Well I guess I don't need to upgrade my shield ever, I can totally afford to use more of this ore for this than I found in the entire first run right.
Apparently people fight Dragonrider without raising the outer rings in the boss arena. I...guess it might be marginally dangerous dealing with him in one-third the area? Also Covetous Demon can actually smash those dead dude lamps in his room and dead dudes will fall out and walk around. Oh noes one-shottable scrub enemies in scrub boss fight.
Made my first attempt at Blue Sentinel invading. Repeated failed attempts in Huntsman's Copse, the one hit I got immediately ends because I am "Driven away from the host's world." I take this to mean the shitheel quit his game. So basically this is at least as unsatisfactory as Darkmoon invading so far. Great. Switching to Sunbro mode, WotG can go hang.
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ToS- Mithos just jumped in the way of falling rocks to save Tabitha ;o
Now at the Iselia Ranch and a dream came true, I have both Zelos and Kratos in my team~
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That's actually a pretty cool idea Gref and I wouldn't be surprised if they put it in the eventual fourth game.
I read the strategy guide descriptions and they're all:
"This enemy: He is really mysterious.
That enemy: Woah guys that enemy is TOTALLY mysterious.
That other enemy: MYSTERY LEVELS REACHING 10000%
That boss: Forget about the others man, THIS is the real deal, this isn't your grandpa's mystery"
And so on and so forth.
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Xenogears: Nisan stuff.
Hour 32: The party arrives in Nisan to discover it is under the control of Shakhan's soldiers. They discuss the situation as stealthy music plays, then after some discussion jump right into the middle of town, fight a bunch of soldiers, and then get told "thus was Nisan freed". ... sure okay.
In the freed town, Sister Agnes reveals to the party that Shakhan forced the sisters to reveal the nature of the Fatima Jasper (the key to unlocking the Omnigear) to Shakhan, i.e. that it is the retinal pattern of the Aveh and Nisan royalty. Shakhan then revealed that he was going to use the retinas of Margie's (presumably recently?) dead mother. Maybe she was enbalmed in a way which would preserve her well enough for this, I dunno. Regardless, Bart decides it's time to stop Shakhan's aspirations: the next destination is the mausoleum where the rulers of Nisan lie, and beyond it the secret location of the Fatima royal treasure. Sigurd, meanwhile, proposes retaking Bledavik while Shakhan is occupied in Nisan. Bart, Margie, Fei, and one other PC head to the mausoleum.
In the mausoleum, the party discovers that no, Margie's mother's corpse has not been desecrated. Bart heads to unlock the Omnigear to deal with Shakhan once and for all. This isn't really the brightest move, but it's Bart. To get in, he needs to get his eyes scanned, but he only has one, so Margie helps out.
The Omnigear's in some weird 500-year old facility. This place is kind of weird. It's a large area with no randoms (which makes sense) but in general it feels unfinished; there are lots of areas you can go to with nothing in them.
Hour 33: After exploring the facility, the party discovers the Omnigear. It's locked in the facility so the party heads to the control room to open the hangar. Upon getting there, Bart hits a bunch of buttons and stuff happens. In particular, the whole facility rises to float in the air (Bart promptly names it Fort Jasper) and it fires a giant laser beam which Bart gushes about how awesome it is. His rants autoscroll at rapid speed, something the game normally reserves for annoying NPCs. I am amused.
He also opens the hangar. As soon as he does, Shakhan shows up with a "JUST AS PLANNED" moment! Turns out he never intended to use Margie's mother to open the door (that plan never did make much sense...), but let Bart think he was going to to panic him into doing something impulsive. Safe bet. Anyway Bart rushes to the hangar to stop him from stealing the gear.
Shakhan is waiting for that, though, as he surprises the party with an ambush of a large number troops in the hallway on the way there. All seems lost but Margie quickly sneaks past into the gear hangar. Also, Sigurd and Citan show up, fresh from taking over Bledavik! God that took hardly any time at all, this is what happens when you leave Citan in charge of something; shit happens quickly. Shakhan retreats to the gear hangar to try to capture Margie, but she is able to use the omnigear to fight them off. Someone locks the door so Bart has to open it, but he can't because he only has one eye... but Sigurd to the rescue! He has it scan both their eyes, it works. Bart is all like "wait... what is going on man" and Sigurd yells at him to deal with it later since oh right Shakhan is threatening Margie over there, which amuses me. Bart hops in Andvari (as somehow in the chaos he's able to reach it before Shakhan does, probably because Margie is trying to machinegun everyone else) and syncs up with it, fighting off a gear mini-boss, and Shakhan is forced to run away. Well that turned out better than it probably should have.
Hour 34: Sigurd and Citan provide some other information; they've raided Shakhan's room and learned that one of the Solaris gates was under his purview, and that it's located near Nisan. The party suspects he may be hanging out there, so time to go deal with him.
At the gate generator, they meet Shakhan, who promptly attaches his gear to the gate generator, revealing that while Ethos had been instructed to guard the gates without being told what they were, they eventually figured out and learned how to siphon off energy from the system. Or... he thinks they did as the energy draining system malfunctions. Bart mocks him, but Grahf shows up and does his whole power-granting thing for the third and final time.
I actually lose this fight because not using Maria is stupid and there's actually rather little margin for error in the fight without her. Using her makes everything better.
Anyway, the fight ends with the whole system malfunctioning. Bart takes the time to trash-talk his nemesis one last time before the party retreats just in time for the gate to blow up.
The scene shifts to Aveh. Bart thanks the people for their patience and announces his plan to end the war with Kislev. He also reveals that his father's will included leaving the kingdom as a republic, perhaps because Bart's dad realised that Bart shouldn't be in charge of ruling anything. The people don't know that, though, and promptly acclaim Bart their king/president-for-life or something, much to his chagrin.
In a scene later that evening, Bart inquires to first Maison, then Sigurd himself about Sigurd's past. We learn that he was born to an affair of the king and a woman from a small nation east of Aveh (is this supposed to be Elru? His skin tone is a lot like Dominia's) who might have become queen except that she ran off because she knew she was dying and didn't want to get attached to anyone. Sigurd had later entered the service of the Fatimas as a squire (before, of course, getting abducted by Solaris). He didn't think his father knew who he was, but speaks warmly of how his father treated him. Bart reveals that his father's will instructed to split his inheritance with his brother, which had always confused him until the recent Sigurd revelations. Guess dad knew after all.
With Shakhan dealt with, the party once more turns its attentions to Solaris. To deal with Solaris, they first need to get access to it, which means dealing with the gates. Fortunately, one has already been blown up. There are two more, one is known to be buried deep within Ethos. The party discusses various plans, none of which seem likely to work; they can't dig down to it in a realistic amount of time and they don't have enough firepower to blow it up from the surface. OR DO THEY? Bart proudly reminds everyone of his new toy, Fort Jasper. But it's much to far away. Citan comes up with the crazy plan of reflecting the Fort Jasper beam off of the giant mirror of Babel Tower though. You know I have no idea what the scale of RPG world maps are supposed to be sometimes. Fort Jasper and Babel are half a world apart, but a beam can travel between them? Is the map just a small part of the world? Does the Fort Jasper beam curve with the planet's gravity? Is this all just a setup so that a crazy Citan plan can work because the game loves him? Who knows! Regardless, that's our next goal.
The Gazel, meanwhile, are not impressed. They berate Ramsus, calling him 'trash' (won't be the last time...) for his failure to stop the party reaching Shevat as well as his defeat at the Thames and allowing the Ignas gate to be destroyed. They order him to defend the remaining gates. He is still injured, though, and as badly as he wants to go fight Fei again, Miang refuses. Dominia and company step up to defend the gate in his place.
Next time: Almost at Solaris! Looking forward to it.
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RPG worlds are shaped like donuts and you can walk across a continent in three minutes while passing at most five towns. Physics gave up and went to the bar 25 years ago.
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Honestly I sorta feel like the "bad" ending of Bravely Default was (spoilers from here) meant to be part of the good ending, but they decided that the game needed to go on for longer or that "properly" ending the game would require all 20 crystals to be turned on, so they split it into a "bad" ending that honestly feels more satisfactory to me and a "good" ending where you ignore half the moralizing and everyone pretends that Airy's a good guy until they can justify beating her up to get to the real bad guy. I don't know; I feel like the game was intended to just be three worlds (3-2-1) and got stretched at some point. The refights in worlds 4 & 3 don't add much, the "bad" ending right up until Airy's final speech felt so much cleaner... maybe I'm inserting how I would've rather seen it, but there's a lot of ways they could've trimmed fat and concisely done so much more/made both endings have so much more punch and impact.
It might say something as to how much I like the game that I'm thinking through the problems, as relatively small as they actually wind up being, and attempting to figure out how I'd make it even better.
Also, I'll still maintain that breaking the last crystal in world 3, after all the buildup, just feels so goddamn right. May be another part of why I think a three-world setup would've fit far better.
You are not the only one who thinks that way. Ch.5 clearlt felt superfluous. The whole Celestial Realm deal also felt tagged on.
It felt like the writer wants to make the whole thing really meta when they are already half way into the development, so they plug in the last boss the way it is.
But that still doesn't excuse the bad writing of requring to make the whole PC cast to be total idiots to get to the true ending. Not to mention the fake ending has less casualty...
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You know, Citan is 29.
You have all wasted your lives.
(I still have two years to get as awesome)
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RPG worlds are shaped like donuts and you can walk across a continent in three minutes while passing at most five towns. Physics gave up and went to the bar 25 years ago.
I figured it's more just V. Joe World Logic where things reach a point of ridiculous, Physics just sort of goes "Screw this, I'm done" and leaves (that's the only way to explain the V. Joe final boss fight, where the world clearly is NOT a donut.)
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DS2: Hex? More like H4X
Well it's not that good. But I just noticed recently that I had naturally turned all 8 of my spell slots into dark spells + the occasional fun spell like the one that turns your shoes blue.
Dark Orb is my new default magic spell. So far I've only noticed one enemy that resists dark but not sorcery (those few club wielding green dudes in Earthen Peak)
Sorcery is now like the middle of the road option as far as magic goes, stuck between pyromancy and hex.
So yeah if you want a full frue mage you have to get into hex. Sorcery, and its soft cap at 20 int, doesn't cut it anymore.
Get 20 Int and 20 Fai first, get the ultra badass wand from Felkin, put some twinkling titanite into it, have the blacksmith turn it into a dark weapon, and voila. Get to NG+, buy unlimited cracked orbs, shotgun dark blast people (that's my plan)
The hex damage spells that consume souls are worth it. Just like a regular Soul Arrow, except doing just slightly less damage than point blank dark shotgun? Insanity.
I reaaaally don't see the point of an healing spell that consumes 2000 souls though. It doesn't even heal allies. The dark weapon spell that consumes souls is also pretty underwhelming, I guess they didn't want to make it too overpowered for PVP but still.
Oh, the NPC you can use for the poizn lady fight in the windmill is pretty cool. He's a jester who's dual wielding pyro hands.
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Re: Xenogears physics:
Dude, did you forget the part about Solaris' gravity being reversed for... reasons, or the fact that the world map changes completely because Solaris had some... force... field... that... made the world look different... or .... whatever?
The only physics the game gives a shit about is Metaphysics, and look at how they handle that.
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Well it's not that good. But I just noticed recently that I had naturally turned all 8 of my spell slots into dark spells + the occasional fun spell like the one that turns your shoes blue.
Stop making me want to play this game.
Oh, the NPC you can use for the poizn lady fight in the windmill is pretty cool. He's a jester who's dual wielding pyro hands.
Stop making me want to play this game
POKEDUDES XXX - Finished. Overlevelled because Exp Share and I didn't rotate pokemons as much as I intended to. Second game in a row where I meant to use a Ghost Steel because Golget is rad and Honedge sounds fucking sick. Second game in a row I failed to do so and hated self. Ran a Scizor the entire game because I got a level 1 Technician Scyther with a good Nature from Wonder Trade on my first night of playing and a friend had a Metal Coat to spare, so bam, Bullet Punch Technician Scyther straight out the gates. Good times were had.
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I will no doubt nitpick those things when we get to them, Zenny.
Xenogears - Hour 35: Citan's plan is put into effect, as Fort Jasper's beam is fired at Babel's mirror to destroy the second gate generator. Not much to say about the sequence of events here; of more note is that you meet all the Elements again. Dominia still wants Elly to die while Kelvena is shown as level-headed and speaks regretfully of having to fight Elly, implying that they are former friends. Tolone and Seraphita mainly provide comic relief as before, with Tolone trash-talking the PCs' plan, and Seraphita ignoring her and blathering about unrelated things.
Anyway it works. The party then notes that thanks to information from Shevat, the gates form a triangle. (I snarkily remark to my company at this point that any three points form a triangle because I am that kind of person. Yes, yes, I know they mean equilateral triangle.) Elly remembers that one of the gates was near the ocean, which narrows down where it can be.
There's a scene with the Gazel again, expressing contempt for the renewed failure of Ramsus and his soldiers. Krelian, meanwhile, notes that there is some interesting data from the memory cubes (wait, did the game just acknowledge save points to be a thing?), and wants to send Emeralda to confirm the presence of the 'antitype' (which we later learn means Elly).
The party heads to the underwater gate. Here, they meets the final PC, Emeralda. Krelian has brainwashed her into trying to kill the party, and one of his flunkies named Rattan (who like Stone, also has no face... Krelian has weird expectations of his followers) observes the boss fight. After we win, Emeralda recognises Fei as 'Kim', which pleases Rattan, and he takes off, allowing the party to blow up the gate. Emeralda, meanwhile, turns out to be fiercely loyal to Kim/Fei, but not give a shit about Elly... clearly she didn't do a very good job of impressing Emeralda 4000 years ago! Considering Emeralda was apparently sent to identify Elly, this is kind of ironic, but I guess her recognising Fei was ample proof or something? Feels a bit plot-holey.
Anyway, with three gates destroyed, Solaris appears. It is big and menacing-looking; there's a surprisingly lengthy cutscene just panning over the place. This is the source of all the evil which has assailed the Lambs for the last five hundred years and the game makes you want to savour it. Time to go in and mess up the Gazel once and for all!
The party forms a plan to do just that. They'll need to destroy the fourth gate on Solaris itself before the place itself can be attacked. Fei, Elly, and Citan will form the strike squad. Before they leave for Solaris, Citan has a cutscene with his wife, where he talks about how he has chosen his path, but he may yet be overcome by the "dark side". Yui gives him his sword and tells him to come back alive. Meanwhile, Jesiah also accosts Citan alone, warning Citan he will kill him if he does anything funny. Citan merely notes that he is counting on it, which flusters Jesiah. Good.
Next time: Solaris! Maybe some Soylent Green references, definitely some character work.
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Atelier Escha & Logy- I'm not sure I like this game. Almost done with Assignment 7. It's fairly breezy and easy, but... there's almost nothing here. It's a regression from Ayesha on the story front, with next to no character work or story happening, and I know Ayesha was also light on the former but it at least tried. Everything here is just so empty and melodramatic and you just end up not caring. It's so boring. My god. There is no compelling reason to finish this game. At all. They really missed the mark trying to "fix" the "problems" with Ayesha. The end of the story really better tie it all together because goddamn this is just a whole lot of nothing.
The alchemy system is a little more intuitive. Not being able to register items in shops is annoying, even if the Homunculus duplication tries to make up for it. It's just less convenient more than total bullshit, so I can deal. Filling out the assignment pad is easy enough, though sometimes it's not exactly clear on how things work sometimes, which can waste some time.
Combat kinda treads water. Alchemic attack items are back on their pedestal, and you get not one but TWO overpowered alchemists. On the flipside, stats and buffs generally aren't as clearly overpowering as they were in Ayesha (just mostly). Your non-alchemists are still generally strong though, owing to Ayesha's improvements. But the enemies got HP buffs and nothing else really, which makes early battles until you can craft better stuff really tedious.
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Solaris having reverse gravity never bothered me. They understand all the advanced technology and shit right? The spaceship from the beginning of the game clearly had artificial gravity just from looking at how it was shaped. They are missing a particularly clever reason for it though. The prison where they reversed the artificial gravity in one of the ancillary Star Wars works, for example, did that because people would try to escape by going up since they were underground but that only lead further down. I understand HOW Solaris could, just don't understand their motive.
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Totally agree with you on the Bravely Default plot stuff.
This is especially true because after entering the pillar of World 3, NOTHING HAPPENS WHATSOEVER in Worlds 4/5 until you break crystal #20. The optional refights are neat (sometimes amazingly so) but the characters stop having any real interaction related to the plot, which is just sad. If you break the 4th crystal in World 3 it all works much, much better from a storytelling perspective.
Also Airy makes for a much more compelling villain than Ouroborus. Ouro just kind of shows up, says some Evil things, has a fairly long battle, then is done. Admittedly he hams it up better than your average space flea from nowhere final boss, but still. Airy taunts the party, has conversations with them about how much she hates them mid-battle and how she enjoys using them, and so on. Much more connection to the narrative, which makes for a more compelling villain.
The game COULD have done something interesting with the plot after W3, but it did not. Pity.
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Don't have anything but my own experiences to compare it too, but Hexes tended to do more damage to giants. Around 180 to normal enemies and usually 1.5x or more to giants. Yay odd usefulness! Resonant Weapon can have its uses if you're using something with poor attack power like Caestus(I hate meeeeee).
DARK SOULS 2: Shitty boss breakdown edition.
Smelter Demon: Hey look, another antithesis to Caestus! Hello giant gap between your legs making me whiff 75% of my attacks. Guess I have to target your sides instead and hope you don't flatten me in one hit! Or I could wuss out and just spam spells while I let Lucatial tank you. Except that one time she doesn't enter the arena and that's my best run to that time! And when I finally succeed it is exactly when she dies so no credit for completing that quest.
The Rotten: Hey look! When I'm not aggravating myself wasting ten minutes getting to the door the stupid dull garbage that is this boss fight is just that! Gutter was more interesting because I accidentally punched one of those dogs to death. Went full tank mode since lol Gutter souls. Also found the Darkdiver and Giant Soul here on complete accident. Then I went and grabbed Havel's gear. Arm/Leg is gonna be the new pieces for my tank set yay Twinkling use!
Drangleic Castle: Ruin Sentinals the return got me a few too many times. The Stone Soldiers dropping Titanite Slaps like crazy is lulzy. I have more Slaps on me then I ever got in Dark Souls period.
Dragonrider X2: No, even if there's two of you you are still effortless trash. The real difficulty here is living with yourself if you get hit. They have less health than the generic enemies in the castle I'm pretty sure.
Black Chasm?" HELLO HAVEL. GOODBYE MY LIVING. The 70 Effigies I've stocked up will sure come in handy soon!
Looking Glass Knight: Hey, an interesting boss, that I can hit! with a neat gimmick, that doesn't do 80% of my life on any attack. Nifty!
Shrine of Amala: Having a bow and fire arrows really made this cake. Got a fair bit of Twinkling Titanite and Effigies from the swimming freaks.
Demon of Song: ! How the hell is melee supposed to fight this thing all its attacks killed me in one hit? I had a bow so it wasn't so bad but...
Undead Crypt: Neatly put together. Enemies being able to stunlock me to death though is poorly put together. SCREW IT MAXIMUM TANK. HAHAHAHA those shield assholes only take off like 15% of my sad pathetic lifebar. Hello Aveyn.
Royal Aegis: Hey look, a dull boss, that I can't hit, with a stupid gimmick, that does 80% of my life on any attack! STUPID! That offhand backswing costed me about a third of my dozen attempts on him. Stupid insta-kill homing attack only took me twice however! Because his legs were spread so far apart AGAIN, I couldn't get in very many hits with Caestus. After a couple of weird attempts with spells and bows I just wussed out again and took him out with the Black Knight ULTRA Greatsword. Apparently it got an upgrade sitting unused for XXXXX amount of years. Oh hey, his soul trades for that Sacred Oath miracle. Cool, a boss near endgame giving such teamplay miracle. Princess Guard all over again!
King Ring get. Throne of Want? No. Aildia Place thingy? Sure. Oh hey, using a Fragrant Branch of Yore, it's been a while. Hey these glowy-weapon guys drop Petrified Dragon Bones, neat!
Guardian Dragon: Turns out the Dragonrider Bow is real good at taking our dragons!
Dragon Aerie: Got invaded, enough time passed for me to get fully geared up. Fight took place in that tiny passageway before the bonfire so naturally my Casetus hit the wall and bounced off while his giant greatsword swung on by effortlessly five times and I died and have to wait for that elevator forever. Run up to the Ancient Dragon is a nightmare because everything as too much health and the big dudes once again have their legs so far apart I can't hit them from behind.
Giant Memories: Now this is a cool idea! Would be better if the Royal Soldiers didn't keep trying to kill me because clearly between Giants and some guy some guy is more important. Dying here is a nightmare because of suffering through two slowass loading screens each bloody time not even counting for blacksmith trips.
Giant Lord: Last Giant MK2! Now with 100x the stupid run up to him! One of my failures was solely because I ran out of time hahahahaha. After the phantom proved useless a half-dozen times I said screw it and went solo. Such a better idea ugh. Resonant Weapon is actually what won this for me in the end.
OFF TO FIGHT SALAMANDERS! And die about four times because they're the fastest thing in the game cripes. Why does this open with the Iron Key that's dumb.
Anyway.... half a million souls on my person with probably another 200K in consumables. I didn't want to level so I could keep getting summoned but my connection's so bad that I rarely get called in. I should just go get myself those 30 or so levels. Maybe getting 60 more attack will be slightly helpful.
Death total broke a hundred million monday whoooooo.
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Dark Souls 2: I probably need to listen to Fenrir and start working towards Hexes because Sorceries are underwhelming right now. The damage really needs to be increased, because Soul Spear still isn't one shotting most of the trash enemies which seems wrong. I do have the sunset wand, but I need more faith for most of the spells and I would like to get the Staff of Wisdom levelled up first and see if that helps at all with the sorcery damage. Soulmass is still alright I guess and I just got the Greatsword spell which is also neat. I also tried Pyromancy and did over 1000 damage with Flame Swath. That was pretty neat, but it's also very slow and takes up all of my stamina to use most of the spells.
People are very nice in Drangleic castle though! Had two sets of sunbros help me through the area and then another group help me through the Mirror Knight. I think I'll stick around and do co-op for the Mirror Knight a bit longer. I'd like to see him actually summon an opposing player instead of the generic phantom.
edit:Oh my. I just saw how much the Sunset Staff gets with each upgrade. Going to go work on that today.
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Dark Souls 2: More wandering because Smelter Demon is too much for me. Seriously, fuck that guy.
Ended up going to the shaded ruins and fighting the Scorpioness. Not too bad a fight. Then I fought some Magus and his Congregation, which was odd. Then I met Freja.
ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffml.
Went roaming a little more and got... summoned as a grey phantom in Pharros' Door? What? The hell?
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Little trick with Freja: You can usually run behind her when she's firing the laser safely, and it's easy to bait her into firing it. I summoned the NPC to deal with the spiders, but Freja kills them sometimes too.
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Went roaming a little more and got... summoned as a grey phantom in Pharros' Door? What? The hell?
It's part of a new covenant where you get summoned into someones world and they can try to kill you. There are typically traps they can activate using Pharros Lockstones (you should ignore most of the Lockstones in that area. They only have enemies or traps mostly) and the enemies will be hostile towards you. If you die though as a phantom you don't lose anything so it's just an inconvenience really. It only triggers there and one other area.
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Ah. Okay. I was deeply confused when that happened.
And yeah, Freja's laser is easy to dodge. I just hate spiders and I hate lasers. I'm more annoyed that the bonfire I have seems a long ways off.
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Fudo: Wait you have 15 Int and 24 Faith with a dual cestus + Ultrasword build??
I suggest getting more HP
Dude: Yeah. Hex's not that crazy (inferior to sorcery in PvE in Dark Souls 1 I'd say) but still much better I feel. Right now my base damage is 408 with Dark Orb (Hex's faster more accurate Soul Arrow with slightly less charges) and a Sunset Staff +3
Gref: I also summoned a giant man-scorpion against a giant woman-scorpion boss
Edit: Scorpion related domestic violence that you solve by killing the woman. Real progressive there, Dark Souls 2
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The plus side of getting grabbed by Ratbros is that killing them nets you Pharros Lockstones.
Lead-up to aesir spider is probably the longest bonfire-free run in the game. I think only Lost Sinner can compete there (both of the closest bonfires place you within immediate aggro range of enemy mobs, in one case 'splosion zombies, so fuck that noise).
Overall, didn't like the game as much as Dark Souls 1. Shitty mandatory areas, quantity > quality bosses, and nonexistant lore and interesting NPCs. The cat has one sexy voice though. PvP is probably better, but I'm not interested in that. Outside of rat hell and bell towers, I got invaded a grand total of 3 times. One guy did nothing but throw toxic mist at me and broke all my gear. Thanks.
Bosses granted. I'm pretty okay with the areas, though. Forest was a pretty dull intro zone but they got better after that. They generally don't have the kind of fine detail that made me want to stop and look at everything in DS1, but I at least find the environments satisfactorily diverse and from a level design perspective there's more meat to them on average than their DS1 counterparts (a lot of which could be run through in thirty seconds if you were confident in dodging enemies; whether DS2's lack of invincibility while walking through fog walls is boon or bane is I suppose debatable). I actually didn't even mind Blighttown mk. 2 (or Valley of Defiled mk. 3 I suppose). Torch hopscotch was good use of a game mechanic otherwise almost wholly optional and superfluous.
What really disappoints me aesthetically is equipment. DS1 had a plethora of fantastic-looking gear. And not in the common fantasy game manner of let's just make all this shit glowy because glowy equals magic, but actually nicely designed and stylishly unique stuff that just seeing it makes me want to go out and find it. Where is the DS2 equivalent of instantly memorable onion knight armor? There is none. Most DS2 gear in comparison looks extremely utilitarian in more of a Demon's Souls way. Not that DS1 didn't have plenty of functional, realistic armor too, but there's really nothing so eye-catching here as say Dusk's/Beatrice's/Lautrec's/Darkmoon Knight's/Gwyndolin's outfits (just tossing some personal favorites, there's lots of other visually outstanding sets). The best of DS2 in my eyes tend to be holdovers (Velka/Xanthous)/show up way late in the game/require ultra-rare upgrade materials so impractical to bother wearing them. Fun game, DS2, but it just misses the style train in a lot of little ways. The set I want the most sadly is Emerald Herald's (uber-impractical unless you're done leveling bro).
So Drangleic not as welcoming a place for the fashion-conscious as Lordran was, very sad.
Definitely agreed on NPCs. Not that Souls NPCs are ever about deep character development or anything, but they're generally good at finding a proper VA to inject at least a little personality into them. There's really no standout so immediately, appealingly quirky as Solaire or Siegmeier here, though.
Oh, the NPC you can use for the poizn lady fight in the windmill is pretty cool. He's a jester who's dual wielding pyro hands.
Squire Jester Thomas is the Iron Tarkus of DS2. Most DS2 summons deal piddly damage and exist to die distracting the boss away from you. By contrast, Thomas can and will solo the boss he's available for.
Not much progress to report personally, presently just Bell covenant grinding to upgrade equipment (I get the feeling this constitutes the midgame of any DS2 run). I still don't understand the geography of the Earthen Peak -> Iron Keep transition. You climb a tower in the middle of nowhere, from the top take an elevator up, rise up through a sea of lava. ???
Got invaded and killed in my own world for the first time. Huh, I thought that couldn't happen while you were human in DS2? Now I wonder where I got that idea from. Only notably annoyed because humanity basically being a finite resource in this game* (Fudo your luck with drops continues to baffle me). Anyway it was nice the first couple weeks playing the game before anybody was into the red phantom covenant yet.
(*Rumor reaches me that praying at the creepy altar in Shrine of Amana while hollow and with zero effigies in stock makes you human. I cannot confirm this and plan not to ever be in a position to do so. I was personally inclined to try going in there with Ring of the Dead on because you get it from a singing girl, singing girl is at the altar, singing girls trained by Great Dead One I.E. Nito. Maybe try that later I guess.)
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Oh yeah, also beat the Executioner's Chariot. Neat enough gimmick boss I guess. Guy outside the door could fat roll between Caestus swings and had actual poise for an NPC-type enemy.
@Fenrir: 20INT, 26FAITH. 8 VIG AWWWWWW YEAH. BKUG I only plan on using on Royal Aegis and random dicking around. Until I meet another boss with a giant gap between his legs whoo hoo.
@Cid: Best guess about Earthen Peak > Iron Keep I can hazard, is Iron Keep sat in a volcano which the environment supports at least. When it sank it didn't sink all the way or something. This doesn't explain why the elevator itself still works but whatever. Efigy drops are a combination of never using them because of Ring of Life Protection and always wearing Item Find gear going through areas.
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Thomas didn't really seem that good in my game. Maybe he just got stunlocked.
El Cid You need to watch the shadow of a sunset staff being made by a bonfire. And have you heard about the (ok, NG+ only) Moon butterfly set??
And yeah, Ring of Life protection -> Costs 3000 health to be repaired -> You never have to be hollow again from midgame on
I liked the cat, invasion covenant dude, and hex dude. Pate is also at its best in this one. Blacksmith's daughter and her sexual innuendo. Licia. Ladder dude and his infinite ladders. The three old ladies that mock you at the beginning. I dunno, I like the cast.
I actually find the Valley of Defilement v3 extremely tame. It sounds horrible on paper (Vertical + Bottomless pits + Darkness + Poison everywhere) but the enemies aren't dangerous, the statues can be broken, and lightning all these torches feels nice. There's no oppression. The most disappointing part of the game for me.
Fudo: ... That explains a lot.
Man, get that to 20, at least!! SURRENDER. You get so much health by doing this!
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Bravely Default, C2: I have slain a young girl furry. Achievement unlocked?
Norende nearly complete. Also while I vowed not to buy equipment from it except in case of emergency, I notice now that the special move parts are just free despite being in a "shop." So... +50% damage + other buffs on all my special moves? I guess I might as well add it.
Anyway, clock tower was not TOO bad despite initially being scared by the Brave->buff->Strong Strike for 1300 damage randoms (to PC ~800 max HP). Relentless offense can take 'em out, and Strong Strike misses half the time, so. Also the bosses were surprisingly scrubby; Khrim was okay but Khamer support was worse than Jackal or Profiteur. I kind of question the evil plot here, too. Mission: Destabilize own kingdom, drive people to desperation, get overthrown in revolution blame religion? Florem has the better idea about how to stamp it out.
Oh, and Florem. Ladies. It's a brutal competition to attract the menfolk, I get it, but I have a cunning suggestion: move somewhere else where there are more fish in the sea? I guess the hair dye has gotten to their heads. Also we get the mission for sexy Agnes dress-up mark 2, sigh. Luckily the sidequests are more amusing.
Difficulty remains pleasantly high, for the most part at least. Night formations with Poison Moth + 3 Alarunes are insanely badass, especially if they get first strike - Poison Moth is very fast and has a MT 3HKO + Poison, Alarunes have weird erratic damage but it's anywhere from a 4HKO to a 2HKO. Let the other side - especially the Moth - get a 2nd round and your team is taking a dirt nap; have "enemies get first strike" and eat wipe. Like I did after switching Time Mage off [no Time Slip] and when I was 3 steps or so from returning to Florem. GRAGHHHH, all that wandering around and "we have no cause to be here" lost. Save moar I suppose.
Also, while JP gains spiking makes switching classes theoretically tempting, JL clearly has a pretty huge invisible stat modifiers. JL3 Time Mage Ringabel did ~120 damage with black magic while JL7 White Mage Agnes did ~200 damage. No Black Resonance in play here, and Ringabel actually had higher MAttack, so clearly it's just Job Level. So... not getting too crazy with the job switching. Party is basically Edea = Spell Fencer / Knight, Tiz = Thief [sometimes Monk and before I remember that Monk is bad] + Miscellany for Examine, Agnes = White Mage, Ringabel = Black Mage / Time Mage / [Merchant, except it is bad]. I agree with earlier Spell Fencer hype; how do you make Mystic Knight type classes relevant? A) Nearly every enemy sports an elemental weakness, and bosses that don't get Withering Ripple'd. B) Quad-acting. Okay then, this rules.
Went for Mephilia first and got absolutely *rolled*: she has an MT OHKO (more ~1000 damage to ~850 PCHP and me having not upgraded my armor yet), an ST 2HKO (~500 damage or so off staff thwacks), and summons Bloodrose Legion types who nearly sport ST OHKOs themselves. Default spam only goes so far, I got crushed. Tried Artemia next, and rolled *her*. Not sure I ever saw the Brave -> 2x Multiburst that Pyro mentioned in his stat topic, and she dies extremely fast anyway thanks to sporting an elemental weakness and not really putting enough pressure on the party. I didn't even have L3 Black/SpellFencer access and she still got smashed. Kinda weird that Pyro hypes Artemia > Mephilia in the DL, since it didn't feel true in-game! Anyway, Artemia's character design + height + the fact that the American localization added three to most character's age in years (quite reasonably!) makes me suspect I just put down a berserk 14-year old. Too late for a crisis of conscience, I suppose.
Also Knight Stomp with a Bow equipped has a funny animation.
Anyway, good times so far.
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-Job Level definitely has a definite effect on damage (although it's calculated after defence I'm nearly certain; may even be adding "hits" in the FF1-5 mechanics sense).
-Despite this, the game does a pretty good job of encouraging job switching, unlike FF3DS. Not so much where you are, but in Chapter 3, JP gains rise pretty notably and allow you to level other classes quickly, but there's a -huge- JP requirement spike from JL 9 to JL 10, so the game will encourage you to get multiple jobs to 7-9 or so to plunder their skills rather than just sitting in one class, since it takes about twice as much JP to go from 9 to 10 as it did from 1 to 9.
-I had the same experience as you regarding Artemia and Mephilia (the latter still registers as the best asterisk-holder in the game to me). The DL's a weird beast though. I have more thoughts on the subject but they should probably be saved for a stat topic.
-It's not like 14-year olds are any shorter than adults on average so Artemia is just a midget. (and/or character designers have no grasp of female human growth patterns, take your pick).
-If you think Stomp looks silly with a bow, wait until you see Crescent Moon~
Anyway, for my end, just beat the earth crystal boss of C4. Time to go to the final dungeon! I wonder how much I would have bought this line if I didn't know there were more chapters. Probably not too much, there are too many reasons to be suspicious at this point plotwise + the game is clearly poised to allow another JP spike so that it becomes more practical to gain late job levels.
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Dark Souls 2 NG+ Antics:
Right away you fight guys with birds on their shoulders. The bird doesn't do anything but it looks like the guy is using the bird as a shield.
Red NPC phantoms are everywhere. Heide's Tower has roughly double the giant soldiers.
Invasions are a lot more common. Already had two red and one blue phantom at the forest of giants. Havel's Armor and Shield with pyromancy is the new giant dad. Get used to it.
Ally NPC are still pretty worthless but somehow have crazy high defense and HP. I'm pretty sure Pate could solo the last giant if I supported him with one heal.
Lost Sinner goes from a pretty good boss to absolutely the worst fight in the game. At half HP, it summons two pyros that constantly throw fireballs at you. Again taking a quality boss and adding more enemies doesn't make it fun.
I somehow found the giant manscorpion that Fenrir was talking about. I thought he was an enemy so I threw the sun at him. Took it like a champ. How do you talk to his guy.
Traded my many petrified somethings and got a bunch of junk and an Old Whip. Turns out it's the best dex weapon in the game. Base stats are insane. Low durability but here repair powder is infinite and souls are not in short supply.
Steel chest do respawn, unlike using a bonfire aestic. Get multiple copies of Soul Geyser and (great) Resonance Soul.
Cap is 12 Estus Flasks at +5. I guess too much healing is a bad thing? I'm sitting on max lifegems and 40 radiant gems.
Invading at Bellfry Sol/Luna as a red phantom is great. You got the host, bellbros, sunbros, red phantoms all trying to kill each other. Attacking bellbros as a red phantom is counterproductive but it counts towards kills in the covenant. I've been trying to invade ratbros but they seems to summon you faster than you can open the menu and select cracked red eye orb.
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Job levels for physical classes definately adds hits in the FF1-4 sense. It's also particially dependent on which specific job you're in, I believe, with classes like Ninja, Ranger, Thief getting more hits out of increased jlvls.
Job levels for magic are apparantly straight up damage increases, though.
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Get the "You can hear monster grunts now, enjoy" ring from the cat
Remember that Giantdad was the new Full Havel. So it goes Full Havel -> Giantdad -> Full Havel
THE ENDLESS CYCLE CONTINUES
Edit: There's already a Dark Souls 2 speedrun in less than two hours
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUoxeAqjq70
You need to watch the fights against Dragondude at 4 minutes and Pursuer at 12
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Not full havel, just the armor and greatshield. Head is probably something that gives you +1 casting or Hexer hood, gloves and feet are cast enhancing gear.
There's no reason not to use Havel's shield if you have the strength. It has solid resists against everything. I can't poison anybody behind it.
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Estus being capped at 12 is such a random number. There's more shards than that in a playthrough.
Dark Souls 2: OH WAIT! THE PS3 BROKE A-FUCKING-GAIN! IT WAS LITERALLY IN THE SHOP LONGER THAN THE TIME I GOT TO PLAY IT FAJSVSSA(VFSAFJVSAIPV*F
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A hundred million deaths were not enough for Fudo. :(
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(http://static.zerochan.net/Valkyrie.Profile.full.291172.jpg)
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Went for Mephilia first and got absolutely *rolled*: she has an MT OHKO (more ~1000 damage to ~850 PCHP and me having not upgraded my armor yet), an ST 2HKO (~500 damage or so off staff thwacks), and summons Bloodrose Legion types who nearly sport ST OHKOs themselves. Default spam only goes so far, I got crushed. Tried Artemia next, and rolled *her*. Not sure I ever saw the Brave -> 2x Multiburst that Pyro mentioned in his stat topic, and she dies extremely fast anyway thanks to sporting an elemental weakness and not really putting enough pressure on the party. I didn't even have L3 Black/SpellFencer access and she still got smashed. Kinda weird that Pyro hypes Artemia > Mephilia in the DL, since it didn't feel true in-game! Anyway, Artemia's character design + height + the fact that the American localization added three to most character's age in years (quite reasonably!) makes me suspect I just put down a berserk 14-year old. Too late for a crisis of conscience, I suppose.
Well, in-DL =/= in-game. Artemia is definitely far easier than Mephilia in-game (you know her Multiburst string? It -unfocuses- in-game. This alone makes it so much simpler). Also, Mephilia benefits from Hard more than Artemia because her support summoning is the big factor in the fight - those soldiers are NASTY.
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Helping show a good illustration for my anti-hyping of boss full focusing in the DL!
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FFD: Almost done with chapter 4, I think. I got a legitimate shock when the two parties joined up - juggling eight party members with five available slots is a whole ton of customization dropped on you at once. Luckily I didn't build up the two teams that similarly. I do have two dedicated spellcasters, which is one more than I'll ever need.
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I would rec 2 casters actually. Some of the later bosses are pretty easy to blitz down but there is definitely some that are resistant to it. Having access to that OP as fuck FF healing is really worth it.
For what it is worth Magus and whatever the whitemage variant is give you easy access to the White and Black Magic skillsets on a fighter, so it is super easy to make someone pinch hit in those skills without developing in them previously. The high level skills you get for WM/BM are both pretty solid so time spent there wasn't a waste either. It is pretty neat balancing bit really.
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Artemia's attack is 4 random attacks, much like Meteor. More deadly than BM/TM/RM magics that unfocus.
Mephillia's support is a big deal in her fight. Other than that it seems folks go after Mephillia first in a fair number of cases, which modifies stats (because of Mephillia's own dungeon). This is a pity as you miss some lines from Mephillia that ... uh.... yeah.
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The scene changes based on the order you do them in? Should have rewatched the scenes in my Mephilia (get owned) -> Artemia -> Mephilia sequnce of doing things, clearly.
Bravely Default - Chapter 5. Iiiinteresting. Also hahaha if you guys think Artemia and/or Qada are obnoxious in the DL, wait until you see the last C4 boss~ (Unlike them s/he's actually a pretty decent fight so I can't complain as much, but yeesh.)
For the Snows, I did beat one of the bosses on the vampire sidequest. Fun enough, but when I realised the second one I fought was going to be the same thing except forcing me to equip a statusblocker and with a less exploitable weakness I decided to move on with the game instead. Those fights can wait until 135k is less impressive.
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Oh, yeah, that boss is also nuts. Just spams Minus Strike way less than Qada does Dark Breath (I think it's restricted to under 50% hp) so less obvious about it.
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The removal of the recharge time on it makes it more dangerous. I actually game-overed to it because I got greedy, went negative on BP on a person or two, and then got lapped by the boss and.... yeah.
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Fudo's PS3 has just gone hollow.
I know why I was a lot more panicked by the Sentinels than the other bosses in DS2. Boss track is boss. I don't know why I didn't notice it in game. It's like the only good music in the game too. (w/ the skeleton lords track)
As far as pre-castle stuff goes, only the Duke's left for me in my hex playthrough. Pursuers is a biiiit disappointing damage-wise, as it takes way too long to cast.
I think I'll try to ironman this next playthrough (no deaths period) for the great PVP ring reward. (And the challenge!)
Build would be VIGOR/Endurance/Vitality/STRENGTH, with a little Faith and Attunement.
Strategy would be hiding behind a shield at all times then bashing with said shield? Or some giant club.
The most dangerous part of the whole playthrough would have to be Old King That Might Be SPOILER OMG. The Gutter's not that bad in comparison. I'm considering using a Bonfire Ascetic and just fighting the Rotten twice instead of even attempting Lava Boy. (I don't want to fight NG+ Sinner or Freja)
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Rec for LARGE CLUB. Main weapon on my first run, very satisfactory (have to get past Sentinels to find it...but still, S-rank STR scaling!) Heavy weapons in general are faster than they used to be and much more reliable for it.
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I wish it did go hollow, at least I'd have 50% of it working!
Before it did break I fought the Traitor. Wow, it's just as what as as been said. I guess the drop was stolen? At least my poison caestus finally got a real use.
Great Club's off in the Gutter I think at least maybe.
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Dark Souls 2: Met the Royal Rat Authority. I hate everything. RRA, Smelter Demon, Lost Sinner, and Freja all need to be beaten.
It really is bizzare how sprawling this game is. Every time I think I've exhausted all my paths, it turns out there's somewhere else I can go.
Temporarily retired from being a Sunbro to become a Bellbro. Being a Bellbro is hilarious and makes me feel like a terrible person.
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The scene changes based on the order you do them in? Should have rewatched the scenes in my Mephilia (get owned) -> Artemia -> Mephilia sequnce of doing things, clearly.
Bravely Default - Chapter 5. Iiiinteresting. Also hahaha if you guys think Artemia and/or Qada are obnoxious in the DL, wait until you see the last C4 boss~ (Unlike them s/he's actually a pretty decent fight so I can't complain as much, but yeesh.)
Minus Strike variants: amazingly obnoxious. In-game, they're more of an annoyance than anything. DL-wise, they just get nuts. (QADA DEALING OVER 13X PC HP IN ITD DAMAGE AFTER LOSING 10% HP THIS IS SO VERY NOT RIDICULOUS RITE) It's particularly insulting in his case because ST OHKO with a telegraph turn is pretty whatever in a game with revival as accessible as BD's.
For the Snows, I did beat one of the bosses on the vampire sidequest. Fun enough, but when I realised the second one I fought was going to be the same thing except forcing me to equip a statusblocker and with a less exploitable weakness I decided to move on with the game instead. Those fights can wait until 135k is less impressive.
That's pretty much the gist of it. The game could've stood to use less contrivances than they did too. I'd have been particularly interested to see your reaction to the asterisk-bearer fight itself, though, but its fundamental design change is just the boss' durability. It was a decently fun - if simple - fight to figure out.
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Dark Souls 2: Met the Royal Rat Authority. I hate everything. RRA, Smelter Demon, Lost Sinner, and Freja all need to be beaten.
It really is bizzare how sprawling this game is. Every time I think I've exhausted all my paths, it turns out there's somewhere else I can go.
Temporarily retired from being a Sunbro to become a Bellbro. Being a Bellbro is hilarious and makes me feel like a terrible person.
The best thing about being a Bellbro is that even if you are losing a duel, you can just run off and wait until another bellbro invades to help. I have gotten several hate messages.
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When two other people duel I always run in the middle and spam emotes.
I'm trying to get summoned for the Looking Glass Battle but it isn't working :(
I've won like 20 fights with no losses with this hex build in PvP.
(Except in fights where I fought two guys at once + fights with huge lag involved)
Equipment is that ring that boosts hex damage by like 40% and drains HPs after each hex + stuff that improves casting speed.
Spells are
- Affinity: Very slow very damaging homing spell that launches when the enemy is close
- Dark Fog: AKA Fog of POIZN.
- Dark Hail: AKA Dark Shotgun
Strategy: Affinity right away, then Dark Fog spam. Affinity forces the opponent to either roll or take huge damage, and the recovery time for either means the opponent gets hit by Dark Fog's DEADLY POIZN.
At that point the opponent usually panicks and either:
1) Runs away to estus, eats a few Dark Hails, and dies
2) Goes for the kill, eats a point blank Dark Hail, and dies
Hexes, guys. Hexes.
And I'm usually really terrible at making good builds for PvP, or for PvP itself.
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Dark Souls 2: Beaten. Sorcery gets a lot better late with Staff of Wisdom. Still feel that hexes are better, although being stuck across two catalyst types sucks. RRA was the only optional boss I beat. I tried the one at the end of Undead Crypt and then decided that figuring out his patterns would take way too long when every attack one shots me. That's probably the biggest problem I have with the game. Too many enemies rely on just doing obscene amounts of damage. As a result most of the bosses where really boom or bust and it really encourages going in with some helpers to grab the bosses attention. I admit I was running a frail sorceror build, but I ran one in DS1 too and I didn't find my self getting OHKOd too much outside of things like grab attacks or other attacks with significant windup. Final boss went down like a chump because I went in with two sunbros although there was a scary moment at the start when I realized that those orbs were very potent curse orbs.
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DS2: My computer has 400 shades of lightning.
Got Lucatiel through her requisite three boss fights the only way I could see it being feasible: through horrific overleveling. Girl just gets herself killed too damn fast. So sunbro grinding to open up Sunlight Spear -> I can do five thousand damage in like ten seconds. Now I just have to find out where the hell she hangs out after all that's done! I...think Black Gulch is her fourth location? But I poked around there to summon her earlier (because trash boss is trash, bodes well for her chances of survival as opposed to Smelter Demon or Lost Sinner) but couldn't ever find her sign. And Benhart boss completion 1/3 so far. I'm so never bothering with these quests ever again once I get them done this time (if I haven't already fucked something up somehow).
I was almost capable of killing the gargoyles in one hit. Unfortunately, almost wasn't good enough. Briefly witnessed the horror of four of them being in the field at once! Then switch to Flame Swathe and 50% of the boss healthbar evaporates instantly. Christ what is wrong with that spell. I need to kill fast and lightning too slow.
Fenrir man you know you convinced me to never use hexing right.
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Dude: Yeah definitely, needing both a staff and a bell is a pain. My bell is actually the only shield i can equip in the game, and the soul-consuming spells that use it do way less damage than regular Dark Orb from my sunlight staff.
Cid: But... Hexes!
One of the cat's ring supposedly makes enemies only target the players and not the NPCs.
You have to talk to Lucretia before she's available as a summon in the Gulch, and she's in what's probably the most hidden area in the whole game.
And you have to appreciate her for being the fastest changing tsundere of all time. The first conversation with her is like:
" >:-( Leave me be.
... Wait why are you still talking to me? .... Thanks?
... YOU HAVE PIERCED MY HEART."
I am barely exaggerating there. You can all confirm.
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ToS- So I saw the scenes during the final return to the Tower of Salvation where all of the characters (except Zelos. Kratos and Colette because reasons) apparently "die"/sacrifice themselves to save Lloyd ... except not really! CT is not amused! Worse is I couldn't really have a proper emotional reaction because I didn't really believe they were seriously going to go/pull through with that and that Lloyd was going to have to fight the boss himself ;P All I've got is this was really just supposed to be some sort of character bonding thing, supposed to show just how much each member of the team had come to trust and believe in Lloyd, to the extent they'd put themselves in danger, in a position where they might be sacrificing themselves, while trusting Lloyd to carry on the torch and get the job done~l Still though~
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You really shouldn't have spoiler texted that bit because that sequence is one of the single worst moments ins gaming history and should be openly mocked and degraded at every possible moment. Fuck that bullshit moment in a game that is frankly full of bullshit moments.
I say that as someone that genuinely likes a lot of the Tales series.
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Why are you using spoiler text for a game that's roughly a decade old anyway?
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The game just came out! Clearly it must be spoiler text'd.
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From what I recall, Sheena's moment was actually legitimate, given the stance she was in was one that couldn't be simply "Why don't you just do this blatant action?" and she was also not in a position that she could be easily rescued too. Cannot realistically defend any other characters though. Genis is probably the worst though...
Lloyd: Ok, I got this plan, it'll totally work! You do this, I do this, and then victory!
Genis: Ok.
Lloyd: On the count of 3! 1...2...3...!
*Plan enacted, Genis doesn't run through*
Genis: Your plan was good BUT YOU FORGOT THIS IMPORTANT DETAIL WHICH IS WHY IT DIDN'T WORK PERFECTLY!
Well, gee, Genis, why didn't you...I dunno...BRING THAT UP TO LLOYD WHEN HE WAS TELLING YOU THE PLAN? You know...when the information would be useful? Mentioning it in hindsight after it has already been too late is kind of completely pointless given I highly doubt Lloyd will ever be put into a comparable situation again (no, this isn't foreshadowing for ToS2; nothing like that happens in ToS2.)
ANYWAY, onto stuff I played, and less punching Genis in the face for being an idiot...
Super Mario 3D Land: Beat this a while back, decided not to mention it because reasons you'll find out later! Fun game, better than I was expecting. Some claims I heard was that it's just small scale SM64, as well as uses the 3D on the 3DS Mechanic to be able to pull off things. I found neither of those real; you can actually get a sense of depth without the 3D Mechanic in the rare instances it's necessary, so that part is a wash. In the case of the SM64 parallel, it's not directly comparable.
SM64 was more of this big open world platformer where you run around large stages until you complete a task. SM3L is more like taking the standards of a 2D Mario game and applying a 3rd Dimension. It follows all the conventions of 2D Mario (get hit, you turn small, hit again you die. Get Power Up, you get powers, one of this lets you through fireballs. You know the drill), and puts in some of the 3D Mechanics like Backflipping and the side flip. It really came off as "A standard Mario platformer in 3D" as opposed to this grandiose adventure like SM64, Galaxy, etc. tried to be. Not that one is better than the other, more just illustrating that yes, 3D Land is something new.
It's hard to explain what I mean, but I guess it's mostly that 3D Land stages are all structured with a "race to flagpole" style that the 2D games have, while the 3D games clearly were not built like this.
Complaints? Difficulty is a bit too low for me. Some stages felt a bit repetitive (though most did keep things fresh at least), music just felt poorly done, and OVERUSAGE OF BOOM BOOM. Ok, this I have to get out now, and you'll see why later as well, but it's especially big here:
There are 8 worlds, and naturally 8 bosses. 3 of them are Bowser (or Bowser-like), which ok, fair, it's Bowser. So clearly the other 5 should be something original, right? NOPE! It's 2 Boom Booms, 2 FEMALE Boom Booms (she's basically the same thing but throws a Boomerang, apparently her name is Pom Pom...), then the two of them together. I don't have a problem with Boom Boom in general but my problem is simple:
He's such a basic and simple boss. Which is fine...FOR A MINI BOSS. WHICH IS HOW HE ORIGINALLY WAS. In SMB3 AND NSMB/LU, he was the boss of forts, or mid-world castles, which is perfectly fine. As a mini boss, I have no problem. The issue is that for some strange reason, he is now a boss, and one used repeatedly. It's like they couldn't be bothered to think of creative boss designs, or I dunno, use other pre-existing characters to make interesting. I don't like Bowser Jr. but at least they tried to make his few boss fights in NSMBU different from the previous ones. You have plenty of Mario characters who can be bosses, DON'T KEEP USING THE CHEAP MINI BOSS FROM SMB3 AS YOUR WORLD BOSS! Especially when the only other boss in the game is Bowser, and he's done so much better, it just makes him look worse by comparison.
Ok, that's out of my system, the final stage is annoying because the Checkpoint is right before the boss, but right after a cannon that you CAN botch because of how awkward the set up is, despite how the game wants you to think it's basic. The Final Boss itself is actually a cool platforming based boss that actually makes it feel like a legitimate battle against Bowser, despite not actually fighting him, more just avoiding everything he throws at you. You'd have to see the fight to understand.
Power Up assessments...Fire Mario is Fire Mario, you know what to expect. Boomerang Bros. Mario is a neat alternative, for all that it's rare. Tanuki Suit Mario is disappointing; can't fly, can't statue, merely has slow-fall, and it's Melee is a little too close for comfort. Of course, Tanuki Suit is better than no Power Up because extra hit + access to things you wouldn't have otherwise, so you don't complain when a Leaf pops up and you lack anything else, but generally always preferred one of the other two.
White Tanuki Suit needs to die though, or have an option to turn off. If you die 5 times in a stage (which happened on like 2 or 3 times), a Golden Box appears, hit it and you become White Tanuki Mario. This is PERMANENT INVINCIBILITY WITH TANUKI SUIT ADVANTAGES. So if you avoid platforming deaths, you just cruise the stage. I gt the "Failsafe for tough spots" mindset, but do it the way NSMBU and DKCR did with the "Automated character" concept. Gets you through the stage, but won't get you any of the hidden goodies, which is a good compromise. White Tanuki suit, I don't know what the penalty is for it, and in at least one case, it was placed in an obnoxious spot where I had to make a required jump to a platform on a rather narrow spot and it was placed right in the idea jumping spot. Seriously, what the hell?
Though, in hindsight, SM3L does feel very...test runny. Like they wanted to experiment with something new, so made it for a cheaper platform (that could use games at the time because 3DS was struggling bad pre-3D Land), as this game clearly doesn't use itself to it's potential and they didn't want a big major release. I dunno, kind of wish there was a game that used the same engine but to a much greater effect...possibly on the Wii U because it needs more games...OH WAIT...
(http://nintendoeverything.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/super_mario_3d_world_boxart_sneak_peak.jpg)
Yeah, beat this too; took me longer than I'd like for various REAL LIFE reasons, but shh! Anyway, this game got immense critical praise and more or less lived up to it.
First off, yes, it does play a lot like 3D Land; anyone who says otherwise is lying. The difference is that while 3D Land kind of came up with the idea, 3D World perfected it. The stages are pretty much universally better across the board, rarely feeling repetitive, the world map is open instead of just a straight line leading to actual branching paths like in 2D Entries.
And yes, there is a bit of a Cat Theme going on in the game. Goombas and Bullet Bills are just two examples of things with cat-suits now, but 3D Land had obsession with Tanuki suit, so this is kind of expected. What's cool about cat suit is, once you get your mind out of the gutter, is that the Cat Suit is actually a very neat power up that's fun to play with. A more intuitive melee option, the dive-bomb attack is an interesting mobility trick, and climbing walls has obvious uses...just make sure you're prepared to resist hearing Luigi "Meow" because that is a thing that happens...
Oh right, that's the other big thing about SM3W:
FOUR PLAYABLE CHARACTERS WHO FUNCTION DIFFERENTLY. That's never happened in a Mario game before or anything, of course, this totally new and...
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/00/Super_Mario_Bros_2.jpg)
...derp, nevermind. Ok, while not the first time it has happened, it's nice that they brought this mechanic back after so long. The four playables of SMB2 with all their gameplay styles return, and honestly, this adds an extra element of the game. Worst case scenario? You just play as Mario the entire game and it's basically a notably improved sequel to SM3L, which is not a bad thing in the slightest. In any event, my thoughts on the characters:
Mario: Just good for familiarity purposes. His speed and jump arc are what you're most use to, so he's good if you don't know what you're getting into on a stage. It's pretty much what you expect for a Middle-Man character.
Luigi: Worst character in the game. His jumps aren't appreciably better than Mario here even though they are higher, but with a number of things like Backflips and such, it compromises that. The fact that his jump arc is slower actually hurts more than helps I find, as makes gauging where he'll land harder. On top of everything, he has the trademark "lack of friction" making precision platforming all the harder.
Toad: He lost his SUPER SPEED VEGETABLE PULLS! ...and no one cares. More importantly though, he's the fastest character in the game, which makes him great for some areas (especially low timed segments inspired by NSLU) and really good on many bosses because a lot of times, simply running is your best method of evading. His low jumps are definitely a nuisance at times, as there are times where he'll just fall short of making a jump, and either you miss an optional star because no Cat-suit that anyone else could have gotten, OR he'll have to take a slightly longer route. Still, I think he wins the award of Most Improved Character from SMB2 <_< >_>
Peach: She's about what you'd expect from SMB2, only floating isn't anywhere near as broken. It's still good and lets her make jumps no other character can for some creative shortcuts, and lets her not need to use Long Jumps as much (which have much lower height) so she's still good in gimmicky ways. What she's bad at, however, is Multiplayer, because being the slowest character means she has the hardest time nabbing power ups and such, which means she won't be lording that crown as much as other characters to troll the hell out of other players!
Also, for no reason whatsoever, ASSESSMENTS OF POWER UP DESIGNS FOR CHARACTERS:
Fire: Peach > Mario > Luigi > Toad
Peach's white + red combo actually looks better than expected and they even added the extra Pony-tail thing in as well. Mario and Luigi are what you expect, and the White + Red > White + Green IMO. Toad doesn't look bad just worse than the others.
Catsuit: ...no...
I refuse to do this one because seriously, I have dignity
Tanuki Suit: Toad > Mario > Luigi > Peach
Toad looks kind of adorable in the suit, honestly. Mario fits into it better than Luigi does and Peach...uhh...there's no easy way to say this: THAT TANUKI SUIT MAKES YOU LOOK FAT!
Boomerang Bros. Suit: Mario > Luigi > Toad > Peach
Turtles with staches > turtles without staches, and again, Mario just works better than Luigi here. Toad still has an element of adorableness, but looks a tad underwhelming at the same time. Peach, while getting the Ponytail thing, it just kind of clashes with the outfit.
Bosses...well, Boom Boom and Pom Pom return AGAIN with multiple fights, and it's annoying when they do, but it's less times, and there are legitimate bosses intermixed that are new and creative, so it's not as annoying here, which allowed for Mario to have a boss rush of sorts late game...well, more like refighitng all bosses in a matter of 2 worlds, and the bosses are improved, but it still was a neat thing to do.
I could go on and bore you, but I think I'll sum up what SM3D is in a paragraph:
It looks at the past 30 years of Super Mario games, particularly the 2D entries, and combines all the favorable elements, and makes the most of them. ( I think the only thing it's missing is the SMB3 style inventory, but it does have the SMW "Hold item" which I don't think the two were ever used at the same time, so yeah.) IOWs, for those not checking, it means the following:
-Engine of Super Mario 3D Land (while not BETTER than other engines, its also not worse, and probably fit the design better than standard 2D platform style)
-Playable characters of SMB2
-Multiplayer that destroys Friendships of the console NSMB games
-SMW's Item Stock idea
-Stage design creativity that the series in general is known for
-A Mario Kart themed stage (...yes, this deserves it's own mention)
-A few low timed, High Obstacle driven stages that are similar to New Super Luigi U
-Bowser beating up Fairies. No, this isn't in previous Mario games, but it SHOULD HAVE BEEN
I emphasize it this way because apparently some people were expecting a REVOLUTIONARY EXPERIENCE ala Super Mario Galaxy, but SM3W was clearly not trying for that, but rather, make a game built on older elements from previous games, and make sure they are used appropriately and thoughtfully so they all add to the experience, and frankly, I can think of anything questionable they put in...except Luigi meowing...
Oh, if you're wondering, I played the game entirely on Random Character select, to keep things fresh. From what I can tell, the game will never choose the character you entered the stage with on Random, so it insures you will always be alternating characters, which was neat. This led to I think Toad being the one to blow up all of Bowser's Trains (there are 3 or 4 of them), and Peach beating up Bowser in a non-spin off title for like the first time ever, I think.
I did unlock Rosalina, and played as her for a stage and...good god I can see why people say she's the best character. Always has a melee move (which seems better than the Tanuki Suit's variant...by the way, Tanuki Suit in this game basically gives Peach's hover to every character, as opposed to "Slow Fall"), double jump, and her jump height seems way better than everyone else. She is really slow...I think slower than Peach even...but they had to try and balance her somehow.
She also gets a Black Cat Suit, which was unexpected...then again, Mario gets a yellow one for some strange reason.
And with that, I end this rant with the best part of the game by far:
The Bowser Pimp Mobile (image too big to post here) (http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2013/275/5/2/bowser_artwork___super_mario_3d_world_by_drybowjap-d6ozh3b.png)
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Not killing off Genis for real was the cruelest fake-out imaginable.
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Ys Memories of Celceta has something equivalently dumb to the Tower of Salvation bit from ToS, except playing the melodrama from a slightly different angle. It's at the very end though so I'll spoiler text it in case people care about YS PLOT.
Toward the end of the game you're essentially trying to toss an artifact into Mt. Doom because... it's really stupid, but because it'll save the world, natch. The game wants to have a dramatic final duel between Adol & the villain - fine, I actually approve, 1 on 1 fights are great in a system like Ys. However its excuse is that evil distortion shadows crop up on the way to the volcano, and the other characters / everyone you ever helped in the game conveniently show up to fight 'em. Similar kind of "Thanks Adol, let me handle these losers, you do the awesome thing!" Except... what.
A) It's not like I'm trying to secure supply lines or something. There's absolutely no need to guard areas that Adol is not directly on top of.
B) The Princess with a Flying Giant Robot is one of the people who stop by to say hi than fight some shadows off-screen allegedly meancing Our Hero. Did I mention it was flying, and the bad guys don't fly?
Just... have there be such a horde of bad guys in *front* that everyone else carves a path through the horde while Adol goes through the breach to fight the villain, rather than dropping off people to fight nowhere in particular. Or, if you want to actually make sense, have Adol get on the Flying Robot (which he is canonically established to have done once even!) and drop the artifact into the volcano from there! That sounds safer anyway...
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Even if you take a specific one of the character's sacrifices as "okay" they still have then teleport to the top of the tower and then do absolutely nothing in the plot. They piss away your time with a shitty fake out that ultimately gets you nowhere at all progressively taking away your party members until you only have LLoyd left in a game where you can change who you are playing and has 4 player multiplayer during a dungeon that was set up to be the climax of the game. The only thing of value that happens in that entire sequence is a fight with whichever of the split path characters you didn't pick and that happens as soon as you enter the dungeon. The rest of it is a slow boring waste of time.
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Super Mario 3D Land: [...]
There are 8 worlds [...]
On the off-chance that you missed it somehow (or were thinking that the second set were just harder copies of the first, which is sometimes the case but not always), there are actually 16 worlds in SM3DL.
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You have to talk to Lucretia before she's available as a summon in the Gulch, and she's in what's probably the most hidden area in the whole game.
And you have to appreciate her for being the fastest changing tsundere of all time. The first conversation with her is like:
" >:-( Leave me be.
... Wait why are you still talking to me? .... Thanks?
... YOU HAVE PIERCED MY HEART."
I am barely exaggerating there. You can all confirm.
Summary is 100% accurate.
I did ultimately find her after jumping off random cliffs until I hit land! Girl what are you doing down there. How did you even find this place. Tracked down her final appearance (much) later and aw man she's gone all Kang & Kodos on us. Tears. Wondering if this changes the invasion in Aldia any? Find out later I guess. Her gear is totally snazzy but regrettably this is Not!Saint cosplay run, my wardrobe is spoken for.
Oh yes, I also tried to shoot the queen in Drangleic Castle this time. Nothing happens. The game registers her as scenery.
Finally, scrotum zombies. Because how has this passed without mention? Because scrotum zombies.
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Even if you take a specific one of the character's sacrifices as "okay" they still have then teleport to the top of the tower and then do absolutely nothing in the plot. They piss away your time with a shitty fake out that ultimately gets you nowhere at all progressively taking away your party members until you only have LLoyd left in a game where you can change who you are playing and has 4 player multiplayer during a dungeon that was set up to be the climax of the game. The only thing of value that happens in that entire sequence is a fight with whichever of the split path characters you didn't pick and that happens as soon as you enter the dungeon. The rest of it is a slow boring waste of time.
You'll note I don't defend the rest of that sequence at all, and pretty much for the reason you labelled:
They FF4 it up by the end of the dungeon.
Yeah, there are other games that do this too (Wild ARMs 2 Brad comes to mind), but at least they make good on it. The whole point of the Lloyd sequence was basically to get him alone in a "OMG NO HOPE AND YOU'RE ALONE!" moment, which could have been done in a bunch of other ways, and pretty much all those other ways are far less time wasting.
It's a dumb sequence nonetheless and I don't think I've seen anyone defend it. Even when the opinion of ToS in the DL was higher, no one realistically defended that sequence, because it is just that stupid.
I was mostly playing Devil's Advocate noting that Sheena, at very least, had a half decently written section that made sense in the context, and didn't feel like "I gotta do this because reasons" "can't do this other idea instead and take like 3 minutes longer but you'll live?" "NO! HEROIC SACRIFICE IS THE ONLY WAY!"
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I always liked Brad's return. He just shows up running across the desert and now he has a giant fucking gun. They didn't really bother giving a fuck and it was hilarious.
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Xenogears: The Solaris arc, part one. Ahh, it's good to be back.
Hour 36: "I'm coming, Solaris! Seibzehn and I shall be the dark wings which carry you all to your deaths!!"
Wow, Maria, that's a little dark, there. And also auspicious.
Anyway, Seibzhen flies the party through the weakened Solaris barrier. Fei, Elly, and Citan land at the docks, and the rest of the party flies off to investigate separately, including Hammer, who is (he will remind you) good at this information-gathering thing. Also, the party is now upside-down as per reversed Solaris gravity. Elly just says "We don't have time to explain" regarding it. XG translation isn't good enough for me to be sure if this is the writers winking at the player or not.
While investigating the docks, Fei ends up being lost and funnelled into a third-class citizen area of Solaris, filled with Lambs doing manual labour. One of them speaks out against the slavery they are being forced to do and is promptly and unceremoniously executed as a security robot picks him up and drops him to his death. The rest of his comrades grumble about his outburst, since one bad apple like that spoils the entire block's chance at promotion. You can talk to his roommate, who complains woefully that thanks to his buddy's actions, he will probably be 'rearranged' (which you later learn means re-educated/brainwashed). As you leave his living quarters (with him still in it), there is a scene of the block he is in being dragged off to some unknown location. Kinda creepy.
After some wandering, Fei meets up with Elly. Elly explains a bit about where they are. She rather casually mentions having come on a "field trip" to this place before, a touch I find oddly effective. The difficult part, of course, is getting out since the area is under guard.
Fortunately a solution opens up pretty quickly, as they meet up with a guy named Samson, who looks an awful lot like Fei's old friend Timothy. Samson is a labourer Lamb like the rest, but has a plan to sneak out. Since he remembers Fei from the Aveh tournament, he decides to let him in on the plan (figuring probably that Fei could beat up some dudes on the way out if need be). Sadly for him the plan doesn't work too well, as once the party reaches a security checkpoint, he tries to cross it and is vaporised for not having recognised DNA. Well. I certainly hope that system doesn't have any bugs in it. Fortunately, Elly does have recognised DNA and is able to cross, although she reveals afterwards that she was scared that she'd been named a traitor and might have been vaporised anyway. Yikes. She then gets Fei across by keeping him close to her, which seems a bit unlikely but who am I to question the sci-fi.
This takes us to Etrenank, the actual city of Solaris proper! This place is great. After all the dark nastiness of Solaris we've learned about and seen, this place has, by contrast, an upbeat, impossibly peppy piece of background music. Citizens obsess over toys, the latest fashion, and the news about those evil barbarian Lambs destroying the gates and threatening Solarian way of life. I love this place, but I am a sucker for these types of settings, and the music really sells it.
While in the city, Fei and Elly learn about an announcement the Emperor is going to make, which all the citizens are really interested in. They head to the square to see it. Cain appears and makes his announcements: that Solaris had planned the destruction of Solaris gates! It was all part of their plan to reach "God's paradise", Mahanon. All with lots of fireworks! The crowd applauds constantly. Then Krelian (whom Elly notes is the real leader of Solaris) shows up, and generally seconds Cain's words.
Seeing Krelian, Fei has a sudden flashback in which he (named Lacan) and Krelian were buddies. Lacan has already been mentioned, but this is the first confirmation that he looked just like Fei, I believe. In the flashback, Krelian is portrayed as an avid learner.
Back in the present, Krelian also announces that yes, some stupid Lambs have taken the opportunity to sneak in, but that they have already been caught! He shows a displayed image of the non-Fei/Elly/Citan party members.
At this point Fei picks up the idiot ball and starts freaking out and yelling that WE HAVE TO GO RESCUE THEM. In, of course, Lamb language, because it's all he knows. In a public place. Elly tries to shush him but to no avail. They are chased by security robots, but luckilly are able to escape into a sewer until they lose them.
Hour 37: Fei and Elly emerge from the sewer in front of a big mansion. Elly explains that they are now in the first-class-citizen district. She opens the gate and walks into the property. Fei tries to stop her, before she assures him that this is her house.
Upon entering, they come face to face with Elly's mother, Medena. Medena is understandably overyjoyed to see her daughter alive, having only been told she was MIA. She asks who Fei is, and Elly smoothly lies, saying he is a recently promoted third-class citizen now serving as an officer of Gebler, who helped her return from the surface. Fei unfortunately is not so smooth, so before her mother can get too suspicious, Elly hurries him off to her room.
There, Elly decides to take a shower. They chat meanwhile. Fei says to Elly that her mother is "very pretty... but you don't look much like her" proving that his game is somewhere in the negatives. Elly reveals her suspicions that Medena is not her birth mother, and that Elly is half-Lamb via her father's fraternizing with a third-class serving woman who lived in their household (Dominia had alluded to this rumour about Elly earlier). Afterwards, Fei takes a shower and gets really defensive about making sure Elly isn't peeking which I find amusing in a role reversy way.
Elly then resolves to figure out where Bart and company are being held by breaking into her father's computer which has access to that sort of information. After a couple guesses she figures out that his password is her name backwards (which IIRC in the Japanese is something like "Miang" with a couple letters stuck on the end, which in hindsight of course is very amusing foreshadowing). They locate where their friends are being held, and a way to get there (through the third-class area they first arrived in) but at that moment, Elly's father Erich gets home.
As a high-ranking member of the Solaris administration he is uh needless to say not so pleased at discovering his daughter and some Lamb breaking into his computer. He calls security, draws a gun and threatens Fei. Elly tries to argue with her father, but he insists that he can protect from any treasonous allegations as long as Fei is captured, and that he is just concerned for her safety. Elly angrilly yells at him and accuses him of just caring about his own position, just like he has always been ashamed of his half-land dweller daughter. At this Medena runs out of the room and Erich slaps his daughter, demanding how she dare make such accusations.
Fei of all people diffuses the situation. Not wanting to see the two fight, he offers to escape and leave Elly alone (noting to Erich that if he tries to stop him, he'll put up one hell of a fight), saying he can't bear to watch the two fight. He also tells Elly that she shouldn't say those things in front of her mother, whatever the truth of her biological birth. Erich agrees, using the gun to break the window and then calling security to let them know the intruder escaped that way (Fei leaves via the door). Fei makes one last appeal to Elly, asking her to leave the army just as he did the last time the two separated.
Honestly this is probably one of my favourite Fei scenes. He can be a bit loserly at times and I definitely don't care for him now as much as I did when I was closer to his age, but I respect his decision there, doing the best thing for the safety of his friends and Elly's security despite his feelings for her, and also I very much approve of the comments regarding Elly and her mother, biology be damned.
Anyway, Fei makes his way back through Etrenank (amusing thing to note here: all the NPCs speak gibberish, as Fei doesn't actually understand their language) and heads to the third-class citizen area. As he enters, he is accosted by a guard who pulls him aside... and who turns out to be Citan! Oh that lovable spy. The two of them cross into the third-class citizen area, with Citan protecting Fei here just as Elly did. After they cross, Fei is suddenly surprised that Citan was able to cross safely. Citan just laughs nervously and says he figures they never deleted him from when he was in the military here years ago... an oversight, he is sure. He's obviously a bit uncomfortable perhaps knowing how flimsy this excuse sounds for one like him to have just walked confidently through a DNA scanner which vaporises those it doesn't recognise, but Fei dutifully picks up the idiot ball again and believes him. Or perhaps doesn't want to doubt him, since at this point he really can't afford to!
Hour 38: Fei and Citan make it back to the third-class district and jump in a dust chute. Once there, they are... trapped! They need a security card to go further. Fei is pissed off because he trusted Citan had a plan and Citan is all "nope". Not one of his more badass moments!
Luckilly for them, Elly shows up! She relates what has happened. After Fei left, her parents saw how despondent she was and encouraged her to go after him, with her dad giving her a keycard. Before she could leave, though, the imperial guard showed up and tried to arrest Elly. Erich refused to turn her over, even despite threats to him and his position, and Elly was able to make her mistake. It's a bit of a heart-warming moment considering Elly's doubts about him a bit earlier.
Regardless, the keycard turns out to be just the thing to allow the party to advance further. The party walks around in the dust chutes for a while and then find themselves in a factory, the Soylent System. There is some packaged food there, so a hungry Fei and Elly stop to eat it. Citan politely declines.
Proceeding further into the factor, the party discovers the food they just ate being produced here. Moving through the dungeon takes them further and further back along the production line, and they see the food at its various states of preparation, until finally they one last door remains. "Wait, Fei. You ate that food. Consider the fact when you open that door." (Spoilers: Citan is a bit of a dick.)
Behind the door lies the horrible truth: the first stage of the production is dead human carcasses. Elly and Fei both understandably freak out (with Fei having a sudden flashback to a traumatic memory in another part of the Soylent System). Citan explains to Elly that the humans seen here are all waste from Krelian's experiments, previously mentioned by Jesiah and Dominia among others. Holy shit that's a lot of experiments. He also reveals that Erich had also been involved, but hated being part of the project, so had requested to be transferred from it. But the guilt from it caused him to try and protect as many Lambs as he could as servants. This explains some of Elly's previous comments, although the game remains forever ambiguous on the subject of Elly's biological parentage (something I am honestly quite happy for).
"Now get up, Fei. Get up and look it over."
"Could... this be true...? Doc..."
"This is reality. Let's go."
<3
The party continues through the factory and into Krelian's labs. This part is pretty creepy. First of all, we see where memory cubes (save points!) are manufactured! While it isn't quite clear what these are used for in-world (although some Solarians mention that you should use them), their purpose for their makers is clear, as Solaris uses them as a big spying network. Not my trusted save points!
Besides that you meet various people in various stages of experiments. Most of them turn into monsters and fight you. One or two are even people you've met before and have since been captured, or are connected to those who have been. The whole area is quite disconcerting. I have some issues with Krelian the character but I'll give this section one thing: it really makes you ready to go and punch him in the face.
Next time: More Solaris goodness, and the big Citan reveal!
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Oooh save points again, reminds me I meant to chime in with it last time the overlap came up with XG originally being planned at some point as a Chrono Trigger sequel. It is cool to see the save points being both an in game thing AND used by not nice people to do not nice things in both games. It is probably a direct rip of the idea in to CC, but I am fine with this. It is used differently in each one and is pretty good both times (XG does it better with Soylent System in play too of course).
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Finally, scrotum zombies. Because how has this passed without mention? Because scrotum zombies.
Their running animation is hilarious. They're trying to move fast but not rack themselves at the same time. Fantastic design.
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I always liked Brad's return. He just shows up running across the desert and now he has a giant fucking gun. They didn't really bother giving a fuck and it was hilarious.
A gun that required a truck to lug around at the beginning of the game, no less. It's pretty awesome.
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Oooh save points again, reminds me I meant to chime in with it last time the overlap came up with XG originally being planned at some point as a Chrono Trigger sequel. It is cool to see the save points being both an in game thing AND used by not nice people to do not nice things in both games. It is probably a direct rip of the idea in to CC, but I am fine with this. It is used differently in each one and is pretty good both times (XG does it better with Soylent System in play too of course).
Doesn't XG predate Chrono Cross? CC would be the one doing the direct rip.
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Yeah a rip from XG spec script in to CC where it is probably done worse, but it is still pretty neat.
Also meant to chime in on the WA2 thing. Brad works so well in WA2 in part because of how little goddamned sense WA2 makes (in part due to translation). The issue isn't with heroic sacrifices that the characters overcome though, it is overturning them within the same sequence and doing it multiple times that really grates in ToS.
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Anyone noticed that the Soylent System itself is a rip off from the film Soylent Green?
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Seeing as the name is the same, I'd say it's more of an homage or reference, but yes.
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Anyone noticed that the Soylent System itself is a rip off from the film Soylent Green?
GUYS. fuckin, GUYS.
CHILL OUT. I'm about to drop a truth bomb on y'all.
CHILL THE FUCK OUT.
NOW
did you know
that water is wet
you may resume flipping the fuck out
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Seeing as the name is the same, I'd say it's more of an homage or reference, but yes.
I feel like that reference definitely played better in Japan, oddly because it's less familiar there. Naming it the "Soylent System" ruins the reveal because the second they go in and there's food inside I'm like "this is definitely made of people." I don't imagine that, in Japan, Soylent Green is a movie where everyone knows the final plot twist even if they've never seen it like it is in America, where it's in the same situation there as Planet of the Apes or Citizen Kane, so it might have been actually surprising.
That said if it IS an intentional advance spoiler then big ups. It takes balls to spoil plot twists in your own game and I think the only other time I've seen it done on purpose was in DX:HR, with the Picus building emails.
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It works pretty chill for a few reasons in that it helps with the build up as you watch Elly and Fei eat in the scene that Elf covered. Also it is such a minor point in the overall plot that you can totally get away with spoiling it in advance. It isn't a plot twist so much as a "Yeah these guys are exactly as horrible as you have been lead to believe".
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Anyone noticed that the Soylent System itself is a rip off from the film Soylent Green?
GUYS. fuckin, GUYS.
CHILL OUT. I'm about to drop a truth bomb on y'all.
CHILL THE FUCK OUT.
NOW
did you know
that water is wet
you may resume flipping the fuck out
Goddamnit Zenny spoiler tag that shit.
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DS2: Darklurker annihilated. I have five Sunlight Spears. It was all I needed. Didn't live long enough to clone itself and I took no damage.
So now I have the best chime in the game and guys it honestly looks pretty silly. It seriously looks like my character is waving Buster Bluth's hook hand at people and using it to generate lightning bolts. She's a robot!
Anyway remaining bosses are a mix of boring and OH GOD NO so instead I'm now futzing around with a sorcerer. Sorc damage definitely not so overpowering out of the gate as it was in DS1, even the good spells take me like 15-20 hits to down bosses. I want a better staff but can't find one, gather Hexdude would give me one but that requires investment into faith and blaaah. I still resist the multitasking. Instead I'm just dumping all my titanite on the crappy starting staff to compensate.
I lack the strength to use any shields and don't want to make the investment (I dumped a couple levels on STR to use a rapier as back-up weapon, but that's it) so I just have to dodge everything if it somehow manages to close range. As always, this is good practice. I took the Sentinels solo because the server was down and Bellclaire's sign mysteriously refused to appear. Holy crap you can actually dodge through their unfair pirouette of doom attack. Amazing what you learn how to do when you have no other choice.
Rolling is weird, it seems that if you're just mashing the dodge button then consecutive rolls will eat up like twice the stamina, but if you wait a split second in between rolls (the way successful dodging of enemy combos actually requires) then the second roll will just use up the normal amount.
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It works pretty chill for a few reasons in that it helps with the build up as you watch Elly and Fei eat in the scene that Elf covered. Also it is such a minor point in the overall plot that you can totally get away with spoiling it in advance. It isn't a plot twist so much as a "Yeah these guys are exactly as horrible as you have been lead to believe".
At the same time though, if there's a game you are allowed to doubt the competency of the localization team for, its probably Xenogears.
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Hey, Xenogears is absolutely in the upper half of localisation team competence for the PSX era. Probably in the upper quarter. These are some low standards we're talking about here.
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Soul Silver: Got a Calm Mewtwo (+SDef, -Atk) by Master Balling him and giving the finger to multiple -SpA or -Speed Natures. Normally wouldn't bother but when you're using Master Ball, you have little excuse!
Also caught Articuno using a Great Ball because shut up.
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Dark Souls 2: Now that I'm unemployed I played way more of this than I should.
Basically ran through the remainder of the game(?) and am up to the Withered Memory area. Still missing a few bonfire locales, don't think I completed anyone's story successfully, and lost the plot thread somewhere. So Dark Souls all over again.
I'm honestly finding DS2 way harder than DS and that can be attributed to the fact that every fucking lategame enemy and boss is still massively two-shotting (or one-shotting) me. Like I am honestly not sure why I am bothering with armor. The help it is providing is not substantial. I'll do a more thorough rundown on bosses/areas when I finish the game.
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Woaah Citan is even better than I remember.
Niu too.
Andrew, if you use mage armor and don't raise vigor above 20 like I'm doing right now, you end up getting one shotted by random enemies. So that's at least something.
El Cid, the good sorcerer staff is in Aldia's Mansion. Sorry. Hex staff isn't that good for sorcery anyway, though still way better than anything else at the time int-wise. (And it looks hot, I need to insist)
I'm at the end of the game right now, wearing Velka's robe + Witch hat + Astronomer skirt. Fantastic. Stuff is generally easy. I had three blue invaders trying to kill me, that was pretty cool.
Doing more damage with Dark Orb than Soul Spear right now. I'm aiming for 64 intelligence just to see the animation for the uber sorcery spell, then resetting all that into HP.
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Bravely Default - Last boss! *Humdedum* *lololololol disaster* WELP, that went poorly.
So, I decided to stroll around the Dimension's Hasp instead, gathering new equipment and mastering an extra job for each party member along the way. In the interim, I also discovered focused Meteor with Pierce Magic Defense is about as nuts as offensive magic ever gets, scoring easy 9999s with no buffing involved (relevant, since nothing else I have -reliably- reaches that high without buffing off a single swing). Of course, there's Dark Knight landing 40k+ damage Rage strings post-Life or Death, but that costs 2 BP. I'll probably master Freelancer with Tiz and slap Perform on Agnés for BP-boosting cheese against the final boss because, well, why the fuck not.
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Armor is only the tiniest bit helpful if you stack absurd amounts of it. When I hit 1300 the Royal Aegis changed from two-shotting me to three-shotting me. And that's only if one of his hits was with the handle otherwise it was a coin toss to survivability. I just stuck with my item-find or soul-gain sets unless I felt like whoring out with pure armor. Against normal enemies insane DEF can matter... but bosses it's useless. With 8 VIG I had 1000 HP and took 800 in damage roughy. Even if I pumped every stored level I had into VIG I still would have only reached 1600. Two-shot range anyway!
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Bravely Default - Last boss! *Humdedum* *lololololol disaster* WELP, that went poorly.
So, I decided to stroll around the Dimension's Hasp instead, gathering new equipment and mastering an extra job for each party member along the way. In the interim, I also discovered focused Meteor with Pierce Magic Defense is about as nuts as offensive magic ever gets, scoring easy 9999s with no buffing involved (relevant, since nothing else I have -reliably- reaches that high without buffing off a single swing). Of course, there's Dark Knight landing 40k+ damage Rage strings post-Life or Death, but that costs 2 BP. I'll probably master Freelancer with Tiz and slap Perform on Agnés for BP-boosting cheese against the final boss because, well, why the fuck not.
Yeaaah. I feel like Time Mage in general is immensely backloaded, and part of that is Meteor being... damn near the only spell on them that's routinely useful. Great for cross classing with either BM or Arcanist (or both really, if you're going to attack mage you've got time to master at least those three classes (thanks C5-7 sidequests!!)) but a bit weak on their own.
Also, enjoying the meta?
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Yeaaah. I feel like Time Mage in general is immensely backloaded, and part of that is Meteor being... damn near the only spell on them that's routinely useful. Great for cross classing with either BM or Arcanist (or both really, if you're going to attack mage you've got time to master at least those three classes (thanks C5-7 sidequests!!)) but a bit weak on their own.
Also, enjoying the meta?
Time Mage indeed is crazy backloaded. Its truly good skills are all lategame things (Magic Attack +30%, Meteor, arguably Hasten/Slow World). Gravity/Graviga would be better if they weren't so chancy and Stop's duration is immensely erratic (moreso than the other status spells), which makes its usefulness limited. Meanwhile, the only thing I ever used consistently on TM until that endgame spread was... Slow. That's not really great, although guaranteeing bosses always go last is -very- useful, at least until Pirate shows up and learns Shin Smash. For the sake of crossclassing, Meteor benefits more from Black Mage, since Pierce MDef single-handedly keeps attack magic desirable as a high-end offensive tactic for the remainder of the game. And Meteor's mostly a ST smash thing (late, Summon Magic+Pierce MDef uniformly turns randoms to mulch, but the game de-emphasizes randoms at that point. Granted, BOSS FIGHTS start getting very crowded, so the crowd control niche remains). The thing with Meteor and Pierce MDef is that the spell is insanely defense-subject (multihit magic, oh my). You remove that factor and suddenly things start getting very silly.
As for the meta: concept's fun, but the execution could use some work! I'll mull it over a bit further once I'm truly done with the game, though.
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Arcanist mostly brings Convergence to the table (at 3 sp mind) so with all three classes together you have your option of either mocking Mdef or having targetable Meteor, which is pretty useful depending on the fight (in particular, before the C8 battles most fights tended to have one reaaaallly dangerous member and everything else didn't matter.)
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True. On the other hand, you can do pretty okay at damage even just sporting Summon Magic+Pierce MDef and Magic +20%, but that's more of a C7 fight and onwards thing. With a little tinkering, I could pull off Susano-os gobbling over 7k a pop (granted, needs M. Atk buffing, otherwise you're looking at 4.5k per casting). I suspect you could pull off some utterly degenerate MT ITD blitzes this way with a relatively short fallout time, and, of course, you could always Convergence summons as well, but it kind of defeats the point, since they don't unfocus. As far as my money goes, for pure passive skill building, the overall best offensive setup runs off Pierce M. Def and +20% M. Attack. Efficient, elegant and benefits both pure blitzes and status whoring (I was looking at 100% hit rates even on Death spam outside of massive resistance even at the Dimension's Hasp off DL-legal mage builds).
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Huhh. I never had much success with status where it mattered, so I never really looked at ID (because in a majority of games, ID will inevitably be the weakest status in terms of efficiency to make up for being the best in terms of effect). Well that and after chapter 6 or so I turned randoms off and turned them back on only to grind JP for the finale.
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The problem with BD status in-game is largely being ST early and then just not really mattering late. There's a window in C4 where it's insanely useful (Vampire Castle and Eternia, where Sleep+Annihilation >>>>>>>>>>>> -every random- in those dungeons. If you get BM's MT amplifying skill, it gets even better, though in that case I slapped Status Amp just in case). But from testing against Dimension Hasp and final dungeon randoms, 160 M. Attack racks you 100% hit rates on every Black Mage status against typical resistance.
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So gets good just in time to be irrelevant. Woot.
(Although considering that BMs are vital for most of the game and lose their biggest niche in the DL, having some other boon so they still look good in the stat topic is pretty okay with me.)
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BD: I just noticed that the title screen changes after you get the bad ending. Bwahaha! Did it do that in Japanese version? Doesn't seem like something that would translate across.
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Actually, that happens either late in or immediately after Chapter 6.
The japanese subtitle is just "Flying Fairy", and the same removing of FF (ha HA! internal puns) renders it as "Lying Airy", so the pun is essentially unaltered between languages. At least according to everything I've read.
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I also suspect Black Mage'll end up near the top of the damage curve anyway because Pierce M. Defense is -awesome- and they get M. Attack +20% - so they'll manage. Additionally, the draining's also pretty decent. For pure offense, otherwise, Meteor is very def-subject and, while TM gets M. Attack +30%, it's mdef-busting that makes the spell truly nuts (though they'll probably end up good too). The rest suffers from varying shades of bad to downright depressing - Aeroga and Holy are horrible and trying to boost their offense eats into WM's healing, Red Mage doesn't even get elemental L3s (eeeeeeeeeeew), Summon Magic just doesn't pan out for duelling and suffers further from getting no real significant boosts besides Summoning Amp, which plain isn't enough running off awful overall stats. Arcanist gets Convergence Interment, but that's 4PB and Arcanist's going to mix its amazing basic physical along its three-turn average. Vampire doesn't count because that's a -physical- class.
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Definitely possible, although my instinct is that the physical classes have better DL tools for damage averages. On the other hand, weapon availability, so who knows.
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From experience, basic physicals -really- need skill crossclassing in order to not look unimpressive, especially if they don't get damage-boosting options. In-game, for instance, you toss Two-Handed right and left at worst, but only Knight, who has poor damage skills and bad speed, gets it in the DL. Attack-boosting passives also run off people with their own issues (Monk's bad weaponry, Pirate's egregious accuracy and Dark Knight's mHP sacrifice to attain good offense, which also eats into the damage averages).
The split from DL weaponry and in-game only stuff mostly isn't that wide until you factor in Dimension's Hasp stuff, but some weapons get it real bad (daggers, axes, knuckles, mainly. GRANTED, axes is more because they really suck regardless) and we'll have some classes who get UTTERLY screwed (holy crap Spiritmaster will fail beyond all reason). Classes with good in-game damage will get the shaft on the three-turn splits (hi, Valkyrie), some others will be stuck with basic physicals (hi Ninja, HI SWORDMASTER). It'll be an interesting beast, and then there's Salve-Maker, who may either suck, stuck with 1.5k Poison X-Potions, or stand tall atop the heavens with 7.5k Shadow Flares depending on how harsh you are with mixing items.
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Andy you should just do what I do and stick to the sexiest armor available. It's only marginally less useful than real armor and more to the point at least you look totally flash getting 2HKO'd by everything.
Character quest stuff (such as it is) generally not missable outside of Lucatiel and Benhart. For the Bastile smith & ladderbro it's just buy a lot of shit from them and then exhaust dialogue. For mapguy it's just kill every mandatory boss and then exhaust dialogue. Pyrogirl you just have to give spare clothes! Not going to get the "get everyone to relocate to Majula" trigger without at least 8 INT though (because if you're any dumber than that then the sorc trainer won't talk to you).
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I was generally referring to Lucatiel/Bernhart. Although I have no idea who the hell Mapguy is.
Anyhow, decided to reallocate stats a bit to clean up some points before the Giant Lord (fuck everyone who whined about the Soul Vessels). Sitting at SL 130. 26/6/35/5/80/11/10/5/5.
Probably should have dumped Vit a bit but eh, I like the weight I'm at.
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Mapguy's in a wing of the Forest right past the second bonfire. The bit where you walk up a giant branch? Jump off to the right instead of ascending. He opens up that locked house in Majula if you talk to him enough (and there's an estus flask shard in there). I didn't even notice he existed either until I went back for the giant memory stuff at the end of the game.
Geez, do you actually get anything substantial out of 80 strength? I stopped leveling that at 40 because diminishing returns.
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Time Mage was definitely useful for a while early. Haste and Slow were really good for bosses, which on HM seem to get some sort of hidden unlisted speed boost since they regularly go before PCs who are listed as faster than them otherwise (probably similar to the thief passives, which also don't list the effect). Unfortunately Pirate and Performer then show up to utterly ruin this niche (since instead of just modifying speed, they also modify other stats, and in pirate's case do damage at the same time), and nothing else in JL1-9 really recommends the class so far. I mean Slowga was god against the Automatons but that's the last time I've really felt a pressing need for the class, to the point where I still haven't investigated the JL10+ stuff. I've increasingly moved away from magical offence, though. I keep saying I'll put Ringabel back along that route for a bit but I'm too happy with him as the "draw fire and tank" performer/defender build he has going. I think this is the first Final Fantasy game where I've been underwhelmed by offensive magic (except FF2? We don't talk about FF2).
Bravely Default - Chapter 6. Bwahaha well played with the villain, game, well played. Current main builds are dark knight/spellfencer, pirate/valkyrie(/spellfencer), white mage/whatever, and performer/templar.
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Time Mage was definitely useful for a while early. Haste and Slow were really good for bosses, which on HM seem to get some sort of hidden unlisted speed boost since they regularly go before PCs who are listed as faster than them otherwise (probably similar to the thief passives, which also don't list the effect). Unfortunately Pirate and Performer then show up to utterly ruin this niche (since instead of just modifying speed, they also modify other stats, and in pirate's case do damage at the same time), and nothing else in JL1-9 really recommends the class so far. I mean Slowga was god against the Automatons but that's the last time I've really felt a pressing need for the class, to the point where I still haven't investigated the JL10+ stuff. I've increasingly moved away from magical offence, though. I keep saying I'll put Ringabel back along that route for a bell but I'm too happy with him as the "draw fire and tank" performer/defender build he has going. I think this is the first Final Fantasy game where I've been underwhelmed by offensive magic (except FF2? We don't talk about FF2).
Magic offense is definitely niche even when you figure out its optimum build (mainly effectively gets around defenses and this -matters-, also becomes the optimum randomsmashing method once you master BM/reach L10 Summoning), and just useless later on if you don't tweak specifically this way - and, since you're playing on Hard, magic suffers -further- because the stat boosts also apply to Mind, which raises enemy mdef across the board, but not Vitality. I only have one dedicated attack mage while I have two fighters, which says everything you need to know. Physicals are strangely more versatile than magic in BD.
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Armor is only the tiniest bit helpful if you stack absurd amounts of it. When I hit 1300 the Royal Aegis changed from two-shotting me to three-shotting me. And that's only if one of his hits was with the handle otherwise it was a coin toss to survivability. I just stuck with my item-find or soul-gain sets unless I felt like whoring out with pure armor. Against normal enemies insane DEF can matter... but bosses it's useless. With 8 VIG I had 1000 HP and took 800 in damage roughy. Even if I pumped every stored level I had into VIG I still would have only reached 1600. Two-shot range anyway!
I'm pretty sure not every enemy does exactly 800 damage!
Anyway I've finished with the mage. She nuked things.
Planning to get the last 4 trophies, which involve going into the castle in NG++, re-doing the assassination quest, and giving some NG+ souls to Straid. Everything else is done (I've spent the evening sunbroing for 30 sunlight medals) Whee.
Then the true Dark Souls 2 will begin, for real.
Since I'm level 150 I don't plan to do much more levelling (Stats are roughly 40 mem/int/faith, 50 vig) so I can finally use all these souls I can't hold on those soul-costing spells. I've updated the traitor's bell to +10 and started using them. Man. Ultra fast 900 damage for 500 Souls. NG+ = So dead.
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The default system in general rewards free or resource cheap spammable attacks, which naturally skews physical (especially once you get skills like Crescent Moon, Energy Burst, Drain Sword+Black Wave, etc.) Meanwhile, it takes experimentation to find an attack magic setup that's both strong and reasonable on MP consumption. I dunno on Hard, but on Normal I there was nothing to keep me from going all-in on physical damage vs randoms after I realized that MT attacks won't trigger counters. Conjurers get one skill that can help MP a non-issue, but then they also get Obliterate which makes randoms a non-issue, period.
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Honestly I think conjurer exists solely as a Mage carrier class and that's basically why. But yeah magic tends to be more straightforward but less effective than swording after C3.
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Conjurer also comes by -way- too late, and Conjuring is kind of a bad skillset for party synergy. Granted, I found MP expenditure to matter more for PHYSICAL classes until Free Lunch after that C3 point (thanks mainly to Pirate), but that's temporary. Also, if you're running a Black Mage, by the time you get L4 magic, you'll never have MP problems for offense again.
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Conjurer is weird in that it's part carrier class for mages and part self-buff and smack things with physicals class, with the net result that it isn't really good for any niche lategame, when you can actually get it. The two grinding skills are great if you're looking to grind, but it's not particularly good for much else besides that, which is kinda sad for how late it comes.
It fares especially poorly compared to Vampire, which has a crazy good skillset that is even better when carried over to a faster/more offensive class.
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Vampire's particularly insulting thing is being a PHYSICAL class. The only thing you'd want to tweak its magic for is the MT status, but, as I mentioned before: status just isn't very useful late, and the goddamn physical status skills are plenty accurate anyway. Vampire also does the whole self-sustainable deal -beautifully- as is, with its free, easily buffable through attack amping draining. I'm really not sure why they made the class physical, it's not like magic needed to suffer any -further-.
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BTW
Mapguy's in a wing of the Forest right past the second bonfire. The bit where you walk up a giant branch? Jump off to the right instead of ascending. He opens up that locked house in Majula if you talk to him enough (and there's an estus flask shard in there). I didn't even notice he existed either until I went back for the giant memory stuff at the end of the game.
Geez, do you actually get anything substantial out of 80 strength? I stopped leveling that at 40 because diminishing returns.
Do you even lift?
You need 90 strength to dual wield those Giant Warrior Clubs. That's a very reasonable goal in life.
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The -ja spells are also magical, but they're spotpass only so they don't even show up in the Encyclopedia. 99 MP cost is also pretty bad, compared to something like Gastric Juice which costs 20 MP for MT damage and defense down that works on bosses
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BD: I just noticed that the title screen changes after you get the bad ending. Bwahaha! Did it do that in Japanese version? Doesn't seem like something that would translate across.
The proper way to read the original Japanese title is this:
Brave (ly)Lee Default - (f)Lying (f)Airy
or Brave Lee de Fault - Lying Airy, depends on how you look at it.
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Escha & Logy- Right before the final. Welp, the game finally did something. God knows why they waited so goddamn long. Even the character arcs don't trigger until late. The game is generally longer than Ayesha to boot, so prepare for a whole lot of nothing until that point!
Beat the two optional bosses (Child of Terror and Dreadnaught). Neither are as hard as Grand Dragon was, but they were tough since they have a sort-of limit. Prepping for hard mode final. Lots of prep work to do, but I have like almost a year. Level ~58. Another 10-20 levels and further item refinement/testing should do it.
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Bravely Default
Also last boss!
...Also got Disaster'd for 9K.
Guess I should slap Time Magic on Edea or something for Reraise.
Team is about the same as before. It's been pretty effective, able to beat the Chapter 8 Sidequest bosses (mostly) without resorting to anything too cheesy. It's amazing the difference a Scale Strip from a Pirate does on Summon magic's damage, though. It makes Tiz's Girtablulu go from 3500 to, like, 7500. (Enemy depending), Girtablulu Spam for 9999 was basically how I beat most of the Chapter 8 Sidequest fights, though it requires a fair bit of setup (Withering Ripple > Earth Weak, Sacrifice on Self for M.Atk buff, Zero Passive ability for constant +50% M.Atk for only one slot, Gaia Gear, Summoning Surge). Obviously not optimal but it's fun and works.
I'll post final story thoughts and such when I do actually beat the last boss.
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Bravely Default: Holy crap who thought Dark Nebula was remotely balanced?
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Do you even lift?
You need 90 strength to dual wield those Giant Warrior Clubs. That's a very reasonable goal in life.
I don't go the gym, I'm just naturally this way.
How exactly does that special dual-wieldy stance thingy work? Considering running double DEX weapon build as last playthrough (though if I'm honest the impetus is more look man you've got 75% of the Noir cast accounted for here you might as well toss in a ninja). Ignore STR this time and dump extra levels in random stuff for some utility magic and maybe ability to use real armor this time?! (I probably wouldn't even if I could.) Plan would be access Brotherhood of Blood as early as feasible. Invade bellbros. Invade everybody! Complete Navlaan's quest by genuinely killing everyone because I'm such a fan of murrrder. Wear the Herald's clothes for the rest of the game.
I don't know if I'm ever getting all those magic trophies because seriously NG+++ for some of them? But everything else is done.
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I think you can go to Majula in NG+, use a fragrant branch of yore on the pyro and go straight to Drangleic castle while ignoring everything else. Not 100% sure though.
Dual wielding is like world tendency in Demon's Souls, totally obscure and complicated.
To dual wield you need 150% of the strength/dex stat requirement on the weapon with the highest stat requirement. For example, something that requires 30 strength and 20 dex requires 45 strength and 30 dex to dual wield with another weapon with lower requirements.
You can only dual wield weapons of -roughly- the same type. = You can't dual wield a whip and a great club. You can dual wield a rapier and a curved sword though.
To dual wield, press Triangle for a short while (Dual wielding replaces "Two-hand your left weapon" if you have the stat requirement)
I've found that dual wielding does a lot of damage but is slightly slower and has low stun power.
Also, dex build is pretty crappy in this game. Good luck with your invasions.
I found out that my base damage is 1200 and not 900. Must have fought an enemy with some dark defense before. Neat!
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Bravely Default: Holy crap who thought Dark Nebula was remotely balanced?
Man, it's not even the nastiest thing Dark Knight has in its arsenal. The class is just -ridiculous-.
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The person who thought Dark Nebula was balanced didn't realize
1. You get like 3 Dark. Shields
2. PC. defense stats can be higher than Atk
3. A 5x MT mult is a little much!
Otherwise people saying Knight sucks at offense amuse me as they obviously have not Mastered the class~
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Is that the Dual Shields+that mastery skill that costs 2 BP setup, Pyro? I'll have to finish up the class on Tiz and see if that's remotely good. But generally, unless you're landing multiple attacks with your BP-spending offense post Dark Knight mastery, you're not impressing me too overly much. Bushido+Piracy synergy also plays into it to a degree - it's almost as degenerate as Sword Magic+Dark Arts.
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Getting an offensive spike near the game's end doesn't mean we have to forget about someone's offensive woes for the rest of the game.
Also if you have PC def stats higher than atk you're doing something wrong, probably not using Love Power enough (... although even if you don't, Dark Nebula sometimes kicks off Adversity, which... yeah, it really didn't need to). Fortunately, three Dark Shields + Spirit Ward on the attacker = gg. Although in fairness, Dark Nebula is so broken you can probably get away with lowering your atk significantly for randoms, to the point where Pyro's suggestion may have some merit there if random HP doesn't spike notably late. Seems more difficult than just using dark immunity, though (or absorption, if you're a horrible person).
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Knight's Stomp works well enough throughout the game on a class with nice defensive skills. Obviously it calls out for synergy, but most things do.
I meant for a stat topic. Knight should be competent at offense (capable of a ORKO) with the added bonus of perfect def.
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Stomp is sorta nice, though I honestly don't really like the Defense debuffing much. I mostly left that class in the dust once I got Ranger, since 8 MP is a really trivial cost for a 1.25 attack skill (running off an S in one of the best weapon types midgame) and I tend to run offense rather than defense on people who aren't running healer/support duty. Which is to say I got Shield Lore for Agnés and later Armor Lore so she'd be a death tank healer.
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Bravely Default: Nearing the end of C2. Fun times!
Re the comments earlier, the conversation with Mephilia doesn't change tons by killing Artemia first. It's basically exactly the same, except she adds in at the beginning something along the lines of "I hear you killed my sister", and toward the end of the conversation the party members say something along the lines of "She's gone batshit crazy, just like Artemia." [With both her journal & the character write-up confirming she wasn't totally insane before huffing fairy wings en masse.]
Anyway, the dress-up + Radiant Flower Festival plot point were handled like I hoped rather than as I feared, so there's that, yay. Took on Mephilia again post Mt. Fragmentum, was still an awesome fight but now winnable. I like how she isn't THAT durable, but she's durable enough to unload her tricks, and letting her live too long WILL get you killed.
Einheria... wasn't too bad, actually, fought her with only a slight gain in levels / equipment off Mephilia, and beat her on the first attempt. (Formations of 2 D'gons in her dungeon were scarier, actually! Brave->2x 1300 damage Fireballs, RUN) She's got great damage in theory, including an MT near-OHKO in Crescent Moon, but she has no answer to relentless Default spam. So yeah, play it safe, and she can't really kill you. Thought it was kinda weird that the party didn't see fit to mention to her in the pre-battle dialogue the delicate issue with her sisters, though. "Hey, heads up. We had to put down your sisters because they'd gone raving loco as a result of performing your orders. How does that make you feel?"
Then I beat up Victor and Victoria, it was awesome. (Tiz: Hey, that's not what it says in your journal!)
Anyway, it's grind time now, because I'm pretty clearly underlevel. Rusalka MT OHKO's the party with Dark Flow *through Default*. Okay, not really, Defaulting Angelic Ward Agnes w/ Abate Water laughs, but uh she's not getting the party back up in time vs. 4 enemies. Meanwhile, while I made some forward progress vs. DeRosa, his ~2200 Cura healing was pretty significant and he has lots of ways to randomly hax you up if the battles goes on too long. More importantly, Dread is a better status than I gave it credit for at first - locking Brave & Default isn't SO bad, but sending BP to 0 is terrible. Unlike Einheria, this pretty well mocks the "Default a lot" strategy. Haven't learned Abate Lightning yet on anyone either (don't tell me which class it's on, I'll find it eventually), so yeah. [Side note: In the DL, while Dread is much less useful and Revenge is nerfed, DeRosa at least likes that BD separates Confuse & Charm, and Confuse blockers exist for him but not Charm blockers. Means a lot of games' vanilla confuse blockers won't help much vs. him.]
More generally, fun villains this chapter. A well-done sympathetic villain is potentially among the greatest characters out there, but this is hard, and a failed-sympathetic villain is among the worst things a plot can have. It's totally okay to have some cackling baby eaters out there that you really want to smash their face in! Harder to screw this kind of villain up, too, not that it can't be done - usually by overexposure and/or bullshit superpowers. Also while we're in tiny text, that was an awfully quick change from a bikini to knight armor, Edea. DeRosa is such a slimebag, it's going to be great killing him.
Somewhat related, since I just read it -
http://www.nytimes.com/1995/10/01/books/bookend-arendt-and-heidegger-an-affair-to-forget.html
More unwise bodice-ripping emotions. So a Nazi & a German Jew get it on after the war... uh... yeah, that isn't really love conquers all territory, let's just call that a moment of weakness and move on.
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Mild gameplay spoiler/hint for Rusalka: Dark Flow ignores Default so don't feel pressed to use it on those turns. You'll still need a good way to deal with it + what comes after, as you've probably figured out.
I consider DeRosa to be trash in the DL but I didn't find that sidequest until a bit later and have zero sympathy for sidequest bosses in such cases. Charm does help, though, yes.
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Xenogears: Solaris, part 2.
Hours 39-40: More fun times in the Soylent laboratories. This area is actually a pretty large dungeon so it's time-consuming even when it isn't being punctuated by grotesque reminders of just what it is these people are doing.
In one room, the party is surprised to discover records of themselves! Seems someone here has been keeping an eye on them. Of interest is the notes of what is to be done with each. Fei is dangerous and needs to be destroyed. Maria, Emeralda, and Chu-Chu are dismissed as "useless" and also slated to be "disposed". Bart, Rico, and Billy are listed as being desired for "animus allignment" whatever that is (this will be explained momentarily), with Rico getting an extra note that he is a test subject of Ethos in the Kislev area, who observed his battling capabilities. It's nothing we couldn't piece together previously but well, there's the confirmation. Elly is to be retained for more detailed study, while Citan just has no comments whatsoever.
The party proceeds further, with Citan opening a security door to allow them to do so. Fei asks what the facility is for, and Citan answers, saying that the whole place is basically built around experiments designed to increase the longevity of the emperor and the Gazel Ministry. He further explains that the Ministry lost their bodies in the war 500 years ago but research is been done here on how they can be resurrected. Fei asks if all the experiments, the corpses they have seen, etc., are to the end of letting these old dudes attain immortality, and Citan confirms it.
Elly, however, at this point, has had enough. She heaps accusation upon accusation onto Citan. How does he know all this, despite her parents, Jesiah, Maria, etc., not knowing it? How did he have clearance to open some of the doors here? Fei tries to defuse the situation but Elly is insistent, demanding to know just what is going on. Citan has no response. Suddenly, the lights go off.
Fei is captured, and held susupended in the air in a room covered by TV screens on all six sides. Images of Id appear, and then the Gazel Ministry appear on the screens and talk to him. And with them is Citan. They reveal that Citan has been watching Fei all this time, and had led him and his friends to Solaris. Furthermore, they reveal the purpose of his "friends", or Animus; they are special individuals whose bodies are needed for their resurrection. (Shots of Bart and Billy on operating tables appear as they say this.) They explain their purpose: to regain their fleshly bodies and to resurrect their God, which brought humanity to this world 10000 years ago, and take to the starry skies. Fei asks them if they are not content with simply ruling this world.
"What meaning is there in having control of a planet as insignificant as this? God has given us the right to rule over the universe."
Go big or go home, I guess!
The scene cuts to Elly, who is been held in a lab by Krelian. Krelian makes reference to something not mentioned in a long time, the incident in which Elly was accosted by some fellow soldiers, freaked out, and killed some of them. He reveals that the "official" explanation, that her episode was the side effect of drugs, was in fact a lie, but is cryptic about what actually happened. He reveals that he has plans involving Elly, but not what those are. He confirms that the other party members will be used for the Gazel resurrection or killed, and babbles a bit about how his methods are so much more noble. He babbles about it a bit, talking about interesting things found in the introns of Elly's DNA. While I can appreciate that this is not, in fact, technobabble, but something vaguely plausible in a sci-fi way, in practice this scene ends up pretty useless because Krelian manages to talk a lot and say nothing. The only useful thing he reveals is confirmation that Elly is the 'mother', which is somehow very important in the Deus-related plans. He also notes that this confirms some of Grahf and Miang's actions, which reveals more about his rocky relationship with those two: Miang is his ally, certainly, but it's clear they aren't entirely trying to do the same thing.
Back to Fei, who is now alone. Citan walks in and has a chat with the still-captive Fei. He tries to explain Solaris' point of view: that people are happier just being told their place in life. What could be easier? Fei is obviously unhappy, and Citan taunts him: he has failed. What can he do? Nothing. He is hopelessly bound, his friends are captive and about to be killed, and despite his efforts even Elly is now going to suffer. Fei, in obvious anguish, starts begging Citan to stop, but Citan continues relentlessly. Eventually, Fei passes out. The lights darken with Fei's point of view, and Citan says something to the effect of "Now we can talk... Id."
Back to Elly! Krelian is gone, but Ramsus is here! And he is going crazier and crazier! He babbles to Elly, demanding to know where Fei is, hating Fei, wondering why Fei is believed to be superior to him. He seems on the point of hurting Elly but instead backs off, swallows some pills, and wanders off. Ramsus has looked a bit unstable before, to be sure, but this is the first time we really see what a mess he is, when he isn't in front of Miang or his superiors.
And back to Fei again! After a series of hopeless scenes, suddenly the tone shfits dramatically, as Bart and Billy are cutting him loose. Citan is also there. Fei yells at Citan, calling him a traitor, but Bart and Billy insist that Citan saved them. Citan has their best interests at heart after all: he brought them to the Soylent labs because it is the only place with the technology to neutralise their limiters, which is something he wanted to do so that they could fight against the Gazel without psychological fear of doing so (not that this has really manifested itself yet, but I'll give this plot point the benefit of the doubt). He also reveals that he learned that Elly doesn't have a limiter, which he finds strange, and that Fei... well. He cuts off before saying anything, but something is up there too.
Citan's story still isn't fully adding up of course: is he really double-double-crossing Solaris? But he's not about to elaborate further and I can't really fault the PCs for basically going along with him now since he did just save them, whatever happened previously. Citan offers Fei and company directions of where Elly is being held so they can go free her, and then rendezvous with him in the hangar area. Citan himself goes and blows up the last Gate Generator, the one in Solaris proper, since that's the kind of thing he does. There he meets Jesiah, who is pleased that Citan appears to be on his side after all. He asks about the Emperor, to whom Citan's loyalties lie, and Citan reveals that the Emperor gave his blessing for the party to do as it sees fit. Looks like Cain and the Ministry really don't see eye to eye. Anyway, they destroy the Gate. Ramsus appears and appeals to his old friends before they can do so, but to no avail. His anguish yells of "Traitors!" follow them as they escape.
Everyone meets up en route to the hangar: all the PCs and Jesiah of course, but also Hammer and Elly's parents, with the former having learned where the latter two were being held so that they could be rescued. Erich decides to go separately from the party to secure extra transportation, figuring that with his rank and the confusion currently going on in Solaris he can pull some strings if he is alone. Fei and two chosen PCs, meanwhile, get one last stretch of dungeon to work through so that they can join up with him and escape Solaris.
Hour 41: The party reaches the hangar and is all ready to escape Solaris. Unfortunately, Hammer has decided that for the first time in over 20 hours he's going to be all-too relevant! He draws a gun and insists that Elly accompany him back to captivity. The party flips out at this betrayal, which Hammer says he had to do because Krelian threatened to "change it" if Elly wasn't recaptured (which I assume means change him into some sort of horrible Wels-related monstrosity since that's how Krelian rolls). The party is at a loss for what to do, except Medena who just begins slowly walking towards Hammer. He panics and points the gun at her instead, telling her not to come closer. She stops, but tells Elly to walk towards the party, the gun still trained on her. Elly does so. She makes it past her mother, back to Fei and company, all while Hammer blubbers at his inability to stop the situation, everything slipping away from him...
There's a single gunshot. Medena falls to the ground, dead without a chance to say any more. Hammer gives out a scream at what he has done and runs back into Solaris. A tearful Elly goes to her mother's side, but unfortunately for her, Grahf and the Executioner (the mysterious Solarian woman who was supporting Kislev) show up to ruin this emotional moment.
There's a boss fight, it's pretty easy, but plotwise it might as well not even happen. Erich shows up in a gear, stepping between the two sides, threatening the Executioner and Grahf to buy time for the party to escape. The Executioner chortles at this show, and unceremoniously uses some ether power to destroy Erich's gear. Erich gets a chance to wish Elly the best, telling Elly to keep living for the sake of her parents who loved her, before his gear explodes.
The Executioner menacingly taunts Elly. "Oh, have I overdone it? You had no time to say goodbye." But she isn't done yet. Glowing with even more ether power, she lashes out and attacks the party. Blinding pain wracks Elly, Citan, Bart, everyone... everyone except Fei, who can only watch helplessly as his friends appear to be dying. A villain deliberating causing Fei mental trauma? We know what this means.
The game's done pussyfooting around the subject of Id. In the Yggdrasil's hangar, Weltall activates on its own and morphs into the red mech we associate with Fei's destroyer personality. From the Yggdrasil, the next we see thing we see is the gear reaching Solaris, and starting to attack it.
The scene cuts back to the Executioner, standing on a smoldering dock, and now joined by Krelian. She takes off her disguise to reveal that she is, in fact, Miang, chief architecht of Fei's suffering. She is clearly pleased that Id has awakened, and believes that it will be more difficult for Fei to regain control this time. Krelian is concerned with recovering Elly, a task which has Miang has deferred to Ramsus, though both are skeptical of his chance of success. There's a bit more dialogue here which reveals that they're not entirely on the same page for motivations, but are working together for now. The scene ends with Krelian noting that it is time for them to leave, as Solaris' destruction is imminent.
Imminent indeed. More videos of Id-Weltall attacking Solaris follows, and the whole structure falls apart, the core of it crashing into a mountain and exploding. Whoa, holy shit, thousands of people (millions?) just died. Hard not to feel bad for the ones who were innocent, even if they were part of a pretty jerkass society. I kinda feel like the game glosses over the death a bit here, but I guess I can't see many of the PCs feeling that torn up about it and/or they have much bigger problems to deal with...
Meanwhile, we finally cut back to the PCs, escaping on Seibzehn, as Elly regains consciousness. She asks where Fei is, and after Citan attempts some evasive answers, he eventually tells her the truth: Fei is in the red gear. Fei is destroying Solaris. The entire party witnessed his transformation at the docks.
Id's not done yet. His next target: those inconvenient "friends" of Fei's. The Yggdrasil crew turns to Citan for instructions, but for once he is at a complete loss. Elly takes initiative and pilots Vierge out of the Yggdrasil to meet Id. Id gleefully talks about killing her. Elly tells him that if that is what will make him happy, then she will die for him. Id attacks her, but as he does, Elly grabs him, momentarily restraining him. She yells at him, to Fei, telling Fei she won't ever let him go, to please return to being Fei. Id angrilly fends her off and eventually overcomes her, but even as he does, Fei begins to wake up. An enraged Id leaves the stage once more.
The scene shifts to Shevat, the dust having settled, as people discuss what to do with Fei now that it is clear he is Id. Citan explains a fair deal of what has happened, including his own role: he had been ordered by Cain to watch Fei and determine if he was a threat to humanity. Watching Fei, Citan came to believe that he would be good for the world, and the two both held hope that Fei could use his power to challenge the evil of the Gazel Ministry and those with like-minded plans. Cain defers to Citan's judgement, saying that he is atoning for his crimes by letting humans govern their own affairs.
Citan has learned much about Id, some pieced together from things Solaris would know (such as the fact that Id had been an assassin under Grahf's control which Solaris had employed to destroy the rebelling Elru, Dominia's homeland), but much from watching Fei for the past three years, and, of course, a certain scene. We flash back now to the scene where Citan had taunted the captive Fei with his failures until he could stand it no more, and Id had appeared. This scene is pretty awesome, as Citan smoothly engages with the raging destructive force that is Id. Citan reveals that yes, he did indeed allow Fei to be held in a capture device which blocks his nerve signals precisely for this purpose (the real reason he led the party to captivity). He asks him various questions and Id is happy enough to answer. Id hates Fei, the personality which Khan Wong, his father, "created" on top of his own three years ago, keeping Id's persona bound up. Fei didn't exist until then, which is why he has no memories. However, Id has far more hate for another personality he has, which he just refers to as a coward, which Citan speculates might be the "base" personality of the whole mess. Eventually, Id tires of questioning, threatening to break out of his captivity. Citan just tells him that he can't: that even if he somehow could, he knows Id has finite available "mental energy" and would waste it on the act of breaking free. Id is pissed off, and assures Citan he will enjoy murdering him some day.
Meanwhile, a decision has to be reached for Fei. Most of the Shevat elders, remembering the time when Grahf all but destroyed the world by unleashing the Diabolos disaster, fear Fei and despite the misgivings of several named characters (but especially Elly), they elect to freeze him in carbonite, because you really can never have too many Star Wars references. Elly will have none of it, though, so that night, before they can enact their plan, she breaks him out of prison. Fei worries that perhaps he should be frozen, that perhaps if he continues to be free he might eventually hurt her. Elly notes that he wasn't able to kill her, even as Id, and that she will be there for him no matter what. D'aww.
Unfortunately, Vierge is damaged from the fight with Id, so they have to fly out in Vierge. Citan appears to give them his blessing, having unsurprisingly guessed out what Elly would do. They make their escape.
Cut to the Gazel Ministry. WHAT THEY MADE IT OUT OF SOLARIS FUCKING BASTARDS I HOPED THEY MIGHT BE DEAD; CAN'T YOU DO ANYTHING USEFUL ID?!?! Ahem. It's not yet clear where they are, but apparently the villains have a new home base. They're pissed that Cain was working behind their back and they want that Fei dead, and his little dog too! Krelian says that he has sent Ramsus after him, having turned his gear into an Omnigear with a relic he recovered from the recent salvage operations.
The scene cuts to Ramsus, recalling his orders from Krelian to kill Fei and recover Elly, and Miang's words of encouragement, that she believes in him even if nobody else does. Twist the knife a little more, Miang, will you.
Ramsus catches up with Fei, and then, something truly amazing happens. They fight, and Ramsus, with his awesome new omnigear, wins. Ramsus. Wins. At something. Anything. He is overcome with joy and cackles madly about how he isn't useless as he takes out his rage on Weltall. Even as Elly screams that they surrender, he can't hear them, sending the gear crashing to earth in his madness, apparently destroying it. Ramsus comes to his senses and realises he has ignored his orders by allowing Elly to die as well. He doesn't give a shit. Today is Ramsus Day, baby!
That said, he may also have slightly overestimted his own accomplishments. The first disc ends with a scene of Fei and Elly struggling out of the burning remnants of Weltall... as Grahf watches from the shadows.
Whew! Anyway, as you can probably tell, I really dig the whole Solaris arc. A lot of plot points pay off, there is some excellent character work, the plans of the antagonists become clear, and in general pretty much every character worth caring about gets a chance to shine. You get a freat look at a twisted society and lots of things happen; even the "victory" of Solaris' destruction, as the major villains all survive and obviously are about to be doing really bad things. Really sets things up nicely for the big endgame push which goes on for pretty much the entire disc.
Honestly, parts of this replay definitely remind me why the game is not on my short list of all-time favourite RPGs, ringing in at something more like 8/10 level. Obviously the gameplay is a big reason (and even Solaris reminds me of that: the labs were definitely too big a dungeon for a game which obviously cares far more about its story than its gameplay). But apart from that the story definitely isn't always firing on all cylinders. Just looking back, prior to Solaris there's quite a long segment of the game which was punctuated by only occasional parts (Ethos revelations, Shevat) which really delivered what the goods in terms of making me really care about the game's writing. But Solaris? Yeah, pretty much that whole place lived up to my memories of what the game does well.
Next time: people sitting in chairs, and some hilariously weak bosses!
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BD - Dimension's Hasp done! Also, some mild testing with Pierce M. Defense gives me this: Max Summoning-amped Summon Magic deals -considerably less damage- than just Pierce M. Def. Summon Magic. As in, 1/3 less minimum. Yeah, I know which skill is paramount to making magic viable long-term in this now.
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I think you can go to Majula in NG+, use a fragrant branch of yore on the pyro and go straight to Drangleic castle while ignoring everything else. Not 100% sure though.
Nevermind about that.
You even lose all your Esuna tree branches in NG+.
BUT NG+ flies by really fast. I'm up to the Shrine of Amala in four hours, and I'm fighting every boss even when I don't need to. (Some have new item)s
NG+ is really cool, there's just enough new enemies/surprises! Some bosses now have support. One in particular is now nerve wrecking, at least solo. I'm not spoiling anything.
I feel like I'm kind of trivializing with Great Resonant Soul though. That thing is probably the easiest way to handle NG+ for a lowish stat investment (You need to: get 20 Int 26 Faith, get 4 spell slots, get Catia's Shime and upgrade it to +10 and dark, get two copies of Great Resonant Soul: Those two katanas you've been using for 60 hours now look terrible)
I saw Mirror Dude finally summon a player, but I just mashed R1 during the summoning and he died right after the invader went out of the mirror? So, said invader promptly disappeared. I sent him "Hexes, dude. Hexes. Sorry."
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Huh, you can infuse caster weapons with an element and...improve their spell power with that element? That would've been good to know a long time ago.
Gargoyles/Najka/Not!Pinwheel down today. Laser spider is next because honestly that scares me less than Smelter Demon or Lost Sinner. I'm still just chucking Heavy Soul Arrow/Great Heavy Soul Arrow at everything. I have Soul Spear! But I get all of three shots of it. I have Homing Soulmass! But the one time I tried it it failed to kill 1x Bastile dog (only one bolt actually managed to hit or something? So fail tracking). Quantity over quality is really the thing with sorcery in DS2. You get a billion shots of the basic spells and fire like twice as fast as lightning bolts but do a fraction of the damage. Like holy crap why are lion jerks so ridiculously resilient to everything but pure physical damage. GHSA didn't even approach breaking into triple-digit damage. These assholes have like a thousand hitpoints! I was taking them all down with arrows and rapier pokes instead.
Straid's outfit is pretty swanky, I gotta admit (but we have ever more stylish plans in the long run so we leave it unupgraded). I just noticed that Flame Swathe does not in fact possess the capacity to destroy breakable objects despite being a gigantic fuck-off explosion. Holy shit it's the neutron bomb. (I should probably try other pyromancies at some point.)
I've also just noticed that the wall right behind the first Black Gulch bonfire is a screaming face.
~
Not!Licia's still sitting at the end of the game with just Dynamic Duo (OH GOD NO), Frue Final (hahaha) and optional OHKO machine left. I'm probably never bothering with that last fight again. Killed him first run, got the trophy, it's not fun and gives me nothing I care about. And man giant memory stuff is just so tedious. I wish this wasn't like the last thing you do in the game. I just lose all interest once the Dragon Shrine's clear. Still will probably be cleric mode if/when I get into the mood to try NG+. I do appreciate having such a deep arsenal of lightning bolts to chuck at people.
Benhart's sword is hilariously bad.
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BD - Hooray, Conjurer get. I must say, the third boss in that sidequest chain was one of the toughest involving human enemies in a while. (Which probably isn't surprising!) I can't imagine what I'd have done without the ability to do MT 9999. (Also, I was amused how the sidequest seemed to be building up to more and more badass opposition... then you get the "boss" which you MT OHKO right after.) The actual final was fine, a bit different than some, but not too bad.
Still need to get Vampire. I probably have the tools needed to finally run roughshod over that boss chain, so guess I'll do that next. Can't say I'm terribly interested in the class at this point, though... really, blue mages don't need a seven-boss barrier to accession, their skills are enough of a chore.
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Still need to get Vampire. I probably have the tools needed to finally run roughshod over that boss chain, so guess I'll do that next. Can't say I'm terribly interested in the class at this point, though... really, blue mages don't need a seven-boss barrier to accession, their skills are enough of a chore.
I kinda question the lengths you have to go for the class myself, but the overall set they provide is very appealing in a vaccuum. Excellent offensive/utility mix for cheap (it so didn't need 1.25x power MT that adds status/p. def busting -and- competent elemental ITD that can be buffed by Love Power. Oh, and completely free, game-best parasitic HP/MP healing BY FAR in a game where it's actually a viable option) and the class itself has nice passives, level-up skills and stats. If you get it at C4, holy mother, does it pay off like a motherfucker.
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More videos of Id-Weltall attacking Solaris follows, and the whole structure falls apart, the core of it crashing into a mountain and exploding. Whoa, holy shit, thousands of people (millions?) just died. Hard not to feel bad for the ones who were innocent, even if they were part of a pretty jerkass society. I kinda feel like the game glosses over the death a bit here, but I guess I can't see many of the PCs feeling that torn up about it and/or they have much bigger problems to deal with...
This is a general issue with a lot of works of fiction, but yeah, XG is definitely an offender here. Killing zillions of people you haven't met doesn't mean much; if you want it to have impact, kill of someone we know and either like and/or hate. Admittedly, this is a tall order, as XG already has one of the biggest VG casts around, and I'm essentially asking that the list be even larger (introduce someone else to kill 'em off). Granted, Solaris is not SO bad since most of the Solarian characters in the real cast have fairly good excuses to not be blown up... XG's worse offense is in Disc 2, where the game kind of off-handedly mentions "oh btw 90% of the planet's population just died and became goo, everyone who didn't descend from Abel sufficiently." Now what are the odds that everyone in your party and that you know & care about are immune? Even the villains? They could have killed off one of the Elements or something from this, at least... alternatively, done something like "Billy got really sick, but then we put him in his Omnigear and it technomagically protected him, but now he needs to stay within 90 feet of the Anima Reactor at all times or else his condition will worsen again." Even just in text, hey, it's Disc 2, once that ship has sailed you might as well keep going with it. As is, the fact that a disaster of epic proportions strikes the planet's population never really has quite the impact it should, although I suppose the restricted world map with the tiny towns of refugees helps a little.
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I think the Ramsus subplot is probably the best-written part of XG. The crazy XG cosmology (only Ramsus, as a clone of the Emperor, can kill the Emperor) is more of a MacGuffin to give Krelian, Miang and the Gazel reasons to manipulate him in ways that are about a thousand times more straightforward than anything else that happens. His actions are the product of him having an inferiority complex that they periodically stoke or soothe, and he gradually becomes more and more unhinged until he loses his shit and does exactly what they want. No split personalities or past lives involved.
e: More videos of Id-Weltall attacking Solaris follows, and the whole structure falls apart, the core of it crashing into a mountain and exploding. Whoa, holy shit, thousands of people (millions?) just died. Hard not to feel bad for the ones who were innocent, even if they were part of a pretty jerkass society. I kinda feel like the game glosses over the death a bit here, but I guess I can't see many of the PCs feeling that torn up about it and/or they have much bigger problems to deal with...
This is a general issue with a lot of works of fiction, but yeah, XG is definitely an offender here. Killing zillions of people you haven't met doesn't mean much; if you want it to have impact, kill of someone we know and either like and/or hate. Admittedly, this is a tall order, as XG already has one of the biggest VG casts around, and I'm essentially asking that the list be even larger (introduce someone else to kill 'em off). Granted, Solaris is not SO bad since most of the Solarian characters in the real cast have fairly good excuses to not be blown up... XG's worse offense is in Disc 2, where the game kind of off-handedly mentions "oh btw 90% of the planet's population just died and became goo, everyone who didn't descend from Abel sufficiently." Now what are the odds that everyone in your party and that you know & care about are immune? Even the villains? They could have killed off one of the Elements or something from this, at least... alternatively, done something like "Billy got really sick, but then we put him in his Omnigear and it technomagically protected him, but now he needs to stay within 90 feet of the Anima Reactor at all times or else his condition will worsen again." Even just in text, hey, it's Disc 2, once that ship has sailed you might as well keep going with it. As is, the fact that a disaster of epic proportions strikes the planet's population never really has quite the impact it should, although I suppose the restricted world map with the tiny towns of refugees helps a little.
I always reconciled the PC cast being pretty much untouched by the fact that every PC except Chu-chu, as well as the blood relatives of the PCs, are all Animus and would be immune because they're important and shit. Maison totally should have turned into a Yoda or something though. On the subject of Animus, it always bugged me that Elly is prprogrammed to fall in love with Fei and has no choice in the matter, and the rest of the cast (except, again, Chu-chu) are all destined to become Fei's buddies but nobody ever acknowledges that.
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Pretty good points both, I generally agree!
And yeah, the predestined love is pretty weird. The two actually have pretty good chemistry and it kind of cheapens it to say they were always fated to be a couple. I think it's meant to be romantic but I definitely find it less romantic than it could have been.
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Tales of Symphonia Chronicles ToS, beaten. Final team was Colette/Zelos/Regal/Sheena. Hard mode, final boss was relatively easy considering especially the second form, no that was just easy. I'm not sure what the point of the second form was, there isn't even any cut scene or anything in between forms~
Edit: Turns out I made the fights easier by destroying the optional "bosses" in the Holy city, beating all of them removes all the final boss's non light/dark elemental resistances, oops didn't know beating them did that ;o Still not sure the second form would have been any less easy any since it seems to be designed to be a giant combo bag anyway. First form did use Time Stop a couple of times at least~
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It's hard not to feel towards Solaris citizens because Solaris is an obvious metaphor to our western civilization and how we can't live without hurting a bunch of other people/animals/ecosystems in poorer countries.
We can't really have an objective point of view here about whether those deaths were truly tragic or not.
All those utopia lands in media always make me feel uncomfortable (but that's not a bad thing)
Dark Souls 2: Crap I need to level Bellbro up again for all the sorceries
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Tales of Symphonia Chronicles ToS, beaten. Final team was Colette/Zelos/Regal/Sheena. Hard mode, final boss was relatively easy considering especially the second form, no that was just easy. I'm not sure what the point of the second form was, there isn't even any cut scene or anything in between forms~
Edit: Turns out I made the fights easier by destroying the optional "bosses" in the Holy city, beating all of them removes all the final boss's non light/dark elemental resistances, oops didn't know beating them did that ;o Still not sure the second form would have been any less easy any since it seems to be designed to be a giant combo bag anyway. First form did use Time Stop a couple of times at least~
The second form exists pretty much out of necessity more so than anything else.
There's basically a rule in Tales games that "every final boss needs two forms"; extend this to jRPGs if you want. Even Dhaos pulls a second form completely out of his ass in the original ToP, and there's 0 precedent for him having that form. No random power he was drawing from he didn't have before, no artifact, no monster he was summoning. Just sort of goes "Screw it, I'M TRANSFORMING NOW BECAUSE ANGRY!" Dunno what the remakes did, but the SNES version just sort of throws that in there for no good reason.
There are cases where it makes sense to be fair (like ToGf was a case of "ok, I can buy that second form existing" considering the circumstances changing from the first form), and then there are cases where it's clearly just there to mark off a box on a check-list; from what I recall of ToS1's final, the latter seems to be the case.
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DS2: I'm confused. First run through the game I kill laser spider and there's a big mysterious rock in the room that "does nothing at this time." Brother suggests it's another memory zone thing, I figure I'll check that on cleric and/or sorc run...but mystery rock is not there for either of them. What.
Man why are there so many bloodstains in the Drangleic Castle throne room? This a favored PVP room or something?
2x Firestorm = dead rodent of unusual size. VENGEANCE.
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re: Tales and two-form final bosses:
ToX plays with this concept in a rather amusing way.
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All things considered, I feel like Xenogears, were it a complete game, probably would have dwelt considerably more on "holy shit Fei just went from killing some dudes who've been trying to kill him to genocide". But despite all logic I think Xenogears was more or less made in chronological order (rather than making the most important parts of the game first to hedge against deadlines, which of course actually DID happen), and when the money dried up and we have to finish the game now now now now is... immediately after the Soylent dungeon, so oh crap we can't keep going full on philosophical about war and death we gotta finish the damn game.
But yeah, the implication from various parts of the game is that the human members of the party are genetically very similar to the Gazel (hence their high Anima ratings and being picked as bodies for them to surf to), which since they were already part of the Deus system probably wouldn't have whatever genetic markers single people out for gooification or what have you. Odd thing is, int he early parts of disc 2, they DO actually address it to some extent; while the party hasn't been effected, people they've met have and a lot of energy is put into helping them via nanomachines. For example, based on the sprites the implication is that Elly's subordinates are the some of the partially mutated people you meet before the Sufal fight, and later on they appear as normal because they've actually been more or less cured and have joined Nisan's defense force.
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That makes a lot of sense and explains their otherwise random reappearance rather nicely. (I'm currently saved at the start of Anima Relic 2, need to update.)
Bravely Default - Welp, Vampire asterisk is finally mine. Also I mastered Dark Knight. Rage would probably feel ridiculous if I hadn't yet seen Dark Nebula (6.25x ST for 3 BP? Man I remember when I thought Judgement was great).
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Pretty good points both, I generally agree!
And yeah, the predestined love is pretty weird. The two actually have pretty good chemistry and it kind of cheapens it to say they were always fated to be a couple. I think it's meant to be romantic but I definitely find it less romantic than it could have been.
Perfect Works makes it worse (I'm willing to admit I own a copy of Perfect Works) by making it pretty clear that Elly/the Antitype is wish fulfillment for the Contact. The Zohar or whatever pulled Abel's idea of the perfect woman from his brain, made her real, programmed her to fall in love with him, and if he was in extreme danger, to die trying to keep him alive. I think there's an interesting idea of nature v. nurture in there but the writers don't seem to realize how fucked up it is how it stands. If we're doing more "fix things with XG" then I think that's one of the two things I would hit (the general disconnect with the casualties is the other). I'd probably have Shevat remove the Antitype programming from her at some point and she has to ask herself if whatever feelings she has are real or programming.
But yeah, the implication from various parts of the game is that the human members of the party are genetically very similar to the Gazel (hence their high Anima ratings and being picked as bodies for them to surf to), which since they were already part of the Deus system probably wouldn't have whatever genetic markers single people out for gooification or what have you. Odd thing is, int he early parts of disc 2, they DO actually address it to some extent; while the party hasn't been effected, people they've met have and a lot of energy is put into helping them via nanomachines. For example, based on the sprites the implication is that Elly's subordinates are the some of the partially mutated people you meet before the Sufal fight, and later on they appear as normal because they've actually been more or less cured and have joined Nisan's defense force.
I'm mostly sure that the Animus aren't just genetically similar to the Gazel Ministry, they're their descendants. First there was just Abel, then Kadamony made Cain, Elly and Miang, then the 12 Gazel Ministry were created to each correspond to an Anima Relic. And of course the people who came after that were progressively less powerful. I'm sure that's a biblical reference of some sort but my mind immediately goes to Bloodlines (thanks, Troika). Based on that it's possible that the people who mutated most severely traced their ancestry back to one of the later generations of people to be produced by Kadomony. Given the game's extreme interest in hierarchies and rank, it wouldn't be surprising if they were planning to reveal that the world had a built-in sorting mechanism based on how soon your most distant ancestor popped out of the space baby toaster.
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There's a line to the effect of "redistributed your genes amongst the -Lambs- to preserve the world after your death during the Fall" (Because Xenogears has some goddamned awkward sentences sometimes). I always figured this meant that through some means or other they actually reintroduced the gazel's genes into the general population after each one physically died, however the fuck they managed that. So beyond just being their 10,000 year on descendants there seems to be a more recent and direct genetic tie between the gazel and the modern animus folk.
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That would actually be marginally more believable than genetic markers breeding true over a 10,000 year span when we're talking about a gene pool of 12 people, all dudes. Still confusing and the VtM metaphor is much cooler thematically. Xenogears clearly wasn't above borrowing from pen-and-paper RPGs, otherwise Cain wouldn't have been... well, the Emperor of Mankind.
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Man why are there so many bloodstains in the Drangleic Castle throne room? This a favored PVP room or something?
I think there's something there in NG+.
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Yes
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Perfect Works makes it worse (I'm willing to admit I own a copy of Perfect Works) by making it pretty clear that Elly/the Antitype is wish fulfillment for the Contact. The Zohar or whatever pulled Abel's idea of the perfect woman from his brain, made her real, programmed her to fall in love with him, and if he was in extreme danger, to die trying to keep him alive. I think there's an interesting idea of nature v. nurture in there but the writers don't seem to realize how fucked up it is how it stands. If we're doing more "fix things with XG" then I think that's one of the two things I would hit (the general disconnect with the casualties is the other). I'd probably have Shevat remove the Antitype programming from her at some point and she has to ask herself if whatever feelings she has are real or programming.
I also really enjoyed Adjustment Bureau and/or Dark City.
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Like I said: if they weren't willing to borrow from Western media, there would be no Cain.
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Wave Existence is the the one who created and programed Elly to act the way she is. In other words, her situation is pretty hopeless from the start. There is absolutely nothing can be done about her.
Kadamony's influence only occurred after the ship crashed, where it reused Elly's material to create the original Myyah Hawwa.
There's a line to the effect of "redistributed your genes amongst the -Lambs- to preserve the world after your death during the Fall" (Because Xenogears has some goddamned awkward sentences sometimes). I always figured this meant that through some means or other they actually reintroduced the gazel's genes into the general population after each one physically died, however the fuck they managed that. So beyond just being their 10,000 year on descendants there seems to be a more recent and direct genetic tie between the gazel and the modern animus folk.
Yes, Krelian rearranged and redistributed the gene sequences of the Animus into the general populace, just like how he had implanted limiter on lambs everywhere.
On surface it is to reproduce the original copy, which are the bodies that Gazel lost during the catastrophe. But the truth is that Krelian is trying to mass produce better copies of Animus so he can trash the Gazel that he has a grudge with.
Tales of Symphonia Chronicles ToS, beaten. Final team was Colette/Zelos/Regal/Sheena. Hard mode, final boss was relatively easy considering especially the second form, no that was just easy. I'm not sure what the point of the second form was, there isn't even any cut scene or anything in between forms~
What difficulty? Mithos does have a couple of damaging mystic arts in his first form.
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What in the heck is a Kadamony? Deus I presume from context? (I don't recall the former name coming up in-game, but it has been a good decade or so.)
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One of the major Deus parts. It's a computer or some such that can also generate biological material. Basically the means by which Deus creates Xenogears humans. Miang is essentially the biological incarnation of it, completely subservient to Deus' will and monitoring its outputs to make sure their sufficient for Deus' purposes. Basically the reason she causes multiple near-extinction events is to weed out inferior genes and create stronger meat-stuffs for Deus to use for parts. Presumably, although we don't see it TOO much, baseline human ether response is so high by the time of the game that random dudes on the street could shoot fireballs if they wanted to, which wasn't the case when they started.
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Guacamelee!: good metroidvania, 5 steam achievements left
Marvel Heroes: leveled daredevil to 60, a terrifying world where daredevil isn't terrible
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Bravely Default - Welp, Vampire asterisk is finally mine. Also I mastered Dark Knight. Rage would probably feel ridiculous if I hadn't yet seen Dark Nebula (6.25x ST for 3 BP? Man I remember when I thought Judgement was great).
It actually costs 2 BP! My current setup has Edea churning out over 40k a pop, which leads to absolutely horrible things.
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What in the heck is a Kadamony? Deus I presume from context? (I don't recall the former name coming up in-game, but it has been a good decade or so.)
Kadamony is the brain of Deus.
All process and command to Deus is issued by Kadamony.
Kadamony consists of two chambers, one of mechanical calculation unit and another of organic calculation units. Whatever Deus is trying to do, it must have the agreement of the both chamber to be put in action.
The organic chamber consists of the three compment.
Persona, the central unit of the chamber, which Wave Existence used to create the origginal Elly, and later reused to create the original Mayyh Hawwa by System Hawwa. It's cheif andf unique function is to control the output of Zohar.
Anima, the supplement to Zohar. Was used as the means to control Zohar before the invention of Persona.
Animus, organic unit capable of human liek function. In other words, they can drew ether. Cain and Gazel are this. Most human are lesser duplicate of this.
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Bravely Default - Welp, Vampire asterisk is finally mine. Also I mastered Dark Knight. Rage would probably feel ridiculous if I hadn't yet seen Dark Nebula (6.25x ST for 3 BP? Man I remember when I thought Judgement was great).
It actually costs 2 BP! My current setup has Edea churning out over 40k a pop, which leads to absolutely horrible things.
It's 3 BP including the turn-BP spent using it, which is how I cost these things mentally. Hence why I compared it to Judgement.
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Mmm. I would simply note that, once you're in endgame (where you're hitting the damage cap far more reliably), Rage comes into its own again, as it permits the most 9999 hits in a round (I believe you can manage to Rage 4x in a round, if you're severely BP abusing). Regardless, even without BP abuse, two Rages hits 9999x10, which is, if not castbest, very very close, and it requires relatively little setup to make it hit that hard (Drain Damage+, Dark Damage+, a Performer maybe?).
Judgment only hits once, so the comparison sort of falls flat there.
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Oh, obviously Judgement doesn't compete with Rage. The point was that they have the same cost, and there was a point in the game when Judgement (3 BP for 3x damage) was actually good, despite doing less than half the damage of Rage (barring dark resistance). It's a testament to the power creep that the class specifically creates.
I'm not sure what I think of the general paradigm where lategame classes have some abilities which crap all over previous classes. Not sure I've seen a case this blatant since FF3o.
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It kinda sucks because it sorta trivializes some investments. Of course, you also ponder Judgment is a L4 ability on an early midgame class and Rage is a mastery skill on the third-last class you ever get, but it just kinda drives the point home that Valkyrie loses its appeal almost entirely by endgame. It's not the -only- case, but it's the most egregious.
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At least full Jump teams are a viable option endgame, although kinda of a dull one in my opinion. It's better than some classes can claim, at least.
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DS2: It only took 75% of the game but I finally got a weapon upgrade. Staff of Amana, not Staff of Wisdom. So not at 100% yet. Still beats the pants off basic catalyst's cruddy B- scaling at +10 (slower to cast though).
I was going to complete all of Navlaan's requests (non-violently) before flipping the switch to set him to merchant mode, but then I realized I'd have to genuinely complete the game just to get the item needed for request #2. So I said fuck it and let him out because I want my fabulous witch dress now god dammit now. It's uniformly less effective on defense than Straid's set and weighs more. The hat's bonus of an extra attunement slot is probably of less consequence than faster casting times (I have 50 Attunement anyway). Also apparently I miss out on some spells until NG+ and get jacked by the uber hexer at every turn, but all of that's a small price to pay for fashion.
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Soul Silver: ...screw fighting Red and his level 80+ Pokemon fairly! *Grabs Mewtwo and Ho-Oh, and throws them at him* Ok, with that done, also caught Groudon, who is Jolly nature, cha-ching!
Tales of Graces f: Another research lab...IN THE FUTURE!!!
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DS2: Beat NG+. Then Freja + Rotten in 50 minutes in NG++. Then Chariot + Old dude, not even going to beat the last giant.
Great Resonant Soul is still totally OP. I'm sitting on 2 500 000 souls so the 500 souls/cast is not a problem anymore.
I forgot to mention that you can dual wield crossbows / machineguns in this game:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FDPSiuM_7k
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At least full Jump teams are a viable option endgame, although kinda of a dull one in my opinion. It's better than some classes can claim, at least.
My kneejerk is that just about -every- class is endgame-viable in some way, just most options are clearly sub-optimal at that point because of the egregious power creep that shows up by C5. It's particularly strange because you have jobs/skillsets that are downright excellent at what they do or at filling oddball niches until then (Ranger, Thief, Valkyrie come to mind), and then late everything sorta flattens towards stuff like Dark Knight+dedicated healers. It's just impossible to outdo Dark Knight offensively and its downside stops existing with Sword Magic in hand.
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Dark Knight is crazy awesome at damage. But no class in BD is 'invalidated'
Freelancer: Scan is always good. Final skill can be degenerate.
Monk: Gets some simple and sometimes ITD damage tricks. Can, uh, OHKO endgame bosses in Bravely Second.
White Mage. Esunga! Dispel! Healing!
Black Mage: Pierce Mdef. Yum. Makes for simpler damage schemes than DK that can still keep up. Also status.
Knight: RAR I OVERKILL YOIR TEAM. Kniht takes 1, does solid damage that may as well be ITD.
Thief: Stealing is good.
Merchant: Low Leverage! High Leverage!
Spell Fencer: Always good with status draining and elements.
Time Mage: Meteor! Hasten World! Slow World!
Summoner: MP becomes less of an issue so MT damage without strings is good.
Ranger: The accura y gimmick can be twinked to high hell.
Valkyrie: Jump gimmicks.
Red Mage: Clever combos with the passive skills can be degenerate.
Salve Maker: Healing Lore passive and Compounding skillset of win.
Pirate: Debuff+damage is nice. Amped Strikes + Free MP is cool.
Performer: Is always good Support.
Ninja: Can twink for lots of damage... and Utsumemi is always fun.
Swordmaster: Free Lunch! And redirecting ST to it for solid Counters.
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BD: Finally completed C2, onto C3. I really really love the encounter control as it speeds up zooming to the bosses & exploring, and makes a quasi-challenge playthrough of keeping level fairly low more sane (because running away constantly is lame). I'm not even exactly attempting to force the issue, but as noted, MP costs are actually pretty significant, so I tend to have my mages nearly dry halfway through a dungeon, causing me to set encounters to 0.
Anyway, Rusalka! Attempt 1 post getting wrecked earlier and gaining a level or two: Okay, Frost Armlet on Thief Tiz, Agnes has Abate Water naturally off WM... Edea can use MAGIC ARMOR + Blizara Sword?! But Rusalka absorbs Water, so I either need to switch up to Thundara immediately or use Withering Ripple - Water weakness. (Withering Ripple, the best ever.) Or - wait, Magic Armor stays around after you switch enchantments? Sweet, I can Blizarra->Thundara and still have Water-halving. Hermes Sandals on Edea to attempt to get her offense off before the clones, Agnes I want to be slow so that she can Cura post-Dark Flow now that I know she doesn't need to Default. Ringabel, get a Mage Shell for more MDef I guess? Okay, so 3/4 of my party can halve Dark Flow, but... Ringabel still gets OHKO'd anyway. (maybe it's physical + water?). Still, that sets up Dark Flow -> Thundara + Judgement + Judgement from Edea to immediately slaughter the clones, so a death isn't even that bad. Doing okay anyway, but then the game crashes upon DS sleep wakeup. +1 reset, but that doesn't really count!
Attempt 2, right, Hermes Sandals on Ringabel to try and get his offense off faster, and I try a Staff & Shield setup on Tiz (despite his Iron Pole proficiency being E) since his offense isn't tremendously relevant anyway. This was sort of okay with some usual Charm scares, and then Charmed Ringabel casts... REGEN ON RUSALKA. This is literally the worst possible thing he could have done, no Dispel yet, and Rusalka will now regen 1200 HP every turn. Despite that, I make some progress until I let Water Halving lapse on Edea and get knocked on the defensive after both Edea & Ringabel wipe to Dark Flow while Tiz & Agnes don't have stocked BP. I COULD rebuild but screw this, +1 reset.
Third attempt, back to Bow Tiz, and this time I set up my specials to have Lightning Element. Now I have 3 free MT Lightning nukes of doom to play with, a rare case that might be better than Withering Ripple (which is pretty much the greatest Special ever normally, a decent reason to run 2 Rod users). This time, I keep up water-halving on Edea and don't get haxed by Charm, so the Water Crystal is saved! Don't feel like pressing my luck and trying to shatter the crystal to see what happens, as if it's a Game Over I don't want to do that fight again.
Anyway, onward to C3, ho. (After first stopping to grab the Wind summon in Ancheim.)
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About Rusalka: I'm pretty sure Dark Flow is physical, most skills on the enemy end gravitate towards that offensive spectrum.
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I'm 100% certain that it is. BD is one of those games where almost anything that isn't part of a recognisable magic skillset is physical. (MDef, the worst BD stat.)
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DS2: Got the platinum!!
*spams "Well, what is it?" in front of Fudo*
I still had to fight every major boss. People really need to figure out this Shrine of Winter thing.
Preparing mentally for No Death mode.
BTW I'm now pretty sure ADP is total BS.
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I'm considering pumping the stat anyway in dual-wield mode for POIZN spam. I am sure this plan cannot fail.
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You'll also have cray estus drinking speed.
OP.
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Kirby Return to Dreamland: Beat a world and a half. So far, all I can say is "This is a Kirby game!" which is a lot more than I can say about Kirby's Epic Yarn. AT least this one I don't feel embarrassed to play in public because while Kirby is on the screen, he isn't being overly cutesy with pre-school art style and enemies actually look like enemies (...in that weird Kirby stylized way...) Not to mention "Kirby can breathe fire, wield a sword, turn into a tornado, and slice things into lots of pieces with bladed boomerangs" is a lot cooler than "Kirby can turn into a car and a train!" (though, being able to turn into a tank was pretty awesome in Epic Yarn, but under utilized.)
Yes, I spent this entire post mostly saying "Screw you Epic Yarn!"
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(Withering Ripple, the best ever.)
It is, but it tapers off later in the game when you have better debuffs than 85% and better damage than giving someone a water/whatever weakness. Still the full multitarget is great!
Staff level 1, now, that is beast. Okay I can fullheal/revive/give MP/give 2 BP to my whole team? Yes please.
And I seem to be the only one that had no trouble with first Rusalka. Weakest of the crystal defenders imho. Refights are another story!
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So, I got RS3. Which quest should I do first???? Snoooow!
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Rusalka's easily the best crystal defender I thought! Thaaat said if you were doing crazy amounts of Norende stuff that's probably when the advantages would be most pronounced, which I suspect is the difference.
On refights, Rusalka gets both more and less dangerous. More dangerous because the clones get a considerable HP boost, but less because Dark Flow becomes far easier to deal with (Rampart, elemental defence, whatever). On balance I think she gets easier, but not dramatically or anything... still a fun fight! By contrast, I thought Gigas Lich was quite easy the first time - beat him first try without dispel! - but he scales up well and I've found him one of the tougher ones in Chapters 5 and 6, while Chaugmar goes from "legimiate threat" to "complete joke" in refights... he's worthless outside his called shot Energy Burst, and Rampart says "lol" among other tactics.
BD - Chapter 7. Welp, spoilers. Broke a crystal, Airy is now a supervillain. I adore this face-heel turn. Also since I don't think I've hyped this outside of chat, the changed title screen is great.
There's a question here I'm hoping someone can answer, dunno if anyone tried: What happens if you *don't* stop praying to a crystal in chapters 1-4?[size]
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Xenogears: In which there are far fewer dungeons.
Hour 42: The second disc opens with a scene of first Fei, then Elly, having a flashback, reliving past lives, but particularly the one where they were Lacan and Sophia. We get to see a bit of their relationship, and for the first time really have their repeated love stories laid out for us. It's kind of weird, but I actually like this scene anyway: it's presented almost like poetry, with Fei and Elly saying many of the same things, sometimes slightly different, as reflections of each other.
Following this, they wake up and we learn that they've been healed from near-death by Taura Melchior, one of the Sages and the master of molecular engineering technology previously mentioned. Apart from saving their lives, he has also modified Fei so no more Id. And modified Weltall so it can use Id's powers at will, along with the help of Balthazar, who makes his first appearance in about 40 hours.
Shevat learns that Fei is safe now and tries to recruit him back into the war effort with Solaris. Apparently pretty much the entire Solaris military survived the fall, which makes sense given how much of it was stationed on battleships and on the surface, and of course the rest probably were able to evacuate. They've already levelled Aveh and are heading for Nisan. Taura doesn't think Fei should give a shit about Shevat, which was trying to string him up not too long ago; he clearly has some contempt for his own home country. While I kinda get this, it's still kind of dumb to leave non-Solarian civilisation hanging. Elly certainly agrees, and encourages Fei to go assist them, with his new powers.
Elly doesn't join him because Taura has another task he wants done: he has, over the years, come up with a nanomachine which, once released, should multiply and remove the Limiters present in all humans, which would be quite a coup for the good guys. But he needs to get them into the upper atmosphere so they can spread across the world. Fortunately he knows of a location with an ancient "mass driver" which should be able to launch a payload into the atmosphere; he just needs someone to go do it. Elly volunteers for this task. Emeralda and Citan also show up, and Emeralda volunteers to help.
Before leaving for her mission, Elly talks with Citan. She thinks she loves Fei, but isn't sure how much of it is anguish over losing her parents and then those strange dreams, and how much of it is real, so she wants to do something separately from Fei to give her some time to sort out her feelings. After everyone leaves, there's a scene where Grahf shows up, and we learn that it was he who saved Fei and Elly and brought them to Taura, showing once again his strange sympathy for his "other self" and reincarnated love interest.
There's totally this dungeon where Elly and Emeralda go and save the day, with Citan joining them in the middle of the mission (why he didn't accompany them is left ambiguous, probably to give Emeralda some time to connect with her "mother" and develop as a character). This could have been kind of cool; certainly sounds more interesting than the Anima Relic dungeons we did get. It isn't actually in the game though.
Fei, meanwhile, gets to beat up Ramsus with his newfound power, and then goes to help stave off Solarian invasion (though again, we don't actually play this) while Bart turns the Kislev palace into a really big gear and beats up another really big gear from Solaris. This gets a "sure, whatever Xenogears"/10. Some things stood out to me as incredibly goofy when I played this game as a teenager and this is definitely one. I guess it's an homage to some mecha anime or something else I don't care about. Regardless, Nisan is saved!
Unfortunately, bad shit starts to happen. Humans everywhere begin transforming into Wels. We learn shortly that it's because Krelian had designed nanomachines which would cause this change and they were released upon Solaris' destruction. It's pretty awful, as huge segments of the population mutate into monsters. The Gazel Ministry are confused as to why it is happening but aren't going to complain since it turns out that these Wels are "the true form of humans" and part of their plan... to be pieces of the god they are trying to resurrect. Meanwhile, there's a scene with Krelian and Miang, highlighting some of the tension between Krelian and the Gazel, as while both seem to be in the business of resurrecting god, both want to be "in control" of the resulting creature at the end. Miang frankly declares to Krelian that she doesn't really care which of the two "wins" as that both are working towards her goals she will support the winner. Nevertheless, she certainly seems to allign more closely with Krelian based on recent scenes, suggesting that the scientist has the inside track on the crazy dead dudes residing in a computer.
The scene shifts to Soylent System. It was previously mentioned that while some of the facilities had been moved to Solaris, the bulk were on the surface. We learn that Solaris had been "recruiting" all the transformed humans to come to Soylent where they would receive treatment, but it was, of course, a terrible trap. The humans there have turned against each other, the infected attacking the uninfencted, the more infected attacking the less infected. All humanity seems lost. Elly is moved by their suffering, however. She sheds some of her own blood to placate a few of them, but for the rest she makes a heartfelt appeal for them to recover their humanity. It's not a bad speech, although it still stretches credibility that she'd actually be able to get through to all these borderline zombies. Nevertheless, she does.
It doesn't help that the party, with Taura's help, does in fact have a cure. Taura's nanomachines can ease the suffering and in some case even reverse the transformations of the people. Combined with Elly's appeal to the hearts and an actual cure, the party is available to free the Wels from the grips of Soylent, going from facility to facility to break Solarian influence over its new god-parts. Elly, meanwhile, starts to appear more and more like her previous incarnation, Sophia, who had become a similar symbol of hope for the people.
The Gazel are furious. Their plans have been thwarted! Fortunately, they have a plan. They will activate the "Gaetia Key", which will greatly increase the rate of Wels transformation. Before they can, though, they EAT ELECTRICITY. Emperor Cain makes his appearance, overruling the Gazel, refusing to let them use the key. They try to appeal to him... they need this to become God, they need this so they can rule as is their purpose, don't you see?!?
Cain savagely mocks them. "Your purpose...? You were fated to it from your birth. Why haven't you realized that it does not arise from your own free will?" Their god, he claims, is playing them like a fiddle. Humanity deserves a chance to go on living, not be consumed by the Ministry's petty greed. Fuck yeah, Cain rules. Good lord is he refreshing compared to all the other centuries-old douchebags in this game.
Hour 43: With things taken care of regarding the future of humanity, at least for now, the party decides to hunt down the remaining Anima Relics. Shevat holds one, Bart reclaimed one, and Citan himself has another, presumably given to him by Cain (although this isn't made explicit). It's time to hunt down some more since keeping such powerful toys out of the hands of Solaris is a good thing.
There's a dungeon where the party goes to reclaim one. No real story here until the end. The anima relic is found and upgrades Billy's gear to an omnigear! (Gameplaywise there's rather little difference.) As they leave, though, the party runs into the Elements. Elly will appear here even if not in the party, as Dominia is essentially her rival, and recent events have only further highlighted the difference between them, Elly the protector and Dominia, who believes that it is right that the weak perish. She has rationalised Solaris' actions, even destroying her own homeland, as natural, and her survival and rise to the top of Solarian ranks proves her own strength. Mild-mannered Kelvena also agrees with Dominia, positing that the sheltering of weak humans will ultimately be the race's downfall, and that only the strong will survive while the weak are weeded out. Two boss battles later shows the Elements who has the real "strength". Yet another RPG where we show those "might makes right" types by... having more might?
The elements are defeated, but Elly specifically spares them. She still has faith in her old friends. As they leave, Kelvena comments admiringly about Elly's way of doing things, showing that her words have had some effect. Dominia isn't so convinced.
Hour 44: The scene cuts back to the Gazel Ministry, now hatching a plot with Miang. They need Cain dead. As long as he lives they are powerless to use the Gaetia Key, and without that their plans are doomed. Miang, fortunately for them, has plans. She has manipulated Ramsus and he will serve their purpose.
Dominia, standing outside the room, overhears this, though! Horrified at what she perceives to be Miang's treachery, she goes to tell Ramsus. However, the Ramsus she runs into is filled with his usual manic fury. Miang has told him where Fei is! He will hunt Fei down! ONLY RAMSUS, WHO TRANSCENDS ALL HUMANS, CAN DEFEAT FEI!
Unfortunately, he has been directed to Nisan, where Fei actually isn't at the moment. Elly is there, watching over the city while Fei and the others search for another Anima Relic. Ramsus is far too deep into the crazy sauce to believe Elly when she says Fei isn't there, however, and with his Omnigear he's able to overpower Nisan's defences easily, screaming at Fei to have him show up. Elly appeals to him, trying to get him to stop. His response is to grab her (with his gear) and threaten to crush her unless Fei appears to rescue her. When Fei doesn't (for obvious reasons), he attempts to carry out his threat, but Elly's ether power overwhelms him and she breaks free. Ramsus is crushed. Not only could he not beat Fei, he is powerless before mere Lieutenant Van Houten as well?
Elly asks him why he is so concerned with Fei, and Ramsus finally volunteers the information. It is not simply that Fei/Id defeated him at Elru, as we had long been told to assume. He reveals that he is a clone of Emperor Cain, created to be the ideal human, but that once Fei was born, who could serve the nebulous purposes of the Solarian elite better, he was rejected, cast aside as useless trash. While it's not yet clear what purpose Solaris had in mind for Ramsus which they felt Fei could fulfill, it's clear that Ramsus has been driven mad by his superiors for this. He proudly trumpets that by his own ability he was nevertheless able to take command of Gebler, but that when Fei reappeared he took away everything from Ramsus. Elly dresses him down, saying that he doesn't understand that love and acceptance aren't things that you take from others, and that Fei's existence does not take them from Ramsus. Ramsus, however, is in no state to hear this. With images of him being grown as a fetus in a vat as Krelian and a mysterious dark-haired woman look on flashing before the player's eyes, he takes off, full of fury.
The Gazel Ministry berates Ramsus for failing yet again. As they dismiss him, Miang appears, telling him comfortingly that she believes in him. And she has a suggestion. She believes that the existence of Cain is limiting Ramsus' potential, that he can not truly ascend to the status of a perfect human, loved and accepted by all, as long as the original exists. But for every problem, there is a solution, isn't there, Kahr...? (Miang is the worst.)
Meanwhile, the party has located another Anima Relic, so it's time for another dungeon! Once again, not much happens here until the end... but that can wait until next time.
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DS2: Got the platinum!!
*spams "Well, what is it?" in front of Fudo*
I still had to fight every major boss. People really need to figure out this Shrine of Winter thing.
Preparing mentally for No Death mode.
BTW I'm now pretty sure ADP is total BS.
That mean you don't need to get all the covenant rank-up items for the Platinum or did you actually win thousands of PVP fights?
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Wrath of the Gods is sold by Wellagar in like NG+++ or something stupid like that. I don't know of any similar alternative for getting the Bell covenant or Brotherhood of Blood spells, though. (Sunlight Spear at least is easy to get because co-op > PVP for chances of success, at least with me.)
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Yeah, you can go to the castle in NG++ to get most spells.
You still need to sunbro 25 times, bellbro 30 times.
Four failed no-death runs. I am running out of names for my characters. And I still haven't beaten the Sentry or Pursuer. This is not going well.
I'm not sure I actually want shields or huge weapons. I struggled against the Dragonrider last time with both. Dragonrider. Most deaths comes from getting ganked (or surprised) so shields might not be a huge help.
Meanwhile, huge weapons mean huge recovery times.
I'll try archery out. Low stat requirements (so I can invest in defensive stats), and range.
Or pyromancy?
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Rusalka's easily the best crystal defender I thought! Thaaat said if you were doing crazy amounts of Norende stuff that's probably when the advantages would be most pronounced, which I suspect is the difference.
On refights, Rusalka gets both more and less dangerous. More dangerous because the clones get a considerable HP boost, but less because Dark Flow becomes far easier to deal with (Rampart, elemental defence, whatever). On balance I think she gets easier, but not dramatically or anything... still a fun fight! By contrast, I thought Gigas Lich was quite easy the first time - beat him first try without dispel! - but he scales up well and I've found him one of the tougher ones in Chapters 5 and 6, while Chaugmar goes from "legimiate threat" to "complete joke" in refights... he's worthless outside his called shot Energy Burst, and Rampart says "lol" among other tactics.
BD - Chapter 7. Welp, spoilers. Broke a crystal, Airy is now a supervillain. I adore this face-heel turn. Also since I don't think I've hyped this outside of chat, the changed title screen is great.
There's a question here I'm hoping someone can answer, dunno if anyone tried: What happens if you *don't* stop praying to a crystal in chapters 1-4?[size]
Entirely BD lategame discussion:
Bravely Second Elixir > Gigas Lich. Otherwise, yeah, he's a legit fight if you aren't abusing that ability.
I believe in ch. 1-4, you automatically transition out of the crystal scene. I don't... recall that with absolute certainty, however.
Also, yeah, Airy is a hilarious/awesome supervillian. Enjoy the normal end, and you do have access to the optional dungeon now to pick up Genome Abilities you didn't get earlier (go talk to DeRosso to unlock it).
Faster than Light: Advanced Edition: holy fuck, did the final really need a buff to forms 1 and 3?
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The answer is always more fire.
Majora's Mask - So I started playing this. It is still a weird game, but I am pretty determined to actually finish it this time instead of playing it for like 2 dungeons and giving up on it because it makes me uncomfortable with its pacing mechanics.
It definitely fits in that patter of every other Zelda game or so being really fucking weird. It has a lot of handy things for managing the time restriction that make me feel so uncomfortable, but true to Zelda form, they are tucked away somewhere unintuitive that you should just work out your damned self by throwing a bomb at this specific piece of ground and it is totally fine because you don't strictly NEED it to beat the game (just maybe to have any fun at all).
Also the bank is terrible. Absolutely terrible. To deposit money you have 2 dialogue bits, then select Deposit from a menu, 4 unskippable dialogue options, two of which are
So...
Alright!
Which leads you into another dialogue prompt which has to scroll slightly, so I hope you aren't mashing Skip skip skip or you are going to go through those four again.
Then you need to pick the exact amount of Rupees you want to deposit (so all of them probably) manually up to 999. If you accidentally say a larger value than you have you get yelled at and kicked back to menu selection.
I got a special reward for depositing 200 Rupees, then wanted to buy a bomb bag so took some rupees back out. I got another reward for depositing up to 200 rupees later when I deposited all my money. It was another 5 rupees that I got to deposit.
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I got a special reward for depositing 200 Rupees, then wanted to buy a bomb bag so took some rupees back out. I got another reward for depositing up to 200 rupees later when I deposited all my money. It was another 5 rupees that I got to deposit.
20/10 GotY
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BD spoilers There are times the game let's you break crystals and times it doesn't. I wasn't able to break the second crystal of third world (you keep pressing X forever and nothing happens), but I was able to break the third one. So plot triggers I guess.
Beat all the asterisk teamup fights. Hardest by far was Ominas/Barras/Heinkel due to Ominas's 1HKO Thunders and Barras's ASPLODE.
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BD spoilers There are times the game let's you break crystals and times it doesn't. I wasn't able to break the second crystal of third world (you keep pressing X forever and nothing happens), but I was able to break the third one. So plot triggers I guess.
Beat all the asterisk teamup fights. Hardest by far was Ominas/Barras/Heinkel due to Ominas's 1HKO Thunders and Barras's ASPLODE.
Apparently, and this is sort of dumb, (BD spoilers) it's got to do with how fast you press the button, not how long/how hard. So the total opposite of sex ed. You probably just were hitting it fast enough on the third crystal to get into the "Airy sez stop" mode.
Ominas' OHKO is really nasty in that, esp. since I didn't come preparing to block Lightning.
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Elly asks him why he is so concerned with Fei, and Ramsus finally volunteers the information. It is not simply that Fei/Id defeated him at Elru, as we had long been told to assume. He reveals that he is a clone of Emperor Cain, created to be the ideal human, but that once Fei was born, who could serve the nebulous purposes of the Solarian elite better, he was rejected, cast aside as useless trash. While it's not yet clear what purpose Solaris had in mind for Ramsus which they felt Fei could fulfill, it's clear that Ramsus has been driven mad by his superiors for this. He proudly trumpets that by his own ability he was nevertheless able to take command of Gebler, but that when Fei reappeared he took away everything from Ramsus. Elly dresses him down, saying that he doesn't understand that love and acceptance aren't things that you take from others, and that Fei's existence does not take them from Ramsus. Ramsus, however, is in no state to hear this. With images of him being grown as a fetus in a vat as Krelian and a mysterious dark-haired woman look on flashing before the player's eyes, he takes off, full of fury.
The Gazel Ministry berates Ramsus for failing yet again. As they dismiss him, Miang appears, telling him comfortingly that she believes in him. And she has a suggestion. She believes that the existence of Cain is limiting Ramsus' potential, that he can not truly ascend to the status of a perfect human, loved and accepted by all, as long as the original exists. But for every problem, there is a solution, isn't there, Kahr...? (Miang is the worst.)
Ramsus' original purpose always kind of confused me. They say he's supposed to be an artificial Contact, but he's a clone of Cain and not Fei so that doesn't make sense. If the Emperor could connect with the Zohar like Fei can, he'd have done it back when he was an asshole, which he was for the first 9,500 years of his life. Krelian, especially, would know the difference between Cain and the Contact because he and Lahan were buddies and whatnot.
The easiest explanation is that Krelian knew that Ramsus was aware as he was growing in that tank and he was just saying shit to condition him to hate Fei. Their plan is that Ramsus needs to have his life fall completely apart and lose his shit before Miang can start telling him that Cain is the problem. The problem with that is that Ramsus is, well, Cain and so finding someone who even poses a real threat to him, let alone someone who will beat him definitively enough times that it damages him mentally is incredibly difficult. Fei, as the Contact, is probably the only person who can, so giving him a lifelong grudge is the best way to make sure he keeps going after the one person who can beat him.
The problem with that is that Ramsus is older than Fei, and so unless they came up with an equation off-screen to predict the appearance of a Contact ala Pacific Rim, this plan makes no sense from a timeline standpoint. I wonder if they had some other plan beforehand to take Cain out of the picture, like getting Ramsus to rise up as a populist hero and getting him to try and depose Cain, at which point they'd destroy each other, maybe. I don't fucking know.
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I'd assume they could have found various ways to manipulate Ramsus into killing Cain. When you're able to condition someone their entire life, not to mention control all aspects of the society he lives in, it really shouldn't be too hard to find a way. Fei was just the most convenient, once he appeared.
I think Ramsus being an artificial contact was a lie told so that Cain wouldn't suspect the truth of Ramsus' purpose?
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Yes, Krelian explicitly mentions that Cain is told that Ramsus is an artificial Contact project when he is in reality a clone of him (while talking to Miang when she's in the body of Fei's mother).
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The most Xenogears line ever, that.
MK2: Picked this up again. I still can't read a lot of the text, but it's playable enough in a technical sense if I sit close and squint. The actual game so far is somewhere between really fucking awful and DQ7. Hopefully it'll pick up some! (Late C1 so still early, but whoof.)
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Yes, Krelian explicitly mentions that Cain is told that Ramsus is an artificial Contact project when he is in reality a clone of him (while talking to Miang when she's in the body of Fei's mother).
You'd think Cain would have noticed at some point that the leader of his military looks absolutely nothing like the Contact, who he has met four times at this point and always looks exactly the same. And if he's a clone, he probably looks a lot like Cain himself. That should probably have raised some warning bells, so I guess I don't really feel that bad for Cain if he was this easy to trick. I mean, holy shit if nothing else "military leader who rose from unknown origins and advocates social change for the disenfranchised" is like instant rebellion, so I'd be taking a real close look at the guy even if it was only to make sure he wasn't up to any bullshit. There's SO MANY FUCKING WARNING SIGNS on this dude, Cain. Maybe you didn't know he was going to chop your head off with a sword but he was CLEARLY going to replace you and become New Emperor.
Between that and Ramsus' and Fei's ages not lining up, I have to admit that as much as I like the Ramsus sub-plot it has some problems with its details.
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BD: robots punching everyone in the face nooooooooooo
XG: I always thought that Ramsus was *both* a clone of Cain and an artificial Contact project.... but I haven't played the game in awhile. So it was something like:
* Ramsus is created, but if he was supposed to be the !Contact from birth, it didn't work. However since there's clearly some point they give up hope and call him -trash-, perhaps they planned on giving him some techno-mystic ceremony to make him the Contact later?
* Except Fei is born, so now Ramsus can't be the Contact, because there can only be one or something. He's *genuinely* thrown away as worthless (except by Miang) because Gazel r dum.
* If Fei is killed, then Ramsus can achieve his true potential and *become* the Contact. Or at least try to become the Contact. Let's fight! (As far as warped religious references, this isn't entirely crazy either, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adoptionism , maybe they can stick the Contact soul in him. I dunno.).
* Of course, even if he became the artificial Contact, Elly wouldn't exist for him, because there's that line about how no Antitype would exist for a fake that merely tapped into the Contact powers. You will never find true happiness, what you going to do, cry about it? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KIVeyTG9KB0)
Possible this is all wrong, but that was my take, at least!
Anyway, knowing XG, the surprising thing is more that they didn't try and make a giant robot the artificial Contact, so hey, "male human" is a step closer to Fei comparatively.
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Some of that stuff is actually explained by the game (the artificial Contact stuff is just a lie they feed Cain, for instance) but don't beat yourself up over it. Trying to remember the minutia of a game's plot that you played years ago is normally hard, and when it's XG, it's basically impossible.
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If Ramsus looking like Cain would arouse suspicions, it would presumably be an easy thing on the bad guys' part to change his appearance. Changing a few genes connected to that is small fry compared to the molecular engineering we see Krelian engage in otherwise.
BD: robots punching everyone in the face nooooooooooo
The automatons are the most badass boss nobody ever talks about. Maybe it's an HM thing.
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I thought they emphasized he was an identical copy, and hence, was the "perfect human" like Cain was. But again, xenogears.
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Ramsus originally don't even have a definitely physical form. He is a blob of goo. He for a clear cut human like physical body from the man he hi-jacked the body from.
Naturally, he won't look the same as either Cain or Fei.
Miang came up with the idea to use Fei to piss off Ramsus when she was pregnant with Fei. During that time, Ramsus is still a goo in the tube.
Speaking of being dense, Gazel is pretty bad too. Not realizing something is wrong when Krelian is turning human into Wels with his nanomachines. When that should not have happened at all until they activate the Lesser Key of Gaetia. It is more than obvious that Krelian is trying to overpower them and make them obsolete so he can kill them, which he had always wanted to do for the past 500 years.
(Krelian managed to cover most of the function the Key and Gazel would serve by using his own nanomachine, the only thing he can't do it himself is to have Deus' program shift into the final phase of the resurrection process, which is a function assigned specifically to Cain and Gazel.)
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Yeah, i remember there being some implication that Ramsus was in his weird fetal phase for, like, YEARS and then rapid aged to adulthood once he was trashed. Actually eating the original Kharan clears that up nicely.
Also that function of the Gaetia Key explains a whole lot. Krel can mimic basically any function of Deus, but his being unable to actually interface with Deus and turn it 'on' so to speak definitely makes bunches of sense.
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FF13 - Chapter 10! Beat down Bahamut.
Trails in the Sky - Started this! Cute little game so far.
Romancing Saga 3 - Also started this.
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I know it's odd considering the Ramsus sub-plot is probably my favorite part of XG, but the Gazel are probably the worst. They're literally non-stop talking about XG's batshit cosmology and nothing else. It probably doesn't help them be distinct in your memory that they're a bunch of different dudes in a computer when you really only need one character to fill that role (hence why nobody ever refers to them by their individual names).
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I'm not 100% they have individual names in fact. I mean you assume, Xenogears and all, but...
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Bravely Default - Got the first ending. The writing at this point is all over the place, but, well, the scene where the villain pretends to be mind-controlled to mess with Agnes' head is absolutely wonderful. The fight was easy, and the ending was... really boring though.
I'm not really certain where to go from here. While Bravely Default is certainly a good game, I'm now at nearly 70 hours and running out of steam for it. I gather that in order to get the second ending I'll have to beat the crystal guardians two more times each. Which... they're pretty fun, well-designed bosses at base, but fighting each one five times? C'mon game. I skipped all the blue exclamation marks in C5-6 (except those that unlocked jobs, naturally) after some investigation of C5's made them appear very boring/repetitive but I gather they get more interesting? But not sure how much energy I'll have for drawing out the game further... hmm. Any advice for what I should do with the rest of this playthrough, folks?
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The sidequests start being team fights in chapter 7, yes. The mandatory bosses don't do anything interesting though until Finale.
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Kaptain Brawe: A Brawe New World - played through
Short - short to the extent that at the point the game feels like it's really starting, it's actually half over (or even a bit further).
Puzzles are more noticeably contrived than preferable, and there's at least one time where you need to do something completely unrelated to what you're trying to do in order to become able to continue.
The ending is kind of terrible.
Professor Layton Vs. Phoenix Wright - played through the maingame and special episode 1
Fine?
It's not exactly the worst of both worlds, but I do kinda feel like it's the worst Phoenix Wright game. I don't think it's the worst Professor Layton game... but that's not really much of a selling point.
Anyone who's a big fan of Professor Layton's puzzles could well be disappointed... there are only 70 in the maingame, and none of them are particularly challenging. Special Episode 1 has one extra puzzle in it, so the future Special Episodes are probably going to have extra puzzles as well... if they're all just one-per episode, though, that's not a lot. There isn't a bunch of bonus puzzles like in regular Professor Layton games.
Being able to repeat the same presses in Phoenix Wright has always been a conceit I've typically been able to handle... but the gimmicks in this game require you to repeat presses and end up drawing too much attention to what's happening, and I found it fairly annoying.
They broke the save system for some reason? Saving in court, at least, does not save at exactly the point you save - it saves you at the most recent of a string of invisible checkpoints they've strewn throughout the system, which are often after successful actions. It's disheartening to make a successful presentation against a testimony, read through a couple of minutes of dialogue, save before an in-line question, then re-load the save for whatever reason and find that you were saved right after selecting the evidence you were presenting.
Further, there's at least one scenario late in the game where you need to present multiple times within the same testimony and there are no checkpoints between them. So you present the first thing correctly, save, present the second thing incorrectly, reload, present the second thing correctly... and you have no way of knowing that you haven't actually presented the first thing any more, so you end up having no idea what else the game could possibly want you to do within this testimony, and start presenting everything to every testimony. And when you reload as part of that, all the rest of the things you correctly presented that testimony also never happened any more... I ended up spending a hint coin to see what the heck it wanted from me, and when I found it was pointing out things that I had already done and had saved after...
Storywise it's a little disappointing that a mystery from early in the game never ends up being resolved. I'm holding out hope that there's going to be a special episode which covers it, but it seems somewhat of a weird oversight if none of them do.
Zacharias Barnham is pretty bland for a prosecutor, sadly.
The Walking Dead Season 1 - played through the maingame and 400 Days
Pretty great.
Results-wise, and I'm not sure how much of the late-game results are foregone conclusions or not given that they seemingly don't have to worry about dealing with continuity: I dropped Ben down the tower in episode 4, teamed up with Omid & Christa for episode 5, Kenny died saving Christa after him and Omid thought that Lee wouldn't need any help to pull her up, Omid and Christa survived. For 400 Days, everyone went with Tavia except Shel & Rebecca.
I wouldn't want to replay it to see how different choices are wrangled any time soon, but it was interesting comparing my experience to the one my brother had.
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Four failed no-death runs. I am running out of names for my characters. And I still haven't beaten the Sentry or Pursuer. This is not going well.
I'm not sure I actually want shields or huge weapons. I struggled against the Dragonrider last time with both. Dragonrider. Most deaths comes from getting ganked (or surprised) so shields might not be a huge help.
Meanwhile, huge weapons mean huge recovery times.
I'll try archery out. Low stat requirements (so I can invest in defensive stats), and range.
Or pyromancy?
The best per-hit damage I've got out of bows is with the Dragonrider Bow. 40 STR/DEX and +5 upgraded it puts out 400-something attack power, which is better than you can get out of quite a lot of melee weapons. You could probably go in with minimum stat investments and it'd still be pretty good. It's slow to fire though, so I don't imagine it great for anything but sniping and trying it on bosses would just be pain. Probably your best bet is Hunter's Blackbow, just pump DEX (STR requirement is negligible) to get some fast, reliable single-element damage and you can put everything else into durability.
Of course, you get that well into the game (Drangleic Castle) and you'll have to rely on the shortbow until then. Shortbow you can't even get until unlocking Lenigrast's shop! Would advise against making any of them elemental, anyway--I spent a chunk of yesterday knocking out some odds and ends on my various files to set them up for NG+ whenever that happens, and during way too much time spent sniping through Shrine of Amana to pick up missed items it became painfully apparent just how inferior elemental bows are to regular ones even with 55 INT or FTH to jack up the scaling. My original character can shoot down the priestesses from a million miles away before they attack. Everyone else has to play hide and seek. Ugh.
Pyro damage is honestly pretty uninspiring outside of the top-tier spells. Even with no investment in mental stats you can explode stuff pretty effectively with Flame Swathe/Lingering Flame/Firestorm, but charges are very limited and you're not getting most of that stuff until after the Sentinels.
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Sorc run complete. Dynamic duo exploded with gratifying ease. Ended up running a mix of high-end pyromancies for max destructive power and sorceries for gunning down mooks. Worked out pretty well by the end but for the occasional confusion of shuffling through like eight different spells.
Brought my melee girl back to Freja's room to check out mystery rock and yeah, it is another memory zone. Not much there but a corpse though! And 1x Ancient Dragon Soul. Makes a sword that would look pretty cool if I actually had the materials to upgrade it. Anyway I still don't get why mystery rock appeared in my original game but no others.
Also finally remembered to clear out the salamander room in the Forest. So that's where the Hawk Ring was hiding all the fucking game! And man those have gotta be the most irritating enemies in the game right there. At least I can one-shot 'splosion zombies.
Man why is Vendrick's soul hiding in an obscure corner of a zone you cleared hours before finding him.
Dual-wieldy mode now engaged, ran up just far enough to dump a bunch of levels into DEX and actually access power stance. It's actually pretty satisfying so far! I'm running dual falchions, dumped all the immediately available titanite into making them both +3 and the damage output is actually very impressive for earlygame. And perhaps more importantly, it looks cool. Not sure what weapon setup I'm looking at long-term. Warped Sword seems pretty cool, but more investment into STR than I'd like. OH WAIT maybe I want to dual-wield the great scythe just because seriously you guys. Also apparently ADP isn't the stat that boosts poison effectiveness, that's just all DEX? Whatever, I'll probably jack it up to 40 anyway just because I don't care about levels once DEX is optimized.
Had a host for an early summoning run for the Pursuer fight right outside the Cardinal Tower bonfire. Shockingly, all three of us survived. 17,000 souls is very nice to have right out of the gate. And his Darth Vader breathing is actually kind of creepy without any music playing.
I'm just now noticing that Lenigrast hangs around all forlorn outside his shop until you unlock it. I always thought he just kind of appeared out of the ether, like he had some mystical smith sense that told him a shop had been opened somewhere!
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Bravely Default - Got the first ending. The writing at this point is all over the place, but, well, the scene where the villain pretends to be mind-controlled to mess with Agnes' head is absolutely wonderful. The fight was easy, and the ending was... really boring though.
I'm not really certain where to go from here. While Bravely Default is certainly a good game, I'm now at nearly 70 hours and running out of steam for it. I gather that in order to get the second ending I'll have to beat the crystal guardians two more times each. Which... they're pretty fun, well-designed bosses at base, but fighting each one five times? C'mon game. I skipped all the blue exclamation marks in C5-6 (except those that unlocked jobs, naturally) after some investigation of C5's made them appear very boring/repetitive but I gather they get more interesting? But not sure how much energy I'll have for drawing out the game further... hmm. Any advice for what I should do with the rest of this playthrough, folks?
BD spoilers, ofc:
It's... sort of your call, overall. The team fights and dialogue in C7 are pretty entertaining, and if challenging boss fights would revitalize your interest the C7/C8 fights stand the best chance.
If you want targeted suggestions for boss fights that are either really entertaining or have bosses with newer skillsets than what you've seen...
C7 Yulyana's house has a fight with Mephilia that has a different summon she uses; minor but interesting.
C7 Florem Gardens/ whatever they're called has an amusing pre-battle and post-battle discussion, complete with Ringabel's notes.
C7 Ominas Crowe is probably one of the best fights he gets, thanks to the second form having both MT 2HKO and ST OHKO and having two support units backing him up.
C7, where the team got jailed up back in C4, has an optional boss fight including DeRosa that has nice speed+ items. Not necessary but nice.
C8... the main thing of interest as far as challenging boss fights is probably the final gauntlet, but you need to beat all the other blue !s before that shows up. It's a really fun gauntlet IMO but who knows where you'll fall on it. (I'd not recommend the boss rush that shows up after the gauntlet either way - a fun challenge but if you're burning out that'd get frustrating as hell).
And if none of this sounds appealing, just rush to the true final. It's worth seeing just for the ham, IMO, and you're not really that far away.
Agreed, though - fighting the crystal guardians 5 times is probably the worst part. They're fun, twice, maybe, and then...
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You can skip the sentinels. Beat pursuer -> Get key in Lost Bastille, beat sentry -> Open door in the other side of Lost Bastille, use the pharros lockstone here -> Voila.
I am so doing that. I'm also obviously skipping the chariot boss everytime.
Unlocking Lenigrast's shop is not a problem at all with anyone really. You can do it in like 5 minutes!
But I've been rolling with a cleric and the dex requirement for bows is too steep. I've tried using a light crossbow instead but they're terrible.
The other class that seems good for this challenge is bandit (they have ultra-low ADP and INT, so they're good if you don't want to use these stats), and they start with one bow already.
Pyromancy is a bit late, unlike Dark Souls 1, you get it after the sentry and only with a boring spell. So I've been using my good old Mace (+5) and pumped Vigor to 50. Beaten four bosses so far. I'm eating all these boss souls instead of letting them rot in the inventory. Yay!
The low charges for pyromancy might be a bit of a problem buuut storebought amber herbs?
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I know it's odd considering the Ramsus sub-plot is probably my favorite part of XG, but the Gazel are probably the worst. They're literally non-stop talking about XG's batshit cosmology and nothing else. It probably doesn't help them be distinct in your memory that they're a bunch of different dudes in a computer when you really only need one character to fill that role (hence why nobody ever refers to them by their individual names).
The game rather deliberately doesn't want you to tell them apart, I think. I actually kind of like them (writing-wise): I hate the Gazel Ministry because they're so ridiculously arrogant. They cause unspeakable suffering to the world in search of their goal and they're aware that they are doing it, but they think that it's their right so who cares about everyone else (heck, they take a step further - they feel everyone else should be happy to give their existence to help the Gazel achieve their manifest destiny). I actually think them being a group instead of a single character works well: they've reinforced each other's arrogance by acting as an echo chamber for each other, something that certainly happens in real life!
I also like the Wild Arms 4 congressional knights cabal and (for a less evil example) the Zexen Council of S3 for similar reasons.
(They could stand to be less cryptic, I'll agree there, although at least on replays it's almost always obvious what they're talking about.)
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Trails in the Sky - Mmm. I am not feeling the game's writing so far -- too much of the dialogue seems to revolve around people telling the main character what a sack of crap she is and how much better her amazing brother is. And then my dad shows up on my rescue mission to also inform me of what a stupid, no-good putz I am? Followed by Joshua giving a pep talk of how Estelle is stupid and no-good but she shouldn't abandon her dreams because that is stupid too?? Man, living with these two assholes must have been a real joy.
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I vaguely remember talking about those councils of ministries of old dudes, and saying what's always boring about them is waiting for the inevitable more ambitious / intelligent Caesar type to backstab them.
Or, if they're on the "good" side, waiting for the ambitious/intelligent Caesar type to totally ruin their shit.
Dark Souls 2: FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
Ok instead I'm doing a Level 1 challenge: Learn to stop worrying and love the firebomb.
Here is a list of all the weapons I can wield in one hand:
- Dagger
6 in every stat also means I can't use any spell until I get a Ring of the South, so this challenge is going to be a hell of a lot harder than in Dark Souls 1.
Pretty much all my souls are going towards attack items.
Kunais are pretty awesome for, uh, the first dungeon. Totally destroyed the white dude there. I need to check if I can aim them with the binoculars.
I hope those infinite fire/magicbombs stay decent for a long while because my only other real offense is this club+3, and I have no shield and no HP.
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I vaguely remember talking about those councils of ministries of old dudes, and saying what's always boring about them is waiting for the inevitable more ambitious / intelligent Caesar type to backstab them.
Or, if they're on the "good" side, waiting for the ambitious/intelligent Caesar type to totally ruin their shit.
This actually doesn't happen in S3! (Despite there being a Caesar there! Thank you, I'll be here all week.)
The complaint is fair I think, although it's far from the only trope which has a fairly predictable outcome (e.g. if your dad is your enemy, he will die but do something noble to help you before he does). And the XG/WA4 "backstabs" do happen for very different reasons, at least.
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I don't have a problem with going to extreme lengths in the narrative to completely dehumanise the Gazel ministry. Especially when the villain cast already has people that they do go to lengths to be people you interact with directly that act as personal" antagonists to varying degrees (Ramsus, Grahf, Miang goooood, Krellian baaaaaad) and having a significantly more alien presence that actually impacts rather than being a force of nature like Deus has value.
Also its neat to parallel how much they actively seek that power and ultimately try to emulate it (start humans and ultimately become a meld of mechanical and organic things) where based on other discussion here Deus/Zohar/whateverthefuck functions as a mix of organic and mechanical components (however ultimately are distinctly separate instead of merged like Gazel). Their approach isn't working and ends up not working. What they really needed to do was ?!??!?!?!? whatever the fuck Krellian did that worked fuck knows what it was any more. I sure as shit am not going to replay XG just to try and remember. That is what elves are for.
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DS2: Man this weekend the game's just all can it wait? From's in the middle of some calibrations here.
FENRIR. Have you tried Wolverine mode. It is definitely a thing.
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So, I got RS3. Which quest should I do first???? Snoooow!
Which PC's your starter? The game's really bad at transparency!
Anyhow, first you want to open up access to cities. First, do to Pidona and take the ship to a couple cities. I recommend opening access to Lance by taking a ship to Zweig then a boat to Justerm. Talk to everybody in Justerm and then they'll tell you where Lance is. -There-, you start the Highwaymen's Den quest (talk to some guy offering money to take some goods to some place, accept and fight the thieves until they start running from you. Then, grab one and ask for info, they'll tell you where the Highwaymen's Den is), which is good for giving you some weapon levels and basic skills, along with moving forward Paul's recruitment quest. Besides that, going to Pidona be a good idea, since you can recruit a few desirable people (Nora, eventually Sharl, Thomas for an early healer with decent stats) and pick up a smithy or two. In Pidona, you can rescue Muse's kid off the bat, so you may as well. You also may want to pick up the Professor's pets in the forest near Zweig, but that's kinda tricky. At first, you mostly want to do the Pidona quests and open up access to cities. Once you're done, doing Justerm's lake quest is a decent idea. You're mostly building up your money, opening your map and bulking your party for the first quarter of the game.
Another quest you can do this early: second go at delivering goods, now to Yamas, then recruiting Robin at that same town. I'd recommend recruiting Fat Robin instead of Slim Robin (you just refuse Slim Robin until Fat Robin shows up at the dock in the same town) at that point: both Robins start with good stats, but Fat Robin starts with Screwdriver, which is a very potent (and hard to learn) Epee tech for the early game.
EDIT: Also, for Elfboy, I'd just rush for the end at this point regarding Bravely Default. The refights start getting interesting at C7, but I always felt the asterisk refights felt more like a replay thing than anything else.
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I've already beat Wolverine mode in DS1 (fist weapon only challenge, I mostly used double claws)
But dual wielding claws in DS2 sounds interesting....
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Claws look like they'll have more range than Caestus at least. Lower scaling though.
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The scaling is baaaad. Like you might manage some unimpressive 200ish attack power at 40 DEX. But the moveset you guys! Spin spin~ Bleed rating is also very high for what that's worth. Higher than my maxed falchions! Which maybe occasionally trigger the status against other PCs on a full combo (this kills almost everything outright anyway).
DS2 either isn't very good at making it obvious when you get status to land or status never lands. Every now and then I see random extra large numbers pop up on people I slash repeatedly, so I assume that's bleed triggering...but there's no blatant MASSIVE HEMORRHAGE indicator that I've seen. I also made some poison rapiers and have tried prodding stuff with them but have yet to see the status apparently connect (and the damage is outright terrible even at +9). I should've gone with poison whips but I figured rapiers would hit faster.
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Bleed doesn't actually do a giant HP splash like in DS1. It just halves Stamina and reduces its regeneration rate. Normal enemies are stupidly resistant to poison but it had some use against the Traitor at least.
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FF Dimensions: Finished! I ended up liking it a lot, although part of that was definitely because I FAQed the location of the Moogle Charm and used it to turn off almost all random encounters from Avalon Castle forward (they were replaced with grinding near save points). Will probably at least take a stab at the superbosses.
Party:
Glaive: Mastered Black Mage, White Mage and Magus. Final class was Magus with White Magic L7 and Magic Font.
Dusk: Mastered Black Mage and Seer, with extended dips in White Mage and Bard. Final class was Seer with Magic Font, MND+20% and a filler fourth ability. Got a lot of mileage out of Hastega.
Sol: Mastered Paladin and Fighter, with an extended dip into Red Mage (basically the first half of the game). Final class was Paladin with Doublehand and Magic Sword.
Nacht: Mastered Dark Knight and Fighter, with dips in Ranger, Thief and Ninja. Final class was Dark Knight with STR+20%, Backliner and Battle Arts.
Sarah: Mastered Monk and Fighter, reached level 19 in Thief, took a brief Dragoon dip. Final class was Fighter with STR+20%, VIT+20%, SPD+10% and HP+20%. Mostly she hit things with Final Heaven and healed with White Wind.
Generally I just got War Cry, Mighty Guard and Hastega going and then smacked things with Final Heaven, elemental swords, Meteor, Holy and Smash.
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Yeah, I think the game generally gets better as it goes on. A lot of the first half is a little on the dull side (though better than say TAY'S first half).
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Bravely Default - And finally beaten. What the hell was that post-game movie?
Anyhow, it could've been a 10/10 game, but holy heck does it start running after its own tail after a point. It's still an interesting idea with a few laudable execution high points and it never gets embarrassing - just meandering. Meanwhile, gameplay-wise, it's just about one of the best FF-style job system games I've played ever. Overall, really good experience, would replay. 8/10 works.
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Conversational game mechanics and sequel spoilers! I thought it was kinda obvious myself.
Alternatively, it's basically like the secret movie at the end of any given Kingdom Hearts game. Random bullshit designed to seem cool that will somehow make less sense once the associated game actually comes out.\
Also: meta meta meta~
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BD: *learns Obliterate*
Ho-lee fuck. Yeah, be right back, I'm going to max out all jobs for all characters in a day or less.
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Bravely Default - And finally beaten. What the hell was that post-game movie?
Anyhow, it could've been a 10/10 game, but holy heck does it start running after its own tail after a point. It's still an interesting idea with a few laudable execution high points and it never gets embarrassing - just meandering. Meanwhile, gameplay-wise, it's just about one of the best FF-style job system games I've played ever. Overall, really good experience, would replay. 8/10 works.
Player is god. Airy's sister kept Tiz alive and let the player be control to screw with Airy's evil plan.
I wonder, what's your reaction when the last boss does that "Look! The celestial realm!"
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OH WHAT THE FUCK I'M LAUGHING SO DAMNED HARD
EDIT: It really does drive the point further home in how the whole last boss shenanigan was utterly unnecessary from a writing standpoint, though.
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Bleed doesn't actually do a giant HP splash like in DS1. It just halves Stamina and reduces its regeneration rate. Normal enemies are stupidly resistant to poison but it had some use against the Traitor at least.
So you can't even tell when bleed takes effect and therefore are not in a position to take advantage of it when it does. As for poison, well, I tried poking Smelter Demon a dozen times or so with my poison rapiers and never saw the status take hold. So yeah, prepared to state that status weapons are flat out worthless. That was a waste of titanite.
Fortunately even without the status being relevant falchion power stance puts out pretty outstanding damage...until I suddenly run into something that resists slashing damage. Hello gargoyles, I can't kill one of you before the third spawns and so on. And practically speaking I've already hit optimal melee damage output. I uh might just have to come back for this later with pyromancy.
EDIT: I also messed around a little with the Brotherhood of Blood. Immediately becomes apparent why you see so few red phantom invasions in this game (something I obviously don't mind): the consumable required for invasions is available in highly limited quantity. The covenant leader doesn't sell them, the amount found in the game appears minimal, and the only reliable way to find them is to duel other covenant members. You've got to kill people to kill people, folks. So basically red phantoms don't invade you much because they're too busy killing each other (and the sheer nastiness of the boss you have to beat to enter the covenant + the way soul memory works basically ensures that nothing like DS1 Undead Parish's plague of overpowered low-level invaders is likely to happen here).
Also the covenant-specific pyromancies apparently require like hundreds of kills. What in the fuck.
Oh well, got my red soapstone out of it so at least I can try getting summoned by the Looking Glass Knight later.
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The main enemy I tried poison against(the pyro-sickle guys in Lost Bastille) were almost always dead before I got it to land. And they have a bunch of HP and the Poisons Casetus damage itself was lower than usual. Maybe if I used two Poison it'd land faster but eyyyyy. Even in PVP just going Normal+10 was better. At least you can just switch the element over or downgrade it entirely and keep the upgrade level.
Hilariously the piggies in Majula drop Red Eye Orbs. Get to farming!
Is the Chariot really that hard? I busted him pretty soundly myself.
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I found the run up to him problematic. Depending on when the necros rez, it can get super annoying.
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Chariot is very hard with a mage type who can't kill the skeletons quickly and reliably. A mage with a dagger for example. You just stay in that tiny safe place to not get rolled over by the chariot, but get shredded by the skeletons instead.
That extremely nice person from the blood covenant sells unlimited cracked red eye orbs in NG+. They just didn't want invasions to punish new players as much as in the other Souls games. You get juuust enough cracked red eye orbs in NG, I feel.
SL1 challenge is proceeding smoothly. Pursuer, Sentry dead. 5 or so deaths only so far.
My main weapon is a Mace +5, but I want to eventually upgrade a large sword and a crossbow too. Kunais are so cool! I'm also already using the Ring of Life protection because I just don't know what to do with all these souls.
My character is pretty cool. Slim, shirtless, with a mustache. He was supposed to be black, but I'm not sure you can actually do a realistic black person in Souls. He just looks really tan.
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I got a pretty decently Africanish of mixed descent kinda face and skintone for dual-wield girl with enough plugging away at random generation. Was really surprised the default chargen options for that were so reduced from DS1 actually (I mean, I know most players spend all their time in armor and don't even see their character's actual body, but still).
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Pokemon X: All Starter Playthrough! Just got to camphrier town and all but one of my Pokemon have evolved to stage 2!
Rules for this thematic playthrough:
-All Pokemon must be one of the main 18 starters (obvious)
-Pikachu IS allowed to be used to fill slot #6 before you get to Lumiose City, because he's technically a starter. I mostly did this to have a team of 6 for the first Gym, and the last Starter is gotten in Lumiose. As soon as the Kanto starter is gotten, Pikachu is banned.
-One of each Region, so all 6 primary regions are represented
-2 of each primary typing as well.
-Kalos and Kanto starter are the ones given to you; this prevents inflated EXP shenanigans
-EXP Share turned off. This is doubly important since 4 of my 6 Pokemon are traded in via Pokebank
-No Hidden Abilities; this is kind of a random rule but I'm sticking to it!
My choices as a result are...
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/656.png)
Main Starter, he's the ONLY FAST WATER STARTER IN THE SERIES! That kind of gives him a huge leg up on the other 5. To top it off, he eventually gets Dark typing for a second STAB, which is unique to him as far as starters go.
As for the other two? Chesnaught's angle can be covered by others, and STAB Fighting is stupid easy to come by in Starters. Delphox I used in previous game and while STAB Psychic is neat, it's not essential.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/004.png)
Technically last one I got due to him being gotten legit in Lumiose, but I digress. I could give a bunch of reasons why I chose Charmander, but ultimately, there's only one reason that really needs to be cited:
He is the only Starter that can learn Fly. That alone sort of makes him a big deal.
If it weren't for Fly, I could see a compelling cast for Venusaur vs. Charizard, as Charizard has probably the best Mega but Venusaur has sleep; Blastoise is easiest to replace.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/393.png)
On top of being Piplup, thereby invalidating all arguments, it also has Steel typing which is bad ass, and STAB Steel moves are actually helpful for taking down pesky fairies. Him and Venusaur are the only ones really suited for that and Venusaur competes with Charizard.
Realistically, I could have chosen any of the Gen 4 starters and been content because, like Gen 6, they're all pretty good and unique, but when it comes down to it, Infernape's areas are easier to cover than Empoleon; Torterra would be potential, but decided to go with Empoleon since "never used." This one pretty much determines which Gen 2 starter I picked, though thinking on it, my Gen 3 starter could have been adjusted too, but, well...
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/252.png)
Fast Grass type with good offense. This is not something anyone else can do. Serperior is fast, but lacks offense, the other Grass types with offense are slugs, NINJA LIZARD WINS!
Like Gen 4 and Gen 6, Gen 3 sort of kicks ass for starters, so I could have been flexible here. I could have gone with Swampert and gotten a Ground STAB, and used Torterra as my Gen 4 starter, but that would leave me with 2 total slugs. Going with Sceptile, I now have only one stupid slow Pokemon from Gen 3/4, rather than two.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/498.png)
SPEAKING OF SLOW THINGS, this guy. And yet he's still faster than the slugs of Gen 3/4, go figure. We're now into the BORING starters, and I realize that I have 4 generations of fighting types and picked none of them. I have a Grass type and a Fire type left to choose from. Emboar has a dual STAB for starters, and Flame Charge to mitigate his poor speed (something other sluggish starters lack.) Serperior would kind of just be Sceptile who sits there and lets things die after a long time instead of legitimately sweeping them, thus kind of boring.
Additionally, it chooses my Gen 2 starter...
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/152.png)
It's between it and Cyndaquil, and Typhlosion has identical stats to Charizard and I want variety so screw that. Meganium is a tankier Serperior with less speed who gets Razor Leaf, and stuff like Reflect to make the rest of the team benefit from tanking more. Additionally, Emboar seems to add a niche that Typhlosion doesn't have (Fire Physicals), especially with Charizard in the mix, so there you go.
As I said, there are some options I could have gone differently, but ultimately, I feel I covered a nice array of variety in my team, both through typings, and through builds. Also, by using Charizard and having X version, I have a Pokemon who has access to 3 STABS! (...granted, Flying loses it's STAB once he Mega evolves, but SHH!)
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Xenogears sitting in a chair edition: in which lots of things happen.
Yeah, this part of the game is concentrated story-telling, which will make these writeups very long. Disc 2 is actually shorter in raw time than I remembered, which is what happens when you strip out most of the gameplay I guess!
Hour 45: The party gets the second anima relic. This one alligns with Rico's gear, as he gets his first few lines in a while. The party heads out and runs into Hammer, the latest person to be fused to a gear. He seems pretty happy with the arrangement, though... finally, he has strength and isn't just some annoying handyman! He insists that we turn over the Anima Relic and Elly. Needless to say that isn't happening. A boss fight ensues, after which Hammer dies. The game tries to sell the tragedy of the character, and indeed, you have to feel a little sorry for the guy. But at the same time it's hard to feel too sorry for him, the little murderer.
Speaking of murders: Ramsus kills Cain. This scene is surprisingly short and uneventful. Ramsus approaches the emperor, babbling that killing him will allow him to be able to beat Fei. Cain tries to activate his invincible barrier but Ramsus shuts it off because being a clone of the emperor apparently lets him do that. Krelian shows up to taunt Cain, and the emperor reacts with surprise that he would be on the same side as the Gazel. Cain demands explanations but Ramsus kills him.
The Gazel, pleased with the news, talk about they now have everything they need for their plan. All the Anima relics have no surfaced and are activated, the identity of the 'mother' is known, and Cain can't interfere any more. They use the "Gaetia Key", the effects of which become apparent quite quickly.
The human mutations, which had largely abated thanks to Taura's technology, now strike again with a renewed vengeance, as people everywhere begin mutating into spare parts for Deus. The party is spared, once again, due to being "Animus", but most others aren't so lucky, and Taura can only help them so much. Additionally, the ship "Mahanon", the paradise sought by the Gazel, rises up out of the sea... but on it is a different name, Eldridge, the name of the ship which crashed in the game's prologue. The villains moved to secure the location, their armies swollen with mutated humans who had turned into living weapons. The PCs moved to stop them, but some stuff needed taking care of first.
Namely, Fei thinks that Elly shouldn't come on the Mahanon mission. He tries to tell her it's too dangouerous which is patently ridiculous: Elly points out she has been risking her life all along and that the importance of the fight means they'll all need to commit to it. Fei then brings up a different reason: that the enemies they will be fighting will all be mutated humans, the same ones that Elly cares so deeply for. He says he doesn't believe she will be able to, and that her reluctance will endanger their mission. He says so very harshly, and Elly runs off in tears.
The party chastises Fei for acting so thoughtlessly and tell him to go talk to Elly, so he does. There he gives Elly another reason for why he didn't want her to come: that people look to her as a leader and that she shouldn't endanger herself. Elly seems to agree that this is reasonable, but reveals she is very scared of losing Fei, and also talks about her (prophetic) fears that she may never see Fei again, that she fears being torn apart and becoming someone she isn't. The two talk a bit about their shared experiences, the similar things they have gone through and how yes, they've both figured out they love each other very much. Fei cites Elly as his reason he has been able to suppress Id, his reason to survive and return, and promises her he will do that. They kiss, end scene.
The game implies at this point that they (gasp) have sex. I could rant here about my annoyance that this hardly ever seems to happen in games even though it is an important part of human relationships and how it makes the medium seem juvenile that it can hardly ever deal with it in ways that aren't tacky, but I think I did that back when the game showed Ramsus and Miang in bed so I won't do it again.
There's a scene with Elly and Margie as they resign themselves to being left behind, and not enjoying it. This scene makes me a bit uncomfortable as the game seems to want to justify Fei's (and Bart's, but Margie doesn't have combat skills so it makes more sense) behaviour on its own right, that "hey you should stay behind because you're my girlfriend and you shouldn't be in danger now excuse me I'll throw MYSELF into danger" is acceptable. I mean, the other two reasons Fei gave are fine! Don't justify that first one!
Anyhow, Fei and company reach Mahanon. This is clearly another dungeon that isn't, as it is reduced to a boss fight against Deus, the creature seen in the game's opening, but now mostly rotted away. They defeat it and locate the ship's computer, which is needlessly mystic-looking to fit with it being called the "Wisdom of God". In it, they learn that Deus was an planet-destroying weapons system, complete with the ability to create "angels" to be its army (which seems to be in line with what the Gaetia Key has been doing to humans). They also learn about the Zohar, the power source of the system, but before they can learn more they get interrupted. By a bunch of soldiers, AND Krelian, AND Miang, AND Grahf. Well fuck.
The party tries to keep the villains from reaching the computer, but Grahf plot-kills them. Grahf is extremely disappointed in Fei, telling him he has become a wuss, nothing like the assassin he raised for so many years. But now Fei is his again, and he will turn him back into the Slayer of God he needs... but Krelian interrupts him and says that he wants to use Fei as bait to capture Elly. Grahf acquiesces to Krelian's wishes, which based on what I know about the character doesn't make much sense, but perhaps he feels he can't fight off him and Miang and a whole bunch of weapons loyal to them at once? I may also just not understand his motivation here... we'll see.
The villains take the gears of the party and crucify them. Yeah, I don't know either. The best part of course is that Chu-Chu is one of the ones crucified (and it's not just to be "complete", there are only four PCs shown in this scene and Chu-Chu is one, so it's a rather deliberate winking at the player not to take this symbolism too seriously). Elly, meanwhile, receives word that if she comes to meet Krelian and Miang alone, her friends will be spared. Her soldiers rightfully question this and point out that it's a trap, to which Elly essentially responds with "duh", but insists on doing it because love makes you do these things. As far as Elly is concerned, trading her own life for Fei's is worthwhile, let alone the rest of her friends as well.
At the meeting place, Krelian agrees to hold his end of the bargain only if Elly defeats two of his man-machine fusion gears. The party tries to tell her not to, but Elly accepts, and a boss fight (which you don't control, possibly because they didn't code Elly's omnigear?) ensues, against Rattan (hey it's that guy who was observing the party's meeting with Emeralda) and Mugwort. Elly appears to be defeated as the two are very powerful, but eventually achieves some sort of awakened Ether-channeling state and utterly destroys them both. Krelian is pleased, as this confirms beyond a doubt that Elly is the "mother" needed for the Deus-awakening plans. Unfortunately for Elly she doesn't have the power to do those crazy attacks any more so the remaining troops are able to overwhelm her and she is captured. He does, however, let the rest of the party go. The party wonders if he has some darker purpose for doing so, but I'm pretty sure it's just because of his weird "love" for Sophia (which the game hasn't actually revealed yet).
Even Grahf lets Fei go, having now decided Fei is too pathetic to be worth his time. He seems extremely upset that Fei allowed Elly to be captured, revealing some definite friction between him and the other two villains.
Speaking of friction between the villains, Krelian does what some of us have been waiting for someone to do for a long, long time. The Gazel ministry crow that all their plans have fallen into place, to which their "loyal follower" replies by removing all the memory circuits from the computer in which they live. This scene is great. They splutter about HOW DARE YOU BETRAY US and WE WERE TO BECOME GOD which just earns them Krelian's mockery. The last surviving ones, clinging to life, say that they, as the Animus, are needed to resurrect Deus, but Krelian is confident that their descendants can be used instead. The last of the Gazel's screens shuts off.
Hour 46: Fei sits in despair about how he couldn't beat Grahf or protect Elly. Wiseman shows up and opines about the fact that Fei couldn't beat Grahf because he wasn't sure of his own feelings, unlike Grahf who was very sure of his own (hateful) ones. He also observes that Elly's strong feelings for him had allowed her to impossibly defeat the two super-gears and save his life. He observes that Fei still has one more chance: the villains' plans are not complete, so it is Fei's turn to save the one he loves.
In two weeks, Krelian and Miang had been building a new ship for Deus, called Merkava, using a combination of data from the Eldridge's computer and nanotechnology. Now it was almost ready. The party regroups and assults it, for yet another dungeon that isn't a dungeon. On the way, they meet the Elements. Dominia by now has figured out everything: that Miang and Krelian manipulated Ramsus into killing the Emperor, wrecking his psyche in the process. She announces her intention to save Ramsus from those two.
In Merkava, the party comes face to face with Ramsus, who has a new omnigear, Amphysvena. He believes he can finally beat Fei! Fei wonders why Ramsus is so obsessed with him, and the latter explains that it is because Fei's existence ruined all of his prospects in life. There is a flashback to when Ramsus was a fetus growing in a vat, and he watched Krelian talking with a dark-haired woman, Karen. Karen asked about Ramsus, and Krelian revealed that the emperor had been told it was an artificial contact (implying, I would say, that it isn't). Karen asks if the creature can hear them, and upon that being confirmed, proposes disposing of it. In hindsight this order makes it quite transparent what her game is. She says that her son, Fei will fulfill all the needs they have, and that this creature, Ramsus, is worthless trash. She turns to Ramsus, saying "Chase after it, boy. A love that's unattainable, no matter how hard you try to pursue it."
There's all sorts of evidence in the scene that Karen is, of course, Miang: a woman conspiring with Krelian with an extremely cruel streak and already in the process of manipulating Ramsus, but the game doesn't explain how Miang could be Fei's mother. Coming soon!
Fei of course is stunned by the revelation that his mother is some sort of supervillain responsible for Ramsus' insanity. Dominia appears and appeals to her commander, saying that his story makes it even clearer that Krelian and Miang have manipulated him into doing their bidding, and that THEY are his real enemies! Ramsus turns on her angrily, reminding that he saved her from becoming a test subject (nicely explaining how an Elru citizen ended up an elite Solarian soldier), and deciding it's time for one last fight with Fei! This is stupid and irrational but it's Ramsus. Needless to say, Miang's promise that he'll attain greater power with Cain's death was a load of shit and he is defeated one last time.
The party makes their way further into Merkava, finally reaching Krelian, Miang, and a captured Elly. Behind them is a giant creature, which is quickly revealed as Deus. Krelian announces that Elly is needed to wake the creature up, and as the party moves to save her, Miang summons her own omnigear, Opiomorph, to fight. The back-to-back fight of Amphysvena and Opiomorph has potential to be one of the game's hardest but I'm better at RPGs than I once was and beat it first try, woohoo.
Unfortunately the fight itself doesn't even mean much: the omnigear has been reinforced with nanomachines and is nearly unbeatable, while the party is fast running out of resources. Miang announces that it is time for Deus to awaken, and awaken he does, its eyes opening. It promptly sucks up all the Anima Relics from all the omnigears, depowering all of them. Miang notes that the true purpose of the Anima Relics was to attain the information of their corresponding Animus (Gazel descendant) and return it to Deus, so Deus now has that part of the system it needs to activate, the part that the Gazel thought they would be. She also reveals that Elly, as the mother, or reincarnation of the original woman created by Deus, is also an integral part, and will shortly be absorbed as well.
At this point, Ramsus straggles onto the scene. He demands to Miang to know what the purpose of his life has been. Miang tells him that, of course, there was only one purpose to his existence: it was just to kill Cain, who would oppose their goals. With Ramsus now useless to him, she savagely mocks him once more, now joining the choruses of the Gazel and Krelian, calling him useless trash, a pathetic excuse for life. Miang turns her back on him, wondering what to do with the defeated party. She decides that because they so kindly returned the Anima Relics, they can live, and instead be absorbed by Deus-
And Ramsus stabs her. You might think, for a moment, that Miang is a colossal fool for allowing him to do so. You might cheer that Ramsus finally attained is revenge. But if you think either, Miang's following line disabuses you of that notion. She thanks Ramsus, revealing that she is "not able" to kill herself, but that thanks to him, all of her wishes have come true. Just as planned? Ramsus is confused, but pulls himself together enough to kill Krelian as well.
The villains are dead, Elly is saved, and the game is over!
Fei and Billy go to untie Elly, but as they do, something very weird happens. Suddenly, Elly grabs Billy's gun, shooting Fei. As she does, her hair changes colour to an all-too-familiar purple. Has she been brainwashed?
Krelian assures them that has not happened (adding that his body is mostly nanomachines, so of course he can't be so easily killed). Elly, meanwhile, volunteers the rest of the information. With her new purple hair and villainous expression there's rather little doubt that somehow, it is Miang that is talking, however. Miang explains about Deus' history: that it was a planet-destroying weapon (which we already knew) which, as partly sentient, had destroyed a civilian planet during a test. Deemed too dangerous, it was partially disassembled and placed on board a ship to be taken to another planet where it could be examined. The sentient Deus, however, had taken over the ship, and in response the ship's captain had blown up the ship, destroying most of Deus' systems. However, they had been close enough to a planet - this planet: that the wreckage had landed on it (highly unlikely, but hey).
And once it landed on the planet, Deus had longed to rebuild itself. But it wasn't ready. So it created humans, using its core genetic material, so that they would grow and multiply and become the parts it needed to rebuild itself. Miang also reveals that, of course, the mutated humans were those spare parts, now mutating according to Deus' needs. She also reveals, though, that those before her are different, that somehow they have been reincarnated through generations, and this makes them unable to be used by Deus (a bit of a flimsy explanation for why our heroes have been spared, but best to just accept it. I could do with a bit less Xenogears reincarnation in general). Otherwise, though, all human evolution has been guided to the perfect parts for Deus, and Krelian was able to accelerate the process even further, his nanomachines compensating for any deficiencies the creature might have. Now, Deus will be the ultimate weapon.
Fei wonders how "Elly" can know all of this, to which point she responds that she is Miang, the creature born to guide people towards the resurrection of Deus. She has existed throughout human history, always guiding people on the path that Deus needed. Humans are Deus' creation, and in the DNA of all women is the ability to become a host body for Miang. And now Miang is in control of the last body needed for Deus' resurrection. All of her wishes have come true, indeed. Miang announces that she is done talking, that it is time for the resurrection of Deus. All that is left for her to do is wipe out the remaining humans on the planet.
Citan demands to know why she would do that. Miang merely offers a shrug, suggesting that this is part of Deus', and therefore her, programming, a reminder that ultimately the villain of this world, this "god", is just an extremely powerful but ultimately artificially intelligent machine. She and Krelian walk into Deus, which promptly flies off from its holdings. Fei desperately chases after them, after Elly, separating himself from the rest of the party, which instead escapes the apparently unstable Merkava.
But it turns out Merkava isn't unstable because it is self-destructing like most RPG dungeons do; it is unstable because it is launching itself into the atmosphere, where it promtly starts firing lasers at the planet below.
Well, shit.
Next time: Lots and lots of plot (again), and I guess Grahf is still around so we need some closure there, too!
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I always figured the barrier was an "Only Cain can kill Cain" thing but now that I think of it there's a lot of things I guessed about to fill in blanks. I forgot that Ramsus either kills or attempts to kill basically every surviving cast member in the span of an hour thanks to his timely face turn, though.
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Well, as far as weird fantasy explanations go, it seems pretty reasonable that a clone of Cain could neutralise the barrier that Cain creates due to having exactly the same ability.
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If only we had sweet Holtzman Shield fights between Ramsus and Cain.
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/2c/Holtzmanshields-Dune1984.jpg)
Will actually edit in real response (or just post again if conversation flows around) because goddammit Disc 2.
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Hearthstone: Just started this, apparently everyone else has been playing it a while and only talked about it in the Theorycrafting topic. Mostly playing Rogue, which seems a little weaker than the other characters but has some fun stuff.
Did some arena but for some reason people keep pulling cards that are stupidly stronger than the ones I get to choose from. Guess there's a better pull if you're higher ranked or something? Still broke even as far as getting equivalent coin-worth compared to buying packs.
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Clearly Ramsus just understood that the slow blade pierces the shield.
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People only pulling stronger cards than you because you are playing Rogue. All your cards are weak.
Ramsus is the slowest blade of all.
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Ah, Hearthstone. I feel like I'm just entirely too behind in getting good cards in that game now to have it be worth playing. Laggy-ness not withstanding.
Re: XG: Apparently as a teenager this is about where I stopped processing any information about the game. I remembered that Deus was god and made humans, and I remembered the Elly/Miang switch, but I had completely forgotten about Hammer killing Elly's mother and why on earth he showed up again at the end of "Why is this a dungeon instead of Merkava" 2, any of the nuances on the Grahf story, and anything about Krelain period. It probably doesn't help that once I finished up sidequesting got to the final boss I had let many months pass since the plotdump and actually beating the game.
I can't help but think that even disregarding all the factors that played into Disk 2 being the mess that it is, none of the core writing is actually very good stuff, just convoluted, and the game gets a lot of it's plot hype because people confuse "convoluted mess" for "complex plot with deep messages".
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Xenogears is really complex plot with dead fuckin' simple messages of course. It's funny that way.
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There are some interesting ideas bogged down by a whole lot of unweildy shit. The way that the writers seem to get bored with most of the PCs and discard them (Bart, Rico, Billy, Maria, and Emeralda, in that order) doesn't really help either.
XG really helped me crystallize a rule of thumb for characters in games: the more accurately you can describe a character's agenda without using any of the game's made up bullshit words the better they are generally written. You can have weird shit involved and want to get the power from whatever thing it is, but at the same time their goals and such work much better when they are rooted in actual wants and desires rather than the metaphysics of your world. That way the emphasis is on understanding the thoughts and feelings of a character, rather than figuring out how the Wave Existence and the Deus System and the Zohar are related.
It's why Ramsus works as a character for me while Fei feels so incomprehensible. Ramsus may be a clone of the God-Emperor and so the only one who can kill him but his actions stem from being callously discarded and having his insecurities manipulated. Fei is a guy with multiple personalities but also multiple past lives in his head and also he talks to a being from a higher-order dimension who explains a bunch of shit so that it finally makes sense. He's pretty much a purely reactionary character trapped in all the crazy pseudophilosophical goings-on and I can't explain anything he does without explaining a bunch of background shit.
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Not to mention he is a walking parable of Freudian concepts who's primary antagonists are a pair of Jungian archetypes. XG is fucking weird man. Edit - "He" is Fei.
FFXHD - Started. I had forgot the opening sequence with Tidus doing a sick kick flip and watching Sin destroy Zanarkand plays to Otherworld while Auron badarse walks down a highway in slow motion. Fucking metal as shit.
Bravely Default - I started this off. Snow and I are the first boss. This shit got meta fucking fast.
Also the in game art style is chibi Tactice Ogre. I assume this is 10/10 for Ciatos. (the town maps even remind me of Saga Frontier style. They are a pretty great use of 3D environments that look like 2D. The NPCs really accentuate this being incredibly flat and I think they pivot a bit to always be facing the camera on a vertical plane or something when the camera zooms?).
Anyway, game feels really good and its dumb that all I have to rant about so far is the art stuffs. More time spent managing the Facebook game side quest that is Norende than actually playing the game.
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Anyway, game feels really good and its dumb that all I have to rant about so far is the art stuffs. More time spent managing the Facebook game side quest that is Norende than actually playing the game.
goddamn it
I swear to god if one more person whose opinion I actually respect about video games plays this and says good things about it, I will be quite indignant. Stop making me spend money.
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Bravely Default - I started this off. Snow and I are the first boss. This shit got meta fucking fast.
It gets crazier.
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FFD: Okay, you have to fight the optional bosses a bunch of times to level them up until they are actually harder than final-dungeon randoms, that's not tedious.
(On a happier note, hello there SRWZ3 shipping notice)
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Not to mention he is a walking parable of Freudian concepts who's primary antagonists are a pair of Jungian archetypes. XG is fucking weird man. Edit - "He" is Fei.
I can't even tell you who Fei's primary antagonists are. Id? Ramsus? Grahf? Krelian? Miang? Solaris as a collective entity? The Deus System? It might be clearer if the back end of the game, where everyone's plots unfold, wasn't an absolute trainwreck, but as it stands it's a pretty comprehensive failure of storytelling and an eerily prescient argument for Square's need to adopt a different model of development than "everyone start at the beginning and work our way to the end of the game."
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Well it would be Grahf and Miang that are Jungian archetypes for what that is worth. They are the ones that most directly fuck around with his shit by offering divine fisting and macro trolling like Miang does.
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DS2: Rat Covenant + Bonfire Ascetic = good times. You can practically see the look on their face through the tv screen when they take a swipe at a rat and don't even do half its hp in damage.
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Bravely Default - Finale, Grandship.
Two resets here. The second is the hilarious one: Boss opens with MT charm, outspeeding my attempt to nullify it. Spiritmaster uses Element damage x1.5 on boss. Boss uses Flare. The end. (And that's not even the boss' main gimmick!) Fun fight, quite a lot nastier than its previous version.
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DS2: Rat Covenant + Bonfire Ascetic = good times. You can practically see the look on their face through the tv screen when they take a swipe at a rat and don't even do half its hp in damage.
wait that's not normal? maaaaaybe I was a little underleveled.
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FFD: Okay, you have to fight the optional bosses a bunch of times to level them up until they are actually harder than final-dungeon randoms, that's not tedious.
(On a happier note, hello there SRWZ3 shipping notice)
There's a SRWZ3!?
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Out yesterday, Vita and PS3. Say hello to Gunbuster, Endless Waltz (WITH WHITE REFLECTION FUCK YES FINALLY), Gundam Unicorn, the proper Gurren Lagann finale and a few others I'm forgetting. Oh, and custom BGMs, which is going to be awesome.
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GODDAMMIT I'm gonna have to import.
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It's available digitally (on both platforms) if you can go that route.
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I can't. I'll have to scrounge on Play-Asia, but that'll wait until May.
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Bravely Default - Finale, Grandship.
Two resets here. The second is the hilarious one: Boss opens with MT charm, outspeeding my attempt to nullify it. Spiritmaster uses Element damage x1.5 on boss. Boss uses Flare. The end. (And that's not even the boss' main gimmick!) Fun fight, quite a lot nastier than its previous version.
You keep making me want to do a BD replay on Hard Mode like, right now.
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Dark Souls 2 SL1:
Beat Skeleton Lords, Covetous Demon, Sentinels (!), Gargoyles (!!!), RRV, Rotten (!).
Scorpion girl is a problem, and I haven't even tried Chariot yet.
SL1 makes every boss fight difficult and interesting. Except Covetous Demon.
I had never noticed that RRV had some cool Mohawk. He also could instantly poison my Sliman, which is very bad news with only 776 max HPs.
Mace is +8.
Pyro Flame is +5 and I have one spell slot with the Ring of the South. Handy but underwhelming compared to DS1 SL1 pyromancy
Firebombs and kunais are still cool.
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I can't. I'll have to scrounge on Play-Asia, but that'll wait until May.
If you are using Play-Asia, you might as well open an alternate account on your PS3 or Vita with a fake Japan address. (Any random hotel over there will work)
Then just purchase a network card code from Play Asia.
The game is a bit too easy when you think it can't get any easier. And what's with those riduclously potent item parts?
The plot also got very stupid, hitting a brand new low on SRW shitty writing.
Outside the emheanced graphic, I don't geel much effort was put into this game.
I also want to complain on how pathetic is the Anti-Spiral. For one of the most potent entity among mecha shows, why is he so weak? If there should be another character that deserves the Dark Brain treatment, it should be him.
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Fenrir, you can't just stay all up in her grill to make her spam spear and stinger jabs? The only difficult to dodge thing I found was her magic.
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Huh, the early reactions I heard were that Z3 got more balanced from the super-easiness of Z2. There's definitely some potential for breakability in the new gameplay systems, though, and those buyable items do look nasty.
(The game is in NYC now yaaaaaaaaaaay)
Edit: this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=DsDKOj6n-Os#t=213) is all the reason I need to buy the game.
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I have no idea about the overall plot, but the crossover events in Z3.1 sound like a big step up from Z2: Chirico and Heero piloting Bonta-kuns briefly, Beastmen mistaking Poniman from Fumoffu for one of their own, Yunoha using her element power to troll Ramiel, Char vs Char Clone, etc.
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Also apparently there is a Paradigm City memory whammy hitting the entire cast, and I am a sucker for more Big O plot.
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XCOM Enemy Within: XCOM HQ got attacked. Shit was crazy. I think the final count for enemies killed was... 55? It was very different than the normal missions in that there's aliens coming at you from all sides and out of the walls and such.
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Huh, the early reactions I heard were that Z3 got more balanced from the super-easiness of Z2. There's definitely some potential for breakability in the new gameplay systems, though, and those buyable items do look nasty.
(The game is in NYC now yaaaaaaaaaaay)
Edit: this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=DsDKOj6n-Os#t=213) is all the reason I need to buy the game.
Holy crap that's ridiculously pretty.
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The memory zap is the worst among the plot device used in this game, just to have a excuse to make the characters to do something they normally wouldn't do and make excuse of plot holes. Thanks to that, the plot becomes stupidly ridiculous in a very very bad way.
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The memory zap is the worst among the plot device used in this game, just to have a excuse to make the characters to do something they normally wouldn't do and make excuse of plot holes. Thanks to that, the plot becomes stupidly ridiculous in a very very bad way.
"TAKE THE PLOT OF THIS CROSSOVER FANFICTION GAME SERIOUSLY." -Niu
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Who cares about plotholes when you can have a submarine operate in spaaaaaaaaaaaaaaace
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Captain Herlock exists with or without your crossover game.
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Cid, she still casts Homing Soulmass at close range. And that's always terrible news. The claw attacks are also pretty dangerous!
I'm counting on getting a Mace +10 on other paths + some gold pine resin from Vengarl.
This is the current situation:
Pit : ^_^
Bastille: Lost Sinner = :(
Lavaworld: Medusa = :(
Spiderland: Scorpiona = :(
Medusa should be the easiest.
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After seeing a stream reach the Anti-Spiral stage of Z3, I can see that it faces a serious problem.
EVERY SINGLE UNIT has size infinite for that map. It is Tengen Toppa Everything: The Stage, basically. The largest boss gets no size modifier benefits!
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Which actually fits, plotwise. The Anti-Spiral wouldn't want a size bonus.
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Captain Herlock exists with or without your crossover game.
The guy who travels from one point to the other in his ship that just kind of cruises through space at a wholly reasonable speed exists outside any kind of causality.
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Hearthstone: Switched to Hunter because I don't have the cards to make Rogue work. Starving Buzzard combos are wonderful. Drew 7 cards in one turn this evening.
I figured out why my arena opponents were getting much better cards than me. Apparently if you own an Epic or Legendary card it will show up in your arena drafts. Explains why I was running into fucking Jaraxxas. Kind of defeats the purpose of a random draft. I'll save my gold for something else, maybe that new expansion coming out.
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DS2 SL1: SL1 makes individual spiders and spidermen genuinely threatening, so the whole Tseldora place was terrifying. Silent Hill terrifying.
I beat Medusa, Scorpion girl, Freja, Chariot.
I'm sitting on 130k souls and only have four bosses to kill right now.
I could beat RRA but he's a real bastard. After like 20 tries I found a way to take care of all the rats immediately. Now I just need to win against RRA himself....... :(
Smelter Demon made it pretty clear that I'm not going to win ever. But I'll try!
I have the Ring of Life Protection on all the time now so each death means losing 3000 souls.
Which is the same cost as, say, 30 kunais or 10 black firebombs.
So If I avoid death by throwing 9 black firebombs, 1) I don't go back to the bonfire 2) I lose less souls.
So basically I'm using a lot of items right now.
I'm surprised by the lack of balance between blunt and slash weapons in PvE, now that I've tried the mace for a good portion of the game. Armored enemies have massive slash res, and ... nothing so far has blunt res.
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can't resist a blunt bro
Bravely Default - So Jack the Ripper + Flava Flav makes for a Merchant. I was planning on trying out Merchant + Salve Maker shenanigans, but the skill set is a lot less robust than I had hopes for. So I guess I am going to just level it until I get its innate passive skill and bench it. I headed directly to the Compounding store and maxed it out in Norende. It really is pretty easy to build that up for anything you want. Even to a very high level. Some of it might just take assigning stuff to run over night, but if you are spending the 30 seconds it takes to assign workers every now and then you make a lot of progress with minimal engagement.
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I figured out why my arena opponents were getting much better cards than me. Apparently if you own an Epic or Legendary card it will show up in your arena drafts. Explains why I was running into fucking Jaraxxas. Kind of defeats the purpose of a random draft. I'll save my gold for something else, maybe that new expansion coming out.
This isn't true at all. Nothing in your constructed list impacts your arena draft. I've gotten epics and legendaries available in arena that I don't have in constructed since day 1. Arena doesn't give an equal distribution of card rarity in drafts nor does it impose the normal 2 card limit, though, so yes you'll fight the mage with 5 Pyrobursts or whatever.
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Reading more SRWZ3 spoilers, I underestimated the Big O factor. HOLY SHIT YOU FIGHT BIG VENUS
Also I got the game! Damn, that was quick. Through stage 1, Gemion is pretty awesome.
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I'm surprised by the lack of balance between blunt and slash weapons in PvE, now that I've tried the mace for a good portion of the game. Armored enemies have massive slash res, and ... nothing so far has blunt res.
No kidding. SMAAASH girl could easily one-shot anything in the Iron Keep because LARGE CLUB. Dual-falchion mode really struggled here.
Tried getting summoned by Looking Glass Knight for a bit yesterday. No luck. Only summons I got was from a gang of trolls loitering around the King's Passage specifically to fuck with people trying to get summoned by the Looking Glass Knight.
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Oh boy I'm posting about Dark Souls 2 prepare for another round of WTF.
So after almost two weeks and no call from the epair place, I fight through my depression and call them and MAGICLLY the PS3 is fixed come on down! Except I'm waiting there for about an hour as they mess around of random stuff. Hey, at least my save data's backed up now! Hey wait where's Dark Souls 2? FIND IT FIND IT FIND IT. Oh hey it was inside all along and they had to open it up to get it out. This surely bodes well. If I actually paid for this I'd care. So back home, PS3 won't accept the disc! Also after about 40 seconds of being on I get a FUCKING HEAT WARNING. Hahahaha no, angry call. Screw that place, save me internet sales! Ohhey slim PS3+3 games+1 controller for literally cheaper than the repair place's replacement estimate. Welcome to the family new PS3! Look down on that fatso in shame. Alright, set up systems stuff, sync internet copy over relevant data like Tales of Xillia and....
ummm....
Where you at Dark Souls 2 data? After three passes through the save and syncing trophies in some desperate bid I set Dark Souls 2 to reinstall. Nope, still not fixed. Alright fatso, stay in one piece long enough for me to use you. Alright, data still here so at least it wasn't deleted.... OHHEY IT CAN'T BE COPIED TO ANYWHERE BUT THE ONLINE STORAGE WHICH REQUIRES A PS+ ACCOUNT I DON'T HAVE. Hahahahahaahahahahahahahaha.
Dark Souls 2: Alright, I'm good and pissed at all of this so I just go maximum cheese with the Mace and ruthlessly destroy everything. With a weapon that actually works I kill Pursuer on his SURPRISE and kill Last Giant with Pate will up. ODS somehow manages to kill me twice through some screwery but chunking 10% of his health a hit means I win eventually. I lose against Drakerider because I got hit then go to Huntsman's Corpse to kill the Skeleton Lords in two hits. STUFF then up to Purgatory. Lost one death to getting caught on geometry on the return jump from the Sublime Bone Dust and another to the red phantom asshole because of randomly whiffing back attacks. Executioner's Chariot went down as easy as any blunt weapon will do against anything weak to it. Over to Harvest Valley, I find no Gavlan, and take care of the giant brawl with the sickle guys in one go. But most importantly I notice the Sunlight Alter statue actually has a head this time. Hello Gwynson!
Enemies also aren't hitting as hard as they used to. I guess there was a patch?
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Dark Souls 2 new patch: Welcome to Casual Souls.
- Last Giant's damage almost cut in half. NPC Pate is now Iron Knight Tarkus.
- Exploding mummies do 40% of your health instead of 90%. This is a good change!
- High end Pyromancy damage nerfed. Forbidden Sun didn't need it but Flame Swathe no longer does 1300 damage with no stat investment.
- I mentioned Pate but every NPC summon is much stronger EXCEPT Jester Thomas, who got weaker. He's still the best NPC summon. The trophy for Lucaitel is much easier because of this.
- Lost Sinner NG+ is not as much bullshit anymore. This is another good change.
- Apparently people had problems with Shrine of Amana's homing sniping magic priestesses. Their aggro range is much shorter and their spells are slower and doesn't track as much.
- Giant Lord's health took a minor hit. Before it took three Chaos Storms, now it can take two and one Forbidden sun to kill it.
- Unrelated to the patch but cheaters are everywhere. My fresh Bandit got invaded by a turtle with butterfly wings using the Moonlight Greatsword. Speaking of which...
- Moonlight Greatsword got nerfed hard. Which means everyone is back to Havel's + Greatsword. Yay :-\
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Fudo: Gavlan doesn't show up in Harvest Valley until you've spoken to him at No Man's Wharf.
I dunno about enemies dealing less damage. Some specific enemies/attacks did get patched. But broadly speaking it feels the same to me, I fought Velstadt last night and he still fucking obliterates your healthbar with ease.
Speaking of, dual-wieldy mode done. For some reason I was under the impression that you could get the herald's outfit by killing her. Apparently this is not true!
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Didn't you never kill Priscilla because that's too horrible? Now you're murdering the Emerald Herald just for her outfit?
Lost Sinner is insane in SL1 mode, as expected, like way harder than Sentinels, even though she should die in 10 hits. I might skip her for a while.
Unfortunately I can't really improve my character anymore. Maybe I could find some better pyro? Better accessories?
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What!? Noriko has MIRACLE as her unique senshin through her Ace bonus. Once per stage and triggers when her morale hits 150
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That seems completely fair.
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Didn't you never kill Priscilla because that's too horrible? Now you're murdering the Emerald Herald just for her outfit?
I killed her as part of Navlaan's quest. I figured I'd make a deliberate effort to be a dick this time just to see what happens with him. Not much as it turns out!
The patch nerfing top-tier pyro spells doesn't exactly bode well for SL1 mode. SL1 sounded like less of a huge thing in DS1 than it could've been because hey the only SL1 class is pyro and at least you get a couple spell slots out of that, right? Maxed pyro hand and fireballs will take you pretty far against DS1 bosses. But SL1 class in DS2 is deprived and you can't do jack-shit at gamestart.
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Yeah, I was planning to beat Sinner with Forbidden Sun, but... :(
Indeed, Dark Souls SL1 felt very much like playing a (weak) pyro.
Dark Souls 2 SL1 really does have items to compensate though. In DS1 SL1 you're always losing all your souls all the time and teleportation is not available endgame, so accumulating souls and spending them on items is such an annoying process that you just burn everything instead. (and use some club when fire isn't available)
Here you're always accumulating souls thanks to the Ring of Life Protection, and teleportation makes access to shops way easier.
You can kill bosses very quickly since you're using a doublehanded mace with resins, and can play the long range game with kunais/bombs (Bombs really are the only reason I beat the belfry boss)
So far, I wouldn't say it's actually harder than in DS1, mostly because the bosses are easier overall.
But there's a real punishment for failure so you cannot just throw yourself at the game repeatedly and need to git gud. Else you run out of souls, run out of items, turn hollow, you cannot even grind since the enemies you use to grind have disappearead, etc. I actually like this Sword of Damocles that makes each moment seem important and adds some urgency, much like the D-Counter in BoF5 for example
(Demon's Souls SL1 sounds like lolsoularrow but I haven't tried it)
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Dark Souls 2 new patch: Welcome to Casual Souls.
Whelp. Thanks for confirming.
Fudo: Gavlan doesn't show up in Harvest Valley until you've spoken to him at No Man's Wharf.
Figured as much. Guess my memory haze of him showing up in Harvest Valley without No Man's was wrong.
(Demon's Souls SL1 sounds like lolsoularrow but I haven't tried it)
It pretty much is. At least it makes your final Smug look at the end all the more worth it.
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I was all "DARK SOULS MORE LIKE CASUAL SOULS AM I RIGHT" when they nerfed Lost Izalith in DS1, but after seeing it in action I welcome the Shrine of Amala change. You -can- avoid the homing death lasers very easily now, but they're still dangerous when coupled with everything else you have to deal with at the time, including other death lasers.
You have to move/roll in an orthogonal direction right before the death laser is going to hit you and you might have a whole lot other things to do instead of that.
So yeah the dungeon's still interesting and I'm still dying a lot.
Oh yeah BTW I'm right there in SL1 mode.
Dead bosses:
- Lost Sinner is a lot easier if you don't lock on (and know all her attacks)
- Double Dragons are trouble here but their health is low enough that you don't really have to try the fight a lot of times to get lucky and kill one.
- Looking Glass Knight is not that bad. Durable but slow. I used a poison resin for fun. I was kind of scared when he summoned someone, but he died 10 seconds later because POIZN.
- RRA: Chaos Storm to take care of the rats immediately, then the "Staying below him hoping he doesn't realize I'm there" strategy.
- Smelter Demon: Poison. Seriously.
I think the best bomb-type item is the holy bottle you can buy from the blue cathedral.
Whip + Holy bottle Belmont build. Go.
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I think the best bomb-type item is the holy bottle you can buy from the blue cathedral.
Whip + Holy bottle Belmont build. Go.
I approve of this.
MK2- Snowy mountain with Raze's path. Game has improved immensely- Et is still terrible, as is Ulrika's path (Minus Chloe who is delightful). Issues with the text size remain but I am enjoying the humor at least.
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I think the best bomb-type item is the holy bottle you can buy from the blue cathedral.
Whip + Holy bottle Belmont build. Go.
ARGH and I got the Old Whip as my starting item too!
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Whips are actually genuinely ideal for a lot of situations in DS2 just because range. Damage isn't ever spectacular (outside of Old Whip, which is an amazing weapon but just fucking breaks in five seconds even if you've got the durability ring equipped), but they're great for dealing with lots of dangerous but fragile mooks with fiddly to dodge attacks.
Just burned through 50% of NG+. Cleric mode because ffff dealing with NG+ boss offense in melee if I don't have to. I have 52 shots of Great Lightning Spear and that is basically all I ever use now. 800-1,000 damage a second thanks to Blue Clearstone Ring +2. Miracles straight up embarrass sorcery for damage output this time around.
Blinding Bolt is pretty disappointing for a NG+ spell. The damage is decent if it hits something, but chances are it won't and you'll probably get stabbed in the face trying to cast it anyway. Oh well. More Lightning Spears!
NG+ actually not that terrifying so far? As far as escalated enemy stats go, at least. The scary stuff is just anything that's different because the game's so familiar after hacking through multiple NG runs. Oh god there's a whole gang of dudes throwing birds at me what is happening. I was aware of ninja spider in advance so that didn't really get to me, but oh my god the pigs grew up sure as hell did. Hunter's Copse red phantom ambush is probably the rudest thing I've seen so far (although, yes, I've been made aware of what's in the throne room and I am not contemplating this prospect with any degree of fondness).
I found the dingy set! It is not better than Licia's (slightly less dingy) set though. Alas.
Edit: RED PHANTOM 'SPLOSION ZOMBIE ARGLE BARGLE
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Bravely Default - And finished. Level 76, 79 hours. Most PCs had 3-4 jobs mastered.
The second to last boss was extremely nasty and fun. Last boss was considerably easier overall but has a bit of a dick move in its fifth form out of five, kind of an annoying design there since the first four are mostly either trivial or plot fights, although at least they are somewhat interesting plot fights! Still overall enjoyable, very glad I stayed for the frue ending.
Anyway C5-8 in the game are a great concept but kind of a bad execution. I would have loved it if following Airy's advice until the end of, say, C6, earned you a game over (putting you back before breaking the last crystal of course) and instead you got the true ending by breaking the crystal. As is the actual "true ending" requires the PCs to act like braindead idiots and that puts a real damper on things, since it's definitely the more fun one gameplaywise! Obviously I'd have kept the Airy fights from the true ending because those were pretty great. I basically didn't give a shit about the plot outside of Airy towards the end (as I think I mentioned earlier, the scene where she pretends to be possessed to fuck with Agnes is a highlight). Yulyana and DeRosso are both terribly boring characters who talk far too much towards the end, especially Yulyana. The way the game starts drooling over the awkward comic relief character is a bit embarrassing actually, and I say this as someone who overall enjoyed his appearances early in the game. Ouroburos is a pretty damn boring villain too, and overall I found the whole world-destroying thing more over-the-top than effective.
Gameplaywise C5-8 really didn't need you to fight the same bosses four times in a row. They are fun bosses! But that's really too much. The random design also kinda falls off a cliff at that point, they turn into mostly punching bags for you to gain resources off of. Part of that is that Dark Knight and to a lesser extent Vampire ridiculously up your MT damage potential of course.
As a result I didn't feel very inclined to do much optional in C5-8. I did do the new optional dungeon because hey, new dungeon, with shinies. And I tried a few of the fights. I've heard good things about C8 but by that point I really just wanted the game to end; it is extremely long. Definitely a game I want to replay but I'm not sure how I will approach said replays with said lategame. At least it has sceneskip! Sceneskip will help a lot. The game certainly has considerably more dialog than it strictly needs. Special shout-out to those party chats which I kept watching and which kept disappointing me.
To say some nicer things about the game's writing it does have the aforementioned neat ideas (have the courage to disobey, indeed), Edea is a lot of fun, and the Eternian antagonists are very memorable at worst and at best have some pretty good scenes. It does occasionally stretch belief how little they manage to communicate to the party about the dangers of awakening the crystals but given the personalities involved it's not -that- big a stretch. It certainly has a better plot than the games it most resembles, which again isn't much of an accomplishment but says something about the game's ultimate placement.
Otherwise I've already said a lot about this game. Despite its pacing flaws it remains very good. Great class system, great boss design, an extremely interesting take on the traditional turn-based gameplay with the brave/default mechanics, and just so many polish and gameplay design decisions I approve of. There are a few things which stand out as dated - not getting exp from being dead at the end of a fight, an inability to scroll quickly through the item menu - but yeah not too many. Not sure exactly where I'll end up rating it, but it is either an 8 or a 9 probably.
Final party:
Edea - Dark Knight w/ Spellblade
Tiz - Spiritmaster w/ White Magic
Agnes - Pirate w/ Examine (also had Vampire, but this isn't a great skillset for bosses... their final passive is, though!)
Ringabel - Templar w/ Perform
Class notes:
Monk - I dunno, they hit things, and get some useful passives. Felt outclassed by many other physical options though.
White Mage - Top-tier class. White Mage's healing is indispensable and Angelic Ward is one of the best 1-CP skills, Staff Lore/Dispel/Esunaga/Arise also good. Oh yeah and they destroy undead.
Black Mage - Damage spells are good against weaknesses for a while, status spells are quite useful too. I dropped them when I found their damage aging poorly, but they were an essential part of my C1-2 strategies.
Knight - Two-handed is amazing, how is that their second ability. Their first, Stomp, is also great earlygame. They apparently have some neat death tank builds I didn't really get to, and a bunch of other useful passives.
Thief - I dunno, unimpressive fragile fighter type so I didn't really bother beyond getting Speed+ passives for various people. Heard good things about Godspeed Strike but I didn't get that far.
Merchant - Kinda trashy but More Money is great considering how stingy this game is with the cash. Low Leverage sounds pretty amazing but I didn't get it.
Spellfencer - As others have said, Brave makes this better than in FF5 because you can do things with them first-turn. They're more cost-effective than black mage at black mage's tricks, although they need to be paired with physical skills lest they suffer against evade. Merely good early, but they have great synergy with both of IMO the game's best physical jobs.
Time Mage - Speed manipulation is key, HM bosses can be brutal if they lap you at a bad time. Slow everything! Slow Parry can even do it for free which is nice. Unfortunately once you get Pirate and Performer this class' niche goes down the drain. Some of their later spells did look excellent though.
Ranger - Another class that does physical damage using a weapon which isn't 2H-friendly meh whatever. It's okay for a while, their skillset is decent against certain species certainly.
Summoner - 40 MP's a bit too much for me. Wasn't impressed.
Valkyrie - Crescent Moon! Bow before your new god, randoms. I used two people with it, but hell you should probably use three, wipe out everything for no MP cost. Synergises beautifully with Spellfencer. MT physical that statuses everything! MT physical that hits weaknesses! Did I mention this game has enemies who counter physicals, but they can't counter MT? Yeah. Oh the rest of the skillset's okay, Jump/Spirit Barrier have niche defensive uses and Judgement stings. The Valk/Spellfencer combination is kind of why I ditched offensive mages.
Red Mage - For a while, Red Magic is "White Mage which trades Reflect/Dispel for Sleep/Blind/more elements" which is an okay trade. Becomes crap once you get L5 magic though. They have some useful passives at least, although not ones which were mainstays in my own personal lineup.
Performer - The ability to distribute BP to whoever needs it most is already a great niche, but this class also has MT +25% buffs and a five-turn provoke skill. Great support class.
Salve-Maker - The first of your "double healing" passive skills which is really useful, as well as good MP restoration, full revival, and a few other tricks. The good items are pretty limited if you play offline, though.
Pirate - Stat downs simultaneous with damage is cool. I relied heavilly on this for crippling the last two bosses' speed and offence. Also S in axes good, axe lore good. And they have some good damage if you can deal with the MP costs.
Swordmaster - Counter builds are neat in theory. Didn't really bother though.
Ninja - Their hit-doubling skill is neat though it will put you into negative BP (barring various shenanigans), the evade game can be really potent. Same with drawing attacks to your choice of target. I probably found them the most useful of the low-def fighter-types, which is pretty standard for FF!
Arcanist - Didn't really bother.
Spiritmaster - So many valuable support abilities. Nulls status! Nulls elements! Nulls all damage! Ridiculously useful skillset, I can't imagine how much harder it would make certain bosses if I didn't have it. Probably a top three class in my mind.
Templar - Tanky as fuck, BP limit of 4 is nice. Their skillset has some uses... a lot of it is built around good fighters which my Templar wasn't, really, but Rampart can be really useful.
Dark Knight - Ridiculous and overshadows almost all other physical builds. 4x MT physical is -insane-. Rage is less relatively potent, but with how stingy the game is with letting you past the damage cap, Rage's ability to output 25-50k damage for the cost of 3 actions but (+1 if you need to activate Drain Sword) starts to look really damn good. Not even dark halving really slows them down, and dark immunity is rare and mostly found on undead which you can slaughter with white magic.
Vampire - So this class also has great MT options, though it looks a little less good after Dark Knight, and a bunch of utility. It isn't really worth the incredible amount of effort to get, but it is fun once you do. Their capstone skill is outstanding.
Conjurer - Like Arcanist, I mostly ignored this.
Play it!
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DARk Souls 2: Where was I? Harvest Valley? Sounds right. Anyway, CHARGE. Covetous Demon down, Pate stuff get(WOW his spear is long). Mytha down because Thomas is boss. Mace pretty much one-shots Iron Keep jerks, but the one Sniper is a giant pain for me because I only have Crossbows to use. Now, a heavy Crossbow on my back looks baller but I need some heavier ranged firepower and since I need to pump DEX for the Jester stuff I can pick up the Dragonrider Bow too. So over to No Man's Wharf, and the first boss I kill with Lucatiel's help. Over to Bastille, open stuff hey the Antique Key opens the path past the Ruin Sentinels not the Bastille Key. Whatever! I brag the Barbed Club, Crossbow Shield, Pursuer Ultra Greatsword and Dragonrider Bow from Straid. PUG swings pretty fast... I think? Anyway then I head over to... Shaded Ruins! Fight the Scorpioness with Tark and we wreck her so badly she only manages one hit against him the whole battle. Heading on, the errrrr trash boss in the cathedral dies too then it's the one thousand runs through Tseldora because of the one-way street nature of it. Does that red crystal lizard ever do anything?
Ornifax means fire arrows/bolts which means FIRE. Anyway, fight DDF with the NPC Boyd and learn NPC phantoms can Estus now. Back to Iron Keep! CHARGE ONWARDS! I assume there's some NG+ deathery in the middle part of the climb to the last bonfire. Anyway Irong King takes a life because of enemy over-tracking but second fight goes fine. Come back, fight Smelter Demon with Lucatiel's help. First try fails due to EXPLOSIONS but second slays him. Rematch against Pursuer goes hitless yippie Blade Ring+1.
Back over to Lost Bastille. Run riot over the Ruin Sentinals, and have a fun time in the Belltower. Get invaded by two but I'm at the top so when they show up I just climb back down. One of them jumps down and I backstab and kill him, and the other one I stunlock on the ladder. VICTORY! Gargs go fine but I kill them so fast I had four at once. Get the Northern Band after it's +1 form. Just like Steel Protection Ring. Over to Lost Sinner with Lucatiel again and again victory.
Then I blow all my souls leveling and can't afford the ladder or the cat ring. WHOOPS. Well, Bellfrey Sol should have one of those! Get invaded and win again but the sword-jackass finishes me off. I also never got any Chunks for winning bahhhh.... Whatever, Cat Ring get. Also finally use the two Sublime Bone Dust I had stored up! Har. Down the hole, get Ratbroed in and lose because I didn't have Blade Ring on. For some reason Red Phantom Rhoy doesn't invade me but whatever. RRV was ridiculous cake and then down the Gutter.
Red Phantom manages a kill before I make it through to Black Gulch. Die twice here due to blind running and getting knocked off the ledge by a statue. Find Lucatiel and fight the Rotten and go 4 for 4 survivals. Wanted to test out Shrine of Winter with 1 mil soul memory but narrowly missed it. I continue to really hate the reason you need to go through the Shrine in the first place. Die to the Castle siege but when I see I can actually attack the Mastadons while they're still well it goes easy peasy now! Ruin Sentinel Hell is easy with a good weapon. Try out Dark Chasm but after three deathes to stupid shit(enemy tracking, the fucking jump at the start, three-man attack all of a sudden) I go fuck it and run on. I fail against the Drakeriders by getting hit and then get like 4 more Slabs before Looking Glass Knight. The Knight himself gets wrecked by dual-wield large club and great club but what doesn't.
Then to... Shrine! Forgot this entirely! I'm somehow not one-shotting the lurkers despite the relevant stats being much highest than Senior Caestus. Die a couple time to stupid shit and see my bow damage fluctuate all over the damn place. Demon of Song dies then I wonder if anything has the same moveset as the Keyblade.
Only need RRA, Royal Aegis and Guardian Dragon to be back up to Senior Caestus progress. Yay or something.
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There is a thing right before the final Iron Keep bonfire in NG+, but he's far from the worst addition in that zone.
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Kunais are also pretty much Castlevania daggers, thinking about it.
Too bad you can't throw axes like Gavlan's pals.
I wonder what's with the red phantoms showing up or not. Nameless Usurper didn't invade me this playthrough. I assume that's because I didn't talk to Licia (who's actually totally the Nameless Usurper) much. But Rhoy?
Too bad about being spoiled El Cid. Ninja spider was so cool, my favourite death. I was just running around aggroing all the peasants and didn't even care, then "WOAH WHAT RUN RUN", then I got hit by, like, a hoe, and died.
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Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D - I'm up to world 2-2. Jesus, this game is a humbling platforming experience.
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Escha & Logy: ::Tries out the Final with the limiter released:: ... welp, gonna be bashing my head against this for a while.
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Pokemon X All Starters: In the Mirror Cave.
Current thoughts on everyone:
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/657.png) Needs a bit more diverse moveset at the moment, though Water Pulse is good. Feels like he'll mature into something good but he's a bit lackluster.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/005.png) Dragon Rage at level 16 is downright broken. There is not a single thing he doesn't 2HKO at the least right now besides Fairies, and he still has other moves to fallback on just in case. Granted, Dragon Rage won't be so good in a few levels, but by then, he'll get stronger Fire Attacks (Fire Fang at 28, FLame Burst at 32), and at level 36, he'll become kind of brok'd for different reasons, I suspect.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/153.png) Early Razor Leaf made it much better than expected, and Poison Powder works when I want to catch something or just get one hit in that will last. Reflect is nice, and Nature Power works well. Unfortunately, I can already tell this is about the extent of it's worth, but maybe I'm wrong!
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/253.png) Was lagging for a while because Absorb was it's only STAB. Then it got Fury Cutter so it got something that isn't too bad if he can hit weakness or live beyond a few turns. Nature Power helps on certain terrains due to STAB Energy Ball. Yeah, Grovyle is very much same position as Frogadier, if not worse off, because it's struggling now but once it gets actual moves, it should be quite good.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/394.png) Fun fact, I had a female Piplup, so I bred it to get another Piplup. Why? Because that way, I'd have one less Pokemon with Trade Experience bonuses to help alleviate the levels (also have to pool more EXP on a lower level Pokemon briefly) and it was early enough that I could pull it off. Worse Nature granted, but eh, not a deal breaker. Anyway, it's been the better of two Water types because it takes hits better, has a better moveset thus far, and damage seems better.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/499.png) Flame Charge is really good! It can use Bulldoze for extra moveset variety, and now finally that Strength slot isn't unfair because I got the HM (which is earlier than I remember), so yeah. His durability is disappointing despite the HP, however, but he's generally guaranteed two attacks if he can survive the first one due to his main two forms of offense thus far, Bulldoze and Flame Charge, having Speed Manipulation. Arm Thrust exists for a 2nd STAB, but it rarely see use (on average, marginally stronger than Bulldoze with no speed decrease.)
If I had to rank them, it'd probably be Charmeleon >> Prinplup > Bayleef =~ Pignite > Frogadier > Grovyle so far. We'll see how things turn out from here granted, because a few levels and some key moves (like Leaf Blade) start popping up.
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Man I've never even seen Rhoy. Didn't know he existed until this moment! But yeah, Nameless Usurper has always invaded me in both locations, and is totally Traitor. (This still doesn't necessarily mean I know what the hell Traitor was actually up to, mind.)
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Wait one year until somebody figures all the lore.
Traitor is Lautrec's goddess and the second to last Monumental from Demon's Souls, who time traveled to kill Shalquoir prior to the events of the game and was waiting for the right moment to strike.
It was all pretty obvious, looking back.
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I think you might need to unlock Rhoy's armor from the Armorer? That's the only difference between my previous playthroughs and now. Otherwise it's some weird-ass boss thing. Usurper invaded me twice too and I barely did Traitor talk.
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Just who the hell is this Rhoy guy??
SL1: Up to Veldstadt. Demon of Song was trivial.
2 No Death attempts:
- "Let's try to get that Fragment Dust Bone near the Chariot. I need all the + I can get for my estus.
...
;_;"
- " Hey let's try to go to the Gutter first for once to get one of those ultra cool weapons"
*RRV fight*
Oh god I regret everything.
*wins barely*
I guess I HAVE TO continue now.
*gets to the gutter*
"I regret everything EVEN MORE"
*dies*
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Rhoy the Explorer is an NPC invader in Grave of the Saints. The third bonfire in Shrine of Amana is Rhoy's Resting Place. I was somehow mistaken/correct with the armor thing. Rhoy wears the Aurous set and I got him confused with Alva the Wayfarer's set. Which means the neat self-contained sidestory of Alva's now ruined but eh.
Dark Souls 2: Beaten in only three days. Everything but Ancient Dragon dead and there's no way I'm killing him. He's the perfect culmination of all the worst things about the game(ludicrous HP, insta-death damage, giant tracking attacks and the long run of hell.) Now to recount the actual run up to victory!
Down in Undead Cyrpt. Die once in the falldown pit with a bazillion ghost dudes because the only thing ghost dudes don't phase through is you. Giant club was really great for smashing the summon dealies though. Royal Aegis is unsurprisingly a joke when I'm properly equipped. Also I think his damage got nerfed because I only took like, 300-400 damage from his attacks. King Ring. Off to Alida Mansion to finish up with Lucatiel. Much sadness. Take care of her brother in her gear for style points. Then I die twice in the mansion. Also I finally meet Navlaan. Max out Dragonrider Bow before Guardian Dragon and get some Lightning Arrows too. OHBOY 7 more damage over fire! Whatever, it dies I get Aerie up. FEATHER!
Manage to get all the lizards and all the one-way treasures in the Aerie. Then at the Shrine I promptly die a good seven or so times to the two-hand hammer fuckwit with his tracking attack and dealing 900 damage with his bloody handle. In some obnoxious contrivance the actual ascent to the Ancient Dragon is piss-easy because I could one-shot the Drakekeepers and play zoning against the Disciple guys. Also got Kalameet's tail ace guyssssssssssss.
Back to the Forest. Memories kill me far bloody more than they should but I eventually pry out everything outside the Giant Lord. NEW WEAPON GET. GIANT WARRIOR CLUB. Sure, it requires 60 STR to one-hand, but look at that slightly better damage! I go and finish talking to Cale too since I never sent him back to Majula. Not confident in Benhart's survival against the Giant Lord, I go kill the Throne Duo instead. They really hate Benhart and just latch unto him the whole time allowing me to just rail on them and win. Alright time for my quest reward and.... nothing. OHBOY. Whatever, Giant Lord time. Die to him because the smokescreen blocks my vision and I run into firebombs. Second attack I win with Benhart still up woooo. Pointless gear get. Also I don't think Benhart is undead? He doesn't seem to have any memory problems unlike just about everyone else. Anyway, grab the helm from Drummond and another trophy get.
Then it's over to Doors of Pharros for RRA ARGH. Two Ratbro summons. Lose the first, win the second. Four deaths to RRA including one because I used a resin instead of estus. Throw a life away at Ancient Dragon only to see my 3,000 damage barely dent his health bar so fuck it. Surely Vendrick can't be hard with only 4 souls? Well even with 0 he wouldn't be hard but holy ballz is it tedious. I actually sadly die once to him because I got trapper against his gear and him but I come through on the second.
That just leaves the Dark Chasm. Since I now know there's different locations I go to those first because HAVEL. I mean I'm Havel now. Shaded Ruins go easy, Black Gulch takes a life because of aggoreing three guys at once. Then at the Castle I out-havel Havel. Then I promptly die to Darklurker because I didn't realize I'd drop into the fight I thought I had to come back. ATTEMPT TWO! Goes piss easy and I stagger him every other strong attack and win nearly before he splits. The clone takes one hit then one more and he's dead. I only got hit once the entire fight. Trophy time!
Over to the FINAL BOSS! With two NPC helpers lulz. I don't even get hit even if I get cursed down to half HP. FINAL BOSS DEAD weakest ending yet get. Wooooo.
I go do Navlaan's stuff.
Anyway, more thoughts about comparing things later because I'm bloody tired.
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DS2 No deaths: Another attempt, this time with dual caestus because I as getting desperate.
THIS WENT REALLY WELL! I died in the Iron Keep, tortoise smashed the platform I was standing on it and it crumbled. I had beaten bosses like Chariot, Rotten.
Fist weapons are now viable and have one wicked one-two punch.
Pros:
- Ultra fast damage. This means you don't have to commit to your attacks that much
- High stun rate
- Low stamina consumption
Cons:
- Requires a massive stat investment to do any damage at all, and even then the damage's terrible. This is especially bad in a No Death run where you need to jack that Vitality stat up to 50 ASAP.
- Lowest range in the game
- Hard to aim when not locked on an enemy
- The most pathetic backstab
- Dual wielding means twice the titanite required
Fist weapons are overall pretty good against regular enemies and very bad against bosses. I struggled against both Dragon Rider AND freaking Covetous Demon, to give you an idea.
Honestly I get most of my souls from bosses, so... For the next playthroughs I might only try to get to the strategic items (Titanite items, estus shards, sublime bones, and the good rings. I'm starting to know where they are. (... I need to figure out where the early torches are too)) My end level for that last playthrough was already pretty high (I had 42 Str, 50 Vit, and some Vig/adp)
Next playthroughs I'll try to get the Great Club ASAP. Grab torch, grab estus and estus shard, then go straight down the pit. We'll see if that works >_> Can any class even survive the first fall?
Havel's armor (with some VIG) makes a world of difference, I'll try to get that early next playthroughs. This is actually much more important than more VIT, and doesn't require beating a boss.
I really love how open ended the beginning and middle of the game are. There are 6 possible first bosses!
Post-Shrine of Winter is impressive and atmospheric the first time through, but it gets tedious on replays, in comparison.
Interesting to see how the Souls series has moved away from the need to get a shield. Shields practically seemed like a requirement before, now most people don't even use them. Even though the roll got nerfed into oblivion.
I consider Dark Souls 2 better than 1 right now, as it has improved fighting mechanics, enemy encounters, and balance. It is a similar experience in quality first time through, and a better one for replays / PVP. I also can't help but love a legit Ironman mode.
The model could be improved some more by making middle/lategame weapons more adequate (They could drop weapon forging alltogether and add some other system, or at least make the gap between +0 and +10 weapons significantly smaller), and making the whole game's progression be like pre-Shrine of Winter, but otherwise I have no complaints.
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DS2: Cleric NG+ done insofar as I'm capable of caring about it right now. Damn man that was just two sittings. Game burns first when you have functionally limitless lightning bolts.
So yeah guys my spell selection by the end?
-Sunlight Spear
-Great Lightning Spear
-Great Lightning Spear
-Great Lightning Spear
-Great Lightning Spear
-Great Lightning Spear
-Great Lightning Spear
There's no practical reason for me to use anything else. It is brutally effective and terribly boring.
Throne room battle down in three or four tries? And I have absolutely no use for the reward on this file!
I really love how open ended the beginning and middle of the game are. There are 6 possible first bosses!
Post-Shrine of Winter is impressive and atmospheric the first time through, but it gets tedious on replays, in comparison.
Interesting to see how the Souls series has moved away from the need to get a shield. Shields practically seemed like a requirement before, now most people don't even use them. Even though the roll got nerfed into oblivion.
I consider Dark Souls 2 better than 1 right now, as it has improved fighting mechanics, enemy encounters, and balance. It is a similar experience in quality first time through, and a better one for replays / PVP. I also can't help but love a legit Ironman mode.
DS2 is a weird, probably deliberate inversion of DS1's game progression. In DS1, you fight your way through the gloomy castle to meet the princess and then get tasked with defeating the four old ones (and be rewarded with boobs for surviving a two-on-one boss fight, easily the toughest battle in the game); DS2 you defeat the four old ones to get into the gloomy castle to meet the queen and then fight a dual-boss battle (which is far from the toughest boss fight, and there are no boobs). Even visually Drangleic is sort of a bizarro callback to Anor Londo.
So that's neat and all, but the one unfortunate note the games both precisely hit is that the second half is just less fun--though I think this is more of a problem with DS2, which is basically wholly linear once the old ones are dead and by the time we hit giant memory stuff I just can't give a shit anymore on replays.
Shields are almost completely unnecessary in DS2. Running shieldless in DS1 was a terrifying ordeal! DS2 it's just whatevs, most (non-great)shields are terrible anyway. There's relatively few things in DS2 that are better blocked than dodged (I had a lot of trouble dodging Mytha when going shieldless the first time, for one example). And this despite dodging being beaten to paste with the nerfbat in DS2, yeah.
Not sure I agree about PVP being improved (the actual mechanics of it; I'm totally okay with red phantoms not having such impunity to murder the fuck out of noobs from word go). The functional absence of poise really fucks things up. This was painfully apparent running dual falchions because of the relatively short range of the weapon. Having to get right up in someone's face to do anything made it brutally obvious that whoever gets the first hit in an encounter is basically guaranteed to get one or two more free while the other player is staggered and madly mashing the dodge button to get away. This makes the priority for melee PVP reach more than anything else (switching to whips against other players was shockingly effective).
EDIT: I'll grant you the one distinct advantage that PVP doesn't constantly boil down to lolbackstab now, though.
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Xenogears: Flashbacks and stuff.
Hour 47: Citan speaks of the terror unleashed by Merkava, as it absorbed the mutated humans while attacking the rest. The game, however, spends very little time dwelling on the horror, instead focusing on more of Fei's story. Fei is found comatase in the ruins where Merkava took off from, and Shevat decides that there's a high chance he's going to turn back into Id despite Taura's efforts so they freeze him in carbonite, getting the 90's Square RPG reference to Star Wars checked off.
Citan asks Zephyr about just why Shevat fears Fei so much, and she reveals that it isn't just because Grahf caused destruction, but that Grahf's mere existence was in fact Shevat's fault. Shevat had feared that, even should they win the war, that the people would all follow Nisan instead of them, so they struck a deal with Solaris, essentially trapping Sophia and her followers in a Solarian ambush. (In exchange, Shevat took custody of a Solarian woman who held far too much power and had been manipulating the Gazel Ministry to their chagrin. Citan immediately speculates that this was Miang, because if a woman is causing lots of trouble in the XG world...) The ambush failed because Sophia sacrificed herself to allow her guardians (Lacan, Roni Fatima, Krelian, and Zephyr herself) to escape, but Lacan was driven mad by seeing his loved one killed due to the greed of some old men, and ended up becoming Grahf.
She also mentioned that Krelian suffered much the same fate, though rather than become a crazy destroyer he decided that since God didn't exist, he would "create God with his own hands". And he dedicated himself to searching to some things of legend which are now all too real: Mahanon (the Eldridge), the tree of wisdom (its computer), and the Zohar Modifier (Deus' power supply, which Miang had earlier revealed was also the power suppply of all gears and ether power in the world). Zephyr also reveals that Lacan may have found the Zohar, and it was through tapping its power that he became Grahf.
From here the game cuts to inside Fei's head. Id appears and reveals that the reason Fei has been unconscious is that because, due to the stress of recent events, he has created a -fourth- personality so that he can escape. Id is pleased, because now all he has to do is manipulate this fourth personality and he can finally break free again.
Fei, meanwhile, dreams of episodes from his past life as Lacan. We see some scenes developing his relationship with Sophia, and the love they had for each other. We see Krelian, obviously infatuated with the woman, learning that he was once a violent individual until Sophia taught him to be better... but she never loved him the way Krelian wanted, and he became obviously jealous of Lacan. We see more of Sophia and her ideology, that she believed that everyone has the ability to overcome hardship, and she is trying to be an example to prove that to everyone, despite (as she sees it) all her own weaknesses.
Finally, we see the events Zephyr had described, and it's hard not to feel for the anguished Lacan as Sophia sends her ship on a suicide run into the Gazel flagship to buy her friends an escape route, begging Lacan to "live!" even as she dies. Krelian eats all the paint chips and announces his plans to create his own God, while Lacan turns inwards, finishing Sophia's portrait in anguished silence.
Later, we see him exploring the Shevat prison, though how he gets there isn't clear. There, he sees a woman he mistakes for Elly, but the game makes it quite clear he is looking at Miang. Miang tempts him with power - the power he could have used to save Elly, the power with which he could wreak vengeance on his enemies. I am amused at the symmetry at how Lacan, or Grahf, would later offer power to others. But in this case, it seems that Lacan, despite doubts in his head crying out at him not to, sought out the Zohar at Miang's urging, obtaining the power to have his vengeance, and to bring about the crisis which all but destroyed the world 500 years ago.
And now, the game cuts back to the present. Id has taken control, and just as ws feared, is planning to find the Zohar himself. Dan (apprently still alive!) and Midori have come to see Fei, but Fei has just enough sense of himself to warn them to run, before Id takes over and breaks out of the carbonite encasement.
Hour 48: Inside Fei's head, Fei tries to reason with Id, but Id will have none of it, angrilly talking about his hatred for the father who created the "Fei" personality. Id also reveals that the hate didn't start there, that he blames his father for some trauma he experienced as achild, though he clams up before talking about it, gleefully noting that Fei's "friends" have arrived so he'll finally get to kill them now. Kill everyone now, in fact! Id is going to make contact with the Zohar and use its energy to destroy the world. Great.
The party fights Id in his fancy new Zohar-powered mech, although this is really just an excuse for gameplay as it is irrelevant; Id can not be so easily stopped. Wiseman makes just his second appearance on disc 2, though, trying to stop Id as well. Id taunts Wiseman for wearing a mask, calling him a weakling who can't bear to face the son he failed. Yes, Wiseman is Fei's father, the mysteriously missing Khan Wong! Id rants at his father and begins attacking him. Khan tries to reason with him, and finally reaches out to Fei inside Id and tells him to "accept his memories". Don't think too hard about the mechanics of this. Citan, meanwhile, calls at Fei to remember his desire to save Elly.
Meanwhile, Fei is innundated with Id's memories (whether this is due to Id or Khan isn't clear). He comments that feeling this, he understands Id's pain, and comments that it even feels kinda pleasant, and even starts to think about going along with Id's plans before Citan's words jolt him back to reality. He instead continues to wander inside himself, eventually finding a young version of himself watching a video of himself playing with his mother, a scene which Fei has stumbled upon before.
Id explains that this Fei is the "coward", or original Fei, scarcely able to keep the loathing out of his voice. He shortly decides to explain to Fei the story of the coward, apparently feeling charitable since he's about to destroy everything and will never get another chance to rant.
We learn that Fei was born to a happy, normal family, spending most of his time with his mother as his father was always away on (Shevat agent) business. One day, however, his mother Karen changed dramatically, becoming cold. She took Fei to a Solarian lab and had many horrible experiments done on him. Not only were the experiments painful, but they were deeply traumatic and horrifying, as some involved attempts to psychically link him to other humans ("men, women, the old, the young, even demi-humans") which invariably led to said others dying horribly, apparently due to Fei's own power. Id describes it as hell, and it's hard to disagree with his assessment. Young Fei tried to explain things to his father the rare times he showed up, but his claims were laughed off as childish fantasies. By the time his father did believe, it was too late. Fei had not been able to handle the trauma, so he had created Id, a persona onto which he offloaded every one of his many extremely painful memories, but keeping all the good memories for himself. Hence, Id's description of his previous personality as the coward, and his utter hatred for him, the mother who abused him, the father who ignored him, and the world which allowed this to happen.
Karen being an absolutely horrible person had already been corroborated by Ramsus, and Fei wonders how she could change and be so horrible. Id reveals that Karen had become Miang. Just in case you needed another villain's entire existence to lay at her feet. Miang was able to confirm through her experiments that Fei was a Contact, which was of interest to her for Deus' reactivation. It was also of interest to Grahf, who came to abduct Fei for his own purposes (as we know, he succeeded). Khan fought Grahf to keep him from getting to Fei, while Karen watched on silently, caring little as to the fight's outcome. Khan was defeated, and almost killed, and Fei, overcome with anguish at seeing his father about to die, transformed into Id and lashed out with his powers, killing his mother. Which despite the fact that his mother was pretty much satan, only traumatised him further.
In the outside world, Khan apologises to Id, regretting that he didn't notice his wife's transformation and begging for forgiveness, but Id has none to give. Fei desperately searches inside himself for anything that can help, time running short. He finds himself in the coward's memories. He tries to get the coward to see reality, to see that his life is more than these few happy memories he replays for himself. He tries to convince the coward to show Id the happy memories, too. The coward refuses, saying that he refuses to share them with the one who killed mother. Id and the coward being to argue, so Fei steps in, angrily declaring that "we" killed mother, that it is wrong to blame each other when they are all the same person. He makes an impassioned demand to the coward to show Id the happier memories.
And this time the coward agrees, showing what actually happened at Karen's death. Id's powers had gone out of control, and in fact had been aimed at himself, but Karen had jumped in their way, saving her son's life. As Miang, she could not possibly have killed herself, but somehow Karen found a way, a powerful act that showed how much she loved her son. At this, Id is overwhlmed, first trying to call it a trick. As he realises is isn't, he breaks down in tears. He regrets wanting to kill everyone, but most of all he regrets wanting to kill Elly, the woman who, through his memory of past lives, he knows he has loved for 10 millenia. Id is redeemed through the love of his mother and Elly. I have a lot ot trouble doing this scene justice in text. It works, in context, extremely well.
Id, now, shares all his memories of past selves, the memories he recalled under Miang's painful experiments, with Fei. We, the player, get little scraps of Fei's past lives, but the main thing the sequence draws attention to is Elly, who has repeatedly died trying to protect Fei, but always beseeching him to go on living. We see Lacan's transformation into Grahf, where he took this advice literally and decided to live forever... until he could see the world which robbed him of happiness destroyed.
Now, the scene shifts, and we realise that Fei/Id has finally made contact with the Zohar. There, he talks to a strange creature, calling itself a Wave Existence: a being from another dimension trapped in the Zohar. The Zohar engine, it turns out, is a source of infinite power because it is tapping upon this being it has trapped, drawing it out of said dimension. The creature desires to return home, but it is trapped. The original Fei (Abel) had made contact with the Zohar and it had created Elly in response to the orphan Fei's desire for his mother. (There are some fairly squick ramifications for Elly the essentially the dream woman of the Contact, and based on his mother, but I digress). Regardless, a part of the Wave Existence exists in Fei, the Contact who inadvertently trapped It, and in Elly, the creature it created. The Eixtence has now reunited with Fei, but also needs to be reunited with Elly to escape back to its own world. It also needs to have the Zohar trapping it destroyed, which is now the core of the Deus system. So basically, Deus needs to die, not just because it wants to destroy the world and has essentially fused with Elly, but also because it's the only way this creature can get home.
This sequence is a bit odd, certainly, and I'm never sure what I think about it. Certainly, it is primarily an explanation for the special purpose of the Contact in the story: Fei can channel limitless energy due to his contact with the Zohar (although only Id and Grahf ever seem to have figured out how to do it... Fei mostly does it in the form of a badass gear that the Wave Existence transforms Weltall into). It is also an explanation for the limitless energy and power Deus posesses. The character itself is somewhat unnecessary, though I suppose it is barely a character. (It never appears onscreen again.) The creature is essentially "God" within the Xenogears cosmology, so it's nice that this God is a benevolent creature rather than the monster Deus is, I suppose. Plus you get to save God, don't you feel like a badass.
Meanwhile, the newly united Fei reaches out to his father, asking if he's all right. Khan reveals that he is, and that... IT IS TIME FOR US TO BECOME ONE!
Grahf reveals that he is, in fact, Khan. Grahf has been jumping bodies for centuries to stay alive (this has been previously mentioned) and that when Khan fought him to save Id from him three years ago, Grahf had jumped into him. However, Khan was apparently more badass than most people Grahf tried to possess (there isn't any explanation for this, and Khan doesn't seem like much of a "badass" to me but it's probably some martial arts master stereotype) and couldn't be fully possessed, sometimes able to manifest as himself, and chose to appear as Wiseman during those times, probably because he didn't want Fei to have to deal with his father being Grahf (kind of a sketchy thing to do... I mentioned that I don't think Khan is much of a badass, right?). Grahf taunts Fei, threatening to kill his friends if Fei doesn't fight him, hoping to weaken Fei until he can bodyjump into the body of a Contact, access the Zohar again, and use Deus to destroy the world.
Fei tries to reason with Grahf, indicating his desire to save Elly, and wondering how Grahf can't see the importance of that given their shared memories. Grahf responds that Elly and Miang are part of the Deus system, and can not be saved: that the Miang personality has conquered Elly, and indeed will continue to be reborn as long as humans exist, taking over other women. This is pretty flimsy reason to destroy the world, Grahf! Fei doesn't think much of it either, choosing to believe he can save Elly from Deus/Miang. Might as well trying to destroy Deus and seeing if Miang goes down with it, certainly a better plan than Grahf's stupid one. Miang gets some points here: this stupid Grahf plan is her doing, as he was convinced to want Deus reborn so he could use it for destruction, rather than using his abilities to just destroy Deus. Grahf comes across looking like a moron, though!
Unfortunately for this moron, though, his time in the story is done. The Deus system, having now activated further, is now seeking to reunite with the final part, that which was separated from it first: the Contact. Here, in the presence of where the Zohar fell to earth, it has caught him. Grahf decides to place his faith in Fei after all, offering himself, the fake Contact, up as a sacrifice, but warning Fei this misdirection will not fool Deus for long. He begs Fei to save Elly ("and all the other women with her", barf) from Miang and Deus, as he is consumed.
Reuniuted with the party, and reunited with himself and his memories, Fei reveals a bit more to the party before they leave the crash landing site of the Zohar. He reveals to them the remants of the Deus system's computer, Kadomony, which had created the original human woman (besides Abel, who somehow survived the crash himself) upon landing on earth, who in turn went on to birth all the original humans, including Cain and the Gazel Ministry, as well as two aspects of herself... the nurturer Elly and the destroyer Miang.
Hour 49: After all that plot stuff, there's another surprisingly long and rather boring plot section detailing how the party attacked Merkava, going through all sorts of shenanigans to get through its barriers, around its defences, and destroy its main cannon so it could stop wrecking humanity. There was probably going to be gameplay attached to this? Bart features prominently in the plans, as do ships which transform into mechs. I'd forgotten this sequence even occurs! Boring anime nonsense. Anyway they succeed, and may even destroy Merkava! The party is all "oh no, what about Elly!" while my reaction is certainly along the lines of "fuck Elly, I'm sure she's a sweet young woman and all but hell if we need to kill her to take down world-destroying calamities I will take that trade!" Fortunately for our dumb part, Deus is okay. It may have lost its ship, but it has a new, better plan: terraform the ENTIRE DAMN PLANET into a mobile weapon. Which also means killing all humans. The party gathers at the ruins of Shevat to plan its final assault into the Deus system to stop it.
There are a few scenes in Shevat, with the survivors of humanity. The world is rapidly descending into greater cold as Deus terraforms it, attempting to wipe everyone out. The Thames captain has survived, because that's what men of the sea do. There's a cute scene where he tricks the stepson of his first mate, Hans, into finally calling Hans his father. Queen Zephyr has also survived, guiltilly reflecting on the errors Shevat made which led to this situation but neverthless resolved to lead the survivors. She asks Fei if he has the courage to fight the woman he loves; he reaffirms his dedication to destroying Deus and freeing Elly. And finally, it is revealed that Ramsus has survived. There's a nice scene where Ramsus is referring to himself as trash. Citan slaps him and points out by doing that, he is disrespecting those who believe in him, those he saved from ending up as test subjects as he built Gebler to allow third-class citizens... such as the Elements. Citan notes that by calling himself trash, he is calling those who believe in him trash as well. A veil is lifted from Ramsus' eyes, and Dominia in particular is overjoyed to see him finally get over his demons, leaving the fandom with a little fuel for Ramsus/Dominia shipping.
Beyond that, there are some sidequests to mop up...
Hour 50: The more interesting sidequest is a return to Zeboim, where we learn a bit about society. We learn that Miang may have engineered its downfall, to get humans on a better track for being parts of Deus, creating a calamity where most humans were unable to breed. Emeralda was created by Kim, a past Fei, and Elly, in order to save human fertility somehow (the details are sketchy, but hey nanomachines can do everything I guess) but she died and Emeralda was taken from them for military purposes, and the society crumbled. Emeralda, meanwhile, randomly turns into an adult because she feels she'll be able to better help her "parents" this way. Hey it's a free boost to Atk and Ether, I'll take it.
The other optional dungeon is the Duneman Isle, which is pretty uneventful except that the Thames captain told us about it so doing it is a must. It's also the source of the only lategame foot combat, and a random which can OHKO everyone except Citan who remains completely ridiculous.
Next up: the end!
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MK2- Finished Raze's path. Reicher was a bastard of a final boss. Lots of offense and durability, but not much in the way of tricks. Straight slugfest but pretty fun.
Starting on Ulrika's path next since I don't have a lot else to do right now.
Brief review:
The good: Characters. Lily, Whim, and Raze are a fantastic core. Raze is a perfectly understated dick (Instead of the narcoleptic pushover harem main type), Lily is insane but is geniunely sympathetic re her heartache over Raze, and Whim is just delightful in general as comic relief and someone to deflate Lily. I even liked Yun to an extent, his CQ was entertaining. Puniyo was fun enough for comic relief and the brothers were so hilariously over the top that they worked. I also really dug Puniyo's CQ's. CQs in general were excellent, they showed off the characters well and ranged from funny to touching. Gameplay was MK and it picked up late. Final boss was good, some of the late randoms were tough. Polish was improved over MK2 at several points in the synthing process.
The bad: Ulrika path PC's besides Chloe. They ranged from unfunny to FUCK OFF AND DIE (Pepperoni). Et. Just.... Et. Die Et. Gameplay was pretty bad for most of the game. It combined boring with unpleasant due to text size issues. The synth system had improved polish, but it was still pretty lacking at points. I missed a couple of key skills (Including Yun's best, augh like he needed to be worse) because I didn't synth the right weapon or missed some recipes. Annoying. The game was an incredibly slow starter across the board. Raze's path was also really light on story for the most part, which was a mixed bag.
The ugly: Text size. This actively hampers the game. I ranted enough about this in chat and earlier, but it's terrible. The Grow Book is really bad about it- I missed out on Puniyo's 2x common skills move because I couldn't see it in the book.
???: Reicher. I have no idea what to make of him. What the fuck to letting him just walk away after he nearly tortured Raze's grandfather to death and the whole evil ring thing. He did have his moments though.
Not sure what the rating will be. The good was very good, but the bad was real bad.
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Dark Souls 2: Platinum get. I don't know what inpired me to get all trophies just for this game.
The hard part was getting the NG++ spells. I didn't even know there was a great chaos fireball. I think the only other way of getting it is 100+ kills in the Brotherhood of Blood. No thanks.
What's interesting is the other method of entering the Shrine of Winter. Enough Soul Memory and the door just opens. This means if you save every single consumable soul item, you can go straight for Drangleic Castle. The limiting factor is getting the first branch of yore to enter the Shaded Woods.
The fastest one is in the gutter, which you can enter right away on NG+. The path before the Gutter sucks on NG+ but the new patch made it easier. Wish I went though it sooner.
A lot of bosses become optional now. Oddly you have to fight the Last Giant. You need the soldier key to enter the path to the King's door to fight Giant Lord.
I used this video to beat all the bosses in the game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjslOGK3L4I
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Fun XG reminiscences. For what it's worth, the thing that I always remain impressed by XG about is the sheer amount of plot that basically coheres somewhat. Multiple past lives! Multiple sets of bullshit powers intersecting! Vast amounts of history that is actually related to current events! More villains than you can shake a stick at, many of whom hate each other! Somehow it all involves giant robots! It's an impressive feat.
That said, I agree with the earlier comment that for all his plot centrality, Fei is one of the weaker characters-as-a-character. The reluctant hero archetype is fine, but the vast amount of Stuff related to Fei - being the Contact, having multiple personalities, etc. - doesn't really change his main motivation, which is bland do-gooder + in love with Elly. I suppose when cosmic threats are afoot and you have a Slayer of God robot it's good that he's willing to step up, but still, eh.
The original Fei (Abel) had made contact with the Zohar and it had created Elly in response to the orphan Fei's desire for his mother. (There are some fairly squick ramifications for Elly the essentially the dream woman of the Contact, and based on his mother, but I digress). Regardless, a part of the Wave Existence exists in Fei, the Contact who inadvertently trapped It
This always struck me as a bit weird. Was the Zohar controlled by a psychic computer programmer to do whatever a human thought at it? Wasn't the Wave Existence already "trapped" in the Zohar? Why was Abel using the Zohar's power special and made him the Contact, but everything else using the Zohar (Deus, Anima Relics?) not? It isn't a big deal - it's totally fair to think that after the crash, Kadamony rebooted into "obey new master" mode or something due to the damage to Deus, or that young Abel screwed around with the Zohar in some unusually intense way like walking into the reactor, or whatever is needed to justify Fei's powers.
Also do they ever lay out why exactly this means Fei/Contact keeps resurrecting? Elly, sure, that's explainable, but Fei... again, not too big a deal to say "Abel touching the Wave Existence also gave him reincarnation powers", but.
There's also why the Wave Existence didn't ask for release immediately. Maybe it did but Abel refused it? Oh well. Better for humanity that way at least.
Id's powers had gone out of control, and in fact had been aimed at himself, but Karen had jumped in their way
That was Id's power?! I never had any idea what the heck the doom attack was and just assumed it was random Solaris / Shevat cannons or whatever. If it was Id, I guess Id didn't sport the red hair look at the time?
The Deus system, having now activated further, is now seeking to reunite with the final part, that which was separated from it first: the Contact. Here, in the presence of where the Zohar fell to earth, it has caught him. Grahf decides to place his faith in Fei after all, offering himself, the fake Contact, up as a sacrifice, but warning Fei this misdirection will not fool Deus for long. He begs Fei to save Elly ("and all the other women with her", barf) from Miang and Deus, as he is consumed.
Well, be fair. The cosmology of XG really is one where all women are in some sense "cursed" to potentially be stolen by Miang. That's pretty creepy, and Miang is supposed to be creepy, so it works, and Fei reasonably wants to break said curse, which is also fine by me. I'm willing to give XG a pass on this as not being particularly misogynistic if it correctly grapples with the consequences of its plot. (Elsewhere, not so much perhaps, but here is fine.)
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You forgot the Caestus Cons of knocking enemies out of your attack range and some enemies having such large gaps in their leg stance you can't actually attack them from behind.
I used this video to beat all the bosses in the game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjslOGK3L4I
That video taught me the solution to everything is magic and other dudes. Too legit.
Dark Souls 2: Apparently I secretly meant I was gonna waste most of the day fighting the Ancient Dragon and prepping for the Platinum. Gyrm Greatshield strat for the dragon. Nothing else interesting. Still too tired for effort post.
EDIT: OH RIGHT! I found the Black Knight Sword! THe Black Knight weapons drop from the dog-things in the Alida foreground. I have four Ultra Greatswords now. The normal Sword is now taking after the Greatsword of Artorias.
King's Ultra Greatsword is hilariously dumb too.
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The creature is essentially "God" within the Xenogears cosmology, so it's nice that this God is a benevolent creature rather than the monster Deus is, I suppose. Plus you get to save God, don't you feel like a badass.
I always liked this plot thread. It's a nice change from the constant "Kill God" plot threads in most RPGs (though to be perfectly honest, I kind of like that one too, it is a bit overused). XG cosmology is awesome in that we have both Deus and the Wave Existence, so we can save our god and eat it too. Or something. I liked the dichotomy of this enough that I really wanted XS, which shares a lot of the cosmology (or at least shades of it, depending on who you ask), to not suck as much as it did. In particular regards to what it did with its own cosmology and the Wave Existence.
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That was Id's power?! I never had any idea what the heck the doom attack was and just assumed it was random Solaris / Shevat cannons or whatever. If it was Id, I guess Id didn't sport the red hair look at the time?
Id's amazing hair dye and pasty skin is never explained, but that explosion of energy which kills Karen is pretty explicitly him. Or rather, explicitly Fei in some form - Id blames the coward and the coward blames Id. (Current!Fei later decisively says "-We- killed mother.")
Fun XG reminiscences. For what it's worth, the thing that I always remain impressed by XG about is the sheer amount of plot that basically coheres somewhat. Multiple past lives! Multiple sets of bullshit powers intersecting! Vast amounts of history that is actually related to current events! More villains than you can shake a stick at, many of whom hate each other! Somehow it all involves giant robots! It's an impressive feat.
That said, I agree with the earlier comment that for all his plot centrality, Fei is one of the weaker characters-as-a-character. The reluctant hero archetype is fine, but the vast amount of Stuff related to Fei - being the Contact, having multiple personalities, etc. - doesn't really change his main motivation, which is bland do-gooder + in love with Elly. I suppose when cosmic threats are afoot and you have a Slayer of God robot it's good that he's willing to step up, but still, eh.
Yeah I basically agree with all of this (and I don't even like giant robots!). Re Fei, I'm fairly cool with Fei personally although I like him less now than I used to; I think he's easier to relate to as a younger adult. I think his backstory is really interesting but the current Fei is indeed a bit bland. To some extent this was deliberate: he is a personality that was "created" three years ago and reflects sleepy Lahan village fairly well... and he definitely has his moments. But overall he could certainly have been better (his motivations aren't too interesting, though they're reasonable ones to have), for all that I'll still take Fei over a large majority of RPG mains.
Agreed that how Abel ended up as the Contact is extremely nebulous and a bit unconvincing for such a key point to the cosmology. As for asking for release, the Deus system was still drawing on the power of the Zohar/Wave Existence, so it doesn't seem like it could be released until Deus was destroyed.
I have no problem with the Miang-possessing-women plot point as a general thing; it is indeed suitably creepy. I still don't like the way that scene is phrased, though. This may be partially a reaction to just how stupid Grahf's stated motivation is (Miang destroys the life of one woman every generation, therefore DESTROY THE WORLD). It's a good thing there is that scene between him and Miang in the Shevat prison because "Miang manipulated Grahf into being a moron" is the only reason I can swallow it.
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Tales of Graces F: Completed Future arc!
Ok, time for a run down of my thoughts.
From a writing stand point, the game is pretty much a step down from TotA (let alone ToV) in everyway. I compare it to TotA because both games are pretty much straight faced and serious the entire way through sans the comic relief character, hence why it feels easiest to compare. The key things that stand out is that Luke and Tear are just way better as lead characters than Asbel and Sophie. Asbel is kind of just a generic hero guy with a good heart and a strong will; we've seen this archetype before, and Asbel doesn't really do anything new with it other than we see that as a 12 year old boy, he was an idiot...which is nothing special because lots of 12 year old boys are idiots (I deal with them regularly, so trust me, I know!) Sophie's amnesiac angle kind of is the entire thrust of her character, which is not a good thing. Amnesia works at first, but really needs to be resolved sooner rather than later, especially when the revelation isn't even something big and something you could probably conclude when you first meet the character (if not then, then by the first Amarcian Ruins.) I realize they wanted "Emotionless Vessel becoming human" angle but the game sort of doesn't do her enough justice there. They needed to reveal her past earlier, allowing Sophie to then focus on the next aspect of her development for a much more complete character.
It doesn't help that the plot isn't particularly stand out either. Prologue is kids doing stuff; it's all set up for later in the game, and I fully acknowledge it has a purpose, but it's still BORING, as it's basically just "kids doing stuff." I don't know how to fix it though, and it is necessary, but it's still boring.
After Act 1, which isn't too bad, it's a lot of wild goose chasing then you fight the bad guy. Emeraude's sudden heel turn could have worked if the character was introduced much earlier, and we had a stronger connection to her. As it stands, she became an expendable PC.
That reminds me of another problem this game has: No strong, consistent NPC characters. See, TotA at least had Ion, who was a great foil to Luke and actually helped a fair amount. ToGf has nothing of that sort.
That wouldn't be so bad if the PC roster was good but it's kind of not. Malik is cool, I won't deny that, but he's not particularly amazing either, more just stands out compared to others. Hubert I should hate but I found myself agreeing with him, so he gets a pass.
Pascal...sorry, but I can't be amused by you. Tales games do an awful job when they try to shuffle 90% of the comic relief on one character's shoulders, and honestly, Pascal just isn't funny by herself. She will be all "LOOK AT ME! I AM HYPER SCIENTIST WHO IS AN AIRHEAD!" but then the characters just sort of shrug it off. That's not how you make this character work.
Skits were also some of the worst in the franchise, Discovery ones are the worst. Here, let me demonstrate!
*Discovery Orange Tree*
Cheria: Hey, this is a delicacy of the area, right?
Malik: Yes, they are known to grow well in this area, so many cooks make stuff about them.
Asbel: Man, I hope Richard is not hurting anyone. Let's get to that location next.
Malik: Yes, it is important that we do that because we have our reasons told to us by the president.
Asbel: I just hope we don't have to fight him again!
There are so many Skits like that. They talk about the discovery for like 2 lines then one character makes a non-sequitor about the plot or our next destination and they just go off onto that.
The worst character, though, easily goes to Cheria. There's really no defending this character, she's a major step back in feminism. Ok, at first, the way she acts is understandable. Asbel up and left town 7 years ago, and never once wrote back or visited or anything, leaving her alone, especially since Hubert is gone too. Her being angry at him is sensible, so that's fair. Problem is, after they make up and come to an understanding, Cheria's character is basically reduced to "the nice girl who loves the main." That's her entire character. Either she's just saying a token "sweet nice girl" line, or she's lusting over Asbel, and her style is probably one of the worst I've seen.
Asbel oblivious to her? She gets angry that he doesn't pay attention!
The other characters quick to call her out on her obvious infatuation with Asbel? She gets defensive and tries to deny the truth!
This is not a character, it is a trope, and an awful one. Every scene that seems like they're going to give her development ends up being pointless. Case in point, before the final dungeon, she starts talking to Sophie about Asbel...ok, fine, that's fair...then Asbel comes out, and Cheria leaves, and the discussion...has little to do with what Sophie and Cheria were talking about, and is far more meaningful for Sophie and Asbel. Asbel's portion of the scene felt meaningful because it demonstrated development for Sophie and himself, Cheria's portion came off as "we need to pretend Cheria is actually important."
To be fair, victory sequences were a moment of humor and entertainment, so they didn't hold back there.
Then...Future ARc kicks in, and wow, did the writing quality improve.
Suddenly, the game isn't afraid to not be so serious anymore. We have skits that are entertaining, and just kind of fluffy with punchlines and humor. We have characters showing off more in the way of interpersonal relationships. Heck, HubertxPascal was basically the Cheria thing I mentioned above done right, because it's played for laughs. Richard coming back as a regular helps too, he is the exact kind of character the team needed since he and Malik compliment each other greatly, in the "Troll others" thing.
Speaking of trolling, I was told the team trolls Asbel throughout the game and there's very much a case of "Asbel, your best friend has a bad case of Final Boss" "NO HE DOESN'T!" Yeah, no, that doesn't happen at all. At first, Asbel is stubborn, but then Richard at Lhant happens and Asbel doesn't turn a blind eye (though he doesn't stop believing in Richard, he is resigned to the fact that he's going to have to fight him), and the team never trolls Asbel about it. Heck, Asbel's the one going after a point leading the charge, fully resolved.
...F-Arc of course has lots of Asbel trolling because he's oblivious, and yeah, he asks for it. It cannot be stressed enough just how much better F-Arc is at writing. Furthermore, with the characters acting the way they are, Pascal actually WORKS now; her antics are now complimented by the other characters, not sort of existing in a vacuum, since we can see actual character responses and how they bounce off her, rather than her just doing something crazy and the team going "huh, that helps."
It's not just the silliness that's better, but also serious writing, the main thing being Sophie. No longer being stuck with the "ignorant to everything and has amnesia" angle, they can actually develop the side of her I ranted she needed before: Her strive towards being human. The whole immortality complex, her inability to express herself, inability to relate to others...this is the actually interesting side of characters like that. The MYSTERY aspect works only for so long, and as I said, the sooner revealed, the sooner you can move to the next stage of development, and honestly, Sophie is just a lot more interesting now that we're developing her character, less so "putting pieces of a puzzle together."
Unfortunately, Cheria is still not improved by F-Arc; she's still just "I love Asbel" and her character doesn't evolve at all. To be fair, I can't say she's the worst Tales female ever, because characters like Anise exist <_<
Sadly, F-Arc is only a fraction of the main game and can only save it so much, but it cannot be emphasized just how much better written F-Arc is. It really comes off as them realizing they have this cast they really didn't do a whole lot with, and thus tried to salvage it in a 10-15 hour timeframe as bonus content.
SO WHAT OF GAMEPLAY!?
Well, I'm not in-love with the CC system the way some people are, because honestly, I found my strategy pretty much the same every fight: Hold down defend until Red Aura, go in and use whatever Artes were best appropriate for the time. It doesn't really change from other Tales games just because there's no TP, because TP stops being a notable resource in later games given how fast you get it back. Having actual combos as your basic attacks (A-artes) was something I totally approve of as it does make every character playable to some degree. It's not that it's a bad system so much as I think people overstate the impact it has on battles compared to TP.
To be fair, basic physicals being actual combo chains now instead of repeated attacks IS something I am totally cool with, and makes combat more dynamic. Flipside, I didn't find half the cast as fun to play as as in other Tales games (too many mages; ToG tries to make them more playable, but they still felt way less fun than fighters. Didn't help that one of your healers was one of your meleers), which hurts the game some.
Probably a 6/10. It's not a bad game, but it misses the mark a lot on writing, pre-F-Arc, and that made the experience less enjoyable, as I found myself not really caring where the game went. As for why it took a while to finish F-Arc?
Not really the game's fault there, more timing for IRL things + Jeff hogging the TV that the PS3 is hooked on.
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Fudo: Well yes. That goes with the low range!
Cid: The major improvements are the two reasons you listed (The fact that fights don't entirely revolve around backstabs anymore is the big one) + getting into fights taking way less time + magic/bows being viable + respec existing.
Everybody complained about poise in Dark Souls after Demon's, which didn't have it. I really have no opinion so far, I need to test this more extensively (I'm more interested in PvE honestly)
I'm not really sure we can judge the balance right now but DS1 wasn't balanced anyway. At all.
Anyway I can now get from the beginning of the game to the Great Club in the Gutter (and any other cool weapon that might be lying in the Gutter/ Black Gulch) in 20 minutes. Yay!
This isn't even hard. The worst part is by far is the 'splosion men.
Get the estus flask and shard in Majula, run straight to the Last Giant (Easy even with no upgrades), eat his soul, buy the ring from Asshole Cat, go down the pit (Ignoring the grave alltogether. Note that you don't have to make any leap of faith), then enter the Gutter and light a torch...
The Gutter is not very threatening if you know it well and just run through it. You can get past all the giant dogs, you don't have to make any kind of jump, and the regular zombies are not dangerous. (Except the one at the very end with dark weapons, holy shit these 2HKO. They're the new torch zombies from DS1)
I fear jumps so much in Ironman mode. I'd rather fight Smelter Demon than make a single risky jump now. Mc Duff is never getting his flame again, I'm afraid.
Anyway, what can I say.
Great Club Is Great.
Highly lethal blunt damage. (Re: Grefter)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/16/1397680083-big-yellow-joint.jpg)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hoCcArfJE0
If you do the overhead smash on some enemies they get immediately flattened for a few seconds. It is almost slapstick. They slowly get up, then at this point you do another overhead smash again and they die.
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Holy shit, Ruin Sentinels dying from only one R2-R2 combo
I need to upgrade this to +10 right now
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Stop trying seduce me with your giant wood Fenrir. :(
Bravely Default - Chapter 2. Lots of Asterix fights! I had been hoping to get a fix on when Salve Maker unlocks, seems my ability to predict who is going to be a "side" boss and who is going to be the main story one is well off in this. Tempted to do a no optional bosses run. You still get a ton of highly usable jobs.
Chapter 2 seems to mostly be natural beauty vs fashion or natural depth vs surface shallowness some such theme. I can't quite refine it down to something as simple as Time and Money like chapter 1. Doing Red Mage sidequest and suddenly it got far more rapey.
Also RE: XG stuff. "God" is a largely benevolent but powerless being trapped underneath a more aggressive feral thing that is in control that seeks to destroy the world. The ultimate goal is to set the rational thinking part of the system free from the baser part of it's system. Yep! One part Freud, one part Gnosticism. As DJ showed his last play through of XS, that makes for some pure Xeno right there.
Fei doesn't free himself from Id, but accepts him. Wave Existence (Super Ego) does free itself from Deus (Id) and Zohar (Ego), which is in line with the concept that our conscience is the "best" part of us and the Id and Ego are just related to our primal desires and managing or satisfying them. God is beyond that, but Fei is still a human being . He is close to God because he is under control of them, but he is not "free" of them. Presumably Krellian is, probably with no explanation for it because He Is Just That Awesome + Micromachines Are Awesome!!!
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Pokemon Y: Hey, I managed to get this shit working! Yay~
I have so many new and exciting things to say about this game, but they've been said before, so let's concentrate on what's really important: Pokemon Nicknames.
Fennekin: "Browser" - It is a fire fox. It is also psychic. Bonus points for starting with "Bro" and rhyming with "Bowser".
Caterpie: "Flutterpie" - Because Fluttershy was too obvious?
Pansage: "Grape Ape" - Monkey that grows fruit on its head... in hindsight, perhaps "Chiquita" would have been better?
Pikachu: "Cheeks" - All the good names were taken.
Riolu: "Pound Puppy" - Riolu's had it rough, man. He came from the streets and did his time in the big house. He's stronger for it though, and he'll teach you the meaning of 'pound'.
I haven't fought the first gym leader yet, but getting a Pikachu (that I'm not intending to actually use... >.>;; ) took so long that Fennekin is one level from evolving. Damn rat.
This is going to be an all-canine playthrough, so only Fennekin and Riolu from this group are going to see any significant battle time. I may pick up a bird for Fly slave purposes later on. I may continue catching other random mons just to give them dumb names. I may need suggestions...
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I forget if you have room, but I would have gone with Le Femme Chiquita if you have room and a female Pansage for the double joke.
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@Caestus chat: IT NEEDS TO BE SAID AGAIN AND AGAIN.
@Club chat: Wait until you get the Giant Warrior Club! It actually sends dudes flying. If they live.
@Poise Chat: It doesn't exist. If you stack it to absurd levels you might take one hit from a very low, fast weapon but everything else will break you in full Havel in one hit. PVE enemies are usually less dangerous to Poise so Havel's might let you survive THREE hits from a weak enemy. Anything big will still plow through you. Ruin Sentinels also broke me.
Dark Souls 2: Did some finishing touches before moving to NG+. Upgraded my armors to +10 because dammit they'll be the most upgraded Prisoner's Tatters ever! Also fully upgraded my Stamina Shield because why not... only to see that the other Stamina shield I had was literally better in every way. Bah. Also go and fully upgrade Havel's Shield because seeing 93 Stability is bonkers. I wanna do a shield-only run now! Doing comparable damage to the high-end clubs is just a bonus. Don't feel like going on an NPC murder-spree so NG+ goooooo. Died to Pursuer's ambush because of the usual blahblah button press don't dodge. ODS, Dragonrider(no hit yay) Skeleton Lords, Covetus, Mytha, Flexile, Ruin Sentinels, Bellfry Gargoyles, Scorpioness down. Gargs are the only one to get a life.
Not-so-Finalish Thoughts: Gonna just do this in a pros/cons list because I don't have a random rant in me and I need to get something out.
Pros:
-Lots of small quality of life improvements, (using multiple soul items at once, always bonfire travel,
-Roll weight changes are much better than DS1's restricting nature.
-Sheer wealth of equipment and item options. In DS1 only the head slots had any sort of additive effects but now my pants make me cast spells fast!
-Duel-wielding rocks!
-The world is massive and expansive.
-Covenants, and online, are much more stable.
-More NPC phantoms for boss fights is a welcome relief for the annoying things.
Cons:
-The addition of Lifegems brings back Demon's terrible problems of making enemies do crazy damage to compensate for the player being at full health for every encounter. But Demon's was tuned towards Phantom mode being the base state, while DS2 seems tuned towards human. Coupled with the psychotic counter-hit damage enemies do you can be one-shot or stunlocked stupidly easily. Dar Souls 1's attrition-base around Estus Flask is much preferable.
-Armor/Weight is back to Demon's crippling garbage making any high-end armors useless again. Poise being useless doesn't help things.
-The majority of bosses are either boring or uninspiring, and to many rely on high damage over actual challenge. ODS and Gargs are holdovers from DS1 and are probably the best bosses in the game which is sad in a game with 30+ bosses.
-For all the world is gigantic, it's really disconnected. Every single location links to another through caves and elevators.
-In addition to the above, the entire reason you need the Four Old Souls to get through the Shrine of Winter is because the road is blocked by a bit of rubble. There's a lot of small ledges or tiny drops that just completely artificially hamper progress and it's weird. I can't recall anything like that in DS1 offhand but I'm sure it's there, just.... I don't like most of the quest being dependent on my character being too lazy to climb some fucking rocks.
-No godlike NPCs like Solaire.
-Deeper lore and meaning just... doesn't seem to exist? There's a story here but I don't have any idea why Vendrick ran and nothing but guesses for a lot of things. Nothing really had me headslapping in brilliance like the meaning of Darkroot. Though I guess the Fenito and Milfanito were kinda neat.
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Tales of Symphonia 2 Dawn of the New World- Beaten. True ending get. Short game is short (41.13 final save/final save point before final boss) Final levels were L56 Marta/Emil, L50 ToS cast, L47 Vual Igniter, L32 Black Wolf (aka my Fenrir that was in it's third evolution cycle >_>) Played the game on Hard which was easy for the most part but provided some interesting fights late game (Decus, Lookins, Alice and Decus and the final boss come to mind (actual final boss w/th party not the plot fights) Didn't discover Radiant Roar until the final dungeon. Just in time too since characters were taken away soon after the start and I only had a L22 Igniter and a L19 Black Wolf at the time (and it only happened by chance I'd recruited the Igniter while doing the roots section. Good time to discover the OP that is Radiant Roar, final dungeon fights/bosses consisted of mostly spamming that. Not quite as OP as Cheria's Garden of Innocence since it doesn't field revive/status cure/hit significant weaknesses in addition to being an field damage/healing combo move, the fights consisted of mostly spamming that in between frantically reviving/healing AIs with items, would have helped a lot if it was revive as well, but still good (it did over 25'000 to Decus with magic tweaked equipment + Enhance Cast~ Heh, Marta didn't get Speed Cast 2 Skill until after the final boss <_<
Monster thingy I mostly didn't bother with, it was mostly just there here are the monsters you get from the plot, didn't really bother with elements in battle, just did whatever, monster wants to join, monster joins/monster ran away/monster left item! Ended up with Almadel L4 (imp from the beginning), Geo (wolf), Mistral/Axe Beak L1, L12 Doris/Archelon (turtle/armadillo thing you get for Triet plot), Hail/Remora L12, Samudra/Sea Hog L1, Praline/Ooze L19 and Vual/Igniter. I was/am disappointed baby winged dragon didn't join. I loved my wolf though. Fenrir, ice wolf when fully evolved. Quite useful with paralyse, icy slow down attacks, and ice damage. Used quite a lot with Marta/Emil when other characters weren't around. Went through two evolution cycles of wolf > black wolf > Fenrir and was on the way back to Fenrir again with better stats/more skills. I also taught my Fenrir First Aid, Heal and Resist over the course of the game~
I was thinking of playing through the game again quickly to get the "Normal" ending but apparently that's not how it works since the "Normal" ending trophy also popped along with the "True" ending trophy so I guess it's an extended ending type deal~
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Pros:
-Lots of small quality of life improvements, (using multiple soul items at once, always bonfire travel,
Other little thing I kept wanting to mention: contextual inputs are now properly prioritized! If you're near a switch or a bonfire or something else genuinely important alongside bloodstains and messages, the game properly defaults to the important thing first. And you don't have to drop your shield to get rid of annoying GOT ITEM messages or trigger things like you did in DS1.
The knocking enemies out of your attack range thing is definitely annoying. Not!Licia ran with blacksmith's hammer for melee backup and it whiffed a lot just because I pushed dudes back too far with the first strike.
Gargs are definitely the best boss in the game. They don't cruise on just doing nutty amounts of damage, you just have to dodge a lot and be very careful about when you choose to attack. Easily the most fun to run co-op for, too (if you can get in the zone, drop a sign, and leave before getting invaded; turns out this is much less of an issue on NG+).
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Pokemon X All Starters: Meganium is a thing that I have because level 33 Evolution. It is now my best Pokemon at the moment because fully evolved stats + Petal Dance.
Prinplup and Frogadier both got Surf, Charmeleon got Fire Fang and Flame Burst, Pignite gets Heat Crash and Grovyle has Leaf Blade, so yes, everyone has a decent STAB! Also have enough TMs to cover most people for moves on variety and such.
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Dark Souls 2: Holy hell how do you actually make the run to the Chariot worse? And to top it off Mace+10 attacks just narrowly miss one-shotting skellies and two-shotting the mages so I die way too many times here. But eventually I run myself out of Estus and win and get the Cloarthy Ring+2.
Kills Reel In some random order:
Smelter: No deaths, I manage to survive his explosion!
Old Iron King: Two deathe. Usual OIK bullshit involving fire breath spam until you're locked in a corner.
Duke's Dear Freyja: No deaths. The laser did less damage than the normal spiders.
Lost Sinner: No deaths. the SURPRISE was a surprise but I could one-shot'em so eh.
Dragonrider2: I feel great sham for nearly dying to the rejects.
Looking Glass Knight: The 2-hand heavy for my club kept ramming into his shield. Still, won with no deaths.
Ambush En Route to the Gutter: Ana whyyyyyyyy.
The Rotten: Joke as usual. So forgettable I can't even remember if he hit me.
SURPRISE IN THE THRONE ROOM!: Hahahahahahahaha. My super-secret super-pro strategy to win this was to get hit with that incredibly telegraphed stab which despawned one of them.
Pursuer, Smelter Style: Hey, back to no-hitting you!
Last Giant: Hey you can still summon Pate even after completing his quest.
Pursuer, Normal Style: Really, that barrel in the room's the most dangerous part about it....
I always bloody forget the Shrine of Amana exists between the castle and crypt. It's just so random! Heide chestpiece is cool beans though.
Then I spent the rest of the day trying to grind out Sunlight Medals. After literally a hundred kills on the enemies that drop them I earned three. Yay. My PS3 connection was so trash I was then fighting it for hours trying to get summons. And yet despite that it's still more reliable than the enemy drops.
Anyway, with Ring of Steel Protection+2 I checked out tank build. 1400-1600-1500 roughly. That's over twice my attack with the Giant Warrior Club! Yowza! And yet it's still effectively useless.
Future Run Ideas:
Belmont Run
Someone spelltastic. Probably Hexes.
Shield-only run.
The sheer self-indulgence of dual-wielding twinblades.
Heide Knight gimmick run.
Looking Glass Knight gimmick run. Grind summon souls for both of these to open Shrine of Winder until I can complete the sets I guess..
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DS2: One day Roberta woke up naked in a rotting medieval kingdom filled with zombies. She is coping with this situation the same way she deals with everything else: by punching the shit out of everyone and not dying even when she's killed.
Pugilism Souls, like so many terrible ideas this is 100% Fudo's fault. Been running around without armor just because well, why not? I may switch in nudist armor if I ever get it (or Velka set because at least it's the right color) but man, haven't hardly noticed any impact from literally not having any defense so far (I haven't died yet after clearing Forest/Heide's/NMW). Of course, the roll distance for <10% weight is honestly kind of problematic sometimes. I go so far that I constantly wind up like ten feet behind the people I want to hit!
I am really trying to keep it absolutely 100% melee this time and never even use a bow. This is difficult since that's my first response to like anything slightly inconvenient (Shrine of Amana nooooooo). I may just invest in throwable objects and accept that as a limited substitute. Throwing knives do seem pretty aces this time around!
I am just immediately chowing on every boss soul this time because seriously what do I need them for? Most boss weapons are crap even in a normal run.
Probably never ever talking to Gavlan this time unless I maybe come back with a huge pile of knives later.
Damage output from the caestus L1 one-two combo is actually very satisfactory so far, but I don't know if that'll hold out long-term. I see a ton of investment in physical stats here, presume optimally I want to hit 40 STR/DEX again because multiple stat scalings. And I guess otherwise just vigor vigor vigor. Well I had to dump some levels on ADP too because starting bandit drinking speed is paiiiiinful. As in unable to chug once without Pursuer stabbing you during the act slow.
Fudo: as far as magic goes, I found running a mix of sorcery/pyromancy a lot more fun than miracles. Also the INT-specific armor's got styyyyyle.
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Suffer as
G I Did!
I can't even imagine going through Shine of Amana without bows.
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DS2: So I have been playing this! Just got the king's ring. Going Miracles'n'maces style, blasting things with lightning and macing things with a mace. Wearing heavy armor, switching between Tower Shield and Rebel Greatshield, the value of which cannot be overstated, especially in Shrine of Amala. Guilt I feel zapping bosses: significant. Guilt I feel zapping everyone in Shrine of Amala: zilch. Oh my god that zone is the worst zone. Unless Black Gulch is the worst zone. Guiltiest pleasure: using Soul Appease on Magus & Congregation. Dick moves by the game that are laugh-out-loud funny: the setup where the crystal lizard falls into the center of the water and you jump off the bridge after it and then there are exploding zombies and YOU DIED; pretty much every time you get jumped from behind at the least convenient moment; "you know fighting invisible enemies in the mist is really hard I'm glad they at least don't backsta--THUNK where my HPs go???"
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Apparently dual wielding twinblades is total trash
Still want to try it out though
Amala is more manageable without bows since the patch. I did it pre-patch with a terrible full dex no bow char, you can do it.
Got a bunch of terrible pointless deaths in No-death run. Always for the same reason: Enemy attack pushing me into lava/bottomless pool of poison, even though I SHOULD BE INVINCIBLE with 50 Vit, 30 Vig, 2 Havel equipments.
At least I beat Smelter.
Very tempted to skip the Earthern Peak alltogether next time.
Anyway I then tried three mages and died almost immediately all three times.
Mages are the SMB2 Mario, Great club wielders are the SMB2 Luigi (Harder to use at first, but waaaaay more effective)
Going to try out that Giant Bandit Axe next.
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The invisible douches in the Shaded Woods will outright insta-kill you with a backstab. Even in Full Armor mode and almost 2000 HP I died in one stab in just NG.
I'm shooting for 90 STR to dual-wield Giant Warrior Club. Infeasible and trash are the furthest concerns from my mind.
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Got backstabbed in NG without the best armor/HP, and survived.
100% Sure, I was in No Death Mode and totally going insane.
Anyway
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Obkd0NeRWbg
Edit: Bandit Greataxe suuuuucks
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Bravely Default - So Chapter 2 was about the true nature of beauty and how toxic and deeply ingrained unhealthy concepts of body image are. So far off early stuff of just getting to
Isengard (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uE-1RPDqJAY) Eisenberg and talking with [SUBTLE]Daniel Goodman [/SUBTLE] it appears that chapter 3 is about how being incredibly passive aggressive about people with no stakes in your civil war not swooping in and being prepared to die for your country.
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Dark Souls 2: Spend most of the day farming Sunlight Medals in Belfry Luna. Thanks for that tip Cid. Highlights include dealing 1800 damage with a jumping attack. Sweet sweet club action. I wish I could hear the response of some people from getting obliterated by the club or watching the gargoyles go down in two hits each. Anyway with 30 medals I go and grab the Sunlight Spear miracle and get invaded. Eyhuh. Due uses the Ancient Dragon Soul sword on me but I eventually manage to land my heavy hit and kill him. Yay or something. All I need now are Royal Aegis Soul and the NG++ stuff for the Platinum. So let's go do those! Shrine is blah. Demon of Song is weakest t magic arrows, gonna stock up on those. DOwn in the crypt the death pit gets another life. Royal Aegis gets one because his giant second swing hits behind him. Next fight I trash him. Run in ring and... heyyyyyyyy I still have my Giant Souls get owned Vendrick! Mmmm mmm mmm sweet 600K souls. That's nearly enough to get me to 90 STR! OKAY, gonna pop a bonfire ascetic for Wellgar and... can't do it because the boss is still alive. OK, whatever, Throne duo aren't hard. BUTOHWAIT THE DUO IN FRONT OF THE KING DOOR IS. Like, HOLY SHIT they took more lives than every other boss in NG+ COMBINED. UGH. At least Throne Duo die easy. Gonna double-check I have the correct bonfire and hahahaha-NOPE it HAS to be NG++ no bonfire asceticing here!
UGH. That means I have to sludge my way through again? But I have so many other things to try! Oh well, Giant Club will be soon at least.... Alida's surprise guest gets a life. Actually fight Guardian Dragon and his cousins in melee since I'm hella annoyed. Learn that Gren's set also boosts soul gain and go switch to that since it's slightly better. Dragon Shrine goes just fine since I ignore the club jerks. Back over to Memory Lane. Get the Club and the sixth giant soul. Bug out, upgrade and dammit... it doesn't do as much damage as just two-handing one of them. BAH.
And then a pyro-giant preforms a complete-180 throw to hit me wipes out 80% of my life and stuns me long enough for a follow-up shot I couldn't possibly dodge.
Grabbed the rest of the soul weapons and the king stuff at some point.
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Pyro Giants cheat.
DS2: At endgame. Cleaning up the optional bosses before I finish.
BD: Finished all the Chapter 8 optionals. Praline cheese is ridiculous, but I found the best way to counteract it is with my own Performer using the Zero Sum skill. Actually this is just a good skill in general. When you use it enemies using brave attacks go negative so you get a free turn afterwards.
And then the super mage fight. You know which one if you've played it. Ended up using Stillness at the beginning to get some setup time, with Slow World support ability on my mage. Dark Nebula x4 from my Dark Knight (after Enigma) and quad Meteors kill two of the four enemies. One of the remaining mages gets off a fire attack that kills my whole party... except for my healer using the secret best support skill in the game: Auto-Shell. Which I threw on just because I didn't have anything else productive to spend that last point of support on. He hits Rejuvenation and Enigma and it's game over for the bad guys.
The remaining fights are trivial after that one. I actually get the Sweeper bonus on the next one. And the one after that was amusing with Slow World vs Hasten World.
Now onto the Frue Final!
Oh, fun fact: If you use a move that uses BP during Bravely Second, you actually get negative SP. Actually that fact was not fun at all.
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FF10 HD: Finally back to this! Just won the Blitzball tournament through the cunning strategy of "sit behind goalie" <_<
Ok, first off, I remember a discussion a while back regarding whether Wakka believes Tidus is from Zanarkand. After rewatching those scenes, he clearly does not. He comes up with a theory about Sin sending people through time, obviously as some sort of way to delude himself into believing that Chappu is still alive, and if believing Tidus raises those chances, then he's all for it. Then Lulu shoots him down immediately saying "Chappu is dead and we even found his corpse; he's gone and never coming back, DEAL WITH IT." This shuts up Wakka's theory entirely and the team moves on. On the boat, the idea of Tidus being from Zanarkand never comes up, at least on Wakka's end. They bring up how he's Jecht's son, and Wakka expresses a little bit of doubt; Lulu's a little hard to read here, because of her stoic way. It's hard to say if she believes if Tidus = Jecht's son, or is merely expressing Yuna's reasoning, and simply didn't care enough about whether it's true or not.
Zanarkand is only brought up by Yuna, and she's the one person who undoubtedly believes Tidus is from Zanarkand, at least at this point in the story. Wakka's helping him out because A. Blitzball and B. He feels higher chance of seeing someone he knows in a place like Luca than a small village like Besaid. He even shows willingness to leave Tidus in Luca and move on with the pilgrimage; it's Lulu who says that Wakka should ask him, on Yuna's behalf, because that's what Yuna wants, and Lulu clearly has Yuna's best interests at heart.
So yeah, in conclusion, outside of the delusional moment in Kilika he has, which Lulu shoots down with a major reality check, seems pretty clearly Wakka doesn't firmly believe Tidus' story.
Regarding Tidus and whining now? So at the temple, after meeting the Goers for the first time, Tidus basically mentions how they're jerks, and...really, he's absolutely right; the Goers are arrogant, pompous jerks. This isn't whining, more just him illustrating "I've seen these kinds of players a lot, my father was one of them" and it's more an indicator of how Tidus isn't a fan of bullies. This is something I didn't notice early on, but just kind of subtle that fits in with everything; Tidus does not like bullies and always stands up to them. This explains why later, he tells Kimhari at Luca to stand up to Yenke and Biran, who are essentially just bullying the heck out of him. Tidus encourages Kimhari to stand up for himself, which Kimhari does do, and originally I felt that was just kind of "Tidus likes picking fights!" but now that I put that scene in context with the Goers scene, I think it actually seems more in character than originally thought. This fits in perfectly with the Jecht relationship too, since his father was essentially one major bully, not that Jecht realized it; to Jecht, it was an act of tough love, but it doesn't change the fact that on the recipient end, Tidus was feeling bullied by his father, and that's definitely the impression they want you to have on your first time through these scenes:
Jecht is an awful person who doesn't care about his son. True, Yuna is defending him, but then that's to make Tidus' story also give a sense of bias; is that how Jecht really was, or how Tidus remembers him? And if the former, why did Jecht act that way? Obviously, these answers all come later, but as it stands, Tidus' anti-Jecht policy is, from what the game illustrates, justified.
In the temple itself, Tidus doesn't really do any whining; some basic questioning and that's it. Ok, he complains when Barthello throws him onto the elevator, but that's just a perfectly normal reaction. What do you expect him to say? "Thanks for manhandling me! I totally appreciate the fact that I may get Yuna in trouble!"
Then the "I felt like I wanted to scream!" scene...I can't justify this. I get it, he wants to go home and he knows he can't, but the sequence still felt a little forced. This is probably the one time I felt Tidus came off as whiny so far. The boat scene then occurs, and the only thing that comes off as remotely whiny is when he says he's going to punch his dad, but he does at least come up with a reason and again, everything the game has portrayed so far, you can completely understand Tidus' disgust towards his dad.
At Luca, Tidus has the "HEY GOERS! WE RULE AND YOU DROOL!" scene on the loudspeaker, but that's just Tidus being loud and a jock. Tidus may not be stupid, but he IS impulsive, and doesn't always think things through. This is not whining, as he's doing it basically as a pure publicity stunt. The game doesn't really try to pretend this is the right thing to do anyway, as Wakka immediately goes "are you crazy!?" The Aurochs are fond of it, but it sounds like because "we never get any attention!"
In any event, Tidus whine values outside of one scene seem pretty low.
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Pokemon XY:
If I catch a female Pansage, "LaFemChiquita" should fit.
All-Canine Playthrough: I've just kinda been leisurely going through the early areas, catching lots of stuff just to catch them. Besides Fennekin and Riolu, which are ridiculously early, the next canines are Furfrou, Smeargle, and Abra/Kadabra (Abra is more like a cat, but kadabra is debatably some kinda fox thing, but that's close enough for my purposes). So I rounded out my early team with these three.
Abra: More of a long-term investment, but since I already have Delphox slotted for my final team, I don't really need another Psychic type (not to mention that getting Alakazam is impossible for me at the moment since I can't trade with anyone). So he's just kinda dead weight here in the earlygame.
Smeargle: Similarly deadweight.... well, I Sketched Fairy Wind early on so he's uh... representing Fairy type for me? Yeah, I may end up using him a lot later on since he's the only canine that can conceivably learn Fly. *grumble*
Furfrou: What a pleasant surprise Furfrou is! Bulky, decently fast, Normal-typed, so not many weaknesses, plus STAB Return is nice in a game with Pokemon-Amie where it's easy to raise happiness.
And let's talk about Pokemon-Amie for a minute. Holy crap, this insidiously genius addition to the battle system. Not only is it innately cute getting essentially a fantasy anime version of Nintendogs, but the minigames are pretty fun and breezy and addictive. The truly genius part are the little touches added into the battle text for a high-affection 'mon. I can't bring myself to run away or switch out a 'mon, when just before choosing an action, the thing glances at me briefly and the text reads "Pokemon is looking at you with trusting eyes!"... Seriously, now I'm gonna have to bust out some expensive items and let it beat down the enemy... It is terrifying how good at emotional manipulation Nintendo is...
Anyway, as early as Route 8, I have team of six canines.
Absol: She rounds out my party by giving me a Psychic-immune Cat/Goat/Dog thing. I had previously maxed out Fennekin, Lucario, AND Furfrou on affection, but for some reason, maxing out Absol's seems to have the most in-battle effects. It shrugs off status all the time, constantly criticals and dodges. It might just be that Absol is built with high crit/evade and Pokemon-Amie is just changing the flavor text to make it seem like it loves me more. (Insidious...) It freakin' worked though. Its TM movepool this early on make it amazing so far. I hope there's a Move Relearner or whatever later on because I've been throwing TMs on it and ignoring most of its good status-type moves in favor of more smash, but I know I'll want some of those status moves for later challenges. Still, current MVP on a team that has Lucario and Delphox on it is pretty impressive.
Barely do I have time to get my new Absol (a mere mountain dungeon and a gym leader where Smeargle got to smack down Tyrunt with Fairy Wind), when I get to Route 10, where the rest of my Dog team awaits! Eevee, Electrike, and Snubbull replace Smeargle, Abra, and Furfrou. You will be missed, Furfrou! I catch a bunch of other Eevees too, just to eventually evolve them for some kind of collector's habit. It's nice that Eevee is just a common wild encounter in this game.
Eevee: I evolve my main Eevee into Vaporeon right away so it can learn Aurora Beam, but it's too late for him to learn any Water-type moves for a while and I have no water TMs. It's frustrating since there's a lot of things that water would hit weakness on coming up.
Electrike: Mostly contributes Thunder Wave and is my go-to dog for catching things. He's fast, but is leveling slowly (with three new 'mon at once, I haven't had time to max out all of their Pokemon-Amie affection boosts.)
Snubbull: He is the newest addition and so I haven't quite figured out what he's good for yet. He has the Run Away ability, which is nigh-useless. I hear there's a way to switch which ability they have in this game, where do I get this?
Fun little romp so far, the Exp Share has insured that I've always been a bit more leveled than my opponents though. Not taking it too seriously overall, but Pokemon-Amie is a highlight.
And now the important part: NICKNAMES. Seriously, I need some suggestions, I'm running out of good ideas.
Roselia: "Byanthyname" would smell as sweet~
Oddish: "MANdrake" If it had been female, I'd have called it Womandragora.
Azurill: "Beachball" Because it is so cute I want to spike it over a volleyball net.
Espurr: "Psykitty" I considered the alternate spelling of Psychitty, but it looked weird
Ralts (M) + (F): "Empatrick" and "Empatricia", together I think of them as the Empats.
Fletchinder: "Firaptor" because a raptor is a bird of prey... and it's on fire.
Bulbasaur: "Dendrobater" Dendrobates are Poison Tree Frogs... bater.
Kecleon: "Comma , , , " CHAMELEON!
Honedge: "Scarebard" He has the soul of a poet in his scabbard.
Minun: "Dimples" - it matches my Pikachu named "Cheeks", and if I ever stumble upon a Plusle, I'll call it "Pimples"
Croagunk: "Toothfrog" - seriously, why does this frog have teeth?
Salamence: "Kickassasaur" I also considered "Kickassic"
Inkay: "Inversushi" Although, how can you really tell if sushi is inverted or not?
Sandile: "Shades Ogrey" Look, he likes BDSM novels, okay?
Cubone: "MommyIssues" It wears them on its face!
Helioptile: "Dilophoshock" I can use Greek prefixes too~
Skitty: "Cattail" because this cat's tail looks like a cattail...
Skiddo: "Handlebars" It's like riding a bicycle... that eats trash
Onix: "Boringsnake" GET IT?! Because it BORES!
Mawile: "Backtalker" double-appropriate because it has a Sassy Nature!
Dwebble: "Sedimentick" I think Dwebble is some kind of tick anyway?
Ducklett: "Infowlible" ...yeah, I told you I needed suggestions...
Hawlucha: "Pollo Diablo" Monkey Island reference mixed with luchador reference!
Swoobat: "Kissoptera" Bat with the power of LOOOOVE~
Zubat: "SCOURGE" of my existence.
Team:
Delphox: "Browser" still a psychic firefox
Lucario: "Pound Puppy" -> renamed "Pounder" because he's not a puppy anymore.
Furfrou: "Passionista" I considered naming this one Grefter or Snow
Smeargle: "Van Doge" much paint so beret such wow
Abra: "All Yo Spoons" yip yip yap
Absol: "Monocorn" because it's monochromatic and has one horn. What, they can't -all- be funny.
Vaporeon: "Paddler" he doggy paddles when you use Surf <3
Manectric: "Wiremane" because I wanted something that sounded like a name, but "ManeAttraction" was such a better pun!
Snubbull: "Faebull" It's a fable about a fairy-type... who is also a bulldog.
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All-Canine Playthrough:
No mention of Stoutland line. Officially dead to me.
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Stoutland is sadly not available in XY. Game Grefter should skip/10
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No Arcanine or Ninetales either :(
And Houndour is X-only.
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Marvel Heroes is a good game. I've been playing Wolverine lately and running the fabled "Baby Wolferine" build, wherein he melts bosses but he is also invincible, because the ESRB won't let you show a baby getting killed. Using multiple Pym's Shrinking Serums, you can make him, already the shortest character, really short. Like baby short. Hence the name.
Baby Wolferine melts bosses because he is a Wolverine with the added anger of a baby. Wolverine has a secondary resource called Fury, which he consumes to do his best moves. Baby Wolferine kills Magneto in 3-5 shots because that makes no sense but neither does a version of Wolverine who is less than two feet tall. He wears the Satan Claw, signature weapon of Baron Strucker, and a Department K vest. Since Department K is Canadian I assume the vest is denim.
Basically being Baby Wolferine means that you max your passives and then use the cooldowns that make Logan get instantly angry, then you just melt things. You get punched a lot but you're Wolverine and healing from shit is what you do.
Is he the best character? Not even close. He is not very good at fighting more than one thing, and since this game is Diablo with Superheroes you can imagine how that is a problem. He also doesn't have multiple viable builds like Iron Man or Dr. Strange or several other characters I could name, so if you get bored of melting bosses there's not much else to do except laugh at how you look like a baby. You also have to pay attention and not stand in things and also press buttons, all of which Jean doesn't have to do. She just turns into Dark Phoenix and flies around the screen cackling and things die almost instantly from getting close to her because I guess she burns like the sun.
All in all I give Baby Wolferine a B and am moving on to playing Punisher. Basically you just fire rockets into a crowd and then spray them down with machine gun fire to mop up the stragglers which makes perfect sense to me.
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DS2: So I'd been avoiding Smelter Demon because everyone says he's hard, and... he's easy? You just roll diagonally towards him and to the left when he attacks. Then you have like an hour to hit him before he attacks again.
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Smelter's explosion is the most dangerous part since it shares the exact same animation as a different attack. Coupled with his damage aura and he falls into the usual pattern of too much damage to compensate for otherwise complete ease.
Dark Souls 2: NG+ Complete. Giant Lord took a life because I I got with fire on the run in again. Then I got hit by fire but lived. Final went down in one go again. Also discovered the real reason for the Soldier's Rest bonfire is to respawn a Black Phantom that only spawns once per NG+ and drops gear. Yippie. Racked my head about whether Four Great Ones or soul-spamming would get me through Shrine of Winter faster. Too tired today to properly think so I went into NG++ without grabbing Benhart's stuff or the Ancient Dragon Soul. Skipped the Rats, Darklurker and Ancient Dragon itself because of there being no real reward anymore.
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DS2: So I'd been avoiding Smelter Demon because everyone says he's hard, and... he's easy? You just roll diagonally towards him and to the left when he attacks. Then you have like an hour to hit him before he attacks again.
Roll diagonally towards the enemy and to the left is Advanced Tactics.
Everybody rolls to the right!
Even if you're super pro, he does a lot of damage, is durable, the room is small, immolation can fuck you over. There's a high chance of getting murdered while estusing. He's much tougher than all the other early-mid bosses, and pretty similar to Veldstadt (who's fought way later)
I got killed by the best trap in a No Death run: You know that room after the second bonfire in the Gutter with all the ladders? You can basically pick any to go down and continue to the Black Gulch.
One leads to nowhere.
Nowadays I just buy a ton of kunais from Melantia since they're so useful (The best anti-exploding zombies weapon) and this nets a Covetous Silver Serpent Ring +1. I also just kill Pate outright since it's so easy and his armor looks boss. The Heide White Knight who's just chilling near the giant tree also gets killed by kunais.
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Well I fought him at endgame with a ranged character so that may have helped.
Now Royal Rat Authority, that is a tough fight at any level. Just because of his support.
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Make sure to plan out which Furfrou trim you want ahead of time, Djinn.
(http://i.imgur.com/9IBwMb8.png)
This is literally the most important decision of your entire playthrough.
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Obviously I'm choosing the one with the top hat, snazzy tie, and the... what is that? a bedknob? for a tail.
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Pugilism Souls: this session, the dying started.
Got murdered first by a crossbow-in-a-box (holy shit these things are mean) attempting to retrieve what memory says is a TORCH. It was downhill from there for a while. Five deaths to Mytha! Who I'll go on record as calling one of the worst things to dodge in the entire game. Also it turns out the eyes on her severed head actually blink! I didn't think people were capable of blinking in Souls games. Oh, and it turns out desert sorceresses actually have melee attacks?! (They should stick to exploding faces, it's much scarier.)
But the only other thing to kill me more than once* so far has been the Sentinels (two deaths). Usual crap, their jump-across-the-goddamn-room attack is way too fast and way too damaging. Everything else is perfectly manageable but that just always comes out of nowhere right when you're trying to heal. Caestus damage actually really outstanding here, even at only +6 weapons I could take them apart pretty quickly given opportunity. Why is strike damage so good. Jesus christ From. I had a higher attack rating in dual-falchion mode but I deal more damage even just per-hit in this run just because everything in DS2 resists slash damage and in Drangleic anything made of metal is weak to punching (what).
So yeah, this is actually both extremely effective and very satisfying. Max roll distance has a surprising degree of utility! Precision timing is less important when you know you can leap right out of anything's attack radius instantly. I'm not sure I can go back to wearing clothes you guys. (Observed impact to damage taken: NONE WHATSOEVER. Even status susceptibility is barely any worse.)
Other stuff, uh, let's see...no deaths to the gargoyles! (Despite me almost embarrassing myself by panicking and getting mauled to within an inch of my life once it was a one-on-one fight.) That was immensely satisfying. Then I got summoned for the fight by some Havel's dude who'd ascetic'd the belfry. I SURVIVED. This was great. And pugilism actually has some surprising utility for PVP? Put on the Stone Ring and you can stunlock through quite a lot of armor. I smashed through two invaders in the process of ringing the bell. Caestus attack range is much less of an issue when you can jump right across the world to uppercut someone.
(*OH WAIT. Retrieving the Bastile key. This was excruciating. Far more trouble than either the boss before it or the one it's useful for. Again reinforcing that the scariest things in this game are not gigantic menacing monstrosities but instead just hordes of tiny dudes.)
I guess there were some other bosses in there. I died once to Smelty, was having an easy time of it but freaked out over it being too easy or something and got smashed at like 85% progress? Victory run was probably the easiest time I've had with him. Roll left and behind really is the key. And I can roll all the way behind whatever I want this time! Then I go back in the room to get my Ring of Blades +1 and wait what Pursuer's glowy blue poke attack curses you?! (I'd never been hit by it before.)
Just entered Drangleic Castle when I called it a day. No deaths to: skelemob, Jabba, balrog (I won a fistfight with a balrog! That is awesome), Lost Sinner (and I dread this fight more than anything else in the game), chariot, Prowling Magus. Prowling Magus is suddenly a crazy attrition fight! Circle around, punch out priest, circle around, punch out other priest, punch out walking zombies one by one, demolish Magus in one attack string, end fight in epic match against crawlers that are too low for my fists to hit without leaping attacks.
One death to:
-Najka. I got stupid (the money was too good). The proper strategy is bait her into using stinger jab then punch the crap out of her. But I just had to try and get in some extra hits between spear stabs.
-Freja. 100% because of her support. I spent a couple minutes circling around the actual boss trying to pick apart her goons one by one and mostly whiffing (because of attack range/spider dodgehax/getting stunlocked). Little spiders are a major problem in this run! Freja a complete joke without her little friends though.
-The Rotten. I have no excuse, you guys. None whatsoever.
I may not bother with ratbro bosses. Dunno. Definitely skipping Darklurker because fuck the lead-up to him and the fight itself, king and ancient dragon can also get tossed because they're both stupidly overpowered and stupidly boring.
My bows are still all in storage, and the only throwing implements I've ever used are the few found ones that were only employed to aggro a few specific enemies (duo outside of Mytha's room, for one). I was going to just leave Straid a statue forever because I don't need anything from him this time but WAIT I want that Mock gesture god dammit (thanks for that video Fudo, now I can't play DS2 without hearing that song in my head. At least it's a pretty cool little song, but still). So had to brave 'splosion zombies after all. This wasn't so bad as expected, I'd taken no hits from them en route to the Gutter earlier. The trick is that they pause just for a second before exploding at you. This is when you must punch them in the face!
And then it turns out Straid won't talk to me because my character is clinically retarded. God dammit. Okay I'll come back later after some Soul Vessel shenanigans.
Oh, and I decided to see what happens with Pate and Creighton if you don't do anything to help either of them. Pate wins. And you don't get the key to that little room with the 'splosion chest. OH NOES. It's nice not having to give a damn about loot or even ore at all. Soul items and healing supplies are always nice to have, but seriously once both caestuses hit +10 there was no reason for me to ever care about picking something else up again ever. Which is good because my character doesn't understand vertical tolerance and my fists fly right over crystal lizards.
Why does the messaging system not include lizard as a noun when there's dozens of them yet you can say horse and there's only one horse in the game.
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Yatta Dark Souls? Because I didn't link any DS2 videos and the video for DS2 I did want to link I kept forgetting. But here it is, how to find the pickaxe! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQ2-PICH0Ls)
EDIT: Fenrir posted the Mockthrough.
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Kirby Return to Dreamland: I just took down a giant DeDeDe Mech with a plasma gun. This may be the single greatest thing in a Kirby game ever.
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All that for a pickaxe.
Love From Soft.
My current character is named Claymoar, she dual wields Claymores.
Pretty great. Slash res everywhere mostly hurts low damage weapons like daggers or dex weapons in general, greatswords are still decent in PvE.
El Cid, that battle right after the Gargoyles should remind you of Capra Demon. I never had much trouble with it (except in SL1 mode) because I used usual Capra Demon tactics. (=abusing the stairs)
You do notice damage difference for low damage attacks. The poizn zombies ambush in the Shaded woods screwed me over a few times, when I had no armor on. I'm pretty happy having armor only has a small effect, you can equip anything stylish you want.
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Greatswords feel like they have a better swing speed than in DS1.
ALSO I finally remembered to say this, but beneath your equipped weapons in your lower-left menu is a red bar indicating durability. MINOR QUALITY OF LIFE IMPROVEMENT!
I also threw on the King's set for my Throne sitting, for STYLE you see. Even an entire playthroughs worth of Twinkling Titanite couldn't fully upgrade the King's Set though. Four off.
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Everything cool takes Twinkling Titanite sadly. I'm rocking the Bone King set myself.
Marvel Heroes: I am playing the Human Torch because that is the only Fantastic Four character available from the outset. I cause extreme property damage. Also my boots summon N'Garai demons. I choose to believe this is canon.
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Human Torch is great all the way through. Thing is probably the worst character so don't get him. Sue Richards is due out in a week or two though.
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Greatswords feel like they have a better swing speed than in DS1.
All heavy weapons have better swing speed than they did in DS1. Which is cool because they're a lot more viable now rather than basically fucking you over any time you miss a hit. And the scarcity of twinkling titanite is really frustrating in a normal run. Everything I want to wear demands that stuff!
Yatta Dark Souls? Because I didn't link any DS2 videos and the video for DS2 I did want to link I kept forgetting. But here it is, how to find the pickaxe! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQ2-PICH0Ls)
EDIT: Fenrir posted the Mockthrough.
Oh right. Look, you're both crazy people whose names start with F. You perceive my confusion, yes?
As for that video, how in the world anyone thinks to do stuff like that is beyond me. (I probably would never even have noticed Logan existed in DS1 if I hadn't been told.)
Anyway, Pugilism Souls completed:
-Castle is nothing special.
-Shrine of Amana actually wasn't too bad? You can run right up to the lizard dudes and punch them out before they're able to rise to an attack position. Priestesses are a pain in tandem with anything else but easily dodged when there's just one. Priestess + archdrake jerks was tough but manageable (one death). As for the giant mushroom dude physically blocking the tunnel to the boss cavern and spamming equip-breaking gas...well, I just walked up without weapons or rings equipped and wore it down barehanded. For all that those soldier ant mandibles it's got look pretty fearsome, it turns out that it will never, ever do anything with them.
But the lead-up to the boss room, oh my god you guys. That is just the worst. The worst! Two priestesses immediately sniping at you, potentially a third if you go after them in melee, maneuvering towards any of the priestesses inevitably aggros lizard dudes, go out far enough and jerkass hexer invasion happens BLERRRGH. I immediately resigned myself to just running straight through to the boss, and even this took a good half a dozen tries. Fortunately, Demon of Song was a joke. Hits like a truck, but it's easy to work around attacks so clearly telegraphed. Wait 'til she flails each of her arms then run in to punch her in the face. That's it.
-Corridor leading to Velstadt is still fucking horrible. And I had to run it three times because fucking Velstadt. And on the first failed attempt he had only an invisible sliver of health left when I died! This was especially frustrating because the prime difficulty of the fight was just that the caestus can't reliably hit him unless you punch him in the leg from just the right angle as he's leaning the opposite direction.
-Guardian Dragon is just oh great another boss I can't reliably hit when I'm goddamn right under him. No-damage fight anyway. And I ran past most of the Aerie and Dragon Shrine enemies.
-Royal Rat Authority deaths = possibly as many as every other boss in the game combined. Aw god why did I even do this. Caestus can't reliably hit the little rats and toxic is basically guaranteed death (and it's here that I discover how little status resistance is really worth, Poisonbite Ring = one hit does like 75% of poison bar instead of like 85%. WOO FUCKING HOO). I actually broke down and tried bringing bombs, but most kinds I had couldn't actually OHKO the goons and I was too lazy to go and get more black firebombs (they tend to dodge bombs anyway). So lots of dodging, lots of RRA knocking his friends around and me hoping they stay down long enough for me to punch them out one by one. This was horrible. It was with great relish that I ate his soul (with some fava beans and a nice chianti).
-I pretty much immediately gave up against dynamic duo and called in a hexer to nuke them for me (this is the only time I summoned anyone this run). Caestus can't even fucking hit Throne Defender. And as is often the case, after the string of endgame dungeons I kind of just want DS2 to be over with. Everything post-Dragon Shrine is just so anticlimactic! It's more disappointing every time. Died twice vs final boss due to being impatient/not paying adequate attention to curse beacons and then that's a wrap. All told took me half as long as the caster runs (and that's supposed to easy mode!) That's just crazy! So yeah, viable unarmed fighting in a Souls game, I am happy about this (aside from occasional targeting bullshit).
If I ever run that character through NG+, I will probably take her full 180 for shits and giggles and run dual Avelyns. I guess back to sorcerer NG+ now, though. I gave Rosabeth the Moon Butterfly set and now she poisons me when I talk to her. Or tries to. The accumulation rate is so feeble and requires such close proximity that I presume the set would be totally ineffectual for actually inflicting poison on enemies. Plus you can't dodge properly anymore. Sadness, I really wanted to use it at some point.
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I gave Rosabeth the Moon Butterfly set and now she poisons me when I talk to her. Or tries to. The accumulation rate is so feeble and requires such close proximity that I presume the set would be totally ineffectual for actually inflicting poison on enemies. Plus you can't dodge properly anymore. Sadness, I really wanted to use it at some point.
Guess how I just killed Dragonrider /smug.
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Well I fought him at endgame with a ranged character so that may have helped.
Now Royal Rat Authority, that is a tough fight at any level. Just because of his support.
Is it not viable to, like, just crossbow his dudes to death? Or is crossbowin' cheatin'? You certainly have the time to snipe most of them from the getgo. Running a plodding, heavy armor wearin' caster, I'm baffled by how easy everyone says The Rotten is and how much trouble people have with RRA and Lost Sinner (who I mace'd to death because casting wasn't going to happen).
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If you keep track of the environment, the Rotten can't really kill you. He does less damage and has less durability than Lost Sinner, but he does let you heal in peace.
I never had trouble with RRA except in SL1 Mode (this "except in SL1 mode" applies to basically every boss) so I don't know about that one. Usually I kill the minions ASAP then do the usual obvious Last Giant / Iron Golem strategy of staying below his legs, which works well.
The hardest bosses for me are Throne dudes / Smelter Demon / Sentinels / Pursuer. The first one is easy with long range damage, while the three later ones can be saved for later.
Giant Lord also always kills me a few times and I don't know why his attacks hit me.
Never fought Big Dragon. And the other uber optional boss is easy.
BTW Pursuer as an Affinity-like attack that also curses. I got cursed twice by him one time. Then I died.
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Bravely Default - Decided to join the fad. :) Just got to Chapter 2 on Hard Mode, am currently using two Spell Fencers, a Time Mage, and a Merchant. Money seems to be a scarce commodity in this game.
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Yup. Right up until you stop having anything to spend it on more or less.
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Also, Orthros was a bitch on Hard. MT ~600 damage to my 680 HP mages? :( Default helps with that some but you've gotta take turns sometime.
Also, holy shit this kingdom is filled with douchebags
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Dark Souls 2: Got the platinum yesterday but was too drained from the marathon to post about it. NG++ all the way to Drangelic Castle in one sitting. Busted through Shrine of Winter with souls, but was at 3/4 Old Souls anyway with only Old Iron King left. Which is a shame because I wanted the Greatbow but whatever. Like I said earlier, took out Dragonrider with the Poison Butterfly stuff and no attacking of my own. Ruin Sentinels took 1 life, Gargs took out like 5. No one else did. Well, I guess Freyja did by *. But the damage I did through the three tries at * carried over so she started at like half life lulz. Damn Peasants.
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Bravely Default - So Red Mage is pretty hard if you fight it ASAP. MT Fear? Yuck. Holy shit that guy is the creepiest, but on the plus side we get some pro-women ranting from the party, including Ringabel.
Summoner was also really hard. ;_;
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Yeah Fear is a shockingly good status.
BD: Basically been skipping almost all randoms lately, makes the boss fights exciting. Behemoth (C3 endboss) was pretty badass. I couldn't beat the Guardian - it'd probably require twinking for HP and possibly a bit more levels, the support cannon fire, aside from 1500 ignoring Default damage, also has INITIATIVE, so MT Rocket Punch -> Cannon Fire is gonna mess you up eventually. Dragon Zombie was much easier. Next boss fights... I guess I'll tiny text since some people still aren't far enough and C4 obviously has the plotty fights.
Victor & Victoria were actually quite badass - at first. Exterminate is good times and wiped me, until I came back with POIZN BLOCKING MWAHAHA for 2 party members. Then they were EZ. Victor wastes way too many turns messing with his element buff spell that inexplicably costs him a BP. Sure bro I'll just dispel that for 1 of my turns, action economy.
Braev is a well-designed boss but I usually felt he had to get lucky and/or for me to make a mistake for him to really get through. After I had form 2 at quite low health - 15k / 45k (so 15/90 total) - he did a 3 BP -> -4 BP 2 massive Brave busting combos in a row. I'd survived that before, but Shin Smash wore off at the EXACT wrong time, AND he targeted perfectly and got criticals, hitting the Defaulting Agnes with his Default-ignorer (Radiant Blast?) AND Agnes' Angelic Ward didn't kick in. Anyway, murder 2 dudes on his first combo, murder my other 2 guys faster than me on his second combo. Sigh. Anyway, at least I know what to bring to the fight now! Time to set Hunting on my brawlers so that they can get Targeting for ignore-Default goodness...
On a plottier note, the plot point should be obvious by C1 assuming you read D's journal, but the game wants us to think that Alternis = D = (Ringabel), from timeline #6 or something (since Ringabel conspicuously wasn't around when Alternis visited the party in C1). Okay, fine, neat, I especially like that Ringabel never brings up the more alarming parts of D's journal if you bother reading it yourself that seem to indicate Alternis had a rough experience with Qada for working with Edea before, but somehow Braev convinced him to stand against Edea anyway, although he didn't want to "kill his own family" or something. But... why didn't Edea recognize that Ringabel looks exactly like Alternis? Are we supposed to believe that Alternis never took off his mask even around Edea? I guess... well, I'll see, the time for the Ringabel reveal will presumably be in the final confrontation at the pillar of light or whatever.
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did that boss just have MT almost OHKO damage??? no, fuck YOU Rusalka. :(
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BD - I am super happy with Salvemaker. !Mix available with an actual skill set and support skills able to be used is pretty sick. Healing power backed by a massive spike in Mind buffing gear made Cure ST nearly full healing, Cura MT nearly full. This is overkill on Normal. A lot of the skill set it gets seems obsoleted by Compounding(!Mix), but I still like that it is there. Also you see results of compounding before you use them. Pretty great.
I think you can get accessory that halves Water damage in that dungeon Ciatos and Abate Water is very achievable for a White Mage there. Ymmv on speed and how much it will help on Hard I don't know.
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The hardest bosses for me are Throne dudes / Smelter Demon / Sentinels / Pursuer. The first one is easy with long range damage, while the three later ones can be saved for later.
Giant Lord also always kills me a few times and I don't know why his attacks hit me.
Never fought Big Dragon. And the other uber optional boss is easy.
BTW Pursuer as an Affinity-like attack that also curses. I got cursed twice by him one time. Then I died.
Throne duo/Sentinels definitely extremely mean, but by this point I've got Smelty dodging pretty well down and I never found Pursuer to be a huge issue. I mean, he's basically got three attacks: charge + slash (roll forward when he swings): slash/slash/slam (roll left/right/anywhere): curse poke (roll anywhere, there's so much windup on this attack). I've seen him use his magic spell like once. Just fight him on the roof immediately outside the Cardinal Tower bonfire instead of his official boss location and you've got more than enough room to evade all of this.
My RRA deaths are almost entirely just living long enough to see the minions all dead. This is easy if you've got any spells slots (because Firestorm) but brutally unpleasant if you're pure melee. He's not much of an issue on his own, no.
So I was getting punchyfist girl geared up to be dual-wield machinegun girl on NG+ but it turns out the Avelyn chest doesn't respawn with an ascetic. Whoops! Anybody got a spare?
Also spent some time running around NG+ in Blue Sentinels mode to see if anything ever happened with that ever. Nope. I'm not bothering anymore. The autosummon thing might work out okay if it triggered for any player, but seriously nobody stays with Way of Blue once they've found like any other covenant early in NG.
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Pursuer's difficultly comes from entirely from frustration leading to missteps leading to more frustration. Literally died once to him solely because of my roll timing being practiced for 9 ADP got me hit constantly with 6 ADP. Doing no damage to his giant healthbar. That freaking barrel completing screwing up your movements. And of course getting hit by Curse stab when you clearly dodge it blahblahblah. When you finally get his moveset down he's sad pathetic fare less dangerous than most normal enemies.
Random other things I keep forgetting to mention!
Club-Guy got his STR up to 99 and just barely managed to hit 700 attack power with the Giant Warrior Club and Ring of Blades+2. Large Club's S scaling still has it weaker than Great Club's A scaling by 20 points.
Dual-Wield Avelyn is even more nuts than you think. Even with just Wood Bolts I burned down NG++ Covetus in like five barrages.
Something else here... but I forgot.
I'm actually gonna run through my second or third dude solely as Way of Blue to see if anything ever pops up. It outta be FUN*
Second Dude Titled: Queen Anime. Will be the twinblade duel-wield. She died to Pursuer because of the ADP thing up above and doing no damage on her attacks.
Third dude titled: Prettygirl. Will be hex-caster because I couldn't get the hair long enough to emulate the Chaos sisters for pyromancy. Yay Sunset staff. Killed Pursuer because I could actually do damage with attacks(lol mace+4) and since I knew about my roll flaw I compensated by baiting his charge out more. Actually killed Dragonrider first because lol and to open Felkin up. Did you know there's a sorcery catalyst in the Forest? I do now!
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did that boss just have MT almost OHKO damage??? no, fuck YOU Rusalka. :(
Twink for defense and slap Abate Water on your White Mage. There's also the water halving acc in the dungeon, like Grefter mentioned. Dark Flow -also- ignores Default, so don't bother (you can use your turns for in-battle buffing or setting up kills on the copies instead). Rusalka is a nasty as hell fight anyway.
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Actually I had beaten it already. Just took 10 tries or so and filled me with rage and yelling and things.
Had the general setup of (gameplay spoilers??)
Valkyrie with Sword Magic
Spell Fencer with White Magic
Time Mage with White Magic and Abate Water acc
Ranger with Misc
My WM spell levels were all just to the Level 3 spells, so I didn't have Abate Water on anyone.
The key was mostly to keep the Time Mage Hasted, make the Valkyrie kill the support as soon as they appeared (and keeping up Thundara blade), and have the Spell Fencer and Ranger get shots in on the boss when necessary. Haste actually helped a lot in this fight -- difference between primary healer going first and second is a huge ass deal. Tiz's job was simply to be a creepy furry in all the cutscenes and then turn back into a Merchant where he can make me mad cash. It is hard to take him seriously in all these scenes~
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There's no way you're going to beat Pursuer on the rooftop the first time through!
His stats are just too good right after the Last Giant, that's why I consider him a pretty hard boss. He's more manageable after Dragon Knight / The Sentry.
That first fight becomes a nice "Can I beat him now" free test in subsequent playthroughs
Dark Souls 2 :
SL1: Tried the Throne bosses...... Yeaaaah.... Firebombs aren't going to cut it anymore...
I could beat them with a few of those consumable spell restoring items and the biggest fireball I can get. But I'd be afraid of dying and eventually running out of items. I don't think anybody sells an infinite supply?
No Death: Claymoar died stupidly. The end.
Tried another brawler and got up (so far) to.... the freaking castle.
With no deaths!
I am so scared.
For the first time I got that bug where burning the windmill doesn't remove the poison from Earthern Peak. THANKS.
I beat Medusa anyway and had more trouble with Smelter. Seriously this guy is still the hardest.
Setup is :
Double Caestus +10
Ring of Blades +1
Covetous Silver Serpent Ring +1
Chloranty Ring +1
Life Ring +1
Vengarl's cool armor and Havel's gloves/legs. No helm.
50 VIT
16 VIG
42 STR
40 DEX
16 ADP
I'm fine with 70% equip load and my extremely pathetic rolls. Anything less and I eventually roll into a pitfall or quicksand or lava. I know myself.
Edit: Died in the infamous Shrine of Amala encounter.
I am broken.
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FLY'N - played through world 1, dropped
Just wasn't really clicking. I might pick it back up at some point.
Final Fantasy V Advance - played through
Job implementation wasn't as bad as I thought I remembered it being. In comparison to BDWTFF, it suffers in that you have barely any room to equip the abilities you're collecting (not that BD has that much more room given the costing system... and BD also has many more abilities in total). On the other hand, job progression feels a lot quicker. As far as I can ascertain, in BD when I first went to Eternia none of the characters had mastered their first job yet. By the second time I had to go to Eternia, they'd each mastered three, but between those two points in time is when the game drives off a cliff, and nothing after that point matters. I've also noted that I spent a lot of time grinding in Eternia because of JP gains having jumped significantly, so who can say what sort of progress would have been made by then if I hadn't done that. (Meanwhile I rarely ground much in FFVA, possibly because the ABP gains never really jumped significantly. Did throw 30-odd gold needles at Objets D'Art, but that quickly got too boring to keep up.)
Also, the concept of the Freelancer getting some of the passive abilities/stat changes from each mastered job for free helps to counteract the limited ability space somewhat, for all that it's probably a little extreme - even given that you need to be using the freelancer job (and consequently not building any other jobs) to take advantage of it. Feels like BD could have done with something along those lines. (Getting 1% stat boosts for every mastered job is not a replacement - it's possible that I'm underselling that, except you also get stuck with the Miscellany skillset if you want to take advantage of it). Anyway.
Final setup was:
Bartz Lv 44 !White/!Time (WHI/TIM/RED/MIM)
Lenna Lv 43 !Spellblade/Two-Handed (KNI/MYS/SAM/BLU/BER)
Krile Lv 44 !Black/!Summon (THI/GEO/DAN/NIN/SUM/BLA)
Faris Lv 44 !Rapid Fire/Barehanded (MON/BER/BEA/CHE/RAN/GEO)
(Didn't end up ever giving anyone Dragoon or Bard.)
Didn't beat Omega or Shinryu, not planning on trying, also not planning on doing any postgame things.
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The real answer to early Pursuer kills is good old Mace. Solves all problems forever.
Can you stack Spell Uses+ gear? The only renewable source of herbs is once the FINAL BOSS goes down. Ornifex just so that's in the open.
Dark Souls 2: Prettygirl trudges onwards. ODS, Skeleton Lords, Skeleton Lords NG+, Covetus Demon, Mytha, Scorpioness, Scorpioness NG+, Ruin Sentinels all down. Bonewheels in the NG+ battle get my first death. Mimic in Doors of Pharros gets my second because he gets reduced damage on his lunge otherwise it would have died. Asceticing Shaded Ruins got me +3 Twinkling so my Sunset Staff's at +3 now. With Iron Keep open I also make it a Dark Sunset Staff. Stopped playing after that. Shotgunning Allone knights works but without an aimable ranged attack the Snipers in Iron Keep are HELL.
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Freelancer in BD does have something to counteract it, it has a skill set baked in to it (that kind of sucks I guess) and Mimic. It is pretty flexible and if you grind out that Job Mastery you have a super strong carry class (positive %s in all stats is exceptional).
This lets Freelancer fill more design space than somewhere between useless and end game only uberclass. It isn't successful at everything it could ideally (like hey it WOULD be cool if it was a decent choice the entire game kind of like special character classes in FFT are), but it definitely is hitting a wider space than FF5 and FFD Freelancers did.
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BD: Beat the game for reals. Overall great game marred by a really ham-handed attempt at extending gameplay time.
Also, this is actual dialogue from the game: "Rgh! It's massive and hard! Are you alright, Edea?"
Coupled with a picture of Edea bent over and Tiz standing behind her with a Success Kid fist pump.
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MK2- Done. Hardest fight in the game was Reicher, followed up closely by Uryu. The rest weren't really worth noting.
Game ended on a positive note. Final combined chapter was an excuse to use an actual decent team (Read: Raze's crew +Ulrika and Enna and -Yun) and beat the hell out of some enemies. It's amazing how much having six competent PC's completely breaks the game. I ended up maxing out my Grow Book. That chapter gave out a hell of a lot of AP.
6/10 is my final rating? I hit on the problems in my earlier post from the mechanical side and there's not enough story for the pathsplit to be remotely justifable. I still had fun with the game after some early frustrations, and the writing was pretty good. Pepperoni and Goto need to jump into a lake of acid with Et and make the world a better place though.
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Y'know, I honestly found Pepperoni funny. If they didn't keep throwing him into scenes with Goto, I think he would have actually worked as comic relief (and hey, he actually got a character development arc, so he's not all bad... unlike Goto who they never actually reveal anything about....)
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Freelancer in BD does have something to counteract it, it has a skill set baked in to it (that kind of sucks I guess) and Mimic. It is pretty flexible and if you grind out that Job Mastery you have a super strong carry class (positive %s in all stats is exceptional).
This lets Freelancer fill more design space than somewhere between useless and end game only uberclass. It isn't successful at everything it could ideally (like hey it WOULD be cool if it was a decent choice the entire game kind of like special character classes in FFT are), but it definitely is hitting a wider space than FF5 and FFD Freelancers did.
Mimic seems kind of useless if you haven't set up your other party members to do things which are worth mimicking or are possible to mimic? During Bartz's time as a mimic in my FFVA playthrough there was certainly no point in mimicking Faris and Lenna (especially during the first half of that time when he still had the Healing Staff equipped), and as far as I could tell there isn't a way to swap to other characters with pending turns so there was no real way to ensure that he went after Krile.
I never used the Mimic command in BD, but it feels like it would require the same conditions? It's hard for me to really think about because lategame BD my party was entirely geared around everyone using shadowflare, so there wasn't anything that one person was doing that any other person wasn't also doing anyway. I don't really remember what other jobs were even capable of. (Reading up on BD Mimic, it claims that mimicking things doesn't consume any items, so it could have been easier on my finances to have people mimicking shadowflares rather than creating them organically... I don't remember what I had set as my other major ability slots, so I don't know whether that would have been viable or not.)
Anyway, as far as I can tell this was specifically in response to:
Also, the concept of the Freelancer getting some of the passive abilities/stat changes from each mastered job for free helps to counteract the limited ability space somewhat, for all that it's probably a little extreme [...]. Feels like BD could have done with something along those lines.
but I guess I wasn't very clear. I was admiring the fact that when you swap back to freelancer in the endgame you get things like Learning without having to devote any ability slots to it. BD's freelancer having its own personal skillset doesn't really answer the same question... especially since I would personally prefer to be able to select a different skillset in the place of Miscellany. I'll agree that them having Miscellany gives you a reason to use them for a time? And I definitely had Divining Rod and Dungeon Master equipped for most of the rest of the game after I got them, so I'm not trying to disparage that concept.
Just... Freelancers having their own skillset when the game doesn't offer much more room for abilities to be equipped than FFV makes the problem in question worse. I don't really have an answer offhand as to what could have been done to make it better.
There's something like 33 passive abilities (http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Freelancer_(Final_Fantasy_V)#Abilities) in FFV (discounting the advance classes), and you get a single slot to equip one in, and they're competing for that slot with something like 40 active abilities. When you go Freelancer, you get up to 13 of those passives by default, and a further 11 of them are redundant compared to the Freelancer's inherent capabilities, so you now essentially have 9 passives to choose from (still competing with ~40 active abilities) with two slots to put them in.
BDWTFF has something like 166 passive abilities (http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Support_Abilities_(Bravely_Default)) and you get five slots, except a lot of them take up more than one slot. Some classes get some support abilities for free, but even with that in place there's a ludicrous difference between what you have access to and what you can actually use. I'm not saying that Freelancer should get a big chunk of them for free, and granted there are a fair amount that are useless unless you have particular active abilities in use... but something should be different. I have no idea what.
(To be fair, those numbers are terribly unrepresentative because they assume that the character has mastered everything. Unfortunately I don't know what a reasonable amount of mastered jobs is for BD...)
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Numbers may be unrepresentative, but still valid litmus test for the discussion at hand. Not anything I will take umbrage over certainly!
Not really disagreeing that FF5 Freelancer is probably stronger yeah. More that they are different and are designed to fill different functions because of it. Miscellany being locked is definitely a big hit to their use (if all you care about in the Misc is Mimic then they are like a Mime -2 potential skill slots!). End game FF5 Freelancer is incredibly strong if you have worked on your dudes but is 100% reliant on you seeing classes through to their logical conclusion, it is very specifically a late to end game thing. BD they are a mix of something you can use during the game and maybe use end game. It certainly helps decentralize character development away from a specific end game carrier class like FF5 does in normal play.
It hits a happy medium between that and Universalist in Blue Dragon, which is a game where you have "Universalist" which is like your Freelancer. Universalist sucks forever to be in really, but you want your entire party to spend time in it because that is how you unlock more skill slots and some special accessory slots (that are quite powerful).
It isn't necessarily about stronger/weaker that matters but my personal opinion on the design, I think Bravely Default's method of that character class archetype is significantly more flexible and makes for more interesting scenarios personally, so is "Better" to me. Mileage may vary of course.
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FFV Mimic certainly has it uses (conserving MP on really expensive doublecast chains, limitng Elixir use on Magic Pots, etc.) but the BD version is really easy to exploit due to the Brave system: just pick a really good move with an expensive MP/BP cost and mimic it thrice. My Hero (+1 BP for entire team, 2BP cost) is the most popular choice and lets you crank out a ton more turns on your other three PCs.
Bravely Default not only has more passive abilities than FF5, it also has much more powerful ones like Holy One, Rise from Dead, Pierce Magic Defense, Obliterate, etc. Being able to stack a larger quantity of them would just make the game even more absurdly breakable than it already is.
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Star Ocean: The Last Hope- beat. So... this game is tri-Ace embracing all their own stereotypes, for good and ill. The core concepts are fine. First human space exploration, the events that ultimately lead to the UP3, broadly but not overtly including the basic defining elements of all three previous games. And then they choose to go about most of them in the wordiest and/or stupidest way possible, so that even perfectly good material seems overdrawn and needlessly melodramatic. Final boss is a fine example. Kindness+Despair+UNLIMITED POWER==Kill 'em All. Great. Valid. When you spend five minutes monologueing on the point, you make your audience think they're being treated like an idiot. Hell, maybe you are. You took the goodwill you won from your plot and piss bunches of it away. Silly.
That said, the gameplay flow i find a lot better than SO3's. It's slimmed down just enough that you have room to play and find what works for you. The rewards are less stingy and the bonus board much easier to maintain, so being a bit bad at the game doesn't snowball into utter suffering like SO3 often did. Cutting out usage==move power was a good move.
On the whole I can say plenty about the game, but in the end it doesn't elicit strong emotion. Just kinda alright. 6/10.
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Can you stack Spell Uses+ gear? The only renewable source of herbs is once the FINAL BOSS goes down. Ornifex just so that's in the open.
I'm pretty sure this works as long as it's different types of gear. I.E. multiple rings are out but ring + Licia's hood would work. Usual Souls effect stacking, game lets you get away with it as long as it's coming from different sources.
Not!Licia and Sorc run up through NG+. I don't feel like messing with either of them (for the remaining trophies) at the moment so I'm running PUGILISM SOULS through NG+ instead en route to proper machinegunning. I've already punched everything to death naked once, so I'm switching in the Avelyn for occasional ranged support and running around in the Singer's Dress. Because I've never ever seen anyone else use it (and also because boobs).
Smashed up through balrog and then went back for Sentinels/gargoyles. Boxer mode is still great but I really want that Ring of Blades +2 already. There's a lot of things that just barely survive one or two combos. Deaths so far for the hell of it:
-Birds thrown at face for massive damage
-2x smashed into paste by red phantom goon outside chariot fog door. What a bastard.
-(Not a death but) holy crap you can roll under the chariot's wheel spikes. I thought for sure I was toast there.
-Retrieving dull ember so I can buy infinite heavy bolts later, oh shit where'd that red phantom come from. Damn the Iron Keep is rude on NG+.
-Smelty. Smashed into ground by jumping attack 90% into battle -> "Oh god if he explodes right now I won't have a chance to escape" -> he explodes right now and I don't have a chance to escape. Cheap motherfucker.
-Did you know that the gargoyles can make lightning rain from the sky? I did not know this.
-Horrible dogswarm after gargoyles. Avelyn, I choose you!
Unsure how to get optimal damage out of Avelyn(s). I set the one I got from NG to Raw because duh there's no stat-scaling to lose anyway. Unsure if elemental weapon likely to do more damage, figure not because high single element attack rating generally > two mediocre multi-element attack ratings.
Oh and just because I haven't seen it mentioned here yet, just confirming that patch definitely did code in that succeeding on a summon will always turn you human now. Cool, that always should've been a feature instead of a bug!
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Pffft, who needs to roll under the Chariot spikes when you can just survive the hit instead.
Iron Keep in NG+: Is there a Red Phantom there in NG? No. Put Red Phantom there for NG+. I honestly think it's easier to go through Smelter than the normal path.
I've seen the Gargs do lightning but it's never hit.
Mundane probably does the most for scaling if you can understand the nonsense of how it works.
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Kirby Return to Dreamland: Beaten, gotten all gears, and have a 94% completion. I'm guessing the other 6% comes from doing challenges and such, maybe I will go and try those.
Dunno if I'll do extra mode. On one hand, the game is fun; on the otherhand, not sure I want to collect all 120 Gears again because some can be annoying to get as the game has lengthy stages at times.
That said, game is what you expect out of Kirby. Classic platforming fun with lots of fun powers to mess around with, all while being cute. See, it's classic Kirby games that make Kirby's Epic Yarn embarrass itself further to me.
Kirby games have that sense of "cuteness" but in a way that compliments gameplay; they clearly made the gameplay first, then went with the cute Kirby style second.
Kirby's Epic Yarn, they tried to mask the game's lack of substance with adorableness, and went way overboard, to the point of "IT'S SO CUTE YOU CANNOT HATE IT ^_^" but in the end, no matter how stylized or cute a game is, it doesn't offset the fact that KEY is just boring. Return to Dreamland didn't need that, by contrast, to be fine, it just added a fun little stylistic touch when the basic enemy your slaughtering are Waddle Dees with a 10 foot tall sword.
Basically, anyone who likes Kirby games should play this. It also has NSMB style Multiplayer, though it doesn't seem to have quite the same "Friendship Murder Ratio" those games have. You can dick around in subtle ways like running into a door to screw others over from getting power ups, but nothing major, so definitely stronger sense of co-op instead of trolling, for better or worse. One major advantage this has is that you can play as DeDeDe, which let's face it, is infinitely better than different colored Toads!
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Dark Souls 2: Prettygirl marches on. Smelter, Old Iron King, DDF, Gargs, Lost Sinner, RRV, The Rotten, DragonriderX2, Looking Glass Knight all down. Being a nigh-unstoppable death machine helps so much. Scrounged up enough Twinkling Titanite to get the Staff to +4 through Iron Keep. +5 came after Looking Glass Knight. Got the dark chime in the castle and had just enough Chuncks to +10 it off the bat. Currently do 612 with Dark Orb, 650 with Resonant Soul and 1152 with Great Resonant Soul. DEATH TO MY ENEMIES! Death counter's up to five. Those giant pricks in the water-part of Sinner's Rise got me once because the game suddenly didn't feel like having my attack connect. Randomly stuck into the wall during a Pit descent. Kill the first lizard in Brightstone, drop down and roll into the damn sandpit. BAH!
Black Gulch Chasm done. Gonna humiliate Darklurker before crying in the Shrine of Amane.
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So last week I meant to comment on XG talk but forgot, then random internet blackout again. Woot.
Anyway the whole Wave Existence thing is not strictly necessary, no. It's there because of the whole inverted gnosticism thing XG loves. There's no particular reason you couldn't achieve a similar end by having the Zohar possess some consciousness or even having the Contact thing be that Fei imparted consciousness to it. But symbolism.
Within the context of the story it's relatively straightforward for a lategame Xenogears plotpoint, it's just not presented very well. the Zohar itself 'actualizes potential phenomena', ie selects future events from among all possible things that COULD happen. When ancient space humans hooked tested out their control unit for the Zohar (I believe this was one of the eleventy billion functions of Kadmony, but I could be wrong), they essentially just told it to generate as much power as it could. Tapping into upper dimensional space achieved that end, but also managed to trap a being of that space in the material universe, which having no other place to go manifested in the Zohar. Being trapped in the Zohar, the WE could access its basic functions, but couldn't directly interact with the world, and since the Zohar is 'Perfect', something like "the Zohar was destroyed" is not a potential phenomena that can happen. So, the Contact. WE puts part of his being into Abel, and since Abel is a physical being that can actually directly interact with the world, he could actually use the Zohar to break the laws of physics where the Zohar by itself could not. Being a child he couldn't really comprehend all that, and before anything could be resolved the Eldridge crashed. All of which is in the game, just it's part of a weird text dump by the Wave Existence that you see all of once and most of the material is barely referenced again.
Since Abel died, WE had to use the Zohar to reincarnate him. If memory serves Elly's reincarnation is similarly accomplished, but done by Deus since she's essentially a missing piece of Kadmony whereas if the Contact stayed dead the Zohar juice he possesses would just go back to the Zohar. That's one of those PW things though.
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Pffft, who needs to roll under the Chariot spikes when you can just survive the hit instead.
Iron Keep in NG+: Is there a Red Phantom there in NG? No. Put Red Phantom there for NG+. I honestly think it's easier to go through Smelter than the normal path.
I've seen the Gargs do lightning but it's never hit.
Mundane probably does the most for scaling if you can understand the nonsense of how it works.
I'm less scared of Smelty than I am of red Alonne captains.
And Mundane is utterly baffling.
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I only have 2 spell slots so I'm not sure Spell Use + gear would help that much. I'll try anyway!
- I can't have the Hex hood because that requires 20 in faith/int (unless you can kill the dude for it? I doubt it IIRC you only get the staff from him).
- Equipping the Northern Ring would mean dying in one hit.
- I guess I could go with Licia's helm (I don't care about not meeting the stat requirement right?)
- Anything else?
Doesn't mundane just scale off your lowest stat? So it's just for jack of all trade characters who want to have 15 in everything.
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So last week I meant to comment on XG talk but forgot, then random internet blackout again. Woot.
Anyway the whole Wave Existence thing is not strictly necessary, no. It's there because of the whole inverted gnosticism thing XG loves. There's no particular reason you couldn't achieve a similar end by having the Zohar possess some consciousness or even having the Contact thing be that Fei imparted consciousness to it. But symbolism.
Within the context of the story it's relatively straightforward for a lategame Xenogears plotpoint, it's just not presented very well. the Zohar itself 'actualizes potential phenomena', ie selects future events from among all possible things that COULD happen. When ancient space humans hooked tested out their control unit for the Zohar (I believe this was one of the eleventy billion functions of Kadmony, but I could be wrong), they essentially just told it to generate as much power as it could. Tapping into upper dimensional space achieved that end, but also managed to trap a being of that space in the material universe, which having no other place to go manifested in the Zohar. Being trapped in the Zohar, the WE could access its basic functions, but couldn't directly interact with the world, and since the Zohar is 'Perfect', something like "the Zohar was destroyed" is not a potential phenomena that can happen. So, the Contact. WE puts part of his being into Abel, and since Abel is a physical being that can actually directly interact with the world, he could actually use the Zohar to break the laws of physics where the Zohar by itself could not. Being a child he couldn't really comprehend all that, and before anything could be resolved the Eldridge crashed. All of which is in the game, just it's part of a weird text dump by the Wave Existence that you see all of once and most of the material is barely referenced again.
Since Abel died, WE had to use the Zohar to reincarnate him. If memory serves Elly's reincarnation is similarly accomplished, but done by Deus since she's essentially a missing piece of Kadmony whereas if the Contact stayed dead the Zohar juice he possesses would just go back to the Zohar. That's one of those PW things though.
I found this whole explanation pretty interesting. It's weird that despite that filling in a lot of holes in the timeline, it doesn't really feel like it explained much of anything...
I guess it helped clarify that the Zohar is essentially more powerful than the Wave Existence? I didn't really know what the Zohar was supposed to be. I still kinda don't, apart from apparently "Perfect" and has technobabble-based wish-granting powers, I guess? I always had kinda assumed that Abel's wishes were just directly granted by "God"/WE, so I wasn't quite sure what the Zohar was for, apart from looking cool in cutscenes?
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Well, that's just the most reasonable explanation for what's going on based on the actual dialog presented in the game. It's just easy to miss it because the phrase 'actualize potential phenomena' will make most people's eyes glaze over. if you want a simpler comparison, it's the Infinite Improbability Drive. On its own it doesn't do much. If you can tell it how unlikely something is, it can make that exceedingly unlikely thing happen. God is trapped in there, so he can mimic the functions of the computer that's supposed to be hooked up to it, but he can't just tell it to blow up because that's impossible, not just improbable. The Contact, though, can tell it to to do many improbable things at once that impossible things become possible, because love and human will and shit.
(That's the shortcut to Xenogears of course. Is something confusing? Try using 'Love' as an answer and build back until that makes sense. You have a 99% chance of being completely right.)
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Melentia will sell NPC gear if they die, including Felkin. I'll scrounge around the wikis to see if there's anything else useful. The Penal gloves increase Pyro damage I know that.
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CK, re XG: I think that's taking that line a little too much? Sounds to me like it just means "Zohar is really powerful and makes stuff happen" not "is the Infinite Improbability Drive." Also... wait, Abel was the contact before the crash? I always thought it was *after* the crash and the security protocols were a mess & all that he became the contact. Certainly IIRC becoming the Contact and the creation of Elly were linked, and there's no need to create Elly until Abel is alone and abandoned on the planet...
Braevly Default: Round 2 of the Templar Asterisk. My offense gets rolling much more easily this time thanks to setting Hunting on my fighters (which is good since Ringabel's magical offense is laughable - still stuck on L3 Blizzaras, no Blizzagas). Sadly in the third phase of the fight (!!! wat), with the boss at less than half health, he manages to KO 2 people going to 0 BP and Shin Smash had worn off again, oh #$%^. (Shin Smash wearing off unexpectedly: basically the worst thing ever.) You know what happens next - I think he might actually have good AI and that if he sees only 2 people alive, he just unloads. He goes to -4 BP and goes first and messily slaughters me in a Default-ignoring rage. Grah. (His Default-Piercer basically OHKOs anyone except for Angelic Ward proc'ing Agnes; his other attacks OHKO non-Defaulters usually - except maybe Giant Slayer - and inflict high damage that usually requires you be at full health to survive it even when Defaulting.) Okay, dangiit, the time has officially come to buy Norende Gear. Glad I held off, Red Caps are STILL good now and could have been had cheaply in like C1 where they'd be overcentralizing, and sticking some Bloody Shields on my mages. Grabbed a Heike Gauntlet as well for some more survivability. Well this boss is certainly being memorable enough! We'll see how my third attempt goes...
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Maybe it was during the crash, but yes. Remember: kid survived the space ship self destructing, Deus intentionally gunning down escape pods, and the damn thing landing on the planet complete with flaming wreckage and all.
(It's reasonable to assume Abel's mom had died before Deus escaped, hence wandering around the ship alone in the first place. There's also some suggestion, albeit nothing substantial, that his mom was the daughter of the Eldridge's captain, hence why he'd even be able to find the presumably-high-security power generator for everything ever.)
I'm not entirely sure what your objection is to the comparison. It's just a more easily understood example of a similar concept. What the Zohar is explicitly stated to do (cause things to happen) or not be able to do (destroy itself) doesn't suggest much one way or the other in terms of its limits. The reincarnation thing is PW stuff, nothing in the game really suggests the Zohar is the mechanism by which that happens (though it's a reasonable conclusion, so the PW word of god confirmation is plenty good for me).
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Marvel Heroes: So lots of free stuff given away this week. My random Hero was Thing and random costume was for Thing so I lucked out since that was the next character I was going to buy anyway. Now I can save up for Invisible Woman.
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Your Daily Dark Souls 2 video. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4p1VZ6KysMs)
Everything Magic Related I could find after doing a half-assed check.
Head:
Black Hood: +2 INT/FTH, improves casting speed, 16 INT, Trade in Four Souls with Straid.
Black Witch Mask: +Magic damage, -HP. Rare drop from a oneshot enemy so lol. 20 INT.
Black Witch Hat: +1 Attunement Slot. 20 INT.
Chaos: +3INT, faster cast, 16INT/FTH.
Hexer: +1INT/FTH, +1 Spell use, no requirements to equip. Requires killing Felkin then buying from the Merchant Hag.
Moon Hat: +2 INT, no requirements.
Saint Hood: +1 FTH, +1 Spell use, CEO
Everything Else:
Lion Mage Set increases Casting Speed.
Penal Gloves: Boost Pyro damage by 7.5% woooooo.
Rings:
Ring of Knowledge and Ring of Prayer will boost Int/FTH +5 if you get really desperate.
Third Dragon+Life Ring2 should equal out the HP loss of the Northern0.
Dark Souls 2: Prettygirl's great swimming adventure. Demon of Song, Royal Aegis, Authority the Royal Rat, Guardian Dragon, down. Despite playing a quarter of the day away I feel like I've made no progress. Damn you Dragon Aerie. Death Counter's up to 12 now I think. Fun with Lava in Iron Keep(eventually when I did grab everything I was outright invulnerable to the lava damage), the great Death pit in Undead Crypt got a life as usual, Royal Aegis got a life because of the usual hammer-roll crap, one of the Aerie drakes got another because I'm a twit and healed right next to his foot, and finally the drop to the zipline platform had me drop on the rope bridge's rope-rail. UGH. Anyway, found the Black Knight Greatax in Iron Keep.... and the Greatsword there too! Finished Dark set for how irrelevant that is. Two giant Memories cleared. Dark just carves the path of death through them. On another note, for some utterly absurd reason on my Club-guy, the Royal soldiers stopped attacking him. Not just the ballista dudes ignoring him, no the archers and infantry didn't care either. But on Prettygirl they're back to being jerks. I think maybe killing Giant Lord makes them non-hostile? Well whatever, should finish up next playthrough. Probably gonna skip Ancient Dragon since I can't gyrm greatshield it and whoooooooo cares anyway.
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DS2: Wow Ancient Dragon's AI is horrible. Ridiculously easy once you know what to look for. Vendrick on the other hand...
2 hours straight of running through the area (enemies are already dead) and fighting him and I still haven't beaten him. Combination of him being insanely fast plus rolls going forward instead of to the side due to his crazy pivot-in-place mechanics. I think he's about to replace the Ruin Sentinels as hardest boss in the run.
And you don't have to kill Felkin, he gives you his full gear if you have 20 int and faith.
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Fudo miiiiight be talking in context of Fenrir's SL1 run (base 6 in all stats if I have my useless information for game I don't plan to play lined up) where I would expect 20/20 in caster stats might be a bit hard?
Bravely Default - Unlocked Swordmaster. Intend on trying to use it a bit. Trying to dodge some of what seem to be the standard end game builds. Think I am going to fail because seems Salvemaker is more widely used than I expected (Because hoooooolyshit is it strong).
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Vendrick got a buff I guess?
Fudo miiiiight be talking in context of Fenrir's SL1 run (base 6 in all stats if I have my useless information for game I don't plan to play lined up) where I would expect 20/20 in caster stats might be a bit hard?
Yeah, that exactly.
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Bravely Default - Unlocked Swordmaster. Intend on trying to use it a bit. Trying to dodge some of what seem to be the standard end game builds. Think I am going to fail because seems Salvemaker is more widely used than I expected (Because hoooooolyshit is it strong).
Even if you don't use a Salvemaker much, your healer absolutely wants to pit stop there for Healing Lore so yeah, pretty much unavoidable. There's an alternate viable setup, but Spiritmaster is generally agreed as one of the overall best classes so... yeah not much better for "try to avoid stereotypical builds".
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New patch? Okay. Change notes say something along the lines of "users can enter the Shrine of Winter." Whuzzuh? We could always do that. I have no idea what this means.
Forgot to mention I was finally lucky enough to get Rowena's awesome skull hat to drop. Yes! But PUGILISM SOULS is too stupid to wear it. :(
Additional deaths: the red phantom outside Drangleic Castle is a colossal douche (who can apparently murder the Herald as collateral damage if you kite him back that far); throne room battle. Yeah I called in sunbros to nuke the latter. No shame!
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It isn't "Avoid stereotypes" so much as just wanting to have a different experience. Spiritmaster was what I saw a lot of people pushing for end game.
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New patch? Okay. Change notes say something along the lines of "users can enter the Shrine of Winter." Whuzzuh? We could always do that. I have no idea what this means.
Forgot to mention I was finally lucky enough to get Rowena's awesome skull hat to drop. Yes! But PUGILISM SOULS is too stupid to wear it. :(
That dropped for Prettygirl too. Bloody hilarious.
Also I got two Channeler's Tridents from crow roulette, Old Whip and a Demon's Great Hammer.
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Thanks Fudo.
Looks like I'm going for the hex hood, penal gloves, lion mage rest. Black With Hat sounds reaaaally nice though.
Boosting Int or Faith by 5 might actually be a good idea since pyromancy might actually get some huge bonus from it?
I barely survived some of the Throne bosses hits even with a Life Ring + Defense Ring. But I might try fighting them in full glass cannon mode; with the northern and red tearstone rings.
Is there any safe way to reduce your own HPs in DS2 to proc the Red Tearstone Ring effect, available around the throne room?
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I don't know of any convenient HP-draining equips like the mimic hat in DS1. Unless there is such a thing, the best I can think of is to toss some dung pies until you're poisoned and eat a lifegem at low HP to try and balance it out just right.
What pyromancy are you using? Flame Swathe is pretty squarely best per-hit you're going to get with no investment in stats. You only get two shots and it's easily dodged by enemies, but if you can nab both of them at once, that's most of the fight right there. (Fire Tempest would probably flat out murder them, but good luck getting that off without getting stabbed.)
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Bravely Default - So Tiz has gone from dirty thief to dirty capitalist (not that I am sure what the difference is here) to fucking furry and now he has reached the pinnacle of being a fabulous rock star~ The Automotons are the latest boss who can fuck themselves in the eye. Had to grind to get Dispel. :(
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I only ever use Immolation El Cid.
Actually I've been using Fire Tempest and it's pretty good. Otherwise I use Flame Swathe, but actually hitting them is tricky.
Lingering Flame would be good but it takes ages to cast.
I should try to get Forbidden Sun. Dubstep Dark Souls 2 videos tell me it's pretty good. (Edit: 3 spell slots??)
Also Chaos Storm obviously.
But I just had a run where I killed Watcher and Defender revived him. I was heartbroken.
Edit2: OH SHIT CHAOS STORM. I won the throne fight on the first try since I got it.
It went:
- CHAOS STORM, both enemies at half HP
- Roll roll roll, estus, roll roll, CHAOS STORM. Defender dead, Watcher with only a little health left.
- Roll roll estus.
- The equivalent of the "Well what is it!?" gesture
- Watcher tries to resurrect Defender, gets maced two times.
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Lost Sinner Sword and Chaos Blade drain HP when you hit dudes, but when I needed to activate the Red Tearstone Ring for the Ancient Dragon fight I just rolled off ledges. So that's a thing if suicide into the dragon's a goal with Throne Duo down!
Speaking of the Ancient Dragon I have a new idea to try and fight him which may be the easiest way ever. Just need to scrounge info on the wikis first.
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The Abyss covenant ring drains your hp every time you cast a hex, could do that.
Ancient Dragon technique you just stand in front of his head. If his wings flap he's going to fly into the air so you just deselect targeting and run as far away as you can. Otherwise he will do the close flame breath - you just run towards him and get free attacks at his legs. After a few attacks go stand in front of his head again and repeat.
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Xenogears: Final dungeon.
Hours 51-52: I don't have much to say about the final dungeon. It is long and boring and essentially a treasure hunt for two arbitrarily placed switches. Thank goodness the game provides you with a map, I would hate it so much otherwise.
Hour 53: Finally, there is the clash with Deus. I kind of like the design of this fight where you have to decide how optimally to take down the four pillars (or not!) and handle the boss, with party switching in the way. It's all pretty trivially easy if you've gotten Big Joe's silly power upgrades though.
Anyway Deus is beaten, which also shuts off the Zohar that is tied to it. The world is saved! Or not. The Wave Existence is freed and is heading back to its home dimension... which perhaps fittingly for something which has been used as a near-infinite power source, is going to release a lot of energy when it happens! Citan calculates that it will be enough to blow up the world. Well. That wasn't as planned.
But then, Deus starts moving upwards, leaving the planet. It appears that it will escape the world before it can explode. Fei realises that it must be Elly who is moving Deus away, in order to save everyone else. Which is great news, but Fei is still understandably frustrated that Elly is, once again, going to die. He also realises that hey, his gear still works because it is special and because it made direct contact with the Zohar, still has some power of its own despite Zohar being gone. So he goes to chase after Elly and Deus, whatever the risk to his own life.
When he catches up with Deus, he is absorbed into what seems to be another subconscious dimension, like when he first met the Wave Existence. Only this time the Wave Existence isn't there, but Krelian. Krelian talks about how by being absorbed by Deus he is now one with god, and desires to return to god's plane of existence. (It isn't clear what his plans were should Deus not have been destroyed... I'd compare this rambling to Seymour's idiotic rambling inside Sin in FFX but I think the game wants me to take Krelian more seriously.) There is some stupid converation about how Krelian can't trust people therefore the only solution is to go to a dimension where all are one (or at least he and Elly). Fei says he's wrong, boss fight ensues against Urobolus (Ouroburos), a purple-haired snake-woman which is the manifestation of Miang's hold on Elly.
Elly is saved. She talks about how being one with Krelian made her realise all the sadness he held, and that he actually "loved people more than anyone". That's why he tried to kill almost everyone right? Barf, what an awful villain. Elly also talks about regretting trying to sacrifice herself to save everyone, but Fei tells her not to apologise, that making sacrifices to help others, even if it feels selfish, is what love is and an essential part of being human. At this point the pocket dimension starts to fall apart so the two make to escape.
As they do, Elly trips, so Fei stops to go back to her, and the dimension is apparently destroyed. But they aren't dead, because Krelian saved them. He tells them to return to their planet. Fei wants him to come too, but Krelian says he has committed too many sins to do so (hey, for once, I agree), so he goes off to "walk with god" by going to its dimension. Which was his goal all along, so I guess he wins?
Pretty much everything about that character in that scene rubs me the wrong way.
Anyway, Fei and Elly make it home, and there's a happy scene as they are reunited with an overjoyed Citan, Bart, Margie, Emeralda... and even Chu-Chu. Humans are free from Deus and the Zohar, and Fei and Elly are finally free to live out a happy life with each other after so many past lives of tragedy. The end. :)
I'm a big fan of Xenogears but there isn't much about those last few hours (after the big scenes at the Zohar with Id) I really like? The ending deciding to suddenly be all about feeble attempts to justify and glorify an unredeemable monster (who wasn't even the main villain) is bizarre and leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Overall though, there's still a lot to like about this game. Yes it could have been better (some pacing problems at point, wasting too many time in side stuff in disc 1 then cramming together the good stuff in disc 2), but to echo what Snowfire said, it remains impressive just what a tapestry of plotting this game creates, with so many characters with distinct motivations (PCs and NPCs alike) and it's really interesting to see. As someone who really enjoys seeing how a large cast each with their own agenda can fit together, not to mention a rich backstory which has clear implications on the present characters' trials, Xenogears has a lot to offer. Not a perfect game by any means (even completely ignoring all its failings on fronts that aren't writing), but one in a style I would certainly like to see more of, especially in an era with better production values and better translations.
A fun ride anyway. Hope you enjoyed reading about it.
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Ayup. I know there's some Krelian fans out there, but... meh. I am a *fine* with a putatively sympathetic villain who becomes a monster, but XG leans way too far toward rewarding Krelian - having Elly be the one to say how Krelian loved more than anyone without qualification and with it seeming like a good thing for the dude who has engineered the death of a vast number of people bah. So Krelian wins and gets to become one with God and I guess that resurrecting Deus was the only way to save humanity or something. If our villain is going to win, at least have our heroes be a tad more bitter about it - what about all the people Deus ate? Do they get to be one with God too? etc.
Krelian's mostly fine for his main purpose in the plot, but yeah, meh to the way he's handled in the ending.
I think I've mentioned this before to CK and he had some answer that sounded moderately convincing at the time, but something that always struck me as odd about Krelian (but not necessarily bad) is that the game paints him as very passionate in the backstory and the ending - he loved Sophia just SO MUCH he would do crazy shit. Yet his style in the present timeline was very much the cold calculating rational "I've read the script" type. He never loses his temper or gets angry or surprised, and coldly plans mass murder -> revive "God", yet never reconsiders that his goal might be, uh, less than rational. I'm not saying this combination can't work, but XG doesn't really delve any further into it or really notice this seeming clash. It'd be nice if they added a scene where someone confronted (present) Krelian over something, and he got flustered and defensive and snappy, which might explain his stubbornness for never reconsidering his crazy genocidal out of love path.
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I pretty much agree entirely.
I also play other games, so catching up with those...
Devil May Cry: Replayed this on a whim, just did a NM playthrough straight through with no frills. I retained enough ability at the game that I didn't have too much trouble. Except against Nightmare 3 who is a complete jerk.
Phoenix Wright: Replayed this game, minus 1-5. Good times as always. I was struck by a few things, though
-This game is quite a bit shorter than later games. Thanks to the 3DS clock I now know that AAI was 17 hours, PWDD was 26, but AA1 was about 10. That's probably why they stuck another case into the game for the DS release, since even AA2 and AA3 are notably longer I think.
-The internet has convinced me that presenting your badge to everyone is a thing, so I figured this time I would make more of a point to do that. Hardly anyone in AA1 reacts to your badge, including nobody in the first case where presenting is possible (1-2). Interesting.
-The end of 1-2 is one of those things I expect will be less stupid when I see it coming, but it never is. Terrible. On the other hand I really have gained an appreciation for the raw feeling of oppresion in 1-4, and 1-3 is pretty much good times throughout, but especially that second trial day. Whoof.
Phoenix Wright JFA: Just started this, am currently in 2-2.
DmC Devil May Cry: See, I play new games too! Anyway I'm a couple hours into this. Despite rather low expectations the gameplay seems very promising, I really like the weapons and how you switch between them, and especially their "pull enemy / pull self" functions which seem like they might lead to a lot of fun! Writing... mm. On the one hand the opening was pretty awful, why were there random strippers okay. On the other hand the game has definitely managed some moments since. Vergil being a calm, rational, intellectual man is just the weirdest, but obviously a large improvement anyway.
Soul Nomad: I'm at around map 20 or so. Gameplay is pretty brainless outside one map where I got owned by squid-monsters repeatedly until I learned how the game's squad weapon-triangle worked and made leaders who weren't melee fighters. The gameplay's not very engaging but at least it isn't actively offputting like Disgaea, and Gig is just amazing. I could take or leave the sum total of the rest of the writing so far, but Gig makes every scene he is in. Someone give his voice actor a medal.
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BD- Snow who did you pay to get put into this game? Holly is so you that it hurts.
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Snow is like 1/3 of the boss fights.
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I neither confirm nor deny.
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DS2: Now I have a machinegun. Ho. Ho. Ho.
All that is not punchable is bowgunned. Dual Avelyn mode is pretty sweet. Not so broke as that video Fenrir posted--I'm definitely not getting 1800 damage out per volley, dunno if it was patched at some point or if that dude had some crazy magic setup boosting his damage--but a thousand or so damage on demand is still nothing to complain about. But yeesh you burn through ammo using this thing. It isn't even the cost that's inconvenient (because NG+), it's just having to go back to slightly out of the way merchants to restock.
Have I mentioned that power stance gives you a totally girly walk? Because it does and it's fantastic. Running with two crossbows equipped looks especially ridiculous. If I flap my armaments hard enough I can flyyyyy.
So I was fighting some dudes today and I got stabbed and then I got a message rated and I got some health back. !!! So rating messages actually does do something.
EDIT: I think that Krelian--much like Albedo in XS--is evidence of the writer being far too impressed with his own creations. Fei and Elly's blase reaction to watching him walk off to get exactly what he wanted the whole time just isn't reconcilable with all the awful stuff they know he did. "He loved people more than anyone else" + architect of global genocide = cognitive dissonance. I've always figured the writer just thought Krelian needed to come out on top because he's so smart and masterfully conniving and cunningly manipulative, guys don't you see everything should work out for him just because he had such an amazing plan and fooled everybody for so long and blarrgh (I've always found the same problem to apply to a somewhat lesser degree to Citan, you just don't care as much because he's on your side. Even if he's occasionally a dick about it).
This is really more apparent given the way the same point is hammered home with Albedo. His exit in XS2, carried off by the angelic forms of all the little girls he brutally murdered? (A scene which I still consider a far more egregious example of bad writing than any of XS3's Dan Brown plot hokery.) Given that and all the time spent on URTV flashbacks early in the game, the obvious implication is that we should overlook all the horrible shit he did because man he had a rough childhood, okay? But sympathy for a brutal past =/= forgiveness for adult crimes. It seems like there's no buffer between those concepts in the mind of the Xeno writer.
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There is some stupid converation about how Krelian can't trust people therefore the only solution is to go to a dimension where all are one (or at least he and Elly).
Elly is saved. She talks about how being one with Krelian made her realise all the sadness he held, and that he actually "loved people more than anyone". That's why he tried to kill almost everyone right? Barf, what an awful villain. Elly also talks about regretting trying to sacrifice herself to save everyone, but Fei tells her not to apologise, that making sacrifices to help others, even if it feels selfish, is what love is and an essential part of being human. At this point the pocket dimension starts to fall apart so the two make to escape.
Regarding this bit, I always assumed that Krellian is exactly as selfish and terrible as he seems for the rest of the game, but 'redeeming' part is that he was genuinely in love with Sofia, so Elly picked up on that while they were stuck together. When she says he 'loved people more than anyone', I'm almost reading that as 'loved Sofia/Elly more than anyone'. Elly forgives him his 'transgressions' because that's just what Elly would do. I'm not sure that player is necessarily supposed to be as magnanimous as Elly.
But again, CK has the right of it - when you don't understand something in XG: Start with "Love" and work backwards from there.
It's been a long time since I've seen the scene in question, so perhaps the framing of Krellian is more sympathetic than I remember, but that could also be the game running on crunch time trying to give us a big happy ending ASAP.
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Dark Souls 2: How much effort can be done in two hours? Throne Duo, Giant Lord, FINAL BOSS, Executioner Chariot all dead. None took a life but I jumped off a cliff on purpose at one point to grab the Aurous set. I also managed to survive the pit fall without the cat ring so yeah, fall damage is straight damage confirmed! All those every other game ever can suck it. Doesn't look like I can get SUPER-EASY mode for Ancient Dragon up though. Managed to get 20 Fire Seeds so yay that I guess.
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Krelian hype, somewhat like Fei hype, often comes from his situation, not the character himself. He rose to prominence and ultimately survived every other villain through the combination of intelligence/SCIENCE and willpower. Some people really dig that.
I think though what the game's trying to elicit from us is pity. Krelian is a broken man, and not in the same sense that Grahf was, at least not entirely. They say to the effect that he was a ball of uncontained fury before he came under Sophia's wing, and in the story proper he exhibits nearly no emotion and essentially commits genocide with utter callousness. But what I think the game is trying to say with the 'loved people more than anyone else' line... hard to put to words. That he, by nature, is an optimist, who wants to see the best in people. But that the gap between what he thinks people should be and how they act aren't something he can reconcile, so he at first acts out, and later coldly manipulates. So in that callous, doesn't-fucking-get-it way, activating Deus so people would be 'one' together with it was a way to force people into a 'better' life, albeit through much pain. But, of course, if the plan failed, it would mean an end to the Deus system entirely, meaning a world that was properly free to fill its own destiny. His words and actions after you beat Deus can definitely be read as him expecting Fei to win out and finally destroy Deus, and him arranging things so he could free Elly as well.
The pity comes in here because 'walking with god' is not the better option. A human life, one with love, clearly preferable. But Krelian, broken as he is, isn't fit to be human. And so the only thing left is to go with god. Fei argues, essentially, 'you are better than you think you are', but nobody else in the room is really having it. And really it's more an indicator of Fei being a softy than Krel really being able to make up for the whole genocide thing and be a decent human being.
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While pity isn't exactly what I'd think of for a situation like that, I'd be happier if the game made it more clear that's what it's going for. It randomly turns really, really shiny on Krelian toward the end, which kind of mutes any "this poor pitiable creature lost his love and suffered a lot of pain."
The larger issue is your 2nd paragraph - put things another way, suppose you have some vanilla fantasy world, and there's some evil wizard doing evil stuff, the evil wizard summons the Demon Lord, the heroes defeat the Demon Lord, then the wizard announces "well great everything went just according to plan, I knew you'd beat him, now look, no more demon lord, right?" It's a tough plot point to pull off without wanting to throw the controller at the screen. (Wild Arms 2 probably comes the closest, I guess!)
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I didn't say they did it well, just it's what I think they were trying to do.
That said Deus was not some threat manufactured by Krelian. Remember, both of Fei's major past lives coincided with massive depopulation events (it's fairly explicitly stated that around 95% of humans died during the fall of the Zeboim civilization, and again during the Diablos invasion), and both were directly set into motion by Miang, the agent of Deus resurrection, with that express result in mind. The random demon lord comparison isn't particularly apt.
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BD - Just beat the Fire Crystal boss. :) Now I can use Summoner because I have Salve Maker MP healing. Woot.
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I can't really swallow that Krelian knew the heroes would defeat Deus. The game paints their victory as quite unlikely. If that was the angle the writers were going for I think they failed miserably; they should have thrown in some ways Krelian was clearly manipulating Deus into a loss if that was their goal. I can see how his words after the fact possibly sync up with that expectation, but yeah it falls flat.
He rose to prominence and ultimately survived every other villain through the combination of intelligence/SCIENCE and willpower.
It's funny, I think that's part of why I don't like him him much. He survives all the other villains who are more memorable/important than him and suddenly the ending is all about him. It's a bit narratively jarring. I also generally find his motivation overlaps far too much with Grahf's and he's less sympathetic/consistent/believable about it.
For what it's worth I do think your (CK's) analysis of the writers' intent with the character is probably accurate and yeah it does make Elly's line there less objectionable. Obviously I still consider the character and scene to be a big swing and a miss.
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CK: Well assume the Demon Lord's followers were tormenting mankind before. That's the pro-Krelian argument - he knew that Deus was wrecking havoc from behind the scenes, so the best way to stop him was to let him "win" then get him destroyed once and for all. Same deal.
FF13's "ending" has something similar, of course... wherein Lightning rambles about how the Fal'cie are poisoning humanity or something, so fine, we'll go wreck the world but live free lives. She's essentially chosen the Krelian solution - we may blow up the world, but hey, no more Big Bad Guy messing with things behind the scenes. Except the world isn't quite blown up in FF13's case but details.
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The Blackwell Epiphany - played through
Pretty great.
It is a bit annoying that the major plotline leading out of Deception is mostly ignored. I was expecting Alex Silva to be behind the media lockdown and for there to be a confrontation between her and Rosa after after Sam started feeding Rosa information, but instead she essentially doesn't even appear in the game.
Wasn't expecting the ending. Thankfully Rosa doesn't appear to have become a ghost, at least. Seems like Joey could probably have quite a bit of trouble living in an identity-centric world, presumably without any money on top of that so I'm not sure if that was really the best thing that could have happened, although I guess it could be seen as preferable to the status quo assuming he doesn't just end up homeless or so on. Um. At minimum he could hope that when he died he didn't become a spirit guide again?
It was interesting to see the scenes with Jocelyn, but I don't understand why Joey was the ghost she and Madeline had to deal with. It seems pointlessly coincidental? Given that Joey never shows any signs of recognising Madeline from that time, and they appear to send him on his way successfully so it isn't explained how he ended up becoming a spirit guide either. I will note that I possibly missed a scene or some extra dialogue somewhere somehow because I'm missing an achievement which has a description that seems like it could be related.
I don't think it was ever explained who shot George either.
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Woah, Super's playing Bravely Default?
Really looking forward to his reaction towads a certain plot twist now.
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Vendrick on the other hand...
Vendrick is far easier if you block instead of rolling. If you can take two shield hits from full stamina then survive a hit from full health, Vendrick's got nothing on you. Just circle close around him, most of his attacks will whiff. As long as you hug his body you avoid the Vendrick Death Zone.
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Problem is I'm playing a 3-strength caster. The only shield I can use is the Disc Chime, which isn't designed to take Vendrick hits.
Finished the Dark covenant. Took 3 tries on Darklurker, I came back with Dark Quartz Ring + 2 which changed his Biju bomb to 60% damage instead of 100% damage. He is also stupidly weak to lightning bolts.
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If you've got Sunlight Spear, all it should take is the standard compliment of charges to murder Darklurker from full health. It's great.
And yeah, blocking Vendrick is not an option unless you've got the strength to use greatshields. Anything less and he'll blow right through your stamina on the first shot, forcing you to rely on dodging and endure a tediously overlong fight where one mistake equals death. It's just about the least fun fight in the game (Ancient Dragon competes).
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I don't think I'll ever try to actually kill the Ancient Dragon.
Vendrick isn't that hard, you just need to be methodical and hide behind those legs. Make sure you have 5 Giant souls. If not, burn an ascetic in the first black gulch bonfire and go kill those two giants again.
SL1: Finished.
230 total deaths.
Hex reaaaaly wasn't an option!
Giant Lord is easy to cheese and I got him with those 10 pyro spells doing 3/4th of the total damage needed.
Final boss was easy.
Long range: Kunais
Mid range: Holy bottles
Close range: Roll away from the extremely slow attack
Her only scary attack is the one stolen straight from Freja, but she doesn't use it that often. The other laser attack which she uses all the time is a joke.
I said my thoughts about this challenge already, it's one of the best I've done.
El Cid you can use these Dual crossbow prostats:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8I6fmvp37TU
(Actually I'm pretty sure it doesn't work in 2 :( )
- Half Minute Hero PSP: I already played this on Xbox, I tried the PSP version for the extra modes.
They suck. Princess 30 is so awful.
Not complaining since I'm replaying Hero 30 and don't have access to the other version anymore.
- FFDimensions: Yeaaaah I really don't want to do a regular playthrough.
I tried a solo but it was extremely boring, especially compared to FF5 solo.
So I want to do a 4 job fiesta kind of thing?
As I understand it, you get a ton of jobs at the beginning, then you get all the other ones one by one?
So do :
- Thief / Bard / MEMORIST (??) / Random job
and
- Black Mage / Dancer / Ranger / Random job
sound good? I'd like to try these ones in particular instead of more boring (and probably better) classes.
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- FFDimensions: Yeaaaah I really don't want to do a regular playthrough.
I tried a solo but it was extremely boring, especially compared to FF5 solo.
So I want to do a 4 job fiesta kind of thing?
As I understand it, you get a ton of jobs at the beginning, then you get all the other ones one by one?
So do :
- Thief / Bard / MEMORIST (??) / Random job
and
- Black Mage / Dancer / Ranger / Random job
sound good? I'd like to try these ones in particular instead of more boring (and probably better) classes.
Due to the nature of FFD, yes, you start out with like 8 jobs (Thief is the worst, Black Mage is probably one of the best, though you'll be hurting for MP a lot until the itemcasts. You could probably do Summoner instead if you want a real challenge). I'd personally just 'roll' a new job option at each chapter from the full list rather than restricting it to only the new jobs?
For reference, you get Ranger -before- Dancer. And Ranger is pretty good for damage. Memorist is actually awesome when combined with a small skillset like you're proposing, so...
I doubt you'll get much challenge out of it. Particularly if you allow any grinding or sidequesting. The game just rolls over and dies for any kind of overlevelling (even just like 2 levels) until the later bosses.
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I basically almost never grind. Also why I cannot get into MMORPGs/Monster Hunter.
I've gotten some levels solo and this hasn't really affected anything but HPs though.
This all sounds worrying though. I expected this to be like FF5! Is there no way to make the game both challenging and fun?
I might just roll with 8 Thieves-Bards / Thieves-Dancers.
Oh yeah BTW NEB that was good. I just kind of forgot everything past "Ramsus murders Miang" and now I see why.
I don't think you've mentioned that they're all nude at the end for some reason, which makes the whole ending even more ridiculous the first time through as you're obviously too distracted by their lack of genitals to be 100% immersed in the totally important plot going on at this moment.
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I don't think you've mentioned that they're all nude at the end for some reason, which makes the whole ending even more ridiculous the first time through as you're obviously too distracted by their lack of genitals to be 100% immersed in the totally important plot going on at this moment.
This is true. (and possibly an improvement)
What makes FFD worse for soloing than FF5?
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After a point all bosses immune slow, and are pretty fast at base. So just from an offensive turn standpoint there could be issues.
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BD- Just beat the Dragon in the cave. Was having a monstrously hard time. Was saved by two things. First, I was informed that Ice and Water are the same element in this game (which is weird contextually given that it's based on a template that was split them up since was least FF 4 and I don't believe ever had them together. I would have neved guessed). The second is that I summoned a random helper, which was randomly a water attack...and then randomly criticalled. Took off 4700 HP from it.
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BD- Fenrir, I have shocking news: there's an evil dude with a french accent in this game! An evil merchant, no less.
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Zut alors! You are giving away all of the games secrets!
BD - Got to Eternia. Lots of JP. Get to choose which way I want to approach an enemy fortress. Of course the answer is frontal assault against strong forces and then accidentally go down a side path and fight the "Medium" path monster as well.
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Dark Souls 2: Prettygirl's last hurrah. Flexile, Darklurker, Ancient Dragon, King Vendrick down and that's everyone. Darklurker is unsurprisingly highly resistant to Hexes but enough shots of anything will work. Ancient Dragon got my final life per the usual "so what if you ran your stamina bar empty running away OHKO anyway!" He's still not hard he's just bullshit. Therefor I counter with my own bullshit! See, element esistances work funny in the game, every point is essentially a .1% reduction of that element damage. So 1000 Resistance makes you completely invulnerable, like what I did in Iron Keep for those lava treasures. While I can't reach 1000, I can reach 880, which is enough that the Flame Breath only does about 500 damage! So long forever assclown! Vendrick's sad as usual and didn't even get a hit on me. Just stick close, and roll around him. The vertical swing takes forever and the horizontal one may not even hit if you're hugging his legs because he's so tall. Get two hits in an repeat until he's dead. Grabbed the King's Shield instead of soul eating just cuz I could. I think it's the lightest 100 DEF shield, for what nothing that's worth. Prettygirl ends her reign of terror at a mere 13 deaths. The Dark shined her way.
So, with dual-fist, club power and hex power behind me it's time for the true dark souls 2. SHIELDS-ONLY. Only one name could contain the sheer power of a shields-only run.
Big McLargeHuge: So, the good thing about shield attackin' is that it's pretty quick on the small-med ones, and you're attack counts as you blocking, and since the basic attack's a charge, you don't have to worry about pushing dudes away. The downside it they're shields and it takes four hits and the full stamina bar to kill the weakest enemies. Dagger at least as a psychotic attack speed to make up for its failings. Shields don't. If enemies get grouped up there's no real crowd control since the attack's a thrust with strike typing. So my main goal becomes getting resources. The Greatshield from the armorer and the Rings in ballista hell. It takes a long ass while and plenty of deaths but I manage it. The way to the Last Giant is open, and I've plenty of other things open as well.
Also got another Old Whip with the crows. I just know when I start my Belmont run it'll be impossible to grab it.
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Pokemon X All Starters: I have gotten a Rash Xerneas caught with a Heal Ball! Mwahahah!
In news that should shock no one, (http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/006-mx.png) is pretty damn awesome and murders stuff dead.
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The vertical swing takes forever and the horizontal one may not even hit if you're hugging his legs because he's so tall. Get two hits in an repeat until he's dead.
We cannot be playing the same game.
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FWIW Krelian being forgiven and spirited off to heaven because he loved or whatever regardless of whatever he did is fairly consistent with Christian theology where you get forgiven for anything no matter how mad if you accept God. So it's stupid but in a way that's unusually consistent with Christian theology.
e: Now that I think of it, would anything beyond the final movie have changed if Ramsus had successfully killed Krelian? I don't remember him actually doing anything after that. Maybe it's another one of those things where they cut for time but Krelian still comes back as a sexless angel at the end because the animation had already been drawn and paid for.
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The vertical swing takes forever and the horizontal one may not even hit if you're hugging his legs because he's so tall. Get two hits in an repeat until he's dead.
We cannot be playing the same game.
Oddjob Souls
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I don't think you've mentioned that they're all nude at the end for some reason, which makes the whole ending even more ridiculous the first time through as you're obviously too distracted by their lack of genitals to be 100% immersed in the totally important plot going on at this moment.
This is true. (and possibly an improvement)
What makes FFD worse for soloing than FF5?
Hmm. Hard to say.
Well there's the long jobless prologue for once.
The finite amount of job levels you can get until the aftergame means having to stick with a few jobs, instead of being able to try them all out.
Getting AP looks slower as well.
I just haven't really seen much interesting happening in 3 hours.
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FFD just not balanced for solo runs. I mean, they literally hand you a free fixed-class Jeigan every chapter to keep your party count at 5. Also, a lot of the broken stuff in FFD is attached to MT, making it better, including healing and such. I dunno, just doesn't lend itself to solo play.
Challenge-wise? FFD is very tightly balanced. If you follow the prescribed directions the game carefully lays out for you, you will be the perfect level for awesome challenge and quite a number of wipes without any grinding or random-skipping. But do one extra run through a dungeon and you're overpowered for the next five hours.
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Dark Souls 2: Big McLargeHuge's struggle onwards. The first boss kill isssssss OLD DRAGONSLAYER DUN DUN DUN. Wanted the Ring of Binding while I have slots up and flesh falling off, and the Tower Shield's outright better anyway. Old Knights go down easy to being shield slammed at least. Then... INVASION! Oh boy taking 300 damage from fists and the dude has a ton of life because my 153 damage barely moved his bar. OH BOY. Whatever. ODS, Dragonrider, Pursuer ambush(his sword bounced off the Tower Shield hahahaha!) and Last Giant all go down. Scrape together enough titante to +6 the shield. Ruin Sentienls get me with a fucking double-KO god dammit. Whatever, they die after. Get enough levels that I can finally use Havel's so I dive into the Pit. RRV gets another bloody double-ko. Also petrify apparently docks you t like, 25% HP each time instead of a normal death's whatever. Exploding pricks get two more lives. The first time because the zombie exploded STANDING UP for the first time ever and the second time I misjudged my roll. Whatever. Gutter goes fine until the bloody end where a sword zombie gets me on a ladder ughhhh. Into Black Gulch. Get the key after an EPIC fight with the giants and bonfire back up to grab me some sweet sweet Havel shield. Use Branch to head through Shaded Woods since that has the most twinkling I recall off the top of my head. The initial ambush goes simple but I die along the path to the next bonfire because ughhhhhhh. Whatever. Lion-men are a pain because they never stagger and shield's swing so slow I get hit every time I attack. The giant prick gets my last death of the night because he utilized smough's death zone. OH BOY.
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I imagine this post will not make me any friends...
Bravely Default: Overall, it was okay.
- First four chapters were good, standard RPG fare aside from some terrible fetch quest type things.
- The concept of the second half of the game is pretty cool from a story perspective, but completely insufferable to play through. I won't spoil what happens, but needless to say it makes this entire part of the game a chore.
-Battle mechanics were good, though things get very tedious on normal and hard difficulties. I don't hate the Brave/Default system, but it's also just not that exciting to me. I don't think I would have enjoyed the game less if enemies had 1/4 the HP and the battles were just normal turn-based deals.
- Ringabel (Galuf 2.0) and Edea (Faris 2.0) are great characters with distinct voices and good localization, while the others are just there. Final villain reveal caught me off guard. Overall, I liked the story.
- Music was great, but needed more variety. It reminded me of Radiant Historia in this way.
- I can't give this game any higher than a 7/10 and a stamp of 'give it a go if you are a big jrpg fan.' It hits a lot of buttons I like, then throws a bunch of unwanted pies in my face. Glad we got it here, glad I played it, but I still like FF5 more. It's better than FF Dimensions, though by less than you might expect.
- Next on my list is to at least briefly try Chaos Seed, which recently got a translation patch.
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Honestly most of that seems fair to me except the part about brave/default not adding to the game - they create a wealth of different strategies and boss designs which aren't seen before in RPGs. It's a big part of the game's appeal, I think. I also certainly don't think the game's second half is enough to lower it below FF5 (there are just so many things the game does better) but I can see it.
DmC: First six chapters completed. I definitely haven't internalised the gameplay yet but it's fun. The "pull enemies" and "pull self" options and how you can work that into combos, and combos involving different weapons is good times. Story is pretty dumb even if I get a chuckle out of the Raptor News Network.
Soul Nomad: I just got Odie and Tricia, quite happy the game finally gave me some special PCs in those roles. Writing-wise the game seems a bit all over the place but it manages to hold my attention very firmly whenever Gig is on screen and that is most of the time; the game has its moments otherwise certainly. I can't imagine this will be a game I love (really hard to see myself replaying it, in particular) but am definitely digging it well enough for what it is and am certainly finding it more to my taste than my previous N1 excursion.
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The story is They Live but without the amazing charisma of Rowdy Roddy Piper and Keith David so yeah makes sense.
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DS2: Thought I'd knock out the last of the trophies running cleric through NG++. Turns out she's missing one pyromancy only sold by Titchy Gren. Fuuuuuuuck. Frankly would rather run sorcerer (already has the spell in question) through NG++ up to Drangleic Castle than fight the chariot again.
But instead of doing either of those things, I'm giving a mixed build a shot. I never much liked these in DS1 but DS2 seems a little more flexible about them? The idea is run 30 INT/FTH, specialize in elemental weapons and spam the buffs, all the buffs. Not going to use direct damage spells ever so no reason to ever upgrade a chime/catalyst. Scary chick Sawyer lacks access to chainsaws in this world sadly so scythes will have to do. OH WAIT I can only buy them from Titchy Gren ffffffff. But until then MACE is the star of the show. If I don't get the skull hat to drop again I'll probably go, I dunno, Velka set + Sinner's mask? Running nudist armor right now. It's pretty great. Two deaths so far, one from jumping off a cliff to get nudist armor, other from Bastile Heide knight. Man what a jerk.
Fudo, that's how defensive stats work in these games? I was never sure. So every 100 points of defense = 10% reduction of associated damage type?
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Gren's pyromancy's can be found elsewhere. Firestorm and Great Combustion are in the Castle and Fire Whip drops from the Belfry Sol dwarves. Had about four Fire Whips on Club-guy from grinding the mad warrior ugh.
Great Scythes drop from the Tseldora fun bunch at least. Dark Scythe over near Tark as well. I think the Skeleton Lords Soul makes a scythe too?
The elemental defenses sure as hell work like that. Phys obviously doesn't from my continued being three-shotted by everything despite 1500 Phys defs. I've read that every 100 Phys is a flat 20 damage reduce which I guess fits with my halfass testing on DOGS.
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If that's correct then the Ring of Steel Protection looks even more worthless than ever. Woo spending a ring slot to save like 2% of your max HP per attack.
Skeleton Lords make a halberd, but that might be close enough aesthetically. I'll probably try running with that for a while since that's where I'm going next (and elemental stones aren't in great supply this early). Covetous Demon turns into a totally wicked scythe, but it demands a lot more STR investment than I was planning for. Ultimate goal was to main Waifu Scythe, but apparently that's non-enchantable and anyway I want her bow too. Decisions!
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Play Crow Roulette! My ten stones got turned into eight elemental stones instead of anything remotely useful.
Targray still sells Boltstones at least.
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FFD just not balanced for solo runs. I mean, they literally hand you a free fixed-class Jeigan every chapter to keep your party count at 5. Also, a lot of the broken stuff in FFD is attached to MT, making it better, including healing and such. I dunno, just doesn't lend itself to solo play.
Challenge-wise? FFD is very tightly balanced. If you follow the prescribed directions the game carefully lays out for you, you will be the perfect level for awesome challenge and quite a number of wipes without any grinding or random-skipping. But do one extra run through a dungeon and you're overpowered for the next five hours.
Why is that, since levels don't matter that much?
Chariot isn't that hard once you get to know him. My tips are:
- Bring a mace. Forget about the lightning spears until the fight with the horse
- Kill the first two skeletons, then wait until they're resurrected and kill them again before moving on
- Don't go in the safe areas until two seconds or so before the Chariot passes.
- After killing the first necro, check to see if the skeletons were resurrected (and kill them for good if so)
- After killing the first necro, don't move farther than the next safe area, every skeleton will come towards you there. Kill them all then YOLO towards the necromancer
- Horse is EZ
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Or peg him with a lightning spear each pass and get the alternate kill scenario. Be like Prettygirl!
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Woaaah you can actually do this?
Dark Souls is awesome.
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Yep. You can gate him, just plaster his ass on passes straight out, or do enough damage on his passes to trigger an alternate kill scene.
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Yearn sorcery/Alluring Skulls help immensely with Chariot fight.
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Kirby Adventure: So I have the Kirby 20th Anniversary collection and have used it to play all of...Kirby's Dreamland.
Well, time to fix that, and go on the nostalgic binge with a game I played a lot on the NES when I was younger! How does it hold up?
...fairly well actually. I was worried that after KSS added in expansive movesets to powers, and KRtDL did the same, the "every power has one action" thing might feel off, but Kirby's Adventure is well designed around that. One thing that did stand out to me is how short each individual stage is. Some are huge "blink and you miss it" moments. This isn't a bad thing per se, just kind of stands out a lot.
Also, I forgot just how good the game looks for an NES game. There's a lot of vibrant colors and well defined details, it's a fine case of how 8 Bit Graphics CAN age rather well, and the primitive look of them actually adds a sense of charm to them, as opposed to being a distraction. Granted, kind of already knew this given 8 Bit Mega Man games still look quite good in the same vain, but it's nice to see a game that isn't Mega Man that is similarly good looking from that era, showing that Mega Man wasn't an anomaly.
Anyway, played, beaten, got 100%, and reminded how while the game isn't "hard", it's certainly not laughably easy either. A key thing that stands out is how powers that aren't Throw do kind of low damage to bosses. Using Kirby's basic suck and spit power does notably more, but then puts you at the mercy of the enemies attacks, waiting for them to use something you can fire back. It's oddly well balanced, as either you get the option to attack the boss whenever, but watch the HP drop at a glacial pace, or do significant damage but only during fixed intervals.
Anyway, probably jump onto Kirby Dream Land 2 next, a game I never actually played.
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Pokemon Y: All Doge Version
So... as a challenge, this one wasn't particularly hard. The canines that Y version gives you access to as early as Route 8 have such a wide coverage of niches (and the game not being that tough to begin with) means that it doesn't really change the difficulty curve at all.
Can probably be summed up as: Furfrou is way more awesome than expected, Smeargle is as terrible as advertised (and HM Fly isn't so vital to XY as I thought, I've used it all of twice, so even that niche sucks). Granbull is a bit of a surprise in terms of coverage. Fennekin and Riolu are REALLY STRONG and Early as hell, and Vaporeon is MVP because goddamn do you need a Water-type in this game. (and Surf/Strength are the only HMs that you're using constantly). Manectric, Absol, Kadabra, and the collection of Eeveelutions I raised for the hell of it are all varying shades of replaceable. Would have liked to have used Mightyena, Houndoom, Stoutland, and Arcanine to get the rest of the pokedogs (and probably added a lot more challenge being forced to use Poochyena earlygame if I'd bought X). But sadly two of those are version-exclusive (why?!) and the other two aren't even in the Kalos dex. (seriously, 300+ pokemon, you have GARBODOR but you can't give me Arcanine? All of my hate.)
On Victory Road now, so we'll see if the E4 can muster up some challenge (with all the team switching I've been doing, it's not impossible I could wipe, I'm not severely overlevelled yet).
@Meeple: You've never played Kirby Dreamland 2? What kind of monster are you?
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Bravely Default- Just beat Chapter 2. Still enjoying the game, though the challenge has taken an appreciable drop since C1. Some of that is Norende (Angel's bow is so good), some of that is ditching the awful for randoms BM class for a third fighter, and some of that's just due to enemy durability not being as high as it was a few chapters ago. IT's easy to see how even a fairly minor increase in HP would make the randoms tougher- that means standard brave blitzing wouldn't one round randoms, and even on normal most randoms have decent offense.
The summoner boss was a jerk and everything else hasn't been too tough. De Rosa's pissing me off though. I went into the fight once accidently totally unprepared at the start of C3 and lost, and now he won't reappear. Am I missing something there? The blue exclamation point is still there.
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super do you seriously go cruising for dates at noon? Come on now.
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@Meeple: You've never played Kirby Dreamland 2? What kind of monster are you?
I have never played any Kirby game. I am the monsters.
And super, check the bottom-right corner of the first screen in the city. Remember that location because it'll crop up later on as well.
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Yep. You can gate him, just plaster his ass on passes straight out, or do enough damage on his passes to trigger an alternate kill scene.
Yeah, I guess I could just load up on Firestorms/tempests/Chaos Storms. I've definitely seen those rip off chunks of health in passing when I used them to nuke the necromancers.
But really the worst part is just getting to him. That fucker with the greatsword can one-shot you and he respawns on NG+ and above.
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well, quitting the game and restarting fixed it. Whatever. Just beat the third crystal boss. Still spamming stomp everywhere because it rules, etc. Enemies with counter attackers are *finally* making stomp not a total no brainer to use on every random ever though.
I'm at the point where I really, really need some new classes.I don't have any interest in salve maker and performer's not really an offensive class. Come on game, cough em up!
Tiz is running as a Knight/Spellfencer of physical smashy doom. Ringabel is a Ranger and my best damage dealer by a mile. Rangers have seriously awesome stats and get level bows, which... yeah. He also is spamming stomp all over the place. I gave him a few levels in the teenidol ripoff class, but I haven't felt the need to use it for randoms yet. Edea is a mix of Thief and Valkyrie. Godspeed strike is awesome and steal is great against bosses, but the lack of durability makes me want to keep her in Valkyrie. Agnes is is the required red/white mage because you need healing to deal with BD bosses.
Re a certain scene right before the fire temple:
<2014:04:29:>[18:05:46] > In the least shocking news ever, the Bravely Default Fairie is goddamn worthless and literally demands you sacrifice children rather than screw up any part of your mission.
<2014:04:29:>[20:05:50] <AAA> the tradition continues
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DS2: Dammit, Roenna dropped her skirt instead of her hat. (This sounded less dirty in my head.) I mean, that looks nice too (the whole set does), but tougher to mix and match with that. Also skelemob halberd is way too heavy and has the usual halbed problems (first strike does ass for damage so hope your follow-up connects). Jabba scythe slightly-less-too-heavy and also too much STR requirement. Bah. Had to persevere with MACE until I could collect all the pieces for proper goth mode. I remember there's a darkstone drop from the lizard in the pit so I head down there (I need the token of spite for BoB covenant anyway). Leap at it, miss, he's getting away, dive off the bridge after him, it'll be a worthy sacrifice! All the zombies charge at once and somehow I escape without a scratch. Sweet jeebus what just happened.
One dead chariot later and I trade in nudist armor for the bone king set. Aw yeah, this is the right style. I might just stick with this. Also great scythe get, and after some bellbroing goes dark +10. 394 attack power on fairly minimal offensive stats? This looks nice. Weapon is very strange to use, though. You land a hit right on the point and do a sizable chunk of damage, slash with the top edge of the blade and do a little less, club them with the haft and do maybe a third as much. So you have reach but you really have to exploit it precisely to get the most out of the weapon or resign yourself to just doing a barrage of okayish damage. It definitely handles differently than anything else I've used, which is cool, and you get kind of a hilarious enemy juggling effect when you land multiple hits in succession.
Died today from: Harvest Valley ambush room (fuuuuuck); walking right off the stairway leading to Jabba; oh hey I can't remember what that item on the column next to the Iron Keep bridge is, let's find out.
Playing around with Chameleon a little before shutting down for the night. If you talk to NPCs while camouflaged, they react exactly as normal without disrupting your disguise in any way. Long story short, Creighton thinks Pate looks like a curse pot.
Crow roulette got me a faintstone. Which is nice, I can use that for something, at some point. Also the WHITE RING and Old Whip again (latter from a small stone, no less). Fudo if you're gonna run Belmont mode at some point I hope you have a backup plan for when this thing breaks. Because it will, in short order. The damage is outstanding, but I don't think any weapon in the game degrades more quickly. Like maybe multiple points of durability loss per strike depending on what you're hitting. Bracing Knuckle Ring is mandatory with this thing or it's unlikely to last you through a boss fight.
I'm still waiting to see someone run with dual hookhands. Make it happen, you guys.
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DS2: If you haven't equipped Gower's Ring of Protection yet, do so now. It is somehow sweet and creepy at the same time.
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I don't think I've ever even found that thing.
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NOT-AN-EDIT: The item in Iron Keep column always taunts me. I know its a junky soul but I can't let treasure go!
Belmont plan is thus: Get Old whip(after I'd say 23 tries including a slap, two great hammers, three tridents and four twinking). Burn straight for Dragonrider and kill him to open up Huntsmands Corpse and grab the Notched Whip there. Go to Forest and beat Last Giant to move Merchant Hag to Majula to get Throwing Knife Spam. Beat Old Dragonslayer to get access to Targray's stock, then over to Skeleton Lords and Covetus Demon. Move Gilligan over to Majula and buy many, many whips. Maybe grind a Bloody Whip next?
I don't think I've ever even found that thing.
It shows up in the misty woods in NG+ and onwards.
Bigger reply to stuffs later.
NOT-AN-EDIT: Only Scorpioness, Rotten and Magus jokers down. Spent too long trolling in Ratbros to get stones to Crow Gamble. Didn't actually reach my target but had hilarity all the same. HIDE IN CORNER then either ambush if they go after rats, or tank it out and let rats ambush them. Die doing rat stuff; die against Rotten because clearly holding Shield down does nothing; die going after lizard in Tseldora because LOLROLL into pit.
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Kirby Dream Land 2: Played and beaten and gotten FRUE ENDING or whatever.
Not impressed honestly. Feels like a step back from Kirby's Adventure in every way. An immediately noticeable thing is how they removed Kirby's Dash and Slide, meaning just convenient fast travels and a close range "get off me" attack in a pinch aren't there. Animal helpers do help offset the less powers some but often the game is built around giving the finger to two of the animals and so either you use basic Kirby or the right animal, so botched mechanic, and the animal power ups are often just slightly modified variants of the base one.
The thing that jarred me most was stage design though. The game loved it's self scrolling stages, something that is generally rare in Kirby games. If not a self scrolling stage, it loved abusing the hell out of wind or current mechanics. Oh right, it also loved to shove water in half the stages thereby making the stages more tedious (thankfully they're short!) Lastly, the game LOVES GORDOS LIKE NOTHING ELSE. Is there a slight bit of basic paltforming coming ahead? Expect to see at least 3 Gordos because screw you, that's why! I'm fine with Gordos, but this is way overdoing it.
Basically, what I'm getting at is I can see why no one ever talks about this game. It's like KDL1 gets recognition because it's the original, Kirby Adventure came and set the status quo, introducing a bunch of staple mechanics, ideas, etc. that just made the games a lot more engaging. KDL2...doesn't really do much to the franchise; I guess it established the "100% the game to fight real final boss" standard, but not sure that's a good thing. It looks all the worse when you consider the following game is Kirby Super Star, which is probably the single most critically acclaimed Kirby game of all time (and for good reason!)
I'll give KDL2 props in one area: They actually found unique things to do with Wispy, Kracko and DeDeDe while still keeping them true to their original forms. I guess Mr. Bright and Mr. Shine were similar but those two sort of got forgotten in later games because they're lame <_<
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Some techno babble on Zohar and WE if anyone is interested.
At the bottom of it, Zohar is just a piece of metal. It gave birth to the material world yes, but still a piece of metal. It pretty much cannot do anything on its own without outside force maneuvering it. And in the case of Deus system, Kadmony is what giving command to Zohar.
Zohar functions by bending the time/space axis to select outcomes from possible futures. But in the case when it select something that is impossible, aka bending the time/space axis to the point they completely parallel to one another, it creates a zone which material world can't exist. That zone is the Path of Sephiroth which connects to the higher dimension.
A slight fragment of high dimensional wave fell into material world through it and got stuck in Zohar. That fragment of wave is the WE.
Escaping from Zohar on its own is impossible unless Zohar's manipulation of time and space is fully shut down. To shut Zohar down requires blowing up Kadmony, and to do that you need to blow up the entire Deus System. WE cannot do this on its own as it is a purely spiritual entity, and the material world is a confinement to its potential power, especially what it got stuck into is the very piece of metal that gave birth to the material world.
This whole thing is XG's Gnostic zealotry drawing a parallel to the degradation of the spirit upon entering a physical flesh in Sophia's fall.
WE, having absolutely zero physical capacity, can only influence the world in spirit. Thus it share a portion of its wave with the Contact; creating a direct link between Contact and WE. Since the WE inside Zohar, it is like a direct cable to Zohar. You can say WE opened up a back door there. On the other hand, Elly is a portion of the Kadmony (central calculation unit Persona) that WE hi-jacked by injecting Abel's vision of ideal women into it.
And this whole thing is really XG's further zealotry over Gnostic Sophia's relationship with humanity after her fall and try to combine it with Freud's concept o flust over maternity and masturbation.
Oh god why. It is moment like this I want strangle Takahashi.
Anyway, WE's plan to bail itself out is to create a situation similar to the one that caused its fall. Aka, Deus at its prime of power, Zohar in full throttle, and all the scattered calculation unit of Kadmony reunited at one place, which should recreate the condition to open up the Path of Sephiroth. Then busted them all together at once, so WE can break out and climb his way back home.
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I don't think I've ever even found that thing.
It shows up in the misty woods in NG+ and onwards.
So basically the only place you'll ever need it. Of course.
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<2014:04:29:>[18:05:46] > In the least shocking news ever, the Bravely Default Fairie is goddamn worthless and literally demands you sacrifice children rather than screw up any part of your mission.
<2014:04:29:>[20:05:50] <AAA> the tradition continues
Sorry, but this kind of character is completely a positive in RPGs were bland is the default (not having seen the scene yet, there could obviously be stupider context).
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Kirby Dream Land 2: Played and beaten and gotten FRUE ENDING or whatever.
Not impressed honestly. Feels like a step back from Kirby's Adventure in every way. An immediately noticeable thing is how they removed Kirby's Dash and Slide, meaning just convenient fast travels and a close range "get off me" attack in a pinch aren't there. Animal helpers do help offset the less powers some but often the game is built around giving the finger to two of the animals and so either you use basic Kirby or the right animal, so botched mechanic, and the animal power ups are often just slightly modified variants of the base one.
The thing that jarred me most was stage design though. The game loved it's self scrolling stages, something that is generally rare in Kirby games. If not a self scrolling stage, it loved abusing the hell out of wind or current mechanics. Oh right, it also loved to shove water in half the stages thereby making the stages more tedious (thankfully they're short!) Lastly, the game LOVES GORDOS LIKE NOTHING ELSE. Is there a slight bit of basic paltforming coming ahead? Expect to see at least 3 Gordos because screw you, that's why! I'm fine with Gordos, but this is way overdoing it.
Basically, what I'm getting at is I can see why no one ever talks about this game. It's like KDL1 gets recognition because it's the original, Kirby Adventure came and set the status quo, introducing a bunch of staple mechanics, ideas, etc. that just made the games a lot more engaging. KDL2...doesn't really do much to the franchise; I guess it established the "100% the game to fight real final boss" standard, but not sure that's a good thing. It looks all the worse when you consider the following game is Kirby Super Star, which is probably the single most critically acclaimed Kirby game of all time (and for good reason!)
I'll give KDL2 props in one area: They actually found unique things to do with Wispy, Kracko and DeDeDe while still keeping them true to their original forms. I guess Mr. Bright and Mr. Shine were similar but those two sort of got forgotten in later games because they're lame <_<
I recently replayed and reviewed this game as well. Here's what I wrote, my feelings are similar:
This is a bad game. I used to like it when I was a kid; I remember begging my grandmother to buy it for me. I remember thinking the new animal buddies were cool, and it was the first Kirby game I played that had the copy ability so that was neat at the time. Ultimately, I wish I had not revisited this game, as it doesn't hold up at all. Out of curiosity, I looked it up and found out Masahiro Sakurai, the man behind Kirby and Super Smash Bros, had no involvement with this game or Dream Land 3. That doesn't surprise me. I always suspected the Kirby games involving Dark Matter and animal buddies were designed by a different team than the rest, and it's true after all.
Dream Land 2 has a few major problems that really stick out to an aged gamer. The first is enemy spawning: scroll an enemy off the screen, and it respawns immediately after that part of the screen becomes visible again. This is unbelievably frustrating in the various water maze puzzles in this game, and punishes you for backtracking to get things you missed. Another issue I have with the game is that the buddies and copy abilities Kirby uses are so much worse than his generic swallow and spit attacks. The attacks barely do any damage to bosses, making them take forever to beat. Even worse, a lot of the abilities will put you in precarious positions when used on bosses anyway. For instance, if you want to whack one with the parasol, it will take no hit-stun and just walk right in to you, rendering whatever advantage having the skill would give moot.
The animal buddies are a bigger problem. First, there's Rick the hamster. Using him is inferior to just using Kirby, as you lose the ability to fly and have a bigger hitbox. None of the attacks he can use make up for this. Coo the owl is actually pretty awesome (and has an amazing theme song; actually, all the music in this game is great) but the game doesn't want you to use him! No! In almost every stage, you'll be forced to use Kine the fish, who is absolutely terrible out of water but is required in order to collect the rainbow drops you need to finish the game in about half of the game's levels. It's almost like a cruel joke by the developers. They give you all these potentially neat abilities, then make you use only the worst ones to get anywhere.
The final boss is terrible too, and he's the icing on the crap cake. To fight Dark Matter, you have to use the new Rainbow sword ability. Kirby also gets to move freely in all directions... very slowly. This makes it nearly impossible to avoid Dark Matter's screen-splitting attacks, and since the sword doesn't actually hurt the boss, you have to reflect his attacks with it. The physics of this are poorly conceived to say the least, so I would not be surprised if many players didn't bother to beat the boss. I know I save-scummed through it on this playthrough.
I wanted to say some nice things about this game, but apart from the soundtrack (Ando is a genius composer, seriously) there's not much to recommend. This game is worse than Kirby Super Star in every way, and there's nothing that would encourage a replay. The level design is poor, the bosses are done better in other Kirby games, and the physics feel stiff and antiquated. Look elsewhere for your Kirby fix.
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This game is worse than Kirby Super Star in every way
That's true for most games that have ever been made, though?
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This game is worse than Kirby Super Star in every way
That's true for most games that have ever been made, though?
Well, this is true, can't argue with that. But I assume the point of the comparison is noted.
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<2014:04:29:>[18:05:46] > In the least shocking news ever, the Bravely Default Fairie is goddamn worthless and literally demands you sacrifice children rather than screw up any part of your mission.
<2014:04:29:>[20:05:50] <AAA> the tradition continues
Sorry, but this kind of character is completely a positive in RPGs were bland is the default (not having seen the scene yet, there could obviously be stupider context).
It's more just the usual 'Fairie is terrible'. Though this Fairie is terrible in a much different way than the norm, so there's that!
Just beat the Templar boss. I bet he's a godlike in the DL and that's a shame. Talk about bad in game. The boss duo before him was much nastier.
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Bravely Default - Fighting Dragons in chapter 4 to unlock Vampire. That is pretty metal. I beat Water one pretty easy with a well developed Ninja skill set on one character. Wind dragon proceeded to completely stomp me when I went to it next. Weakness overriding any resistance is a little frustrating since I decided that one job level in Thief for everyone wasn't overly grindy. Abate Wind does nothing. At least Abate skills reapply after overwritten, Null Fire and Ice from the shield that gives those isn't (I might test with accessories also).
I wasn't going to be able to really keep up with Compounding just by how resource intensive it gets (and to be frank the button pushes was going to get pretty annoying). I thought of many of the obvious ways to work around the fight, you could easily grind up the job levels to have everyone get Transience and Utsusemi from Ninja and Turn the Tables from Red Mage and auto battle counter them to death forever. That was lame. There is also Spirit Master stuff but I didn't want to level that up either. I thought about it long and hard and groaned to myself. Threw Tiz into Spirit Master, did one fight and realised the skill I wanted was the level 1 skill.
So 2 people with Spiritualism set and one person trying to keep Utsusemi up gives a setup that can easily handle them with some slow chipping. No deeper investment than Phoenix Downs, some X-Potions in a pinch and a Turbo Ether or two on dragons without Black Magic weakness to beat them. Could handle better with more liberal applications of Kairai instead of mindlessly going on the offensive. Also could probably get away with Compounding and have spend about the same amount of money than replacing Turbo Ethers, but eh. I have about 20 of them and with Quarter Elixir normally in my arsenal I don't really see a need for them much.
Anyway it looks like Water dragon hits way less hard than the others, presumably because it can inflict Stop which can be rough. Fire Dragon was even rougher with either worse luck on speed variance on him or he was faster than the other ones I have fought. I don't have Examine in my setup so I haven't been able to check stats.
Earth and Light ones left to kill.
Have toyed with changing Agnes into Ranger or leaving her in Thief and dropping the damage secondary and rolling three people with Spiritualism but I think that is overkill.
Pretty grindy to be honest and rough on normal, but most strategies that work to kill them in this chapter on Normal will work on Hard too, so I guess the fights scale about the same. You are also like 2 or 3 job levels away from skills that would trivialise them so I assume the fights are cake walks in Chapter 5.
I see Super has caught up to me. The double fight is much more interesting than Templar. What is up with them giving 999 JP and him only giving 200? I was looking forward to a fat payout and got the equivalent of 2 randoms for him. Sad times.
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So basically the only place you'll ever need it. Of course.
Of course! Remember Dark Souls design philosophy is "we hate you".
I also had the most trouble with Wind Dragon Gref, although that may have been because it was the first one I fought.
DS: Finished the Dragon Covenant, working on the Awesomestones covenant now. Then Bellbros and (eventually) Vendrick and finally I might be ready for NG+.
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Arcanist / Spiritmaster fight is probably harder than Templar fight if you go into both blind, but once you've fought 'em once, the Templar fight mostly maintains its difficulty while Arcanist / Spiritmaster collapses. Block POIZN, collect victoly. I only even had 2 Poison blockers but if I'd really been desperate I could've gone back and spent the princely 500 pg. a piece on a full set of 4. Per earlier comments, Templar wiped me twice, but A/S was a "die horribly first time, win easily second time w/ no grinding" affair. Seriously, Spiritmaster is very turn inefficient (you want to trade 2 BP on Fairy's Aid for 1 BP of mine in Dispel? Please do.), & Arcanist doesn't OHKO through Default, and it's just a single target anyway. Arcanist is very sad once Poison is blocked and her Brave shenanigans aren't too bad.
Templar meanwhile goes on horrific Brave-backed killing sprees where he'll take 3 actions two turns in a row, OHKOs through Default, can KO through Default if your HP wasn't maxed without his Default piercer, etc. and sports absurd durability to give him time to get lucky. Knowing to take Hunting into the battle helps a lot at speeding things up, but he can still murder you (presumably on Normal as well!), so.
In more recent news, a dragon ate my party. Guess I'm not doing Vamp just quite yet!
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(minor spoilers)
If you're at the point where you can get Vampire, there is actually much less game in your way before getting Dark Knight, which is IMO the better class anyway.
I basically second Snowfire on the relative merits of Templar and Arcanist/Spiritmaster fights but will note that both of us played on Hard, which makes a big difference, as Templar's default-piercing move becomes a OHKO there (at least potentially, depending on your levels/def).
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This game is worse than Kirby Super Star in every way
That's true for most games that have ever been made, though?
Well, this is true, can't argue with that. But I assume the point of the comparison is noted.
Everything I hear about it makes me think it is terrible, yes. I have been lifting weights and doing cocaine all day, and just thinking about Kirby's Dream Land 2 makes me so angry I might bite off someone's nipple, Castle Freak style.
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If you have L1 Spiritmaster on the entire party, you have -absolute- control over the dragon fights as long as you equip the appropriate statusblocker as needed.
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The final boss is terrible too, and he's the icing on the crap cake. To fight Dark Matter, you have to use the new Rainbow sword ability. Kirby also gets to move freely in all directions... very slowly. This makes it nearly impossible to avoid Dark Matter's screen-splitting attacks, and since the sword doesn't actually hurt the boss, you have to reflect his attacks with it. The physics of this are poorly conceived to say the least, so I would not be surprised if many players didn't bother to beat the boss. I know I save-scummed through it on this playthrough.
That's something I forgot to bring up myself.
In Kirby Adventure, you get the Star Rod, which is basically the Ultimate Power. It's a ranged attack that hits hard (it shoots stars, I can only assume these would do as much damage as Kirby's basic inhale -> release attack), with no strings attached, and even has a decent fire rate. On top of that, it has the Sword Spin-strike, which works as a defensive move in the air. It's the kind of power that makes you feel like a bad ass when fighting the final boss.
The Rainbow Sword, by contrast, is basically what you had when you fought Meta Knight is Kirby's Adventure, namely a sword that doesn't disappear due to damage. This is not a great way to feel awesome because it's such a boring power; the least it could do is fire beams out at full health like in Zelda or something. Heck, the whole point is just to give Kirby something to bat away attacks with.
With Meta Knight, they didn't try to pretend it was a new power, just a gimmick stylish fight. Meta Knight uses Swords, so let's have Kirby with permanent sword to have a sword duel; it was a cute idea and worked for a singular boss fight.
Basically, if you're forcing a special power for a final boss fight, make that power seem good. The Star Rod made it feel like everything else would be pointless, so being forced with it was totally fair! Rainbow Sword, I felt weakened. The fact that, like you said, you really win by playing baseball with him is insulting; beating him with melee is possible but takes forever.
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Child of Light:
Engrossing. The gameplay combines that of a 2D action platformer with a Grandia-esque battle system. It's not an incredibly deep battle system, but it is challenging enough on Hard.
The game's atmosphere is haunting and the music backs that up in subdued fashion. The action platformer part would normally prove lackluster but the game quickly twists the standard formula by giving Aurora the ability to fly after one little dungeon. Aurora herself is a fairly charming as a child protagonist.
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Ooh, I remember seeing images of that game. It looked beautiful. Glad to hear it's panning out decently.
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DS2: Great scythe is wonky as hell. My nemesis now constitutes the sum total of Drangleic's stationary vertical objects. Man, the times I've been stabbed in the face due to being stunned after a follow-up slash pinged off a wall? I now live in dread of all narrow corridors. Weapon also seems to degrade notably when striking armored enemies (or maybe just when you whiff a lot and club people with it, not sure) so I have two of them now, one magic and one dark. Great scythe + enemy hitbox continues to be a really weird combination; little dudes you have to be really precise with your positioning to get proper damage, but bosses are just big blobs you can wail on indiscriminately I guess? (Hi Rotten, you are not a wizard this time.) Damage is aces buffed when you don't have to worry about precision at all.
Speaking of, I can use Resonant Weapon now! But I'm not yet really because there are still things I want to spend levels on (I can't use Dark Fog yet). Anyway there's Great Magic Weapon in the meantime.
Was sitting around the Iron Keep bellbroing it up some more and got invaded. Tossed Chameleon and sat around for a bit. Dude runs past with the Staff of Wisdom and Havel's Greatshield equipped. Okayyyyy there's no way someone legitimately has the stats to use (or even acquire) both of those at my SM level. I don't want to deal with this, so I sit around answering PSN messages while he runs past a couple times more. Eventually I'm interrupted by POIZN noises. He's throwing Dark Fog on all the stationary objects in the Iron Keep. I notice this once I'm poisoned, so I backstab him and run off to heal. He starts throwing around Crystal Soul Spear, Great Lightning Spear, Crystal Homing Soulmass...I managed a piddly three hundred damage with a backstab and he can deal 95% of my health with one spell, so guess how this ends.
I check his PSN profile afterwards. He has two trophies: the one you get for DS2 chargen, and the All Hexes trophy. You know, I really don't understand the hacker mentality. How is that even fun at all?
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You see, by being the unkillable he gets back at all the people who've ever wronged him by annoying random strangers! It's brilliant really.
Dark Souls 2: Spooky Scary Skeletons, Covetus and Mytha down. Lazy lazy day. Connection didn't pop so I didn't Ratbro but I got a Twinkling off Crow Roulette so Havel's is up to +4. Yayyyyy. Deaths include randomly missing the Huntsmans Corpse drop and the Iron Keep column of pointless that I just shut off right then and there because bloody hell do I not want to jump over to the Allone Captain Archer again.
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The gameplay combines that of a 2D action platformer with a Grandia-esque battle system.
So I'm hearing I need to pick this game up.
DmC - Got Devil Trigger! Seriously DMC, stop waiting so long to give me this, why do you keep doing this. Enemy design is ticking upwards although the focus still seems to be more on what the player can do with ridiculous aerial combos; the redesign of devil trigger kinda drives this home...
(edit: In fairness, I think I begrudge this game's long devil trigger delay less than 3 or 4 [I don't even remember when you gained it in 2. Bad sign]. The toys you have to play with as of Chapter 2 made the lack of it less pronounced. Still a welcome addition to the arsenal!)
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DMC2 you actually get Devil Trigger from the outset; you get modifications of it throughout the game via accessories, which while DMC2 has issues, that was one of the cooler features.
Kirby Super Stars: IN the middle of Great Cave Offensive. Trying to 100% it on treasures for the first time ever. Got about 15 thus far!
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Yeah, if you're going to make Devil Trigger a late pickup, having it be a super-move rather than a new character mode makes that decision go down easier, I think.
SRWZ3.1: Mid-chapter 16. They did a pretty good job balancing the combat system - I've had a few close scrapes with both SR points and outright losses, and got out of them with Tag Tension and chain-killing shenanigans rather than just seishin spam. The current stage in particular is going to be fun to deal with – two bosses to kill, they have to go down in the same turn, and only one of them moves so you have to split the team. Nasty grunts to wade through, too. Aquarion has a lot of those, no matter which show it is.
Top aces are Kouji, Souske and Hibiki. Mazinger uber alles.
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Bravely Default - Just got to Chapter 6. Did all of the dragons on Chapter 5, they are still quite tough in Hard Mode. I had to level a bunch to get Stop Immunity on all of my characters to beat the Blue one, though. I'm using a party of Templar(with DK)/DK(with piracy)/Perfomer(with WM)/Vampire(with valk).
spoilerz for end of C5
I guess alternate dimension Alternis Dim is less of a Nice Guy than the original. Also, I think Super might be right about the fairy??? who knew Super could be right about fairies
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Bravely Default - Decided to take the bait and go for the normal/alternate ending in C6.
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BD - Still dragons for me. Shinryuu decided it was sick mad idea to just spam Holy Breath turn after turn before I moved, so party wiped a bit. Ladon is actually scaring me a bit because he is busting out the same thing. When they outspeed my White Mage Tiz with Agi boosting accessory consistently it is scary. My Time Mage is currently a Black Mage with Spiritualism set (and is normally slower than dragons). Ladon could proc Paralyze at very bad times very easily. I could swap to Time Mage for the added control at the cost of damage. I think that is smarter than messing around with Slow Parry like I had been. I have the skill slots for Slow Parry on these fights, but ehhh. I think I would rather build a strat with my current tool kit first.
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I too am at the same point Ciato is at. Game quality has taken a sharp nosedive to me since the end of C4 but eh, oh well. I have absolutely no comment on the plot, but those who have played it can imagine my reaction to it.
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Child of Light:
I continue to play this game. Soaring through the air is truly divine. Combat is like Grandia, albeit rather plain.
The plot is thin, which is unfortunate. Aurora is charming and the party is growing. A cadre of loyal (?) subordinates.
Customizing is choosing from 3 paths. But a dead end on each one makes little room for maths.
I say you should play Child of Light. A passion for simplicity it may reignite.
Have I mentioned the dialog all rhymes? And I don't just mean ... infrequently (He means Sometimes).
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DS2: Today I backstabbed Havel off a cliff.
Velstadt's not much fun when your primary offense is dark elemental. I dumbed down Sunlight Blade just to make things a little easier but even still chipping was a chore. Farmed up a Black Witch Staff to replace existing casting triggers because hey, all-in-one functionality at last. Glancing at the status menu after equipping it, wait what 800ish power? I wonder what it would be like maxed out? I have plenty of titanite sitting around so hey, let's find out. 1266. The display has trouble making sense of a four-digit number, but yeah, 1266. I have to assume the status screen's attack rating for hexing implements is just an amalgamation of the various elements it works for (that's how it works for elemental weapons anyway), because the results when I start experimenting with hexes don't really testify to their reputed gamebreaking greatness (still good, mind).
So I know I wasn't going to use attack magic at all but hey, gotta do something with those spell slots once Waifu Scythe makes all the buffs obsolete. I might just jack up INT/FTH to 40 since there's little else worth caring about for levels and anyway might as well make all those hexes accessible for experimentation purposes at the least. There's probably better catalysts for pumping out damage, but convenience alone basically ensures BWS isn't going anywhere (and at least it doesn't compete with my armor for ore).
Turns out Agdayne gives you a super cool katana if you talk to him after beating up Velstadt. Something to remember whenever I get back to running a DEX fighter.
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Sadly Vestaldt probably has the lowest Dark Def of the three Dark bosses.
Hexes strong point is the sheer ludicrous speed you fire them out due to the nature of the stat invest. Firing off 1K damage with a normal weapon's attack speed is nuts.
Agadyne's Darkdrift has something embarrassing like 20 durability.
Dark Souls 2: Only killed Chariot because I woke up late and I'm adhering to a no-gaming after midnight philosophy. The run to the Chariot was maximum easy at least! Tried going after Lost Sinner but SURPRISE EXPLODING ZOMBIE OUTTA NOWHERE! And of course it goes through the shield because why wouldn't it?
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Child of Light:
I continue to play this game. Soaring through the air is truly divine. Combat is like Grandia, albeit rather plain.
The plot is thin, which is unfortunate. Aurora is charming and the party is growing. A cadre of loyal (?) subordinates.
Customizing is choosing from 3 paths. But a dead end on each one makes little room for maths.
I say you should play Child of Light. A passion for simplicity it may reignite.
Have I mentioned the dialog all rhymes? And I don't just mean ... infrequently (He means Sometimes).
I hear the story puts one in the mind of classic fairy tales. That sounds like the simplicity is more about wins than fails...
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Pokemon X Electric Monotype Challenge:
I started this as filler to avoid replaying Souls over and over. Have spent an hour and a half attempting to catch Light Ball Pikachu. No luck so far, but on the bright side, managed to get one with a decent nature. In my first run of this game, the one Pikachu I caught had the Light Ball. So it goes... Y gets Elektrike exclusively, but I can at least get Mega Ampharos, which is probably better here since I'll need type variety.
This doesn't seem to be that challenging at a glance, but maybe it'll surprise me like Mono-flying 3rd gen.
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It seems like it could be tricky without the Exp Share. With, probably a joke, but I could be surprised.
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Bravely Default - Ladon proved difficult because he decided that busting out random speed was fun. Earth Eye then bust out Megaton Press before even White Mage Tiz with Hermes Sandals goes who in almost all other turns consistently out sped him. Okay. Make sure to keep Slow up, win eh enough. Just have to play game with like real strategy and shit.
Vampire Castle randoms fucking legit capable of one rounding me if ambushed, a few wipes in dungeon. Lots of wins with someone dead because dogs decided to focus them down through default after starting with a BP. Black Mage had null fire shield on so could clean them up easily enough. Could have slapped shields on those turns I guess.
Got to the boss. Levelled everyone enough to get Utsusemi. Played around a bit. Decided it was boring. Decided I didn't feel like fucking around enough to beat it any other way. Decided Edea can get 999 JP. Had everyone but her kill themselves and won on auto battle and Transience counters.
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Bravely Default: Finished. This entire post is going to be spoilery, don't read if you haven't finished.
This is the tale of two games. The first half of bravely default is a brilliantly paced game that constantly introduces new jobs, has plenty of quality subquests to do, and tells a classic story of healing the crystals. The characters start off badly, but that's mostly Tiz and Agnes being boring. Ringabel and Edea are both a lot of fun and spice things up when they go to the forefront (Mercifully, the game calls out Ringabel on his shit constantly which is great). Then chapter five happens and you get to repeat the game four times before getting to the end! What in the fuck. That means you get to do the crystal purging 16 fucking times and do those dungeons 4 more times each. The repetition is mind numbing and completely not fun. The side stuff with the Eternian knights is great if you can stomach refighting them over and over, but ugh god. The gameplay goes in the toliet to me after C4. The tight gameplay is replaced by repeat bosses with no new tricks and the same randoms from C5 till the end of the game. You stop getting to buy things from non Norende shops, so your money issues vanish. It turns into a stompfest/time to figure out your favorite broken setups for endgame. That part's okay, just the repetition hurts.
All that repetition completely kills any interest I have in replaying, which is a shame because the core battle system is amazing. The second half of the game would be okay if it was condensed into an extra world, not *four* extra worlds.I didn't do vampire castle and skipped the conjurer. I apparently missed a bunch of side plot in worlds 5-8 by not doing most of the side fights, but hell with it.
Airy's twist is brilliant. The execution that goes into it is not. Why does the party willingly go along for an extra two worlds after figuring out the truth about Airy, and *then* act shocked when she turns into a personsification of evil? The writing falls apart badly in the main plot after C4 minus Airy's twist, and it hurts to see. So much purifying crystals over and over.
Some brief character notes for NPC's:
Braev: MORON. Oh my god there are a thousand ways you can dissect how he's dumb, but I'll just say not warning his daughter that she's travelling with the Evil One for reasons hurts my head.
Alternis Dim: His diary is amazing to read and gives a lot of depth to a mostly wankery character. Also, love how he explains exactly why the Dutchy got into a brutal civil war in Eisen. It makes sense- ideology has pulled world powers into ugly wars before. C4 Dim still needs a kick to the temple because his dumb confession of love rather than telling Edea the truth about the Fairie is wretched.
Airy: Ah..ahah. AHhaha. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA THE TRUTH IS REVEALED NEVER TRUST A FAIRIE EVER. Ahem. The twist with Airy as the game's true villain is amazing. I had picked up on it before due to my really serious dislike of Fairies, but joking aside her behavior really comes off as strange at best at several points. Still, she does a fantastic job being evil and I can't complain. Most tolerable fairie ever, because you get to exterminate her.
De Rossa/Yulana: Go away. You are tied with the really terrible overarching plot.
The first half of BD is close to 10/10 range. I loved almost all of it. The second half is more like 2/10 range minus Airy's twist. I think it averages out to a 6? No matter how much I adore the first half of the game, I find everything after you beat up Alternis for the first time to be a chore. There's only one new dungeon after that point which is a shame.
It averages out to a 6. There's just too much crap tacked on in the second half. I love the polish put into the game, I love the job system, I hate how the entire second half of the game executes itself.
Non spoilery stuff: I really, really appreciated how the game went out of it's way to balance the classes for the most part. It was like the game designers had figured out it wasn't 1994 any more and things like Steal should be useful. The only classes I'd call out and out bad are Conjurer (accession time's an issue), and Arcanist (Skillset looks really bad, BM tails off late). Classes differ and they try to give every class a unique niche, which is very cool.
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Final Fantasy Dimensions: Yeaaah I'm not feeling it. I'm trying to find something interesting in there but the game's not responding. Also, bad touch controls. Might as well replay FF5 instead.
Dark Souls 2:
Died with a twinblade character. Fell in a hole in the Gutter.
Twinblades give terrible first impressions, with bad damage, bad scaling, bad range, bad everything.
BUT you can use one with both hands and you can go all Star Wars Kid on an enemy with something like a 6 hit combo.
If you wield them in one hand or dual wield, they get the same moveset as other weapons, which obviously doesn't work at all with their extremely low damage.
So they're combo machine. Use with: resins, high str/dex, mundane/bleed/poison enchantment, ring of blades, etc.
That doesn't really make them good though. The combos are high commitment/risk attacks, like say, Great Club attacks, with very little range, unlike say Great Club attacks, without even doing comparable damage in the end.
Bows are cool and all but uuuuh they're just like magic.
If Soul Arrow was the only available spell ever and it did half its usual damage.
Sniping is cool though.
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Kirby Super Star: Just 100% Great Cave Offensive.
This is the one part of KSS I am not fond of, because GCO just always felt annoyingly laid out and seems to drag. To think they apparently made a WHOLE GAME based around the idea of Metroidvania Kirby in Amazing Mirror is headscratching.
Ah well, with that behind me, it's onto easily the best parts of KSS: Revenge of Meta Knight and Milky Way Wishes.
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Dark Souls 2:
Died with a twinblade character. Fell in a hole in the Gutter.
Twinblades give terrible first impressions, with bad damage, bad scaling, bad range, bad everything.
BUT you can use one with both hands and you can go all Star Wars Kid on an enemy with something like a 6 hit combo.
If you wield them in one hand or dual wield, they get the same moveset as other weapons, which obviously doesn't work at all with their extremely low damage.
So they're combo machine. Use with: resins, high str/dex, mundane/bleed/poison enchantment, ring of blades, etc.
That doesn't really make them good though. The combos are high commitment/risk attacks, like say, Great Club attacks, with very little range, unlike say Great Club attacks, without even doing comparable damage in the end.
Bows are cool and all but uuuuh they're just like magic.
If Soul Arrow was the only available spell ever and it did half its usual damage.
Sniping is cool though.
Aw, I was just gearing up to do a run focusing on the weapon types I'd ignored--twinblades/lances/katanas (+3 rapier has to suffice until any of these become available). I guess twinblades can continue being ignored? The stats really did look like trash on paper, but I was holding out hope the moveset would make up for it.
Bows-only was the only other thing I could think of trying at this point, but yeah, I did that in DS1 and it was just like being a ghetto sorcerer. And you can't even ignore END in DS2 because bowshot chews through stamina now. Random thing it took me a long time to notice: if you execute an attack in DS2 with less than the normally required amount of stamina, you do lower damage proportionate to how much stamina you had.
Anyway scythechick -> hexchick basically done. I built a lightning scythe and grabbed Sunlight Blade specifically for the final boss. I still have to kill Darklurker (ffffff) because I want Lifedrain Patch, but Waifu scythe get! It's a little ostentatious. Also heavy, I had to sink a bunch of levels into VIT to carry it and still retain max roll power. 588 attack power, though! That's comparable to what I got out of Great Club shenanigans (on paper, less in practice because elemental weapon). It has the familiar scythe problem of hitbox wonkiness, with less range than the Great Scythe so now I have to get used to things all over again...but man the haft of the weapon is seriously somebody's spine and that is just too fucking metal you guys. Also that two-handed R2 is just pure style. Where to use it though? Oh right NG+.
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I still intend to have QUEEN ANIME run twinblades all evidence pointing to their awfulness be damned!
Reduced damage isn't enough of a deterrent to just spam strong attacks with minimum stamina. DS1 had negative stamina to punish that idea but here it's like 10% less damage and running takes much longer after stamina restores. Whoop dee ship here let me staggerlock Darklurker who cares if it takes one more hit I can do this all day with no effective downsides!
Dark Souls 2: Around a dozen runs to get Old Whip. Yayyyyyyy.
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Dust an Elysian Tail: This is actually good considering it's about furries.
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Twinblades are not Dark Souls 1 Whip bad or anything. Unless you don't use the combo attacks.
Bows are meant to complement melee weapons (preferably dex melee weapons) as they don't require a stat investment then (unlike magic) so their low power makes sense
I didn't even realize that lances were a thing different from spears! Too bad they're all lategame. Like all scythes/katanas/curved greatswords, if I'm not mistaken. Edit: Actually, only katanas and lances are lategame. I'll try the curved greatsword and scythe next time.
Oh by the way, the keyblade cannot be transfered to NG+ :(
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Chariot can make a Lance with its soul, so that would be Four Bosses plus a Gutter Dive(or Five to get to the Valley). A Dark Scythe can be grabbed in the Shaded Ruins so if you make a Gutter Dive it can be grabbed without a boss kill at all, and even the Great Scythes only require one boss anyway on that same path. Katanas are all Iron Keep(Four Bosses) or later. Curved Greatswords are two bosses for the Murakumo(yay Gutter Diving!)
Speaking of the Chariot I forgot its soul could make the Crossbow Shield so Big McLargeHuge ate it and ARGH I could have actually used it!
Yeah, I forgot to mention the Keyblade didn't transfer over with Club-Guy. It can't be upgraded either. I want that damn moveset!
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Actually, anything that requires twinkling titanite or petrified dragon bones to upgrade are not viable for my runs thinking about it. So using the Arced Sword isn't really a solution, and Murakumo requires beating scorpion lady, who's one of the only bosses I still fear!
You can also get some scythes as drops from Huntman's Copse enemies, but I don't know the drop rate. Chariot shouldn't be that hard to beat with a fresh character anyway, so accessing the Great Scythe shouldn't be too much of a problem.
Maybe going straight to the Iron Keep from the beginning of the game isn't that bad. The bosses on the way there aren't, but the levels are. I dunno. I should try it out once.
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All you need for NG chariot is MACE. I left it sitting at +3 on great scythe run because I didn't want to waste the large shards on something planned to become obsolete, and it was still perfectly sufficient.
Blacksteel Katana I think is the earliest of those you can get? Looks pretty sweet on paper. Four bosses in, yeah, but most of them are feebs.
Murakumo is boss, incidentally, was how I handled Throne duo the first time (the arc is big enough to hit both of them).
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Checking the wiki... three katanas are straight related to Iron Keep. Three more are from beyond Drangleic Castle and the last is the Chaos Blade. Yeahhhhhhhhhh.
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So surprisingly this makes katanas the least accessible weapons next to lances?
In the iron keep you either have to farm monsters (and might not even get one) or have to get an item for McDuff. Usually at this point I have Mc Duff's shop available, but not in a Run-straight-to Iron Keep run!
BTW guys, the next not-Souls
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=812089
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Duck Tales Remastered - <3 <3 <3 <3
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So podcast I listen to notes how many From games hearken back to Berserk and I keep seeing it in themes and armour designs and stuff. That is all straight up Black Knight era Berserk shit right there.
Bravely Default - doing earth temple.
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Well that helps explain why I didn't like Dark Souls' setting/atmosphere.
DmC - In what I assume is the final dungeon, which is a big business tower ran by the main villain. In the "demon world" version of it the walls are plastered with such slogans as "greed is great", "punish poverty", and "worship wealth". I am amused. Vergil remains the best character which is really freaking weird. Thoughts on things which are actually important can be saved until I am done.
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There isn't much there thematically other than generic dark fantasy stuff and stuff about fallibility of man/gods. Tons of it in armour and weapon design though.
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Duck Tales Remastered - <3 <3 <3 <3
I am under the slight impression you like this game...
Speaking of awesome classics...
Kirby Super Star: Beat Milky Way Wishes and Meta Knight. 94% playthrough, might go and get that 100% and Arena later before moving onto KDL3. yes, I'm going through the entire Kirby Anniversary Collection in order, WANNA FIGHT ABOUT IT?
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So how is it similar to Berserk? (I don't know Berserk)
Honestly this just looks like The Next Souls Game EXCEPT dudes are wearing weirder hats than usual. (also there are guns apparently)
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The tattered cloak, gun in left hand is reminiscent of Guts. Then more generic stuff you probably run into in other Souls stuff with the washed out colour pallet, army of ramshackle guys with torches. Fighting fucked up zombie hell beasts and shit.
It is mostly just your baseline From things take a lot from it with some more explicit feeling references that give it a clear point in time in Berserk story arc (ie the majority of it).
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Berserk and the Souls games are both low fantasy that happens to be from Japan so similarities are gonna happen.
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@Katana Chat. Well, the jester hat and Gold Ring+1 are pretty much available instantly in Iron Keep and Allone Knights drop stuff pretty frequently but ehhhh it's still annoying.
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Took me all of three trips beating up the opening string of Iron Keep goons to get their katana to drop. Really not much trouble if you've got the stuff from Magerold. Totally worth the minor effort, I am wrecking everybody's shit with this thing. Katanas are actually kinda sluggish (next to comparable straight swords)? And lack bleed from DS1. But that's fine, they were totally overused there and needed to get docked somewhere. Anyway, we're hardly talking gamebest armament here but at +10 and 40 DEX I reliably get 300+ damage a swing off a relatively light slashing weapon and that is pretty good for anything that's not a hammer (should note I'm constantly two-handing it I guess). And there's no strength scaling (it's S for DEX) so you can ignore that stat altogether!
Which would be the reasonable thing to do, but instead I'm also pumping that up to 40 because twinblades! Fenrir neglected to include (among all the other legitimate drawbacks) that they also weigh twice as much as a single sword (this matters for me since I insist on maintaining max roll). And add to the MAD problem that stat requirements for entry tend to be rather high. So yeah, not recommendable but you guys they're so stylish. Dragonrider Twinblade actually looks more salvageable than the rest, so I'm saving up resources to get that upgraded. It was definitely fun using it to go all human blender vs The Rotten.
Lances really functionally don't exist. I won't even bother with the chariot's weapon because all my dragon bones are getting fed to the Dragonrider Twinblade.
Katanas, eh, I'm definitely giving Manslayer and Darkdrift a whirl, at least for novelty value. I am not even going to try getting the Berserker Blade and Chaos Blade is right out. Uchi is basically palette-swapped Blacksteel (except slightly inferior and storebought).
Fudo: I got the Old Whip again first trade this game without trying to or even wanting it. I would've preferred ore!
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By the time Belmont got his whip I had the run time down to three and a half minutes.
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X/Y Electric Monotype:
I've been trying to stick to a low level, and so far that has succeeded in making this pretty tough. A common theme among the available monsters so far is low Defense, which isn't unexpected, but makes anything that hits hard a serious threat.
Before Gym 1, the only Electric type available is Pikachu, but he's a pretty good choice since the Bug gym leader has two flying types.
Between Gyms 1 and 2, the team has expanded to include Plusle, Emolga, Jolteon, and Helioptile. (I had no luck finding either a Light Ball OR a Minun, neither of which is a huge loss in all honesty) This team is surprisingly diverse. Jolteon is the obvious keeper of the lot, but Helioptile has access to Ground and Rock moves, which have proven valuable more than once. Plusle, while terrible on offense, survives better presently than other members of the team, so he's a decent Rocky Helmet candidate for me. I've used that item to help take down a few weaker physical threats. Emolga starts off with Pursuit and hits fairly hard (not to mention he nullifies Ground).
The second gym (Rock) was pretty difficult, but I never got a game over here. The biggest problem is a hiker who has a Rhyhorn and Onix, but between Plusle tanking (lol) and Helioptile flinging mud around, I managed to take him down. Got a bit scared when the Gym Leader critted Helioptile, but I managed to paraflinchhax his Tyrunt, getting Emolga some nice EXP. One great boon from this fight is Rock Tomb, which Helioptile can use.
Thinking forward a bit about Rotom. He'll obviously be a great benefit to the team, but I wonder what the best form is for the challenge? I'm honestly leaning toward his base Ghost form. Rotom-Wash is unnecessary since I'll have Lanturn, meaning Mow, Freeze and base are probably the best options. Looking at how annoying physical threats are, Ghost seems like the way to go.
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Bravely Default - Finished! 74 hours total. Really enjoyed the first half of the game, liked the villain, class system kept me going through the doldrums of C7/C8. Final boss fight was pretty -.-.
I love games having variable difficulty. It is great for adjustable experiences. Played Hard Mode and it was quite difficult, but in a fun way~ Game has great music and I enjoy its graphical style.
The final boss I had a setup of Pirate with two swords and Sword Magic, a Templar with Dark Knight and physical attack 30%, a Time Mage with White Magic, and a Performer with Spiritmaster. Worked pretty well against the final set of bosses.
But obviously the most important thing... character outfit inequalities!
Freelancer: Edea > Agnes > Ringabel > Tiz
Edea's base outfit is the only one I would consider cute, the others are pretty much just in order of how much I like the general character design.
Monk: Agnes > Tiz > Ringabel > Edea
No piggytails, girl. Agnes looks beautiful as always.
White Mage: Agnes > Edea > Ringabel > Tiz
I like the ones that look more like Holly. <_<
Black Mage: Edea > Agnes > Ringabel > Tiz
Floppy hat~
Knight: Edea > Ringabel > Agnes > Tiz
I like both Edea and Ringabel's a lot, but it just seems to fit her more, being a knight in training. :)
Thief: Agnes > Tiz > Ringabel > Edea
Not a huge fan of this outfit on anyone. Agnes' looks the least goofy though. Edea has the strange hood, and Ringabel's clothes are super baggy.
Merchant: Tiz > Ringabel > Edea > Agnes
The men have the more dapper outfits, but Tiz's black is more classy than Ringabel's blue.
Spell Fencer: Tiz > Ringabel > Edea > Agnes
See above pretty much.
Time Mage: Agnes > Ringabel > Edea > Tiz
Agnes is the only person who doesn't look like a dope in this outfit.
Ranger: no comment
Summoner: Agnes > Tiz > Ringabel > Edea
I like Agnes' hair in this one. The men have neat looking little outfits though.
Valkyrie: Edea > Agnes > Ringabel > Tiz
The boys look like stormtroopers, the girls look like valkyries.
Red Mage: Ringabel > Edea > Tiz > Agnes
I like the fabulous coat on the boys, but Edea sports the outfit too well.
Salve Maker: Edea > Agnes > Ringabel > Tiz
Not feeling the strange shoulder pads on the men. Not a great outfit.
Performer: Ringabel > Tiz > Agnes > Edea
Elvis > Stevie Wonder > bunnygirls in other words
Pirate: Edea > Tiz > Agnes > Ringabel
Edea looks so ridiculous in this outfit it wraps back around to awesome. Ringabel just looks bored.
Ninja: Agnes > Edea > Ringabel > Tiz
Don't dig the masks. Do dig the hair of the ladies in this one.
Swordmaster: Tiz > Agnes > Ringabel > Edea
All of these are decent. Tiz looks the most like the boss?
Arcanist: no
Spiritmaster: Ringabel > Tiz > Agnes > Edea
Ringabel looks the least dorky.
Templar: Ringabel > Edea > Agnes > Tiz
Ringabel looks like a knight in shining armor.
Dark Knight: Agnes > Edea > Ringabel > Tiz
Hair > no hair
Vampire: Ringabel > Edea > Tiz > Agnes
Such a dapper little outfit on Ringabel. Edea fits the dominatrix role pretty well though. ;)
Conjurer: Agnes > Tiz > Ringabel > Agnes
Eh, not a fan of this one in general.
I generally don't like Tiz's design very much -- he always looks like a bit of an dullard IMO.
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That was the only important BD review thus far.
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Ranger: no comment
But... a proper pompadour is a joy AND a responsibility.
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By the time Belmont got his whip I had the run time down to three and a half minutes.
So what exactly is permitted under Belmont guidelines? Whips and kunai and uh...it's really a shame PCs can't toss the Gyrm axe like enemies do. It's got the same arc and everything!
Anyway game re-done. Darkdrift is the weakest katana by a substantial margin. God dammit, Agdayne! And it would be so cool toting around a vorpal sword, too. Manslayer is probably the best. On paper it should be a little weaker than Uchi or Blacksteel but...I sometimes found it consistently doing more damage than those for no obvious reason. And it's not just oh hey you hit an enemy mid-attack here's a damage bonus, it looked consistent for specific enemy types. At least this is what I saw farming twinkling titanite in Amana, did better vs archjerks and mushrooms but less vs priestesses. I dunno.
But the important thing is, POIZN at no loss of attack power. I really wish it was more obvious when enemies actually got hit with status in this game, though. Like, it doesn't tick on boss damage numbers even when you can tell (if you squint real close) that the boss health meter is slowly degrading. But it definitely does hit because both Velstadt and Guardian Dragon dropped dead on the other side of the room from me. So Manslayer, definitely a worthy place to dump your twinkling titanite, just a shame it shows up so late.
Velka's set + Washing Pole is 100% Sephiroth cosplay (I even had white hair this time! Though I was shooting for pale blonde, in-game lighting looks a tad different than chargen screens). I'm not sure how I never noticed this before. Washing Pole sadly sucks, stats say it should outdamage the other katanas but I dunno, maybe you have to hit with just the right part of the blade or something? Because it generally didn't outperform like it should on paper. It gets you reach and crappy durability, that's about it.
Stone Twinblade (extremely rare drop from unicorn jerks outside LGK, I despawned the entire corridor trying to get one and nabbed it on the last pass) is probably the most decent representative of that particular weapon class. A hundred or so attack power over the basic Bastile twinblade (which suuuuuucks). I dunno if I can recommend it for all the previous reasons mentioned, but it's perfectly functional and you're not necessarily gimping yourself just for using it. Dragonrider Twinblade is marginally stronger and actually sorta respectable at +5, but multi-element so it probably balances out. Also it eats your game's supply of dragon bones so fuck that thing. These weapons are really good at stunlocking almost everything of humanoid size, I'll give them that.
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Kirby Super Star: Just 100%ed including Arena. Ok, NOW I can get onto Kirby Dreamland 3!
Pokemon All Starter Playthrough: Greninja got Dark Pulse, Sceptile finally dropped Cut, Charizard...had trouble with an Aerodactyl in a skybattle so I cheesed it (don't give me that look!)...that Aerodactyl had it coming! Stupid STAB Stone Edge in a Sky Battle off that speed *grumbles*
Also, is considered wrong to use a Tough Claws Flare Blitz from Megazard X on an Abomasnow?
Oh yeah, Empoleon has Ice beam, Emboar can shoot water out of it's mouth and is questioning if that means anything, and Meganium dances around like the pretty dinosaur that it is while everything nearbye is gets killed by flower petals.
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DmC - I take it back, they ruined Vergil after all.
Reasonably fun game but definitely well short of great. Random design is a mixed bag. The scrubs are scrubs and exist to get owned for free by Osiris and provide minimal at best distraction to real enemies. Some of the real enemies (Witches, the elemental knights) are pretty good, some go through overly long near-invincible phases which kind of bore me. The best part is that the game isn't afraid to mix up combinations of the various enemies, that was definitely cool. Boss design... well there aren't very many of them! Overall, meh. Hunter's fine as a first boss, Bob Barbas is a really fun boss stylistically (but kinda iffy as an actual boss), Mundus Spawn is probably my favourite (reasonable array of moves to deal with). The last two bosses were pretty blah though, and overall that's just not enough in a series known for this. Like this is one place DMC2 beats this game, you don't want DMC2 beating you at much.
Certainly the best thing about the game is all the silly combos you can do with instant weapon switching mid-combo (if this was practical in DMC2-4 I missed it, and it very much isn't in 1) and with the pulling and pushing (taking one of the neat ideas of 4 and expanding it greatly). This was the first DMC where I expect I'll remember more than two weapons a year after playing the game, so good show there.
'sokay. Glad I've played it, but not high on the replay list.
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@Belmont run. Whips and throwing knives obviously. Bare-hand attacks for those few Belmonts who did so. Holy Urns from Targray are effective Holy Water replacements. Some Belmonts use fire whips, so I can upgrade it along that line or use Charcoal Resins or Flame Weapon(lol) to emulate that effect. Gaberial uses light and shadow magic so that means I can lightning/dark as well. Theoretically I could use some of Richtor's moves as a base for say... Sacred Oath or Heavenly Thunder/Binding Bolt if I really want to do something weird.
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Jonathan has a fire crossbow, but that's a stretch.
And he's a Morris!
Enjoy the holy water spam, it's pretty cool.
Apparently the Santiers Spear is the best twinblade. That thing sounds completely ridiculous, with movesets from 4 different weapon classes.
You can notice poison working by a damage number staying constantly above the boss and never disappearing. (Like, 15) It msut be the damage done every half second or something. This makes poison much more noticeable than bleed for me.
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Today's Dark Souls 2 Trolling Video. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSTMvJ7Nn74)
And another. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNDAQ3y0xdA)
Santiers is also completely unbreakable. OH JOY.
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Nice.
I just made a run for the Murakumo and died against Prowling Magus. 4 real. It was hell with unupgraded weapons and extremely few life gems. Scorpion Lady was also a close call.
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Duck Tales - Hard Mode run, only Moon and Vesuvius left. In practice, for the most part it actually feels slightly easier than Normal, mainly because you get a much higher supply of lives, which replace the full healing items. Scrooge's maneuverability is so good that durability doesn't feel like much of an issue if you're remotely quick on your reflexes, so you don't -really- feel the loss of two heart cointainers throughout the game much. The game remains a joy to play overall anyway - the stage design is generally quite solid, if not particularly innovative, and the boss fights are amazing fun.
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Civ 5: I decided to run Autocracy India. http://cloud-4.steampowered.com/ugc/3336349969157700721/AD33A350C6609E06A222B658B6336F93A377539B/
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Today's Dark Souls 2 Trolling Video. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSTMvJ7Nn74)
And another. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNDAQ3y0xdA)
Okay, I'll bite. Can you explain why these videos are funny to a non-DS player?
In one, a guy runs around, uh, casting spells? Is he healing the evil knight or something? Then he runs up and kills the dude. Seems like a vanilla invade.
In the other, guy gets backstabbed by a phantom he wasn't paying attention to and dies. 'k. Is this an unusual death somehow for an invade?
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Today's Dark Souls 2 Trolling Video. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSTMvJ7Nn74)
And another. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNDAQ3y0xdA)
Okay, I'll bite. Can you explain why these videos are funny to a non-DS player?
In one, a guy runs around, uh, casting spells? Is he healing the evil knight or something? Then he runs up and kills the dude. Seems like a vanilla invade.
In the other, guy gets backstabbed by a phantom he wasn't paying attention to and dies. 'k. Is this an unusual death somehow for an invade?
The boss in the first video can summon players as grey phantoms to help him fight other players challenging him. Hostile phantoms otherwise can't interfere with boss fights. The hostile grey phantom summoned player then goes and heals the boss.
The second video has a friendly NPC white phantom outright killing the PC. I didn't even know that was possible.
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Yeah, this fight is an unique case in Souls games, and as an invader, spending most of the fight healing the boss is pretty creative/evil.
Oh man that got me thinking. The wonderful Channeler's trident dance has to work on that boss too right? (This boosts the stats of allies. Looks like this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?annotation_id=annotation_133035&feature=iv&src_vid=24N4BW2syPs&v=mbIhwTClif4)
Another no death run failed, with the Full Moon Sickle.
I died because of some weird glitch, and I wasn't even mad because scythes are terrible and I basically wanted ANYTHING ELSE.
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Civ 5: I decided to run Autocracy India. http://cloud-4.steampowered.com/ugc/3336349969157700721/AD33A350C6609E06A222B658B6336F93A377539B/
Wow that's a lot of unhappiness.
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Super is a firm believer of the mantra that it is better to be feared than loved.
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Japan declared war on me. I responded by capturing most of his civilization and setting it on fire at the same time. I had 10~ cities burning there at the same time, which is why my happiness was so special.
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I love how the second invader walks in, stands there a minute just processing what the hell is going on, then politely leaves.
Scythes are pretty terrible! The damage can be outstanding if you land it precisely point on, but if you're anything like me that happens so inconsistently that the average is pretty scrubby.
DS2: Bows-only is a thing. Yeah that's right, this is happening. Oh my god this is so bad. I decide to allow myself the capacity to punch people barehanded if/when I run out of arrows. This happens several times in the first hour. This wasn't as much of an issue in DS1 because arrows were incredibly cheap, but in DS2 the weakest arrows cost ten souls each! The basic scrubs in the first zone give you 50-90 souls each, and you only get up to maybe 3HKOing people once you've multiply upgraded the bow and got some more DEX. So your brain starts processing every enemy in terms of profit margins and at best 2/3 or your souls accrued constitutes actual gain and augh. Also suddenly Last Giant is a grueling test of endurance (I brought Pate for a distraction and he actually almost died) and HERO SKELETON in the Majula basement is an epic test of fortitude. Holy shit arrows are so bad vs skellies, I am putting off chariot and skelemob for as long as possible (Nito was by far the worst part of DS1 bow run too).
So that's horrible and I may be chipping away at it in between more worthwhile ideas for a while. What's left on the table here? I dunno, I was thinking: Great Demon Hammer pure STR mode, hope I get two for utter ridiculousness, maybe go dragon transformation because I haven't tried that yet; or LOST SINNER cosplay run. And then I'm out of save slots (assuming DS2 has the same limit as DS1. Let's just hope it does).
Actually, the latter sounds pretty cool, let's go with that. After a couple hours of chunking through standard cleric MACE cheese, it's starting to come together. Armor, check, pyromancy, check, sword...still a ways off. I need more petrification cures before I can help out Ornifex/Straid, so off to Harvest Valley next. And yeah, I'm using the sword no matter what, that awful, terribad weapon that eats your HP when you hit people for no added benefit. I'm sure this won't cause any major amount of swearing on my part from unnecessary deaths down the road! Pyromancy is just thematically appropriate and anyway I wanted to try it out as a principle form of offense just because the game so clearly does not want you to do this (it's obviously meant as an accessory to other casting classes; or at least this was my initial thought, but some rudimentary testing now with Flame Swathe turned out a difference of like a hundred damage between users with 30/40 INT/FTH and one with single-digits for both stats, so it really looks like stats barely matter for it at all).
The character model is fashioned after my darkwraith pyro from DS1. Forget trying to relight the first flame, the Lost Sinner's real transgression was spamming Black Flame in low-level PVP (NG+ at SL50? I can dig it).
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Seems to me that regular greatswords are about the same thing as scythes (they might even be a little faster) except they always do optimal damage and have a more varied skillset.
Only downside is that they can't bypass shields, which is almost totally useless in PvE and doesn't really seem worth it in PvP.
So far I think scythes might be the worst melee weapon type in the game. Axes, great axes and twinblades are also pretty bad but probably not as much. Weird how fist weapons and whips are actually better than all of these.
Good luck with your bow only character vs guys like Smelter Demon. Get him with poison arrows!
Skelemob should actually be very easy at range, watch out for the wheels though.
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There's another secret to the Lost Sinner's sword that is absolutely amazing in how awful it is. I don't want to ruin the surprise for it though.
Dark Souls 2: Since Shield-Only is just Club+- I decided to spend a bit with the Belmont run. I learned the secret to the Old Whip is to carefully position yourself to only hit enemies by the very tip. If you do that you only lose 1 durability instead of 4 or 5! Progress! Unfortunately due to some bad positioning and outright bullshit I died to Dragonrider and seriously contemplated just deleting the character an hour of farming be damned it's a terrible night to have a curse.
But I am also very lazy and just dropped him next fight. Go and grab the Notched Whip, be completely baffled by bleed in this game again when it suddenly adds 200 damage on attacks and lose a couple thousand souls to hyper armor. Also the full moon sickle dropped from the first fatty.
Over to Forest, die again to getting geometry stuck on the throwing knife jump. Ballista room was actually pretty easy with whips because I could just one-shot dudes and not be overrun. Whips got nearly broke in the end so I had to fist the final dudes. Yay Belmont fury. Notched Whip is now +4 and with skelton fight I'm surprised to learn whips are slash damage instead of strike. That uh... doesn't bode well.
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Hearthstone: I'd been saving my gold for the expansion but apparently it's not coming out for a while. And since it's really painful playing with just the basic cards it's back to the Arena. Went 7-3 with a Paladin deck that I thought was terrible as soon as I made it! Highlight of the week: playing Betrayal on an enemy's Emperor Cobra.
Also got my first Legendary, Cairne Bloodhoof.
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There's another secret to the Lost Sinner's sword that is absolutely amazing in how awful it is. I don't want to ruin the surprise for it though.
I'm not invading or killing any NPCs this time! Not even Bellbroing for titanite! (All my gear uses twinkling or dragon bones god dammit.) The Lost Sinner will remain innocent. I'm even just going to sit back and watch Pate/Creighton duke it out again.
And what else would whips be? Were they strike in DS1 or something? (I don't remember them being particularly effective vs skellies in DS1 or anything.) Definitely onboard with whips being better than a lot of things in DS2. I'm surprised, but pleasantly so. Ditto for caestus, genuinely a highly effective option if you're built for it (probably the easiest run I've had through the game, and definitely the most fun).
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Hahaha, oh no, if an NPC dies EVER you get the Sin for it. You can't actually do Pate/Creighton because it'll still give you sin even if you do nothing. And there's no way to remove sin without getting bluecopped, and that only works til you're back down to 9 sin. Even if you invade the traitor you still get sin.
I always figured whips for more hitty less cutty I guess?
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Whoa okay. Note to self, never talk to either of them again. I think that should cover it!
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Child of Light: Finished.
Child of Light combines unbelievably gorgeous visuals, a suitable soundtrack, an engrossing sense of immersion, a competent battle system, and a simple story. These things extremely well together and I have to hand it to the game.
I would have liked to see the endgame plot handled a little differently I felt Nox was not given enough focus as she and Aurora had actually built a relationship with each other. Also Umbra's lack of a more extreme reaction to her daughter's death.
High points:
- Just wandering around the world and gazing at the impossibly high waterfalls, trees, windmills...
- Boss fights. Great boss music and the fights themselves tended to be competent enough...
- Boss Intros. These tended to be fast but very stylish.
- Random battles that didn't just roll over and die.
- A few plot points were presented beautifully enough to be emotional.
- Aurora's personality and dialogue.
Low Points:
- Aurora not being a particularly good PC. She's really a mage and should be raised as such (though being one of only 2 mages in a game where a lot of enemies can only be damaged with magic is vaulable!)
- Lack of equipment tinkering.
- Lack of resolution with Nox.
Others should play this when you get a chance.
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DS2: Terrible sword acquired! Aw god it's one of those weapons where DS2 thinks you want attacks to charge in the direction you're moving instead of towards the enemy you're locked onto. For fuck's sake you guys. Also I lack the stats to use it one-handed. I don't know if I'll bother to fix this or not. I'll always be using it two-handed (because that's just how Lost Sinner rolls) and I'm probably going to make it a fire weapon which does no favors for the crappy-by-default scaling. The raw damage per hit at +3 is okay I guess (though it's probably not getting any higher until like Aldia). The HP drain is...not unnoticeable. It'd be worse on a fast weapon. (Did I mention this thing is slow? This thing is slow.) Apparently Old Sun Ring/Ring of Thorns can trigger from the self-inflicted damage. That might be fun to play around with. Hit people and you explode at them.
Anyway 3/4 Old Ones down. Iron Keep last for obvious reasons. Smelty eats it on the first try to ratbro spells. I barely had to attack him at all. And then the archer jerk outside decides to step in and snipe me while I'm fighting Pursuer mk. 2. You sonuvabitch! That's the last time you put a knife in me, Pagoda.
Playing crow roulette for dragon bones got me a Demon's Great Hammer and Old Whip in succession. God dammit, game.
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It is because Old Iron King is a complete dice roll? That's why I loath Iron Keep on melee.
Dark Souls 2: Speaking of which! back to Big McLargeHuge's adventures. Old Iron King was a half-dozen fucking dice rolls including three times dying to the awful hit detection. Speaking of awful hit detection: his arms. They have some bizarre ass hitbox that ISN'T the whole arm. I don't mean up near the shoulders either, like the bottom parts of his forearms don't have a hitbox it's all on the top half. If a weapon's low enough to te ground it will blantently miss as I just saw from trying it with the Gyrm Greatshield.
Speaking of Grym, I genocided them from the Doors of Pharros. I got 6 hammers, 3 greatshields 7 armors, 7 gloves, 7 boots, 3 greathelms, around 14 chunks, a whole tone of magic and mundane stones and..... 0 normal helms. The only item I BLOODY WANTED. Sure the chunks were a bonus but CRIPES that's over a hundred of the pricks. And the droprate isn't even low which makes it more insulting.
Whatever. Killed Authority the Royal Rat with only one death. I died to the Sinner's Rise archers because I was off fighting cats and forgot about them. Died on the run to the Lost Sinner because I only do this melee now so I forget the exploding mummy near the stairs exists when I attack the abomination. Lost Sinner gets nothing.
Over to the castle, over to the Dark Chasm and ughhh didn't do Black Gulch? Whatever. Over there... worm sends me off into the great dead beyond because of course. Whatever, to the Dark Chasm! Hey the Ironclad Phantom bounces off Havels! Too bad he has magic and this somehow doesn't cause him to deflection stagger and instead he can immediately chain three blood attacks off of it instantly. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
Also the actual Ironclad enemies in iron keep have a kick. Who knew?
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Nah, just because fire magic & slashing weapon vs armor jerks is generally haha no. But it turns out the sword is boss enough to kill everyone in two hits anyway and also there's POIZN.
Sometimes Velstadt will also forgo his appalling array of murderrific combos to just kick you right in the face. It was several playthroughs before I saw this.
Man I don't even bother with the Dark Chasm unless it gives me something I want. That quest is just a pain in the ass.
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Have you seen the Lion Warrior's multi-hit combo too?
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Hahaha, oh no, if an NPC dies EVER you get the Sin for it. You can't actually do Pate/Creighton because it'll still give you sin even if you do nothing. And there's no way to remove sin without getting bluecopped, and that only works til you're back down to 9 sin. Even if you invade the traitor you still get sin.
This is not true. I killed Pate to save Creighton and had no sin when I talked to Velka later.
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Cromwell doesn't remove sin, he resets NPC hostility.
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Roguelike Souls 2: Died a few more times. I think I can finish the game in 5 hours or so now, so this is getting close to an actual roguelike experience without the randomness.
I went back to hammers and oh my god they are so much better than all these crappy weapons. I'm totally biased but I'd rank melee weapons like this in PvE, ignoring availability:
From What The Hell Tier
Santiers Spear, Great Hammers
Top Tier
Hammers, Ultra Greatswords
High Tier
Greatswords, Regular Swords, Rapiers, Halberds
Mid Tier
Whips, Fist Weapons, Curved Swords, Spears
Ultra low Tier
Scythes, Twinblades, Axes, Greataxes, Daggers
Not sure but probably "Mid" and "High" and "Dunno" respectively Tier
Katanas, Great Curved Swords, long Greataxes
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Hammers/great hammers really are absurdly good in DS2. Why is MACE one of the best things ever? That's just crazy.
Have you seen the Lion Warrior's multi-hit combo too?
Not that I can recall.
DS2: Not!Sinner has linked the fire (presumably).
The sword actually puts out some pretty decent damage (+5 & fire, 20ish in all relevant stats = ~610 attack power). This doesn't mean it's a good weapon. It's slower than I'd like and seems to degrade in condition more quickly than it should. But it's perfectly fine as a melee alternate to POIZN and setting things on fire with my brain. Oh, and the self-inflicted damage also kicks in if you use it to destroy breakable objects. It does not trigger if you strike indestructible scenery. Backstabs don't seem to set it off either for some reason.
I'm now pretty sure that "Fire Bonus" stat in the character screen does nothing more than contribute a flat increase to pyromancy damage on a 1-to-1 basis. So yeah pump both mental stats to pro caster levels and you may get an extra hundred or so damage out of your fire spells. WOO. (Or at least this was what some minor testing with Fireball indicated--chuck a few at basic Forest goons to observe numbers, go grab a couple levels to boost Fire Bonus a modest amount, toss more Fireballs and see damage increased about the same amount.) Pyromancy's functional as principle offense if you just have a mess of spell slots for it; that is probably the way you're supposed to go with it since casting stats have so little impact, quantity over quality. Combustion/Great Combustion still the most efficient way to deal fire damage, except the range is shorter here (you had a couple feet to hit with in DS1, but you really have to be right up in someone's grill for it to connect now) and has a bad tendency to push enemies out of the second blast's range. D'oh. Spam away vs immovable bosses, though.
Have I mentioned how convenient it is that the Sinner's mask has apertures for my pigtails? Because that's just fantastic.
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That's all so cool.
So as I see it pyromancy is basically like in Dark Souls 1 except better balanced.
Roguesouls 2: Got the Murakumo in a cleric playthrough, got it to +8, immediately died against the Ruin Sentinels, as the first one fell down and I got helicoptered by all three of them down below. I just realized I could have used all these lightning spears to snipe them from above.... Shit...
Great Curved Swords seemed decent but not amazing
One handed = Not strong enough
Two handed = Not a good enough moveset
Power stance = Cool but try raising 2 Murakumos at that point in the game
But to be fair I only had 20 dex. (The Murakumo has an A Scaling in dex)
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Super Metroid - Started playing this. I've never played a Metroid game, but I like both Megaman and Castlevania so I figured I'd enjoy it. I just got the High Jump Boots.
Civ V- Playing as Babylon. Currently conquering Germany after they attacked me for no reason.
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I'm still playing Soul Nomad of course. Game is coming along quite nicely. Not headed for an all-time favourite by any means, but pleasant enough certainly, much more to my taste than Disgaea was.
Phoenix Wright JFA - Finished a replay of this.
-Yeah, this game is way longer than the first one (at least without 1-5), my 3DS game clock says it took me 17 hours instead of 10. Last case is huge, the middle two are as long as 1-4 was.
-It's also a much tougher game. The most recent games I've played in the series (DD, AAI, and 1) are all much easier by comparison. A lot of things I really had to think about. A few where the game even obfuscates deliberately... mostly Engarde's psyche-locks which I can't really begrudge since it is such a crucial point of the case series and I can see very solid narrative reasons for that one to be the way it is. Phoenix is obviously struggling himself with the truth, and has to first present something which is wrong but kinda maybe seems like it can be right before ruling that out and going on to the right thing.
-I like what psyche-locks bring to the investigation for sure, and I like that they recharge health. I don't like that they are literally the only thing that recharges health in the game. If you do the last psyche-lock badly you go into the next trial day with 50% health, yikes. Just encourages save abuse. I am really glad DD moved on from the punitive system the original trilogy (and especially 2 and 3) had.
-Nothing new here but I really dig the cases in this game, minus the first. 2-3 with its devilishly humourous cast and amazing villain showdown, and 2-4... well, is 2-4. It is generally seen as the "best" Phoenix Wright case and while I'm not sure I agree - it isn't always terribly fun especially with the way the second trial day seems to be a stall for time, and I'm a bit lukewarm on Edgeworth in this case - it is still excellent.
Not sure if I'll bother with T&T this time around.
Super Mario Bros. 1 - Played through this on a whim. Breezed for a while, then world 7 was tough. Then world 8 was the devil. This game is great classic fun and a huge nostalgia trip for me whenever I pull it out. The physics are punitive compared to later Marios but it's amazing how much this game got right.
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I'm still playing Soul Nomad of course. Game is coming along quite nicely. Not headed for an all-time favourite by any means, but pleasant enough certainly, much more to my taste than Disgaea was.
Be sure to play the optional storyline once you beat it for the first time. A lot of the best plot stuff is saved until that second playthrough.
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I don't want to hype the Demon Path too much, I don't think it will be your cup of tea. But it's... interesting, in a "I like that a game is acknowledging this" sort of way.
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Roguesouls 2:
Did a Katana run! DIED BECAUSE OF FUCKING DWARF GANKING NEAR THE GARGOYLES
I killed some Alonne knights, got the jester hat and Covetous Gold Serpent Ring+1, and got a Blacksteel Katana drop right after equipping them.
The Blacksteel Katana is gotten late but it's very nice! The moveset is very similar to a regular sword (the power stance is the same), but maybe a little faster, and there's a monstrous S scaling in dex. My blacksteel katana+7 had 315 attack at 50 dex.
Until I got the katana I used a winged spear+4 and it was totally outclassed by a regular mace +0.
My usual playstyle has changed a bit.
- I used bandits almost exclusively before, as they have extremely bad magic stats and I don't need magic.
I'm leaning more towards clerics now. They start with that OP mace, and the early miracles are always welcome, whether I spend 10 levels towards getting lightning spear or I stay with Heal. A cleric can go and kill the Dragonrider right away and ignoring the Forest of Giant, the bandit has a harder time.
- Also I always start by killing Maughlin like I am the most racist Dark Souls player in the world. His armor is very cool and has the passive ability of granting a bunch of extra souls. Judge all you want. I've sacrificed so many damsels in Spelunky, my soul is lost already.
- I've also discovered that the random face generator at character creation isn't very random after all. So I use it to create the same fairly unique character every game without it being a pain.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/19/1399596196-yattaf2.jpg)
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I think the random generation is actually variations of whatever option you started with? Or at least that's just a guess from me also seeing a lot of similar results turn up again and again.
Third-Person Shooter Souls: So as much as I need that Ring of Blades so fucking bad, I probably need more levels before I can get it. That means killing the next wussiest boss around and eating his soul. Onward to Heide's! Oh ugh the knights each chew through like twenty arrows before dying. That's only a 50% net profit on souls! Okay, loot everything and flip switches then restock and run past everyone the second time. Dragonrider is Dragonrider, it took like sixty arrows to kill him but I was never in any real danger so whatevs. I probably shouldn't eat his soul because I might want his bow someday? Oh wait I'm too stupid for Straid to talk to me OM NOM NOM.
Boss fights are so long now that the completely useless Ring of Restoration actually has a noticeable effect. Pursuer chunks me once at the start of the fight and before I slip up a second time I'm at full health again. Not because the ring is markedly effective but because bow damage. You guys. But now I get twenty extra damage per shot and that makes a lot of enemies drop just one arrow faster so totally worth the trouble to get as early as possible.
O-man, No Man's Wharf, blah blah blah. These are both easy even with crap offense. I don't have a lockstone though so I'll have to come back later for Gavlan.
Skelemob gets my first death. It's actually easy at first, as the three arrows a full stamina bar gets me are enough to put down a single representative of each mob and they don't close range quickly enough to bother me. But then the horror the horror pops up and they move too fast for me to get off a full barrage and then face full of spikes. So that was terrifying even when I won. Also apparently pyroskelly's explosions hurt his friends? Had never noticed before.
Second death is to a crypt jerk in Earthen Peak. He knocks me into a poison jar, I kill him, then die trying to chug an estus flask before status eats me. That's just humiliating. Amazingly no deaths to Mytha though.
Deaths 3 & 4 & 5: the pit. Jumping to deliberate death to get Maughlin to give me nudist armor; jumping down a second time because I idiotically recovered souls before talking to him (this always happens); jumping fail while genuinely trying to navigate it. Gravity is my worst foe so far.
The Bastile looms, but I'm scared so I want more boss souls to eat. Where to go? Well, I thought the Gutter would be a problem because can't fire a bow and hold a torch at the same time, right? But whatever, you know the place and you can just evade almost all combat. The Rotten's dark sword blast hurts like a motherfucker, but whatever he's still the Rotten. Sadly I can't chow down on his soul because I need it to get through Shrine of Winter (as I discovered last run, it's having the Old One souls in inventory that opens the door, not lighting the primal bonfires; so the latter really means nothing at all).
Sentinels eat it on the first try. Aw yeah. I use the rewards to buy the butterfly armor, because I think that I cannot properly refrain from floating like a butterfly while stinging like a bee, yeah? And I'd never actually tried it in combat before, figured maybe there's a side roll when you're actually locked on to someone so it doesn't totally nuke your capacity to dodge? Nope, dodge button makes you leap forward no matter what direction you mash unless you already have forward momentum from a previous jump in which case then you roll some direction, hopefully it's the right one. I really shouldn't have walked into the gargoyle room with this on. (I won anyway.)
Re: Bastile key acquisition, apparently you can lock onto the dogs from atop the ladder. ...Well, that's much easier! But Lost Sinner scares me so I'm heading to the Shaded Woods now. The ambush room was a dreadful prospect but it turns out you can shoot down the second-floor doors and headshot dudes from the ground. This aggros everybody at once, but who cares because the exit's still open. Then you pull the switch and the door slides open dramatically to reveal one lone basilisk who goes down looking like a chump for backing up nobody.
DEX is 40 and the shortbow is at +7. I might just leave it there, getting along well enough and killed some of the worst shit the first half of the game can throw at you, should maybe just save materials for Hunter's Blackbow later (I hate to waste the titanite chunks given how stupidly scarce they are outside of bellbroing, which I'm not even going to attempt this time for obvious reasons). I don't even know what's happening with the rest of my levels. I guess just lots more END so I can get extra shots or something (probably pointless since no boss'll let you take more than a couple safe shots at a time anyway).
Oh, I forgot to mention I got hit by one of those throwing axes for the first time the other day. The visual for this is hilarious. You know how when you got shot with an arrow, the shaft juts out from your character model for a few seconds? Like that, except there's a gigantic battle axe shoved all the way through your cranium.
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I just know that if you don't change anything and select random faces, you get the exact same options every time you start the game
But if you change your hair, you get 6 different options than these ones.
Even if you select "random faces", then cancel and select it again, you also get 6 different options
And even if you select "Start over character creation" you also get 6 different options.
I think the game takes the face you have chosen right now, and then moves a few sliders a little according to its stored numbers for RNG calculation. (Usually with absolutely disgusting results)
You can always raise Int, talk to Straid as an intelligent dude then Soul Vessel that int away. Apparently he still considers you as an intelligent human being if you do that.
I really need to try a bow / get hit with an axe throw later
My favourite enemy, after the giant ant, is the dwarf who dual wields axes, but decides instead to throw them at you then punch you to death.
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I think the game takes the face you have chosen right now, and then moves a few sliders a little according to its stored numbers for RNG calculation. (Usually with absolutely disgusting results)
Yeah, that was my impression, and yeah, most of them are 100% OH MY GAH. I'm always surprised when something decent turns up and what I always settle on is "Huh, that looks just a little different from [base face], but it's not a grotesque mockery of life so I'll roll with it."
And yeah, definitely soul vesseling Straid into compliance eventually just because I must have that gesture. This is our concern, dude.
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@ Shrine of Winter Souls. Did you forget to grab the Great Soul in DDF chamber? Because her soul doesn't count. I've eaten or spent all four Old One souls and gotten through the Shrine without soul-busting it.
Dark Souls 2: I did not play this Wednesday nope. There was no experience so awful on my Belmont run that I stopped playing immediately due to sheer bullshit.
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Link's Awakening - Chasing musical instruments with my pet Chain Chomp, let's do this baby
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Hey. That Chain Chomp belongs to someone else. Chain Chomp Theft is a CRIME.
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The chain chomp is happier in the swamp, chain chomp captivity is immoral
On the plus side, the baby chain chomp now has a ribbon
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Cid, did you know that you can snipe Dragonrider without even entering the boss room, from around the first switch?
Just snipe him a few dozen times. Then he will turn towards you with his shield raised and you can't hurt him anymore. But he has 1 HP left at that point so lol.
Dark Souls.
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I'd never tried, figured it was one of those times the game wouldn't generate the enemy from so far away to streamline processing. That's awesome. (Apparently the speedrun tactic is to leave the outer rings down and have him charge off the edge.)
DS2: I gave in and farmed peasants for titanite chunks because--
Death 6: Smelty is an asshole. No seriously, look at him, I can't be the only one who's thought it. I hate him and I hate his ass-face.
Death 7: Pursuer mk 2 is a fat man in a little coat.
I'm out of poison arrows after that failed attempt, but I need that ring so bad. I do less than 100 damage a shot to him and it's not consistently safe to try for two in between his attacks, so I have to go track down Gavlan. I already bought his twenty or so basic stock in prepping for this attempt, though...Hey Gavlan, you sell an infinite supply of poison arrows in Doors of Pharros, don't you? Please tell me you do.
...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tN_HVup9oOg
YUS.
Almost immediately this becomes my first resort for anything that's not a one-or-twoshottable mook. Pretty much everything gets poisoned in exactly four arrows and the damage over time is something like an extra thousand damage. I barely have to shoot dudes anymore, I can just poison them and dodge until they fall over (this is more cost-efficient, too!) I got some mileage out of this in Not!Sinner mode too, but you know dudes can run right out of that cloud before the status lands. Arrows basically never miss!
Deaths 8 & 9: Chariot = fuuuuuuuuck. I need three shots to put down one resurrectable goon. Are they going to give me the chance to shoot three times before closing range? Hell no. I die a couple times just trying to kill the first necromancer; when this finally works, I stand by the front door and whittle the chariot down one arrow at a time until he falls into the pit. Victory!
Remaining bosses for the day: Old Iron King is not immune to poison. Lost Sinner is not immune to poison (but maybe resists it, think it took more shots here?) Prowling Magus dies from the raw damage before the status can even matter (!!!) and yet this was almost a failed match because one of the cleric dudes cast a defense buff or something. Freja probably is immune to poison, I landed plenty of hits and it never took (videogame logic, spiders are often poisonous in games, therefore they cannot be poisoned?) Dragonriders are not immune to poison. Looking Glass Knight is not immune to poison.
This game suddenly got a whole lot simpler.
And I got a weapon upgrade! Only took more than halfway through the game! Hunter's Blackbow gets me an extra...36 or so attack power? I'll take it. +10 and 50 DEX and Ring of Blades +1 = 290-something attack power? That approaches competence. Elemental arrows are also a lot better than expected (I ignored them a lot because they were pointless in DS1), I should really be using them for primary offense, but expenses. I'm actually running with the Covetous Silver Serpent Ring just to offset basically spending souls on every press of the attack button. It does actually work for bosses!
EDIT: Fudo tell us about this awful thing that didn't actually happen. Also I dunno about Shrine of Winter, I thought I'd grabbed Freja's soul and eaten it, but I definitely made sure to do that today and still got through the door with less than a million souls. So maybe I did forget last time.
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Yeah poison is pretty cool when you have NO OFFENSE. Infusing like your great club with it is as cool as it is pointless though.
I've farmed all of No Man's Wharf until basically Total Mob Extinction with some Item Find + item on, and got no Sea Bow for it. Even though usually I just run through it once and always get one.
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I think the main thing is that arrows deliver like twice as much poison effect as melee weapons can. You can toss a melee weapon's attack rating in the toilet infusing it to get some mediocre chance of poison, or you can just switch in arrows and keep doing average damage while poisoning everything twice as fast. What the hell, guys?
(This is part of why the Manslayer stands out so much. It's a melee weapon where you don't get gimped on offense to deal status! There aren't many of those in DS2.)
I failed to get a sea bow, or a long bow, or even a bell keeper bow to drop from anything this time. But that's fine, I'm not sure I would've used them anyway. Too multi-attribute dependent when I knew the only thing I'd care about in the long run was DEX anyway. I can manage 200-250 a shot by this point, depending on enemy and arrow type. That's not outstanding, but it's not terrible either.
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So because you guys make me obsessive about Dark Souls without playing it just because I want to understand Fenrir and El Cid posts (not dissing you Fudo, but you ain't that special kind of cray).
I look up what Covetous Silver Serpent Ring does and see mention of Tesldora's set which boosts soul gains. This is a set I think you should wear 24x7 since you seem to favour no armour anyway Cid. Ghetto Bow Pope is a 10/10 look.
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Yes, the innocent black dude I mentioned killing at the beginning of every game is the one wearing this set. Killing him is the only way to get it.
I use all of it PLUS the Covetous Serpent Ring +1 (which can be gotten before killing even one boss) for way too many souls. I also sometimes wear all of it + The Archdrake Robe. Less souls but more fashion.
Which stats are you raising Cid? I'm already pretty much set, with 20 Endurance 40 dex and 25 vit honestly. I wouldn't mind having to raise some strength at all at this point. Right now I'm just going for more vitality and adaptability, but meh.
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Wiki I poke for details says Drops from Hollowed Spiders(Prisoners with spiders on their back) within the Brightstone Cove area for Tseldora's. But lol random drops.
Your alternative is pretty swag.
BD - I haven't progressed, I have just done some optional fights when I am getting ready in the morning for work waiting for food to cook. These fights are super frustrating in how inconsistent they are. Sometimes enemies have new weapons to steal or nice items. Sometimes they have nothing. Sometimes they just have consumables. Sometimes they give no experience or money. Sometimes they do. They always give a boatload of JP I guess.
Having bad luck on RNG on Black Mage boss to not get his Wizard Rod until like 6 rounds after I could have easily destroyed him was annoying. Thanks for a 3 chapter out of date piece of equipment? What? Why?
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Pokemon XY All Starter Playthrough vs the E4:
Here's how this went down, because reasons!
Of course, this requires MUSIC (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tq_bFmaQKho) to go along with it!
Drasna is first! Not much to say here; Empoleon and Greninja did most of the work hurling Ice Beams. I said it in the past, but that Altaria needed to be a Flygon; no wouldn't save her here because still gets murdered by Ice Beam, but the rest of the E4 has no redundant typing Pokemon, she has 2 Dragon/Flyings. Noivern is kind of a must because Gen 6 Flier, but Altaria is just dumb. Flygon would be something different at least.
Malva gets pasted easily. Mostly Greninja just sweeping most of her team effortlessly, Emboar getting OHKOed by Talonflame's Bravebird, and dying to Empoleon, nothing much here.
Siebold was next! Open with Sceptile to face the Clawncher. It survives Energy Ball, Dragon Pulse, Sceptile survives with sub-33% HP. Oh look, Overgrow kicks in! Sceptile starts going on a murder spree...then comes out Gyarados, Sceptile returns because Overgrow bonus stays so no worries, and then Gyarados comes out! Ok, so I throw Meganium at it to hopefully Toxic, and maybe get some damage in too. It gets the Toxic, Ice Fang causes Rocky Helmet damage, and Gyarados is at like 40% when Meganium dies. Ok, so Charizard X should have no problems beating this. Things seem to go well as, expected, it uses Waterfall as it's opening move, Charizard X Mega Evolves and takes the brunt of the force. Ok, so he should be able to kill it with Dragon Claw, right? NOPE! FLINCH HAX! Then Full Restore thanks to Toxic, insult to injjury, Rock Slide misses, Earthquake, Zard X dies, I realize I am not winning this.
Ok, looking back at what happened, I lost because of that Aqua Tail flinch, and that Rock Slide is really stupid on Zard X if he's not hitting a Fire/Flying type because anything else that has a W4 to Rock has a W2 to Fire, at least (So Flare Blitz is better), and W2 = STAB Dragon Claw w/ Tough Nails is better. Ok, NEVER USING ROCK SLIDE AGAIN! So I do exactly what I did before again, and win this time because no Waterfall flinch hax, and Sceptile murders the rest of the team.
Wikstrom last! Being a steel type, Emboar beats up Klefki with Flamethrower and Probopass with Hammer Arm. Aegislash beats him because stance change, King's Shield, etc. He's a jerk. I think Aegislash beats another one, but then Greninja finishes off Aegislash because NINJA FROG. He brings out Scizor. Oh dear, how will I ever beat that...
*Mega Charizard X Flare Blitz*
Yeah, that was not hard in the slightest!
Now, onto the Champion! This time, I'm going to do it in EPIC PLAY BY PLAY FASHION! I'll note I lose the first time, because while I beat most of her team fine, her last Pokemon just ripped me apart. So here's the WINNING RUN!
First off obligatory Music Change!
CHAMPION BATTLE THEME GO GO GO!!! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjuPPmXNM44)
ROUND 1:
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/006.png) VS.(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/701.png)
I didn't know what she was opening with my first time I fought her, and when I saw Hawlucha, my first reaction was "SHIT! How do I deal with that!?" Especially because I took of Extrasensory on Greninja. Then I realized Charizard was my best openner, who my first fight I coincidentally opened with because he has Fly.
Charizard goes (http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/006-mx.png), uses Fly. Hawlucha uses Sword Dance twice in the interim, gets smashed in the face. Hawlucha falls! I was thinking about finding an image of Hawlucha being defeated but hell if I know where to start looking for that.
ROUND 2:
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/395.png) VS.(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/697.png)
If you ever wanted to see a Mechanical Penguin Fighting a T-Rex, this is the probably the only place you'll see it, and you should worship Pokemon as a result! Empoleon summons up his Inner (https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTpj-h7dJioT90Uo8iqC9ZRXA1JYHBs4zI_DDgGIKmjuqDacfQ0) and fires Ice Beams at the Dinosaur, who Earthquakes, then gets a Full Restore...followed by a 2nd Ice Beam...and a 3rd...and Empoleon wins.
...you know, on hindsight, maybe he isn't as much like Chill Penguin as I thought, since Empoleon actually won.
ROUND 3:
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/006-mx.png) vs. (http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/706.png)
First fight, I threw Sceptile at it and hoped Dragon Claw would do it. Sceptile's attack proved not enough and Goodra has Fire Blast I believe, so oops, who'd think the LIQUID DRAGON WHO GETS POWERED UP BY THE RAIN would breathe fire? I then Ice Beam'd and that didn't work so well because Special Defense.
Winning run? I just throw my own badass Dragon at it. Tough Nails STAB Dragon Claw hitting weakness vs. averagish defenses, Goodra goes splat.
ROUND 4:
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/500.png)VS.(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/699.png)
Flaming Sumo Pig is faster, goes first, Hammer Arms, W4 from high attack with STAB, I don't think I need to say what happens to the dinosaur.
ROUND 5:
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/500.png)(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/658.png)VS.(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/711.png)
Emboar tries to fry the Pumpkin, it doesn't work as well as expected, it sets up Ghost typing, then Phantom Forces! Ninja Frog swaps in, takes the hit, Dark Pulses for the win.
FINAL ROUND:
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/254.png)(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/658.png)(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/154.png)(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/006-mx.png)VS.(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/282-m.png)
Ok, Gardevoir downright destroyed me last game. It's faster than Zard X so a quick OHKO won't work, it does enough damage to murder Meganium in a shot before getting Light Screen up. Greninja and Sceptile are my only hopes for outspeeding it. Thankfully, there's Confide TM, which I give to both!
Sceptile goes in first, because he hasn't been used yet. He goes first, uses Confide! Gardevoir uses Moon Blast, Sceptile barely survives. Ok, cool, I can get a 2nd in, right?
Nope, Gardevoir goes first next turn, and kills Sceptile; yes, they were equal speed clearly. I fear for Greninja until I remember that Sceptile had a negative Speed nature, so it's going to be notably slower than Greninja instead of slightly below and basically, I know I didn't futz up EVs so much there, so yeah, Greninja goes in, uses Confide, then still gets OHKOed by Moon Blast because Greninja durability is a thing and Moon Blast hits weakness.
Next up, Meganium. Ok, this is my most durable Pokemon easily, and it has Light Screen, which is the obvious first action. Moon Blast takes off not so much because of two confides, Light Screen, Toxic, I get off like 3 bulldozes due to Light Screen + eventually lapping it in turns. Ok, now that it's sufficiently weakened on Speed, Megazard X comes out!
Megazard X near as I can tell is not weak to any of Gardevoir's attacks, so there's no way he's getting KO'd. Charizard has Shadow Claw for this fight, which while yes, weaker than Flare Blitz, the last thing I want to do is make Charizard potentially easier to kill in case he fails to OHKO. Shadow Claw hitting weakness beats out Dragon Claw, so it's my best bet here; plus there's the Crit Rate. So Charizard uses it, attack does like 90% damage! And that wasn't even a crit
...well, I guess any thoughts about Flare Blitz failing to OHKO just went RIGHT OUT THE WINDOW, because STAB Flare Blitz is so much stronger. As expected, she Moon Blasts, Zard survives, full restores, Flare Blitz, VICTORY!
Fun playthrough in any event, though a few things that bugged me were HMs, mostly Emboar being stuck with Strength and Sceptile wtih Cut a large part of the game, as well as an instance where Greninja needed to use Waterfall over Surf because even with the -Attack EVs, his Attack > Empoleon's.
NOW TO RUN DOWN THE TEAM!
GOING BY ORDER OF GENERATION BECAUSE SCREW YOU!
Also, Music change:
Probably most appropriate song for this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-X5FKopt9U)
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/006.png)(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/006-mx.png)
MVP, no questions asked. Charmander stage, he's generic but he joins at level 10 so he's only that for 6 levels. Charmeleon gets Dragon Rage one level after Evolving, which is stupidly overpowered that early. As that starts to stop being broken, he gets Fire Fang and a few levels later, Flame Burst, so his STABs improve significantly, which holds him over long enough til he evolves.
Charizard...well, Mega Charizard X is ridiculous. High in both offensive stats, so you can be flexible, Tough Claws makes him better at physicals of course, physical tanks, good typing both offensive and defensive, and once he reaches Move Relearner, he gets access to Dragon Claw AND Flare Blitz, steamrolling over things. There were a number of moments where my strategy was just throw Charizard at something and watch him murder things. He was also my only Sky Battle viable character, which the only time I ran into a problem was against Aerodactyl, aka something faster than him with STAB Stone Edge, jerk <_<
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/154.png)
On paper, Meganium shouldn't be that good relative tot his team. He's a tank, but doesn't really do much with it. He ended up being a pleasant surprise. The tanking made him good for just stalling things with Poison Powder/Toxic, having Reflect + Rocky Helmet made him good for just sitting there and taking damage while hitting someone with a stat lowering move (like Bulldoze). Nature Power works at intervals for some offensive variety too.
The thing that stands out about Meganium is that it often just gets moves earlier than expected and ends up being better offensively as a result. Most obvious is the early Razor Leaf, where it has 55 Power STAB Crit move when everyone else is using 40 power moves. On top of that, it evolves to final form earlier than most and gets Petal Dance, aka 120 Power STAB, stupid early. It would struggle a bit against other Grass types and Flying types, granted, especially pre-Toxic when it couldn't use Poison Powder, but ultimately, as you saw above, was key for beating Mega Gardevoir.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/254.png)
I had a slightly botched Sceptile due to lowered Speed nature. Thankfully, he still outsped most opponents, so wasn't a big deal, though mattered against Mega Gardevoir.
One thing that held Sceptile back was being forced to have Cut for a large part of the game because there's so many goodies you get with it throughout the entire game. That was annoying. Another thing is how Sceptile has to wait quite a while to get a decent Grass STAB; it's stuck with Absorb for a while which is awful, it can use Nature Power during outside segments for Energy Ball, but then you use it somewhere else, and suddenly it's Earth Power or Power Gem and THAT'S NOT WHAT YOU WANT so unreliable. It gets cool stuff like Fury Cutter and X-scissor at least, but yeah, held back by that STAB. Acrobatics didn't hurt either though meant he couldn't use an item.
He gets a lot better at level 29 when Leaf Blade kicks in of course, because ACTUAL GRASS STAB! Sure, running off his weaker offensive stat, but it's good enough to last him until you get the Grass Pledge tutor, which is his primary source of offense until the Energy Ball TM. Of all starters, Sceptile is the most grateful of the Pledge Boost; while 4 of my Pokemon made use of it to some degree, Sceptile is the one who needed it most desperately; yeah, Leaf Blade is cool, but 80 Power running off a much higher offensive stat > 90 Power. Oh, did I forget to mention Sceptile had a +SpA Nature?
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/395.png)
Really wishes Flash cannon wasn't aftergame, but hey, it could use other stuff to compensate. Getting Flying type attacks like Drill Peck, even if off the weaker offensive stat, let him deal with some nuisances, Shadow Claw let him beat up Psychics and Ghosts, and of course STAB Surf off high SpA is always nice. It of course got better once Ice Beam popped up (it was using Blizzard before this), and...uh, yeah, it's Empoleon. Interesting typing, good defensive stats, solid offense, it performed about as well as expected.
Inability to bust Fairies because of the Flash Cannon thing was annoying though, but it could tank them at least.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/500.png)
I kept overselling this guys durability, stupid highest HP of my team by a long shot! That said, Emboar is oddly good at overcoming Speed issues thanks to stuff like Bulldoze and Flame Charge, though this didn't come up as often as you'd think. One thing that is annoying is that his STAB Fire Physicals sort of end at Flame Charge for worth; Heat Crash exists but it's wildly inconsistent, and doesn't really do him any favors on lots of things he hits weaknesses on. As a result, I gave him Flamethrower, and he was my primary source of Special Fire offense, despite Charizard being better at it. Thing is, Charizard is just better than him at all forms of offense, so not a fair comparison, and Emboar's SpA isn't even bad at all (100), so this ended up working out.
Emboar also had some weird quirks in that consistently he was the only one capable of learning a bunch of key TMs. Heck, both Poison Jab AND Gyro Ball were only learnable by him, so he was my best Fairy Buster, which didn't come up often. He also does get a good Fighting STAB in Hammer Arm, which while makes him slower, after a point I felt it wasn't worth wasting time dealing with his speed so the less Speed aspect didn't really come up.
Basically, he didn't stand out much but he was effective when I needed him.
(http://www.serebii.net/xy/pokemon/658.png)
The disappointment, sadly. The game is just so randomly geared against Greninja throughout a large part of the game. His good moves don't pop up until a little too late, and he really cannot take hits at all, so he often needs that OHKO. Also enemies seem really good at hitting his Dark typing weakness, having a Fighting or Fairy move often (Psychic types were huge offenders of this.) The other thing is his offense isn't as high as you'd expect.
He gets much better once Dark Pulse, Ice Beam and Extrasensory are gotten, but they're all late, and before then he has legitimate issues. On paper, he really shouldn't be worse than Sceptile at all, but for some reason, the game just seems so geared against him, and the the slight durability difference the two had seemed to make a notable difference, at least to special, as well as Fighting moves seemingly being everywhere. True, Empoleon had a similar issue there but Empoleon can actually take a hit, and in some cases would get Torrent activated as a result, which made all the difference.
In any event, it was fun, and I kind of want to do another themed play-through but by the time I feel like playing Pokemon again more seriously (I am doing some aftergame stuff too anyway), Alpha Sapphire will be out and well GIGA RAYQUAZA!!!! (yes that is a thing even if it's not)
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Duck Tales Remastered - Welp, beat Hard. The game actually -isn't- terribly hard once you get the hang of the controls and stage design! Now, I just have to deal with Extreme and unlock all the extras. Only TV show art left.
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Which stats are you raising Cid? I'm already pretty much set, with 20 Endurance 40 dex and 25 vit honestly. I wouldn't mind having to raise some strength at all at this point. Right now I'm just going for more vitality and adaptability, but meh.
There wasn't anything I really needed after 20 VIG/END and 50 DEX + some decent ADP, but because I was well short of my self-imposed limit of SL150, I kept on going as long as the game kept throwing boss souls at me. 40 VIG, 50 END/DEX, 20ish ADP, and finally dumped the last ten levels into Faith (we'll get to why). The extra stamina was appreciated, having enough to fire four arrows means I can get poison out in the initial barrage and then switch to straight damage arrows. And you really don't care about strength unless you're going to use like Dragonrider Bow or something (it requires a decent amount and I think scales from it). Or I guess composite bow but meh, why dump dozens of levels into STR to make that slightly better then Hunter's Blackbow when I could just main DEX and be 99% as awesome with that instead?
In related news, POIZN SOULS is done. Let's go through the remaining bosses!
Demon of Song is not immune to poison. Velstadt is not immune to poison. Guardian Dragon is not immune to poison. Giant Lord is not immune to poison. Throne jerks are not immune to poison. None of these should take you more than 4-6 arrows for the status to start ticking away. Final boss is not immune to poison but so highly resistant that it probably took more than a dozen shots for the status to land. Now I wonder if I should've just kept trying with Freja (or focused on one head?)
Anyway I decided to give Bow of Waifu a try after that because it looks pretty snazzy on paper. A-scaling in DEX? Could be decent. Also it's got a goddamn bell on it for some reason. So I dump all my dragonbones on it and equip to compare. ...I now have an extra hundred attack power to play with. At the minimum Faith requirement. It's slower than what I've been using and uses more stamina, but only a hair slower (not like Dragonrider Bow don't-make-any-fucking-plans slow) and that's a perfectly fair trade for 40-80 extra damage per shot (depending on the enemy). It can shoot lightning bolts, too! (Which do less damage than regular arrows and keep you completely immobilized, but come on man that's style.) And because the game doesn't count boss/unique weapons with elemental damage as elemental weapons, I still get the full bonus from Ring of Blades. This thing's awesome and I could actually call archer damage commendable if you had access to it at any normal time during the game. If only I had something to use it on! (Oh right NG+.)
Oh wait, I never killed Royal Rat jerks. Let's give that a try. Vanguard dies in one attack sequence, poison test invalid. Royal Rat Authority rather shockingly is not immune to poison, but it's not worth bothering trying it on him. He's so heavily resistant that if I'd been focusing on fire arrows instead, he would've been dead by the equivalent time the poison actually took hold. Last deaths--
10 & 11: Guardian Dragon and drake failure. I have soiled myself. How embarrassing.
12: Throne jerks. This was going very well until I walked off a cliff.
Twelve deaths is a decent amount I think? (My best for DS1 was four.) Especially for something that comes off as a horrible challenge mode when you're just starting the game. You are so astonishingly incompetent for the first few zones of the game and are only sort of passably functional for the bulk of it. Once you finally get an upgrade over the shortbow and have free access to poison arrows, though, challenge really goes downhill.
I ran some phantom mode after all that to get the souls to stock up on elemental arrows, though, and as useful as poison is single-player, it is almost completely a waste of time in multiplayer. The defense buff enemies get from extra players does jack up their status resist too; you're likely to take two or three times as much time trying to get status to hit and are probably better off just sticking to pure damage. Which, you know, you suck at because you're an archer.
Wiki I poke for details says Drops from Hollowed Spiders(Prisoners with spiders on their back) within the Brightstone Cove area for Tseldora's. But lol random drops.
Yeah, ghetto pope outfit is pretty swanky so I decided to give that a shot after seeing this post (I was getting tired of exhibitionist mail). But I wasn't about to kill an NPC for it, because murdering someone just because they have something I want is like the most un-Cid thing (in DS1 I killed the undead merchant once for his sword then immediately felt like a horrible person and never did it again). Instead I committed spiderman genocide and only got half of it. Bah. I actually ended up running with the Priestess Skirt (Kindalur dropped it) alone, as this actually looks fairly decent by itself. I'd prefer to have the whole set but dammit, there's very little in the game that's more of a pain in the ass to get than that.
I'm usually at least wearing something. If I'm running naked, it's either a novelty run, or for practical reasons when I'm using heavy weapons (because of the weight, Dude, the ringer cannot look empty). That said, my priorities are straightforward: does it look nice Y/N; if N -> don't use it; if Y, is it light enough not to impair mobility Y/N; if N -> don't use it; if Y -> score! I'll fiddle with stats a little to make something cool-but-sorta-heavy work, but I certainly won't restructure a character build around it.
All this is facilitated in DS2 by the simple fact that I don't like virtually all of the game's medium/heavy armors. They really dropped the ball on visual design this time around, there's a decent amount of snazzy-looking light clothes and such but genuine armor is almost all just blandly functional (and you know realistic armor has its place and all, but where's my brass set you guys?)
Defensive stats never ever enter into consideration. Secondary effects are nice but ultimately just a bonus. Aesthetics are a moral imperative.
Anyway if we're talking about clothes so much then the true Fashion Souls starts here. This is what I've gone with on previous characters:
Kirika (I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M DOING initial run): Desert Sorceress (Earthen Peak pyrogirl) set because it is the sexiest. And if you're surprised by this point at me taking the opportunity to dress as a sexy harem dancer, you haven't been paying attention.
Altena (cleric): Saint's (Licia's) set. This is actually really drab and I wore it for thematic appropriateness (manipulative, backstabbing priestess), but I do like how obviously used and trailworn it is. I should acknowledge that a lot of DS2's clothes actually demonstrate wear and tear suggestive of a world running down, and flow in a very natural way in response to slight movements and actions (DS1's clothes were very stiffly modeled).
Mireille (sorcerer): Black Witch set. Oh wait I was wrong up there with the first one. Backless, just a tasteful display of legs--this is sexy and classy! Definitely the best.
Chloe (let's powerstancing!): Judgement set (DS1 Velka's). Again, lack of surprise that one of the nicest looking outfits in DS2 originated from DS1. Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Johnny Cash.
Roberta (PUGILISM SOULS): naked for NG, Singer's Dress (torn up Milfanito gown) for NG+ because it does convey a certain don't-push-me-cause-I'm-close-to-the-edge degree of damage. Also cleavage.
Sawyer (scythehexer): Bone King set. This is 100% goth princess mode.
Balalaika (katanasouls): Throne Watcher set. This is basically the only instance of me wearing genuine clanky armor in DS2 (and you get it from the penultimate boss fight). I'm still unnerved by the sound because I associate it with enemy movement rather than my own. I dunno, it's simple and austere, but I like it.
Iris (Not!Sinner): Penal set. Iron mask, straightjacket, manacles, only the penitent (wo)man will pass. This is one of those cases where I had to boost carrying capacity a lot to make it work, but anything for a theme!
If you're wikiing random things now then behold the spell of Grefters: http://darksouls2.wiki.fextralife.com/Immolation#.U27MWvldXHQ
I love that spell description. "If a person is truly desirous of something, perhaps being set on fire does not seem so bad."
~
Intermission, I loaded up my lowest soul memory character (this turned out to be katanasouls) and tried giving Looking Glass Knight summons another shot. In between gankers and normal invasions (in which I realize that there is something uniquely satisfying about murdering anyone who uses the Moonlight Greatsword), I actually got three successes this time! Which all ended ignominiously one way or another (the one victory was in no way my doing). It seems like people always call in help for this fight. Geez, is that how normal people play this game?
~
So with all that out of the way there was one more thing I wanted to try (and yeah, hitting the character limit here, so definitely it for NG). And that thing would be...the Great Demon's Hammer! It takes me about an hour of restarts to finally get the damn thing (might've been quicker if I'd gone for a generic character model but I had to fiddle with sliders to get just the right green skintone for SHULK MASH). Turns out I need to dump twenty levels into strength before I can even two-hand it...but you guys, three hundred base attack power! A couple hours of standard club shenanigans ensue before I can equip the damn thing, but at last! And just as in DS1, it takes up so much visual real estate that it's actually a liability, and if anything is even more unwieldy, and I have to dump a bunch of levels into VIT to be able to keep a decent roll speed with it equipped...but hey, that beats having to use Havel's Ring just for fast roll, and you just can't argue with 400+ attack power at base requirements and no upgrades just a couple hours into the game.
So let's road test this baby! Skeleton lords get OHKO'd; Jabba actually seems to take like half damage from it (holy crap something in DS2 actually resists strike damage?); Mytha goes pretty well until she backstepsslithers out of the killing blow and murders me with a full combo. I'm pretty cheesed off about this so I figure, you know what, the Sentinels don't like blunt damage, let's see how badly this thing wrecks them.
...
HAHAHAHAHAHA. Press R2 -> press R2 again -> Sentinel is now staggered, press R1 to kill -> repeat two more times -> collect thirty thousand souls. Best Sentinels run ever.
I'm going to put the gargoyles off as long as possible to see if I can kill them in one hit this time.
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Ciddy your dark souls addiction is surpassing your Civ addiction. No more deaths!
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I have seen Immolation and heard stories of how well it mixes with Oil.
(Also FYI for everyone Dark Souls 2 has Oil "status").
Fashion Souls is legit a good way to play the game and nearly a reason to play the game in and of itself. That said, just browsing I don't mind some of the heavy armour sets, but I have boners for functional armour in my games. But only when they don't have shoulders or waists as wide as a house or have helmets that look either literally or figuratively like butt holes.
Edit - That said, Smelter Demon Armour has serious possibilities without the helmet for a Sexy Greven il-Vec cosplay.
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Ciddy your dark souls addiction is surpassing your Civ addiction. No more deaths!
Go back to nuking Japan, Supreme Dictator for Life.
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That wasn't nukes, that was just a moderately large stack of bombers and the will to use them. I normally run mostly peaceful empires with super high happiness! Really!
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Mega Man Xtreme: Beat it! Then played Hard mode and beat that!
Ok, Hard mode is a nice way to make sure you get a full Mega man experience out of it because it makes effectively 8 Mavericks in the game, though they really needed to alter the Final Boss sequence, or at least, change the boss fights so you're not just fighting the same things with more weapons, health, etc. Not sure if I'll do EXTREME!!!! mode.
Overall, I am pleasantly surprised at how they converted an MMX game to GBC format; it didn't feel as watered down as I was expected, and the game is even pretty good graphically if you remember "This is made on the Gameboy Color!" I can see why this won the fan-vote for first Mega Man game to be released in May. If MMI and MMII were any indicators, the other games would feel like notably watered down versions of the NES games; this game, despite being based off SNES games (MMX1 and MMX2), managed to be closer in quality despite the bigger gap in technology, and thus shows more effort as a result.
(Yes, I know MMV is suppose to be legitimately good because it's basically it's own thing instead of a cheap splicing of 2 NES games, but I was referring to MMI-IV)
Kirby Dream Land 3: Up to World 5, gotten every Heart Star so far. Game so far is...basically more of KDL2; not as bad to be fair, but still has a lot of the same issues, and Heart Stars are annoying to collect at times (and unintuitive on what you need to do.) I'll get a more in-depth review once I beat the game, which I'm not far off from!
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Courageous Bankruptcy.
Been slowing down a bit with this, but still moving on. Mostly finally managed to get all the Ch3 classes, and am moving on to Chapter 4. The one battle I've done there so far showed a huge JP growth, which is nice since it suggests I am closer than ever to having my Pirate Swordmaster Edea up and running.
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Soul Nomad - Raksha. Ahahahahaha, that was great. Disappointed that the game seems to be moving onto a much more boring villain now, but we'll see. Also, the battle against ("real") Yavis and Parin was perhaps the first legitimately challenging one in the game! I actually had to think about things like positioning. My earlier squads are probably pretty wussy now, but I am too lazy to redo them.
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Re: Fashion Souls
There's a barrel armor in game but no one knows how to get it. Maybe it's cut content!! Or future DLC!!
This doomed archery playthrough, I lit up a torch while I was covered in oil. Perhaps not the greatest idea I've had. The damage wasn't fatal though.
Instead I just got Smeltered. Dude I till the hardest boss. I tried to roll diagonally to the left but he didn't give a fuck. Couldn't dodge any of these flame trail attacks. He never did that jump slash + Explosion thing with a ton of recovery time, and just did a metric ton of three slash combos instead.
I still got pretty far, I beat DDF and Sinner Waifu.
I rolled a mage instead and it really feels like EZ mode so far compared to archery. The only (extremely minor) problem is the lower range, but you can still snipe with binoculars, which I'm doing a lot.
Edit: KILLED BY DWARVES AGAIN?? FUCKING GANKERS
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Link's Awakening - Also known as "Where the fuck am I supposed to go now?". I guess this is why Zelda is popular on GameFAQs. I have certainly used GF for this game more than I have for anything in a long time. Just got the fifth instrument.
Super Metroid - Obtained the Power Bomb so now I can open yellow doors~
Trails in the Sky - Got the ambigiously gay Olivier and met up with the legendary cunt General Morgan.
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Kirby Dream Land 3: Completed with all Heart Stars. So here's my thoughts on the game...
While it's not as bad as KDL2, it has a lot of the same problems and feels soulless. The thing about KDL2 though was that at the time, there were only two Kirby games before it. KDL1 was about as barebones a platformer as you can get, and intended to be "Child's First Platformer" in a sense, so really, Kirby Adventure was the only strong entry in the franchise to go off of, so I can understand the hiccup there, and they wanted to give KDL2 it's own identity with animal helpers and such to expand upon abilities...it was a misfire make no mistake, but at least the angle makes sense.
KDL3 doesn't have this excuse; it was released after Kirby Super Star, which took just about everything KA had to the next level. Now yes, KDL3 shouldn't be a clone of KSS and do it's own thing, but instead it regressed in just about every area. Let's look at each area in and of themselves:
Aesthetics: The game is a clear downgrade from KSS. Kirby and enemy sprites are smaller and less detailed, the backgrounds aren't as colored, and animations are just plain simpler. Let's do a quick comparison shall we:
KDL3:
(http://www.emuparadise.me/Super%20Nintendo/Snaps/Kirby's%20Dream%20Land%203%20(U).png)
KSS:
(http://tcrf.net/images/f/f5/KSSDarkEffect.png)
If I didn't know better, I'd say KDL3 came out first but that's not the case. On top of that, enemy designs felt regularly very un-Kirby like. Basic enemies were just generic grunts you'd see everything, given a slight Kirby Artstyle. Oh sure, we had a few mainstays like Waddle Dees, the bird things, Gordos, Scarfies, etc. but we were also missing on a few key things, most obviously offhand were Waddle Doos, and instead we got...Kappas, Witches, Birds and Bats. Now I don't mind having new enemies, but they should at least stand out; Kirby enemies regularly have a certain style to them and these new enemies regularly failed to capture that.
The Minibosses were even worse. KDL2 already had this problem, bringing back only Mr. Frosty...you know, this guy:
(http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140103165305/kirby/en/images/f/f8/Mr._Frosty.png)
Which made the other minibosses stand out as that much more less inspired. Let's look at Mr. Frosty alone to display the point. He's clearly a blue polar-bear guy, giving the obvious Ice Relations, but has a "cute" look despite his big appearance and even seems to be wearing overalls at that. It's a simple yet effective and memorable design. Kirby tends to reuse Minibosses throughout the series, but frankly considering his copy ability and the way the games function, it works pretty well.
KDL2 and 3, however, everything but him are basically just "Make it a living version of the elemental power!" See, Mr. Frosty is related to his powers pretty clearly, but he isn't a literal manifestation of his powers. In KDL3, the Fire Miniboss is literally a Walking Fireball. The Spike Miniboss is an oversized Gordo (Gordo's being glorified hazards more so than enemies).
Where as other Kirby Games gave us things like this for Suplex and Hammer:
(http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20081111015054/kirby/en/images/0/05/Bugzzy.png)
(http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20081111143003/kirby/en/images/3/3f/Bonkers2.png)
Quite a contrast, wouldn't you say? Also, DeDeDe just looked kind of off this game. Like, yeah, it was him, but he was more round with a smaller head, instead of...well, a huge round head with a slimmer (but still bulky) body. I seem to recall K64 having a similar DeDeDe build.
So yeah, game just seemed to lack that Kirby feel at aesthetics, and instead just felt very generic by comparison.
Powers: Ok, this is the thing that stood out the most. Kirby's powers in this game suck. Every game has come up with a new power to get, or in some cases, has a new mechanic to make the power more interesting (K64's Power Mixing for example). This game has one new power and that is Broom, which may be the single worst Kirby ability ever.
A short range attack that has no aerial worth whatsoever, was this a joke power? Thing is, game makes you need it for multiple Heart Stars. Animal Helpers have good versions right? Not really; outside of Pitch's Waterpail, they're all similarly bad.
The other powers...well...talking about Kirby himself...
Cutter is fine, I'll give it that. It's pretty much unchanged. Parasol received an unnecessary nerf in losing the slow fall properties, Spike and Spark have no range whatsoever, even by defensive move standards and worse, Spike stops your ascension. Stone...HOW DO YOU MAKE STONE WORSE!? Stone was always a highly one dimensional ability, but you know what? It worked. It stopped you in mid-air and brought you straight down, which was good for getting on precise spots while staying protected., This game decides to remove Stone's trademark use of Freefall, and just kind of makes your fall at a sharper angle...while causing a slight roll too...umm...why would I want this?
Fireball seems cool at first, but then you realize how inconsistent the range is and it took away the "Smash against wall to bounce up" property and it's not that great. Ice feels too slow and unwieldly.
To give the game credit, at least these powers do damage to bosses, so they're not as useless as they were in KDL2.
Animal Powers are an entirely other game, in that 90% of them are extremely awkward to use and just field unwieldly. Not going to get into details, but many a time I hated using animals because their variants of powers just felt so much harder to make use of than the base one, and then there were really weird cases of the straight forward ones feeling underpowered. Rick + Spark = Classic Beam. ok, cool...BUT THEN THEY NERFED BEAM WHAT THE HELL? Beam was in no way overpowered in KA, and even with the all the boosts it got in KSS, it was balanced, why did it need to be nerfed in trajectory?
To the game's credit again, at least the Heart Rod or whatever felt like a legitimate ultimate power...yeah, it was literally just the Star Rod all over again, but after the Rainbow Sword of KDL2, I don't mind reusing the same idea.
Also, the game has a lack of some key powers that were big in KA and/or KSS, like Sword, Hammer, Fighter, etc. It had the very basic ones and that's it. At least this game, he had his Dash (which felt awkward to use at times though) and the Slide back. They also gave every animal some gimmick for platforming at least, like Rick can wall climb, or Nago has a Triple Jump, to not make them feel completely worse than Kirby who can fly. And hey, they didn't force Kine on you a lot which is a plus!
Stage Design: Ok, there wasn't as much Gordo usage or self scrolling stages as KDL2, but stages still were poorly designed and uninspired. The Heart Star idea was a pain because if you screw up ONCE you gotta restart the stage from the beginning and unlike KDL2, these stages are not short at all. Heart Stars are not obvious in requirements and sometimes you have to do the opposite of expectations.
The fact that they are so patterened got old too. Every World is structured like this:
Stage 1: Flower related
Stage 2: Power Related
Stage 3: Mini Game related (The last minigame can bite me on that note)
Stage 4: Collect Single Item
Stage 5: Have proper animal buddy
Stage 6: Collect x amount of whatever items
THAT'S IT. There was no creative spin or anything like that, it was all that exact same pattern. The patterned style just further shows how bland this was.
Also, while it held off on Self Scrolling stages compared to KDL2, there were a lot of segments which makes the stages that much longer, which is why I hate Self Scrolling Stages. No, they aren't harder, they just make everything A LOT SLOWER. They work in Mario mostly because Mario is paced in a way that self scrolling compliments it, but Kirby not so much; the games are designed that you can either try to blitz through them or take your time, forcing a pace on you just clashes with the game. The game still loved underwater segments too, though the current segments were lowered a lot, thankfully, so a lot less "YOU MUST USE KINE IF YOU WANT TO LIVE!" nonsense.
Oh, speaking of animal helpers, ChuChu can go die. She's about as useless as they come, having some of the most awkward abilities and her platforming never came in handy. Thankfully, you almost never have to use her, but when you do, it was the biggest chore.
Music: The game had like 3 main Kirby themes I recognized, one is Gourmet Race, the Hyper Theme, and DeDeDe's theme. While yes, original themes are needed, you need to use some of the mainstays to help give that feel of the franchise. The main Kirby theme (Stage 1 of KDL1 IOWs) was nowhere to be found, and the new songs just felt so generic too; I wouldn't say they were "Anti-Kirby" per se, just kind of there. The only reason I would remember a song is because I was stuck having to do a stage multiple times for a Heart Star.
Also, I blame this game for the reason why they pretended Gourmet Race was the Kirby theme and people think that song was there since the beginning. No, that song first appeared in KSS, hence why the name of the song is Gourmet Race; I know K64 brings it back but K64 uses it for Minigames...which is more or less where the song originated from! Ok really, it's Smash 64's fault, but shhh!!!
So yeah, this is definitely a Kirby game I will probably never touch again. It's like they took everything they learned in KSS and decided to use none of it, instead deciding KDL2 was the GOLDEN STANDARD. After playing both KDL2 and KDL3, I can see why they didn't bring back the animal helper system. Neat in theory, but in practice it just doesn't work out, and it's easier to just make more powers to run off of (or in K64, mix and match powers to allow fun combinations.) Shame it sounds like it took until Return to Dream Land for them to bring back legitimate Power Movesets like KSS had; glad to hear K3D followed suit and recognized Powers having variety in and of themselves = Good!
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Roguesouls 2: I think I underestimated fist weapons because I keep coming back to double caestuses and keep having better results than with anything else.
They're not really a lategame weapon at all, or require that much investment actually. Raise that strength stat to 40 ASAP and dual wield them and you're good to go. (This takes liek 3 bosses? Dragonrider, Last Giant, Skellies. Boom) At this point early on you are totally awesome but can't really improve anymore: Investing in str or dex only improves AR by 1 or 2, and upgrades by like 5.
Maybe the best midgame weapons after the imba Great Hammers.
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I wouldn't hesitate to call them one of the best weapons. One of the easiest runs I've had through the game and definitely the most enjoyable (if I just feel like wasting some bosses as a phantom instead of making genuine progress, this is the file I generally load up). Damage can stack up very quickly off of low-commitment attacks. Don't have to worry about weight or endurance at all. I just ramped STR up to 50 and DEX up to 40 (41-50 does get you some diminishing results in DS2, it's 51+ that you really start needing multiple levels to see a single point of damage increase). Nothing else I cared about save HP and enough ADP to not get stabbed while healing. The only point against them I'd say is their inability to connect with some of the wonkier boss hitboxes (and this is the fault of boss designers more than the weapon). This was a problem for Velstadt and basically got me killed; I couldn't practically hit Throne Defender at all, so have a backup plan if you make it that far.
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How feasible is a single one or is the move set too shitty with just one? Because the idea of running around with a shield and punching shit is pretty great but also if it is a shallow investment (like SL40-50 when I understand "end game" or accepted PVP levels is 150 or so) or you could grab a Talisman or somethiing then it could pinch hit into Caster stuff fairly easy yeah? Asking for a friend obviously.
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Caestus has really low requirements of just 10/7 STR/DEX and two classes have those stats to start and two more classes would only need one level to use them. Even the class with the worst comparable stats would only end up SL18 to use a caestus. The lightest 100% PHYS reduce shield takes 12 STR, but it's a few bosses in and there's one earlier that takes 16 STR.
Don't know about the one caestus moveset. It's been too long since I recall it.
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How feasible is a single one or is the move set too shitty with just one? Because the idea of running around with a shield and punching shit is pretty great but also if it is a shallow investment (like SL40-50 when I understand "end game" or accepted PVP levels is 150 or so) or you could grab a Talisman or somethiing then it could pinch hit into Caster stuff fairly easy yeah? Asking for a friend obviously.
Dual wield is more fun but I give that a solid Viable/10.
You get one ultra fast punch and one slightly slower more damaging punch (that gets chained into an uppercut!!)
You can also wield it in both hands to do that weird catch move, but meh.
The shield might actually complement the caestus well, since fist weapons use very little stamina.
Still, blocking a hit drains stamina so you need 20 End at some point. (this isn't necessary early on)
40 Str is also the bare minimum for a good caestus and you need this ASAP.
I'd also get at least 20 VIT (This is the HP stat) fairly soon.
ADP is less useful with a shield, I'd keep it very low.
VIG lets you carry more stuff, it's kind of cool but armor doesn't matter that much, and you can keep it low too.
You can still invest in some other stats, like Attunement. Get that to like 20 once you finally find that pyro flame, and you'll get four spell slots? Pyromancy basically costs nothing but spell slots and items you find by exploring, so you get a niiice complement to that caestus for a low cost.
So yeah I'd suggest grabbing a caestus, the biggest shield you can find (Or just the Wicked Eye Greatshield which is just way too cool) and a pyro flame. Tank every hit then punch/burn everything.
Eat all the boss souls.
Cool ass build actually.
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Sinner and Rotten down.
40 STR, 40 VIT, 40 ADP, 15 DEX
Also using a Sea Bow.
I should have kept track of all my deaths in roguelike mode. Most come from underestimating the opponent because I can't possibly be on guard 100% of the time.
Just going from memory here (All these meant having to restart the game entirely):
- Forest of Giants: 2x "Well I'm just not going to die in the first level"
- Forest of Giants: 2x "Well i'm just not going to die against the first boss" *gets turned into a pancacke*
- Forest of Giants: 2x "I'll fight the Pursuer on the rooftop, I'll just escape if I get hurt too much. Wait... Let me roll out of the way... DAMN IT"
- Tower of Flame: 2x "Those combos actually hurt more than I remem- WAIT NO"
- Tower of Flame: 1x rolling into the water
- Majula: 2x "Allright with 10 VIT and the Cat's Ring I should probably survive that fall..."
- Majula: 2x "Allright with 20 VIT and the Cat's Ring I should probably survive that fall... .......Oh shit I forgot to equip the Cat's Ring!!"
- Grave of Saints: 2x "I know I'm doing that level straight away isntead of later, but hey, it's just RRA. I can't lose right?"
- The Gutter: 2x rolling or getting pushed into a bottomless pits
- The Gutter: 1x "Sliding down that ladder wheeee WHAT WHY"
- The Gutter: 1x "Regular zombie-types. Cute."
x
- No Man's Wharf: 1x "Shallow water. My favourite kind of water" *Falls into the bottomless water straight ahead*
- Belfry Luna: 2x "Dwarves. LOL"
- Lost Bastille: 2x Super Sentinel Helicopter
- Huntsman's Copse: 1x *gets teleported into a bottomless pit* WHAT
- Huntsman's Copse: 2x red phantom death
- Huntsman's Copse: 1x "There's some Uber Bone Dust there, I need to make that jump. Thankfully I've never actually failed it.
- Huntsman's Copse: 1x "There's some Uber Bone Dust there, I need to make that jump. Thankfully I've only actually failed it that one other time
- Shaded Woods: 2x deaths agains the Disgusting Penis Demon ambush
- Shaded Woods: 2x backstabs trying to get the Cloranthy Ring
- Shaded Woods: 1x death against Flexile redux
- Iron Keep: 2x "Allright, Smelter is mean, but THIS TIME I COME WITH 50 VIT... "
- Iron Keep: 1x "That turtle trap is so cute. I don't see how ... NO"
- Iron Keep: 1x "Allright, not underestimating that turtle trap this time. Oh crap get out of the way. NONONOOOO"
- Brightstone Cove: 1x Prowling Magus defeat. Such embarassment.
- Shrine of Amana: 1x "The hardest part of the game right here. ... Wait the fighters' aggro range is this close? RUUUUUUUN"
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Diablo 3 Reaper of Souls: Finished Act V. Haven't really messed with Adventure Mode or Rifts or anything. There's a lot positive to say about D3's later evolution - the magical items are more interesting than D3's "here have a big pile of stats", smart loot by class and canning the auction house is great, the runes & skills were nicely rebalanced, etc. The boss fights in Act V are pretty well designed, too - lots of area-denial & telegraphed-but-not-too-much attacks, I approve. That said, there's still a problem.
http://www.nerfnow.com/comic/1240/
Enemy damage has been nerfed just too damn much. Especially regular enemies. Okay dying to a sudden lag spike in D3 1.03/1.04 wasn't tons of fun, but classic D3 was certainly exciting. Enemies would actually punish you if you screwed up. I tested this out, and my Demon Hunter - the most mobile-but-fragile class - can just sit there and facetank randoms 24/7, getting a ton of auto-dodges + life-on-hit healing to stay afloat. Okay, fine, I have a rather conservative build for a DH, but this still shouldn't work except on the easiest difficulties. So... why not just be a Tallychu and play Torment 4 then or whatever to get your jollies, you ask? The problem is that enemy HP is still comparatively excellent. Especially, again, randoms! It takes *eons* to kill stuff at Torment 1 (possibly the fault of a not aggreesive enough build / item loadout). It's still really slow at Master. It's plain not fun to have to actually worry about dying AND take forever to kill anything - let me just maul randoms and have it still take "too long" while never being in peril. It's a shame, because the gameplay is still solid, just having bullet-sponge enemies who tap you gently with their attacks is a combo for zzzzzzzzzzz. Give me enemies who die fast but also kill me fast. Damn casuals who want to never be threatened but still feel like they've achieved something so look how much HP I took down.
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- Majula: 2x "Allright with 20 VIT and the Cat's Ring I should probably survive that fall... .......Oh shit I forgot to equip the Cat's Ring!!"
I feel like this has to have been the worst.
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Kingdom Hearts 3D: Started this game, not much to say other than I can already tell there's a large dose of NOMURA!!!! running through this game...to put things lightly...
Kirby 64: The crystal Shards: Just beat Rock Star. You know, this game really comes off as them really wanting to make good on ideas they had KDL3 but make them not suck at the same time. They're succeeding too!
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Now I am trying to understand how some stat scaling works.
So if you went Fire Cestus/Pyro Flame, Pyro Flame has Fire Scaling. Does that boost the Fire damage on the Cestus (Fire Bonus? Is Fire Bonus just from Int/Faith scaling?)
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The fire caestus would stick to its own scaling, unaffected by the pyromancy flame itself but following the same basic rules. Specifically, the caestus' physical damage would still get a damage bonus from STR/DEX, and the caestus' fire damage would get a damage bonus from INT/FTH (these appear to influence fire damage equally--every even number you hit in either of them will boost a character's Fire Bonus stat, which is applicable to damage with both pyromancies and fire weapons).
I'm not sure how effective a fire caestus would be. Elemental infusions are generally best for weapons that have high base damage and don't rely much on scaling in the first place. Making a normal weapon into an elemental weapon basically does the following: reduce base physical damage to something like 70%; add base elemental damage equal to the base physical damage; reduce the weapon's existing scaling ranks by one letter; add elemental scaling as a C or B (think it ranks up to the latter with linear weapon quality upgrades).
Anything less than an A is fairly unspecial for scaling in DS2. I imagine it would be painful losing a +10 caestus' A in STR/DEX since that's where most of the weapon's damage comes from in the first place, but bonuses from multiple stats can definitely stack up. I guess if you're running a character with basically modest stats across the board who doesn't excel in the physical attack stats in the first place, you might come out on top this way.
Of course, you can totally try it either way since the caestus is storebought in infinite quantity. If it winds up being crap as a fire weapon you can still revert it back to normal later. Should note it takes handing a specific item to a specific vendor to able to infuse anything, and although you could run straight to both it's probably going to be a good half-dozen bosses into the game. Earliest place I know of to get the ore needed for the specific infusion is in the salamander room in the Forest of Fallen Giants; you can jump down there safely with the cat ring but might want to range kill the salamanders first (they're bastards).
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I don't have the game, just generally following my interests. I understand that there is at least one salamander out of three that you can snipe (maybe two?). I had envisioned this build starting as Sorcerer honestly and coasting on Soul Arrow for the first chunk.
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Oh I wasn't suggesting a fire caestus, this would probably suck yeah. Also infusion is mid-lategame anyway. You need to get to both the Iron Keep and the Lost Bastille first. I think you can snipe three salamanders out of 4. Would take so much time though.
Cid has shown that Pyromancy scales extremely weakly with stats and the spells have no requirements, so I was just suggesting a couple spell slots as you'll have some slots left at the end.
Hexes require a high stat investment (Faith, Int, and Attunement), miracles and sorceries a moderate one (Either Faith or Int, and Attunement), and pyromancy a low one. (Only Attunement) So pyromancy is the good default stat to support melee builds.
Sorcery/Caestus/Big Shield could work... Maybe... I don't know.
If you choose a Sorcerer you're stuck with 14 Int while, say, the Bandit has 1. If you respec you can't go lower than 14 Int. It's a bit of a waste if you don't plan on using sorcery later. Sorcery also becomes very weak pretty fast if you don't focus on it.
But you could enchant your caestus and shield and shit, and turn your shoes blue.
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Well I am sold.
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Bravely Default - Into the 4th chapter now. Discovered the first Blue Quest that doesn't hand feed you all the various steps besides time of day juggling. Currently in the Earth Tower, which is feeling like a decent spike in difficulty. Though, part of this may be a combination of not having Examine around for targetted killing, and having Edea learning Templar which feels like a drop in offensive power from her Pirate/Valkyrie/Swordmaster days.
Fiddling around also found a dragon which kicked my ass. Though, I can see how I'll beat the Salamander quickly (so long as I don't mind only getting Exp and JP for Tiz)
SRW:AG - Also playing this. Nearing the end of the game, as knowable by the fact that I've got the Hi-Nu, Mazinkaiser, and Shin Getter. Naturally, they are also seeing use. Garrod and the Double X is also in play due to the fact that I jumped through all the hoops to get me some G-Bits, so I may as well use them.
Random notes.
Hi-Nu Gundam's moveset looks ridiculously dramatic. I especially like the touch of adding Lalah's ghost to the Fin Funnels.
Mazinkaiser is still obscenely broken. Why yes I want a 1-4 range free attack that can do up to 10k damage without Valour.
Finally, just two Mastery Points away from locking in the Hard Ending. With four maps left before the pathsplit, it should be doable. Though the masteries are at least getting harder now.
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Fiddling around also found a dragon which kicked my ass. Though, I can see how I'll beat the Salamander quickly (so long as I don't mind only getting Exp and JP for Tiz)
Hahahaha. I'm on C5 and am only tackling the dragons now (3 down, 3 to go). Your clever Iceflame Shield? strategy is not going to work.
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Link's Awakening - Kinda running out of steam. Just beat the sixth instrument dungeon.
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I haven't made any progress in Chapter 4, decided to cut down the dragons and wanted something mindless to do while I was cooking supper. Half of them are down now and the hardest part is finding the ruddy things. Killed Dark, Light, and Wind, know where Fire is, but no clue where Water is despite trying to hunt it down.
Tiz is the only survivor, but I got the Wind Dragon with the Unscathed bonus. They are, um, kinda easy to break, and Comeback Kid only makes it take a lot less time.
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Bioshock Infinite:
Just got dropped off in Finkerton. Game is a clear step up from Bioshock 1, with some solid fights that actually threaten to kill you on Hard mode. The addition of Elizabeth is quite nice as it cuts down on running around looking for health packs in the middle of a fight, and if I miss a few coins here and there while exploring it's nice to have an NPC to just pick them up (or point out when I overlook things like lockpicks). Also, the skyline system is pretty neat.
The downside is that they kinda botched the weapons system, I think. You can only hold two guns, which on the one hand lets them have a pretty large selection of guns and lets there be a handful of unique overpowered guns that you use once and throw away, but on the other hand actually just means I stick to the Carbine and RPG or Sniper Rifle and use nothing else for fear of not having one of those two/three available when I need it. And when I *DO* need one of them that I don't have on hand, it leaves you running around the battle field scrounging for supplies, negating the entire reason Elizabeth is nice to have in combat. To top it off, the Vigors are all borderline useless, the most useful being the lightning one because it actually stuns enemies long enough for you to reload in a pinch. And from a storyline perspective, the Vigors feel... really out of place. In Bioshock 1, your Adam moves were an integral part of the setting and mythos, but in Infinite it feels tacked on, like someone said "It's Bioshock so we need magic powers," and there you have it. The only time they've actually been a part of the story so far was when one was acting as a Macguffin to sidetrack you for a couple hours.
To sum up, gameplay wise it has worse designed guns and vigors than BS1 but much better designed encounters and ancillary mechanics.
Setting wise, it certainly feels more alive and distinct than Rapture in BS1, with more backstory than "Rar Libertarianism", and it has given me an excuse to fight not one, not two, but four different mechanical George Washingtons With Chainguns, and that is Cool. On the other hand I can't help but feel that the game is going to be uncomfortable for anyone who isn't a white man to play because of all the blatant racism. I get that it's going for an era set-piece sort of thing with all of it, but I just can't help but feel like it's being handled poorly. It hasn't really come into play except to go "Hey look at all these bigoted assholes aren't they horrible. Here's a picture of a hook-nosed Jew and a bespectacled buck-toothed Chinaman. Do you feel repulsed yet." Granted I imagine I'm not even halfway through the game so I do hope that they do more with it, but at this point I just don't think that it's making a strong or poignant enough social commentary to justify all the horribleness.
Plot wise it is all very intriguing and all but I imagine it is going to go into the shitter quick because it's Bioshock. I was not impressed by the Would You Kindly twist in 1 and I imagine whatever they pull out of their ass for Infinite will be just as tedious-yet-somehow-universally-praised-by-the-internet.
A final note, I'm not sure the whole choose-your-morality choices really fit when you have a character who speaks, has a personality, and above all none of the choices seem to affect that personality. And while some of them are your standard "spare your enemy or don't" type of choices a lot of them are just dumb, like "this is an obvious trap and the character in front of you is literally saying "yes he is here we'll take care of the situation" do you draw first or wait to have your body filled with bullets to shoot your guns?" Morality systems in games that are distinctly not RPGs are just bad and this one is no exception. Oh well. I guess I'm going for the good ending now? Except for the time when I didn't want to get shot first? I don't even care.
I'm still having fun with the game but I imagine I'm going to be happy I waited for a sale and didn't pay full price for it.
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I will read your shit drivel later you sexy sexy man slurry.
Excal: Water dude is on island North East of Florem. Just before the Snow starts.
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I'm still having fun with the game but I imagine I'm going to be happy I waited for a sale and didn't pay full price for it.
Oh, you will be. I look forward to endgame story rants.
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I started Bioshock Infinite a couple of months ago and got bored waiting for something to happen other than rummaging through trashcans. I mean at least Star Ocean 2 let you fight Alan Tax after a while. With this game it's like how long does it take before you get to fucking shoot something?
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I started Bioshock Infinite a couple of months ago and got bored waiting for something to happen other than rummaging through trashcans. I mean at least Star Ocean 2 let you fight Alan Tax after a while. With this game it's like how long does it take before you get to fucking shoot something?
Yeah that's a fair point, it was like an hour of obsessively checking trashcans and then they finally give you a weapon at the raffle. In hindsight, considering how pointless money became once I could buy something, I wish I had just run to the raffle. I'd have, what, one less upgrade for a weapon I only ever use IIF I'm out of Carbine ammo and need a weapon NOW, OR the RPG / Sniper Rifle, whichever I'm carrying at the moment, are useless (which is really damn rare) without that cash? yeah whatever. That said it at least picks up immediately. SO2 still sucks even when it gets going.
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Super Metroid - what the hell was up with that wall jumping section
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Damn casuals who want to never be threatened but still feel like they've achieved something so look how much HP I took down.
I think the balance issue you're having is mostly a result of you just having hit max level. For DH especially, your damage can be boosted via equipment more efficiently than your health can, so if you gear up a bit, you'll soon find the high risk/high reward challenge you want.
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Soul Nomad: Finished. Around 25 hours, levels around 30-32 mostly. Final boss was fairly legitimate at least, one of two battles that convinced me to bother using decors (the other was Yavis/Parin which remained clearly the most difficult map in the game to me).
It was pretty fun. The best thing about the game was, of course, Gig. The design doc for the game was presumably all based around him; the rest of the plot feels kind of mailed in but Gig stuff, both the obvious humour and the learning about his role in the backstory, were good times. Even better, his voice acting is basically amazing, and completely sells me on a whole bunch of his lines. He's not the only good part of the game, mind. Most of the rest of the PC cast is quite solid. I liked Danette, Levin, Vitali, and Tricia pretty well! Even Grunzford was less bland than I was expecting, and Juno was fine. Generally found most of the cutscenes pretty enjoyable as such. I enjoyed plenty of the NPCs too. Shauna and Raksha get shout-outs for being memorable villains; Thuris and Kanan were fine too. Unfortunately the late villains are rather bland/unmemorable by comparison. I really can't bring myself to care about any of them after Raksha, and certainly any of them after Dio.
I think my previous post made this obvious but yeah you can add Levin's reveal as another on my list of beloved face-heel turns. Another case where great voice acting helped sell the scene.
The writing's not perfect certianly. The setting feels rather mailed in (some of this is the complete lack of visual budget), and I don't think the game tied up its serious plot points very well. I basically felt nothing during the conflict with the last three villains (four depending on if you count someone as a villain) and that's not very good. I got emotionally invested in the major characters, but not the plot. Also Endorph is a pretty obnoxious Stu (sorry, Tonfa!) and most of his later scenes were cringe-worthy. I also somehow got his ending. Sadface.
Gameplaywise it is there, it largely doesn't get in your way. It also doesn't make much good of its potential either. Map design feels very lazy; a lot of maps just felt like ("4 of this enemy type, 4 of this other, oh just place there wherever it doesn't matter") kinda like SRW's weaker map designs. I largely ignored decors; they seemed cumbersome to constantly re-equip, but in the end they work pretty well as a "use only if the map is hard" because the game is so easy most of the time. Setting up rooms seemed needlessly cumbersome. Fights were fun when the game made you use the system (although it took me over a quarter of the game to understand the weapon triangle and then make use of it) and at worst they were bland filler before more writing. It's not a gameplay game but the gameplay didn't get in the way and occasionally had some things going for it, so I can't really complain.
Voice acting is great as I keep mentioning, at least for certain key parts. Music was also good. Graphics are of course where the game cuts all sorts of corners, and while it's a bit worse for this, it's not ultimately a big deal.
Going to give the Demon Path a spin next. Nooo idea what to think about that! We'll see.
Probably a 6/10 game regardless. This one's not going on the replay list most likely, but it was time well spent.
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Roguesouls 2: YES LET'S WIN THIS
Caestus +10
Caestus +10
Sea Bow +8
50 Vit
40 Str
25 Dex
40 Adp
Tseldora Hat
Tseldora Gloves
Tseldora Chest
Havel's leggings
Ring of Blades +1
Life Ring +1
Chloranthy Ring +1
Covetous Serpent Ring +1
10 Estus Flasks +3
Way too many small stones of healing
Way too many fire arrows
Way too many Lightning/fire/poizn enchant items
Drangleic Castle
Super high confidence
If I die at this point I am going to scream "I DO NOT ACCEPT THIS" like VP Surt for an hour.
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FENRIR you need better quality heals to get your precious HPs back
(Seriously why not +5? Is it so dangerous getting the extra two whatchamacallits to upgrade it all the way? ...Or did you just skip Rotten/OIK altogether?)
Re: Soul Nomad demon path, it's much shorter (~1/3 the missions I want to say?) and enemy levels ramp up in inverse proportion to its length. I actually had to do some grinding to get through it, but knowing you you'll just coast through underleveled wondering what the big deal's supposed to be. Either way, totally worth it for all the horrible horrible scenes that ensue.
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Oh well. I guess I'm going for the good ending now? Except for the time when I didn't want to get shot first? I don't even care.
It's somewhat less by the numbers than that, FWIW.
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Soul Nomad
Glad to hear you enjoyed it overall. It's certainly N1's strongest title to me. And it's nice to see them trying some new ideas. I hope they try this again in the future, but I'm not holding my breath. Fortunately for me, I do like the Disgaea formula so that's fine but I would not mind some other games in wholly different veins than the core series while still being SRPGs. Their roguelikes are interesting, but I'm not a huge RL fan. Alternately, I wouldn't mind seeing a non strategy RPG out of them. Arcadia looks promising as an ARPG, and Witch&TheHundredKnight is mixing things up a bit too, and supposedly has a Gig like main character. Haven't played them yet, but just wanting to point out that not everything N1 is doing is exactly like Disgaea and I'm glad you finally tried SN out.
If you wanted to find some more challenge in the game, you could try out the inspections. They are the main avenue for Grinding in SN. Admittedly, this is also the place where te game gets more Disgaea like, which may not be your cup of tea. It's just a different gaming mindset I think. I saw a cool comment on it the other day that I'm gonna dig up.
Disgaea is the game breaker's game. It's the systematization of abusing exploits in game mechanics. Are you the kind of person who when playing an RPG loves finding ways to go to places you shouldn't be able to go to yet and getting powerful equipment you shouldn't have yet? If you haven, or know people who do, then you know it usually goes two ways. one is people who then enjoy powering through the game, and two, those who having faced the challenge of doing something difficult they shouldn't have been able to do, wish the challenge would continue.
Disgaea serves both crowds. If you go out of your way to abuse game mechanics early, you can turn around and dominate the main game should you so choose to. Alternately, you can visit the dark assembly and request the difficulty of the game be brought up to your level, with higher exp and money payouts to go along with it.
Regardless, if you love exploiting game mechanics, the series is built so there is always something else hidden in the game waiting to be exploited.
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Yeah that mindset doesn't really appeal to me at all. I never really investigated inspections after I figured out they were the game's method of grinding (and SN is pretty easy most of the time, why would I grind?).
I do actually kind of like breaking games (kinda. If they're broken to the point where they can't fight back at all they get boring fast) but grinding is like, the child's way of breaking games. I'm much more a fan of learning how best to make use of the tools available to me without grinding, since with the degree knowledge = power in RPGs this is pretty much always an option in all but the most primitive of entries into the genre. I have no issue with people who want to break games via grinding, and certainly Disgaea is a good vehicle for that, but it's not for me and of course a big part of why I rate Disgaea poorly and why it took me just shy of a decade (holy shit, has it really been that long?!) to play a second N1 game.
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FENRIR you need better quality heals to get your precious HPs back
(Seriously why not +5? Is it so dangerous getting the extra two whatchamacallits to upgrade it all the way? ...Or did you just skip Rotten/OIK altogether?)
Yeah, I'm not grabbing the one near the Undead Purgatory (I've already lost twice because of the tricky jump) and the one behind OIK (Yes he scares me more than Smelter in a no death allowed run)
I also haven't fought RRA. (Or was it V?) Every other boss is dead though.
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As far as I'm concerned In N1 games either I power through the game normally but the mechanics are never really any interesting/good on their own, or I have to find the fastest way to grind among million ways to grind, which isn't really interesting either.
Also it's not fun to break a game when the game doesn't even pretend to care you won't break it.
So it's more of a Lose/Lose/Lose thing for me
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I also haven't fought RRA. (Or was it V?) Every other boss is dead though.
Given your build and Roguelike Souls I would see zero point in even trying RRA or RRV unless you really want the souls. Authority's a bastard and running to him offline means you get invaded by the awful awful dual-Avelyn phantom in a place where you have almost no capacity to dodge (I've recently discovered Rhoy turns up in Grave of the Saints if you're offline; if memory serves he is 100% PUGILISM SOULS, which is fearsome but not you know dual machineguns to the face). Vanguard is easy and at least gets you Toxic Mist but eh, no point if you haven't any Attunement.
Did you actually kill Darklurker or just skip that headache of a quest altogether like I usually do.
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I always fight RRV really early on (He's usually the second or third boss I fight) for the extra souls.
Rhoy is actually pretty hard early on! And he's not using a fist weapon, he has an invisible weapon (probably a sword)
Edit: Wiki said he has a heavy crossbow +5 and a shotel +5. Bastard.
I actually went through all of the Door of Pharos because titanite chunks. Red phantom + Rat + Elephant is scary the first time, but the red phantom takes some time to get to you and isn't doing that much damage, and the elephant is slow. The rat is actually the biggest threat there but you can kill him pretty quickly.
RRA sounds too dangerous with no rewards though (Like 1 level worth of souls wooo)
I like the Darklurker sidequest but ahahahah NO. I didn't talk about it because I didn't consider it one second.
I'm not going to fight the king and the dragon either.
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Yeah that mindset doesn't really appeal to me at all. I never really investigated inspections after I figured out they were the game's method of grinding (and SN is pretty easy most of the time, why would I grind?).
I do actually kind of like breaking games (kinda. If they're broken to the point where they can't fight back at all they get boring fast) but grinding is like, the child's way of breaking games. I'm much more a fan of learning how best to make use of the tools available to me without grinding, since with the degree knowledge = power in RPGs this is pretty much always an option in all but the most primitive of entries into the genre. I have no issue with people who want to break games via grinding, and certainly Disgaea is a good vehicle for that, but it's not for me and of course a big part of why I rate Disgaea poorly and why it took me just shy of a decade (holy shit, has it really been that long?!) to play a second N1 game.
I'm not a big fan of N1 style grinding either, but in Soul Nomad it is mercifully quick if you know what you're doing. Just grind up the MC by abusing the Invisibility Decors and menu spells in inspections and then buy a bunch of guys at the same level.
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Bioshock Infinite: Small update, I ran across a tear that had Creedence Clearwater Revival playing from it. The game is set in the 1910s or thereabouts... for fucks sake the twist has to do with time travel or alternate universes or some bullshit like that doesn't it.
So many guns I don't want to use because I am paranoid about not finding another Carbine if it sucks. They really could have done a better job with the guns here.
EDIT: Not 20 minutes later I go into an alternate universe. Oh man this is gonna get retaaaaaaaarded.
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You missed earlier that a barbershop quartet were singing a Beach Boys song in the slowpening sequence. The music is legit some of the best done stuff in it.
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That's it I beat Dark Souls 2 without dying once. I am awesome. The end.
LOL at the three jerks at the beginning of the game saying I was going to die over and over again.
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Enjoy your ring of trolling.
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Yes.
The plan so far is to constantly alternate between Invisible Zweihander +10, Invisible Pyro Hand +10 and Invisible Caestus +10 in PVP.
:)
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That's it I beat Dark Souls 2 without dying once. I am awesome. The end.
LOL at the three jerks at the beginning of the game saying I was going to die over and over again.
:O
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Kirby 64: Crystal Shards: Beaten with 100%.
Ok, game starts off on right foot, but slowly decays into the KDL2/3 problems though never quite as bad. As playing it, I notice the game really does take a lot from those games more so than the others. First off, it takes a lot of those one-off monsters from KDL3 that were boring and such like the Kappas, and just uses them again.
Next off, powers...the power combining is a lot like the animal thing though more powers are actually reasonably intuitive in use and less weird, and the stand alone powers are generally fine unlike KDL3. Though, I still don't like what they did to Cutter and Stone. I guess they were trying something new with Stone (Slow moving near-invulnerability) but the conventional style is better, and Cutter...it went from rapid fire boomerang to slow moving powerful one, and feels more unwieldly. Additionally, while it brings back Bomb from KSS, it dropped Parasol, and still left out ones like Sword (though Fire + Cutter = Sword, so I guess that's fair?), so the number of base powers feel so limited compared to KA and KSS.
Also has the same issues with music, and minibosses are literally "larger versions of previous basic enemies." This is boring!
It's ashame, because it has all the makings of a decent Kirby game but sort of drops it mid-way, and becomes chore-like. Looking at the staff, it seems, yet again, Sakurai wasn't on board with this game...
...which explains all the similarities it has with KDL3, ranging from same basic style of gameplay to the reusing of the bland generic enemy designs instead of actual Kirby mainstays (though, lack of Waddle Dee and Waddle Doo makes sense here because one of the main characters is a Waddle Dee, who turns into a Waddle Doo for a boss fight...)
Looking ahead at the games through the "History of Kirby" section on the Anniversary Collection, seems Amazing Mirror, in terms of powers, goes back to more conventional Kirby things and brings back a lot of the mainstays like Wheel, Sword, etc. and some of the new fun ones like Fighter from KSS. Seems Squeak Squad is similar in that regard. Glad to see they went back and recognized that it was Adventure and Super Star that are the big ones, and not the Dreamland games.
I will give K64 one thing: First game where you can play as DeDeDe! Short segments sure, but hey, PLAYABLE DEDEDE ARGUMENTS INVALID.
Oh, also played some of the challenges. Probably will finish them when I do extra mode on Kirby Adventure; seems they literally just shoved a small part of Kirby Return to Dreamland in the game, which...well, I'm fine with this! It makes the Anniversary Collection feel meaningful beyond "He's 6 games that are on the E-Shop!"
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I play games sometimes!
BlazBlue: Chrono Phantasma
After Continuum Shift, I was worried that the antagonists would drive BlazBlue plot forever, constantly getting their way despite the good guys' seeming victories. So I was pleasantly surprised that BB:CP plot amounts to a robust counterattack by the forces of, for lack of a better word, good. BB:CP really moves the plot, whereas BB:CS seemed more like all the ideas that they couldn't fit into the first game. Good stuff. All that said, the new cast of characters was almost universally unimpressive.
Risk of Rain
totally awesome hectic combat platformer. Won't use the word roguelike because Meeple is allergic to it or something. Anyway it's great, so I beat it on normal with every character, then unlocked everything, including the really ridiculous stuff. You should play it unless you hate fun. And pump up that volume.
Desktop Dungeons
It was 50% off on Steam so I picked up the commercial version of this. Lots of polish. Implements a town-building mechanic, with some snappy writing. Good music was an unexpected surprise, as was character portraits for every class/race combo. An excellent filling-up-bars simulator.
Impossible Spellcard
Best Touhou game since Subterranean Animism. 75 spell cards, and a lot of them have the characteristic polish and subtlety that make Touhou games stand out from the crowd.
Kero Blaster
New game by the Cave Story guy. It's short, and frankly shallow, but enjoyable. Features nicely balanced weapons. Plot that is unusual in the same way Cave Story's is, but has a lot less going on. Retro graphics are pretty great.
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You missed earlier that a barbershop quartet were singing a Beach Boys song in the slowpening sequence. The music is legit some of the best done stuff in it.
Yeah, hearing R.E.M./Tears for Fears done vaudeville was pretty special. There was plenty I didn't care for in Bioshock Infinite (the two-guns thing is dumb, maybe realistic carrying capacity but still dumb) but it definitely has its moments.
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There are only three games left.
Demon's Souls. Went back to it.
No death challenge in this one too.
Comments
- Demon's is less videogame-y and feels like a real place at times.
- I'm on rollerskates
- "Jumps" are so floaty
- This game is really easy compared to the two others
Well, to be fair, the game is only easy if it's played like Dark / Dark 2, and it might not want you to do it.
Healing is strictly finite in this one, you have to go buy more weed when you run out of it, while Dark/Dark 2 auto-replenish weed at checkpoints.
And the game forces you to be super conservative at first, you get like 10 souls from killing enemies and basic crappy herbs cost 100.
So basic math shows you that you have to pay attention. The perverse effect is that you'll so want to preserve your healing items that you'll run around at low-ish HP because you might go back to the Nexus or might heal that with a free regen item instead of that costly herb.
But yeah fuck that, I went with a two handed claymore, rushed in the middle of enemies and only used shields under particular circustances and spent 20% of my budget on herbs. Until I died because I underestimated plague babies.
I killed 7 bosses and it was so easy.
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KH3D: in Tron Land still! Died a lot because yeah, probably chose the wrong world to go to first, but levels are getting up, and so is my durability (as well as Defense Boost being gotten), so I'm getting better at the "not dying" thing, as well as abusing Flowmotion attacks.
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Child of Light - This is a neat little budget release. It uses a sloppier version of the Grandia style combat system (everything interrupts charges). You can only ever use two characters at a time (but can swap party members instantly). This commonly puts you in the position of gauging what the opponent is going to do based on their current charge speed and determine if the optimal thing to do is block or risk eating a ST hit to the face (MT has a big windup and you can normally either interrupt or it is easy to predict). You do get some flexibility in that you have ability to slow down any single foe at a time (or spend the meter on healing which is a terrible waste of meter).
The fact that the system is a bit sloppier than Grandia 3 doesn't matter too much since it is generally pretty easy game anyway (harder than Grandia 1 and 2...).
It is pretty and the rhyming scheme for dialogue can be fun. If you have a system that has it on it and want a JRPG for $15 I would say to try it out. When it inevitably drops in price I would definitely say to try it.
My biggest gripe is that my favourite character in combat is a temp and while all the other characters you get are useful in niches I don't find any as much fun as that temp. The final recruit is especially boring in comparison and the last three all seem to be made to try and fill in her niche but do it in less interesting ways.
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There are only three games left.
Demon's Souls. Went back to it.
No death challenge in this one too.
Comments
- Demon's is less videogame-y and feels like a real place at times.
- I'm on rollerskates
- "Jumps" are so floaty
- This game is really easy compared to the two others
Three games?
-Yeah, this is something that really strikes me about Dark Souls 2: the environments feel much more like videogame levels than anything people might've built for actual use. Like, Forest of Fallen Giants/Drangleic Castle, none of the rooms serve any discernible purpose beyond being a series of empty corridors that lead you to a boss fight. Boletaria Castle at least is meant to be a freakishly defensible fortification, Anor Londo at least has places of recognizable use like bedrooms and a chapel. Tonally DS2's environments cover a fairly wide range, but they routinely lack that extra touch of character that would make them come together as a former habitation of people, and they rarely shoot for the extremes of unpleasantness that its predecessors sometimes managed (for all that I didn't care for Demon's Souls' universally gray-and-brown color scheme--and a lot else about the game--I'll readily acknowledge the prison and the swamp as some of the most viscerally nasty locations I've ever encountered in a videogame).
-Demon's Souls bosses are scruuuuubs. Maneaters gave me a tremendous amount of trouble, but otherwise the vast majority of them I took on the first try. Let's see, I also died to...Penetrator and Old King Allant, that's it. Mine bosses could've been trouble if I hadn't fought them last, admittedly. Spider honestly strikes me as being tremendously shitty design. I did pretty much what you're doing: grab the biggest sword you can find, knock everybody down and kill them on the ground, pump HP through the roof because STR scaling caps so early in Demon's Souls and nothing else is worth caring about.
I'll never play Demon's Souls again, myself, too much that actively annoyed me about it after Dark Souls--the healing, the enforced resource scarcity and inability to fully upgrade weapons without extreme farming, the crappy bosses and crappier music, armor being actively counterproductive and generally nothing special aesthetically...Dark Souls 2 is even more > Demon's Souls than Dark Souls 1 is > Dark Souls 2.
Anyway, as far as DS2 goes, mostly just fitfully messing with various NG+s by this point. Flame Weapon on +5 fire Sinner's Sword = I do a thousand damage a shot now. Was not expecting that degree of potency from Not!Sinner, weapon stands up better than expected despite its problems (I sometimes have to run with the Bracing Knuckle Ring to keep it from breaking during longer zones). Also respecced scythe chick to use weapons that suck less (I noticed I had a Channeler's Trident and figured what the hell; turns out it's actually pretty cool, the standard R2 does a spinny multihit thing that staggers everybody, just a pity the weapon breaks as fast as Old Whip does) and dump a bunch of levels into hitting 40 in all mental stats to optimize hexing. Holy shit now I see where the broken really comes into play. Dark Caitha's Chime + Abyss Seal = Great Resonant Soul tosses off twelve hundred damage with like no casting time. Oh noes 500 souls and 30 HP per shot. And somewhere along the line I also got the platinum trophy.
Otherwise, fiddling with PVP. It really is unfortunate how that turned out here and I'm probably already done with it. The lack of any meaningful poise far too often reduces combat to stunlocking; invasion items are basically finite (or just prohibitively expensive in NG+); hit detection and lag seem to mix in a more toxic manner here--cases of "God dammit that Soul Arrow was ten feet away from me" are everywhere.
But for another thing, there's the way matches are determined by Soul Memory (I.E., the total number of souls you've accumulated over the course of the game regardless of what you've used them for) rather than by character level. I understand why they did this, and I fundamentally approve of the intent: it means that no player can make low-level runs through the game just to come back to starting areas and use overpowered pyromancies and elemental weapons to murder newbies with impunity in a zone before any players have the capacity to actually indict them (this was absolutely rampant in Undead Parish in DS1).
But the thing is, I stop leveling at a certain point because it bores me to just level until you can do anything. But that Soul Memory count won't stop going up so eventually all you're gonna draw are people who've taken the levels, all the levels, and pumped their stats through the roof to use all the cheapest stuff. I mean, I've killed max-level players in DS1 (because DS1 has no upper ceiling for red phantom invasions), but that's not really the experience I'm looking for here. The obvious rejoinder to this is "Take more levels, scrub," but I dislike doing this for the same reason that chopping wood to be the most talented person in the world at everything in Skyrim is fucking stupid: when you excel at absolutely everything, nothing you can do is really all that special. It cramps my style because I prefer running specialists; it's more fun having to adapt a focused skillset to different circumstances than to be capable of doing everything at once.
EDIT: I guess I should acknowledge another qualitative difference--it's much easier to find a match in DS2 because it scans the entire game world when you're trying to invade someone rather than just your current zone. On the one hand this means less wasted time spamming the Red Eye Orb, but otherwise if you want to play in a specific zone you're basically out of luck short of dropping a red sign and hoping for the best. Invasions also seem not to place you in set locations, but instead within a certain proximity of the host player. While basically convenient, I actually find this a bit of a bummer. Aside from having to scramble to get your bearings as to precisely where you are in the level every time you land in someone else's world, the tension of hunting someone down to get a sense of what you're dealing with from afar and preparing appropriately is basically gone. I've also had some invasions where I turned up beyond a shortcut that I could not backtrack through and the host was on the other side. Waste of everybody's time, that.
Anyway at some point last night a dude on my friend list PMs me to the basic extent of "I'm in Darkroot Garden, come and get me." So I toss DS1 back in for a bit and man the lack of stunlocking and the cleaner rolling make it handle so much nicer than DS2's generally squishy player interactions. The backstab-fishing is still fucking awful, though. Cleaning up that and the crazy HP bloat people could get in DS1 were probably the smarter things DS2 did for PVP purposes.
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Bioshock Infinite:
Well, I missed the Beach Boys reference because I don't actually like the Beach Boys all that much. I will say that coming into the Revolution universe with a woman singing Fortunate Son was pretty neat though.
There are spoilers because I don't give a shit, the plot isn't very good anyway. So you say you want a revolution, well, you know... I think they got some scenes changed around after they recorded the voice acting and neglected to fix that. One second, Booker is all "Yeah Fitzroy is needed because Fink hires goons like me" and then not the next elevator conversation they're talking about how Fitzroy and Comstock are the same type of leader... which would make sense after it became clear that Fitzroy was going to kill you because the Booker in the universe you travelled to was a martyr for the revolution (god that is so bad) and she needed to keep the narrative uncomplicated to keep her revolution going, but absolutely nothing happened to change Booker's opinion between those scenes... unless just the fact that she's leading an attack was the reason? God whatever don't care, I'm going to assume it was a mistake in editing.
Plot is getting more retarded by the minute. The mysterious twins are here because of quantum mechanics and that's what those tears are about? this is so dumb.
I've also gone from fighting a bunch of bigots to fighting revolutionaries. On the one hand, this means I now fight giant mechanical Abraham Lincolns (yessssss), on the other hand, just what point is the game trying to make? It's starting to go off the rails into loony misinterpretations of quantum mechanics more than the social commentary that I guess it was going for in the beginning, which... the lack of a point to all the racism in the first part of the game makes it ridiculously gratuitous. Judging by the audio log count I'm at least half, maybe more than halfway through the game, so I guess I should give up on there being any redemption in this area.
Gameplay... I have some useful Vigors now! ... Or they would be useful if I had been upgrading my Salts at all instead of putting all of my upgrades into shields and health. But still, Water Tentacle is nice for taking care of goons with bombs, and Charge could be quite nice if I used shotguns at all. Or had taken any of the then-useless melee upgrades earlier in the game. Speaking of poor design decisions, that. So I basically get one shot to decide if I want to use an upgrade or not and can't ever switch, even if the previous upgrades synergize well with newly acquired vigors. That's just so dumb. It's like they made all these neat powers for me to not play with. So dumb.
Don't get me wrong. I am actually enjoying the time I'm spending on the game in part because almost entirely because of the gameplay, but they made a lot of stupid design decisions that just make it worse than it could have been.
Speaking of dumb, I decided to force myself to start playing around with the guns. Holy shit, the Burst gun and the Repeater both manage to be flat out worse than the machine gun every mook came with in the first half of the game. Actually, the machine gun is pretty OK for picking up and then ditching immediately, saves Carbine ammo, but is clearly the worst weapon after those two. Hand Cannon would be great if it had more ammo. Shotgun is too slow but may be fine upgraded. Hailfire is a neat version of the volley gun that ends up being worse in practice because splash damage on contact is way more useful than ricocheting on anything you'd be trying to take down with a volley gun. Shotgun would be great!... if I could ever use it when I need it. I'm only so rarely surrounded by guys that it's never worth it to hang onto (2 gun limit is so dumb).
Anyway, progress... going to Comstock's lair now. I got stuck on some geometry because I thought I was playing a valve game and started jumping on crates. Ragequit.
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All three Souls games Cid!
Replaying the Valley of Defilement I really do have to admit that Dark 2 went too far in the right direction by putting so many bonfires everywhere.
You get harder, tighter fights, but the amazing atmosphere of the valley can't possibly be copied. Even Blight town was tame in comparison.
I just fought Armored Spider as the first post Phalanx boss and had no trouble this time, it's been hell the first time through though. Like many bosses you can just go up close and mash mash mash. Play too defensively and you might lose. What's the problem with its design?
I'm not sure about Dark 2 being worse than Dark 1, I can see Soul Memory being a problem but I never play with the same character in PvP for that long anyway. Demon's is worse but I like the Valley and Latria a whole lot more than any other area in any other game.
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The comments about realistic areas vs. not is interesting. I'm not really sure how much I care about the realism, myself? To use DS1 as an example, Sen's Fortress felt very "video game"y. The route you take through the castle is an implausible warren, there are hallways where bowling balls the size of cars roll down endlessly and try to crush you, and in general the whole place felt built to trap one random earthbound warrior (as opposed to say an invading army). It's not really very believable as a castle or fortress. It was also my favourite area in the game. (Although Anor Londo was much more believable, and also just plain looked cool, which made me enjoy it despite the fact that its gameplay-specific design is bland. So both styles can work.)
New Super Mario Bros. - Beat this through again. All star coins as usual because those are so fun to get (Mario knows how to make just the right number of collectibles so that they don't feel like a chore, and instead a welcome challenge/distraction from simply completing levels). Took about 11 hours.
It's still a pretty fun game. At the same time, playing it right after SMB1, I am reminded that even after decades to hopefully let the nostalgia of the NES games wear off, I still prefer the NES games, which mostly comes from the fact that they are more challenging, and they make lives/extra lives count. In SMB1 I was tracking down coins in hopes of a valuable extra life. In NSMB (and most modern Mario games), lives and coins are all just a waste of your time or something done for personal pride.
Still NSMB has a lot about it I like. Compared to some other Marios, I really do enjoy the two game-specific suits. Tiny Mario is honestly quite inspired, a nice double-edged sword of a powerup. I wish there was a code you could input where you would play the whole game that way to be honest. Turtle Mario is a little more temperamental - the way you go into turtleshell mode is a little awkward if there are enemies around, since if you mistime it and don't acceelrate enough you'll run into an enemy like a moron - but it's still an awful lot of fun even if using it feels a bit dangerous. (That's probably why they also gave it the ducking = invincible to most things, to balance out an otherwise aggressive powerup.) Also enjoyed how the powerups were used in finding secrets. Getting them can be a bit annoying, though, as you're generally reliant on timed hits (or redoing certain levels, possibly in other worlds), which is a bit frustrating if you're set on getting the secrets. But it's fine; they were obviously trying to replicate the rare feeling of SMB3's frog/tanooki/hammer suits, but since they didn't want you to lose out on secrets forever they made them more a bit tricky to get than literally finite.
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You've never went to a place with perpetually swinging giant axes before?
The problem is that Dark Souls 2 has videogame-y levels but without doing something much with it, unlike Sen's Fortress. That's a net negative compared to a believable place like the Boletaria Palace.
Part of the problem is that Dark Souls 2's locations are very short. Each Dark 1 area is half the size of a Dark 2 area I'd say? There's a lot more variety but you spend a lot less time in each location, so it feels kind of like an insane theme park at times. "Poison world! Windmill world! Lava world!"
Oh man I realize that we have never hyped the laughing cursed vases in Dark Souls 2? They're great.
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There are spoilers because I don't give a shit, the plot isn't very good anyway. So you say you want a revolution, well, you know... I think they got some scenes changed around after they recorded the voice acting and neglected to fix that. One second, Booker is all "Yeah Fitzroy is needed because Fink hires goons like me" and then not the next elevator conversation they're talking about how Fitzroy and Comstock are the same type of leader... which would make sense after it became clear that Fitzroy was going to kill you because the Booker in the universe you travelled to was a martyr for the revolution (god that is so bad) and she needed to keep the narrative uncomplicated to keep her revolution going, but absolutely nothing happened to change Booker's opinion between those scenes... unless just the fact that she's leading an attack was the reason? God whatever don't care, I'm going to assume it was a mistake in editing.
Well, you see, Comstock oversaw an oppressive racist regime that brutally exploited an underclass based on white supremacy and jingoism, while Fitzroy started a revolution to overthrow said regime where some people died, so they're basically both Hitler.
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Talk to NPCs enough and they'll actually suggest that Sen's Fortress was built exactly for the purpose you describe, NEB.
As for Armor Spider, Fenrir, mostly the blast radius on its attacks makes dodging anything in that hallway really flaky. And if you get hit by the web spit it's just okay I guess I'll trudge around getting hit by fireballs and chewing grass for a couple minutes. Tedious and annoying more than challenging (though I guess I should note I fought it so late that I had enough HP to just tank through everything).
Child of Light: This is one of those games that I could easily coast through just based on aesthetics even if everything else sucked. Fortunately this latter is not the case, although I really should've taken the Grandia comparisons as reason to start the game on hard mode. I haven't even had to use Totally-Not-A-German-Strain-Of-The-Measles' healing spells at all yet. Oh hey I can change the difficulty midgame? That's cool.
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Yeah, Sen's was literally designed to test warriors looking to reach Anor Lando. So was Battle of Stoicism but lol.
Speaking of the Laughing Vases... they can kill enemies. Yeah. Unless that Lion Warrior dropped dead for literally no reason they'll kill dudes given enough time. Not feasible, but HILARIOUS.
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The poison statues in The Gutter/Black Gulch are equally indiscriminate (they'll target invaders as well as enemies, making that easily the worst place to invade in the game).
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You've never went to a place with perpetually swinging giant axes before?
Oh man I realize that we have never hyped the laughing cursed vases in Dark Souls 2? They're great.
Canadian Castles are much more friendly than Euro Castles bro. No swinging axes at all. The Princess is also there every single time. Universal health care + no EU is in fact that good.
Also I told you to stop making me want to play this. I don't have the $70 to spend on disappointment (because my PC is having seizures and won't run it).
Edit - I totally forgot that Child of Light even had difficulty modes. Hard might be okay I guess? Normal is hellaz easy. The final boss is a massive spike though.
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Bioshock Infinite: So it turns out where I gave up on the game was roughly 2 minutes away from where the action starts. Anyway got the girl and just got Shock Jockey. Having a different experience than Zenny - earlygame vigors are good, particularly the crow one. It gets downright broken when you upgrade it. Enemies step on trap, crows everywhere, enemies that die become *more* crow traps. Basically you cast that once and it clears the entire room then you just walk around and loot corpses. In weapon news, shotgun is instant kill even at range, while carbine is nothing special.
The worldbuilding is really nice... but... yeah, the racism. I'm a white male and it makes me uncomfortable. I'm not denying that things like this existed in the past, but I certainly don't want to play a game about them. Not sure if the developers were trying for social commentary and went too far, or if they *are* racists and just using art as a pretense to say what they really think.
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My experience mirrored Zenny's to be honest, so you are saying Crow trap works like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCeD2gF9jUo)?
I do definitely agree with Zenny in that Vigor usefulness is massively out of whack. It is even worse with how much your gameplay is influence by what hats, pants and shoes you pick up early because there is some that are really powerful and if you get early skyrocket the usefulness of Vigors. There is some that spike up gunplay as well. There is some that hold up Melee even (but none to the level of Bioshock 1 Wrench Tonics). 100% random and not even any weighting to spawn stronger ones later in the game.
Salts you at least can't really go too wrong with and they are plentiful enough that you can resolve any "mistakes" you have made. Various bits of clothing are completely RNG and you can do fuck all about it. They are pretty plentiful too, but the pool of clothing is massive and has a lot of chaff in it.
Edit - Devs use crazy racism because it is set in a place full of mega crazies in a time where crazy racism is a thing. The game is in no way about crazy racism. Crazy racism is a vehicle to shower you in crazy though and crazy IS very important to the central plot.
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Link's Awakening - Almost done I think. Just finished the eighth dungeon.
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Devs use crazy racism because it is set in a place full of mega crazies in a time where crazy racism is a thing. The game is in no way about crazy racism. Crazy racism is a vehicle to shower you in crazy though and crazy IS very important to the central plot.
Unfortunately for the devs, "we present to you this racism without commentary" is still commentary, and at the bare minimum it was such a huge distraction as to detract from the game as a whole. It's too bad, because actually the whole "George Washington, Ben Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson are all religious figures here" was both absolutely insane and really entertaining. It made one feel uncomfortable in a way that didn't beg any real world value judgements, and so ended up working really well to showcase the crazy. The racism without comment was at best distracting and at worst really fucking terrible. And frankly, there are interdimensional wormholes everywhere, a giant fucking robot pigeon keeps taking me out of the skies, and I drink liquids that make me deformed and then I can shoot crows, ghosts, and water tentacles out of my hand. "They were trying to portray the time period accurately" isn't a valid excuse.
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I don't think it is necessarily without comment. It is pretty much "this is terrible obv". It definitely isn't commentary, barely even a statement really. They don't go out of their way to say it is justified in any way either. They might try to humanize your day to day citizens, but it is very much saying "it was another time. A stupid time." It is shallow as fuck, which I have said I. The past I think is okay for a tertiary story element.
It does serve a purpose though with that being the only "realistic" thingIt very solidly dates the time period in a way that a game set in a flying city with deliberately anachronistic media. There isn't really much that grounds it in the era otherwise, everything you see outside of the main city is the lighthouse and dream sequences.
Without it how much even shittier would the revolution have been? (Straight query, not defense of it, because I would agree that since the racism is unnecessary to the plot and game would be better leaner.)
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Sounds like it's similar to Bioshock 1's commentary on extreme liberalism.
Next on Bioshock Unfinite Indiscovery (2017): "People sure can be misogynistic"
The DS2 laughing vases are great because you're just running around and you suddendly hear that ... woman's cackle. It is the exact same sound of a woman mocking you. It talks directly to your part of your brain that has nightmares about being humiliated in public. Then you realize it's just a fucking vase that you can break and feel like even more of a fool.
Anyway that was my experience. Pretty nice stuff.
El Cid: It's a trap, you should actually fight the armor at short range even with a ranged character. Obviously every player is too scared to do that in game.
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Sounds like it's similar to Bioshock 1's commentary on extreme liberalism.
Next on Bioshock Unfinite Indiscovery (2017): "People sure can be misogynistic"
The DS2 laughing vases are great because you're just running around and you suddendly hear that ... woman's cackle. It is the exact same sound of a woman mocking you. It talks directly to your part of your brain that has nightmares about being humiliated in public. Then you realize it's just a fucking vase that you can break and feel like even more of a fool.
Anyway that was my experience. Pretty nice stuff.
El Cid: It's a trap, you should actually fight the armor at short range even with a ranged character. Obviously every player is too scared to do that in game.
I want you to have all my babies. I am supposed to be losing weight anyway.
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My experience mirrored Zenny's to be honest, so you are saying Crow trap works like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCeD2gF9jUo)?
It's a light grenade that flies around and touches you instead of you picking it up, and then makes more light grenades. That stay in the area forever for the next set of enemies that spawn to run into. It's ridiculous, but doesn't work on automatons or Crows.
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KH3D: No, screw you Tron World. Glad I'm done with you because you were not fun, your plot sucked, your characters are unrecognizable non-classic people from the new movie, and your aesthetic was totally wasted. GOOD BYE FOREVER!
Next Up: Hunchback, aka where I was suppose to go to first but didn't notice the game had an "BATTLE LEVEL" indicator in the top...why couldn't we just do what KH1 did and have Stars indicate difficulty? Easier to notice immediately.
FF10HD: Just saw FF10's best attempt to reinact a typical Army vs. Godzilla Scene. It didn't occur to me until just now how shockingly similar Project Mii'hen is to your typical Toho Kaiju scene in that regard, even down to special weapons meant to destroy the monster backfiring spectacularly (usually Masers, because for some reason, Toho decided the Japanese Military loves Masers even though they NEVER WORK! What's the point of cool Sci-fi weapons if they don't work!?)
Anyway, Tidus hasn't really done much to analyze in regards to his whinieness. Mostly go "hey, give Gatta more of a chance" but that's him being naive and such. He did chase after Sin like a moron, but the narrative pretty much has him saying "...yeah, I am not going to even pretend to defend that action; it was really stupid in retrospect"; that's fine though because emotional outbursts and reactions as a result often aren't accompanied by rational thought, and being able to look at it and go "Man, that WAS stupid of me" is about the best we'll without feeling contrived, and it was in-character because, again, Tidus is not suppose to be super smart or anything, just kind of average in that regard.
What I found most interesting though is that while to the player, Seymour definitely feels off during these scenes, partially because it's so obvious based off design, tropes, etc., it's actually very believable from the character stand point, at least once you consider just how brainwashed Spiran Society is. Seymour does seem to act on behalf of both Yevon and the people of Spira, and his "I'll turn the other cheek of this blasphemy if it means Sin is defeated" is said in a very simple and logical manner. He's doesn't try to sugar coat it or anything, just simply goes "Sin dies = good for everyone, who cares if the method if blasphemous?" When you add this to the way Spiran culture is, yes, it works very well in context that the entire party trusts Seymour, and when Wakka second guesses him (out of shear hate for Machina and Al Bhed, mind you, not because "Seymour is the evilz!"), Seymour just responds as I stated above.
There is one person who does, in fact, think Seymour is off...and that's Tidus...you know, the one guy in the game who is completely free of Yevon Brainwashing? It makes sense that to him, "Maester Seymour" is just another guy with a title, and makes sense he'd be the only one thinking "I don't like this guy; he seems bad" though at the same time, Tidus keeps it to himself, but for two reasons. One is because Tidus by this point has enough brains to respect Spiran culture and beliefs; he has no reason to uproot society. Second guess it, sure, but try to change people's beliefs? Everything is alien to him, but that doesn't mean he views it as wrong. The other reason, he pretty much explains outright in the narrative:
Seymour's logic makes sense. He's not going to call Seymour out on something that actually makes sense and considering how little stuff makes sense to Tidus in Spira, due to cultural differences, it'd be crazy for him to speak up on the one thing he DOES seem agree with.
And yes, I am aware it's very possible Auron is suspicious of Seymour considering Auron's...well...everything, but there's no way the game really implies it. It's also possible Auron thinks Seymour is just young and naive for believing this will work, and given Seymour's position, he's in no state to question it. Kinnoc, now, Auron does reciprocate the discussion there, because he's someone who should know better, and Auron's also a lot more acquainted with Kinnoc than Seymour, so he has a better sense of what's going on his mind. Not really meaningful here of course, just something to think about.
Still, I mostly bring this up because I remember someone somewhere going "SEYMOUR'S TRANSPARENTLY EVIL! HOW DO YOU TRUST THIS GUY!?" Yes, he's evil...to the player, that's called Dramatic Irony. He's also off to Tidus, the one character who knows as much about Spira as the player, and is the only character completely free of Yevon's Brainwashing...I think it's safe to say the reason he isn't "Transparently Evil" is a sign of the state of Spira's Citizens.
As a side note, I had forgotten Tidus mentions Sin's Toxins here! Not that it's meaningful, but mostly just trying to pay attention to references to Sin's Toxins whenever because I've been convinced for a while that Sin's Toxins don't actually exist, it's just one of Yevon's many lies for "Any mental trauma caused by Sin Attacks." This ranges from PTSD to memory loss from head trauma to whatever. Not that Tidus would know the answer to this himself; he knows jack all about Sin, so of course he's going to assume the civilization that has been dealing with Sin for 1000 years knows a thing or two about the monster.
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Kirby Triple Deluxe - Got it, binge played it into the ground. Beat the main game, almost done with DeDeDetour, which is great fun. I definitely prefer DeDeDetour to the Meta Knightmare from Nightmare in Dreamland. Triple D's version of hammer is the right mix of powerful without being so OP that the run becomes a snoozefest, and it invites taking more risks to get in on bosses due to his power moves being such short range.
Volcano Frog strongest boss in the game by miles. Dude refuses to stay on the screen where you can hit him for longer than 1-2 seconds at a time. >_<
Anyway, new powers:
Bell - Fun to use, but not really that effective, I think? I usually just dash attack everywhere with it, and send bells bouncing all over the place for the lulz.
Archer - Great defensively, not so hot offensively. Comparable to Leaf, only trading leaf's damage potential for range. Fairly even trade. Note that Leaf remains OP as hell, so comparable to Leaf is a big compliment.
Circus - WHY. It's a neat gimmick set, but the way it moves with its attacks just drives me nuts. Really hard to control and not all that strong.
Beetle - Okay, this power is straight up FUN. High damage, good mobility, grabbing mooks and throwing them all over the place is always amusing. The King of Insects indeed. Probably in the top 5 powers for the game, its only weaknesses are no real range(common problem) and no perfect defense moves(even MORE common problem). That's it. Easily my favorite power in the game~
Lack of Beetle in Kirby Fighters mode is sadness, though I can understand WHY. Stalling out on Very Hard for that, cleared Easy/Normal/Hard with various powers. I thiiiiink Archer will be my best bet for Very Hard, but that's such a boring answer.
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Child of Light: What's inside? Homicide.
Recruited 1x swordgirl's elder sister. Slow is dominating. Feeding all the stat-up items to Aurora because hey she's the protagonist and that's what you do with these things, but she's actually fairly deficient in a number of them anyway? I dunno, I went straight for the attack upgrades in her skill tree, maybe I should've focused on laser beams instead (you should always focus on laser beams instead).
Hard mode probably like doubles enemy offense? Not!Measles actually died a couple times today. Not sure it does anything to enemy durability, think not, but it's basically reminiscent of Mana Khemia in this way--engage hard mode to enable modicum of enemy competence, not to mention rapid party switching is a thing once you have multiple PCs. Also visible, evadable random encounters, inactive PCs level along with everyone else, etc. So mechanically the game basically cherrypicks necessary conveniences from JRPGs, doesn't do much of anything complex with it but it's entertaining enough a combination. That's cool and all but personality is really the game's selling point.
Stopped in rat country.
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Without it how much even shittier would the revolution have been? (Straight query, not defense of it, because I would agree that since the racism is unnecessary to the plot and game would be better leaner.)
Well, they could have done more focus on the class disparity than anything. Finkerton was really good about that. As for how much shittier it would have been... considering the last 5 hours have been spent shooting these revolutionaries instead of the Colombians, infinitely less. At this point, they basically made you sympathize with the revolutionaries as much as they could with how horrible their lot in Colombia is and now you have to shoot them all in the face. It's pretty poorly handled.
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Soul Nomad - Demon Path, got to Thuris and got MT OHKOed. Maybe level 32 isn't good enough. So... woohoo grinding. This is doing a pretty good job of killing my interest in the game. It's not -that- bad (Exp+50% decor and some ones to boost stats to handle enemies notably above my level = it goes quickly enough) but I have no patience for this garbage in RPGs any more.
Bravely Default - Punching the C8 sidequests in the face. I actually had quite a bit of trouble with the ninja+performer one (My Hero + first strike actions is not something my team is really built to deal with too well) but otherwise Dark Nebula backed by the usual tactics has generally taken care of business pretty well; everything else fell on the first try. I've done all the non-Eternian High Command fights and three of the High Command ones. Definitely enjoying this; I just needed a break after long-game-is-long or I might have done this much sooner.
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Soul Nomad - Demon Path, got to Thuris and got MT OHKOed. Maybe level 32 isn't good enough. So... woohoo grinding. This is doing a pretty good job of killing my interest in the game. It's not -that- bad (Exp+50% decor and some ones to boost stats to handle enemies notably above my level = it goes quickly enough) but I have no patience for this garbage in RPGs any more.
If you do want to play the rest of the plot, kick everyone else out of your party, put the loner decor (and silent walk/something that let you use skills more IIRC? optimally) on the hero and just nuke floor bosses with the map blast to get to level 2000 in 2 hours. Just 150 takes care of the demon path fine, the rest is for the post-postgame plot (beating Feinne 1+storebought battles)
Also there are split endings based on whether you win or lose the last battle of the scenario.
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I knew you'd understand Gref.
Rogue's Souls:
Deaths so far:
- Seriously, never underestimate these plague babies. Fuck all those items in 5-3 I'm never trying to get them again.
- Getting pushed by a monster off a ledge in the Valley of Defilement
- The backstep (Tapping the circle button without pushing in a direction) seriously only exists to make you die
I'm rocking with a Kilij now. Weapon options are sadly pretty damn limited! But the Kilij is pretty awesome honestly.
Somehow it feels less non linear than Dark Souls 2 at the beginning, which is not good for Rogue's Souls. (It's at least less linear than Dark Souls)
In Dark 2 you can go in any direction and get enough stuff really.
In Demon's:
World 1 has all the herbs
World 2 has all the upgrade ores (except the shitty ones you have to farm that only matter if you min/max)
World 3 has all the spices
World 4 has all the souls (And the OP regen items)
World 5 has all the misery
You have to do 1-1 first, and then doing anything but 2 / 4 is totally counterproductive unless you want to go get a particular weapon in another world, or are seriously running out of herbs.
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Bioshock Infinite:
Holy shit that was stupid. (http://www.reddit.com/r/im14andthisisdeep/) Literally John you are the demons... except you're not... except you are? God I don't care. The point is that the game managed to out-shitty Deus Ex: Human Revolution's ending, and that's an achievement. It would probably knock the game down an arbitrary ranking point if I weren't already prepared for absolute retardation. Actually, the game manages to be consistently more retarded than Bioshock 1, which is kind of impressive.
It doesn't even answer everything, much less make sense. Why is Booker completely unaware of Colombia at the start of the game? What are the Luteces all about? So if Bookstock is killed before the game starts then how does Elizabanna still exist? These aren't even INTERESTING questions, they're just questions. Fuck Ken Levine is pretty good at crawling up his own ass and checking for corpses but I wish he'd be less pleased with himself about it. At least the Luteces are entertaining?
I realized in the final battle that if I hit O I could change my gear... yay menu I never had to open at all for anything else bound to a stupid key that I couldn't rebind. But still that knocks the game up a point because I actually CAN change my gear. Oh well. This menu also let me count how many guns there were... about 14, which is only slightly more than the weapon count of Half Life 2, which doesn't limit you to two guns at a time. So there isn't really an excuse for it, at least not on the PC port. There are plenty of bindings to use. I guess to the game's credit it would have made the finale a lot less difficult, since the only reason it was hard was because I had to keep scavenging for ammo and new guns. Still, it's a design decision that ultimately holds the game back.
All and all... a good game for 10 bucks but I would be piiiiiiiiissed if I paid full retail. I would be lying if I said I didn't have fun while playing it though, even if I thought it was very, very stupid. I may replay in 1999 mode at some point but meh.
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The Luteces were alternate universe copies of the same person. Male Lutece (forget first names by now) got stuck on distaff counterpart's side or something. I don't really recall what exactly they were trying to accomplish other than generally reversing Comstock's scheme because I dunno remorse or something? I didn't expend much effort trying to puzzle it out because no one's motivations make any sense in Bioshock Infinite anyway. They were amusing while they were onscreen, I give them that much credit. Best character(s) in the game for what that's worth.
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Hearthstone: It is mind-boggling how often I lose with my opponent at exactly 1 health. It's like they put the magic pixel from Marvel vs Capcom 3 in this game, and it gives you super Heart of the Cards when it happens.
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Booker doesn't know about Colombia because there is no universe where Booker exists that Colombia does.
Nothing explains really how the Luteces keep getting new Bookers though. Presumably they don't care about the damage they do to a bunch I universes they ultimately want to unmake when they kill Booker before he can become Comstock and prevent Elizabeth from being stuck in two dimensions.
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Thanks for the advice, Tonfa. :) And yeah I definitely do want to see more of the story so I will be playing on.
Bravely Default - And all the C8 sidequests beat. That last one was pretty tough; definitely had to change the way I thought about fights. It probably would be easier to people who regularly used Hasten World I imagine. Anyway, fun collection of fights, that. Now I'm finally done with the game until inevitable replays.
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Demon's Souls: Died in a mine cart explosion, restarted, and won in 5 hours.
How this went:
- Got through 1-1
- Went to 4-1 and grabbed all the shinies (Big long bow, kilij, regen shield, regen ring)
- Got to 2-1, bought a bunch of upgrade stones and upgraded the kilij to +3. Kilij is now nearly always two handed and Regen Shield only used against skeletons. (And for the regen obviously)
- Finished 2-1 Bought a bunch of other upgrade ores from 2-2 and upgraded the Kilij to +6. So much damage.
- Went through all of the Valley of Defilement at once to unlock 5-3. Ignoring every side path because Valley of Defilement.
- Fought BP Garl for fun (Holy shit that damage), killed Selen after she gave me one fucking herb for her sidequest, then raised endurance to 35 to equip that badass armor 24/7 (I actually consider it fairly Fashion Soulsesque)
- Went through 1-3 (lol penetrator with Biorr), killed a few lizards in 1-4 to get the Kilij to 10. I could actually get the bow to +10 too!
- At this point I had way too many herbs and fully upgraded weapons. I didn't need anything but levels! Souls! MORE SOULS. I fled through all of World 4 and 3, and the rest of world 1 and 2, ignoring every item, in like one hour, spending all the souls in vitality and lengthening that already gross as hell HP bar.
Amazingly I almost died against a BP Cthulhu monstrosity which was the freaking third to last thing I fought. (Old Monk was my last boss)
- Killed the Maiden in Black for more souls.
41 Vit 35 Endurance 25 Dex.
So yeah Demon's Souls is so much easier than Dark Souls 1/2. At least on replays.
I still don't know how to fight all the non-gimmick bosses because I could just get up to their faces and R1 R1 R1 to oblivion.
Healing is so ultra fast that you can't possibly die to straight damage unless you don't have enough herbs (And I still had SO MANY at the end)
I actually now consider False King Allant easier than the Dark Souls 2 final boss.
Not looking forward to trying to go through Dark Souls 1 without dying. Not sure I want to. Anor Londo archers. Gwyn. Sen's Fortress. Bed of Motherfucking Chaos.
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Booker doesn't know about Colombia because there is no universe where Booker exists that Colombia does.
Nothing explains really how the Luteces keep getting new Bookers though. Presumably they don't care about the damage they do to a bunch I universes they ultimately want to unmake when they kill Booker before he can become Comstock and prevent Elizabeth from being stuck in two dimensions.
Ah, that makes sense. I guess also that I missed making the connection that the Luteces must have just brought Booker into the first iteration of the B:I universe when they're rowing that boat, which explains why he's so confused and thinks he needs to get to Elizabeth to New York.
Wrapping up my ability to give a damn about the Bioshock universe, I read recaps of the Burial at Sea DLCs and watched the Endings. Lolololol so bad. A version of Comstock that killed Elizabeth is sent to Rapture and becomes Booker again, but has all of Booker's motivations and personality because that makes sense? And he's there with a different Elizabeth for some reason... k.
Also, if amnesia is a common side effect of swapping universes (except for Elizabeth for some reason that is never explained) it calls into question why Booker doesn't zonk out when they travel through the universes where Chen Lin is alternately dead, alive, then dead again... and in the ending where he is transported to a universe where Elizabeth destroys New York.
And if there are infinite universes and the Luteces were killed in the one the Bioshock: Infinite we play is in, why do they care about getting revenge on this Comstock? Clearly there are more Comstocks out there, as Burial at Sea shows... and for that matter, doesn't the fact that Elizabeth still exists AND there's a Comstock running around in Rapture utterly invalidate the reason why Booker let himself get offed in the end of Infinite?
Again, these aren't interesting questions, just questions. I have spent way too much brainpower (re: any) trying to salvage this clusterfuck and I am done. On the bright side, it seems that Ken Levine has run his studio into the ground, so hopefully he isn't given creative control over another game ever again.
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Link's Awakening - Apparently I was supposed to do more in the trade quest in order to figure out how to get to the final dungeon boss. Oh well, FAQed it, got to final boss. The last form with the eye was pretty interesting and entertaining.
Awoke the fish by playing all of the Instruments. Hooray.
I feel like Zelda is probably something you had to play when you were younger to really enjoy. I just found the game tedious with some occasionally interesting enemies and bosses.
Super Metroid - Fighting Dagon. F this guy.
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KH3D: Yay! Almost done with Riku's section of the Hunback Wo-*gets dropped back into Sora's* DAH! I really don't like the Drop mechanic at all. Not the worst time it happened; at least this time I was all the wiser to recognize it was almost done and avoided going into a boss fight, but the fact that it can happen in a boss fight (AND DID TWICE FOR ME) is dumb; worse is how it happening in a boss fight makes you literally lose all your progress in the boss and start over.
Really feels like the game would be better off with a more episodic style, eg. use Sora until you reach a certain plot point, then it forces you to swap back to Riku, and keep this up. The fact that you can get dicked out on boss fights (as I mentioned above) and Challenges (happened at least once, was almost done then DROP! And the challenge disappears as a result) shows just how poorly conceived it was. Alternatively, turn off the mechanic entirely, stalling it during the aforementioned scenarios (as well as any forced fight); if you're in bonus time, just cancel out Bonus Time during those situations as so it's not abused.
FF10 HD: Ok, yeah, the Gatta Dies is way better than the Luzu Dies scene. I especially like the part where he shouts "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND MY PAIN!" to Wakka, and my thoughts were "wait what? Of all people to say that to, he's the ONE PERSON who does"...and sure enough, Wakka responds in kind with an "I do."
So...about Tidus whining related shenanigans...
Ok, so Kimhari speaks for the first time! This is provoked by Tidus saying "She seems cheerful" and him being the only one there, and probably the person who understands Yuna most, it actually worked for a sudden "Kimhari finally opens his mouth" moment. While Yuna is usually pretty cheerful, Tidus' analysis here actually works because considering the context, this is one moment where you'd expect Yuna NOT to be in her usual happy self. Kimhari's line of course just further reaffirms what Yuna told Tidus before: She tries her hardest to smile no matter what, and Kimhari adds in that the darker the times, the bigger the happier Yuna acts (regardless of how she feels on the inside), because she knows she's the hope of Spira. Tidus dose sort of mock the mindset with "Don't worry, be happy?"; not really whining, just a "That's kind of a hard to follow considering the circumstances."
Next off, speaking to Auron about Jecht. First off, Tidus admits he did in fact feel Jecht's presence in Sin, but still doubts Auron. While it's true that Auron showed some proof, it's understandable why Tidus is in denial; "Your father is an evil whale Kaiju!" Also, Auron mentions that Jecht wants Tidus to kill him, because Jecht himself hates doing this, but being Sin, he can't control it. Tidus of course has a "Great..." reaction. It's hard to call Tidus whiny here because the circumstances are not exactly something anyone would cope with easily, and he's able to keep himself in control pretty well. So basically, here's how Tidus reacts to everything:
Sin = Jecht, now with proof: Denial. That's really all he CAN do at this point is "I still don't believe you" implying he's not willing to accept the truth. Ok, fair, he's still only learned the news.
Jecht wants Tidus to kill him: Depression. Considering what happened at Project Mii'hen, and the fact that, despite hating him, Jecht is still his dad, and Tidus is still a "newbee" at killing Fiends, how do you expect him to react? The alternative would be to kick and scream at it, but he actually just has a calm reaction.
"Don't tell Yuna" = Reluctant agreement. Hey look, Tidus showing an understanding of characters he's just met! Proof he's not entirely stupid. His first thought is "they wouldn't believe me anyway" which considering how they reacted to "I'm from Zanarkand" is perfectly reasonable...except of course Yuna, who does believe him. Auron is quick to respond with "Yuna would" and Tidus goes "Good point..." because Yuna basically believes everything Tidus says to her, whether it's true faith or some kind of naivete (though Tidus hasn't told any lies thus far, and Yuna's reason for believing Tidus is because his story matches up with what Jecht claims, so it actually is pretty logical because two people wouldn't have very similar stories, so chances are it's legitimate faith)
This is also where Tidus asks WHY Auron told him so soon, and what good it would do, and Auron responds with essentially "better sooner rather than later." Both perspectives make sense though Auron's makes more sense, so you can't fault either character here. Tidus is clearly thinking "ignorance is bliss", which is fair; there's enough problems he has to deal with Spira right now, why add such a big one on top of all the other issues? It just makes everything worse. Auron's side of course is telling Tidus then meant Tidus could get the emotional outbursts out then, and they'd still be reasonable, as opposed to a different moment where he could have a legitimate mental break down. The "Me, emotional? HA!" response was pretty amusing because yes, you are emotional Tidus, but whose going to admit to something like that? Auron of course completely owns him by "You were quite the cry baby..." and narrative Tidus even tries to deflect it, ending with a "Well...maybe still a little then..." which is his way of admitting Auron is right without actually admitting "I am a cry baby."
One thing to note is that when Tidus is NOT dealing with all the Sin related nonsense, he is constantly having a positive attitude. Two examples just passed that demonstrate it:
-Djose temple, when it activates, he is fascinated by it, as opposed to a reaction of fear.
-Moonflow, Tidus actually wants to see the Pyreflies Light Show that supposedly happens at night, though of course Auron says no, since they are on a mission, and can't afford to waste time.
So yeah, current moment, Tidus still isn't very whiny at all. The moments he does whine are understandable and really few and far between. What may kick in, though, is that sometimes his voice comes off that way, but if you actually looked at the context, he's not actually complaining or anything.
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That's sure a lot of words to defend a character from a 14 year old game against detractors.
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WGAYP: kinda the place to go for a lot of words about games.
I'm enjoying reading these, for what it's worth, Meeple.
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Fenrir: Why would you ever jump in the plague baby pool. I mean, I don't actually know what the items in there are, but seriously why would you do that. And yeah Selen's armor is the nicest looking gear in Demon's Souls. It's just a pity that it's, you know, Demon's Souls armor, I'll wear flashy swag that's just useless, but not mechanically kneecapping myself for it. Re: roguelike Dark Souls, man just Homeward Bone out of Bed of Chaos after fragging each of the shield generators. That's basically what I do in a normal run just because fuck Bed of Chaos.
Child of Light: Oh god dammit. Yeah, the skill overlap was suspicious, but don't expect me to not complain about the style downgrade anyway.
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I dunno, I think the fact that it's a fourteen year old game and people are still talking about it (outside of the DL too!) is actually MORE of a reason to spend some time discussing people's perceptions of it.
And hey, I mean he's replaying it now anyway, let him dissect it, what else is he gonna do besides talk about how pretty the new graphics are in his what, fourth playthrough?
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Fenrir: Why would you ever jump in the plague baby pool. I mean, I don't actually know what the items in there are, but seriously why would you do that. And yeah Selen's armor is the nicest looking gear in Demon's Souls. It's just a pity that it's, you know, Demon's Souls armor, I'll wear flashy swag that's just useless, but not mechanically kneecapping myself for it. Re: roguelike Dark Souls, man just Homeward Bone out of Bed of Chaos after fragging each of the shield generators. That's basically what I do in a normal run just because fuck Bed of Chaos.
Child of Light: Oh god dammit. Yeah, the skill overlap was suspicious, but don't expect me to not complain about the style downgrade anyway.
I was all "I have too much health and a Claymore + 574. Plague babies can't be as bad as I remember"
The worst part about Bed of Chaos has to be actually getting to the second insect for me!
Actually, look at this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ0csuFo5vY
Hahahah totally doing that.
I'll snipe the Anor Londo archers and tank Gwyn wearing Full Havel.
Might be not that bad! Mostly scared about Iron Golem (yep) and O&S now.
This should still be the hardest roguelike out of the three games: No bonus HP/ring slot from being human form, no extra healing in case things get rough.
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I mentioned to a friend you were doing this stuff. He was thinking Capra might fuck you over, but I figure you have played enough that you have learned the lessons of Capra. Alternately you may just throw poop at it instead if it is really a scary thing.
I also have no idea what the fuck I just watched.
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I don't think Capra is going to be too much of a problem. I can beat him pretty reliably. He's an optional boss. I'm always going to do a bunch of other stuff before and save him for later. I would not even fight him if it weren't for all these souls and the ember in the depths.
I'm also going to farm some Chunks in New Londo before O&S
For Bed of Chaos, you basically have to go to each side of the room to kill an insect while the boss attacks and the floor crumbles around you. It is a Climatic Uncharted Fight except you can die. Here the guy just threw bombs in an arc to kill the insects from afar and pretty much skipped the whole fight.
My plan right now is to head straight to the forest at the beginning and kill Shiva and Ninja Buddy with black firebombs for Ninja Flip Ring and Murakumo, then go to the catacombs and shit. Going to be awesome.
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I thought that video was going to be sniping the generators with a bow (which I've gotten slammed a couple times doing). Wow, dude. Nice dumbfiring.
The best counter to Gwyn I've always found to be the Black Knight Shield. 95% fire resist what up. Maybe there's a comparable greatshield, but I don't use those. And obviously I'm not parrying him to death because ohmygodohmygodohmygod so my version of tanking it out is just not taking direct hits. (I wore Havel's my first time through the game. I still died to him like a dozen times! Then I stopped idiotically trying to block with the Grass Crest Shield.)
Shiva and his buddy are pretty fearsome at low levels. Good luck!
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Child of Light: Thank you, DL hype machine. I tried this out after reading all the comments on it, and yeah, it's awesome. There are flaws but none of them are ones that particular bother me. On chapter 3, hoping it keeps up this brisk pace. Would prefer at least a 3-member party, but it's fine. Djinn-bait.
It's good to know that even though Grandia hasn't made a game in like 10 years or whatever, the indie scene hasn't forgotten it. Both Zeboyd PA games and this are great for getting my Grandia fix, even without Millenia~
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Shit I started a reply to El Cid RE: Child of Light there and lost it somewhere.
I am bothered by both the style downgrade and the fact that I found that the most interesting combat PC (and the most fun in party interaction for what there is). You get other things that fill some of the utility but it is all through different delivery methods that I find way more boring. I will edit in more on this in tiny text or a new post when I get to work.
Ubisoft not very Indie though DJ. I am pretty happy to see a bigger developer adopting a more Indie business model to publish JRPG style games though! I think it is both a more viable business model and a good way to handle the genre. They don't need to be 40 hour mega epics. I am happy to buy 10 or 20 hour things for $15.
That said, El Cid and I are now officially a DL hypetrain? Does that mean people are going to start listening to Joe Satriani now?
Zenny, I haven't played Burial at Sea so can't speak for that (that does sound bad) and yeah agree on they are generally not interesting questions anyway. I just wanted to answer the one I could. Even as someone that likes Infinite it is a thing I liked as a journey, not as something you sit down and analyse. Your mileage will vary on if you think the stories shallow enough that they only hold up during the journey being an acceptable or not. For lots of video games, especially action based ones I think that is fine personally. If you give me an action based movie as well that references as broadly and well read as Bioshock Infinite does then I would probably be just as likely to come out happy as well.
That said, the Lutece's motivation isn't revenge so much as trying to correct what they see as a great wrong and prevent Comstock from existing and creating an infinite number of brainwashed fanatical Elizabeth's that want to conquer in the name of god with steel and fire who all have the ability to hop between dimensions.
There is more than one Comstock just like there is more than one Booker, there is still a nearly limitless number of divergent paths that take place during people's lives for all the parallel universes. The point to go back and off Booker before Comstock can be "born" during the baptism is that it destroy every single possible scenario where there could have been a Comstock that would buy a child off a Booker.
Also travel doesn't cause amnesia specifically, it is existing in the parallel universe causes the brain to struggle with accepting the new reality. The brain rejects it and starts suffering a fatal aneurysm because of some kind of seizure (because it is struggling with too much data? Too many impulses?) lots of the time when you see people completely fucked up by it. Sometimes the minds of the two people in the same existence enter a kind of fugue state like you see with the weaponsmith. Every Booker you play as suffers from it the whole game whenever they get nose bleeds and blackouts.
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That said, El Cid and I are now officially a DL hypetrain?
You two + Pyro. That's a divergent enough set of views that I'm interested, at least.
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So I need to get Pyro listening to guitar wank. Okay.
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Rogue Souls:
- 1 death to Titanite Demon because he blocked me with his foot (DAMNIT FEET) and I couldn't avoid his l i t t l e m o n e y overly telegraphed attack that I actually had never seen actually connecting before. Spoiler: It hurts.
- 1 death because I tried to jumpslash Minotaur Demon and he blocked me with his foot.
- 1 death because I ignored a zombie knight who actually followed me around and got me in a corner (bastard)
On the plus side on one run I tried to fight Shiva and pal and won. Barely.
Not going well at all, Dark Souls 1 is indeed by far the hardest game out of all three. Normal enemies do a ton of damage. At least gold pine resins murder the earlygame bosses.
I'm tempted to just go with a Zweihander or something, and ignore tha Murakumo for a while. I want to try it out and all, but having to spend all the earlygame souls on a dumb crest hurts.
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Fenrir why are you not just headshotting the titanite demon from a million miles away. For reals. (I hope you left a BE WARY OF FEET message.) Also sorcery is really easymode DS1, there's almost nothing in the game this notably fails against (oh hi crystal golems meet low-requirement blunt weapons instead). Is this not being considered as an option?
You know, I'm forced to wonder what you're going to do with yourself if/when you actually accomplish this.
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I'm waiting with baited breath for all the Seethe skip failures.
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Seethe skip would be a speed run thing though. Fenrir can go with safe but slow routes rather than high risk high technical execution things 3/4 of the way through a run.
That said more Bone Wheel Skeleton shield strats plz.
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That's sure a lot of words to defend a character from a 14 year old game against detractors.
Any time I see more than three sentences from Meep I just assume I'll be bored and skip it so maybe try that.
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Zenny, I haven't played Burial at Sea so can't speak for that (that does sound bad) and yeah agree on they are generally not interesting questions anyway. I just wanted to answer the one I could. Even as someone that likes Infinite it is a thing I liked as a journey, not as something you sit down and analyse. Your mileage will vary on if you think the stories shallow enough that they only hold up during the journey being an acceptable or not. For lots of video games, especially action based ones I think that is fine personally. If you give me an action based movie as well that references as broadly and well read as Bioshock Infinite does then I would probably be just as likely to come out happy as well.
That said, the Lutece's motivation isn't revenge so much as trying to correct what they see as a great wrong and prevent Comstock from existing and creating an infinite number of brainwashed fanatical Elizabeth's that want to conquer in the name of god with steel and fire who all have the ability to hop between dimensions.
There is more than one Comstock just like there is more than one Booker, there is still a nearly limitless number of divergent paths that take place during people's lives for all the parallel universes. The point to go back and off Booker before Comstock can be "born" during the baptism is that it destroy every single possible scenario where there could have been a Comstock that would buy a child off a Booker.
Also travel doesn't cause amnesia specifically, it is existing in the parallel universe causes the brain to struggle with accepting the new reality. The brain rejects it and starts suffering a fatal aneurysm because of some kind of seizure (because it is struggling with too much data? Too many impulses?) lots of the time when you see people completely fucked up by it. Sometimes the minds of the two people in the same existence enter a kind of fugue state like you see with the weaponsmith. Every Booker you play as suffers from it the whole game whenever they get nose bleeds and blackouts.
That I can agree with. Like I said, I would be lying if I said I didn't enjoy the game. It's just... ugh, Ken Levine, stop.
You know it probably says something about how mind blowingly stupid the ending was that I completely forgot about the interlude where Booker sees Elizabeth destroying New York. That said at least in those Universes it seems like she doesn't have her dimensional powers, but yeah that probably explains the Luteces enough.
I think discussing anything else at this point is just going to be dancing around big-ass plot holes, and none of it is very good even before the DLC makes it super inconsistent, so I'm ready to put thinking about the game to rest.
Now to pass this test in July and then download Dark Souls so I can be several months late in joining Cid and Fenrir. Yay.
Ignore Meeple
In my defense I was reading from my phone scrolling upward and unfortunately didn't realize it was Meeple until I got the jist of the post. Really, it is my own fault.
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Played through Disgaea D2. Pretty fun romp if you enjoy the series in general, though it's unlikely to do anything major to change your mind if you're not a Disgaea fan. I'm bored and feel like rambling so I'll break it down a bit.
The good:
As Disgaea experiences go, DD2 is incredibly streamlined and convenient. The shop system has been retooled; customer rank, rather than functioning as the maximum shop rank you can achieve by passing bills in the Dark Assembly, simply gives you -3% to purchase prices and +3% to sell prices per rank. (It advances a bit slower than it used to as such, which is fine.) Shop rank is now instead capped by game progress, and advances automatically; the game holds it at a minimum rank equal to your current chapter minus one, and you can pass a Dark Assembly bill to raise it one rank (and only one rank, as it's capped at your current chapter).
Tweaking enemy levels is no longer in the Dark Assembly at all; it's now simply a menu toggle which you can do freely in the new Cheat Shop, which also lets you do things like adjust the balance of how much EXP/HL/Mana you earn. I found that generally, it was best leaving the rates at 100% until you promoted whatever generics you end up using one or two tiers, and then dumping mana gain while boosting EXP and HL as high as the chapter allows them to go; there is vanishingly little need to use the Dark Assembly in maingame in DD2 - at most you'll spend maybe 300 mana per generic you use and then maybe another 300-400 or so split across the story PCs. (You probably will use a couple generics, since for most of the game you only have 5 forced story PCs in this one.)
The master/apprentice system and Extra Gain are back all the way from Disgaea 1, fittingly since this game is a direct sequel. However, this system too is massively streamlined; master/apprentice relationships can be changed at will for free, and there are no funny adjacency requirements on an apprentice using their master's skills/spells (and yes, weapon skills are inherited by apprentices just as spells are). It is utterly trivial to teach your entire team Heal/Espoir for example by apprenticing absolutely everyone to Flonne or a generic healer and having them cast it on themselves in battle 3 times. That's it. That's all you have to do. By the same token, you can create a new generic in deep postgame, apprentice them to Laharl and have the entire sword weapon skill tree learned on the new character in a matter of minutes without grinding weapon mastery levels the old-fashioned way.
Gone, too, are rarity numbers on equipment; it is now simply a trinary system - equips are either normal, rare or legendary, and can be upgraded in rarity by running (a lot of) Item World. Common items upgrade to rare when you clear 30 floors in them, and rare items upgrade to legendary when you clear 60 floors in them. Unlike in previous Disgaeas, if you clear an item's world in its entirety, you can now rerun it for even more item levels (if you're so inclined for aftergame, you can actually level items up to level 999).
As this is a direct sequel, the core cast from the original Disgaea (Laharl/Etna/Flonne) is back, and you have all three of them for the entire game. The Disgaea 1 cast is probably my least favorite Disgaea cast, but this game handles them, IMO, better than the original game did - possibly because it doesn't have to waste time developing them and can just jump right into the crazy hijinks. Sadly, none of the other Disgaea 1 characters return as playables besides those three, and only one of them even appears at all. DD2 is pretty light on story PCs in general: you get one at the end of chapter 2, another at the end of chapter 4, and then you don't get the last forced story PC until just before the final chapter (10). There are, however, two optional story PCs that can be recruited in maingame (after chapters 5 and 6 respectively); both are worth it IMO.
Unlocking new tiers of generic classes is back to the (superior) Disgaea 1 system: based solely on category and level. You can level a tier 1 up and unlock all tiers from it - no need to level up, reincarnate to tier 2, level up again, etc., etc. Even if it wasn't back to that standard, you wouldn't need to anyway - as briefly alluded above, generics can now promote to their class' next tier now without reincarnating for (current tier*100) mana or thereabouts.
The bad:
As Disgaea plots go, this is one of the weaker ones really. There wasn't a whole lot left to *do* with this cast after Disgaea 1, and it kind of shows. It doesn't really detract from the game too badly, but coming off of Disgaea 4's strong effort it contrasts quite a bit.
Also, as mentioned, weapon mastery is back. At least you only have to really grind each weapon once and then you can just apprentice all the skills around after that.
General commentary/things that aren't good or bad:
Overall, in a lot of ways DD2 played like a heavily modernized, streamlined remake of Disgaea 1. This is not exactly a bad thing, as it does keep most of the good things from later Disgaea games while adding some of its own (CHEAT SHOP HYPE), but weapon mastery returning is arguably a regression. Magichange is gone, as well, replaced by monster mounting; this is a fairly lateral change IMO - humanoid PCs can "mount" monster PCs; while mounted, the combined unit cannot use either any of the monster's skills nor the humanoid's weapon skills; only basic physicals and any magic the humanoid PC has learned are available, plus a "Collaboration Attack" which is basically functionally the same as D3/D4 magichange specials. Unlike magichange, mounting has no time limit. The combined unit uses the defensive stats of the monster, and the offensive stats of the humanoid, as far as I can tell; if the monster is killed, the humanoid is left on the field still. Overall I found monster PCs still pretty good.
I'm not the right person to stat topic the game since I grind a little too much, but I think it'd be fun to speculate on how these PCs would look in the DL in a Futurama or the like, so I'm going to do that below. The new characters will be tinyfonted for spoilers but not the main three. (Note: All "stat boost" evilities cap at +200%.)
Laharl:
He's pretty much the same as his D1 version. In-game, he has two different evilities: one that he carries for chapter 4 only, and one that he has for the rest of the game outside of chapter 4. In aftergame you can switch between his evilities in the Dark Assembly; switching to his chapter 4 evility is trivial but switching back to his regular one is expensive on mana and has a low pass rate. His standard evility gives him +10% to all stats for every unit KOed in the battle (until the end of the map, and both sides count), while his chapter 4 evility adds the restriction that the KOed units must be equal or higher level to him, but ratchets the stat boost up to a whopping 25%. Sadly neither of these evilities do a damn thing for him in the DL. He comes with swords by default, and has A affinity with fists/swords/axes. He is likely better off with fists than swords in this game, as his innate skills give him all the AoE he really needs and fist damage is generally better on single targets. I ran him with swords and found them surprisingly a little underwhelming compared to my fist-using generic or even Etna's spears.
Etna:
Solid upgrade from the D1 version, I think, no matter what. Spears are better, spear techs are better, and she's just all around better. Starts with spears, has A in spear/gun/axe. She probably wants to stay with spear. She has a spurious claim to a very overpowered spear for "plot" reasons as well, though it's totally missable and it's not actually unique to her so I could totally see not allowing it. (Specifics: You have to pass a bill at the Dark Assembly to make her stop following you in the base - which costs 10 mana and always succeeds - then hit the two hidden switches in the Overlord's Castle to open up the secret room where her diary was in Disgaea 1. The switches are in the exact same places as D1, too. Then you have to read the entire diary and you get the weapon. The weapon is a "unique" in the sense that it's not in the standard rank scheme for Disgaea equipment, and the description in-game specifically calls it "Etna's favorite spear"; it's guaranteed legendary and has 1500 ATK/300 DEF/262 RES/262 HIT plus whatever its innocents grant. However, you CAN equip it on any spear user. It's only there in the aftergame, though you can do it immediately upon clearing with no other requirements.)
Like Laharl, Etna has two evilities: one that she carries for the entirety of the main game, and a second which she gains (in addition to her original one, not replacing it) immediately on game clear (automatically; nothing special must be done to unlock it). The maingame evility boosts her damage by 50% against full-HP targets, while the aftergame evility doubles(!) all her stats if she's the only non-Prinny PC on the map (being alone counts!) Obviously if you allow her this, she's pretty terrifying in duels.
Flonne:
Definitely upgraded from the D1 version as well, even if you don't allow her spells learned from Extra Gain. Staff physicals now are based on INT and are ranged. Add to this that Flonne can counter, and that DD2 counters are now universal rather than only triggered by basic physicals - specials and spells trigger counters just as physicals do - and the fact that Flonne's attacking specials aren't too bad anyway. She gets S mastery in staves and A with bows and books; going books gives her a sleep weapon skill at the cost of ranged counters. Like the other two mains, she has two evilities: one which she carries for chapters 1-8, and a second she carries for the final 2 chapters. In aftergame, she returns to the first evility and you have to spend (a lot of) mana to get the second evility back. The second evility is the one she uses against the final boss though. Her initial evility gives her +10% to all stats whenever she heals someone to full HP (until the end of the map); her lategame evility gives her percentage stat boosts when she is healed, equal to the percentage of HP she regained (so if she's healed for 50% of her HP - overhealing doesn't count - +50% to all stats).
Oh, and she innately learns healing spells. Yeah, her second evility is absolutely insane for dueling anyone who doesn't OHKO her or status her to death. It's about as broken in-game too.
Sicily:
Eeeh... well, she's a slightly better D1 Flonne, I guess. She's got S in books and A in staves; books are really not great weapons, but since she doesn't get innate magic of any sort she depends on their weapon skills for much of her offensive game. So it goes. Her specials are basically "Laharl but INT-based", and her stats are much the same really. Her evility reduces all elemental damage by 75%; this is processed separately from the standard elemental resist system (and stacks multiplicatively with it as such, not additively). It doesn't catch Star element; personally I'd interp it as catching all common elements, but not stuff like the esoteric SO elements or Almighty or the like. Book weaponskills give her a sleep skill, which helps some.
Lanzarote:
She's a palette swapped Archer that trades some offensive stats for stat-buff spells, including some which are normally unique to the Sea Angel monster class (and which cannot be apprenticed onto other PCs). DD2 stat buffs are +50% stat for 3 turns, so this is good, but she can't buff DEF or RES. Her evility is simply +4% all stats to all allies and -4% all stats to all enemies, nothing too interesting. Most of the unique buffs are irrelevant in the DL (one gives +50% crit rate, which is nice). Standard weapon is bow (S), and she has no better than B in any other weapon.
Barbara:
Basically a palette swapped Heavy Knight with a different hair style. Standard weapon is spear. She only has two specials but they're pretty good. She has A in sword, spear and axe, and probably just wants to stay with spear since she's a late PC and she starts with the most levels there. Her evility boosts her attack and defense by 50% and makes her always counterattack (if in range) when she is defending... which means she probably just wants to spam Defend in duels and let things kill themselves on her as that's likely to be her best damage if her opponent can't outrange her.
Asagi:
She's a maingame PC this time, if an optional one! She's got S in guns, nothing above B elsewhere, and has the same skillset as her Disgaea 4 "HD Asagi" DLC incarnation as far as I can tell. Her evility is useless in the DL (whenever she performs a Team Attack, she attacks again, up to a maximum of 3 times if she repeatedly Team Attacks). Gun skills are decent and she can possibly outright kite with them since she has 5 movement as well. Hmm.
Porkmeister:
The other maingame optional PC and the only story monster. Like his father Hoggmeiser in Disgaea 1, he's simply "generic Minotaur with better stats and better specials" and a unique evility (in this case, +30% all stats whenever any "Overlord" is on the map, so nothing in the DL). Eh.
Final boss:
Well, all he does is spam one massively overpowered attack (it OHKOed all but one of my PCs it hit), but his evility makes him a potentially very interesting dueler. His evility drains stats from nearby units (regardless of allegiance) and adds them to his own: 30% of base (unequipped) stats at point-blank range, -3% per square of distance between him and the unit.
EDIT: A few added notes that might be helpful for anyone who DOES stat topic DD2 sometime:
- Final boss is level 80. I'd probably take endgame levels somewhere right around there, though getting there would take some grinding, in large part because the final boss' design strongly encourages overpowering him with a single PC supported by a very tanky healer. In my case, with moderate grinding, I had levels in the high 80s/low 90s and most of my characters were getting OHKOed by him.
- DD2 counters are the most inclusive things I've ever seen, in sharp contrast to counters in early Disgaea games: everything offensive triggers them, whether basic physical or special physical or magic, and whether ST or MT.
Also, I added another point to the good things above.
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The end of Burial at Sea is really fucking uncomfortable and it doesn't seem to serve any real purpose other than shock value.
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Her dimensional powers are specifically because she is partly in two dimensions (the lost finger). I suppose we don't actually know if that is a singular situation (we know multiple Elizabeths are functionally stolen from Bookers because Comstock can't have kids...), but I doubt it. The Luteces only needed to succeed once to make the change, but there is clearly multiple Comstocks with functioning flying cities and they only worked on the strengths of Lutece. Not sure how much is derived from Elizabeth and how much from Lutece. Shit I don't think we have any idea of what Elizabeth ends up like if she doesn't have powers. Or does Colombia even end up with the power to effect that kind of change just on what Lutece more restrained transdimensional stuff.
Anyway, none of that is particularly interesting like you said. It is mostly just filling in plot holes by digging bigger ones. Like I said, for me it is far more enjoyable a ride than a well built road.
Oh and for what it is worth, he didn't run the studio into the ground. He just closed it. Dropped the mic while he was on top. Suck it h8rz. In no way was Bioshock Infinite not a success financially.
Also plz no pissing contest. I will shit on your chest later if it makes you happy.
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Played through Disgaea D2. Pretty fun romp if you enjoy the series in general, though it's unlikely to do anything major to change your mind if you're not a Disgaea fan. I'm bored and feel like rambling so I'll break it down a bit.
What a great summary of all of the salient points of Disgaea D2! Thanks for this, I will link to it often.
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I'm waiting with baited breath for all the Seethe skip failures.
I'm inclined to suggest Seath mk. 1 death shouldn't count since it's basically a forced plot kill (and the skip route is incredibly risky, since you know it isn't supposed to be possible).
Also Zenny how in the world could you ever mistake a Meeple post for someone not Meeple. Just saying.
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Your question about Elizabeth without powers is answered in Burial at Sea pt 2.
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Any time I see more than three sentences from Meep I just assume I'll be bored and skip it so maybe try that.
In my defense I was reading from my phone scrolling upward and unfortunately didn't realize it was Meeple until I got the jist of the post. Really, it is my own fault.
Does it hurt to be that far up your own ass? What is this, second grade? You need a time out?
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Not to mention we just spent like 2 months talking about Xenogears plot.
Saints Row 3: I think this is the first game I've seen that lets you put facial hair on women. Also, it has the Three Amigos Salute built into it, so automatic 10/10 game.
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Bravely Default - Still poking through this. I am still getting minor enjoyment out of doing all the side stuff. Just minor differences between things is interesting and cute how it is only hinted at rather than fully fleshed out, but does leave me wanting more.
Now I want to talk about Natural Talent. This is hands down the most expensive skill in the game. For 1 SP and 3 equipment slots you double your attack power. It needs to be used with Knuckle Lore on most classes.
This competes with Double Hand which is 1 SP and does the exact same buff.
Fuck Natural Talent.
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Two-Handed only doubles the -wielded weapon power-, I thought. Doubling the actual -attack- stat post-weapon modifiers is a different ballpark.
That said, Natural Talent's still a terrible skill, it exists only for shiny numbers.
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Transistor: Marathoned. It was... ok. Good, even. But not nearly as good as Bastion, and unfortunately that is a comparison the developers heavily invited on themselves, advertising and selling the game entirely on the strengths of "from the makers of Bastion! With Logan Cunningham!" etc. In addition to making parts of the game strongly resemble Bastion when they didn't have to, particularly the Backdoor hub area. So it's hard to get away from that when talking about it.
The gameplay at least is very fun and not much like Bastion's, despite appearing similar at first glance. It's more like... I dunno, SRPG DDS, or Frozen Synapse if anyone else played that. There are really two battle systems going on at once, and you can choose to use either or both: A. basic realtime run around and hit things, wherein individual skills have their own cooldowns, and B. the Turn() system, which lets you stop time and queue up a sequence of movement and attacks which you then execute near-instantly. The catch is that coming out of Turn() has a long cooldown during which you can do nothing but walk around.
Turn() is super awesome and fun, lets you constantly feel like you're stopping time and omnislashing crowds to death, or surgical striking certain targets, or whatever you please. It's not the best choice in every situation, though, and your Turn is not *quite* instantaneous or uninterruptible. Certain enemies can teleport away or counterattack even in the middle of a Turn, and lategame opponents have their own Turn system they can use against you - quite dangerous!
The actual skills and attacks you use are... well the system is complicated to explain but not that bad to set up in practice. You have some number of slots for active skills, active skills can have other skills attached to them to modify and boost their effects (like materia links, or Diablo 3 runes), there's a max Memory limit keeping your total abilities in check, and on top of all this your skills are also your party members and using them more unlocks more bios and conversations with them. Quite a lot of builds and customizations are possible, but each individual skill is pretty easy to grasp.
Fights themselves are kind of lacking though, after a while, and while many builds are possible, if you have any amount of basic gaming skill and some rudimentary Turn() strategy it's not hard to hack through everything using whatever you want. Getting "killed" doesn't even kill you, it just disables one of your active skills until the next save point or two. I guess you could die if you ran out of all skills but that seems very difficult to do, I only got skill broken a couple of times across the whole game.
Atmosphere and aesthetics are, of course, the game's other major selling point, and on this point it definitely delivers. Music and visual design are A+++++, the atmosphere is incredible, lots of lavish little touches, very immersive, neat world, general praise. This is where it certainly exceeds Bastion, even. There's even some online integration, you can see ghostly flickers of other players walking around sometimes, and interact with them (sort of) by humming and dancing.
Characters and story though... not... so much. Transistor takes the "start in media res, explain nothing" style of narrative up to 11, and while I respect that style, it does come with some risks and I think the game does run afoul of those. Especially compared to Bastion, which did the same thing but much better. By the end of Bastion, I was emotionally sold on caring about all the characters to some extent, and they all had some depth except for The Kid. By the end of Transistor, I was sold on Red (the protagonist), but... that was about it. She has some depth, but all the other characters are mostly one-note, even the Logan Cunningham Narrator Plot Device Sword.
And, avoiding spoilers, but... that ending... the ending is bad. The depth that Red does have feels like it's concealed from the player and only comes out at the very end, making for a very jarring "wait, what just happened?" conclusion. Bastion offered 2 x2 choices in the endgame, and all options felt real and valid and like the player could "own" their actions, even though there was one clearly encouraged path. Transistor offers no choices at all to the player, Red acts on her own, and the actions she chooses made me seriously reconsider the connection and understanding I had felt with her up until then. This was a big deal to me and had a significant impact on my enjoyment of the game when immediately looking back on it.
Transistor is also short. Very short. Like 4 hours short. I wish it was about 1.5x to 2x as long, both in gameplay and story. There isn't enough meat there to fully explore either the combat ("Oh come on, enemies just started getting Turn()! We're out of the tutorial now, things are just getting interesting!") or the storyline ("Oh, finally, a hint to an actual plot and some explanation - wait it's over?"). Other than the incredible amount of polish on the aesthetics, it feels more like an amateur tech demo than a complete game, like we should be waiting for "Bastion, from the makers of Transistor!" rather than vice versa. There are "limiters," which are like Bastion's challenge idols but less fleshed out. There are challenge rooms for survival and skill training, like Bastion's but less fleshed out (too easy, and they close after beating them once, unlike Bastion's which you could replay endlessly).
It's pretty. It's fun. I certainly don't regret playing Transistor, and taking it on its own it's probably a solid 7/10 or so. But I also can't help but feel disappointed at the amount of unrealized potential, and the constant comparison to Bastion *really* pushes that in your face. Final verdict: a fine game that could and probably should have been more than fine.
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Two-Handed only doubles the -wielded weapon power-, I thought. Doubling the actual -attack- stat post-weapon modifiers is a different ballpark.
That said, Natural Talent's still a terrible skill, it exists only for shiny numbers.
Can't equip weapons with it. Minor functional difference . Fuck the skill and it should feel bad for being terrible. If it let you equip accessories or more FFT monk style stripped your Helm slot it would maybe be okay.
Level 14 skill like it is though? lol. I could use it if I wanted to stay in Monk forever I guess. Which I have no inclination to do. Monk blows and is boring.
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Child of Light: Girl, you'll be a woman soon.
The POWER OF THE MOON is now mine. Presently under the sea (because that's the solution to everything). I actually had a gameover today! "*MT magic* -> Oh that's right, these guys counter magic. *casts another spell at critical HP because surely this one will finish the enemies, right? It doesn't*" Total stupidity on my part. Hard mode does tend to peg the better bosses 'round the level of "Crap, the whole party's out of MP, this guy better die in the next couple attacks or I'll have to actually use an item. *Boss dies in the next couple attacks*" Which I think is a fine place for boss difficulty to be. Forgot to mention it before, but hard mode also appears to take away the in-battle healing/MP restoration you get with flowers. This actually matters for bosses! (Not so much for randoms since you level up constantly and the game swipes the whole full-heals-on-levelup thing from P2.)
Last progress for a few days since going out of town tomorrow.
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Two-Handed only doubles the -wielded weapon power-, I thought. Doubling the actual -attack- stat post-weapon modifiers is a different ballpark.
That said, Natural Talent's still a terrible skill, it exists only for shiny numbers.
Can't equip weapons with it. Minor functional difference . Fuck the skill and it should feel bad for being terrible. If it let you equip accessories or more FFT monk style stripped your Helm slot it would maybe be okay.
Level 14 skill like it is though? lol. I could use it if I wanted to stay in Monk forever I guess. Which I have no inclination to do. Monk blows and is boring.
It also adds the power of fists (which, with Knuckle Lore, as you mentioned, actually -matters-, since it's a Level*affinity power weapon with that). Without that, though, it'd be useless even as a shiny number depository.
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Yes. And that opportunity cost is still dumb and bad and needs to die in a fire. Too lazy to math it out, but knee jerk is saying that needs it only starts to outpace the boosts of Double Hand at like post level 50 at the cost of an extra skill slot where you could just as easily place P.atk + 10%, so they are competing with that too, bumps it +5 or 10 levels on top.
A super late game skill that comes at the cost of literally all your defense is so very very bad.
You are right at the end there. Did you get Gen? You can get her straight after the Giant fight and I didn't realise so missed her because I thought there was going to be more game... (not that this bothers me. She is still boring and is filling in holes left behind).
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Natural Talent is a 1 CP skill, and is better than anyting else for boosting offense assuming you use fists (which you can in Monk by default). If you are looking for big shiny offense it can definitely help. You can certainly hit the damage cap with other gimmicks, but Natural Talent is useful if you are of a mind to just out and out KO a boss with Bravely Second. Otherwise you can play around with that + See You In Hell/Revive or Auto-Phoenix for some amusing ways of messing with enemies. It's there if you feel you really must have one PC capable of laying down 70K+ damage/turn in various twisted ways (Rages, SEe you in Hell, etc). And I've played around to OHKO the final boss with relatively minimal effort buffing and a single SP. You can probably use it as a part of a setup to blitz the final boss fight's 2 'real' portions. Unfortunately it is harder to do this with the penultimate boss because of the HP buffering.
Zone of the Enders HD:
Played through 2nd Runner. The translation remains absolutely terrible and no good too. The visuals aren't impressive enough to warrant mention in this day and age, having no real artistic value either. The gameplay is interesting because being able to teleport and throw around mechs like baseballs is amusing. Two bosses stand out as really quite annoying this time. Both the Viola AI fight and the "Damaged Jehuty" Anubis showdown were frustrating due to rather stupid limits for fairly difficult fights (Viola randomly decides to destroy herself and cause a game-over! Anubis can KO you in a single combo and the mechanics of fighting it are wonky due to the teleportation!) Otherwise it's enjoyable enough but I can't recommend this game series anymore.
MVP Subweapon is Gauntlet. Because it is just so dang useful in a variety of missions that would otherwise be incredibly frustrating. City defense, Tunnel train fight, War sequence....
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Fishgirl was acquired (I am extremely thorough! I fight everything and loot everything I can find before moving on.) She's okay as an enemy delaying mechanism, obviously not outshining Slow or anything but functional enough. Haven't tried her other skills at all. I should maybe use paralysis more since nothing seems to immune status in this game. Standard party tends to be something like Aurora + either happy clown or capitalist rodent to interrupt enemies, sub in Finn for one or the other if I need elemental nukes. I have barely used sad clown because slowing enemies > hasting party given how frequently you might be swapping party members, or the slow bruisers (although Oengus could be useful as a distraction I guess?) which is pretty par for the course with me in games where speed actually matters.
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On normal at least Oengus was pretty amazing, especially if you use Sad Clown to buff him. Between mixing Taunt + defend and his basic physical being pretty solid in late game environment where Magic is sometimes punished he is a solid performer.
The best use I found for Haste was buffing Sad Clown so he could dump interrupt ignore and defense buffs on people better. Slow is hands down the better status, but Haste being significantly cheaper lasting 8 turns and off Sad Clown competing with Slow from Mouse being expensive and only lasting a couple made it significantly more competitive. That said Haste was something I found that I would apply tactically while Slow was something you would just slap on universally.
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KH3D: Congrats, for finishing the first set of worlds you get to...GO BACK TO TRAVERSE TOWN BECAUSE TWEWY!
...what? That's pretty much what happened, honest!
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Any time I see more than three sentences from Meep I just assume I'll be bored and skip it so maybe try that.
In my defense I was reading from my phone scrolling upward and unfortunately didn't realize it was Meeple until I got the jist of the post. Really, it is my own fault.
Does it hurt to be that far up your own ass? What is this, second grade? You need a time out?
Oh no I'm not paying equal attention to everyone and also not giving everyone a valentine on Valentine's Day. How terrible of me. What do you expect me to do, read a bunch of words about shit that doesn't interest me because everyone is special?
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What I expect is that you keep being an ass. What I hope is that you be a bit quieter about it.
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Oh no I'm not paying equal attention to everyone and also not giving everyone a valentine on Valentine's Day. How terrible of me. What do you expect me to do, read a bunch of words about shit that doesn't interest me because everyone is special?
Wait... I'm not getting a Valentine from you? I am outraged! As punishment, you have to play Dawn of Mana.
Child of Light: Finished. Quick game, the best kind of game for my schedule. Helps that it is highly polished and a lot of fun at base. I didn't manage to find the "Golem" PC. No idea where to look, and I only know it exists due to gamefaqs. Still, despite that, great game overall. The three main bosses were all decently challenging and a lot of fun throwing all the different PCs at them. The 'equipment' system in the game is a little bit at odds with the idea of using all the PCs though. I ended up using Sad Clown and Bulky Mask the most, with Aurora being a primary switch-in.
After beating the game, you're sent back to the beginning with all your PCs and stats, but apparently this is not the same as NG+, where you just keep your stats. Not quite sure the point of the 'epilogue' there. Game needs more documentation online. 8/10-9/10 game.
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Epilogue appears to just be for doing stuff you missed. I have no idea of a "Golem" PC.
Edit - It is DLC.
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This is the second best DLC golem PC I've ever seen
I don't know why I want to do it melee Cid. Magic just feels kind of boring. Will do it if I fail too many times. I'm done with the Murakumo for now, it's too stupid. I'll try getting something that sounds almost as equally dangerous to get at the beginning of the game instead; the Great Scythe.
Grefter you have to die against Seath once in some BS unbeatable fight unless you use do some insanely tricky and dangerous (and unintented obviously) jump to completely skip it.
I think I'll just practice the jump with another character
Then fail it with my main No Deaths character
And say "Ok whatever, fuck the first fight with Seath, it doesn't count"
Zenny: Guessing you're getting the second one? Did you play the first one?
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Civ 5- Immortal game, default settings, using Polynesia. The only change I made was turning off diplomatic wins and kept policy saving on. This is unusual, as I usually have barbs/CS/ancient ruins off and play with my setup some. I'm halfway through the renaissance and competitive in tech; which means I'll probably win the game.
I was able to build the Great Library and the Temple of Artemis, which is amazingly lucky on Immortal. A lot of that was stumbling over El Dorado first and getting lucky on finding survivors in ancient ruins, but still. The AI completely ignored both wonders, I turned on IGE and checked- the closest civ was 10 turns away from building the library. Still, yay, good start right? Nope. The neighbors make up for it.
Polynesia's UA was actually pretty important here. I met most of the CSes first, so that was an appreciable jump in gold.
I have Rome to my north (They literally went hostile to me on the third turn after I met them), Japan to my east, and Persia to my west. The first reset is where I go to war, lose my westernmost city, and have Rome *and* Japan DoW me midway through the process. Yeah. Turns out I saved a turn before Persia backstabbed me and declares war, so I have to monkey around a bit. Thankfully all three civs are deceptive/friendly rather than hostile. I sell some luxuries to Persia for all their cash before war starts and use the money to bribe Rome into DoWing Gandhi. This is super criticial, as Rome has a direct border with my capital city. Japan will only declare war if they see weakness, so thankfully they don't DoW me. I end up forcing a stalemale, but have to switch from wonder whoring to building military to prevent from getting steamrolled by the AI.
I end up getting into a two front war with Rome and Persia in the late Medieval era, but I have a Great General at that point so a Citadel+archer in Captial means Rome can't do shit besides annoy me until artillery. The western front with Persia was a bloody meatgrinder again, but thankfully I only lose 3-4 units and not a city. I'm not worried about Persia after this war, as they have Austria on their borders and are a small empire. I am pretty appreciably outteching them already, just they had a lot of bodies to throw at me.
Besides that, Austria has a giant ass empire I an mercifully unconnected with. I am going to have DoW them as soon as I get planes, they are buying up CS at an alarming rate and I'm not going to be able to win the space race against them.
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Kingdom Hearts 3D: So ok, I knew Mickey was a total bad ass in the Kingdom Hearts universe; anyone who has played KH2 knows that. What I didn't know is that the KH universe actually ACKNOWLEDGES how bad ass he is.
Case in point: Maleficent and Pete have to kidnap Minnie in hopes to blackmail Mickey into giving up a macguffin. When this fails, does Maleficent try to go for "Plan B: TAKE BY FORCE!"? Hell no, she presses the abort button and gets out of there, pretty much acknowledging she'd get her ass kicked. Granted, he had support in the form of a few others, but still, this pretty much confirms that Maleficent fears Mickey Mouse. Yes, Maleficent, the top evil Disney villain the KH-verse, is running scared of Mickey Mouse.
Say what you will about KH Universe plot, this is one thing it has done oh so right.
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Final Fantasy Dimensions: into chapter 2 now. Game is really feeling like a significantly harder (but still not amazingly hard) FF5 with moderately worse execution mechanically (some of which I know about because I FAQed).
I am somewhat strongly unfond of e.g. the way the game seems to emphasize fusion abilities as the best skills in game, doesn't tell you how to get any of them, and then compounds the problem by capping all job levels at 3 unless you spend a finite* resource (blindly) to increase those caps; it seems entirely likely that without FAQs, you'll miss most of the good F-abilities outright as a lot of them aren't exactly intuitive combinations. It's also compounded a fair bit that a number of core optimization abiltiies are very deep in some jobs, really limiting your options for building characters if you don't want them to be terrible (examples: any magic user, whether offensive or healer, who doesn't have Black Mage 20 is awful; missing Paladin 14 on any light-side melee halves your damage potential; missing Ninja 20 on any dark-side melee similarly halves your damage potential). It reminds me of the worse aspects of Diablo 2 character building and feels very stifling in a job-system game.
That all said, still enjoying the game. I feel a bit overleveled though.
(* said resource is not finite in aftergame if you feel like grinding your balls off)
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Bravely Default: Chapter 5.
Cleaned out the asterisk fights (despite the fact that it's not really clear that Eternia is in the wrong anymore...? Well the part about the wind/water/fire dying is certainly bad and Agnes fixes it, but nobody seems very interested in how that worked.) Then cleaned out the dragons, then did the Vampire asterisk and figured out where the game was going since he clues you in pretty well. Haha, that's interesting. Okay, fine, I wanted to bust a crystal anyway but Orthos & Rusalka gave me Genomes I didn't want to have to repeat getting again, and oh look Sage Yulyana confirms Agnes is the angel and says everything is going like it did in the BAD version. Well now I even have an excuse in-character to bust a crystal to vary things up. So I do it after Chaugmar (who is EZ) and - hooray, plot confirmed, that's pretty fun (if aggravating in that Our Villain is correct in WHY DIDN'T PEOPLE ASK MORE QUESTIONS EARLIER). Except it also rushed me straight to the Finale, and not Finale Bravely Default. Should I reset, or let autosave take its course? I don't want to have to replay the game to get Finale Bravely Defualt, and if there's an NG+ option I don't want to make C6-C8 super EZ from having to level enough to beat the final bosses.
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Zenny: Guessing you're getting the second one? Did you play the first one?
I actually hadn't decided yet.
Then Steam put Dark Souls 1 on sale for 7 dollars.
So I have that now and am trying to avoid installing it asap.
Any time I see more than three sentences from Meep I just assume I'll be bored and skip it so maybe try that.
In my defense I was reading from my phone scrolling upward and unfortunately didn't realize it was Meeple until I got the jist of the post. Really, it is my own fault.
Does it hurt to be that far up your own ass? What is this, second grade? You need a time out?
Oh no I'm not paying equal attention to everyone and also not giving everyone a valentine on Valentine's Day. How terrible of me. What do you expect me to do, read a bunch of words about shit that doesn't interest me because everyone is special?
What I expect is that you keep being an ass. What I hope is that you be a bit quieter about it.
Yep now is where I point out that Meeple is acting more mature than all of us at this very moment.
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@Snowfire, you don't need to reset, it takes you back to where you left off afterward.
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FF Dimensions: No really notable progress since the last post. I mostly play it not at home and I haven't been not at home.
Pokemon Flawless Platinum: This is a ROM hack of Pokemon Platinum, pretty much the usual sort of thing - makes all 493 pokemon catchable, rebalances the pokemon to make more (all?) of them much more viable endgame choices, rebalances trainers' teams etc. etc. difficulty hack. Comes in two flavors, regular and Challenge Mode (challenge mode has progressively higher level curve and trainers have progressively larger teams throughout the game). I'm playing the Challenge Mode variety. Looking at the documentation, almost every final evolution has been boosted up to at least 500 BST (there's a few in the 480-500 range, but generally speaking 500).
Took Piplup as starter. The net sum of changes to him in this hack: his Ability is now a 50/50 shot of either Torrent or Swift Swim (I got Swift Swim). Perhaps I should plain on strategies involving rain. As for the rest, he's seen very slight shifts to his bases bringing him (along with all other starters) to 545 BST at Empoleon, who has also seen his typing change to Water/Ice. As the moveset goes, he trades out Brine, Metal Claw and Aqua Jet for Aurora Beam, Icy Wind and Ice Shard respectively, which strikes me as a net positive... if only barely, that typing change hurts.
Lost to Barry. At this early stage of the game, all trainers have +1 level over the hack's normal mode, and Barry was no exception, hitting me with L6 Turtwig. Withdraw > Growl in this situation.
Now considering what sort of team I want to shoot for. A rain team might be an idea, using a Drizzle Politoed to set up; Water's probably one of the types that's least bad to run duplicates of, and there's plenty of dual-types for coverage to be had. Empoleon itself would handle grass types well with Ice Shard. Other Swift Swimmers at my disposal include Lumineon, Floatzel, Gorebyss, Relicanth, Luvdisc, Ludicolo, Kingdra, Mantine, Qwilfish, Omastar, Kabutops, and Seaking. Food for thought, anyway.
Labyrinth of Touhou: Started a new game of this, which will amount to I believe my fourth run of the game now, maybe third, I dunno. Regular new game rather than NG+, attempting a challenge run where I only recruit and use the 14 PCs the game forces on you. This means I get no status removal all game, which is sure to be joyful. Currently walled on the 2F boss fight with Youmu; I'm pretty sure I just flat out need another level to have a reasonable chance of beating her. So I'll grind more later. In a normal run I could probably take her at this level, but in a normal run I'd have things like potent ST healing and a backup tank that I don't get here.
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Legend of Dragoon- Minimalist/Story run. Beat Grand Jewel. Meru just went up two dragoon levels in one fight, hilarious~
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Zenny: Guessing you're getting the second one? Did you play the first one?
I actually hadn't decided yet.
Then Steam put Dark Souls 1 on sale for 7 dollars.
So I have that now and am trying to avoid installing it asap.
You could at least install it now and patch DSFix to save you the hassle later.
Also you'll need a controller, apparently it's horrible with KB+M
...
...
And remember that upgrading your weapon is a lot more important than levelling up.
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Captain K: Fair enough. I'd been assuming before that the "bad ending" referred to by others was to blindly follow and re-enact the previous world's events, and the "good ending" would be what I got onto via breaking the crystal. Oh well, it's still cool that the game at least lets you respond to its hints and take it off the rails.
On a more random BD note, checking a FAQ, I see that White Wind is basically an easter egg - to get it you need to not only Charm one specific enemy at low HP, but it needs to either be in C4 (aka before I even had Vampire) or in the final dungeon (whew for that to not enrage completionists at least). I suppose some ability had to be in there as a reward for the obscura-hunters. (And in fairness attempting to run Vampirism as your only group healing is asking for trouble anyway when big MT attacks are one of the dangers you face and exactly where WW is potentially bad.)
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Captain K: Fair enough. I'd been assuming before that the "bad ending" referred to by others was to blindly follow and re-enact the previous world's events, and the "good ending" would be what I got onto via breaking the crystal. Oh well, it's still cool that the game at least lets you respond to its hints and take it off the rails.
That would make a lot more sense than what they actually did.
And yeah you're pretty much correct about White Wind. Oh well, not like there haven't been easter egg-like blue magic spells before.
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Duck Tales Remastered - Beat the game on Extreme. The game's pretty much officially my bitch. That said... man, what a well-done remake. The redone music is excellent, the overall design is highly faithful to the original and the controls are a joy. Scrooge controls amazingly well - mobile both vertically and horizontally and allows for a highly precise maneuverability. It's pretty much amazing.
I also like the boss fights in general, with their generally interesting patterns and good balance between making you wait for chances to crack at the boss and overall slugging, though some are better than others: the Abominable Snow Woman is pretty much my favorite boss fight in the game, requiring both reflexes and a slight degree of aiming, while the Giant Moon Rat is my least favorite, with its overly simplistic dodge patterns. Magica de Spell's a runner up - in spite of being ultimately a bit easy, her patterns are really fun to deal with. Glad I got this game, though all that's left to do with it now is stuff like beating it without losing lives or without heart upgrades. We'll see about that eventually.
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Don't forget to swim in the money pool for 3 hours! If you aren't doing that, there's really no point in buying the game.
Kingdom Hearts 3D: Beat the 3 Musketeers World. yay for having Pete and being legitimately very different between Sora and Riku, rather than rehashes like most of the others.
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(http://media.pcgamer.com/files/2013/07/dt5.png)
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Pokemon Flawless Platinum: Decided to start over (since I was still early) and go with a different starter choice after some thought. So Turtwig it is, alright. The changes to him in the hack are minor, a little bit of HP and Attack gain bringing him up to 545 BST. Beat Barry this time. A little girl in the route south of Sandgem Town or whatever gives me an egg. My first stop is Lake Verity; the wilds here consist of most of the baby pokemon, and I went for a Cleffa. First one I caught was Modest with Magic Guard; perfect for what I usually run Clefable for (though -Attack is unfortunate for actually leveling the thing before I get TMs). If the hacker made Life Orb available in main game she will be a monster with it.
Started moving along. The trainers are surprisingly competent for early game; one youngster even switches on me for type advantage. Picked up a Zubat as well along the way (Mild, Inner Focus). Zubat has some rather interesting special movepool options, so that's not all bad. The hack's only change to the evolution line of note is that Crobat's evolution is now level-based (at 40) and it can have Anticipation as an ability. Got the Poketch in Jubilife (the hacker changed the questions asked by the clowns to expose some hack changes, which is a nice touch). I fight a couple junk trainers on Route 204 for exp and learn that low-level Abra have Hidden Power now. Also a nice touch, pokemon without attacks at level 1 are dumb.
Moving along, I face (and rather easily win) the second Barry fight - he was packing a single Potion this time - and shortly after, the little girl's egg hatches to reveal Manaphy. Oh my.
Edit: Fastforward a bit. Now have one badge, Roark took two tries to beat. I'm definitely in for a challenge here: while Gym Leader teams retain their type themes, they are very much specced like competitive teams in this hack's challenge mode (6 pokemon, hold items all around). For a sample, this is what Roark fielded:
Omanyte -Lv.13-Focus Sash -Stealth Rock, Water Gun, Withdraw, AncientPower
Kabuto-Lv.13-Big Root-Stealth Rock, Scratch, Absorb, Harden
Lileep-Lv.13-Petaya Berry-AncientPower, Grass Knot, Acid, Recover
Anorith-Lv.13-Zoom Lens-Fury Cutter, Harden, Dig, Rock Tomb
Cranidos-Lv.14-Liechi Berry-Headbutt, Leer, Focus Energy, Pursuit
Larvitar-Lv.15-Quick Claw-Bite, Sandstorm, Screech, Rock Slide
Nothing Manaphy couldn't handle after two Tail Glows and then Bubble spam to sweep, at least. Stealth Rock would have been a problem if I'd gotten in a situation where a switch would have been necessary, Omanyte's build more or less ensures he gets it off.
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Lightning Returns: I finally decided to start this game, just beat the prologue because that's often how I do these things for some reason (play prologue, even if it's short -> stop playing.)
My first impressions?
Gameplay: Ok, so it's an ARPG without actually being an ARPG...I'm not sure I'm fond of this. Why can't they just do what Crisis Core did? It got the same point across but simplified with less menu mess on the bottom! I guess I'm judging too early, but it feels like a streamlined ARPG, and I'm not sure I dig that, because, again, Crisis Core sort of did the same thing but felt more engaging, and less buttom mash-y.
Plot: Ok, ignoring the cluster **** action sequence beginning, here's what I've got:
A female protagonist sent by the gods to save a world that is inevitably going to die in a short amount of time. Said female protagonist wields a sword, and has not much in the way of emotions. Also said God is the SUPREME GOD, who let's face it, is going to either be the main villain or the "ultimate" villain (no, I haven't read spoilers, but after reading the Datalog, they pretty much put a huge "THIS IS THE FINAL BOSS!" sign on him, despite trying their best to pretend he's not. I'll be legitimately shocked if he's not the final boss.) Oh, and it seems "Saving" is synonymous with "Pull soul of person's body effectively killing them" making people not want to immediately "be saved." Also, sounds like the game is less linear and more mission based in terms of plot development too, as well as being "World Driven."
You know, sounds kind of original...I could dig this idea...OH WAIT:
(http://s230.photobucket.com/albums/ee57/staroceanuniverse/Boxart/VPL/VPJP.jpg)
...yeah, unless the game makes a huge left turn from the direction it's currently taking, it's freaking Valkyrie Profile but with Toriyama's paint job on it, so Lenneth becomes Lightning, the Norse setting becomes Cyber Dystopia, and Freya's Divine Phases are replaced with Hope and a super computer. Sorry if I sound negative, but all the parallels just kept popping up.
Then again, I suppose it's only logical this game is Valkyrie Profile considering what they did to Lightning in the previous game, design wise, and the usage of Valhalla there.
Characters: Ok, so Lightning = Lenneth, except without the charisma Lenneth had. I like Lightning in FF13 mind you (her role in FF13-2 is too minor to gauge beyond "All style, no substance"), but they're trying to treat her as someone she's not...a character I like more than Lightning at that! Snow is emo...I get it, it's 500 years later, so that could change a man, but damn it, DON'T GIVE US EMO SNOW! Hopefully they actually answer the question of what the hell Snow was doing in FF13-2, because they kind of left that in the dark (He's running around, as a l'Cie, doing...?) And Lumina...ok, on one hand, it is nice to see an energetic, happy go lucky antagonistic character...on the otherhand, they gave her way too much personality. Like even when she's talking to herself, she's giving way too many vibes of "^_^!!!!!!" I dunno; feels like they were aiming for a Joker-esque "Despite being the villain, she lightens up every scene she's in by stealing it!" but considering how much insanity is going on in the opening, she sort of falls short at the scene stealing, and instead her bright personality is just a real whiplash compared to "THIS IS SERIOUS STUFF YO!" opening, and not in a way that compliments the game.
Hopefully the game improves after the prologue, but it's not giving a good first impression. As a reminder, I like FF13 and FF13-2, so I don't want the finale to end up sucking but...*shrugs*
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Lost Odyssey- Fin. Good lord the endgame just goes on and on in this game.
In the end I think Lost odyssey reminds me of a weird cross between Legend of Dragoon and Legaia 2. there's a really good game with rock solid ideas here that just never comes together and expresses itself. While both those games manage to have more interesting enemy design and higher overall fun factor than LO, LO has two big things going for it that bring it up to respectable levels on the non-gameplay side.
Presumably anyone who gives a shit about this post knows what those two things are, so moving on.
All things considered I more or less spent the whole game after the intro settled on it being in the 7/10 range, and despite the last disc being about 10 hours longer than I wanted it to be I don't think it lost any points in the end.
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Super Metroid - Finished! It's a really fun game which I wished I'd discovered in the SNES days. May tackle Metroid Fusion next in the series.
FF13 - Decided to finish my playthrough, crushed the final boss~
Kirby's Adventure - At World 3 right now. This game is uber-fluff.
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Lost Odyssey- Fin. Good lord the endgame just goes on and on in this game.
In the end I think Lost odyssey reminds me of a weird cross between Legend of Dragoon and Legaia 2. there's a really good game with rock solid ideas here that just never comes together and expresses itself. While both those games manage to have more interesting enemy design and higher overall fun factor than LO, LO has two big things going for it that bring it up to respectable levels on the non-gameplay side.
Presumably anyone who gives a shit about this post knows what those two things are, so moving on.
I played this like 2 years ago and really have no idea what you're talking about.
Except the dreams obv.
Maybe the OST? Can't remember any track, it was fairly boring/bland or annoying Uematsu IIRC
Graphics? Scenery could be pretty cool I guess but the character design ruined everything
Can't possibly be the story or characters
Edit: Shit I forgot to post creepy Dark Souls vids
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5zB3lzEEco
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ow-mNgNBawI
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I assume it is amazing boots.
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Whose boots?
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I figured he meant Jansen Antics.
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http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20080211061909/lostodyssey/images/0/00/Gorgora0.jpg
Those boots.
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Okay yes.
Definitely.
I hope Cmdr doesn't post again or he'd ruin this.
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well I have to post again eventually, but certainly I'll ignore this stuff.
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http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20080211061909/lostodyssey/images/0/00/Gorgora0.jpg
Those boots.
Sing along, girls. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVaqQe3V498)
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I'd certainly have assumed the soundtrack myself; thought it was pretty great. But if it's something else I'd certainly like to hear about it! :)
Definitely liked LO the least of those three games myself though I won't defend Legaia 2 vs. it too hard. Ultimately the things I liked most about LO are just too divorced from the game's core.
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Guys I think he's talking about that one character's double thong
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I don't know why I want to do it melee Cid. Magic just feels kind of boring. Will do it if I fail too many times. I'm done with the Murakumo for now, it's too stupid. I'll try getting something that sounds almost as equally dangerous to get at the beginning of the game instead; the Great Scythe.
Great Scythe is legitimately decent in DS1 since you get good reach without the crazy hitbox shenanigans (it isn't fast enough for bleed to ever matter, though). I ran it divine when I played a cleric and it turned out pretty well. Good scaling as a normal weapon too. Good luck getting it without dying, though. Start cleric with master key, grab Astora Straight Sword to make shutting down the skellies easier maybe?
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Guys I think he's talking about that one character's double thong
Just what I was going to post...
Or the hammer pants.
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...moving us away from Lost Odyssey fashion sense because seriously guys...
Metroid Fusion: Just got Varia suit! I will never try to fight my way through those Ice spots before getting this again because that's clearly suicide.
KH3D: Just beat Fantasia World. Riku continues to be awesome, Sora continues to be completely useless. Also, Spellican can go burn in the pits of Eternal Brahne.
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Defense Grid 2- Been playing the beta a little. I really need an upgrade to my computer for this game, I think.
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Rondo of Swords:
So yeah, the LP of this is really good: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3546224 (http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3546224)
Playing along. I had originally played the game about 6 or so years ago when it came out and finally succumbed to its lack of documentation about a 1/3 of the way through. I had rather enjoyed its story and character work the whole way, so I was pretty disappointed that it became unbeatable with my suboptimal team and complete lack of understanding of how do simple things like buying items....
But with all the new documentation available online from the past 6 years and this wonderful masochist of an LPer, I can now play the game as intended. And it's pretty fun (except for checking spell ranges on enemies for placement). Still only like a 4/10 game at best, even with me highly enjoying its story. But kind of a worthwhile read. Play at your own risk. Unless you're super, he should play this every day.
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Kirby Anniversary collection: Went and beat Kirby Adventure on Extra mode. Why wait til then? Because reasons.
Then finished off the challenges. The challenges can be summed up as "demo for Return to Dreamland" but that's not a bad thing; it's a nice little extra perk on top of getting 6 older games, soundtrack, and a series retrospective.
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Bioshock Infinite:
Holy shit that was stupid. (http://www.reddit.com/r/im14andthisisdeep/) At least the Luteces are entertaining?
All and all... a good game for 7 bucks but I would be piiiiiiiiissed if I paid full retail.
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Roguesouls: 25 or so tries, haven't made it past Blight town yet.
Great Scythe = nope.
Good plan Cid, but it's not worth trading the Tiny Being Ring and having Cleric starting stats for this weapon.
Sorcerers are definitely way better than melee users, but there's no variety.
I'm already really tired of the lack of options at the beginning, and of the backtracking in the Undead Burg. Dark Souls 2 and Demon's Souls were way more fun as challenges.
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Rondo of Swords:
Continues to be awesome! But also terrible!
It is... SaGa Frontier-ish: Lots of really awesome stuff going on; Arcane mechanics and zero (but very necessary) documentation holding it back.
I'm playing it (about 7 years after my first attempt when it came out) alongside an LP that is carefully dissecting the mechanics for me and showing off all the hard-to-find plot and such... and it's an absolute joy knowing how everything works and knowing that I'm not missing any potentially-important plot or gameplay secrets... AND being able to properly plan out my team and kit them out and plan for different maps actually -knowing- what the PCs can do.
Flipside... when I played it when it first came out, it was infuriating... and even knowing all the twists and turns, there's still some bullshit requirements and RNG (for getting items mostly).
Still, there's just so many strong points:
- The writing is really solid
- Even minor characters are decently well-developed (but even that can be all hidden behind arcane mechanics too!)
- The run-through mechanics are unique and a fun twist on the SRPG standards (though only 1/3 of the main classes use it!)
- The 3 main class-types play highly differently from each other (though one of those classes feels like it was added as an afterthought!)
- Due to the skill system, even within classes, each individual PC plays highly different from their counterparts (unfortunately, RoS doesn't seem to have a problem with just throwing in one clearly superior-in-all-regards PC that obsoletes all the others on a first playthrough... BALANCE!)
- The Promotions and Shopping and Quest system presents some variety in the kinds of gameplay available, and forces some meaningful choices (but seriously this part being undocumented is the biggest RNG clusterfuck and trial-and-error bullshit ever, particularly the Promotion items, only by playing along with the LP was this part of the game salvageable)
- Laser Pope (there is no downside to this one)
Soooo.... yes, SaGa Frontier-ish, for every awesome thing, there is a drawback. It is a unique experience with some fascinating ideas and it feels like it ended up rushed out the door because even a month of QC would have nixed some of this lack of documentation and bullshit RNG.
I'm about to play it again on NG+ (also with the LP, though a bit more on my own this time).
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Funny you brought up Rondo of Swords. I was reminded of that while playing Bravely Default, albeit obliquely... but spoilers, so see below.
BD: C5 & C6.
Okay, getting the alternate ending in C5 is REALLY COOL. I wonder if that was added in For the Sequel? Screwing up an intentionally easy "minigame" is rarely so much fun. Airy's right, disobeying is hard, which makes it rewarding to do. In C5 at least the hints were fairly subtle, too, but you could act on them anyway before the game hinted harder - a problem that many games have (e.g. Phoenix Wright) where the game gives you too many hints before asking for your input.
Of course, the above is dulled somewhat by the fact you aren't "rewarded" with the good ending for the above, merely an alternate ending. The fact it's even an option is a good reward, though. Per earlier posts with Elf, I'd kinda assumed that the alternate ending people referred to was to blindly go to the end of C5 without a break, and C6-C8 would be something different and follow from breaking a crystal. Anyway... okay, C6 is actually directly telling the player what's up and raising the question. Hmm. I'm not opposed to this but it makes me fearful C7 & C8 will be more of the same. And this kind of reveal isn't something you can really play around with - once you give people the idea "is Airy being truthful", I don't think this is the kinda question that can be reasonably stretched out. Ringabel's line about what would happen if the crystal was broken was funny, but it's also something that I think was a missed opportunity to make the good/alternate ending even darker - the darkening of the crystals sure did seem like a global catastrophe (which Eternie seemed weirdly blind to - evne if they're right, the death of the oceans should mean like everyone will die shortly), so blowing up a crystal should have some pretty drastic consequences, I'd think. But oh well.
Anyway, where RoS comes in is that I thought the Serdic route in RoS has a very well done "alternate better ending that isn't the true ending." RoS, however, has the split be not based on solving a mystery (so less a-ha awesomeness) but more on a choice, and that choice is pretty close to the end of the game anyway - you only miss out on 3 maps or so (rather than tons of chapters) to continue with the true, worse ending. That seems right to me, because the frustration of going down the wrong path after you've already seen the "good" path is reduced if it's short.
Also, I wonder if the writers were taking any inspiration from Madoka. (not that I've seen Madoka.) Seems pretty similar - psuedo not-really time loops where the cute advice-giving companion who knows suspiciously too much is the villain. Madoka apparently came out in 2011, and BD originally came out in 2012 in Japan, so it seems possible but a bit of a long-shot - the game would have already been in a development for awhile. Maybe Japan just realized that this kind of plot point makes a ton of sense all at the same time...
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Bravely Default writing
Well, if I recall correctly, the person behind the concept for BD's plot -is- the writer for Steins Gate, if that tells you anything...
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Soul Nomad - Finished the demon path. I ended up gaining about 20 levels near the start, and that was good enough to carry me to the end. I didn't beat the last map but I'm pretty okay with that, since losing gives you an ending and I just looked up the other one on YouTube.
Anyway demon path has some more pretty fun writing. I can't take it seriously at all (it is pretty inconceivable that Revya could be that much of a monster without Layna noticing) but fortunately the path itself was taken a bit less seriously than I expected, and it ended up as a fun parody RPG where you play as a villain. You even get foiled by ridiculous over-the-top displays of friendship and teamwork, how gross. I did like how the path inserted some more backstory for certain characters, though. Cast remained pretty good, although Gig oddly isn't quite as good bouncing off evil characters as he is off of good ones. I still enjoyed him, obviously, as well as the wacky exploits of Kanan, Thorndyke, Shauna, Lobo, and others.
Gameplaywise it's a bit of a mess with the wacky level curve and characters randomly leaving but it did manage to hit a sweet spot for a few maps towards the end I thought. Overall I wouldn't say I enjoyed it more than the maingame, but it's neat that it exists and I'm glad I played it anyway.
Game gets a 6/10. Pretty solid. Had fun. Would recommend. etc.
Mega Man X8 - Randomly replaying this. Hard Mode, trying to mainly focus on Zero since I run him so much less than the other two normally.
Fire Emblem: Awakening - Lunatic Mode. I am about halfway done, up to chapter 14. Chapter 2 was satan, and I've had trouble with quite a few others too of course. Current team:
Chrom - 20/4, loads of strength and pretty good stats in general.
Robin [spd+ skl-] - 20/8, very fast mage
Sumia - 20/5 dark flier, all the speed
Frederick - 20/11, finally starting to fall off but still so useful
Tharja - 20/1 sorcerer, Nosferatu is so good
Lon'qu - 20/1 assassin, have I mentioned speed is really useful in this/every mode
Panne - 10/11 wyvern rider - flying axe person the first
Cherche - 16 wyvern rider - flying axe person the second
Anna/Libra/Lissa - healin'. Lissa was OHKOed by everything early, now it is only some things! Libra's a more advanced version of her, Anna actually has some offence with the Levin Sword. The usual.
Henry - Recently obtained, dunno if he'll stick but sure giving him a try because Henry.
Lucina [Robin as mother] - Good starting stats for her level and has Veteran, so I imagine she'll be useful.
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Mario Kart 8 - Game is very pretty and runs very smoothly. Definitely think it doesn't compare super favorably to Double Dash/7 aside from aesthetically, the game isn't as technical as those two. Still think it's my third favorite Mario Kart game though from what I've played. The downgrade from SNES Rainbow Road to N64 Rainbow Road has to be the biggest downgrade of all time, though! Love having the Koopa Kids finally playable. :D
Yoshi's Island GBA - Just did the first level.
Kirby's Adventure - Beat! It is so cute. Final final boss was surprisingly bad though.
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Soul Nomad - Finished the demon path. I ended up gaining about 20 levels near the start, and that was good enough to carry me to the end. I didn't beat the last map but I'm pretty okay with that, since losing gives you an ending and I just looked up the other one on YouTube.
Quick trick to beating the last map: Increase the number of specials that Kanan can use, Use Encumber, have Shauna give her another turn immediately have her use Encumber again. Now all of Raksha's stats will be halved (!) because his Unlimited Stamina skill just means that he doesn't naturally lose or gain them, I believe. However, you can still bust his Stamina. Since he was by far the nastiest thing there, this works amazingly well.
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Kingdom Hearts 3D: Completed. The special Message can be summed up as "YES WE ARE MAKING KINGDOM HEARTS 3! THIS WILL BECOME OBSOLETE IF YOU ARE READING THIS AFTER E3 2013!"
Just like the game is split between two parts, so are my thoughts for it's overall worth. On one hand, it does do KH Gameplay overall right, the Dream Eater mechanic worked out better than I thought and issues I had with later boss fights were my own idiocy for not getting Once More or Leaf Bracer (game really expects you to earn those, because good god do they make a difference; I did at least have Second Chance!), Flowmotions and Reality Shifts seem like one of those "This seems stupidly complicated" but actually ended up restraining themselves to make themselves work in favor of the gameplay, not against it. On top of that, Enemies felt creative this time around; yeah they were all animals, but they all had a unique look to them and worked uniquely too, unlike the Unversed which were all basically Not!Heartless.
But it's gameplay has a bunch of flaws that hold it back too. First off, KH does not do big rooms well; too many enemy spawn points, enemies can DESPAWN, which is both a blessing and a curse depending on the situation, they attack you in large groups (though unlike BbS, you have actual allies, so it feels a little more appropriate) and a lot of enemies have annoying Full Block states which just waste your time; to top it off, dying = reset the entire room. BbS got it right keeping rooms small so encounters were sort of self contained to one or two per room, so dying = major loss of progress didn't come up, because it only set you back a brief bit; this game sort of forgot to adjust game over style.
On top of that, as I've ranted before, the Drop Mechanic is easily the dumbest thing ever. If they wanted a multiple perspective angle, just have forced swap points based on cutscenes; this does hurt the ability to backtrack, but there's nothing fun about knocking a boss down to 10-20% of their health only to be dropped and thus reset the fight. I shouldn't have to escape battle, and throw a Drop Me Not (or equip them) just to finish a boss fight.
Which brings me to the other side of things: Every other flaw in this game can be attributed to one character in some way or another, that being Sora.
First off, let me make one thing clear: I don't have Sora...at least in KH1/2, I prefer not to speak about CoM. No, he's not amazing, but he was inoffensive and kind of like-able. Also, he wasn't written like a total moron; no, he's no Einstein, but he certainly didn't have this "fall for all villain bait!" vibe he does that this game and CoM have (and I went back on my word!)
I can deal with idiocy some, but the real issue is Sora's story serves absolutely no purpose in the overarching plot. Everything is completely pointless and exists to, in the last 10% of the game, set up some ultra, convoluted, Xanatos Roulette by Xehanort that is completely dumb. The worst part is that Sora's diving didn't happen because "The villains baited him" but rather "Because Riku is going too." I was worried the game was going to pretend Riku was secondary by the end, though thankfully the reverse happened; Riku was the focus of all the end stuff, but that in turn just made Sora seem even MORE pointless.
See, here's the thing: this is Riku's story through and through. It's Riku's soul searching quest, or at least, the end of it, to prove to himself he actually is a better person, overcame darkness, etc. He's earned the trust of all his friends and everyone else, but he still has that one little bit of doubt, understandably so, thus the game serves to finally finish off Riku's character arc, and tie up loose ends. This by itself is strong enough story to follow, and Riku after having been a 2nd protagonist in CoM and clear good guy since, he deserves to just have his own game to himself. The game ending with Riku being named Keyblade Master and not Sora was nice though mostly because it really just emphasizes how much Riku had to work to get where he was, while Sora kind of took it for granted, on top of not trying to twist things to make it seem like "Sora saved the day!" but made it clear Riku's actions were more important, and kind of the game acknowledging "Yes, this is Riku's story!"
Thanks to this game, there's really no question that Riku is the single best written character in the franchise. I went in liking him well enough after KH2, but this game pretty much sealed it. No one comes close to the amount of character work put into Riku and the progression seems logical and natural throughout the franchise. In fact, this game only further affirms just how awful Kain is because Riku manages to be exactly what Kain is hyped as but done so much better. TIME TO RANT ABOUT THAT!
See, both characters are Shonen Rivals of the main initially, that ultimately betray them because of the girl. Kain's is because jealousy and mind control, being whiny about a girl that never was into him intimately before and he's known this...and he's an adult remember...and don't forget, MIND CONTROL, so his sob story is just that much less "Whatever" inducing...plus they do it twice.
Riku? First off, he's a 16 year old; 16 year olds are stupid and easy to manipulate. His betrayal was less "Kairi loves Sora!" and more just being angry that Sora didn't put Kairi as his priority, thinking he put his friends behind him. This in turn made it easy for Maleficent to manipulate him, especially since they had Kairi, and this made Riku just kind of stray off the good guy path, get dark, etc. See, the big thing here is that Riku is still Riku, not a mind slave like Kain; everything he did was his decision. Maleficent didn't control him like Golbez did with Kain, she played with his emotions and let him do the rest; that is actual character work. He gets so lost in his emotions that things just kind of explode in his face, gets possessed by an evil bishie, etc. etc.
Next up is the redemption arc. Kain's Redemption is basically "I hurt you guys, forgive me?" and they do...both times. He doesn't do anything to really earn it, just they casually say "ok" outside of Edge who is the one person to go "He betrayed us already, WHAT'S STOPPING HIM FROM DOING IT AGAIN!?" Then he goes off to Mt. Ordeals to train because Cecil did it, and in doing so...skips his best friend's wedding AND Coronation. If you're trying to be a good friend, don't skip out one like the most important day of his life; that only makes you look like a total dick. You can take one day out of training to congratulate your friend, don't give me this "I'm not worthy!" crap.
Riku's arc starts in Chain of Memories, meanwhile, where he finds himself alive, and hinted by the end of KH1, he's starting to get back to his old self. Here he's a little angsty but understandably so, and used as a tool, but tries his best to fight back. By the end, Riku's not taking this "THE DARKNESS IS YOU!" crap, but has acknowledged the Darkness is part of him, he just can't let it consume him. Ok, he hasn't done much to redeem himself, but you do get a strong sense of him definitely wanting to make up for his actions, and actually aid Sora.
358/2 Days demonstrates that Riku is willing to go to any lengths so save Sora; it's partially his fault all this came down, and he wants to make amends. The fact that he has to go to such great lengths, sacrificing his soul to Darkness to save Sora, but managing to stay himself, is already signs Riku is a stronger person. Obviously it would have been better if he didn't use darkness, but the fact that he could maintain his mind despite it was a big deal. This is something Kain completely lacks; the closest we get is "he failed to fight his darkness, now his darkness runs wild!" If anything, that shows the complete opposite for Kain, in that he hasn't made any sort of progress, just straight up failed again.
KH2 and FF4TAY first half, both characters are hiding their identities because of shame and such. Riku's make sense; he has literally turned into the villain of the first game, it'd be extremely hard to say "hey guys, I'm actually Riku, trust me!" Instead, he does his best to aid Sora, and earn his trust first. Revealing himself to Kairi make sense because Kairi never met Ansem, so to her, Ansem is just a warped version of Riku. When Sora finds out, Riku doesn't try to deflect the claim, but rather "I was afraid what you'd do if you found out." Kain's disguise is because there's another Kain running around and he's pursuing him...it's silly, and well, the EVIL KAIN doesn't even take action until after Kain dons the Hooded Man appearance. Also the reveal scene is a dumb Rosa shouting Kain's name, then OMG! THE GOOD KAIN FIGHTS THE EVIL KAIN! I'll grant Riku's transformation back was basically "Because Darkness exploded thanks to Ansem's machine and that's a good thing and this heals Riku because...uhh...KINGDOM HEARTS! Ok, good, no plot holes" "...wait how does that explain how Riku got healed?" "BECAUSE KINGDOM HEARTS! Weren't you paying attention?"
Then the capstone of their development where they finally deal with Darkness. Kain just goes "You are part of me, now merge with me so we can become...SUPER KAIN!" and it works. Hey remember in FF4 when Cecil fought his darkness by NOT fighting it directly? Yeah, screw that, SUPER KAIN! It does nothing to push the character forward, just sort of says "hey, we gave Kain a matching color scheme to Cecil, awesome, right?" You don't really get a sense of forward movement, he just sort of jumps from spot to spot.
Now Riku in KH3D? This story is arguably not needed, because by the end of KH2, you get a sense of "Yeah, Riku's clearly over all the bad stuff, and he's totes a good guy" but KH3D respectfully take it a step further. Yen Sid goes "take the test of heart because Keyblade Masters!" Sora goes "but we saved the world twice! That should prove it!" Fair enough, but Riku's response? "I'll do it, because I need to prove to myself I am in fact over the darkness of my heart. If I can finish this test, it will prove I am over the darkness of my heart and finally stop any doubt." Considering all Riku's been through, the amount of times he had to rely on Darkness to bail him out, even for good reasons, it makes sense he still has a little bit of doubt in him. Finally putting that doubt at ease once and for all, it makes sense he'd go through with this.
And considering all he has to go through, all he's willing to sacrifice if shit hits the fan, and how he makes sure any loose ends he can tie up do get tied up, he damn well earned his reward at the end of the game, as well as makes sense he can finally be put at rest.
Kain...again, he goes all HOLY DRAGOON, but this doesn't really change him. We're too assume he's no longer obsessed with Rosa, but where is the implication? Because Holy Dragoon? In Riku's case, the lack of Kairi obsession obviously ended when Kairi was saved, because his goal wasn't "get Kairi to like him", it was "Save Kairi from her fate" and the Sora disdain was, as I said, "Sora's being an idiot about it, I'm the only one she can depend on!" Oh, Riku was straight up wrong there, but then, that's why he has the redemption arc, and his story shifts entirely away from Kairi, and more about being a real best friend for Sora, and a dependable ally. That's what they were aiming at with Kain, but really, the only hint that they got that far is "I BEAT MY DARKSIDE!" which implies "He no longer wants to sleep with the WIFE OF HIS BEST FRIEND WITH A 17 YEAR OLD SON!"
And one last thing is timeframe.
The KH series takes a little over a year to go. That makes sense for Riku to become fixated -> get unfixated -> work towards undoing his harm. FF4's story takes nearly 20 years to complete, and Kain is STILL all "why doesn't Rosa love me?!" until his "Redemption Arc" comes to a full circle, which is pathetic.
So yeah, because Kain wasn't pathetic enough as is, Riku just puts the nail in the coffin further. Riku proves that the "best friend turned evil who then goes on a redemption arc" over the course of multiple games CAN be done well, so it's not the core character that's the problem, it's the execution.
ANYWAY, not sure what I'll give the game. I guess 6/10? There's a lot of good stuff, but a lot of really bad stuff too that can't be ignored, which is ashame.
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Child of Light: Oh right I finished this. It is a pretty game that people should play and etcetera.
Grefter I think you somewhat undersell fishgirl. Paralysis works on everything, including the final boss. It only lasts a couple turns, but that's a couple free turns you have to patch the party up after the brutal mauling you likely received while wearing down her support. Mean fight, but any single enemy is total status bait by the end of this game.
I missed one of the confessions. AUGH. With all the world to search and no idea what zone it might be in, that's one achievement that'll have to wait for someone to write an FAQ.
Roguesouls: 25 or so tries, haven't made it past Blight town yet.
Great Scythe = nope.
Good plan Cid, but it's not worth trading the Tiny Being Ring and having Cleric starting stats for this weapon.
Sorcerers are definitely way better than melee users, but there's no variety.
I'm already really tired of the lack of options at the beginning, and of the backtracking in the Undead Burg. Dark Souls 2 and Demon's Souls were way more fun as challenges.
I'm trying to imagine a world where the Tiny Being's Ring is actually worth using and I just can't process it.
DS2: Demon's Great Hammer got boring pretty much immediately so clearly the thing to do was zap that file and replace it with something less practical and therefore more fun: twin-dagger fighting. Actually--and I feel like I've said this before in what's probably a testament to DS2's superior weapon balance--this turned out to not be anywhere near as bad as anticipated (apparently you have to be as crazy as Fenrir to find a proper challenge mode in DS2). Most varieties of knives are terrible, but stick with the basic dagger and you at least get decent scaling and speed. The overall attack power is bad (like barely breaking two hundred) but you hit so fast powerstanced that this actually doesn't matter much. I loaded up PUGILISM SOULS for comparison afterward and kept saying to myself why is punching dudes so slow? I got spoiled. Also the backstab damage is highly gratifying. Depends on enemy defense but I've seen in the vicinity of two thousand damage. Basically if it's crittable you will kill it one hit or near enough.
Also, Mytha's Bent Blade hype~ It's probably the fastest weapon in the game and uses almost no stamina, though it's pretty ineffectual if not upgraded to at least +4 (and you won't have the materials for that 'til near the end of the game). Because I'm crazy, I ascetic'd Earthen Peak to get two of them to dual-wield it. This actually makes for a pretty excellent poison delivery system if you're built for it. Messed around with NG+ some to try it out (because not until the last boss in NG did I get enough materials to upgrade both of them) and it quickly became the default boss-fighting weapon. And then sometimes you start seeing 30's mixed in with all those 15's on the boss healthbar and what? Oh apparently it can inflict poison and toxin simultaneously. Takes longer for the latter to hit, normal enemies will die first and many bosses seem immune, but it's awesome when it happens. Pursuer where'd your healthbar go.
Armor set was Straid's + pimp hat.
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Gone Home: OMFG this is amazing. If you are a fan of point and click adventures play this.
Other than that, been playing lots of Heroes of the Storm alpha. It's fun.
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http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=255767165
Steam has built in Gamefaqs Ciid.
Boring doesn't mean outright bad. Just boring. I hate boring even more than normal when it is replacing a fun interesting thing. Boring sucks.
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Boring is worse than bad. It is numbness. It is Borderlands 2.
Oh yeah I've been playing some Borderlands 2. It is Borderlands 1 reskinned and I find it immensely boring, which means my tolerance for this shit plummeted. 1/10. I think I was too blinded by the coolness of Lots Of Number Going Up in an FPS before to notice.
This is a game with very little skill involved compared to every other FPS on the planet and even compared to Diablo. Because the level and encounter design aren't really the priority, and numbers are everything. In most encounters you're just strafing and shooting. The main/only thing the game asks of you is to quickly aim at another enemy after you've killed one.
So it's a game that asks for your undivided attention but without really asking anything of you. I cannot imagine having a reaction to this game other than being bored out of your mind (and annoyed by the humor and the fact that the enemy/"treasure chest" ratio is lower than 1 when it should be something like 30)
I had more fun with MMOs, which says something.
At one point I felt the same torpor I felt playing Phantasy Star III
Monument Valley:
As far as indie/contemplative/THIS IS ARTOMG games go this one is really cool. (And I'm starting to also dislike these particular indie games)
I think I finished it in 2 hours but it cost 3 bucks. It's worth skipping a fast food meal to play it.
Otherwise, I had lots of Dark Souls death. El Cid: Dude more health. I ABSOLUTELY NEED IT until I can get the Ring of Favor and Protection
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I remembered the health increase being absolutely negligible, but I guess everything counts when your only prerogative is not dying?
Oh right I forgot to mention the shaking carriages in Aldia actually do a thing. Apparently there's basilisks in there (the dragon skull fell on the carriage this time and let one out).
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So yeah the more I studied the more I realized I'm going to fail the test anyway, so fuck it poor life decisions times
Dark Souls:
16 deaths. Playing a Pyromancer. Axe to the FACE and occasional fireballs hell yeah. Was expecting more magery but actually smashing things with an axe is pretty OK so I don't mind.
The two bosses (admittedly, the tutorial boss and then the Taurus Demon) I've faced have kind of shown the game's hand: Stupidly difficult until you know the attack pattern and when to attack, then stupidly easy. A little bit like Buster-only runs of Megaman I guess in that regard. Most of my deaths have been because I was trying to get my power back after getting killed by a black knight guarding somewhere I am not meant to go yet. Silly me.
My internet sucks too much to invade people. :( This is great sadness. But, since I can't invade or be invaded anyway, is there any reason to ever go into human form?
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You can only kindle bonfires when human. Kindling bonfire = raising the number of estus flasks it gives you on resting there (Firelink Shrine is already kindled to 10; most bonfires you find default to 5). So basically go human when you get someplace new to do that and otherwise don't worry about it too much while exploring because if you're playing offline the only other points of distinction to being human are:
-Some unique NPC invaders will show up and killing them is the only way to get their equipment.
-NPC phantoms can be summoned in some areas (no summoning while hollow). This is admittedly a godsend for the toughest fight in the game (Oreo Smalls).
In case pyro mechanics aren't immediately clear: you don't care about your mental stats at all because they don't influence pyromancy damage. Just Attunement for spell slots, and upgrading the flame itself will boost your damage (you won't find any NPCs for this for a while though). Pyro's a good first-run choice.
Black knights = try stabbing in the back.
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Ah, yeah. I was going to play the game blind but quickly decided that was going to be less fun than having an idea of what I was doing. I'm basically bee-lining to unlock the guy who will upgrade my pyromancies.
Also, good to know I need attunement. The Wiki said to focus on Endurance and Vit, but I'll put a few points into Attunement as well.
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Re: KH3D
I feel like the Drop system was supposed to evoke the Reaper's Game from The World Ends With You... similar sort of "linked together even though in different parallel areas" thing.
It, of course, miserably failed as a gameplay mechanism evoking -fun-, but I feel like it was a... not -good-, interesting, maybe? attempt at bringing in mechanics from another game series (KH only has two series it pulls from with -game- mechanics, so I can appreciate them trying to incorporate that into the design, since FF is pretty well represented by all the equips and spells and such).
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Transistor - I finished this days ago, but have been trying to mull it over and get time to post about it when I am not in a completely dazed state.
I really liked it. I seem to be on the counter side to the few people I have talked about it with though. I really really dug the story telling, in medias res is a pretty good way to start something where the main character is very much not an agent of the player's will and entirely mysterious. As a Noir story in a weird cyberspace setting it works really well to keep the motivations of the main character elusive. Red not being able to talk lets you project all kinds of motives on to her, but during the Terminal interactions where she gets short posts and very restricted dialogue towards the end you see that she has a clear defined character. A lot of discussions there project a determination (which she does have), but they also ultimately are about a kind of suffering and you see that play out in the end.
Any game where you have the silent main character talking with disembodied narrator by typing up posts on internet forums is going to get a bit of love from me.
I dig the way that you progress fleshing out the setting at your own pace and it influences your gameplay style, different moves used differently unlocks more side and backstory. So trying a lot of combination of processes used differently rewards the player both with discovering interesting play and with narrative. It is pretty cool.
The story is insaaaaanely Noir. It is petty revenge for revenge's sake in the face of a catastrophe. Damsel in distress who is not so much of a damsel and is really the threat. The fact that you get to play the Femme Fatale in this story instead of the private detective is pretty great. The setting is cyberpunk as fuck. Like, some kind of mix of Tron and the computer part of The Matrix. This is of course pretty great. The really amazing thing though is that these two things don't ever really mix together. They just work really well off each other, but it is a story that takes place in the setting, not a story that is really informed by the setting (if that makes sense). It isn't a dark and gritty Noir story because it is a dark and gritty Noir setting (like you would get in say a Shadowrun). It is an ultimately hella bleak Noir story set in an amazingly deep and interesting utopian cyberpunk setting.
The game shows you enough to hint at a bottomless well of interesting ideas, but doesn't reveal much of anything more than it needs to tell you its story. It always leave me wanting more story. I can't dislike it for being really good and something I like and disappointing me by being so good I want more of it.
The gameplay on the other hand? I found it went on too long. Unlike Alex my Steam play time is at 10 hours and that is from a play and a little bit, so would say it probably took me twice as long play time to beat? I didn't really die or wipe. I probably have some AFK time in there, but it still took me longer. (Some of that was doing stupid thing clearing out an area that you are told to run through with dangerous enemies while I had lots of limiters on because I wanted to unlock some plot and had forgot to use one I got a while back... so lots of limiter on took like 20 mins of chipping and kiting). It kind of overstayed its welcome and with the introduction of the Man class enemies it got mega snoozetown to me. Their method of attacking really pushed running a a ranged attack to poke their Haircuts and a strong burst damage attack to blow them up when they are out of stealth. There didn't seem much wiggle room in that (I aimed to one shot them with close range backstab out of Cloak). They pretty much single handed made the last quarter or so of the game pretty tedious to me. Maybe there was a way to engage them that was more compelling? I didn't find it. I may have been too attached to Jaunt as a movement skill and could have used it to more easily engage Haircuts, but I found your movement vs enemy movement outside of Turn() to be significantly restricted without Jaunt and I would just take massive spikes of damage. Oh and high level Fetch's are bullshit and terrible and need like half the HP. Just fucking terrible and boring. Please, stop having them everywhere.
I also didn't adapt to really using the two different methods of gameplay independently for the longest time. You can cruise just on Turn and evading for so long. It is only really later that you need to start juggling poking and then using Turn to maximise effectiveness in combat. It felt to me like I spent a long time very slowly being introduced to new moves while having fun playing a pretty easy game whichever way I wanted to and then a sudden massive spike of finding out I was doing it wrong and had better learn how to play right very quickly. It is massively forgiving though like Alex says, it is just more frustrating than compelling. Tying up a power for a couple of save points is punitive in that you sacrifice fun and power (it takes your most expensive process first) in future combats. You lose your skill now and the next fight is going to be more boring (yeah it will be harder to, but most importantly it will be boring). I did appreciate the way that it pushed me to expand my skill choices to try new things the few times I lost a few skills, but ultimately it taught me less about skill selection than the Challenges did where artificially restricting me to a set of skills forced me to try things instead of organically having it happen as punishment for sucking. I think the gameplay would progress better with less hand holding and unlocking way more of the Challenge rooms earlier. I finished the game and still didn't have them all unlocked and they are time unlocks.
At the end of the day though, yep, Bastion is a better game. I like Transistor a lot and there is a boat load of great things in it for me, but I do think the majority of people are going to come out of it a bit nonplussed. Especially if you really don't like plots where the writer's head is up their own arse.
Anyway that is a lot of words. The short of it is. Alex's review of it is pretty right. There isn't anything in there that I can't see coming out of this with. But to me personally the Turn() system is great but the game doesn't teach it to you correctly, rolls its intricacies out too slowly (it is significantly shorter than FF13, but feels like it is the same ratio of tutorial:full gameplay). I love the story and the story telling methods. Alex and I are probably going to have to talk about the ending and stuff a bit (I doubt I have any insights he hasn't thought of, I just want to talk about what I liked and he disliked) and hopefully some others try this out. I recommend everyone play this some time, but unfortunately I think unlike Bastion it is going to be a brief moment in time and then it will fade from public conscious.
I will be entirely honest though for the broader DL, if you have $15 to spend on a game, I think the DL in general is probably better off buying Child of Light, it is a bit more up our collective alleys (for more reasons just than it being a JRPG). Both are pretty good in very different ways, Transistor has higher highs and lower lows, but Child of Light is pretty damned consistently solid. This isn't mediocre and boring vs broken and interesting. This is solid delivery vs calculated and strange.
I also don't know if I will bother getting all the achievements and stuff because NG+ involves scaling enemies, which was fun for the first hour or so until they start spawning Man enemies early on and fighting them for the rest of forever is not even remotely appealing. I feel like I am being punished with shitty gameplay for leveling quickly by using Limiters
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Transistor "real talk" now that we are finished with evenhanded reviews.
It does not surprise me at all that Grefter loved the story. The Grefter Mind is a thing that automatically assumes things are pitch black obsidian heart noir anyway, and if you go into Transistor with the mindset that it is super dark noir and you are expecting noir-style characterization and development then it works very well, it really does. Everything Grefter said is true.
My dislike of it is more in the realm of expectations and initial narrative development. If you are not Grefter, or part of a relatively small subset of people who already 'get' and are predisposed to expect noir storytelling, you're going to be confused and disappointed, because *the story does not distinctly or overtly cue the player in* about its genre until it's 'too late' and most players are already going to be running on their own assumptions about characterization and tone and so forth.
Looking on the internet, I see a lot of the people who 'got it' smugly telling others who were confused that it's their own fault for not noticing the cues the game does drop about its tone and what sort of person Red is. I don't think that's a very productive line to take, though. When there's a sufficiently large portion of the audience who are fundamentally misunderstanding the tone and thrust of a narrative, I tend to prefer to place the blame on the author(s) for not giving sufficient information instead of blaming the readers for not picking up on what was given.
It is not terribly hard to see where Transistor goes wrong in these regards and some of the places it could have done better. Most of its media hype, and the whole first act of the storytelling, is positive and hopeful in tone on the surface. Most of the specifics turn out to be subversions, but at the time the player is not given any reason to question them. The main song talks about "becoming one," in the context of computer binary, and people generally know enough to get that 1 is positive and 0 is negative, so... clearly this is about how Red was a 0 and her quest to become a 1, right? She's initially painted as a pissed off vigilante, not a femme fatale.
When Red herself is silent, and the narrator is talking about the loss of her voice being the problem, and the environmental cues are all terminals and locations talking about Red's career and status, and there are quite a few bodies scattered around making one Transistorized individual not so special - well it's pretty easy to assume that Red's mainly pissed off about what happened to herself and what might happen to the rest of the living, rather than being motivated by revenge for the dead.
In particular, I don't recall even a hint of her real relationship to Dildo Man until quite a ways into the game. Brother, father, friend, boyfriend? Leader of alternative terrorist cell? It is clear that he cares for her, but not clear how much, or how much she reciprocates. Her first reactions to him are... well, she barely even reacts, ignores most of his commands, and mostly just interfaces with the terminals themselves, only starting to converse with him later in the game, which is easily mistaken for general fighting camaraderie until they finally break out the "I love you, miss you" stuff right at the end. So when she finally penetrates herself with the giant green dildo (and yes that is totally what happens in every sense), it can come as something of a shock to people who formed their impressions of the characters based on the first act rather than the last.
To bring up Bastion again, I would compare the situation to that game's ending choice of keeping the battering ram. It's obviously not completely out of character, it makes sense and is within the range of supported characterizations... but for most players, it's more to an extreme edge of the possibilities, and probably wouldn't be their first choice.
EDIT addition because I thought of it later: also on the Bastion note, Bastion hit a ton of the exact same story notes as Transistor. Chuckleheads with more technology and ideals than ethics trigger an apocalypse, disputes happen among the survivors when some of them discover others are responsible, etc. Bastion ultimately resolved this very similar plot in a much more optimistic way, with only one of the four major characters taking things poorly, and the player has the option of saving them too. I think this definitely plays into people's expectations and initial reads of Transistor, if you've played Bastion before you're going to notice the similarities and expect a similarly toned ending as well, or at least a dramatic choice or two, being that those choices were the most affective points and the culmination of Bastion's storytelling.
What really irks me about this is how easily the authors could have fixed it, though. If they had placed a little more value on clarity, reordered a couple of scenes, given just a LITTLE more characterization a LITTLE earlier, it would be so much easier to understand the noir implications. One of the major scenes I'm thinking of is Red leaving her apartment and locking it, and the dildo commenting "That's not good...". That was great noir establishment, but it needed to be earlier, like before Sybil. Or just give the dildo man a name, or a profession, or some sort of role where it's clear Red cares about him.
The gameplay... I have less to say about if I'm being honest. 10 hours is very o_O to me. I felt my 6 was already overly generous because I spent a long time wandering around and using Hum() and goofing around with skills, and a "normal" playthrough where you just go where the game tells you and don't trigger optional fights would be closer to 4 hours or less.
As for combat... I spent too many words trying to do it justice for people who are interested in it. To fully indulge my ego for a moment, I found the game embarrassingly easy and felt like everything I did was massive overkill unless I was turning my brain off and trying to deliberately ignore how absurdly broken half the skills and Turn() are. Enemies can do some damage if they hit you, but that's all I can say for it and they should never hit you unless you are just not pushing any buttons ever. Jaunt() and Breach() are the first things you get and strong enough to carry you the whole game. Mask() is broken. Purge() is broken. Switch() is ABSURDLY broken. Putting anything as an upgrade on anything turns it into a fullscreen death cannon, as a general rule.
None of the enemies really got complexity beyond "kill this thing before that thing" and other than discovering what new enemies did, the only interesting fight in the entire game was Royce. I was hoping for a later section with advanced Mans that all had Turn() but no that was it, the end. That is all probably just me playing games a lot though maybe.
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Marvel Heroes: Got Invisible Woman to level 60. If anyone has thought about getting into this game, this would be the week to do so. They're giving away a crapload of stuff for their first anniversary.
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Ah, yeah. I was going to play the game blind but quickly decided that was going to be less fun than having an idea of what I was doing. I'm basically bee-lining to unlock the guy who will upgrade my pyromancies.
Also, good to know I need attunement. The Wiki said to focus on Endurance and Vit, but I'll put a few points into Attunement as well.
Get enough attunement for the spells you need, as well as any STR/DEX requirements for your weapons, but like the wiki says, Endurance is almost always the best stat to raise after you have all the requirements needed for your weapons and spells. Reason is, more stamina is always better and it also increases equip load, which makes a big difference since fast rolling is so important for dodging attacks. Vitality investment is mostly beneficial for newer players, though having more HP never hurt anyone. If you are going to focus on Pyromancy as your main means of dealing damage, it may be better to invest in upgrading your flame. There's a bit more to it than that, but it's not relevant so early in the game.
Re: internet/invasions, your internet might not be the cause of your problems. Dark Souls 1 use a frankly shoddy PvP connection method that makes it difficult to play with a lot of other players in the first place. One time I had to leave the game running with a soul sign down for about 15 minutes before I was "set" in the pool of people that can interact with each other. Had to watch various guides to co-op to discern what was going on.
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Re: KH3D
I feel like the Drop system was supposed to evoke the Reaper's Game from The World Ends With You... similar sort of "linked together even though in different parallel areas" thing.
It, of course, miserably failed as a gameplay mechanism evoking -fun-, but I feel like it was a... not -good-, interesting, maybe? attempt at bringing in mechanics from another game series (KH only has two series it pulls from with -game- mechanics, so I can appreciate them trying to incorporate that into the design, since FF is pretty well represented by all the equips and spells and such).
It's possible, I suppose. TWEWY is a Nomura game afterall, and the fact that he put TWEWY into KH3D does make it plausible he wanted to incorporate something into KH3D, and it's not like TWEWY characters were just in KH3D; they actually referenced the reaper's game and everything, so he's clearly aware of stuff (and they do reference parallels between Neku and Sora, for all that the two are kind of total opposites...)
It's still kind of a dumb mechanic. Other KH games didn't draw from Final Fantasy games outside of naming conventions, in terms of gameplay aspects, so drawing from TWEWY like that and doing it in a way that was very different than what TWEWY did on top of that begs the question of why. If they wanted to force you to swap between them, and not make it story-line based, they could give incentives for it, rather than making it forced. It's a fine case, in any event, where just being original does not necessarily make the idea good. I don't see many people finding this idea conceptually very interesting, and the execution only further demonstrates it's a poor idea. Feels like they wanted to toss a new mechanic in there for the sake of a new mechanic, rather than just play it safe, and follow more conventional methods of Dual-Protagonists.
...and I still play other games!
Mega Man 3 Gameboy: Just beat Dive Man, who was the only MM4 Robot Master faced so far. Game is...kind of flawed horribly in some fundamental ways, most obviously is the hit detection. Not just for taking damage, but also for Mega Man simply hitting his head on a ceiling and limiting his jumps. There's a jump in Spark Man's stage where you have to blast a block, run through the block before it respawns and crushes you, and stop within like a 2 pixel spot before falling off a pit. Said spot has a ceiling right above it, so you have to be literally on the edge of the spot. This is the kind of crap I expect from a Wily Stage, maybe, but NOT from a Robot Master stage, let alone one from the first 4 in the game.
To say nothing of how stages love their spikes. The bosses...kind of suck so far though, but then that's probably because you're facing MM3 Robot Masters with the Mega Buster, and they are not balanced for this (though they did improve Spark Man making him harder to predict AND invincibility with his charge shot, so props there.)
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Dark Souls:
Early game pyromancer starts to suck after you stop OHKOing everyone with a battle axe... until you look some things up and find out you can get a Sick Ass Sword for shooting off the dragon's tail on the bridge before the Parish. Did some grinding to get my STR and DEX up to 16/12 to wield a bow (and subsequently the sword)... took entirely too long because I had blown too many level ups on Vitality. I'm something like level 30 now, and that was before I even beat the Capra Demon and got access to the ability to upgrade my Pyromancies. Leveled up my fire glove to +4, bought Fire Orb and Combustion, and now I actually feel like a fucking Pyromancer instead of a gimpy melee character with infinite fire grenades. Looking up PVP builds (I am going to splurge and get good internet at my next house), it looks like I probably really want the Gargoyle's Halberd, so I guess I'm grinding for that next.
Assuming, actually, that I don't just restart so I can take the Master Key starting gift. Actually, I may do that, since grinding aside I haven't actually made very much progress, and now that I know what I'm doing I can probably catch up to myself in an evening of play... having to deal with keys is bullshit.
This game is exacerbating all of my bad gaming habits. "Ah man I got hit too many times I should run back to the bonfire and try for a more perfect run." "Well it's not that much more to the next level so I should just grind a bit... oh damn I am like halfway to the next level I should just grind a bit more before trying to take out the next boss so I don't lose it all." "OK now that I am opening up the main game time to replay the intro over and over."
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Fumbling around because you don't know what the fuck you're doing is a substantial proportion of any Souls experience (FAQing the hell out of these games is totally legit).
The Drake Sword's a good earlygame nuke, but don't get too attached to it. It'll become obsolete relatively quickly because: it gains no damage bonuses from STR/DEX and thus your melee offense is functionally static unless you upgrade it; upgrading it uses extremely rare materials and costs a fuckton of souls; even at +5 it's pretty sad by endgame standards. Should serve you pretty well up through Blighttown, though.
Sorcery trainer (who you should probably already have set free if you've killed Capra) sells a ring that boosts your pyro damage (says it's for sorcery but does affect both kinds of magic). It's hella expensive by earlygame standards but a worthy investment if you rely a lot on pyromancy for offense.
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Cool, I'll keep that in mind. What's the ring called?
Yeah, I imagined that the Drake Sword must drop off hard because no build I looked into actually uses it for PVP and the only reason for that must be because it sucks lategame. The build I'm looking at uses either the bastard sword or the gargoyle's halberd, and the halberd looks more my style, so I'll probably farm for that and start using it once I get it upgrayedded a bit.
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This game is exacerbating all of my bad gaming habits. "Ah man I got hit too many times I should run back to the bonfire and try for a more perfect run." "Well it's not that much more to the next level so I should just grind a bit... oh damn I am like halfway to the next level I should just grind a bit more before trying to take out the next boss so I don't lose it all." "OK now that I am opening up the main game time to replay the intro over and over."
Get out of my brain.
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Once he is inside you a piece of him is always there.
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Zenny: Bellowing Dragoncrest Ring is the thing (price tag: 20,000 souls. Ouch. Might want to just dump your next boss payday on it). I understand the effect to be percentage based and it stacks with a couple hats you can find later on.
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Lightning Returns: Screw it, I'm doing an abridged version of this game because TORIYAMA!!! plot deserves it!
Mog: Final Fantasy 13-2 Lightning Returns, the story so far, kupo!
Lightning: Snow, I've come to save you!
Snow: I DON'T WANT TO BE SAVED!
Lightning: Is that why we're fighting a giant monster together?
Lumina: Tee hee ^_^
Hope: Lightning be careful! ...wait, when did I get in this scene? Ah hell, get back to the ark because...uhh...
Lightning: God wills it?
Hope: ...yeah, let's go with that. Oh yeah, and Humans no longer age; important detail!
Mog: And now back to our story, kupo!
Lightning: Everything has changed. I have been asleep for 500 years...and the world ends in 13 days...and God sent me to save it. You know, when I say that outloud, it sounds really freaking stupid. Couldn't he have at least given me a year?
Hope: God works in mysterious ways...by the way, you really only have 6 days because CHAOS!
Lightning: Then why did he say 13?
Hope: Because that's the maximum amount of days we can delay the attack?
Lightning: ...and why are you only 13 again?
Hope: Because...uhh...God likes shotas?
Lightning: You know, that should piss me off, but for some reason, I am content...
Hope: Don't tell me you're into...
Lightning: ...no, I mean...it's like God took out my emotions because they're a hindrance.
Hope: Oh, that? Yeah, I kind of have the same problem. I can remember all the stuff in my life before I went to sleep, but none of it evokes an emotional reaction. Like remember how pissed I got at Snow for the death my mother? Well, it's like someone else's memories now, I seem to just not care!
Lightning: So what you're saying is God took away our emotions?
Hope: yeah, and any sort of semblance of character work as a result too. Nonetheless, we have stuff to do, let's do it!
Lightning: So why am I wasting time in here rather than saving the world?
Hope: Because time stops when we're in here!
Lightning: That makes no sense. You're always in here, yet can converse with me when I'm down there where time is moving. There is no logical way that fits in anyway, shape or form. Don't give me this "Time moves differently" nonsense because that's a hand-waive excuse!
Hope: Look, I don't make the rules, I just read the Manual Of God Savior nonsense! Anyway, go down there, get Erata and Save souls, bring it up here, and we can help delay the outcome.
Lightning; What the hell is Erata?
Hope: It's what gives you super powers; you can expend it to keep the world going a little longer! You can get more of it by saving souls, so go do that.
Lightning: *sigh* I should have retired after the first game...
Mog: Down in the Capital City of Holiness, KUPO! We see stuff happening, and a girl who is TOTALLY NOT VANILLE UNDER A VEIL THAT"S CRAZY KUPO!
Civilian: Oh no! There's another one who died!
Guy Man: It's another girl with Rose Colored Hair! Think they're trying to tell us something?
Man Guy: No way! These heretics don't work on logic or reason, it's all coincidental!
Lightning: What's going on here?
Civilian: Just a murder by heretics.
Lightning: And what's that going up there?
Woman Lady: Just a hanging of a dummy meant to look like a corpse to deliver the message "SEND US THE SAVIOR! SIGNED NOEL KREISS SHADOW HUNTER!"
Lightning: And who did all this?
Woman Lady: IF we knew, we wouldn't be here!
Hope: Hey Lightning, I think we have our first real mission!
Lightning: Investigation of this murder?
Hope: YES! THE HERETICS ARE IMPORTANT BECAUSE...uhh...look, they just are ok?
Lightning: So I need to talk to the Proclaimer and figure this out? Ok, on it.
*Bunch useless investigation stuff later, combined with a random quest involving 2 guys at the train station later*
Lightning: So...the Children of Etro are going to leave through that gate. I think you should take down the lock down so we can follow them to their location.
Proclaimer: So you're saying let the guys we're trying to catch escape? THAT'S BRILLIANT! It'll start at 12 AM!
*12 AM*
Child of Etro #1: So...let's go back in a huge large ominous group to our base.
Child of Etro #2: Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.
Hope: Lightning! FOllow them! but don't get caught!
Lightning: Umm...they're staring right at me...
Hope: HIDE IN THE SHADOWS!
Lightning: But...
Hope: DO IT!
Lightning: Ok *walkes 5 feet to the left behind a wall*
Child of Etro #3: Did you see anything?
Child of Etro #4: Just the Savior, our main target and enemy, but she walked behind that wall, so clearly she's no longer here.
Child of Etro #3: Oh ok.
*one Metal Gear Solid sequence later*
Lightning: I'm spying on them, don't tell me to do that Hope, I'm not stupid.
Hope: ...I was just going to ask you to grab some CDs while you're in town, I get bored up here during downtime when you're just slaughtering monsters using your TIME FREEZING Powers we just shoo-horned out of nowhere, and could really use music.
Lightning: I'll see what I can find.
Child of Etro #1: I AM GOING TO CALL THIS PHONE NOW AND ANNOUNCE OUR ENTRY!
Voice on Phone: Hello, TIMBER FOREST SURE HAS CHANGED!
Child of Etro #1: But the owls are still around!
Voice on Phone: Acknowledged, you all can come through.
Lightning: Looks like I need a passcode to get in, it requires 4 numbers.
Hope: What? Where did he say numbers at all? You were close enough to hear him outright!
Lightning: Doesn't matter, how do I find these numbers?
Hope: Oh, they appear at 6 AM...you know the same time your curfew is? Yeah, just go grind on enemies or sidequests during them, not much else you can do.
*pure gameplay segment later*
Hope: So...Lightning...Erata on that tree over there?
*Lightning does so*
Lightning: What is that tree anyway? And that tree wasn't here when we were here earlier.
Hope: That's Yggdrasil the TREE OF LIFE! It'll stop Chaos!
Lightning: So why does the world need to be destroyed and reborn with souls again?
Hope: Because by stop I mean delay. Yes, it's a super special tree whose purpose is going to become completely meaningless after 13 days.
Lightning: Sounds like a poor excuse of a WORLD TREE if you ask me. Again, why couldn't God just re-awaken me with more than 13 days before the end of the world that is actually only 6 days?
Hope: because...uhh...Square oversight?
Lightning: ...fair...
Mog: And so ends the first day of Lightning's adventure, KUPO! Tune in next time, same Kupo time, same kupo channel!
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Dark Souls: So I restarted my pyromancer to have the Master Key. Took 3 hours to catch up to my previous save, which was at 10 hours. lol.
Only level 20 or so this time, but my pyromancer fist is +6 and I have the ring Cid recommended. Everything dies to one blast of combustion, which... it was doing before, but I'm not going to argue for decreased longevity of the spell or anything like that. Really could use more spell charges, though, given how often I think something is close enough to use it but isn't, or how often in a wild panic I use it twice by mistake.
About to take on the boss of the depths, and afterward will try to take down the bell tower gargoyles. Mostly putting that off because I will have to grind for the Halberd drop. I should be able to take care of them now that I have not only the Drake Sword but access to Pyromancy that doesn't suck.
Thinking maybe I should spend my souls on Attunement for a while. It looks like after I get access to Blighttown I should have access to new Pyromancy spells, and a couple of the utility sorceries like Hidden Body and Featherfall (or whatever it was called) sound legit.
One kind of annoying thing is that the game keeps glitching either because my internet sucks or Games For Windows Live sucks or because Dark Souls multiplayer is kinda broken, so it keeps blocking me out of shortcuts and bonfires as if I were being invaded, and though I wait for the invasion to go through nothing fucking happens and I have to restart the game.
One really annoying thing is that the one time I DID successfully have someone invade me they were cheating and I couldn't damage them at all, or the matchmaking system seriously fucked up and I was facing someone a way higher level than me. One of the two.
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Took 3 hours to catch up to my previous save, which was at 10 hours. lol.
hashtagdarksouls
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I never do that because I always think "Even if I die I should be able to come back there easily and get all these souls back. Because look I've just gotten up here all on my own this time"
(Obviously the plan backfires like 50% of the time)
Zenny: Dex slightly increases pyromancy cast speed, so uh it might not be a bad idea to raise that (and get some dex weapon like a scythe / katana / rapier)
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Super Mario 3D Land - Finished last night. Fun little game, not too deep but World 8 was pretty challenging. Definitely better than the other 3DS Mario I've played (NSMB2), it is more creative and challenging, but probably worse than Galaxy (which is the game it reminds me of most).
LFT - Doing a three person playthrough with Elfboy and Magey. We have just got pwned by Wiegraf 1 because my time mage was instant death'd before she got a turn. :( We have a TV/computer adapter and now an XBOX 360 wireless controller adapter for the computer. Pretty cool.
MK8 - Still working on opening Mirror Mode. I've gotten gold on 5/8 of the circuits.
Trails in the Sky - About to fight the blue haired sibling boss fight in the infiltrated fortress.
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Trails in the Sky - About to fight the blue haired sibling boss fight in the infiltrated fortress.
If you're bored, you should totally grab stats for 'em in the stat topic - they're the main human bosses I missed. (Bosses for a bit are going to be the likes of giant penguins or else unknown humans, alas. Okay there are some C2 losers with names but they suck and aren't even the main event.) We can always use more Trails Light bosses! (Josette has damage & status but literally dies to a sneeze IIRC, Kyle is tankier but has no offense, & no one cares about Don...)
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Probably legit a hacker, Zenny. I can't speak from personal experience, but I'm told they're more common on PC. Your best bet is to kick them off a cliff if it happens again (beyond a certain point, fall damage is straight-up ID and will bypass their functionally infinite HP). If you're planning for PVP, keep in mind that, as good as magic is against AI, most other players will find it extremely easy to dodge (due to range and speed, Combustion/Great Combusion/Black Flame are much easier to hit with then fireballs, from personal experience at least).
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If you're planning for PVP, keep in mind that, as good as magic is against AI, most other players will find it extremely easy to dodge (due to range and speed, Combustion/Great Combusion/Black Flame are much easier to hit with then fireballs, from personal experience at least).
Mm, that's a good point. And actually, thinking about it as I went to bed last night, I'm likely going to buy Dark Souls 2 after finishing DS1. I imagine more people will be playing that, so perhaps I should save the PvP build for that game and just do whatever for DS1. Eh, we'll see.
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That's a good idea as Dark Souls 2 PVP is better (Opinion, soul memory is bad but less backstabs, etc etc), and I figure by now that most people doing Dark Souls 1 PVP are pros (and will backstab you again and again)
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Re: FF13-3LR
Wow, that is so much more idiotic than expected, even for FF13 PLOT.
Rondo of Swords: following the A Path this time... It is so much less interesting from a writing standpoint, but there's some fun to be had with skill abuse in NG+
I am enjoying this enough (playing alongside the LP to avoid all the poor documentation problems) that I may grab some stats for it. Anyone who has played it/read the LP have any suggestions on how to set up the topic? I was thinking of just using all the PCs at level 50 (impossible to get them all there in one run, but your main team of six or seven should hover around that), and give everyone their full promotions (again, doable for about 6 PCs), and let them have full access to their twelve best max level skills(difficult, but for my sanity's sake, it'd make the topic less messy... And realistically in the DL, they are going to swap skills and skill points around to best suit a fight).
More controversially is what to do about Card skills. All the pcs want them, they are 100% unique, and for about half of the PCs you're unlikely to even use them unless you were planning on getting their card skills. By endgame if you're dedicated, you could have about four PCs with their card skills, and excluding the main who must be in the party and doesn't get card skills, you can have five more pcs in the active party. Not sure what to do with this but leaning towards allowing them for everyone for uniqueness sake.
The weird balance of RoS makes for interesting builds in the DL. Some skills that are relatively meaningless are kinda broken. My favorite of these is Mana Break, which the Main gets. It is a passive secondary effect on his physical that flat depletes 50% of a target's mMP in addition to the usual damage. In game it's novel because most things with MP are mages that die to one hit or a stuff breeze anyway. In the DL setting, it obviously has more uses.
Conversely, ZOC is a lot less useful (though still has some uses), due to no one besides RoS characters needing to move THROUGH a unit to attack.
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Djinn: I dunno, card skills seem kinda shaky. It takes 6 missions to get a card skill maxed. There are what, ~30 or so missions in the game? Except the earliest missions don't let you send people out, the latest missions don't (I believe), and a few random midgame ones don't allow you to send out people on quests (the ones near the pathsplit IIRC - e.g. letting Alberich out of prison). So it'd barely be 4 characters (4*6 = 24) at absolute best, and even that won't work if too many characters are latejoining ones, and you're running a party of 6-9 people most likely.
Flip side, they are all unique as you noted, and sometimes a large part of a character's worth. So it could go either way, but I'd personally lean toward not including them. I will say that if you do include them, if any character has a lame skill or one that doesn't translate to the DL, let them stop at 0 or 3 card quest missions, and instead sharpen their weapon for [3/6] missions instead. Some characters apparently get decent boosts off that too (e.g. Sasha).
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Not that this matters in the slightest, but here is what I would do. Mostly keeping in mind that RoS is obscure, obtuse, weird as fuck and not worth putting much effort into.
I would go with Level 50 just for convenience sake. Everyone gets card skills because uniqueness trumps in game representation in the DL to me. That and while it is unreasonable to get them for many people in game, you also sure as fuck aren't levelling everyone up in the game either and we all assume that happens.
Everyone is promoted ASAP unless they need to level past class change to get an optimal skill.
I wouldn't sweat optimising too well.
Just get anything that is consistent and post it. If someone disagrees with your interpretation they can play the game themselves and make their own fucking stat topic of obscure fucking weird clunky as shit game. You owe no one anything at the best of times but you certainly don't owe them for something this fucking batshit insane.
Snowfire's thing about giving everyone the option of Sharpening (or training?) in place of going on Card Quests is pretty slick actually and I would say do that because it is just a cool idea.
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Conveniently, the Sharpening gains are well documented so it is trivial to include those in place of Card Quests. Though note that any Mage with a crap Card Skill is still screwed because their weapons max out at 0 in all stats since they can't attack physically. Which is going to make some hilariously awesome Punies that spoil weird shit. (Just a quick eyeball at the numbers shows Selmer at something ridiculous like 0.1 PCHP for physical durability and average speed at best. Though he gets pretty high 2HKO ice dmg to spoil anyone slow and weak to ice or magic.)
Another amusing one I've seen is that Kay gets a passive secondary on his Physicals that applies a status that stops Counterattacks, spoiling lots of FE (kinda a running theme in RoS is poking fun at FE conventions... Nice to see it reflects in the DL too)
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Cheating is rampant is an understatement. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Other/2012-09-12_00002.jpg)
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Dark Souls:
Beat the Depths, boss was stupid easy. Got the Gargoyle Halberd and upgraded it to +5, realized that it isn't my style but used it anyway because the Drake Sword started to suck. I did a bit of exploring, found the Great Basin and Drake Valley and died a lot, got to the bottom of Blighttown and found I couldn't continue without probably dying because of the poison swamp. It looks like beating the area turns off the Bonfire at the main hub anyway until I get closer to Endgame so I'll probably hold off and finish up the side areas first.
BTW, Andy, Toxic Blowdart Snipers aren't hard. Use Spider Shield and block, it stops Toxic altogether. Suck harder.
Found the Iaito, looks like it may be neat if I get my DEX up to use it, which I probably will. It's fast, has both area control and straight line damage, and yeah. Actually, being able to use a good weapon is probably more important than spell slots, so I am now focusing on DEX / Endurance for level ups, and will use either that or the Uchigatana.
Most things I read on the internet recommends going an elemental path for the weapon upgrades but I recall Fenrir saying that it's just better to upgrade on the normal path, and looking at the Wiki that seems especially true for Katanas (If I max out Dex I probably want that A rank), so that's probably what I will do especially since I already have fire damage on the side. I may upgrade the Gargoyle Halberd to Chaos for shits and giggles and to have a secondary weapon but likely I will max out DEX and Endurance first and focus on Katana use. I'll probably dump a little bit into Vit and some into Attunement as necessary but yeah.
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Dark Souls:
Beat the Depths, boss was stupid easy. Got the Gargoyle Halberd and upgraded it to +5, realized that it isn't my style but used it anyway because the Drake Sword started to suck. I did a bit of exploring, found the Great Basin and Drake Valley and died a lot, got to the bottom of Blighttown and found I couldn't continue without probably dying because of the poison swamp. It looks like beating the area turns off the Bonfire at the main hub anyway until I get closer to Endgame so I'll probably hold off and finish up the side areas first.
BTW, Andy, Toxic Blowdart Snipers aren't hard. Use Spider Shield and block, it stops Toxic altogether. Suck harder.
Found the Iaito, looks like it may be neat if I get my DEX up to use it, which I probably will. It's fast, has both area control and straight line damage, and yeah. Actually, being able to use a good weapon is probably more important than spell slots, so I am now focusing on DEX / Endurance for level ups, and will use either that or the Uchigatana.
Most things I read on the internet recommends going an elemental path for the weapon upgrades but I recall Fenrir saying that it's just better to upgrade on the normal path, and looking at the Wiki that seems especially true for Katanas (If I max out Dex I probably want that A rank), so that's probably what I will do especially since I already have fire damage on the side. I may upgrade the Gargoyle Halberd to Chaos for shits and giggles and to have a secondary weapon but likely I will max out DEX and Endurance first and focus on Katana use. I'll probably dump a little bit into Vit and some into Attunement as necessary but yeah.
The reason the Lightning Uchi is so popular is because it requires very little stat investment. You can just get the minimum requirements for the Uchi, go Lightning with it and not worry about stat scaling for your weapon. You'll get more damage if you go normal + DEX, though. Can even apply resins or buffing spells to improve damage.
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At very high levels, DEX slightly increases pyromancy casting animation time. So you could go that route as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHfPcu_B0nQ
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Normal path for weapons being better is mostly a Demon's Souls thing, since getting the alternate stones pretty much required a faq + farming.
Waste 5 hours of your life for 5 more damage woo.
In Dark Souls IIRC you can get enough stones of every type easily. Best path is probably lightning as it requires no stat investment, BUT elemental weapons are much worse than the normal path in the (awesome) DLC. You can't really go wrong with the normal path.
In Dark Souls 2 every path requires the same stones and you can revert at any time and it's awesome. You can only smith stuff pretty late in the game though.
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Depths boss I've always found to be the easiest in the game. Watch him run into a wall, stab him in the butt, run away, repeat.
Re: the swamp? If you haven't gone back to the asylum, now's the time. There's a ring there which'll make that much less painful.
Re: the basin? FAQ Dusk of Oolacile. (How anyone found her through exploration alone is beyond me.) Her hat boosts all types of magic offense (if you don't mind having asymmetrical gold wings jutting from your head) and much later she'll be the gateway to the DLC.
I am a partisan of normal weapons. Lightning weapons might be better in a broad array of normal circumstances, but as Fenrir points out they get almost completely walled in the DLC (which includes two of the game's meanest bosses, in my opinion) and by the base game's two hardest fights (again, my opinion, really don't find there to be much competition, though). 40 DEX and +15 something with A or S scaling and weapon enchants (requires some investment in intelligence of faith) is about the most efficient recipe I've found for melee offense in Dark Souls.
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Pikachu, Snorlax and Vendrick V0.5 resist lightning? I didn't notice having really godawful damage against them.
Do they resist fire too?
I usually prefer a bit less offense with a bit more vitality /endurance, so I always use lightning. but I might have been overestimating endurance all these years. Definitely not vitality though.
Speaking of which, I completely ignored vitality alltogether in my last roguesouls run through the game, and got OHKOed by Moonlight Butterfly. It was still pretty awesome. I only now just realized that the second gargoyle only ever spits fire, and noticing that makes the fight much easier)
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The guy who shoots lightning bolts at you resist lightning? Maybe.
As for final boss, yeah, it's almost worthless against him. (Fire works fine. He uses a fire sword!)
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That would be the game pushing for you to try to have a weapon you swap to wouldn't it? It always seems to be a design point the games try to push you towards and community actively pushes back against (probably because it is shitty and grindy mechanic).
Sounds like DS2 does it better with more focus on weapon durability (and then fucks it up by putting in dual wielding lol)
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Eh, it's not much trouble at all to get two different weapons maxed out in DS1. Everything but the third tier of ore is storebought. (Now, if you're trying to max out two different weapons on the same track--say chaos and fire--then hahaha no there's barely enough readily available chunks in the entire game to finish one of those). What DS2 does right for encouraging weapon variety is just making upgrading simpler and being more generous with ore (eventually, might struggle for materials early/midgame but I've always got a pile of spare slabs by the end). The weapon durability taking a dive into the toilet thing is just an unnecessary irritant.
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Well using Chaos and Fire is kind of defeating the point of the game pushing you to try to use two weapons to bypass enemy weakness.
And just like Vagrant Story you can totally brute force past it through various methods (and the community really does seem to do so, but I might be misreading it).
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That would be the game pushing for you to try to have a weapon you swap to wouldn't it? It always seems to be a design point the games try to push you towards and community actively pushes back against (probably because it is shitty and grindy mechanic).
Sounds like DS2 does it better with more focus on weapon durability (and then fucks it up by putting in dual wielding lol)
My understanding is it was more a reaction to the fact that Lightning Weapons were stupidly good for 99% of DS1, even after nerfing. I remember they were the defacto build early on for sure.
I dunno what this durability thing people talk about in DS2 is. My Greatsword lasts eternally.
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I assume attack speed and damage per attack is something in the performance there. Noting that most of my understanding for durability issues here comes from El Cid. As much as we all love Cid he does have a penchant for frail fast hitting weapons.
I assume Fenrir's Great Club shenanigans avoided a lot of durability issues.
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I ran my clubs into durability issues a few times(good lord the 10 failed summons in a row against the Gargs almost broke my Giant Warrior Club) and the Old Whip will break in the middle of anything instantly.
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Well unfortunately I already dumped 20 DEX into the Iaito so that's where I stand now. Given this convo I may just stay there on Dex, get the Iaito to Lightning, and focus on Endurance/Vit. I have ignored Vit up til this point (15 or so) and it is causing me problems.
Also, turns out, I *CAN* Invade people, I just have to be patient and not run around like a dunkass. I have killed like 3 people so far and it is great! Except that i am out of invasion items and need to get to a covenant that just lets me invade at will asap.
Beat the Hydra and got the equipment Cid recommended. I am Kawaii As Fuck (http://i.imgur.com/uYpMG0s.jpg) now, though I usually wear armor and gloves instead but keep the skirt and tiara. Got the Rusted Iron Ring, got totally owned by the Stray Demon, and said fuck it. Now on my way to finish off Blighttown and get better pyro spells.
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Nice waifu.
Nice face.
20 dex is already some investment, might as well focus on vit/dex and stay with normal.
About the covenant that lets you invade people indefinitely, to join this you need to do crazy stuff and beat one nightmare of a boss.
Keep in mind that it becomes unavailable extremely shortly after you get the ability to warp between bonfires. But you might not even want to try and get it on your first playthrough. (There's always NG+. You can go fight the boss and join the covenant right away, before Taurus Demon)
The Old Whip and Channeler's Trident are the only DS2 weapons with low durability (not counting all the old rusted shit), anything else is just fine. I can't main them so I just don't use them at all. Using a few weapons is very impractical until the endgame, so I don't think Souls games are really pushing using a lot of weapons, it's very impractical until the endgame. Notable exceptions:
- Bows are good utility. But you can keep them barely upgraded
- Some blunt weapons for Demon's Souls earlygame / Dark Souls 2 earlygame
- A divine weapon for Nito / the catacombsIf you're new, you might not even know that divine weapons have the undead slaying property. If you're 1337, you just take the occult club in Anor Londo, downgrade it to divine, and use that without even bothering to upgrade it
Vagrant Story was trickier about it (I remember barely doing any damage often, but switching weapons was so slow that I couldn't imagine doing anything else. In Souls games resistance means only doing half damage or so and you can beat anything with any build, with the notable exception of pyromancy doing 0 damage against one boss.
I didn't even notice it playing Dark Souls 2, but one of the biggest improvement over Dark Souls 1 is being able to roll in every direction (instead of four) when locked on to an enemy.
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(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--vWjIoLm0--/t9l9wcttfkydvvcyslnz.gif)
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20 dex is already some investment, might as well focus on vit/dex and stay with normal.
Yeah I'm kind of regretting it already. Really I should have just kept focusing on Pyromancy and Vitality/Endurance, since that's all I have that can actually deal damage now. Oh well hopefully the Iaito will suck less once I finish grinding for Titanite.
EDIT: Didn't realize the smith sold titanite. Upgraded to +8. Weapon no longer sucks. Am suddenly OK with Dex/VIT Build
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Final Fantasy III: PC version, which is a port of the smartphone port of the DS remake. I decided to do a "magic-heavy" run to see if magic is really as bad as it's cracked up to be in FF3r.
Short answer: No.
I set a restriction for myself: at any given time, I could have no more than a single PC in a primarily physically-inclined job. After beating Jinn, I made a party of Thief/Red Mage/White Mage/Black Mage and got started.
The early game went incredibly smoothly; make no mistake, offensive magic is really good in early FF3r. -aras do much more damage to bosses than anything else at your disposal, and with few exceptions the scariest moves early bosses use are all magical, and thus slamming into the mages' better mdef. Salamander did put up a decent fight, but leftover Antarctic Winds brought his limit phase to a swift end. No other bosses were really notable, and MP was never an issue: staff itemcasts hitting elemental weaknesses are just as good offense at these levels, if not better, than nearly any melee. (Even not hitting weaknesses they're pretty respectable.)
With the Fire Crystal, I switched the Red Mage to a Scholar. Also about this time, Thief was hitting the sort of JLs where stealing battle items starts happening. This brings me to a point: Assuming you can keep it alive (which isn't THAT much harder than any other mage class), a Thief/Scholar duo absolutely trivializes an awful lot of bosses in FF3r. Kraken went down in 2 or 3 rounds under Zeus' Weath and Blizzaga.
Water Crystal brought no job changes right away. Goldor was tedious because of his mdef - only my Thief could really do appreciable damage to him - but his offense was anemic at best and easily healed through. With the Enterprise back in hand I went and bought harps and switched the Thief to a Bard temporarily to prepare for the next boss, because I assumed it was going to be the hardest part of the run: Garuda.
As it turned out, that expectation proved to be dead wrong - -aga itemcasts from a Scholar are freaking 3HKO on Garuda. Combine this with Black Mage's Blizzaga being a 6HKO, and what you have between the two is a solid 2RKO - and you can easily have a pile of Arctic Winds from stealing by now without grinding for them. (I had about ten.) The Bard switched back to Thief after Garuda, in any case.
Got the Nautilus, looted the underwater dungeons. The weaknesses with magic start to be apparent here: non-wind weaknesses become rarer, melee damage finally starts pulling ahead of your itemcasted -aras from the Saronia rods, and BM's status seems to never work. Some of these enemies also manage 3HKOs on backrow mages. I ended up having to switch Scholar back to Red Mage here once I picked up enough updated gear; keeping Scholar alive was just too difficult.
Right now I'm at the Cave of Shadows. I switched the Thief to Dark Knight for this section: spitting enemies suck, and when my mages are 3HKOing at best, I kind of need the help.
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Lightning Returns Abridged EPISODE 2: Noel, the only character who kind of makes sense!
Hope: So...your next task is to find a bunch of numbers scattered around the town.
Lightning: Ok, off I go!
*Lightning appears in a weird place*
Lightning: Where am I?
Lumina: You're in your mind ^_^!!!!
Lightning: What are you doing here?
Lumina: ^_^
Lightning: ...ok, why am I here?
Lumina: Because this is the one place God can't see, pretty neat right ^_^?
Lightning: Why does that matter?
Hope: *with static* LIGHTNING!? WHERE'D YOU GO!?!!
Lumina: See, anything he knows, God knows! God's not Omniscient ^_^!
Lightning: Whatever, I've got a job to do.
Lumina: You're not doing God's work, you've got your own agenda ^_^!
Lightning: What are you talking about? I'm doing this for Serah because Gods basically holding her soul hostage.
Lumina: You're lying to yourself, good bye ^_^!
Lightning: ...what was that all about?
*back at Luxerion*
Hope: So...yeah, there are numbers plastered on walls...go find them.
*Lightning finds 3 of the numbers through various means*
Hope: Oh guess what? The last number is in an area which doesn't open until 12 AM tonight, you know 6 hours before you gotta teleport back?
Lightning: So...I need to do whatever for the next like 10 hours because of stupid time restrictions?
Hope: Exactly.
*10 hours later, Lightning gets to the Warren*
Lumina: Hi there, nice to meet you again ^_^!
Lightning: What are you doing here?
Lumina: I'm here to help ^_^!
Lightning: Ok, how can you help me?
Lumina: There's an Oracle Drive in here, go see it! The Shadow Hunter saw one too, that's why he wants you dead, you know what those are right ^_^?
Lightning: ...leave me alone...
Lumina: Not until you leave yourself alone, tee hee ^_^!
*Lumina leaves, Lightning goes to see the Oracle Drive after getting the number, which shows a picture of her destroying the world and being killed by someone familiar*
Lightning: This is a vision of the future?
Hope: What do you see?
Lightning: Me destroying the world and being killed by the Shadow Hunter...by the way, hi Noel, I know you're the Shadow Hunter and standing behind me.
Noel: Awww, was it really that obvious?
Lightning: Why are you trying to kill me?
Noel: Didn't you just see the image? YOU'RE GOING TO DESTROY THE WORLD!
Lightning: I'm trying to save it, leave me alone!
Noel: Ok, but only because now is not the right time to kill you!
*He leaves*
Lightning: ...so about that 4th number I just got...
Hope: Right, let's go to that phone-booth now and answer a phone call!
*Lightning re-enacts exactly what she saw the previous day*
Lightning: Alright, Children of Etro, here I come!!
*she reaches the ceremony site in the graveyard*
Cultist #1: Praised be to Etro, such that we will kill this girl who MIGHT BE THE SAVIOR!
Cultist #2: Acknowledge the Pink Hair she has, which means she has a higher chance of being the SAVIOR than others!
Cultist #3: Praised be to Etro who IS TOTALLY NOT DEAD FOR 500 YEARS AND THE REAL PATH TO SALVATION!
Lightning: Hi guys, you want the savior?
Cultist #4: IT'S THE SAVIOR! KILL HER!!!
*Lightning starts fighting guys off, killing them*
Hope: Be careful, we're not trying to kill people, but save them.
Lightning: There's a difference?
Hope: Yes! YOu can take souls without killing people!
Lightning: ...that was not in the manual...say, why isn't Noel with these guys?
Noel: Because I have NOTHING TO DO WITH THEM! ...ok, more accurately, they were working with me because I promised I'd kill the Savior, but then they got anxious because no Savior was showing up and they started kill anyone who looks remotely like you...
Lightning: So you're saying I should be happy that the only one you want dead is me, and that everyone else wasn't your idea?
Noel: I didn't say that at all! I'm just saying I'm not linked with those idiots!
Cultists: DEATH TO THE SAVIOR AND THIS KID!
Noel: ...look, we can talk later, can we just have a 5 minute truce to deal with these freaks?
Lightning: Ok.
*they win*
Noel: So...yeah...NOW WE FIGHT!
Lightning: You're that serious about killing me?
Noel: I am! ...but this isn't the right spot, follow me to the Warren, there's something you need to see there! That's where I'll do the deed. *he leaves*
Hope: You know Lightning, if you don't follow him, he won't kill you.
Lightning: But I need to save his soul! Serah would never forgive me if I didn't.
*back at the Warren*
Lumina: Hi again ^_^!
Lightning: Wonderful...
Lumina: For the record, he saw a different Oracle Drive than you did, and I was totally the person who showed it to him, pretty sweet right ^_^?
Lightning: Ok, seriously, what is up with you?
Lumina: You know there was only one person Noel ever loved, and she died in his arms, right ^_^?
Lightning: That could refer to two different people you realize...
Lumina: I'm talking about Yeul, OF COURSE! Seriously, you can be so stupid at times >_< ^_^!
Lightning: Oh, ok...wait, if we're talking about Yeul, why is Noel's theme playing in the background?
Lumina: My last night here for you...same old song...just once more~^_^! *she leaves*
Lightning: ...I'm not even going to try and make sense of any of that...
Hope: So...yeah...pursuit of Noel?
Lightning: On it.
*she chases him down until there's a guy standing in front of a wooden door*
Child of Etro Dude: SHOW THE SIGN OF ETRO NOW! YOU CANNOT PASS ME OR THIS WOODEN DOOR!
Lightning: So Hope, how do we get one of those?
Hope: Beat up a Cultist and steal it from them?
Lightning: Where am I going to find one of those?
Cultist Random Encounters: THE SAVIOR! GET HER!!!
Lightning: ...nevermind...
*more chase sequence through a dungeon later, Lightning meets Noel by an Oracle Drive*
Noel: Did you see the image!? IT SHOWS EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENS!
Lightning: It looked just like the one I saw...how is it different?
Noel: Because damn it, it says Yeul will be back!
Lightning: If I save the world, everyone will survive, even you...well ok, not everyone, but SOME PEOPLE as opposed to none!
Noel: And the way I see it, if you die, the world is saved, and I get Yeul back...not sure how that works, but damn it, Yeul!
Lightning: And I want Serah back, so we are at an impass!
Noel: Ok, I guess I must KILL YOU! *Noel attacks, and fails to do anything significant*
Lightning: I'm more powerful than ever thanks to God! Though thinking on it, wow, I am probably the single biggest jRPG Protagonist cheater for canon plot powers. First l'Cie, then Etro, then Bhunivelze...didn't have to do any work other than be in the right place at the right time.
Noel: And here I've been fighting for 500 YEARS getting stronger, I know I can take you!
Lightning: You don't have it in you to kill me! You have Emotions, I don't! Therefore I'm better!!
Noel: That's just bull. You're getting angry right now, you're acting on love of your sister, and clearly show a sense of hope in your eyes; those are all emotions! DON'T PRETEND YOU'RE EMOTIONLESS!
*they fight, Noel gets down to one knee*
Lightning: See? You can't beat me.
Noel: Yes. I. CAN!!! *attacks Lightning at full force, knocks her down, throws Knife, and misses Lightning, hitting Oracle Drive instead...on purpose*
Lightning: You...spared me?
Noel: ...it's not what Yeul would have wanted. I realize that now. The Oracle Drive is just an image, not the truth; it's up to me to help change the future. There was a lot of hope in us 500 years ago...Hope, Snow and I all wanted to fight the Chaos, so we did, but in only 500 years, and even in that's almost gone. Also, Hope disappeared, wonder where he went...
Lightning: Actually...
Hope: DO NOT TELL HIM! I REPEAT! DO NOT TELL HIM! ABORT! ABORT! ABORT!
Lightning: ...I wonder happened to Hope myself...
Noel: Anyway, thanks Lightning, I'll do my best to fight fiends and such until the end of days!
Lightning: So...mission success?
Lumina: Unfortunately >:( >_< ^_^!
Lightning: Can you cut to the chase?
Lumina: Oh sure, I showed him the Oracle Drive and expected him to kill you ^_^
Lightning: But your planned failed.
Lumina: Nope! I was kind of hoping it'd end this way ^_^!
Lightning: ...logic doesn't work with you, does it?
Lumina: no, logic doens't work with YOU, tee hee ^_^!
Hope: So...uhh...yeah, Lightning, I hear there's this saint in Luxerion...you should go meet her.
Lightning: It's Vanille, isn't it?
Hope: How do you know that?
Lightning: Because seriously, who else would it be? If the character is important, it needs to be someone from the previous games, and they teased her in the intro to this area. Not to mention I can't see Fang being it.
Hope: Ok, fair enough.
*Minor fetchquest for Lightning to get into Cathedral later*
Lightning: Hi Vanille.
Vanille: Lightning! It's so nice to see you!
Lightning: So you've awakened from the crystal, huh?
Vanille: Yeah, 13 years ago. Then I found I could hear the SPIRITS OF THE DEAD, so I joined the order.
Lightning: Where's Fang?
Vanille: Oh, she awoke with me too...then left to go find something or other...
Lumina: Yeah, Vanille's the Saint, pretty cool right ^_^!
Lightning: ...what are you doing here?
Vanille: Oh, that's just Lumina, she's been helping me out here, she's harmless.
Lumina: ^_^!
Lightning: ...you're not cheating on Fang, are you?
Vanille: What?! NO! She's just helping me with Chaos and such. Here, let me show you!
*they go the room behind*
Lightning: Why is there so much Chaos in the Saint's room?
Vanille: Because so many people died and I can hear them all. Million's of souls, and only I can listen! Lightning, you need to set them all free by destroying the Chaos, please!
Lightning: ...that didn't answer my question...
Vanille: I need to stay here, ok!? The people need me!
Lumina: You can't save her soul~ You can't save her soul~ ^_^!
Lightning: Ok, but I will be back, don't worry, you just keep doing your job!
*6 AM hits*
Hope: Lightning, I'm bringing you back up to the Arc now!
*in Lightning's mind again*
Lumina: ^_^!
Lightning: ok, what this time.
Lumina: Mock Mock Mock Mock Mock ^_^!
Lightning: What are you talking about?
Lumina: This stuff is important but I'm being oddly cryptic because lalalalala~^_^!
Lightning: Huh?
Lumina: The watchers dance! Lalalalala! Lalalalala! ^_^!
Lightning: ...yeah, I'm just going to leave now, good bye.
*at the Ark* (http://www.listenonrepeat.com/watch/?v=8HGJ4pIPiq8)
Hope: It has been a long time, Lightning. Our current situation is as follows.
*picture of Yggdrassil, days extend to Day 3, 6 days left*
Hope: Our current situation is...if things do not change, than all is lost! Do you wish to know the status of your item stock?
*Lightning does some menu based stuff*
Hope: Lightning, about your performance...send us souls Brave and True! These are all the Eradia Points I can grant you at this time! The Lord Bhunivelze is pleased with you. He begs me give you these Artifacts!
*get new equipment*
Hope: Lightning, I have a request to make of you. SEND US SOULS THAT ARE SIGNIFICANT! May fate guide your hand!
---
I am leaving out any segment where Lightning goes into detail about the previous games because those only exist for people who, for whatever reason, skipped those two.
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Up to 30 Vit you get more and more HPs per level (like 35/level near the end) then you only get like 20 and it only goes lower from then on. So 30 Vit is a pretty good goal.
Roguesouls: Hey I discovered that getting the Great Club is not that bad. I can do it in about 15 minutes. It smashes earlygame bosses.
I made a Great Club + Elite Knight Set high poise + midroll build, and it's much better than a sorcerer build for survival even if it's melee range only. Usually I die because I get ganked by dogs or something and can't do anything about it. High poise > That.
I died once against Ceaseless Discharge. I was running far from a ledge, he hit me with his flame laser for non lethal damage and I was teleported into the lava pit. As far as I'm concerned this is BS and I don't count this as a death.
I considered an AFK death as an actual death before, but glitch deaths = NO
So yeah I'm still going and Sen's fortress is next (And I'll probably die there, honestly)
Edit: Oh yeah forgot to mention that Great Club = Awesome.
it doesn't have a wide arc attack like in DS2 and its R2 suuuucks, but the running attack, the jumping attack and the rolling attack are actually pretty useful.
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Jumping Great Club R2 literally all you need ever. It's an excellent weapon even in DS1 despite being worlds slower and stiffer than in DS2. The thing that gets me killed with it, though (in both games) is fucking up that jumping attack and then getting stabbed during the painfully long windup for a regular R2.
Re: DS2 weapon durability, I dunno, I've had stuff like great hammers come pretty close to breaking just running through a single area. On paper there really isn't much of a gap between a dinky little dagger's durability score and that of Not!Sinner's giant fuckoff sword. It really seems like across weapon types they balanced it so that your gear would last you through an entire zone but try anything more than that without resting and shit's gonna fall apart. I'm not really sure I see the logic behind this; as I said, it is mostly just a nuisance.
Oh and Dusk's outfit is my favorite thing to wear in DS1, let's all act shocked.
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Hope: Our current situation is...if things do not change, then all is lost! Do you wish to know the status of your item stock?
I chuckled.
Rondo of Swords: Path A finished. Not nearly as good as Path B. Game still has some worthwhile writing, I'm gonna go ahead an shortlist it on the "good JRPG plot" list. Gameplay is even often times fun when you have full documentation, though there is some serious negatives from the Errand System (seriously, how do you fuck up -shopping- in a JRPG, they've been doing that fine since Dragon Quest...). Probably a 4/10 game altogether, 2/10 if you're playing it blind, and 8/10 if you're like me and love this kind of SaGa Frontier-ish broken mess with enough redeeming qualities that it's worth the work you put into finding those qualities.
Stat topic notes for anyone who has played the game/read the LP who has an opinion on equipment legality... I'm not allowing any equips outside of initial equips (these do almost nothing anyway) and some character-unique consumable items. I'm not sure if this is the best way to go about it, but the only other option I can think of is to just give everyone a flat +72 Def in amulets because those are the only 'storebought' equips that anyone would even want. This just serves to dilute the durability curve and give the tanky melee types better magic res (which is really not unique at all). This does make the mages love you forever (they are sooooo squishy without amulets). Not really sure which is better. Kitting everyone out with amulets is certainly true to in-game if you know what you're doing with the arcane shopping system. But it doesn't really seem right to just hand out roughly 1.5-2x durability to the whole cast.
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Yeah, the jump attack is tricky. You should see the rollstab though, it's really good too.
I died in the Painting Guardian hangout place. Fell off near that chandelier. Tried killing the others with poison arrows from a bow I couldn't wield properly, but it didn't work :( I just didn't want to invest stat points into Dex.
Oh well, good run.
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I have a tip for Meeple, always remember to look at your feet!~
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I have a tip for Meeple, always remember to look at your feet!~
I am an interesting scenario with money by doing that actually. On one hand, I have more than enough that I can throw potions around willy-nilly and not worry about being able to restock because Gil. On the otherhand, I still can't afford the most expensive gear so I can't say "I have more than enough than what I know what to do with!" I have bought everything else in the potential price range granted.
I'm actually further than what I showed in the Abridged scenario, just no real plot developments, only side quest stuff which I'm purposely skipping because it's hard enough to remember the events of the plot.
That said, for non-Toriyama plot...
Mario Kart 8: 1st place in 50 CC in all courses...except Lightning...stupid last minute Rainbow Road mess up *grumbles*
Metroid Fusion: Just got Power Bombs!
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Mario Super Picross - played through
Brings in 20x20 and 25x20 boards, which is fine in theory, but the 25x20 boards take forever and there are far too many of them. And just when it looks like you've finished all the puzzles, it brings in the Ultra set. Then finishing that brings in the EX set, and finishing that opens up an unmarked EX puzzle which if you finish opens up a second EX set, and finishing that opens up several more unmarked EX puzzles. And then it's finally over after those, supposedly for a total of 300 puzzles. I like Picross and all but argh.
Picross e4 - played through
So the gimmick in Picross e2 was Micross, which were terribly boring. And the gimmick in Picross e3 was Mega Picross, which was just plain terrible. What is the gimmick in Picross e4? To have both Micross and Mega Picross. OH BOY
If you have save data for Picross e1-e3 then it unlocks more Mega Picross puzzles BEST BONUS (to top it off, they're apparently all Mega Picross versions of standard puzzles from those games, although I haven't actually checked). At least there are only two Micross boards. They're still boring.
I guess it also has some 20x15 boards in the standard mode, whereas e1-e3 only ever went as high as 15x15. 20x15 is nowhere near as bad as 25x20 and there's nowhere near as many of them, so that was fun.
One nice thing about Picross e4 is that the 'free' rules (no time limit in exchange for no notification if you tap out an incorrect tile) are available for all puzzles rather than being constrained to particular modes like in the previous games in the series. I don't care much for the normal rules because I feel that the game telling you that you've tapped out an incorrect tile kind of defeats the purpose.
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MK8 - Unlocked Mirror Mode! Let the getting my ass kicked commence. :(
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Mega Man 3 Gameboy: Completed. Game has a lot of issues and I won't go through them; very skippable entry, not worth playing, etc.
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Dark Souls:
Ugh, I hate the Iaito (At least, I hate it since I don't have the stats to make it work), so I restarted... and caught up to where I was in an evening. This game, man.
Decided I was happy with the Gargoyle Halberd and stuck with that, will probably make it Lightning when I can. Almost ready to ascend my Pyro glove, too. Stat wise, I put more points into Attunement and actually have spell charges now, it's weird. This game is so much more fun when you don't try to put points into everything at once.
Is there a way to make Firestorm not burn through all it's charges at once?
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To Meeple-
You actually don't need passwords at the phone booth. You can break it at force. Just have a lot of Blizzard ready as you'll have to fight a pretty strong fire based foe.
The time used for find the password can be used to do some quest in Yusnan instead.
They put a lot of character work in Lightning this time. She will have monologues for each individual quest she completed, so remember to take a look at those by opening up the menu once in a while.
A couple of things she said is really heartfelt. One of the few things I appreciated from the character works they did, when the writing of this game is mostly ass.
As for the costumes, Cloud's DLC is broken and worth getting. If you don't want DLC, I suggest you fetch the Amazon custom by working on Wild Land first.
Do Snow's quest after finishing up Luxerion. Than go do Wild Plain. You want the goodies from the quest there as well as the stuff in Caius' dungeon.
Save Dead Dune for the last. That place is extremely time consuming and dull.
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Dark Souls:
Ugh, I hate the Iaito (At least, I hate it since I don't have the stats to make it work), so I restarted... and caught up to where I was in an evening. This game, man.
Decided I was happy with the Gargoyle Halberd and stuck with that, will probably make it Lightning when I can. Almost ready to ascend my Pyro glove, too. Stat wise, I put more points into Attunement and actually have spell charges now, it's weird. This game is so much more fun when you don't try to put points into everything at once.
Is there a way to make Firestorm not burn through all it's charges at once?
Yeah, I've always found the Souls games to heavily reward specialization. You really can't be even competent on every front without grossly overlevelling. (I am perfectly fine with this approach since it ensures replays will be a different experience.) And re: Firestorm, nope, that's the way it's programmed, for all practical purposes it's a single-shot spell. Still has tactical uses against mobs and fuckhuge targets. Attunement is something that's handled a little neater in DS2, boosting it increases your number of charges per spell and casting speed in addition to spell slots (and Firestorm properly says single-digit charges instead of this crazy "You have twenty charges but casting it uses 17" nonsense).
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Djinn: A decent compromise (since the RoS shopping system is obtuse and you're not necessarily guaranteed to get what you want) might be to assume that the cast only gets 2 accessory slots for amulets, or, equivalently, only has reliable access to crappy amulets. I'm not sure even allowing the full 3 good amulets makes Selmer etc. that much happier anyway - I get the impression RoS defense is subtractive to a degree, as it certainly sounds like Margus decked out with 3 amulets basically doesn't die, which will still make the mages suck comparatively. (Check out the FF6 defense curve for comparison - a few super-tanks like Mog & Gau who get close to 255 defense in the DL make everyone else sadface.)
Also, if a player for some reason did want to send a mage out to go duel an enemy, you probably would equip 'em with amulets and hope for the best. (although if Selmer in particular is so insanely fragile such that he dies to anything more damaging than Mint anyway, he might well want to shuck off defense and get more offense anyway, on the theory that the only matches he wins are the ones where he goes first and OHKOs...)
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Well, Selmer actually gets Invoke Life (+40% HP) and Stand Fast (+20% Def), so it turns out he's the second most durable mage. Marie and Igraine are actually looking like the durability failures, but notably, all the mages easily outdamage the melee fighters against endgame enemy averages. Arios with Ars Magna and his Card skills is pumping out like 1400 RoS damage. The only other attack breaking 1000 is Serdic's OverBreak level 3 and most melee is hovering around 300 dmg.
And yes, RoS Defense is subtractive. Amulets would also add to the cast's magical durability. The damage formulas are:
(2*ATK-DEF) * Terrain Modifier * (Direction Modifier+Class Modifier) * Active Skill Modifier * Passive Skill Modifier, rounded down after each modifier - notably only Direction and Passive Skill Modifiers are DL-relevant.
(Pow*SpellModifiers*3/2-EqDef) * (1 + 3/2*(C_Mag*SkillModifiers - T_Mag) / 100), so magical durability is basically 2/3*Amulets + Magic stat?
Subtractive in all cases.
Hmm... 2 amulets seems like a fair compromise and also lets the starting equips matter. Only 3 PCs get any starting equips that effect their damage so I won't have to run the calculations over and over and I can let the topic reader decide which method they prefer.
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Tales of Symphonia HD:
Playing this reminds me of everything I dislike about some of the Tales games... The character work and such is not well done, there aren't any particularly charismatic characters, and the gameplay is rather dull all told.
I suppose I may be a bit harsh on Lloyd since he can be likable enough sometimes when he is being reasonable and coming up with a plan to do something, but as a whole the cast is rather bad. Genis is insufferable at times, Raine is played too much for laughs with the whole beating people thing, Kratos has the personality of a tin can, and Collette is played up a little TOO sickly sweet. Maybe things get much better and I just don't remember real character development that is supposed to happen later, or maybe Sheena/Zelos are more amusing than I remember... But I doubt it.
The gameplay is standard Tales but lacks a real... selling point. I suppose the selling point is "ARPG!!!" but that's just not very endearing. It can require some strategy when facing down boss fights with multiple foes. The customization system sucks and now I am reminded of why I didn't recall actually using it. Compared to ToX and ToV this is very disappointing.
"Compared to ToV and ToX this is very disappointing" pretty much sums up my feelings on ToS1. ToS2 I recall being likable even after I finished ToV, so I look forward to that. I have a gripe that the HD collection doesn't allow one to play ToS2 until ToS1 is beaten. Lame.
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Customization isn't as bad if you play as Colette and steal some L3 EX Gems from the first Sword Dancer to unlock some Compound EX Skills for characters from early. Mainly helps well Colette with early access to Life + Spirit Up (always works on bosses!) Cross Counter, Pow Hammer counter, Super Guard, EXP plus, and the likes but also other decent stuff like Hard Hit and Nimble Mage for Raine and actually well Kratos can get Super Blast from it, forgot about that, hmmm he's probably the best off then. Titles you can get good growth from for example from using Colette's Little Pickpocket from as early as L10 (by unlocking from using Item Thief over and over then running away), if she's using that the whole game she can give Presea a run for her money, and I believe Lloyd gets some solid title options too~ Equipment customization isn't extensive or anything, fairly simply really but I actually preferred that over the huge work/effort/time sink that is Tales of Graces dualize system, and you can get materials earlier than usual by using Colette's steal and build up cash by stealing/selling Black Silvers from Balacruf Museum so. Kind of Tales of Obscura though~
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Super Mario World 2 - Kamek is awesome. Why isn't he in Mario Kart? Anyway, just beat the minifortress of World 2. World 2-1 was actually pretty tough, but the next three weren't too bad.
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Super Mario World 2 - Kamek is awesome. Why isn't he in Mario Kart? Anyway, just beat the minifortress of World 2. World 2-1 was actually pretty tough, but the next three weren't too bad.
I've seriously been wondering the same thing forever. You'd think a recurring Mario villain/henchman, who is also effectively the Arch Nemesis of Yoshi, who is plenty memorable, would get into Mario Spin Offs regularly. Certainly a better idea than the likes of BABY DAISY or a bunch of generic mooks we keep getting (I don't mean the likes of Koopa or Shy Guy; they're at least notable, iconic characters. I mean like some of those Super Mario Sunshine one shots they tried to make popular)
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need DLC kamek
let's do it nintendo
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Child of Light - Holy -shit- is this game beautiful.
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Re child of light:
Seriously I want to see another game that uses this graphics engine. And battle system. Basically I'm saying Ubisoft take my money.
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Dark Souls: Beat Sen's fortress. Iron Giant for easiest boss in the game. I didn't even get hit.
Used my last payday to ascend my Pyro fist and now I am a fiery god of death. Very little takes more than two hits of Great Combustion, and a lot of things take only two from regular combustion. Now running two copies of combustion and I never have to worry about spell charges, will probably keep this up until I can upgrade my weapon to Lightning. Its damage is shit now with my stats. Current loadout is Toxic Mist/Fire Orb/Combustion/Great Combustion/Combustion, taking out the second combustion and Toxic Mist for Great Chaos Fireball for bosses and such. Stopped running Firestorm because even with the wolf ring I always, without fail, get knocked out of the cast anytime it would be a good skill to use. Maybe this is a better skill for Dex Pyro.
Doing a lot of PVP in the Forest Protector Covenant. Most people are goons trying to get in at a low level and die easily... until I run into the handful of people who are actually good at PVP who just instantly stab me in the back as soon as I try to cast anything. Oy. Good thing most pubbies are mooks. Forest Covenant PVP, as it turns out, is a good way to get studying done, as an aside. I spend so much time idling that I may as well do something else while I wait.
Onto Anor Londo next. Already at the second bonfire. If the cathedral area is any indication of the stage's design MO I am going to fucking hate this place. Pretty, though.
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Mega Man X8 - Playing this on hard mode primarily as Zero (I also use Axl, but only as a switch-in PC, and in particular he has no health upgrades). Mostly an interesting experiment since I don't use Zero nearly as much as the other two. Unsurprisingly there are some things he does well even if I think he's overall the worst. His spear weapon (which sadly includes Gigavolt Man'o'war's stage as a prerequisite... ugh) is actually really good and I've really used it much before.
Anyway, currently dying repeatedly to the final boss chain, the true Mega Man Xperience.
Fire Emblem Awakening - Lunatic Mode. Just beat chapter 20! Also cleared all the paralogues I've opened to this point, although to be fair that isn't very many (Morgan, Cynthia, Yarne, Tiki). This mode's pretty hard, yo.
Suikoden Tactics - I started this in my latest attempt to play random PS2 RPGsI missed which I've always meant to play. It's kinda slow and dull so far. And dear god the voice acting is bad. Not all of it, but enough. Game's not as easy as I was expecting (Rita got OHKOed on her joining map, how wonderful) although obviously still the easiest thing I am playing at the moment.
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Challenge Mode for Suikoden Tactics: use Pablo on every map and keep him from getting killed! Might make it on par with FE lunatic mode. Dear god is he bad.
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Zenny I hope you're using the "Well what is it?" emote often.
If you restart AGAIN I really strongly recommend the Great Club. One of the most fun weapon in the game for sure and you can grab it right away.
Soul Sacrifice Delta: I bought the expansion pack for a game I only liked a bit, because there's all that new lore, man.
I think I might actually like all the lore in this game more than Lost Odyssey's dreams, for all that there's less emotional impact.
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Onto Anor Londo next. Already at the second bonfire. If the cathedral area is any indication of the stage's design MO I am going to fucking hate this place.
You poor, poor bastard.
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Hey speak of the devil:
Dark Souls: FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKK YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU.
Seriously, like 15 goddamn deaths on that ONE PART and then 0 for the rest of the Anor Londo run. Like, WTF am I supposed to do there? (Rhetorical question, I looked it up after the fact.) I only finally got past the archers because of luck. When I got between them their arrows synced up and I could dodge both in a single roll, then the archer I approach switched to his sword and killed himself (fun fact: In the PC version, they fixed this for the most part. Blighttown is actually kind of annoying because enemies don't just kill themselves... thank god they didn't fix it here.)
Ornstein and Smaugh were easy enough, but admittedly I summoned the Sunbro so Smaugh's second form rarely ever focused on me.
Lotec... Laurtrec... L.... Goldboy ran straight into two Great Chaos Fireballs and that went about as well for him as you would expect.
Got my Lightning Halberd and it still sucks compared to my pyro fist but it is passable secondary damage now. Toxic Mist is kind of useless when I'm not PVPing. Speaking of PVP, apparently there is a glitch where if you walk backwards and attack from the front it counts as a backstab. This is stupid and I hope they fixed it in Dark Souls 2. Fortunately for every asshole who has figured this out there are 20 mooks who don't know what they're doing so yeah. Gonna switch from Forest Protector to Darkmoon as soon as I can since I imagine there is more PVP to be had there than in the forest.
Downgraded the Occult club per Fenrir's suggestion and taking on the catacombs next. I tried it once without, and admittedly it was on my 2nd run through, but I don't even want to bother with regenerating skeltons. 2 Spooky 4 Me.
Probably will do the Duke's Archives next, since apparently there is a glitch to farm humanity and I want to take the shortcut to Lost Izailith and collect a pyro spell I probably won't use because holy hell Firestorm type spells don't work with low dex.
I should have my pyro fist upgraded fully after a couple of bosses. On the one hand, yay. On the other hand, I will not be able to make my fire more overpowered afterward and that will make me sad. Oh well I can always restart for a fourth time, rite guys
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Noting that I have literally no idea what the fuck I am talking about.
I don't think there is much boost to the Pyro Flame after you Ascend it? Once you get it to Ascended +1 it is at A scaling Fire and doesn't go up past that (I think Cid has commented on that in the past?), you just get +6 to Magic Adjustment (so 6% boost on base damage?) for 4 levels and +10 for last level. So 28 more Magic Adjustment for like 150k souls? Feels like NG+ souls dump to me.
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I actually don't have any idea precisely how pyro damage is calculated per upgrade in DS1, but more offense is always the best thing to spend your resources on. Maxed pyro hand is totally a legit thing to have on NG.
Re: Darkmoon covenant, it's cool in theory but I always had a ton of trouble actually getting matches. Again, can't comment on PC connectivity here, but on PS3 my time trying to invade as a Darkmoon Blade was heavily weighted towards sitting around and watching failed attempt after failed attempt. The trouble (and actual appeal, for me) is that you'll only be invading people with sin, which your average player can dispel by paying Oswald, which means your prime invasion targets are Darkwraiths (whose sin can't be absolved). But Darkwraiths tend not to sit still since you know they're constantly invading other people, so I found it relatively rare I could actually get a match. You could just sit around with the invasion ring on but bleh Dark Anor Londo (I hate the reduced lock-on range there).
Unless they changed the mechanics of this for the PC port, the best bet for invading remains the Darkwraith covenant because that way you can hit anyone at or above your level in any area. You just have to, you know, beat one of the game's most infamous bosses immediately after O&S to access it...although personally, I've never found the Four Kings to be that huge a deal. You've got, what six attunement slots? That's totally enough (it's all I had going in there with a SL50 pyro). The fight is wholly about DPS and Combustion-class spells have got you covered there. The worst part is just getting to them because ghost houuuuuse!
Backstabbery is FAR less prominent in DS2. There's a fair amount I dislike about DS2 PVP, but at least they nuked the tendency towards backstab-fishing that dominated DS1 PVP.
Speaking of DS2 oh hey they patched it again. Tossed the game in to check on what:
-Oh wow they totally nerfed the Avelyn. It's now weaker, slower, and inaccurate. Hardly even worth using anymore.
-Abyss Seal is now only marginally more powerful than the crappy Sunbro ring.
-Haven't tested, but apparently Great Resonant Soul got hit with the nerfbat too. GEE YOU GUYS DIDN'T FIGURE OUT HEXING WAS BROKEN DID YOU
-Never personally used it but apparently Santier's Spear is less crazy now?
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Grefter: Eh, at the point that I'm at any level ups cost 22000 souls themselves, may as well get more damage. Only one more level to go and then I am tapped for the game, though. It will probably be plenty. I will just have to accept that I can't OHKO *every* enemy with Great Combustion. :( Life is hard guys.
Cid: So, I already placed the lordvessel and the darkwraithes are locked out for now but whatever NG+. I want to play around with the other covenants and get the good ending this time anyway. Once I finish farming for the Chaos Servant shortcut and pyromancy I'll switch to Dark Moon... perhaps the PC connectivity is better, but maybe you're right. In the case that you are I may go Gravelord Servant to try that out (or whatever it's called, the Nito coventant) but probably just finish up the game and unlock Darkwraithe in NG+.
Progress: I realized I hadn't taken on Yiff the wolf yet in the Basin, and I had too much damage for him. The big pussies outside of his boss area made up for it though. Then I finished the catacombs. Fuck that place, that was tedious as hell. I apparently also missed all the content for the place by doing it too late, too? Whatever, next play through. In lieu of going down into more spooky skeletons, I wing over to the Duke's Archives. Got wrecked by the plot battle and lost 23k souls because I didn't realize it was a plot battle. >_< Broke out of jail, halfway through the level and I decided I should get some sleep tonight for a change. Probably gonna check out the Painted World next because I'm in the area and it looks like I can farm humanity there.
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Guacamelee - Picked this up because I wanted a platformer. Quite a lot of fun so far, though the best part isn't even the gameplay, it's all the lucha-tized references to video games, movies, internet memes, you name it, all scattered through the game(mostly in the towns as posters).
Not to say the gameplay is bad, mind you. It's pretty good on the platforming aspect. The combat is...either easy or very hard with few middle areas. Also a criminal lack of bossfights so far.
But overall, fun game. You get to play as a luchador, suplex skeletons, piledrive demons, transform into a chicken, travel to the world of the dead, all that normal lucha stuff. Pretty great.
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The only thing special about hitting the Catacombs early is that Patches is waiting for you there instead of in Tomb of the Giants later. You only missed a chance to get killed. And yeah the Catacombs are terrible and running them early is pain. The only good reasons for doing that are: if you're a cleric and you really really want Wrath of the Gods early; have some interest in accessing Gravelord Servant (or just using the sword you get with it) immediately; or for some reason think ten estus flasks aren't enough and absolutely must have twenty from the start of the game. Few if any of these things are worth climbing back out of that dump on foot.
Gravelord Servant is another super cool in theory but hard to tell if it's actually doing anything thing (yeah covenants not universally a resounding success in DS1). If the black phantoms you generate in other worlds are really doing their job, nobody will live long enough to find and fight you (and they are fucking terrifying if you ever get hit with them). But you could just place your sign really obviously if you're just looking for matches I guess.
Ending is entirely decided by a last-minute decision (the Darkwraith covenant leader gives you the game's most notable infodump but doesn't actually determine your ending) so whatevs there.
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Capturing shit in Crusader Kings 2 is confusing. I don't think I'm doing it right. But I killed a lot of enemy troops so I'm good at that, at least.
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Trails in the Sky - Anime rival has shown up again to be a petulant, childish douche, so happy
Super Mario World 2- World 4! Halfway done~
Mario Kart 8 - Got Gold in 7/8 of Mirror Mode. Once I complete that I will start working on 150 cc three stars.
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Catacombs are also good early if you want to do a shield only run. (You insane person) or grab a great scythe!
I died again in a "Welcome to the CLUB" playthrough. Stupidly.
Earlier, I got hit by Toxic on the way back from the Great Club, and I was too far from any bonfire to survive the poison, and I had no Homeward Bone either.
This means that for the first and last time EVER, the "Dark Souls" item has been useful.
It's like a Homeward Bone (you go back to the bonfire) except you lose all your souls and humanity. So it's like dying. Except you can't get back your souls and humanity that way, so it's actualy WAY WORSE than dying. Awesome item.
But - You have it from the start and it has infinite uses? Hurray?
Actually this means that could actually be useful in regular gameplay and not in a weird no death challenge for real.
Say you die, lose 35 humanity and 67 million souls, then on the way to get your soul back you get hit by Toxic like I just did. You have no toxic restoration item no estus no homeward bone (Jesus man how did you get in this mess with million souls stored?)
SO then you can use the Dark Souls item and I ASSUME (not 100% sure) that the first lost soul with the 35 humanity is still there when you get back. And if you had died instead it would be lost forever.
... Maybe this item only exists to get you out of horribly glitched places if you have no homeward bone, as the game autosaves everywhere and there is no reverting back to an earlier save. But the game's no fun; I haven't encountered any of these horribly glitched places except in Dark Souls 2. (and it was only a (major) graphical glitch)
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The Darksign can also be used for item duping if you're in to that. It is very useful in challenge runs or when farming enemies that give crappy souls (Blighttown slugs)
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SL1 no pyro run!??!?!?!?? Free Homeward Bonezzzzz
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Brave New World: Played several games of this.
Takeaways: I like this more than Laggy, donno if I like it more than plain old GNK. Every single change made to the game seems to be squarely aimed at: limiting warmongering and limiting the power of runaways civs. This is a net benefit to to the player on higher levels, but yeesh. It definitely encourages playing tall and peacefully. The big problem with that is that Civ 5's diplo system still sucks, even with all the tweaks put in.
Cleared with Poland and Portugal. Poland was as insanely overpowered as you'd expect from their UA. Portugal I played on a contentients map and they were okay. After running trade ships, I get why they nerfed ocean tiles. You get an insane amount of food from ships on internal trade routes, same goes for gold on extenal ship trade routes. Exploration and Piety now duke it out for worst policy tree to me. Piety tree is still junky outside of reformation beliefs and exploration only really offers much from the opener and finisher. Order is pretty powerful as well, hard to not love the building purchasing discount policy.
New wonders seem pretty irrelevant.
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Mega Man 4 Gameboy: This game saddens me. It has just about everything needed to be a good Mega Man game. Unique stage designs, bosses, while reused Robot Masters, aren't bad, good weapons, physics...ok, still using the MM2 latter climbing which is annoying, but I can overlook that, and even has the shop found in later Mega Man games which is a nice touch, and the Energy Balancer on top of that!
Yet, I struggle to call it a good game for one fatal flaw:
Lag. A lot of NES and Gameboy games had that slowdown issue if things got too complicated but it never felt as bad as it did here. If there were more than 2 sprites on the screen, the game's framerate would drop dramatically, and game would be so hard to play. If this was something that only happened in extreme circumstances? I'd overlook it, but getting to that 3+ threshold, it's so easy to accidentally get into that state and it really destroys what could have been a legitimately good Mega Man game.
I guess MM5GB is up next. I hear that's suppose to be the best Gameboy one by far, but trying to not get expectations up too high because I'd rather be simply unimpressed than disappointed (though ideally, I should end up satisfied.)
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Poking around with Lightning Returns because I actually really liked FF13-2 and morbid curiosity. It is as terrible as I thought... Which is really too bad, there's something there worth salvaging, but the main plot is Just. So. Dumb. The non-main plot is actually kinda cute. Lightning goes around being a snarky general do-gooder, which is completely at odds with the stupid in the main plot.
Gameplay is kinda fun, for all that I still don't like solo RPGs. I don't think I'll be finishing this one, but I might follow the LP.
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No playtime for the weekend, out being social. Small update from yesterday.
The crystal cave is a dungeon with invisible floor paths that you can't really check in any way except for the absolutely most vague indication ever plus trial and error. On the plus side, all but one path is linear and the non linear path is optional.
I spent two hours trying to navigate that optional path only to find a Blue Titanite Slab I have no use for on this character. At this point, I figured out that it was optional and ragequit to go be a productive adult.
I did not find out it was the ONLY FUCKING PATH that pulled that bullshit until well after it was too late to keep playing.
you win, dark souls. you fucking win. You made me rage quit for no reason whatsoever. Fuck this game.
I can't wait until I can get home in a couple days and play more.
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^_^
No playtime for the weekend, out being social. Small update from yesterday.
The crystal cave is a dungeon with invisible floor paths that you can't really check in any way except for the absolutely most vague indication ever plus trial and error.
And prism stones.
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Yeah ok you can use prism stones but not really to check if you are about to walk off the cliff in three steps instead of two.
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Murdered Soul Suspect - I am now a kitty~ This is interesting.
Been reading some comments about the game, and people saying they couldn't really care or feel empathy for Ronan, and so didn't really care who killed him but I'm not really finding that to be the case. Julia's thoughts and My Life stuff helps with that I think, plus I will be shocked if it's the douche cop guy that is really the killer.
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Fire Emblem Awakening - Nearing the end now! Chapter 21 was really evil, 22 was pretty easy even if the enemy stats are beyond ridiculous.
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Civ 5 BNW- I've come around on this. The caravan system is annoying but it has a place. Striking a balance between internal food and hammer trades and external gold trades is an interesting one, and I kind of dig it because I tend to play tall. The nerfing of sea tiles makes sense when you see how dumb sea caravans are as well.
I still really, really don't like the diplo system. The world's fair is cool enough, as are all the group projects. Everything else varies from annoying to actively pissing you off- hi, banning luxuries! There's just not a lot of depth to the system. You collect CS if you want to pass something other than generically popular things like the world fair.
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Bravely Default (Hard): Still working on, uh, the "postgame" I guess (C7). I'm even more convinced now with how they did C6 & C7 then before that it was at least someone's intent that this is a game where you can control when you kick the pail and go fight Lavos, and that's the real ending, and then we'll toss in some wacky postgame sidequests afterward. Dang good thing no-encounters exists, BD is a game I'd never have ever finished if you couldn't turn off randoms.
Everyone else seemed to say that Dark Knights kill the challenge of the game, but lacking Dark Shields for everyone and that seeming kind of lame, I decided to pass. (Also Dark Nebula doesn't show up before L9, and that was the extent of cheaply grabbing DK.) Instead I used a different cheesy strat mentioned in the stat topic: Dual Shields is busted. Templar or Knight Edea with Dual Shields + P. Def +30% + Default Guard, and equipped with 2x Bloody Shield, Ribbon, Heike Armor, & Heike Gloves = lol 1 damage from practically everything. Nice & slow so spamming Desperation every turn rarely makes the Defense loss notable. Only mages can really threaten her. Kinda funny, vs. C6 Rusalka it wiped my entire team except her, but as she lacks magic damage entirely, Edea could effortlessly solo (uh oh watch out for that 4600HKO or whatever). But yeah, defense is insanely potent in BD, and there are offensive skills that run off defense, so put 'em together and bam. Of course the other side of this is that Tiz, who was my generic "light warrior" guy with Two-Handed, started dying to absolutely everything. Time to give up on that and grab a Shield and admit his sole purpose in life is to debuff dudes with Piracy, not to really deal damage. (and heck, even with a Shield, he's still pretty fragile.) But yeah... strictly speaking, he'd be better off as a dual-shield dude with Piracy. Although I guess there are merits to being super-fast with a Fox Tail at least.
For whatever it's worth, since I already mentioned Edea's default skill load out... Tiz has a bunch of boring stat buffs (P. Atk +20%, HP +10%, etc.) Agnes has Default Guard, Angelic Ward, Holy One, & 1 free slot (currently +10% Speed). The defensive skills are obvious, your healer dying is bad times. For Holy One... it's too bad, I liked the old Buff Up / Support Amp package from Performer I ran in C4 & early C5, but Holy One really is needed to save MP, since with Holy One Cura / Curada is sufficient MT healing, while without the MP-slurping Curaga is required. Ringabel, and any offensive caster, is even more constrained in build: casters absolutely *must* equip Pierce M. Def, without which they are bad, with which they are quite good. MP concerns means the other 2 slots are on either Save BM MP or Save TM MP. There isn't even room for Gloom or the like. Still, once fighters start having trouble dealing damage, Pierce M. Def TM gives an EZ 9999 damage to single targets on the cheap, and BM, while less impressive, can still throw 5000 to a Single Target (nice in team fights) and also has Aspir.
C7 teamup fights are a ton of fun so far. Two in particular gave me some trouble:
* Eternian Board of Girl Power, the first one I attempted. So... Kikyo is actually amazing support in a team fight, she'll go hunt the weakest members of your party. Artemia is still shit (I have still NEVER seen 2x Multiburst ever, I think Pyro's making stuff up), but Multiburst is hard to plan around and can surprise kill a party member, sure, and Tiz & Ringabel are still made of paper and get OHKO'd by her physical sans Default. But Victoria is much more at home with this support; Corpse is useful for setting up badly-timed deaths, she's a mage so she can kill Edea, and her MT poison is actually quite accurate, and it's hard to afford an accessory to block it anymore. Oh and Dark is like a OHKO now or something if you're not Defaulting. Anyway, it's mostly Kikyo hype; I can roughly stay alive okay, but the initiative breaks the wrong way or Multiburst gets lucky and Agnes dies, and hooooly shit, I'm in deep, how do I get her back up (without blowing Elixirs?). For extra fun, I forgot to stock up on P. Downs, and only had ~18 or so, something I didn't notice on my first few deaths. Anyway... I figured it out, mwahaha. The secret is to exploit Kikyo's good AI - let Edea die, then revive her with a P. Down at 200 HP. Watch as Shipujinrai bounces off for 1 damage repeatedly, cackle. Definitely much safer than the "everyone else goes to critical and use Knight cover" strat which gets owned by Poison. Ribbon doesn't block Corpse, so as I ran out of P. Downs it was quite important to spam the Spiritmaster status immunity spell to save Agnes & Edea. Murdered Artemia first thanks to that nice Fire weakness - Shield Magic infused Firey Desperations + Firagas (well when Ringabel could stay alive) meant she was the easiest to take down first, and while she's not great, removing the threat of suprise Multibursts was still useful. Close fight!
* Braev/Alternis/Kamiizumi. A bit frustrating, but still awesome. Kamiizuimi can ACTUALLY BREAK 2x SHIELD TEMPLAR EDEA DEFENSE wat with his physical for like 300 damage, which is amazing and says something about how much you will be hurting if he hits someone else and hasn't been Defanged (answer: a lot). Braev will throw erratic surges of offense your direction, but the true threat is Alternis, who provides nasty MT damage AND will start Minus Striking out key figures like Edea & Agnes right through Default Guard & Angelic Ward. This is where things get frustrating: despite learning I needed to set Speed +10% on Agnes (she already had the +20 Speed Hermes Shoes but she needs even MORE), Spiritmaster Agnes with 73 Speed would still go after 60 speed Alternis sometimes such that she couldn't fix the damage first. And so now with Agnes dead, okay fine Edea will do an intentionally slow revive so that she doesn't die in the revival round, oh wait Minus Strike lol. Variants of this happened a LOT. Apparently you need 80 Speed off Fox Tail or something to reliably go first, argh. Anyway, no particular trick here aside from definitely neededing Fox Tail / Bloody Shield Pirate Tiz, but Tiz applies Defang as much as he dares when not dead, Edea keeps the Holy Shield Desperation offense rolling at Alternis and provides slow revival if desired, and Agnes Defaults & heals a lot. Ringabel throws Firagas as usual. Finally, as the trio got the drop on me once again murdering Edea & Agnes, I #YOLO'd Ringabel into -4 BP at Alternis, and... killed him?! Amazing. Speedy Tiz revived the girls before dying, and I stabilized. Fun times, didn't even use SP. Reminds me of the Orthos battle of requiring some good luck, except the Orthos battle was much faster than this one when I failed at it 3-4 times.
Praline / Jackal was easy, Yulyana & goons weren't bad either ('sup I heard you like Dispel), Einheria's crew gets basically solo'd by Edea (only Holly's Aero is a threat). DeRosso & Victor actually wiped me but that was more due to not respecting Energy Burst as much as I should, if you keep DeRosso Defang'd and always Default if he has BP the fight is not so bad.
Maybe some day I'll finish this long long looong game and move on to the rest of my giant mobile backlog. Or books. Books are good too.
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The final bosses are really fun and I definitely recommend getting to them however much optional stuff you end up doing. (Though as you're discovering, plenty of that optional stuff is pretty fun too!) I actually wasn't too enamoured of the C7 optional fights I did but maybe I wasn't in the mood. The final C8 ones are pretty fun though.
Double Multiburst can certainly happen for what it's worth.
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Well, the fights are indeed fun, but I was also ready to be finished with the game and move on sometime around C5, so make of that what you will.
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Bravely Default - I suppose since SF is talking about it I should chime in that I finished it the other week. I didn't have much more to add after Chapter 4 stuff. Game is good. Normal mode doesn't throw too much at you (did the optional ending in C6, enjoyed Ribbon for the rest of the game). I did pretty much all the optional stuff but half the C8 boss fights (and a few world's dragon fights, I redid those a couple of times as easy things to do of a morning with no play time though). Over levelled and a flood of JP made for diverse builds. I opted to use Dark Shields but no Dark Knights. I really dig a lot of the uses you can eke out of the various Jobs, there is only a few that I think are of very little value in terms of what they bring to the game. If I had to pick like 3 worst jobs even some of those are viable, just boring (Hi Monk).
Something I do agree with is the game is hella long and doing optional stuff I was pretty ready to be finished with the game before I did everything (thus giving up on C8 boss fights). I do disagree with the general sentiment that seemed to come up that Chapter 5-7 were bad and don't do anything. I think they are a contributing part of the meta discussion of the game (doing the same thing over and over again with very little change in your long spanning JRPG series that is all about saving the Crystals) and the biggest crime they have is not that doing the same boss fights over and over is bad pacing, it is that they are the only mandatory things to do. If you do some (doesn't need to be all!) the optional fights you get a much better feel for the minor differences in the various travels and it really breaks up the monotony of the whole thing. I was never sick of the cycle while I was playing. I was just worn out from playing like 70 hours of the same game for a month.
Also Super's hate on Airy is dumb and stupid. It is forewarned from a mile away and built up. It is a fine serviceable plot point.
It isn't a good plot, but it certainly isn't a bad plot. It does some interesting things and has a bland boring lead. It is a JRPG from Square that is commenting on JRPGs that Square makes and rightfully completely embraces that is what it is. Solid game. Highly recommend to fans of the genre (which everyone here is) even if you have lapsed. It is quality and if you haven't played a JRPG for a while it will scratch that itch while reminding you why you liked them at some point but probably also informing you of why you stopped.
Edit - Meant to comment on the boss that made me just stop Qada, Mephilia, Ominas and whoever else it is (Yulyana?) I just couldn't ever survive the Round 1 Fire Weakness -> Promethean Fire -> Firaga combo. Speed variation doesn't let me get any healing in between. I don't have people with nearly enough M.Def builds. I didn't feel like grinding to get a solid M.Def setup for everyone. It shouldn't be too hard if you shell out for Silver Lances for people and grab Auto-Shell, some time in Spirit Master for everyone will get you M.Def passives and Auto-Shell, but I was so ready to check out that I just went and did the final boss instead. I will be interested in how you handle it on Hard.
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Can't imagine getting the blue slab without prism stones. Did you at least try thousands of times from the boss bonfire near the clams and not the Archive bonfire?
Nothing to do with your post Gref, but your encyclopedic knowledge of Dark Souls is incredible.
BTW I died again. Against the gargoyles. Hurray. Should have grabbed the Wolf Ring before attempting them!
In general, I think the best setup for this is <50% equip weight instead of <25%, just for the poise. I went pretty far with Great Club + Wolf Ring + Elite Knight Set, without really being in danger past the beginning, last time.
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That is what happens when I don't understand something that people I like find interesting. I needed to understand Dark Souls so I have read, watched and listened to a lot of things about it. You succeeded in getting me really interested in it as a thing. One of these days I might even get around to playing it.
I suppose I could actually read a walkthrough too.
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Can't imagine getting the blue slab without prism stones. Did you at least try thousands of times from the boss bonfire near the clams and not the Archive bonfire?
Nothing to do with your post Gref, but your encyclopedic knowledge of Dark Souls is incredible.
BTW I died again. Against the gargoyles. Hurray. Should have grabbed the Wolf Ring before attempting them!
In general, I think the best setup for this is <50% equip weight instead of <25%, just for the poise. I went pretty far with Great Club + Wolf Ring + Elite Knight Set, without really being in danger past the beginning, last time.
Nope. Went from the archives each time.
Yeah, the ragequit felt justified at the time.
To be clear I used prism stones but I only had 20 so I ran out near the end, and they reset when you die.
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At least it's super easy to run past all the enemies en route.
Zenny, if this hasn't already been thrown at you, it's pretty handy for sorting out what your final attack power will be with specific weapons/builds without needing to invest a whole game's worth of levels and ore: https://mugenmonkey.com/darksouls/
Doesn't tell you anything about spell power but you can always assume that >>> melee anyway.
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Grefter:
Super hates on Airy because he hates on fairies; it is what he does. I'm pretty certain he likes the actual plot point there. Finally a game which reveals fairies for the demonic creatures they are!
Regarding the C8 boss fight you asked about, how I did it was to slow down Qada so that Fire Bane always went after the actual fire spells. Meanwhile my Spiritmaster was super-speed twinked so always went first next round to patch it up. Still a decent fight on Hard, certainly!
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Hasten World also useful in the strat there I assume? It seems neat but I never did use it much. It chews through your damage on a caster to use it. I suppose I should just bite the bullet and throw Time on a Vampire. Vampire seems to be my solution to many things.
Actually that is something to talk about. You guys generally seem to not be partying hard about Vampire. If you get over the Blue Mage World Tour syndrome (Because you are going to do that world tour anyway!) you end up with a pretty boss and super flexible skill set (even barring Norende only Magic stat based skills and White Wind, but those are great too!). Having a bevy of Physical skills that are MT and can hit weakness makes them mince trash like nobodies business. Shifting the gaps in Weakness hitting on elementally diverse class (other than Summoner) to Lightning and Earth is pretty cool (and can be leveraged with Thundaja). Throw in ST stat down/self buffer, MP draining (though a bit unnecessary), Defense Ignoring attack, Default ignoring attack (Both elemental to play nice with your Salve Maker!) and HP Draining in a pinch (not your best skill, but saw use even on normal from me). Vampire with the full skill list seriously impressed me. There is stuff in there that I know I would use in Hard mode that I didn't here (75% hit rate Status effects, slap on Status Amp for 1 SP? Yessssssss). It is a strong diverse skill set that both avoids the outright broken of FF5 Blue Mage and simultaneously avoids some of the pitfalls of FF5 Blue Mage of having a small pool of actually useful skills and skills that don't scale (I like Flamethrower. Flamethrower has a shelf life).
Some of the skills are redundant chaff that should be culled (I could do MT 1.25x Physical based Fire damage and lower enemy defense by 25% for 3 turns for 24MP or I could do MT 1.25x Physical based Fire damage for 30MP woooo!), but ultimately it makes for a pretty neat skill set that I highly suggest checking out. I ran 2 of them at end game and don't regret it in the slightest. They could use a little bit of love in the cleaner design space (they support Magic builds! But only get Magic from Norende boss fights...) but they are super flexible even still.
Edit - That said, I totally get the down side of the Blue Mage Would Tour. Blue Mages as second last job you learn is pretty shitty. Cutting out chunks of skills from easy access right after you can unlock them is also shitty.
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Mario Kart 8: Unlocked all characters, got a silver in the Leaf Cup because the AI just kept nailing me with crap all over the place! Red Shell -> Get hit by guy who is surrounded by Green shells -> get pushed while still spinning. That kind of a dickery! Gotta replay that course and such.
Metroid Fusion: Looking for the security robot. Nightmare was pissing me off until I remembered "oh, that ladder on the side is there for a reason" then just aggro'd him.
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Oh, I did the Blue Mage World tour all right. Vampire's good but not amazing. The problem is, the aggro builds want you to be two-handing a sword ideally, and that is vastly shortening your life expectancy on Hard (at least while underleveled). I ran Templar Armor Lore and Heike Armor and P. Def + 20% to go with it, but it only goes so far. There's the status option too, I guess, but BM/TM generally covers that niche already if I care, although I guess Vamp is faster & tankier than those skillsets. For bosses, eh, I'd rather have a full tank who takes 1 damage from everything, or a Dark Knight spamming Dark Nebula for ludicrous damage.
If I slotted in Vampire as anything, it'd be a Piracy replacement on Tiz, as he could theoretically use Curse rather than Defang / Shell Split at the cost of giving up the attached damage, but gaining the Vampirism skill set if there's an elemental weakness in play or something. Pretty much a sidegrade. Okay, Fireball sounds rad due to being ITD, but it's also C4 / Dimension's Hasp only, like White Wind. In conclusion, Vampirism is "good" and certainly better than lategame trash like Acrobatics, but it isn't dominating. (However, I leveled up Edea as a vamp in her spare time, which while looking neat - yay vampiric cat ears - doesn't play well with double-shields, which require Holy Arts basically.)
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And yeah that touches on part of my point that I like. Without Dark Knight lots of Job skill sets are pretty viable. Vampire doesn't dominate, but it is solid and if you get everything it does a lot of things pretty well. The base job having an A in Shields is a nice bonus too.
Dark Knight is broken though and is dumb. They should feel bad for making it. I am glad I skipped it.
Edit - FFX - I told myself I would give Blitzball a real try this time. It can suck a bucket of second hand dicks. Slow and boring with no control lots of the time. Introducing you to it with a massive disadvantage is amazingly stupid and kills all good sentiment I tried to go into it with. Boring and shitty.
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Personally I thought Vampire was a clear #2 for physical skillset, just behind Dark Knight. Fireball being ITD made it insanely powerful for solo bosses, especially with a Salvemaker to apply Fire Bane. Meanwhile the various MT skills combined pretty much obsolete everything except for DK for randomsmashing: Energy Burst flat out obsoletes Crescent Moon for a zero-MP MT attack, Gastric Juices lets you apply def down on every enemy in group boss fights 100% of the time, Sandstorm lets you try to apply blind while still doing heavy damage, Hellfire and Deep Freeze maximize your damage output when you need that. Throwing in the draining and debufing and White Wind on top of that was just gravy. Oh, and there's a 1 SP skill to make all these Vampire attacks stronger, too!
The only caveat to Vampire is that its stat build is too well-rounded to stand out, so it works better overall as a secondary for a class like Ninja or Pirate. White Wind in particular is much more useful with Fox Tail/Falcon Knife-boosted speed. It still felt kinda degenerate overall and I used it heavily any time I didn't feel like resorting to all-Dark Shield Dark Nebula spam.
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Well the last solo boss that was a vague threat was the C5 Finale boss, so owning them harder isn't a huge concern. Also, dual-shield Desperation seems to do *more* damage than double-handed Hellfire or Deep Freeze, albeit ST. (Which even in boss team fights is fine, since those are all about killing one boss first.) Granted that's a very specific build so I'm not going to hold that too harshly against Vamp.
Fireball & White Wind would help a lot (especially off Fox Tail speed, which makes WW more reliable), just you get locked out of 'em for awhile if you pick up Vamp in C5. Ah well. That said, I disagree with Grefter that it's a bad move by the designers to have Blue Mage be the second-to-last class to pick up; if you had it earlier, it'd have felt semi-obligatory to have around all the time in your party, which would be over-centralizing. Giving it to you late and then saying "by the way check out the encyclopedia for <Attacks like this> if you want to use" is fine by me.
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I liked the Airy plot twist, it was hilarious and the game shaded it well. I just hate all Fairies. The repetition of C5 and onwards was a terrible design choice. I get the concept behind it, but it was really unfun to break the crystals all those times. While I liked parts of the plot (Did not like the true final plot at all, but that's an aside), the repetition of it completely killed my love for the game. It started as a 9/10 and ended as a 5 or 6, depending on my mood. I twitch at the idea of replaying the game and completiting it, which is a shame as there is a damn good job system buried there. FF5 bores me to tears, but it did one thing right. It doesn't bog you down with a lot of plot, so it's easy to pick it up and burn through it. BD was a few minor design tweaks away from being great, augh. Giving you a way to skip (at least) the crystal breaking/restoring thing after breaking one the first time and seeing Airy change would've helped a bunch!
Also vampire is shit. I am not going to do a giant sidequest for an inferior to DK class that also requires chasing down skills. Whenever the game comes up for in game use, I'm slapping the class with a 1/10. Same problem Meliadoul has in FFT, it is completely obsoleted by a class that comes before it.
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Never got Hasten World myself. The one battle it features in on the enemy side was a bit of a mindfuck which gave me some difficulty just for that.
Vampire is good once it gets going but the effort spent in getting it running is rather colossal. I still did it but I can't look the other way about that. Even the likes of Gau take less effort. It should also be noted that while its random-bashing is ridiculously good on paper (although #2 to dark knight), you get it after a point where you may not be fighting many randoms any more, depending on playstyle. At best randoms are much easier by then than they were earlier.
For bosses... while it's very versatile it still had a bit of trouble finding place on my final list of skillsets. It was sometimes there, sometimes not, depending on what I needed: Dark Knight, Spiritmaster, White Mage, and Performer were all ensured a skillset spot all the time, and while I'd pretty much always use at least one of Vampire or Pirate for debuffing, I often didn't have space for both.
Washes out as a below average class overall to me, although not the 1/10 material Super claims - that is reserved for Conjurer, which also requires considerable effort and the reward package is puny by comparison.
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Wild ARMS 3 - Finished in 9:26:55 real time (H/M/S). Time to go back to ACF.
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Metroid Fusion: Finished, 4:02 time and 52% completion. Game is definitely more playable on a Wii U Gamepad than a keyboard, so glad I played it closer to how it was intended.
Probably go with Kirby and the Amazing Mirror next because...Kirby.
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FF5 Four Job Fiesta - Summer is the best. Decided to try a "classic" (FF1-styled) run, and I got a White Mage, a Black Mage, and two thieves. FML. Just beat the Ship Graveyard.
New Super Mario Bros Wii U - Played the first world and a half with Ciato and a friend. Lots of fun! Already seems much better than NSMB2, closer in quality to the first two games in the series. Some neat stage design so far.
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FFX - Rage at Blitzball for a while. Put Vita down and go make a drink while laughing scene happens. Suddenly at Miihen High Road, have Auron, game is great again. Up to Mushroom Road, going to enjoy Djose Temple and then the push to get Shiva.
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Civ 5- Emperor MP with Snowfire. I played Venice on small continents. We won a domination victory. I used Great Gallaesses (Which are better than I expected, the extra attack is really noticeable) to capture Arabia, and then took out Korea because they completely ignored military. After that it just snowballed into a dom win. I pumped out a lot of science, Snowfire pumped out gold, culture, and religion. I grabbed the Hanging Gardens, Oracle, Red Fort, and Effiel Tower for wonders.
I ended the game by sending five range four battleships after Edinburgh, which had 48~ defense. You can imagine how that went.
Double trade routes are outstanding in an MP game. Was able to ship a bunch of food to my nearly foodless capital (I had like five farms total), but was able to send hammers over to snowfire so he could wonder spam. I didn't use my extra trade routes much- I would've generated a fuck of a lot of gold if I did, but I was too busy pumping military early and happiness and science late for that.
Fun game. I really like water maps and Venice is mercifully easy on the micromanagement side of the game.
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Child of Light - My, Aurora, that's an upgrade. Grefter is right about the temp PC - and nobody else could fill in -that- niche the way done there. I miss that slot already.
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Grefter's reminding me I have an FF10 replay I'm not playing...I blame my brother. He somehow finds a way to make whatever console I'm about to go on occupied and for the dumbest reasons too.
ANYWAY!!!
Kirby and the Amazing Mirror: I did...stuff in this game. No really, I don't know what else to say; this game is completely non-linear and since it lacks any sort of "development" aspect like Metroid and Castlevania games have, there's nothing to stop you from doing things in spontaneous orders. Not that this is a bad thing just makes the game weird.
I guess I could say I beat a giant golem version of Wispy Woods (...don't ask...), Master Hand (yes, THAT Master Hand), and Kracko.
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Dark Souls:
Pyromancer makes bosses stupidly easy. Seath the Scaleless provided fewer deaths than the big ass clams outside his boss room. Failed to get the tail weapon but I don't care. After taking down Seath I went to the Demon's Ruins to unlock the shortcut and get the Sunlight Maggot. Upgraded my Pyro hand to +5, am at soul level 70, and have endurance maxed and Vit at 30. Thinking I could use more vit than more spells (there is a serious lack of pyromancies that I want at the moment, and the ones I want for PVP are not useful in PVE, so I have more than enough spell slots for now), or perhaps I should start pumping Dex to get faster explosions. Probably vit then Dex.
Probably will do optional areas I have already unlocked and then go back and do Izalith. The number of enemies who resist fire there is annoying but then I get another Pyromancy I kinda want (and can maybe use once I get more DEX), so that takes priority. I'm already locked out of the Darkwraithes so the 4 kings can wait til last.
BTW, once I have dried up their usefulness re: covenants, is there any reason to not kill The Fair Lady and the Darkmoon woman in Anor Londo for their sweet, sweet firekeeper souls? Like, I know it's a sin (oh no I may have to pvp more wow) but since i've already gotten the Fair Lady's pyromancy rewards and bought all I want off of Eignui, and don't really need the bonfire near Anor Londo anymore, I can't see it mattering any more this play through, but will it affect subsequent playthroughs?
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Dark Souls:
Pyromancer makes bosses stupidly easy. Seath the Scaleless provided fewer deaths than the big ass clams outside his boss room. Failed to get the tail weapon but I don't care. After taking down Seath I went to the Demon's Ruins to unlock the shortcut and get the Sunlight Maggot. Upgraded my Pyro hand to +5, am at soul level 70, and have endurance maxed and Vit at 30. Thinking I could use more vit than more spells (there is a serious lack of pyromancies that I want at the moment, and the ones I want for PVP are not useful in PVE, so I have more than enough spell slots for now), or perhaps I should start pumping Dex to get faster explosions. Probably vit then Dex.
Probably will do optional areas I have already unlocked and then go back and do Izalith. The number of enemies who resist fire there is annoying but then I get another Pyromancy I kinda want (and can maybe use once I get more DEX), so that takes priority. I'm already locked out of the Darkwraithes so the 4 kings can wait til last.
BTW, once I have dried up their usefulness re: covenants, is there any reason to not kill The Fair Lady and the Darkmoon woman in Anor Londo for their sweet, sweet firekeeper souls? Like, I know it's a sin (oh no I may have to pvp more wow) but since i've already gotten the Fair Lady's pyromancy rewards and bought all I want off of Eignui, and don't really need the bonfire near Anor Londo anymore, I can't see it mattering any more this play through, but will it affect subsequent playthroughs?
As long as you don't care about the sin and don't need their bonfires, slaughter away.
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You can give Anastacia's and the Darkmoon woman's to the Fair Lady for the same results.
No more Firelink bonfire but you're slightly less of a monster that way?
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Dude, Firelink is 20 Estus Flask charges for free.
I am not Cid. I am that much of a monster.
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Pragmatically speaking, Firelink's the most useful of those bonfires to keep just because it's your closest starting point for Four Kings attempts (the alternative is the basin bonfire just outside of Valley of the Drakes; personally, I fucking hate fighting drakes and never take this route).
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Mario Kart 8 - Trudging along. Got 3/8 3-starred 150 cc tracks. Such a beautiful, detailed game.
Super Mario World 2 - Beat the halfway boss of World 6. Raphael the Raven is basically the best.
Kid Icarus Uprising - Just beat Chapter 4. Strange mix of a shooter and an actiony game.
Trails in the Sky - Just picked up a school girl. Hopefully this time she isn't a douchecanoe.
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She's not a douchecanoe, but she is kinda boring and low key. Good Useful PC though. There's a sword you can get fairly soon that'll make her your best physical and magical attacker for a good while.
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Boring and low-key makes her by far the better character of the two you get in that chapter. <.<
FF5 - World 1 beaten, up to Drakenvale. No resets so far - black mage + white mage covers the bases well enough - but argh I am feeling the lack of offence from three of my four PCs right now. There are certainly no shortage of randoms (against higher def enemies or those who counter, etc.) where I have everyone defend/healstaff while Faris kills everything.
Suikoden Tactics - Getting competent PCs besides the first three has made the game notably easier. That and understanding the elemental panel system better. Currently three battles into my excursion of territory not seen in Suikoden IV.
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Well yeah, the other one is a douchecanoe. But not a schoolgirl.
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Pragmatically speaking, Firelink's the most useful of those bonfires to keep just because it's your closest starting point for Four Kings attempts (the alternative is the basin bonfire just outside of Valley of the Drakes; personally, I fucking hate fighting drakes and never take this route).
20 Estus flask charges without having to pay up 3 humanity and you can warp to most bonfires you need to get to. Even without easy access to the Four Kings (which, yeah, I agree, fighting those drakes every time sounds like more trouble than it's worth... that said you can still warp TO the useless bonfire so that doesn't really count) it is clearly the most useful out of them all.
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LoH:Trails in the Sky:
Agate isn't just a douchenozzle, he's also quite dense. And has a terrible habit of shouting phrases that would make most shounen anime rivals get embarrassed saying. ...he might be my favorite character (besides Estelle and Olivier). I just crack up every time he's on screen. I don't think he was intended this way in the original script but I feel like the localization team had fun with his dickish idiocy.
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Usually I have paid for a Firelink Bonfire +3 way before I can actually get it for free.
There's all that humanity around and it's the most obvious bonfire to kindle.
For 4 Kings you can always go to another bonfire then teleport to Firelink everytime even if the bonfire is dead, I believe?
Which is a bit annoying but #getgud and you only need to do it once
Basically it's mostly a convenience thing. Firelink is very convenient, Anor Londo is slightly convenient, Spider lady bonfire is totally useless
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LoH: Trails in the Sky
Just got to Ch.3 - first thoughts: Tita is actually pretty cool for a child character. Not my favorite, but I was expecting to instantly hate her.
In other news, Estelle said this:
(http://lpix.org/1403301/9.png)
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Super Mario World 2- Baby Bowser and Giga Baby Bowser have been vanquished and Baby Luigi has been saved. Fun little game, definitely not as good as the best entries into the Mario series but certainly a fine game. Very unhinged. I loved the drug-tripping fuzzies.
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Usually I have paid for a Firelink Bonfire +3 way before I can actually get it for free.
...Wait, I didn't even know the latter even happens. (Is it a reward for rezzing Ana?) I tend to manually max it out and then use it as my estus supply for the rest of the game (because I'm cheap and apparently don't mind load times).
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FE Awakening Lunatic Casual - Completed.
Pretty tough as advertised. The earlygoing, especially chapter 2 (probably the hardest map in the game?) is of course some of the nastiest. I also had a lot of trouble with chapters 11, 14, 17, and 21. Final chapter also surprisingly nasty but I eventually hit on a good way to deal with it, engaging with the final on turn 2 and hunting down anyone who could use Physic with prejudice. Die, combat medics, die! Pretty sure I was playing as the good guys anyway.
Pointless unit commentary!
A * indicates a reclassing at between level 15 and 18 typically. For obvious reasons the precise level isn't too important past 15, so it's a matter of whenever it is convenient mostly.
Chrom - 20/*/4 Paladin, 130 kills - Solid. Benefitted a lot from having to survive every map, gave him a nice level push early before others could catch up. Had great strength and speed so could usually be counted on to kill things, and durable enough to not be a high priority for enemy targetting.
Robin - (F, Spd+, Skl-) 20/*/9 Dark Flier, 109 kills - I probably should have made her a Sorcerer but I didn't want to lean on that more than necessary. Anyway the speed was pretty great, and Veteran gave her a great early push. Spent a while as MVP in the early midgame. Later her level/kills fell off a bit as she ended up providing support for Tharja (who loved the speed/magic and had a shortage of other options) and did a lot of Rally Spectrum spam from Chapter 21 onwards.
Lissa - 20/15 Sage, 6 skills - Healbot (also Rescuebot). Lissa dies a lot but on Casual that mean Miracle is actually a decent skill. Anyway she was often able to take one hit (after the earlygame anyway) which is why she made the cut over Maribelle.
Frederick - 15 Great Knight, 49 kills - Most important PC in the game because he's the only person who can deal with horrifying chapter 2 enemies. Obvious MVP of that part of the game. Later on fits very nicely as a supporter for Sumia, who is kind of short on options and appreciates str/def/move. And hey he can use Hammer and Beastkiller and has A in all weapon ranks so he is kinda relevant as a support attacker forever.
Sumia - 20/*/9 Dark Flier->Falconknight, 164 kills - Flying speed demon, great for dealing with lots of enemies and extremely important in the earlymidgame. Got Galeforce around chapter 20 or so and this was a huge help to her offensive specialist game even as her stat niche gets filled by people less likely to be 2HKOed. Never really felt like an MVP but as the kill count shows, always good and an important player throughout.
Lon'qu - 20/14 Assassin, 65 kills - Speed is always the god stat, although his build is just inferior to Sumia's overall. Bows were a helpful pickup for slaying fliers (he got to C without an Arms Scroll. Spent more time than not as Panne's supporter but did plenty of frontlining too, the two complement each other well.
Panne - 10/16/17 Griffon Knight, 96 kills - The four-level push before reclass hurt more than normal on this mode. Past that, as always the Wyvern reclass gives her high strength/speed (which Lon'qu pushed even more). Could 2HKO anything and doubled almost everything, so had great offence. Durability could be better but the HP kept it from feeling awful. A better Sumia outside the lack of Galeforce once she got going, but that early going really matters.
Tharja - 20/20/10 Sorcerer, 201 kills - Nosferatu is kinda badass. How well Tharja's game works by enemy class, but things she doubles and don't have great res just get devoured endlessly. In some cases this applies to whole maps, she all but soloed chapter 19 for instance. Low accuracy is a minor flaw ultimately. Midgame MVP and has a case to be the best unit in the playthrough overall.
Anna - 20 Trickster, 23 kills - Healer who could kill things with a Levin Sword for a while midgame and took the most punishment before dropping (only rarely OHKOed!). Even had a pairup that granted move and speed! Anna's great, this isn't news.
Lucina - 20/*/15 Hero, 121 kills - Inherited Veteran and some pretty great stats seeing as her parents were overlevelled midgame. As time got on her stats just went ridiculous. Capped strength and had 42 or above in Str/Skl/Spd/Lck and great stats otherwise. Ran Sol+Aether+Rightful King and had a ~70% chance to regenerate HP with every strike, while doubling most everything, being reasonably durable and doing massive damage. Needless to say, one of the best. The main person to tangle with the final boss.
Say'ri - 11 Swordmaster, 21 kills - Did some midgame troubleshooting with her strong overall stats, although the lack of supports was notable. Once Tiki joined she became permanent pairup bait through not fault of her own.
Morgan - 10/10/4 Sorcerer, 11 kills - I got him right after Say'ri's map. I had a plan to turn him into a competent Sorcerer but it proved too difficult to get him many levels, so he ended up as Lucina's support partner instead, bolstering two of her non-stupidly-high stats, so there's that. If I did things again I'd have waited a bit longer before getting him and made him a Rally Spectrum monkey, which would have freed up Robin.
Tiki - 30/21 Manakete, 46 kills - Absolutely ridiculous. Capped HP/Skl/Spd/Lck. Lowest stat was Res at like 42. Her speed is kinda shaky at first but Say'ri fixes that. Tanky as all hell from the getgo, and as time goes on just starts doubling everything, 2HKOing most things, and giving no shits about anything (final boss' Ignis? Oh no a 3HKO). Lategame MVP.
Basilio & Flavia - Lv 14, 9/10 kills - Useful lategame filler. Can take a hit or two, can hit lots of weaknesses.
Libra - 11 War Monk, 3 kills - Third staff user when I had the space for him. Died instantly to everything later.
Cherche - 20/7 Griffon Rider, 30 kills - High Str/Def and Hammer use gave her a clear niche for a while, and then she complemented Say'ri well midgame. Kinda lacked a niche late + bad speed caught up with her, so got dropped.
Sully (24 kills), Stahl (23 kills), Cordelia (14 kills) all saw some definite use early before becoming overall outclassed and dropped before promotion.
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Usually I have paid for a Firelink Bonfire +3 way before I can actually get it for free.
...Wait, I didn't even know the latter even happens. (Is it a reward for rezzing Ana?) I tend to manually max it out and then use it as my estus supply for the rest of the game (because I'm cheap and apparently don't mind load times).
Kinda. You rez Ana, and then talk to her again after beating the first of the four lord soul bosses.
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So you leave your main hub (?) with a shitty bonfire for 80% of the game because you want to save 6 (?) Humanity if you do that?
Seems not worth it if I understand the mechanics properlike..
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A couple things:
1. 10 charges isn't really that shitty, at least in the first playthrough. I haven't ever actually needed more than 10 Estus flask charges for the first run through of the game. I've run out with only 5 before but I usually make it to the next bonfire before 10 runs out. If you've run out during a boss you have lost against the boss in the first place.
2. You can't actually upgrade past 10 charges anyway until you beat the Catacombs, which as we discussed earlier is really obnoxious to do before Anor Londo.
3. It's actually more like 50% of the game unless you're doing every single optional area possible before taking down one of the lord soul bosses, which doesn't make any sense to do.
4. Even if you rush to the Catacombs first, Firelink Shrine isn't actually a very good main hub for any of the mandatory areas. It's actually kinda far for most things that aren't New Londo and the catacombs (EDIT: And the Undead Asylum revisited, but there are two easily accessible bonfires there and the boss is easy once you know to just run up and hit him in the dick a bunch while hanging between his legs.), and that humanity is way better spent making bonfires closer to the bosses or in the middle of dungeons better. Oh, and it gets deactivated after you ring the second bell of awakening anyway. There's no reason to upgrade it beforehand because you can't use it for two dungeons anyway.
5. After you beat Anor Londo and get the Lordvessel you can warp from bonfire to bonfire so it doesn't even really act as a main hub anymore, and is only the closest bonfire for New Londo and the Catacombs. Admittedly, I could have used the extra charges for the Catacombs, but you don't get the item to manually upgrade it until after the catacombs anyway.
I really just don't see any benefit to upgrading that Bonfire manually. You're way better off dumping the humanity into making multiple other bonfires give you 10 charges. Come to think of it, if it didn't upgrade for free I don't think I'd upgrade it past 10 charges anyway for that very reason. However, since it IS free and you CAN warp to it, it is awesome.
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Trails:
Estelle and Joshua continue to be some of the best written characters ever. We also solve a mystery by learning how to speak Cat. I am not sure if this puts me more in mind of Phoenix Wright or Scooby Doo.
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You can't actually upgrade past 10 charges anyway until you beat the Catacombs, which as we discussed earlier is really obnoxious to do before Anor Londo.
Catacombs actually isn't that bad when you know what you are doing. Upgraded mace, decent shield, and the knowledge that skeletons stop re-forming if you kill necromancers gets you most of the way through it.
I don't think there's really a POINT to doing it early, for all the reasons you said, but it's one of the dungeons with the biggest drops in difficulty from knowing how to do it.
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I suppose that's true, but even if knowing how to do it makes it easier, it is still obnoxious to do... not difficult, but obnoxious. That said, I can see how suicide running to gank all the necros and then then doing it normal could significantly cut down on the time spent there. I guess I won't really know until I replay on a new character, though.
EDIT: OH yeah and probably even not suiciding but having a decent Divine weapon is probably good too. Divine club sucks but was basically free so whatevs.
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Sadly divine club is actually one of the better options there (skellies resist non-strike weapons). Divine weapons are always going to be kind of ass unless you just happen to be a cleric.
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If you've been building STR, plain old club club will do just fine. If you can take a skelly down in 2 hits, you can make it to the necromancers without wasting so much time that you have to be watching your back.
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Child of Light - Full party finally, including the thoroughly underwhelming DLC character. The character balance is actually pretty neat here. Game continues to be notably good.
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Penny Arcade 4- Done. It does a few things just a teensy bit less interestingly than PA3 that while individually irrelevant add up to it feeling about half a point worse, more or less. Mostly the Underhellmon just aren't as fun to use as PA3's pc cast were, and most of the game is spent with teams that are missing key components of skillset, or feel like they are. 7/10 overall.
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Dark Souls: So over the last couple of days I beat the Demon's Ruins and Lost Izalith. That was annoying, particularly the centipede demon. It is a good thing my lightning Gargoyle Halberd is at +5, otherwise it would have taken even more tries. At least the Bed of Chaos was a nice change of pace from "damage the boss before they damage you," and until the final boss I don't anticipate that I'll run into much fire resistance.
Did the Great Hollow and Ash Lake next. The Hollow Sucked and there wasn't much there except the end of Seigmeyer's story (and a titanite slab if I want to get that Iaito upgraded when I pump dex later... I guess), but hey it was pretty. Wrapped up Aramis' Painted World, too, though I'm waiting to fight the boss until I'm gonna have to sin next.
I think I have my final loadout for the first run through. Gargoyle Halberd +5, Ascended Pyro Fist +5, Giant Armor +5, Antiquated Skirt +5, Black Iron Gauntlets, Crown of Dusk, Bellowing Dragon Crest, Wolf Ring. It has me at the most stats for exactly 40 weight, so it works for me.
By the way, Cid: Darkmoon Invasion still sucks on PC. Perhaps it would suck less if they didn't limit you to the area you were in? I mean, they have to load you into the other player's world anyway... Oh well, I'll go dark wraithe after NG+ anyway and it will be good. Found a Red Soapstone Chisel but it probably sucks. Have other people willingly summon you into their world for fisticuffs? Sounds like getting ganked. I'd rather the odds be ever in my favor, thank you very much.
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Lightning Returns Abridged, Chapter Snow, because this game doesn't deserve numeric chapter titles!
WARNING: Since this covers several disjointed play sessions, my memories of this sequence aren't perfect so I might be making some instances up.
Chocolina: Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13, the Story so far, choco-chocolina!
Lightning: People are dying because of a cult...
Hope: They all look like you too!
Lumina: CRYPTIC METAPHOR AND PLOT TEASES ^_^!!!!
Noel: THE WORLD HAS SUCKED FOR 500 YEARS AND YOU WERE SLEEPING DURING IT ALL! I'm killing you, FOR YEUL!
Lightning: We both know that's not what she wants...
Noel: Ok, sorry about the whole "Trying to kill you" thing!
Vanille: I'm contractually obligated to make a cameo in this section!
*back to the game*
Lightning: Ok, I guess I should go save Vanille right now. I mean, she's right in Luxerion like Noel was.
Lumina: That's a stupid idea, go save someone else ^_^!
Lightning: Leave me alone...
Lumina: I can't leave you alone..."sis" ^_^!
Lightning: Seeing as you pop up completely randomly on your own terms, yes, you can.
Lumina: Awww, but aren't we friends ;_; ^_^?
Lightning: NO!
Hope: Umm...Lightning, who are you talking to?
Lightning: Just...thinking outloud?
Hope: ...anyway...I suspect Vanille probably won't budge from her current spot, so let's go save someone else, take the train to a different area!
Lightning: Alright, going to save Snow in Yusnaan then!
Hope: ...that's probably the dumbest idea you can do; didn't he try to kill you last time?
Lightning: Don't care, saving him now.
Hope: *sigh* Fine, let's do this.
*Yusnaan*
Lightning Monologue: Yusnaan is a place ruled by the Patron, aka Snow. It's basically the polar opposite of Luxerion which was essentially the Vatican while this place is Vegas. I'm telling you this all now; what goes in Yusnaan, stays in Yusnaan!
Hope: So...Lightning...Snow's going to throw a big celebration in honor of the savior because he likes parties and people like celebrating, even though he's clearly anti-you.
Lightning: What's that go to do with me?
Hope: Because you're the savior and you want to save Snow?
Lightning: And...?
Hope: ...just go crash the party so you can get to Snow and save him. Don't forget to save random people along the way if they need help.
Lightning: Oh, right, Soul Saving!
*Lightning grabs the souls of about 30 arbitrary people*
Hope: ...that's not what I meant...
Lightning: Hope, are you the savior?
Hope: Not really...
Lightning: Then shut up and let me do my job!
Hope: Ok, but we should get to saving Snow.
Lightning: And how do we do that?
Hope: Well the front gate is...
Lightning: Front gate, got it!
Hope: Wait! The entire city is on alert for you, how do you plan to get around unnoticed...
Lightning: Who said anything about being unnoticed?
Soldier Guy: IT'S THE SAVIOR!
Lightning: That's me!
Solider Guy: GET HER!!!!
*one guy with 2 flans attacks Lightning and loses horribly*
Hope: ...you didn't have to kill the guy...
Lightning: He'll respawn.
Hope: Ok, now, about the Front Gate.
Lightning: Already there, time to open it!
Hope: Um, Lightning, I'm trying to tell you...
Lightning: Be careful, I know!
*Gate is locked*
Lightning: Well, Gate's locked, guess we need to cancel this plan. Why didn't you tell me?
Hope: Tried multiple times; you kept interrupting me. Anyway, there seems to be a smuggler trade route into the center, maybe you could find a way in through that.
Lightning: And how would I find about that?
Tour Guide: HEY LADY! YOU WANNA GET IN AND SEE THE FESTIVAL TONIGHT!? I CAN GET YOU IN THERE VIA A TRADE SMUGGLER ROUTE WITH A LARGE GROUP! JUST GET THERE BY 6 PM!
Lightning: How...
Hope: ...disturbingly...
Lightning: ...convenient...
*6 PM*
Tour Guide: Ok, everyone's here! There are a lot of monsters here, so YOUR LIFE IS IN YOUR OWN HANDS! Don't blame me if you die wanting to see Fireworks!
Lightning: I eat monsters for breakfast...
Hope: So does the rest of the world, technically...
Lightning: Wait, what?
Hope: See, Pandemonium, the last Fal'cie who basically makes all of the world's goods, makes it from manufactured Chaos.
Lightning: People are literally eating Chaos?
Hope: Yeah, mostly because that's really the only constant resource left in this world! Well, there are farmers in the one nature preserve in the world, but no one cares about them...at least until we go there.
Lightning: Well enough talk about that Nightmare fuel, I need to get to Snow.
Hope: You know, you don't seem to be having much problems.
Lightning: I'm not complaining, this area isn't too hard. I could get use to thi-...
Lumina: Hello there ^_^!
Lightning: I take that back, I want to get out of here, NOW!
Lumina: Awww, don't want me to taunt you with monsters and chaos and fun stuff ;_; ^_^!
Lightning: Who the hell could want that?
Lumina: You, of course ^_^!
Lightning: *face desk, despite no desk being there*
Lumina: Anyway, you're going to save Snow, right? But he doesn't want to be saved! Because he failed to save Serah ^_^! And blah blah blah Chaos blah blah blah Savior blah blah blah Serah blah blah blah ^_^...
Hope: Lightning, we really need to get moving...
Lightning: I know, I've been slowly inching away from her as she's been speaking hoping she doesn't notice...
Lumina: HEY! ARE YOU LISTENING!?
Lightning: No, I'm not.
Lumina: THAT MAKES ME SO ANGRY >_< ^_^! *Summons a giant Cyclops on Lightning through chaos*
Lightning: ...should have seen this coming...
*one boss fight later*
Lumina: Awww...poor baby, you know you're going to die, so you want to go out with a bang? That's fine, here's more power ^_^!
Lightning: ...you're kidding...
*ONE BOSS FIGHT LATER*
Lightning: Do that again and I quit this game forever.
Lumina: Fine, sheesh, but I can still BLOW UP THIS BRIDGE AND SEND YOU OFF YOUR PATH :P ^_^!
Lightning: ...well crap...
*Lightning falls off the smuggler path int some dump*
Hope: Well, that idea seems like a wash. Either we wait another 24 hours and do it again or we find another way into the quarters, like scaling the wall or...
Lightning: Hey look, a gate key among this decomposed corpse!
Hope: ...or that works too!
NOTE: Yes, you actually do find a convenient gatekey in that exact manner. This is an exaggeration, dialog aside.
*Lightning walks through front door into the celebration area*
Lightning: Ok, so the Palace is still blocked off...I can bust in though!
Hope: It's too heavily secure, and this it not Final Fantasy 7 meaning that "Busting in" is not the right option ever.
Lightning: Wait, you mean this franchise ISN'T the new Final Fantasy 7? Has Square-enix been lying to us the entire time?
Hope: Just because they say it doesn't mean it's true. Anyway, the best idea I can think of is...
Lightning: Scale the wall and sneak in, right?
Hope: No, I was going to say blow up that giant statue of Bhunivelze through usage of a lot of fireworks during the festival and get in during the confusion.
Lightning: That'll kill hundreds of people, won't it.
Hope: We need to save Snow, a few casualities for God's work isn't a big deal.
Lightning: I thought god wanted me to save as many souls as possible...this kind of goes against his mission statement...
Hope: WE'RE GOING WITH PLAN B AND THAT'S FINAL!
Lightning: And if I refuse?
Hope: I'll start playing this convenient Album "The Best of Julia Heartilley" into the com system until you do.
Lightning: ...so about blowing up that statue...
Hope: Go talk to the Director, tell him your idea!
*at the director*
Director: *sigh* These festivals are getting dull, doing the same thing for 500 years, whoever would have thunk it.
Lightning: Why not just make more Fireworks, about 3x as many and blow the entire house down.
Director: THAT'S AMAZING! GO TELL MY TECHNICIAN YOUR IDEA SO HE CAN GET PREPARED!
Lightning: Well, that was easy...
*at the Technician*
Technician: I can do it, but I need more Fireworks...by the way, the Director's insane.
Lightning: Where can I get them?
Technician: You can get them from other Technician's throughout the town. there are other means as well, if you know what I me-...
Lightning: I am not doing THAT to get Fireworks.
Technician: ...I just meant talking to random people who may have some and fulfilling deeds, like the Chocobo ladies!
*about an hour lady*
Chocobo Lady: HAVE A CHOCO GOOD TIME! SHOW US YOU CAN DO SO.
Lightning: Meow Meow Choco Wow...
Chocobo Lady: OMG KAWAII DESU KA!!!!! *gives Lightning Fireworks*
Hope: ...I can't believe you just said that...
Lightning: WHAT GOES IN YUSNAAN STAYS IN YUSNAAN!
Hope: Yeah, you might want to get Fireworks from the other Technicians.
*First Technician*
Lightning: Can I have Fireworks?
Technician: Here you go!
Lightning: Well that was easy...
*2nd Technician*
Lightning: Can I have Fireworks?
Technician: Woe is me, life is worthless, why do I even bother. FIREWORKS ARE SYMBOLIC OF LIFE ITSELF! IT IS ALL AN ILLUSION!
Lightning: So...I got this rare alcoholic beverage here...
Technician: WHAT!? LIFE HAS MEANING AGAIN! TAKE THESE FIREWORKS! I promised them for a kid but he died and I felt bad about using them, but NOW WE WILL HONOR HIM WITH THESE!
*3rd Technician*
Lightning: Give me Fireworks.
Technician: PLEASE TAKE THEM! I HATE FIRE! WHY DID I BECOME A PYROTECHNICIAN!? THE LESS FIREWORKS THE BETTER!
Lightning: O...k...
Technician: By the way, you can get more at the Coliseum right there!
*Coliseum*
Receptionist: WE ARE GIVING AWAY FIREWORKS HERE BECAUSE PLOT CONVENIENCE! DO YOU WANT TO WIN SOME!?
Lightning: Yes, yes I do.
Receptionist: Ok! Go beat that easy enemy and get some!
*Lightning gets Fireworks, FF Victory Fanfare plays*
Hope: Why is that it took us 3 games to finally get that song into the game?
Lightning: The same reason there was a poster of Warrior of Light at the Coliseum, and a random guy playing Battle on the Big Bridge on the streets.
Hope: That doesn't really answer my question...
*At the Director*
Director: Aha, you got the Fireworks, give them to the Technician now!
Lightning: Why can't you do that?
Director: Gameplay padding.
Lightning: Ah, ok.
*Lightning gives them to the Technician then returns to the Director*
Hope: Lightning, you need to get yourself as part of the performance.
Lightning: So I should e a stage prop or something?
Hope: I think you need to star as the Savior.
Lightning: WHAT!? I'm a soldier, not some sort of opera floozy!
Hope: Good thing this isn't an Opera then, right?
Lightning: Is there really no other way?
Hope: We could ask Lumina for advice...
Lightning: ...right, Opera Floozy it is!
Hope: It's not an...ah hell with it.
*At the Director*
Lightning: This is going to be dangerous, you should probably change actors so they don't get hurt.
Director: BUT WHO WOULD PLAY THE SAVIOR!?
Lightning: You're looking at her!
Director: NOT DRESSED LIKE THAT YOU WON'T!
Lightning: But this is how the Savior dresses!
Director: GO TO THE COLISEUM AND GET A DRESS FROM THERE, PRONTO!
*Lightning does exactly that*
Director: AHA! NOW THAT'S A SAVIOR!
Lightning: I don't think a Savior would run around in a maroon, strapless dress intended for a ballroom...
Director: IT'S ALL ABOUT STYLE! PEOPLE WANT A PRETTY GIRL! NOT ONE IN ARMOR!
Lightning: Whatever...
Hope: Psst! Wrong main character!
Lightning: Anyway, I won't just act as the Savior, I'll AM THE SAVIOR!
Director: Right...by the way, I made some modifications to the show. Now no one will die, BUT THE STATUE WILL STILL EXPLODE! THIS WILL BE GLORIOUS!
Hope: Huh, sounds like the Director came through for you.
Director: THE SHOW MUST START! LET'S GET THIS OVER WITH!
*insert the FF10-2 Opening here. No really, that is an accurate way to describe what is going on here*
Lightning: And we're in, with minimal casualities! Now what could go wrong?
Hope: Um, Lightning, yeah, forgot to tell you but there's a lot of Chaos resonating from here. Best case scenario, it's just a huge giant monster.
Lightning: Sure that's not the WORST case scenario?
Hope: Worst case scenario would involve Lumina...
Lightning: ...ok, what's the 2nd worst case scenario?
Hope: It's a Cie'th.
Lightning: That requires l'Cie to exist, which they haven't since we destroyed Orphan...except for Snow...who is in that tower...oh...
*One dungeon later*
Soldier: Aha, you're the Savior!
Lightning: Are you seriously going to stand in my way? Do you know how many nameless mooks I've taken out in the past 24 hours?
Soldier: No, I'm not, I'm here to help you! But I'm useless against Chaos things but I conveniently have a lot of supplies I can sell you! GO SAVE THE PATRON PLEASE!
Lightning: How convenient...
*Lightning reaches Snow's office*
Lightning: The Door is frozen.
Hope: Burn it down then!
Lightning: NO! THIS IS SPECIAL ICE! I CAN'T DO THAT! IT'S MAGIC!
Hope: But...you can make magical fire...
Lightning: It. Is. Magic!
Hope: *sigh* Fine, guess we'll have to convince him to get in, go search his room for a clue or something.
*Lightning gets to Snow's room*
Lightning: It's Serah's engagement Pendant...THIS MUST BE THE ANSWER! IT'LL GET US IN!
Hope: Um...how is that suppose to work?
Lightning: It just will, OK!!?
Hope: So this is a complete crapshoot. great...
*Lightning opens door with Pendent*
Hope: ...well, guess I'll eat crow now, where's that damn tengu that's been bothering me?
Lightning: Time to beat up Snow!
*inside*
Snow: Hey sis! Guess you are the real deal since you figured out my puzzle!
Lightning: Wait, this whole thing was a test?
Snow: Yep! Had to make sure you were the real thing. That's why I attacked you last time; thought you might be an imposter.
Lightning: Couldn't you have just asked a simple question that only you and I know the answer to...
Snow: Nope! Had to be a convoluted puzzle with the pendant.
Lightning: So...can I save your soul now?
Snow: No, I need to go DESTROY THE CHAOS BEHIND THIS DOOR!
Lightning: That's going to either kill you or turn you into a Cie'th...
Snow: Yes, and if I turn into a Cie'th, I expect you to kill me. ONLY YOU CAN DO THIS!
Lightning: You're running from your problems again...
Snow: NO! FINALLY I CAN BE USEFUL AFTER FAILING TO KEEP MY ONLY PROMISE TO SERAH!
Lightning: No, Snow, don't do it!
Snow: TOO LATE!
*boss fight where the two fight because Snow is suppose to be a Cie'th even though he looks human and is apparently in control of himself...but hey, Blinded by Light plays, so who can argue?*
Snow: Good, KILL ME NOW LIGHTNING! I CAN'T STOP THE TURNING!
Lightning: No, Snow, I WON'T LET YOU! SERAH WOULDN'T WANT THIS!
Snow: YES SHE WOULD! SHE WANTS THE WORLD TO BE SAVED BUT SHE'S DEAD!
Lightning: YOU'RE THE ONLY THING SERAH EVER WANTED! HOW CAN WE BE A FAMILY IF YOU'RE DEAD!? SERAH WILL COME BACK!
Lumina: Aaawwww, just kill him already ^_^!
Snow: Come on, Light, KILL ME! *Turns into a Cie'th*
Lightning: NO! *Punches Snow in the face* I WILL SAVE YOU SNOW! LIVE DAMN IT! SERAH WANTS IT!
Hope: Umm...Lightning...I thought God removed all emotions from you...how the heck are you getting...
Lightning: NO SNOW! *Bursts out crying* I WON'T LET THIS HAPPEN! SERAH WOULD NEVER FORGIVE ME!
Lumina: Awww, lying about a dead person are we? You pretend to know what Serah wants, it's cute, but you're still lying tee hee ^_^!
Lightning: COME BACK TO ME SNOW! *Punches him some more*
Lumina: It's pointless, kill him ^_^!
*Snow comes back*
Snow: What? I'm...alive? Thanks...sis...
Lightning: I'm not your sister...yet...
Snow: Heh, I've been given a second lease on life, I'll do my best to be there when I can finally be reunited with Serah.
Lightning: You better!
*Lightning gets Snow's soul*
Lumina: Well poopy, this is stupid >_< ^_^!
Hope: Mission Accomplished!
*back at the Arc*
Lumina: Well, that was interesting ^_^
Lightning: What are you doing here?
Lumina: You still lied about what Serah wanted ^_^!
Lightning: Go away.
Lumina: But don't you see...Serah's not dead! And I don't mean this "oh, she lives in all of us!" I mean she's still alive ^_^!
Lightning: No, seriously, get the hell out of here.
Lumina ^_^!
*The usual (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HGJ4pIPiq8)*
Hope: It has been a long time, Lightning. Our current situation is as follows*
*Yggdrasil grows and +1 day added onto time*
Hope: Our current situation is...we are routing the Chaos! If all goes well, we should be prepared for the new world in no time! Would you like to know the status of your past companions?
*Lightning talks to Hope about what he remembers of Snow*
Hope: Lightning, about your performance...IT IS MAGNIFICENT! These are all the Eradia Points I can grant you at this time. The Lord Bhunivelze is pleased with you, he begs me give you these treasures!
*Lightning gets new abilities, weapons, etc*
Hope: Lightning, I have a request of you. GO SAVE ANOTHER ONE OF OUR FORMER COMPANIONS! May fate guide your hand!
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FFX - Managed to get through the Bevelle Arc, missed the last chest, but didn't really care by that point. Now hit the Calm Lands and managed to capture one of everything. Debating staying behind long enough to also get ten of everything, but the Marlboroughs have been proving difficult to convince to show up. Probably will anyways, just means I'll wait until I feel like doing this to pick the game back up again. Until then...
SRW:AG - Managed to finish ABAYO, and have enough Mastery Points to have myself locked into the True ending. Also, Kamen Kamen seems to have not gotten any better despite being left alone for thousands of years. So, three of him were dead easy to dispatch, and got the Mastery without even trying. Sanger showed up and I had to beat on him with my juiced up team. This was agreeable. Sadly, he ran at 30% HP left, but I saw the mastery list for all the stages, I know he'll be back. And I'll be waiting. Oh yes, I will be waiting. >:)
Also started up the following level, which is the last grasp of the GX plot, aka emo boys want to destroy world to show their version of post humanity is better than New Types. Complete with that Turn A guy who wants to rule the Moon AND the Earth. Dude is continually getting offered the chance to just settle down and accept a decently large chunk of post-apocalypic North America, complete with the fact that a lot of the local power structure has just been taken out... by the PCs... so, y'know, if he just took the offer he'd be a pretty damn powerful guy. But no, he feels the need to take on the guys that have taken out the Moon Race Military Caste after their badass leader got his Apocalypse Event Powerful mech, And took out every Innocent Base they came across, including most of their strongest ones. So, he's kinda failed the Lemming test, and thus earned the sweet, sweet death he's going to be dealt.
Currently halfway through the map, though given the intro, I'm almost half expecting to have Mycenaean forces popping up after I deal with these mooks, so I'm saving on SP and Energy (The Ra Cailum can refill Ammo easily enough).
Bravely Default - Just hit Chapter 6.
This... Just, this... (http://www.angryflower.com/245.html)
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Dark Souls: Lololol. I stumbled into the 4 Kings battle with:
A) 5 Soft Humanity
B) 40000 unspent souls
C) A PVP Pyromancy loadout with half charge on most of my useful moves
D) 3 Estus flask charges
and kicked their ass. The pyromancies I had just happened to be the ones I needed, and I could chew through the last one with my Halberd. Actually probably could have taken these dudes first pretty easily, since the only thing that changed about my damage output is that I have Fire Tempest now... which actually did take down the last king, so hey.
Playing around with pyromancies. Acid surge seems too... uh, telegraphed to be worth the trouble in PVP. Kinda like Toxic mist that doesn't completely fuck your opponent up. Fire Surge is nice when assholes don't stop blocking but I think combustion is better for PVE. Fire tempest actually does enough damage to be worth the huge casting time and low charges, so it has earned a place in my roster, esp. now that I have poise worth talking about... and completely obsoletes Chaos Storm, perhaps making CS the worst spell in the game. Less damage than Fire Tempest (950 or so vs 1150 or so), takes up 2 attunement slots, seems to cast slower, AND you have to blow 30 humanity on the Chaos Servant covenant to get it. In exchange it leaves the lava piles, but those aren't guaranteed damage. Seriously, contending for Poison mist and Chaos Fire Whip (and by extension Fire Whip) for "Why the fuck would I ever use that?"
Except all three of those are way less expensive. Really, though, what I want is more Chaos Fire Ball charges, or more Great Combustion charges. Too bad that's not happening (maybe in NG+?)
Not really seeing the point right now in getting more attunement slots. Instead of pumping Dex I think it is about time I get all my armor to +5. Shit's expensive, so much twinkling titanite needed.
EDIT: Oh, yeah, I got lucky with a dark hand. Hell yeah free humanity points from npcs. Never be ugly again.
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Never be ugly again.
Why I go out of my way to be human all the time. (That Dark Hand drop's a lot less exciting when you're trying to farm titanite chunks, though.)
Yeah pyro's great for 4K. You can never get another hit of Great Chaos Fireball, though (covenant spells are one-per-character, no way to ever obtain a second scroll). Shame because unlike most fireball spells (which are obviously telegraphed and easy to dodge) it has some genuine use in PVP since people always forget about the lava. You can buy a second round of Great Fireball on NG+ at least? Not sure how obvious the game makes it, but any spell with Chaos in the name ramps up in damage with soft humanity just like chaos weapons (maxes at ten; damage bonus may just enhance the lava aftereffects though, can't recall). Most useful pyromancy for PVP in my experience has been Black Flame, found near the end of the DLC. Slightly weaker Great Combustion that deals a ton of stamina damage. So if dudes try to block through your charges they just get staggered and then you can nuke their face while they're stunned.
My PVP loadout was very straightforward: Great Chaos Fireball, Chaos Storm, 2x Black Flame. Usually all I needed was the latter (though Chaos Storm was occasionally nice given the chance to burn through the wind-up while someone obliviously rounded a corner. Best place for it? Midway up the buttress leading to the Anor Londo snipers).
At least you can actually buy twinkling titanite in DS1.
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Even Twinkling Farming in DS1 isn't that bad.
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DS: Nito down.
The Tomb of the Giants wasn't that bad, actually. I don't have any bloody idea how you'd deal with Skeleton Dogs without Pyromancy or some other one hit KO attack, but hey. Nito was pretty easy. I almost lost because I got surrounded but Fire Tempest saved the day again.
All my equipment is fully upgraydded now so pumping DEX.
And with that, all four of the Lord Soul Keepers were taken down, and it was time for little Sassypants to take on Gwyn and step up to become the new god of the world. But wait, what's this? Dusk has disappeared and in her place is a time portal. I sure hope whatever shenanigans lie beyond that don't make her go crazy, start sinning and kill everyone before fighting the Lord of Cinder. That would be bad, eh? So bad. On the other hand, if it DIDN'T happen I would be missing out on content, so hey.
Oh, yeah, I also have no idea how to deal with the Hellkite Dragon, so that will probably be the last thing I do this playthrough. Y'know after all the sinning and murdering saints and all that.
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Finished up Trails in the Sky. It is a great classic JRPG (that came out 3 years ago... or 6, depending on which version?).
[13:55] <LoveBracerDjinn> Andy, you should play Trails in the Sky, I think it's your kind of JRPG. It's plot-heavy and character-focused and kinda feels very much like something -you-, personally, would write. I think you'd enjoy it. Having an extremely well-written female main character is just a bonus.
[13:56] <LoveBracerDjinn> the only disparaging thing I can say about Trails is that it's not wildly inventive on the gameplay front, though certainly not bog-standard generic.
[13:56] <LoveBracerDjinn> it does integrate every single gameplay function with some kind of story explanation too
[13:57] <LoveBracerDjinn> so there's that going for it
[13:57] <LoveBracerDjinn> I guess the other disparaging thing you can say about Trails is that it's -wordy-, by sheer volume of text in the game... but honestly it never feels that way. The dialogue is all very quick and natural.
[14:00] <LoveBracerDjinn> there's a metric shit-ton of available world-building stuff in optional side stuff like quests, library areas, a database, and it's got its own novella you can read in-game, just for flavor. The game really feels like it has a living breathing world and the main characters are just people living in it and not having the world revolve around them. It's pretty brilliant from a pure world-building standpoint.
May also apply to other people who care about JRPG plot, like Gate, Tal, and Jim.
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Only thing I would note that I would suggest waiting for the PC version for a Steam release. Both for the inevitable price drop, ease of availability and the fact that the sequel is expected to port and transfer data.
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Yeah, even without the sequel, it's still a fine game. Obviously, having the sequel would be better, but I feel like I could be satisfied without it just based on the first game's merits.
The weird thing is that the Steam release was already slated to have been released by now... I really wonder what the delay is. I suppose they could be waiting for the sequel's localization to be done first and then release them both together?
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The Tomb of the Giants wasn't that bad, actually. I don't have any bloody idea how you'd deal with Skeleton Dogs without Pyromancy or some other one hit KO attack, but hey. Nito was pretty easy. I almost lost because I got surrounded but Fire Tempest saved the day again.
All my equipment is fully upgraydded now so pumping DEX.
If you can't one-shot them (jumping attack with any decent strength weapon is sufficient if you don't have high-end magic) you just run past them. It's actually surprising how much mundane combat you can skip in DS1 once you know the level layouts well (this works less well in DS2 because in that case goons can still shank you while you're traversing fog doors).
I was going to read through this afternoon but I think now I can only retire for a double dose of pimpin'.
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Mario Kart 8 - Finally got three stars on all of the courses on 150 cc. Definitely glad to see that, between MK7 and MK8, that the series has gotten some momentum back after the uninspiring Wii game. MK8 is definitely a slower game than 7, but hmm. Not sure, but it kinda feels like the portable ones might be designed for a more hardcore audience? Just a guess though.
New Super Mario Bros. WiiU - Got through the end of World 4 and then a SMB3-style ship world appeared! Sweet! I like this game. Less overpowered powerups than a lot of the previous games (SM3DL was like this as well) and the stage design is more inspired than NSMB2. Three players is pretty hilarious as always because you are often in each other's way. The silliest moment was when all three of us were standing in a "safe place" and all realized that the place was somewhere we would be smashed as we all died in a row. I played as Luigi and mostly spent my time yelling at Toad and resenting my brother for being better at the game/life than me.
Trails in the Sky - Definitely teetering between just quitting the game and continuing to play it. It's boring and relatively uninspiring in every way, but doesn't really do anything too bad, so I've just been chipping away in my spare bussing time. The game is trying to win me over with Jill and Joshua's crossdressing, though.
Kid Icarus Uprising - I'm really not very good at these kind of games, but I'm giving this one a try. It's decent so far, snappy dialogue and the ground gameplay is pretty fun. I find the shooter portion a little boring though.
Super Mario World 2 - Beat this game. The final boss is kind of odd and not overly enjoyable, but it is GIANT BABY BOWSER so I forgive it.
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Trails has good world-building but I wouldn't say it has especially strong plot or characters. So... depending on which one is more important to you will determine your opinion on the game a lot.
FF5 Four Job Fiesta - Beat as BM, WM, two thieves. No resets ultimately but dealing with low thief offence was pretty frustrating certainly. At least they can run away easily and make what resource issues FF5 has go away. WM and BM cover all the necessary bases though so things went pretty smoothly. Level 33.
Child of Light - Started this up, HM. Seems cute so far.
Suikoden Tactics - I'm warming up to this game a bit, the combat is quite fun. Not top-tier SRPG fun by any means, but enjoyable enough. The plot is... well, better than S4 certainly. I like how they explain plot points of S4 that really should have been in the game itself, like anything related to Graham Cray or what the fuck that giant tree was.
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I am enjoying Suikoden Tactics voice acting. >.>
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Cid: Yeah, I can see that. A lot of my time spent refighting Bed of Chaos was running through and ignoring enemies, so I imagine it can work pretty well. But, like... them souls. How you gonna get them souls? You need to farm rite.
Anyway
DS: DLC beaten. This is DLC done right. By that, I mean I didn't have to pay extra for it, thank you Steam Sale.
It was pretty reminiscent of midgame Dark Souls and that was the best part of the game so it is good. I feel like once you got the lord vessel Dark Souls made a lot of poor design choices, specifically with the distance between the Lord Soul bosses and the nearest Bonfire. Luckily, with the build I chose, it really only mattered for the Bed of Chaos and Seath, but that doesn't make it any better. The shortcuts between bonfires and bosses in the DLC were much, much shorter and therefore better.
It seems like they may have listened to feedback from fans of the game while making the DLC. They certainly were listening to my mental feedback. In addition to the previous example, we have:
1) Less "Massive hard to tell which attack they're doing because the camera literally doesn't fit the whole of the boss onto the screen" bosses, more bosses where you're actually paying attention and trying to figure out what move is being telegraphed.
2) There's a multiplayer arena so actually all the covenants are useless but NOW there is actually a set way to find multiplayer that (HOPEFULLY) other people are using.
3) We need more puppy
4) This time we don't KILL the puppy, we SAVE the puppy
5) Doggiedoggiedoggie
Good DLC. Best friend.
Unfortunately, doggiedoggiedoggie died while fighting Manus, and while Sassypants came out physically alive, she was griefstricken beyond belief. Also there was some dark influence there? Sure whatever. Anyway she's crazy now and is going to go kill all the NPCs who don't directly benefit her, then kill Gwyn and get an ending whatever dark souls plot.
EDIT: Oh, yeah. The last hit on EVERY SINGLE BOSS was Fire Tempest. This is mostly because I had run out of Chaos Fireball and Great Combustion charges and Tempest deals the most damage and I can usually find an opening by that point in the fight. But really, I wonder how much use I'd be getting out of the spell if I just had another 8 Great Combustion charges. I imagine not as much.
I kinda want to replay the game without NG+ but with the same build just to see how annoying Kalameet would be without Gough crippling him. But I will not do that. I will probably do a DEX build if I replay from scratch and don't just buy DS2.
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TWD Episode 2 is on sale right now. They're up to Chapter 3 so far. The use of Clementine as a player character has left me playing much more opportunistically than I did as Lee since, you know, ten-year-old girl and all, so you gotta take what you can.
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Nobody uses Battle of Stoicism.
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The real Battle of Stoicism is called Undead Burg.
Zenny: I have never actually seen Sif die against Manus, he literally has like ten thousand hit points. I guess you took your time learning how to dodge? Oh, and fighting Sif after doing the DLC changes the pre-battle cutscene to make you feel like even more of a horrible person than you already are, so I recommend doing that on replay/NG+ (or just Youtubing it since you lock out Darkwraith covenant by doing this). DLC is probably the best part of the game? That or Anor Londo. Kalameet is fucking awful as a pyro though, goooood he just takes forfuckingever to die. His tail's a pretty boss weapon if you can use it at least. Unfortunately From didn't entirely learn that lesson about bosses too big to fit in the camera, there's definitely worse in that regard in DS2 (god Giant Lord is such an idiotic boss design).
Personal favorite DEX weapon if you replay on that mode: Balder Side Sword. That is some excellent reach for a light weapon.
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Sif did not actually die during the fight. But he also contributed nothing to the fight, so that may as well be like dying, right?
I'm still killing every NPC and you can't stop me.
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Distracting Manus is a perfectly valid contribution! (But yeah, Sif damage, so bad.)
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I'm actually pretty sure that Manus never focused on Sif for the last round that I beat him. Definitely did once or twice on one of the tries beforehand, though, so I guess I should give him more credit.
Regardless, doggiedoggiedoggie.
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Alpha Protocol: No screen has ever held this much face.
I've decided to work through my game backlog alphabetically. Got this for a buck in a Steam sale a while back (cheap + Obsidian? Sure). Game chunks a little on my elderly computer, unfortunately. Playable but precision aiming kind of a problem. So I guess should just main shotguns since I am fucking terrible at stealth in everything ever. (I went Soldier because I assumed assault rifles would trump everything like they always do.) Stopped in the middle of the first real mission because ach I'm really bad at this. Not sure patience will keep up with computer-induced camera jitteriness, we'll see.
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Grab a pistol or an assault rifle instead (Most people seem to prefer the pistol, I prefer the assault rifle) since shotguns (and SMGs, but especially shotguns) fucking suuuuck.
And melee is just not something you can always rely on.
Stealth becomes totally godly even if you suck at it. You get some crazy Cloak of Invisibility shit later on.
But you need a good weapon for bosses so you can't totally rely on it.
Good luck with Gwyn Zenny. LRN2Parry if you can't beat him properly.
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Bravely Default: Still slogging through.
The Banner Saga: Finished. It's a good game. Vikingon Trail Emblem indeed. Nice & short, which makes the penalties for perma-screw ups not quite so harsh. Also the last battles are pleasantly extremely tough, especially under Poor (-2) Morale, which I was totally at for the end.
The battle system is interestingly different... although I'm not sure I'd want to particularly hope other games adopt it, it was good for a change-up. Basically the game has strict alternation between sides, unless a team only has 1 member. So if side A has 5 members and side B has 3 members, the turn order would be something like A1/B1/A2/B2/A3/B3/A4/B1/A5/B2/A1/B3. See how side B is magically "faster" and B1 can sneak a double-turn in on someone they're facing? Then combine this turn order with the fact that health = damage basically. Thus, unlike most SRPGs where you want to focus down one enemy at a time, and ideally lure a single enemy out, Banner Saga turns this on its head. You want to keep as many enemies alive as possible (it isn't always), but then kneecap their offense by reducing them to their knees. This makes their turn efficiency worse by giving turns to low-HP and thus low-damage units - who can still be a threat in a number of ways (armor-breaking, summon reinforcements, spells, special abilities, etc.), but it's better than more turns for the high-threat units. The system also makes units who can't move and do something relevant to an enemy in range horrible dead-weight - so you the player have to be careful not to let characters wander off to nowhere-ville, and simultaneously try and set up the enemies to waste their turns closing with your force. Turn-denial abilities also become incredibly powerful as a result, as well. It's weird, but like I said, interestingly different.
I do have one minor complaint, although it may be more a quirk. Renown functions as both XP (use it to level up your units) and money (you are a respected warrior, so fork over the artifact / food). Rook's scenario tends to be direly low on food, at least if you're keeping your caravan population high, which is great for making you feel desperate and thus driven to do less-than-honorable things to get any food you can, but also has the perverse side-effect of encouraging you not to level-up your characters for fear you won't be able to buy up all the food at the next village. Okay, one resource meter for everything is clean & neat, but I'd like to be both desperate for food and still able to level up my units, because stronger units are fun... (heck, I still ran out of food anyway despite being VERY aggressive about buying it and doing some nasty things on the side.)
Final boss was a badass. Alas I got the worse ending, and it was all my fault. Sigh. Nice job at making me feel like a character in a George R. R. Martin story, game.
Re Djinn's Trails hype: Unlike Elf apparently, I'd be pretty willing to hype the Trails character cast as "strong"! They're certainly better than yon "average" VG cast to me a la Star Ocean 3, and they have their merits even over games I'd consider strong in the category like your average Suikoden. I guess if you're all animed out give the cast a skip, but since everyone here loves WAXF's super-anime-trope cast (which is fine!), I don't think that's true.
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Grab a pistol or an assault rifle instead (Most people seem to prefer the pistol, I prefer the assault rifle) since shotguns (and SMGs, but especially shotguns) fucking suuuuck.
And melee is just not something you can always rely on.
Stealth becomes totally godly even if you suck at it. You get some crazy Cloak of Invisibility shit later on.
But you need a good weapon for bosses so you can't totally rely on it.
Good luck with Gwyn Zenny. LRN2Parry if you can't beat him properly.
Pistol is really the go-to for killing bosses. Hit chain shot and drop most of a magazine into the guy's head? Don't mind if I do. You don't even need a GOOD pistol, you just need to put enough points to... like the second tier chain shot, which gives you three rounds at a time. If you wanna get real crazy with it, though, max that shit out because it goes to six. Master chain shot is just "you walk into a room. Time freezes. Everyone inside dies."
But yeah, stealth is really important. Even if you want to kill everyone, having some stealth skills lets you attack from advantageous positions, split up enemies so you can pick them off, and so on. It's not exactly Assassin's Creed where any time you get caught you can just kill twelve guys like it's no thing.
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Dark Souls:
Priscilla and Dark Son Gwyndolin down. I thought I one-shot the former until I realized she just turned invisible. Two shot her, though. The latter managed to snag a kill off of me due to a missed roll and 4 homing soulmasses in a row. Both may have been interesting fights if I did them ASAP but this late they were both really easy.
Dark Anor Londo sucks. Anor Londo was the best looking part of the game BECAUSE it wasn't all fuckin' dreary and dark like a 13 year old's bedroom. I fucking hate that trend in "moody design", and it is prevalent basically everywhere BUT Anor Londo and a handful of other areas (Upper Undead Burg, Undead Parish, The Duke's Archives, and... the first part of the Royal Wood?) but whatever.
Taking out Our Fair Lady probably should have made me feel like a dick, but there have been so many other things I've had to do as a mandatory part of the game that were designed to make me feel that way so whaaaaatever.
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My favorite character in Trails is Jill, some girl I met like ten minutes ago. I will remain hopeful that the good character work will come!
P.S. Not sure "everyone" loves XF's cast, particularly its PCs (which seems to be a focus of Trails)? I don't think any of them break even 8/10 to me. <_<
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Lightning Returns: The Return of Purple Wanker: Yes We USed Returned Twice Here!
Rosch: Lightning Returns, the story so far! ...wait, why am I here?
Lightning: I am God's Servant, I must do his will!
Hope: I'll watch you on GOD'S SUPER COMPUTER and help you from here!
Snow: SERAH!!!!!!!!
Noel: YEUL!!!!!!!!!
Vanille: FANG!!!!!!!!!
Lumina: ^_^!!!!!!!!!!
Lightning: ...what the hell was all that?
Hope: Uhh...God's Will?
*Lightning travels to the Wildlands*
Lightning: The Wildlands, people left civilization to live out in the open and be farmers and hunters, away from the Fal'Cie. IOWs, there won't be much in the way of technology out here. This is where the Chaos first came from too, which doesn't really explain why it's the only area of the world that i s green and filled with wild life still...
Female Voice: Savior, you must find the Angel of Valhalla!
Lightning: wait what? Where'd that come from?
Female Voice: Find the Angel of Valhalla!
Lightning: Hope, what was that?
Hope: What was what? You were having an internal monologue and then suddenly started shouting stuff.
Lightning: So I'm the only one who heard that?
Hope: Heard what?
Lightning: ...look, just tell me, what's the Angel of Valhalla?
Hope: Nothing appears on any records about it here, guess you'll have to find out the old fashioned way...
Lightning; Wait, you don't mean...
Hope: Yes...talking to random NPCs and get info!
Lightning: NO!!!!!!!!!!!
*one NPC later*
Lightning: What can you tell me about the Angel of Valhalla?
NPC: Angel of Valhalla? You don't know of the Angel of Valhalla? WHAT DID YOU GROW UP ON A FARM!?
Lightning: Evidently not, seeing as I don't live here...
NPC: ...touche. Everyone here knows of the Angel of Valhalla, it's a PURE WHITE CHOCOBO (that technically has a little green on it but whose counting?) that runs around. Only a few have found it! It is an omen that will portend the end of times, so we know the end is nigh! That's a good thing because NATURE FINALLY CAN TAKE IT'S COURSE AND KILL US! IMMORTAL HUMANS ARE BAD!
Lightning: That's...more than I wanted to know...
NPC: THE ANGEL WILL BE THE MOUNT OF THE SAVIOR! IT WILL TAKE THE SAVIOR TO THE TEMPLE OF VALHALLA THAT APPEARED WHEN THE CHAOS APPEARED! but that stuff is not going to be relevant to you at all, what's more important is YES! THE WORLD IS FINALLY ENDING!
Lightning: Wait, it's going to be the mount of the savior? Ok, do you know how I can find this thing?
NPC: Well, Doctor Gysahl might know, he's been studying the thing...BUT THE HARBINGER OF DOOM IS AMONG US! PRAISED BE TO YEVON!
Lightning: ...yeah, I'm going to walk to that village now, hope there are no Behemoths in this area that will get in my wa-...
*Giant Behemoth appears as first encounter*
Lightning: ...God, if I'm really your chosen one, why do you hate me?
*At the farm*
Lightning: So Doctor Gysahl...where's the Angel of Valhalla?
Gysahl: It's in the North, that's where people claimed to have seen it! If only I could see it!
Lightning: You could just...head north yourself, you know.
Gysahl: That's nonsense! I'm a DOCTOR!
Lightning: You're also over 500 years old, and the end of the world is coming shortly, face it, you have nothing to lose at this point.
Gysahl: IF ONLY I COULD SEE THE WHITE BIRD MYSELF!
Hope: Just go north and see if you can find the thing, Lightning. Maybe you'll run across some ruins or something...
*City Ruins in the North*
Hunter on Chocobo: Well, you look capable lady, but be warned, THERE'S A CHOCOBO EATER FIGHTING THE ANGEL OF VALHALLA UP THERE!
Lightning: A Chocobo Eater? You mean those things exist in this setting?
Hunter: OF COURSE! There are Chocobo Eaters all over Spira!
Lightning: ...but this is Nova Chrysallis...
Hunter: CHOCOBO. EATERS. ALL. OVER. SPIRA!
Lightning: ...Hope, is possible for Chaos to infect people's brains?
Hope: Theoretically...yes...why?
Lightning: Oh, no reason, off to go kill a Chocobo Eater!
Lumina: Not without me interrupting you won't ^_^!
Lightning: ...ok, what is the point of you being here?
Lumina: Because you're going to the temple of Valhalla, duh! And you are going to use that bird to get there, DUH! ^_^!
Lightning: Yes, I know; this was already established; being cryptic is bad enough, but being redundant is far worse!
Lumina: DO YOU KNOW WHY YOU NEED TO GO THOUGH ^_^?
Lightning: ...you're not going to tell me either way, so I'm not going to bother answering that...
Lumina: You're no fun >:( ^_^!
*Lightning comes across a wounded White Chocobo and Chocobo Eater, kills the Chocobo Eater*
Lightning: It's the Angel! It's badly hurt! It needs medical attention, stat!
Hope: Lightning, who are you talking to?
Lightning: That Hunter guy right behind me who clearly was not there when I was talking.
Hope: Oh ok.
*short bit with Gysahl carrying the Angel of Valhalla back to the farm and giving him Medical Attention*
Lightning: Will he be alright?
Gysahl: Well, we slowed down the bleeding but he's still dying of starvation! He'll only eat FROM HIS CHOSEN OWNER!
Lightning: IOWs, the Savior...which is me by the way...let me feed him!
*Lightning feeds him*
Gysahl: My word, you weren't kidding! Ok, here's what he needs *Hands Lightning a laundry list of things to get*
Lightning: ...this is just a fetch quest to pad out this part of the game so it's not stupid short, isn't it?
Gysahl: Yes, yes it is! NOW GO GET THESE ITEMS!
*one fetch quest later that I'm skipping because no real plot relevant things happen, just a lot of gameplay*
Gysahl: Hey, the Chocobo is strong enough to stand! But it can't Fly yet...
Hope: Well, if you want to be technical, White Chocobos don't fly. Traditionally, it's only been the black ones that fly, outside of those that live on Planet Gaia where it's the Gold ones that fly.
Lightning: Good, I'll be getting him healed through "Yeul's Flowers" that I was told about at the other village. By the way, I have decided to name the Angel of Valhalla...BOBBY CORWEN! But that's too long, so I'll just refer to him as Bob! Come on, Bob, let's go!
Bob: Kweh!
*a few flowers later, Bob loses his bandages and is fully healed, Lightning heads off to temple, we're skipping the interim stuff because it's all filler boring stuff no one cares about*
Lightning: So...Hope...what's suppose to be in there?
Hope: Unseen Chaos, the stuff you failed to stop 500 years ago when you fought CAIUS!
Lightning: Wait, I thought Chaos was everywhere already...
Hope: No, this is UNSEEN Chaos, that's totally different!
Lightning: But Chaos in itself is an abstract element that you don't really see, it just exists, doesn't that make all Chaos unseen?
Hope: IT IS TOTALLY DIFFERENT BECAUSE THE FILES ON GOD'S SUPER COMPUTER SAY SO OK!?
Lightning: Fine, I'll take your word for it...but something feels unsettling about this. I can't put my finger on it...something evil and familiar approaches...
Lumina: Hi there, glad you made it ^_^!
Lightning: ...well, that explains THAT sense of forboding...
Lumina: So...yeah...Caius...remember him ^_^?
Lightning: How can I forget? HE LITERALLY IS THE ONE BEHIND ALL THIS MESS!
Lumina: It's pretty sad isn't? I mean, all that Chaos and all he could do is blow stuff up with it ^_^?
Lightning: No, it's not sad; the only sad part is that I failed to beat him and I have to live with this guilt.
Lumina: HA! GOT YOU! YOU ADMITTED YOU'RE A FAILURE :P!
Lightning: ...I loathe you...
Hope: But...you don't have emotions...
Lumina: Well, have fun in the temple, toodles ^_^! Oh by the way, you can't use your powers in there because of all the Chaos, so you should turn around ^_^!
*in the Temple*
Lightning: So this came from Valhalla and the Chaos brought it here. So what am I suppose to be looking for here? Chaos that can't be seen? You know, I probably should have gone over the itinerary a bit better before jumping in here...
Caius: Perhaps I can help you with that.
Lightning: ...and by help, you mean attack me and try to kill me, don't you?
Caius: Nonsense. I would never kill you directly; I prefer cursing you and watching you fail slowly to pain!
Lightning: ...so...you're basically just being a super villain...
Caius: The Chaos demands it!
*Caius blasts Lightning, she falls through a hole, now has a big black glowing spot on her*
Lightning: Well, this isn't going to be easy...am I suppose to save his soul?
Hope: I...uhh...er...we can at least solve the mystery?
Lightning: Where do I need to go?
Hope: To the top...by the way, you're at the very bottom.
Lightning: Figures...wait, how can I use my powers here? Lumina said the total opposite.
Hope: Oh, well, by "not use your powers" she really meant "you'll gradually lose Health at a very slow rate that won't be notice-able", because Caius cursed you...which only works in this dungeon...who makes these rules anyway?
Lightning: Well, better start getting to the top...
*part way up*
Female Voice: You must save Caius, his soul begs for it!
Lightning: Ok, just show yourself already, I have enough issues with that black dressed bimbo parading around in my sister's likeness.
Yeul: I'm sorry, but it was me who did it.
Lightning: Oh, it's the seeress...wait, what are you doing here? Aren't you suppose to be dead...several hundred times over...and finally not revived?
Yeul: I am here because I am part of the Chaos.
Lightning: I'm not going to bother questioning that.
Yeul: I am also here to make platforms for you to continue in the dungeon. Please save Caius!
Lightning; Oh, hey, thanks!
*Lightning continues on*
Lightning: Oh, Yeul, you're here as well...how did you get here before me? That doesn't make sense...unless this is more Chaos shenanigans.
Yeul: I am not the Yeul you just talked to.
Lightning: Oh, right, there are many of you and-...wait, didn't we do this EXACT SAME PLOT DEVICE in the previous game, with my sister stuck in that void?
Yeul: You must kill Caius!
Lightning: ...didn't you just tell me to save him?
Yeul: Caius is suffering, only in death can he be freed!
Lightning: ...you're giving me mixed signals here.
*Next Yeul*
Yeul: Save Caius!
Lightning: By killing him, thereby letting him rest in peace?
Yeul: No, you must convince him to let you have his soul so he can be part of the new world!
Lightning: ...seriously, you're not making any sense.
*Next Yeul*
Lightning: ...save or kill?
Yeul: It matters not what I say, because there will always be disagreement between us.
Lightning: Ok, finally we're getting somewhere! Can you maybe explain what's going on?
Yeul: Half of us want Caius to be saved, but the other half want him to be killed; we're constantly tugging at both sides.
Lightning: Ok, so do you like or hate him?
Yeul: All of us wish the best for Caius, and want to be by his side. At the same time, we want him be able to move on with his pain.
Lightning: I guess that makes sense, but how are you part of the Chaos exactly?
Yeul: I am the Unseen Chaos.
Lightning: Wait WHAT!?
Yeul: As each of my lives die, my soul goes into the Chaos, and the grief helps it grow. Every life I lose feeds the Chaos and makes it stronger...
Lightning: So what you're saying is you're a manipulative bitch who basically made Caius destroy the world because you're a whiny little brat who just wants to be in the arms of a big strong man? Because seriously, that's what I'm hearing...
Yeul: ...you do not know my pain...
Lightning: Look, just create platforms so I can deal with Caius, alright?
*At the top*
Caius: So you've managed to reach here, Savior. You truly are God's servant.
Lightning: Caius, I've come to save you! Why, I don't know; you did destroy the world...except that now I learned it's really Yeul's fault...but you still did kind of push the proverbally BIG RED THREATENING "HISTORY ERASER" BUTTON, so you're at least 37% to blame for that!
Hope: ...your math makes no sense whatsoever.
Lightning: SHUT UP HOPE!
Caius: I cannot be saved. I am cursed to forever wander with the souls of those lost in the Chaos who will not be reborn. That is my punishment for my crimes.
Lightning: ...the sympathy angle doesn't really work when you did that knowingly and enjoyed what you did, you know...
Caius: THE YEULS DO NOT KNOW WHAT THEY WANT OF ME! SOME WANT ME DEAD TO BE WITH THEM FOREVER! OTHERS WANT ME SAVED SO I CAN MOVE ON! Tell me Savior, what decision can you make?
Lightning: I'll save your soul AND Yeul's!
Caius: ...that's stupid, you can't save a soul that's part of chaos!
Lightning: Yes I can because...uh...you're stupid!
Caius: ...can we end this charrade and just get to finishing that duel we started in the previous game?
Lightning: Ok.
*one Duel later*
Caius: It seems you're serious savior...but alas, I cannot accept being saved. It is as I said; I must be there to guide the souls lost in Chaos. That is my punishment.
Lightning: Well, if you do not want to be saved, then there's nothing I can do. Good bye Caius and Yeul!
*Lightning leaves, somehow gets big stat bonuses from saving a soul she didn't actually save*
Lightning: Well, that seemed like a waste of time...seriously, what did I accomplish?
Hope: We did learn that Caius is still alive...except I'm not sure how that helps us...
Yeul: Thank you for helping us, Lightning.
Lightning: ...you were the Yeul who called me, weren't you?
Yeul: Yes, I saw this moment, and wanted you to come here. The Angel of Valhalla wanted you to come here too!
Lightning: Yeah, that Angel isn't really a Chocobo is it?
*Odin appears near the White Chocobo*
Lightning: ...that was one hell of a disguise, good to be back with you old friend. And judging how you're acting, I'm assuming you're the Yeul who was with Noel, which is to say, the only Yeul that can be something resembling a decent human being?
Yeul: That's...one way to put it, yes. I am the last of the Yeuls.
Hope: So...Lightning...we still have half a day left to do stuff...go do God's work!
Lightning: Ok, time to look for that Moogle Village everyone is talking about!
*Lightning finds it at night*
Lightning: Hi Moogles, what's up?
Moogles AH! MONSTERS ARE ATTACKING! KUPO!
Lightning: Well, that's certainly an inconvenience...
*Lightning kills the Dryads*
Lightning: There, anyway, as I was saying, HI MOOGLES!
Moogle Chief: You saved us, Kupo!
Lightning: YOu seem...familiar...
Moogle Chief: we've never met, Kupo!
Lightning: ...hi Mog...
Mog: Kupo! Who are yo talking about!? ...was it really that obvious, Kupo?
Lightning: You think I'd ever forget a friend like you?
Mog: No, Kupo! Leave!
Lightning: Why?
Mog: I failed to protect Serah, Kupo! I don't deserve to look at you, Kupo!
Lightning: Mog, you did your best, it's not your fault; Serah's not dead anyway, we'll see her again someday!
Mog: We will? OH LIGHTNING! THAT MAKES ME SO HAPPY KUPO!
*Mog flies towards Lightning's chest, gets punched in the face...yes, this really happens*
Mog: Ow, Kupo! Same old Lightning, Kupo!
Lightning: Same old Mog too! Anyway, time to explore the one area of the Wild Lands I didn't explore...THE NORTH SIDE!
*in the North section, she comes across an Airship Wreck*
Hope: Lightning, there's apparently a crazy old man in there, be careful, I wonder who it could b-...
Lightning: It's going to be Sazh.
Hope: Wait, how do you know that?
Lightning: Face it, we've met everyone else thus far outside of him and Fang, and Fang isn't a man.
Hope: That's some flawed logic.
Lightning: Bet you 500 Gil I'm right.
Hope: You're on.
*Lightning walks in, Sazh is sitting there*
Hope: ...well, guess I'm down 500 Gil, hope God pays well.
Lightning: Hi Sazh.
Sazh: Go away, got nothing to say.
Lightning: Oh come on, can't I help?
Sazh: DAJH HAS BEEN ASLEEP FOR 500 YEARS! ONLY THIS BOX CAN SAVE HIM! LUMINA SAID SO!
Lightning: Uh, yeah, I think I can help more than she can, what's wrong with him?
Sazh: His soul is shattered across the world!
Hope: So...yeah, it's going to take a long time to fix this, Lightning.
Lightning: Look, I promise I'll get Dajh's Soul back, ok?
Sazh: I hope you can do it.
*6 Am occurs, Lightning goes back to the Ark, sees Serah*
Lightning: Serah, I'll save you, I promise!
Serah: I know you will, even though you don't show it; that's so like you to not show your emotions! You've been that way since we were kids.
Lightning: You know me too well!
*Totally NOT SACRED PHASE TIME! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HGJ4pIPiq8)*
Hope: It has been a long time, Lightning. Our current situation is as follows!
*Yggdrasil grows a leaf, +2 Days til end of the world*
Hope: Our Current situation is...Yggdrasil is routing the Chaos! If all goes well, we will be ready for God's awakening!
Hope: Would you like to learn the status of our previous characters?
*Lightning selects Mog*
Hope: Would you like to know his status?
*Lightning and Hope discuss Mog. Repeat this for Caius too*
Hope: Lightning, about your performance...IT IS MAGNIFICENT!
Hope: This is all the Eradia Points I can grant you at this time!
Hope: The Lord Bhunivelze is pleased, he begs me give you these artifacts!
*Lightning gets items*
Hope: Lightning, I have a request for you: Finish finding our friends so Yggdrasil can blume! May Fate Guide your hand!
NOTE: I've already done most of Sazh's quest in my playthrough, but holding off on that stuff til later in the Abridged series. This is going on too long.
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Ciato: Actually I'm not a fan of WAXF's PC cast, but whenever I brought it up before I seem to recall getting shouted down by Elf / Jo'ou / others. (the XF villain cast, sure, there's some quality there.) For Trails, I saw your earlier posts, we'll just have to agree to disagree.
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For what it's worth I (=the biggest XF fan here) wouldn't regard XF's PC cast as super-strong and a reason to play the game; they're okay certainly. Trails is a surprisingly good analog (female main character, her stoic blue-haired "brother", older woman who functions as a bit of a mentor, comic relief secondary male PC, obnoxious "tough guy", and a noble-hearted princess!), with XF pulling ahead a bit for me because Clarissa is notably better than Estelle as far as I'm concerned (the situation she's put in of having to play a fake princess act I find more intriguing than Estelle's struggle with living up to the name of her obnoxiously perfect father). Trails gets some points for Agate talking less than Ragnar, though!
[I'd actually be inclined to put SO3 above either because there is some really interesting stuff involving Fayt/Cliff/Nel but eh maybe not because (a) this dies off on disc 2 and (b) the rest of the cast tops out at "kinda decent". Then again I don't think either of the other casts are anything to write home about by the time we're talking about their #4 PCs either...]
FF5 Four Job Fiesta - I may have a problem. Doing a standard one this time, so far have WM/RM/Geomancer. The latter two are a first-time for me on fiesta so yay to that, hopefully I will get something besides Dragoon from the earth crystal! This playthrough I have decided to only fight randoms I think I can one-round. This means I ran a lot with four white mages (only fought undead) but red mage has since made things more reasonable. This makes me a bit underlevelled but not grotesquely which suits me fine. Levels so far were 3 Wingraptor/Karlabos, 5 Siren, 6 Magisa/Garula, 11 Liquid Flame, currently 13.
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I think Trails strength comes from it's characters and world taking into account things that normal JRPG convention just ignores. Like coming up with a plan that isn't brainless, or actually having objections to child soldiers. Characters actually talk to each other and don't go around hiding things for the sake of drama and the overall plot beats don't feel forced.
Tl;dr: Just a general lack of Idiot Ball makes the game better than 90% of the competition. And the quality is in the little details that make a lot of the "usual dumb cliches" into logical decisions.
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I'm almost kind of sad Meeple isn't abridging some of the NPC quests since I found some of them entertaining enough and Meeple would make them entertaining to read about (maybe just try to do a recap of getting each of Dajh's soul fragments at least?)~
About Yeul, yeah there was a lot of theory floating around back in the day about "Chaos/Black Haze Yeul" and whether or not Yeul would actually be evil or something, guess some people kind of called it, really she's just a selfish child, well at least half of the Yeuls.
Murdered Soul Soul Suspect- I already beat this and got the platinum for it. Story/characters/town and it's history were interesting enough. Gameplay could have maybe done without the demons. Cats were awesme though. Also totally cliche ending, was hoping they weren't going to go that route. Not sure it was worth the full retail price.
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DS: Fenrir, you're kind of an ass. You made me a little nervous about going in to face Gwyn thinking that my pyromancy would be worthless, and he died in 5 hits. :( Admittedly, killing all those NPCs (and sucking their humanity dry beforehand!) brought me up to 8 Soft Humanity and so my chaos stuff was still working great.
Oh yeah, took out the hellkite dragon, too. Since I'm at 30 DEX now my archery is actually p. good and it was easier than I thought. I don't know how you would do that fight melee but whatever. Went and upgraded my Uchigatana to Chaos 5 and it is an acceptable substitute for my Lightning Gargoyle Halberd. Probably better for PVP, but worse for PVE. Having a good bow will also help with some tricky situations for NG+ I think.
So Sassypants destroyed everybody then destroyed everything but there is a time loop or something blah blah blah I'm gonna go kill more bosses.
Thoughts on the first runthrough of the game:
Easiest Level: Undead Asylum lol. Really though, there aren't really any EASY levels in this game, but Painted World of Aramais comes really close. Nothing there was really ever a threat, even the dragon. Sure, I did it at the end of the game, but not *that* much changed between the time I could first access it and the time that I did, at least not in terms of damage I could deal. For non-optional levels, it's harder to say, but maybe the Duke's Archives. Once you know how to get to the end and open up the shortcut it is easier than just about any other level.
Hardest level: Catacombs, hands down. Being swarmed by enemies is by far the biggest threat in the game, to the point that even facing two enemies at a time instead of one can be the difference between life and death. The Catacombs is a level where enemies don't die unless you have a divine weapon or kill a room's necromancer, which is easier said than done.
Most fun level: Either Undead Burg or Anor Londo. Undead Burg is such a solid first level, that is really good at teaching you a lot of the skills you'll need for the rest of the game while not being a cakewalk either. It also had the most fun shortcuts, perhaps because they were the first I had access to. Anor Londo, on the other hand, despite not liking the platforming in this game AND THAT ONE FUCKING SECTION HOLY FUCK FUCK YOU, the rest of the level was really well designed and it was nice to look at. After actually entering the cathedral, you're presented with a labyrinthine mansion to explore and everything about it was a lot of fun.
Easiest Boss: Iron Giant. No boss was really hard after I got my Pyro fist to Ascended +5, but I faced the giant BEFORE I got overpowered and he still sucked. He didn't even hit me once.
Hardest boss: Capra demon. Dark Souls throws the hardest boss at you 3 hours in the game. This asshole caused me the most resets every single time I restarted. The boss isn't even very hard by himself, but you're in a closed space that you can't really dodge well in, you don't really have good armor yet, your endurance gauge isn't maxed out so you can't block indefinitely, AND you're swarmed by the dogs and the boss at the same time. It's actually a well designed encounter, but fucking hell it was so hard. Admittedly, it also comes before you can access your pyromancy merchant, so I have to wonder if he gives any other class as much trouble as Pyromancer. You can access sorceries immediately before the boss, and you've had access to miracles from the start. I can see Dex-heavy melee characters having fits, too, though.
Most fun boss: Knight Artorias. Dark Souls is at it's best when it gives you an enemy you will crumble before until you learn its moveset, and then you can perfect once you know what move is being telegraphed and how to deal with it. I wish more bosses followed this formula, but alas.
Most wasted potential: Bed of Chaos. Bed of Chaos was the most *interesting* fight, because it wasn't just "wittle down his HP before he wittles down yours", but it was greatly hindered by the size of the boss. There's just too much going on at once that you're expected to watch for but can't because the camera won't fuckin' zoom out enough. It doesn't help that BoC, like all Lord Soul bosses, is 5 minutes away from the nearest bonfire, so it's not like you can just jump back into the fray immediately like you could... well, basically every other boss EXCEPT the last 5. That was really the worst design choice DS made, and thankfully the DLC didn't have that problem (they were far away, sure, but you could easily get there in 1-2 minutes if you opened the shortcuts and knew what you were doing).
Anyway, NG+ and "Resist buying DS2 at full price" time.
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I'm almost kind of sad Meeple isn't abridging some of the NPC quests since I found some of them entertaining enough and Meeple would make them entertaining to read about (maybe just try to do a recap of getting each of Dajh's soul fragments at least?)~
About Yeul, yeah there was a lot of theory floating around back in the day about "Chaos/Black Haze Yeul" and whether or not Yeul would actually be evil or something, guess some people kind of called it, really she's just a selfish child, well at least half of the Yeuls.
I'll be doing the Dajh things, don't worry. I held off on doing them now because it was getting too long, considering I covered the entire Caius arc, beginning of Sazh stuff AND Mog. I covered the beginning of Sazh because the nature of the quest comes off as "do it concurrently with other quests" even though I've sort of gotten 4 of the 5 things just by casually running around areas <_<;
As far as the NPC things, there's too much to do, I had to trim fat. Maybe dedicate an episode to where I have her spend an entire day doing nothing but that because that's something that happens in this game.
In regards to Yeul, that's typical for fan theories. It was noted by TV Producers that they don't have an entire season or series planned from the beginning, so some fans will guess plot twists about characters way in advance, even before the developers came up with the idea. Like if two odd ball characters are going to hook up at the end of the season, that idea may have been thought of mid-season by the developers, but Fans would speculate it from episode 3. I feel the Yeul case is similar, as nothing in the Lightning Saga actually feels appropriately planned, just kind of winging it.
But glad at least one person is reading and enjoying these in any event :)
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No expression of mind-numbing terror for the Ariamis basement, Zenny? (I didn't die there either my first time through the game but ohmygodohmygodohmygod.)
Magic Shield is a godsend for Capra if you can use it. It's basically limitless stamina for blocking early on. (Dodging is still better.)
Most of NG+ should be a total breeze. Even with amped up boss HP, nothing in the first half of the game will be scaled for the kind of fire damage you can put out by now (except Quelaag* because lol fire immunity). Centipede Demon even more of a clusterfuck, though! I ultimately skipped him on pyro NG+, legit couldn't beat him with just my crappy lightning claw.
(*Might want to give Quelaag's Furysword a shot whenever you get back to Anor Londo. The rare elemental weapon that actually scales with DEX, counts as a chaos weapon so scales with soft humanity too, damage weighted much more towards fire than physical damage. Most boss weapons are frankly pretty useless, but this one's outstanding and thematically appropriate. It's also totally fucking metal you guys, best-looking weapon in the game.)
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Oh derp, thanks to Toriyama's Unfathomable obsession with Lightning, I forgot I am playing 2 other games!
Mega Man 5: 6 Stardroids down, 2 to go. I'll refrain from commenting until the game is finished, though don't have too much to say because...well...only so much you can say about Mega Man!
Kirby and the Amazing Mirror: 4 Shards down. Starting to get a hang of the map and what each thing means. Most notably, I've discovered that every area you enter, they do show you WHERE the map is, just a case of finding the path to it. Amusingly enough, in trying to get to the Map of Area 5, I stumbled upon the boss instead, so no complaints!
I also looked up the reward for 100%ing the game; just a Boss Rush mode and a "Hey, you 100%ed the game!" indicator at the end. Makes me feel better because 100%ing a game like this (eg Metroidvania) can be a real chore, more so than most because a lot of areas can only be accessed with certain powers, and this game runs off Kirby's Adventure "take one hit, lose power" rules, and it's hard to avoid damage, so it's nice they didn't hide the FRUE FINAL BOSS!!! behind a completionist wall some Kirby games do (mind you, some Kirby games like RtDL and K64 did it half decently, so not so bad there; this is more me raging at Dreamland 3 <_<)
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No expression of mind-numbing terror for the Ariamis basement, Zenny? (I didn't die there either my first time through the game but ohmygodohmygodohmygod.)
You mean the Phalanxes? Yeah I had a moment where I went "Goddamn that's a lot of enemies" and burned through my Chaos Fireball charges, but afterwards I realized that they were slow, and like everything else if you kept moving they wouldn't hit you, so you could just circle around and it was actually a pretty good farming spot.
Will checkout the Furysword. There's an achievement for getting all those weapons, and now that consuming souls no longer really gets me to where I wanna be for the next level up, meh to that, I want achievements. I don't care if nobody will see them because GFWL is shutting down next month.
Speaking of:
Going through NG+ in a really weird order. Quelaag, Puppypuppydoggie, Gargoyles, and Iron Giant. Quit for the night. Quelaag was the hardest of them for obvious reasons (This time around she completely negates fire instead of just resists it. Yaaaaaaay!). Going through in this order feels like I'm doing something really naughty even though it's probably what you're supposed to do on a replay, and that is cool. Gonna get the Lord Vessel before fighting the Four Kings... I need the warp points too much, and I was already in town.
Have been using the Gold Tracer, it's kind of nice. Overall my Lightning Gargoyle Halberd and Chaos Uchi are still flat out better (kinda goes without saying both are upgraded fully but the Tracer isn't, plus my DEX is only at 33 now), but it's a nice change of pace and it eats through enemy's guards quickly enough. Youtubed the alternate Syf intro. Good job on that for making me feel like more of a dick than when I was murdering every NPC.
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FTL: Beat the game both with Engi Cruiser B and Federation Whatever A. It was on easy though, but the perma-death makes me hesitate to play a harder difficulty.
The Engi ship relied on massive firepower to destroy the flagship. I had 13 potential hits I could unleash at once, two defense drones to stop the triple rocket launcher and mind control to defend myself during form 3. I had no effective defense against the power surges, but the flagship was destroyed before my ship was.
The Federation ship relied on hacking to disable enemy shield so I could gradually punch out the threats one after another. I had enough energy to power both fully upgraded engines and shields, so nothing besides the rockets did pose a credible threat. That is, unless the enemy mind controls the pilot or the engineer. It didn't happen too often though. The artillery was a cool idea, but in practice, it occupies a slot that I could have used for say mind control.
I now got the Zoltan ship and Zoltans are great since they allow you to have more power during the final battle. I may try normal difficulty now.
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Hey Fenrir: 2GUD4U
Now do a Broken Sword only SL1 NG+ game, the true Dark Souls starts there, you haven't REALLY played the REAL game before that
Anyway Cid was probably talking about the skeleton wheelies, you might have skipped them. Most dangerous place in the game for me for sure.
Cid: I prefer Great Club w/ Charcoal Resin
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Hey Fenrir: 2GUD4U
Now do a Broken Sword only SL1 NG+ game, the true Dark Souls starts there, you haven't REALLY played the REAL game before that
Anyway Cid was probably talking about the skeleton wheelies, you might have skipped them. Most dangerous place in the game for me for sure.
Cid: I prefer Great Club w/ Charcoal Resin
Oh, THAT PLACE. Fuck that place. I had FAQed by that point and was forewarned about them, but if I hadn't I probably would have taken a few deaths there. I don't think that takes away that I think the level is the easiest in the game, but it definitely bumps up the difficulty of the area.
Also lol u first.
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Painted World can be pretty tough when done right away! Poison zombies can overwhelm, crows can OHKO, skeleton wheelies are bastards.
Ash Lake, Undead Asylum, Undead Burg/ Parish, Depths, post patch Lost Izalith, Darkroot Garden, Duke's, Chasm of the Abyss are all way easier I'd say.
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Xenoblade Chronicles - Three party members! Cool, I guess. Shulk has made me smile a few times already.
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Yeah, Painted World is really rough early on, especially without magic. You have to worry about a ridiculous density of enemies that hit fairly hard, Toxic, Bone Wheels and those freaking crows. I generally skip the place entirely unless I want some item in there.
The easiest area for me (aside from ones without bosses) is New Londo Ruins. The ghosts don't hit too hard, Darkwraiths are jokes if you know how to backstab, and you can skip most of the area on the way to Four Kings.
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FF5: Doing the Fiesta challenge. Got a Knight/RM/Ninja/Dancer squad. In early world 2, trying to figure out/remember where to go. Decided to replay it for the hell of it and see if my opinion of the game has improved. Had several resets. Two in the library from ID, a couple from random bosses, and some from Titan/the bombs at the end of W1.
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Kirby and Amazing Mirror: Finished! Probably not going to go back and 100% it because, as I said before, Kirby's not as well suited for free roaming, ability specific puzzles as Metroid or Castlevania is due to how you can lose powers and such. At least you can still fight the actual final boss without that, who was kind of neat and the Master Sword ability was a neat ability.
Overall, game is decent, but probably still below KSS, KA and RtDL. Considerably better than the Dreamland Sequels or K64 though, as it has way more powers than those games, and the powers feel regularly more useful. Certainly better at being Great Cave Offensive than Great Cave Offensive is though!
Mega Man 5 Gameboy: Also completed. The final stage was amusing because it hurled so many bosses at you. A nice way to be a finale to the Gameboy series.
The game is similar to MM4 in that it has all the right elements to be a good Mega Man game but suffers from some technical aspects like lag. To be fair, game seems better designed around it. You don't run into as many enemies on screen as often, instead they opt to make mooks individually better, and less precision platforming when enemies are around, opting for more hazard based platforming so there's still danger, but no lag, so it ends up being considerably better.
I don't think it's one of the "Greats" as far as Mega Man games go, but it's certainly the only Gameboy one I would recommend getting. It's got an original set of enemies and stages, Mega Arm is an interesting take on the buster, etc. One thing that pisses me off is how I lost the S Tank against the Mercury Refight which is complete bullshit, meaning I was down 1 E-tank on the final boss; the game does hurl 2 E-tanks at you right before the final boss at least, but S Tank takes it's own separate slot.
Anyway, Mega Man XTREME!!!! 2 is next.
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Final Fantasy 5: Doing the FJF and I probably got the easiest loadout imaginable. Team is Blue Mage/Sorcerer/Beast Master/Samurai. So I've got all the tricks and bullshit that Blue Mage can do along with Sorcerer for ST damage and Samurai for cleaning out randoms with Zeninage. Beast Master is pretty handy too for one big shot of damage on bosses and helping the Blue Mage get spells and whips are a good weapon type. Just beat Atomos and I haven't really had too many problems. I've still had a few deaths though because FF5 is pretty good about catching you unprepared with stuff like Bio Knights 2HKOing the entire party with their counters and the like. The only real irritant is lack of revival which means I spend a whole lot on phoenix downs which are still kind of pricey for this point in the game.
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Mystic Knight/Sorcerer certainly isn't the strongest job you can get from the water crystal (that's probably Summoner, which e.g. overkills Bio Soldiers with MT damage) but it has its perks and that is still a pretty strong team.
My somewhat less strong team of WM/RM/Geomancer/Dancer has continued to trudge along. Shell lets me keep the levels low which is good because at some point in world 2 randoms got pretty painful. Gaia varies from useful to garbage and the class has nothing else. Dancer has also been very disappointing. Awful HP and can't get Lamia's Tiara until world 3 without a thief, so they aren't even the offensive cannon class I'm used to. When I did get that yeah Chicken Knife Dance is good damage, but now I've got Holy on everyone so I can do comparable average damage (more actually, unless I grind out more runs) from the back row. RM of course is a problematic class itself once -ara spells stop dominating, but hey at least it provides useful utility like Sleep, Protect, and Cura, and I'll shortly have Dualcast which obviously is great (especially with how low Holy's MP cost is). White Mage obviously carries the team and has kept my reset count down to just one against the Seal Guardians, but many midgame boss fights took forever (Seal Guardians the longest, but also Atomos and Exdeath).
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FTL: Had a few failure runs on normal with the Zoltan Cruiser. I'm going to switch back to easy and basically try to unlock all ships that seem interesting. Then I'll try the most powerful ones on normal.
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Just be a really awful plant boss to get some dragon grass in FF5. I'll second Elfboy. Dancer's been really underwhelming so far. The Ribbon's nice and the payoff with Sword Dance will be great, but come on. *shakes fist* Throw has been awesome and I'm still using Red for healing and revival (Fucking el are PDs expensive even now).
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Dark Souls: Smaugh + Orstein down. Quelaag's Furyblade get. It sucks even at 10 Humanity and 40 DEX. I think I well prefer stronger, slower weapons in this game than faster, weaker ones... which is totally not my style in most other games, but there we go.
I don't see how New Londo is easy. Fuck those ghost ambushes I swear to god. Still slogging through to take out the 4 Kings but goddamn.
Thinking about starting a new save, as Pyro is getting boring. Welcome to the CLUB, maybe? Welcome to the CLUB. I could also see how well Dex weapons play out when they're your main form of attack. Perhaps I just need to learn the playstyle. Also interested in seeing how Faith/INT builds look... Hmmmm.
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Xenoblade - Giant man-eating robots, shirtless hotties, and lasers? Sounds like my kind of game~
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FF5- Galuf dead. Crystal bosses before he died beat me like a throwrug till I figured out the gimmick (Blitz em at low HP, one at a time). Throw helped tons there. Dancer still trash, Throw rules and my Knight's as solid as ever.
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WM/RM/Geomancer/Dancer beaten at Level 30. Once I got Holy everything changed, it was wonderful. Dualcast made it even better. The entire team had Level 6 White Magic so yeah, after having no offence the rest of the playthrough I killed Twintania before it could change forms (despite triggering Megaflare counters which 2HKOed my underlevelled people through Shell), killed Necrophobe before its first non-invincible round once the barriers were down, almost one-rounded tree Exdeath (Man-Eater doing 9k with Sword Dance) after finishing the buff parade (sadly fell one Holy away) and killed the Grand Cross part of Neo Exdeath before it could act. Kinda cathartic. Necrophobe was even a chance for Dance to shine a bit, as I used two to cut through the barriers, for all that it was still the hardest W3 fight probably? Seal Guardians obviously the hardest overall.
Anyway Geomancer and Dancer have their moments but aren't very good overall. Dancer's actually uniquely unsuited to fiesta, I think: it's going to underwhelm Super more than me because there's no way to put boosted Dance on a fighter job in the format, ugh. Red Mage is obviously better than either though still a rough draw for the water crystal; great in W1 then pretty mediocre thereafter though don't underestimate what Protect/Raise/Cura/Sleep/Confuse bring as utility. (And hey I was all ready to Toad Twintania if it had changed forms!) White Mage is obviously good and let me get away with running a lot with the usual wrecking Shell/Blink/Curaga applies to bosses.
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Rough draw for the water crystal is Berserker. I've gotten a lot of use out of Red (Works very well on a Ninja!) but yeah, it's riding entirely on throw after world 1. Also Gilgamesh's last form is optional?
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Oh yes, Red Mage is much better than Berserker. People just give it a lot of shit because the other three options are significantly better still.
Yeah. In a big open room on floor 11 of Castle Exdeath (you can't miss it) there's a treasure chest. If you open it you will end up fighting Gilgamesh, but if you don't you can skip him. I recommend fighting him because if you do he'll show up again in world 3 in a couple plot fights and you can steal Genji equips from him with the thief knife, which are the best heavy armour options in the game for what that's worth.
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Lightning Returns Abridged:
Captain Cryptic: Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13-2: The Story so far! LIGHTNING QUIZ TIM-...
Lightning: *pulls plug* No, we are not doing that!
Hope: Don't we still need to sum up what happened?
Caius: As if what we say here is going to have any significance to events that happened...
Noel: YEUL!!!!!!!
Snow: SERAH!!!!
Vanille: FANG!!!!
Sazh: DAJH!!!!
Lumina: ^_^!!!!
Yeul: ...am I right in saying you don't need to be a Seeress to have seen that coming?
Lightning: Yes, yes you are.
Hope: Ok, Lightning, you're going to the desert next.
Lightning: This is just an excuse to see me dress in far less clothing than I usually wear because of the heat, isn't it?
Hope: ...not answering that...
*at the Dead Dunes*
Lightning Monologue: This place is a desert, everything is dead...except for things that aren't dead...there are bandits here too, and they look for an object called the HOLY CLAVIS!!! I can already tell this is going to be annoying.
Hope: So...Lightning...go to the Bandit Camp even though that's probably a bad idea.
Lightning: Why are you suggesting it to me?
Hope: Because really, what else is there to do in this area?
Lightning: Point taken.
*Bandit Camp*
Lightning: So...yeah, can you guys here help me find the Holy Clavis?
Bandits: AHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH *deep breath* AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAH!
Lightning: What's so funny?
Bandit #1: We've been searching for that for 500 years, and still haven't found it, you seriously think we know where it is?
Bandit #2: You're not even a member of our band! HOW DO WE KNOW YOU'RE NOT A SECUTOR!?
Lightning: So...how could I join this group?
Bandit #3: NO ONE TELL HER HOW!
Bandit #4: YEAH SHE CAN'T KNOW SHE'S SUPPOSE TO SPEAK TO ADONIS TO GET A TASK!
Bandit #1: AHAHAH! YES! WE"LL KEEP THAT A SECRET FROM HER!
Lightning: ...ok, so I definitely will NOT talk to Adonis and thus NOT ask him to make me join.
Bandit #2: Good! WE ARE AWESOME!
Hope: ...so you're going to join the Bandits now, aren't you?
Lightning: Duh.
*at Adonis*
Lightning: So, can I join the bandits?
Adonis: Only if you answer me these questions 3!
Lightning: ...you're not seriously going to do that joke, are you?
Adonis: Hell no, I'm actually going to ask you to stop an inconvenient sandstorm. By doing this Stone thing. Do that and i'll let you in!
Lightning: *sigh* Guess I have no choice*
*one silly quest later*
Lightning: There, Sandstorm done!
Adonis: Wow, you actually did it!
Lightning: ...how'd you get here so fast?
Adonis: I didn't, I just followed you the entire way; being a bandit gives me +5 to Stealth!
Lightning: So...why did you make me do this if you knew how to stop the Sandstorm?
Adonis: Because our chief assumed it'd only work for the savior and you're the first person it worked for! Congrats, you're in, Savior! NOW GO TALK TO THE CHIEF USING THIS SHORTCUT!
Hope: The Chief is probably Fang, just saying.
Lightning: How do you come up with that idea? Fang would never become a bandit! These people are anti-Order, and Vanille's a priestess in the order, and Fang is closer to Vanille than a sister is! They're bonded by something stronger than family! There's no way Fang would be the bandit leader. 0% Chance!
*at the chief*
Fang: Hey Lightning, long time no see, I'm the chief of the bandits.
Hope: Well?
Lightning: *Grumbles angrily*
Fang: What, is that how you say hello to an old friend? I mean, I've been asleep in a Crystal for over 1000 years, that's twice as long as people were alive! Ok, I've been awake for 13 years, but whose counting?
Lightning: You apparently...
Fang: Enough talk, down to business! So you're looking for the Holy Clavis? You're not with the order, are you?
Lightning: Of course not, I'm the Savior just doing God's Work!
Fang: Good enough for me! Let's go find the Holy Clavis, it's in the Ruins! I'll even tag along and help you!
*You gained an actual ally!*
Lightning: Wait, I thought this was a solo RPG?
Fang: Look, I'm the only character in this whole game whose actually acting in-character and accurate to themselves from the previous games, therefor, I still retain PC status to some degree while all the other characters just twiddle their thumbs.
Lightning: Fair Enough!
Hope: You know Lightning, she left Vanille, what makes you think she won't backstab you?
Lightning: BECAUSE I TRUST FANG OK!? YOU FOUGHT ALONGSIDE HER TOO!
Hope: ...sheesh, for someone with no emotions, you sure have a temper.
*Ruins*
Lightning: So where is the Holy Clavis?
Fang: We have an idea but can't access it. For the record, I'm making sure you didn't go in alone because you could open the doors for those damned Secutors and let them walk right through the front door, I have to make sure I get it!
Hope: The Holy Clavis is probably behind that big unopenable door right there.
Lightning: How do we open it?
Hope: Find 3 Murals, it seems and learn what they say, and you'll get an object to do so.
Lightning: Ok, onto the Murals!
*Mural #1*
Lightning: It's not working...
Hope: You need a Tablet...
Fang: Oh, I know where those tablets are! They're in 3 shrines on OPPOSITE SIDES OF THE DESERT!
Lightning: You're joking aren't yo-...wait, how did you know we needed tablets? Hope only speaks directly to me!
Fang: You have the volume on that thing turned up so high, how can I NOT hear every word he says? Also, Hope, if you're listening, you don't have to repeat EVERYTHING WE DO RIGHT AFTER WE DO IT IN GREAT DETAIL! We're sort of dealing with Skeletons, Schrodenger Cats, Earth Eaters, and god knows what else down here.
Hope: ...that hurt...
*one really dumb fetch quest later, and 3 mural readings*
Lightning: Ok, so let me get this straight...the God Lindzei decided to cut Etro, the Goddess which made her bleed and this created humans because...umm...wait, this never told us why.
Fang: Yes, and after that, Chaos was used to fill the bodies that created Etro, those bodies meant to be temporary, but then Chaos was unleashed and broke the rules!
Lightning: And Bhunivelze is going to PURIFY ALL THOSE LOST SOULS using the Holy Clavis, right?
Fang: Pretty much...personally, I don't know why you're doing his work; the Gods just use us to do their bidding, we're so much better at fighting against Fate than actually following it...in fact, didn't we have an ENTIRE GAME about fighting fate? Seriously woman, what happened to you?
Lightning: Umm...er...well....
Fang: In any event, I won't let the damn Order use the Holy Clavis to SAVE ALL THOSE SOULS! Those bastards will kill Vanille if they do that!
Lightning: ...and now finally we get an answer to all this! That's why you left the Order even though Vanille was there?
Fang: Yeah, I was trying to make sure the Order didn't get their rotten hands on it! You come along and are able to open things, so now I can get the Holy Clavis finally!
Lightning: ...ok, Fang, I understand all that, but you do realize a major flaw in your strategy, right?
Fang: What's that?
Lightning: If you had only told me all this from the get go, I wouldn't have come in here and we wouldn't have unleashed the Holy Clavis which is sitting RIGHT THERE by the way, and it would have remained sealed until the end of the world since I'm literally the only person capable of opening the doors. We didn't have to go through all this stupid nonsense to open doors and could have left it here and the Order would have been Shit Out of Luck. By being secretive, you kind of made the whole situation worse.
Fang: Yeah, well, we got to it first, what could possibly go wrong?
*Bunch of secutors pop up*
Secutors: AHA! THE HOLY CLAVIS IS THERE! GET IT MEN!
Fang: ...ok, you win this round Lightning, but we should be able to take care of a bunch of powerless goons, right?
*Secutor summons a huge fuck off monster*
Fang: ...ok, that might pose a bit of a threat...
*big boss fight later*
Lightning: Well, it looks like they got the Holy Clavis.
Fang: DAMN IT! All this time and I failed!
Lightning: when do they plan on using it?
Fang: Last day before the end of the world.
Lighting: So we still have time to stop them.
Lumina: Awww, I can't let you do that, not after all the time I spent baiting you guys out to get the thing ^_^
Lightning: ...dear God, why do you mock me?
Hope: Do you mean that literally?
Lightning: I honestly don't know anymore...
Lumina: Don't you see? Vanille is going to save all those souls! It's so great, isn't it ^_^
Fang: Like hell it is! YOU JUST WANT TO USE HER!
Lumina: Of course I do, but it's such a good thing too ^_^
Lightning: I hate you...
Lumina: Awww, what have I ever done to make you do that ;_; ^_^
Lightning: where do I begin?
Lumina: But we don't have time for that, so good bye savior ^_^
*she leaves*
Fang: Yeah, Lightning, this is where we part ways. I'm going to save Vanille even if it kills me.
Lightning: So...you're going to do what you've always been doing when not sleeping in a crystal?
Fang: Pretty much.
Lightning: Right, but Fang, just so you know, I can't save Vanille if she doesn't want to be saved. By which I mean I can only take her soul by fulfilling her utmost desire; if she truly wants to die, I am unfortunately forced to oblige.
Fang: ...I miss the old Lightning, you know, the one who was all giving Gods, Fate, etc. the middle finger and decided to kick ass? I guess there really is no point staying with you, good bye!
Captain Cryptic: Will Lightning save Fang and Vanille? Will Fang stop the Order from killing Vanille? Will Lumina ever decide to start making sense? And will Fang ever come to grips with the fact that she's the only character in the entire game who manages to be consistent with her previous self? TUNE IN NEXT TIME ON SAME TORIYAMA TIME, SAME TORIYAMA CHANNEL!
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FF5- Galuf dead.
wtf dude spoiler tags
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Now Meeple gets to spend excess days doing nothing but side quests, and canvas requests, and exterminating monsters, and opening the highways, and farming abilities, and growing greens for monies, and buying all the upgraded garbs from the shop (monsters get stronger, drop better stuff, and shops get upgraded on specific Days) , finding the secret merchant, getting all the treasure orbs, etc! (or you know he could sleep till the end but then he wouldn't get the surprise at the end from doing enough sidequests!) ~
About the Dead Dunes originally it was going to be possible to save Bhakti, but it was cut because of time restraints, which explains why their are excess battery packs lying around, more than needed to complete the quest The Dead Dunes in general seems lacking compared to the other continents. Shame too because Fang. Would have been fun to do more stuff with her.
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Dark Souls: Smaugh + Orstein down. Quelaag's Furyblade get. It sucks even at 10 Humanity and 40 DEX. I think I well prefer stronger, slower weapons in this game than faster, weaker ones... which is totally not my style in most other games, but there we go.
I don't see how New Londo is easy. Fuck those ghost ambushes I swear to god. Still slogging through to take out the 4 Kings but goddamn.
Thinking about starting a new save, as Pyro is getting boring. Welcome to the CLUB, maybe? Welcome to the CLUB. I could also see how well Dex weapons play out when they're your main form of attack. Perhaps I just need to learn the playstyle. Also interested in seeing how Faith/INT builds look... Hmmmm.
GHOST HOUSES suck but if you're careful a lot of the inhabitants can be drawn out one at a time to make the actual ambushes less of a problem. The church in particular? Run down the stairs leading to it, run back up-> shoot the ghosts that follow you; snipe the one on the roof before even approaching; wait at the bottom of the stairs overlooking the boss room and shoot one-by-one the ghosts hanging out below as they rise. Should only be like one left in the first room to shank you after all that.
INT/Faith is really difficult to get away with in DS1 (less so in DS2 because there's a class of magic specifically built for it). If you just want to use utility spells then you can have both stats sit in the teens somewhere and get most of the fun ones, but you're not going to get any kind of respectable endgame damage out of offensive spells unless you pump one stat or the other well beyond that. If you want both at pro-caster levels (40 for optimal damage, possibly 45-50 if you want access to all spells, and Crystal Soul Spear/Sunlight Spear are both totally worth it) on the same character, you're looking at well beyond normal endgame levels before that becomes possible, and you're probably gimping yourself on all your physical stats to make that happen.
Might be more manageable to main one and make a sideline in the other if you really want to mix and match both at the same time. There are catalysts/talismans that let you use INT for miracle calculation/Faith for sorcery calculation (still need the base requirement to cast the spell though), so theoretically you could stop at 20 Faith for Lightning Spear or something and then dump the rest of your levels into INT to boost both that and your sorceries. I dunno, I always find specialization the most effective approach in these games.
Ideal Faith starter is Master Key -> go die retrieving the Astora Straight Sword. Undead Parish does not count on you having that.
Pure melee is sooo much a different (and more difficult) experience than offensive caster with melee for backup, definitely worth trying if you like the game enough to replay it. Clubs are great. LARGE CLUB acceptable substitute for Great Club if you're lucky enough to get one or don't mind farming fatties (slightly weaker but faster than Great Club, better moveset, POIZN but that doesn't matter because everything will die before the status lands). The black knight weapons are also all outstanding but hahaha those drop rates. Heavy weapons not outstanding for PVP in my experience though, people tend to see your swings coming much like they do with spells. R1 katana spam godlike for PVP right you guys
DEX weapons you can't rely on knocking down/stunlocking everything to death like you can with clubs, but at least you also don't leave yourself wide open with one whiffed attack (I have died so many fucking times due to accidentally using a club's regular R2 when I meant to do a jumping attack). DEX weapons also benefit greatly from buffs/enchants. You can get like 200-300 extra attack power out of Crystal Magic Weapon/Darkmoon Blade just at minimum casting requirements (weapon enchant bonuses actually do scale with casting stats; they do not in DS2, which makes them much less worth using there). This can seriously add up with a fast weapon (what up Four Kings dying so fast there are only three of them).
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Glad you are one of us.
You're so lucky you have Dark Souls 2 left.
Anyway you can get the great club like 5 minutes into the game if you're PR0. Accept no "kinda large but not that great" substitues.
Watch how Bell Gargoyles react to a Great Club +5 w/ Gold Pine Resin applied.
Black Knight Greataxe is the best weapon if you want to AXE the enemies a few questions but it's more of a NG+ thing.
I agree that Int/Faith sucks big time. I should add that, in Dark Souls 2, endgame levels are way higher, so you can have both high Int/Faith AND high other stats too, when it's not really an option in Dark Souls 1.
Miracles in Dark Souls 1 are more of a complement to regular weapons, and I guarantee you'd get nothing out of them in an Int/Faith playthrough and you'd just spam sorceries basically all the time, save for the occasional Wrath Of Gods. (Gotten very late)
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Off to work, but to clarify: I meant specifically looking at an INT build or specifically looking at a Faith build. My first runthroughs taught me quite well the importance of specialization. That said if both suck fuck it I will just go melee. Club time baby.
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Monster Rancher 2
Been playing this. Quite a few monsters.
CT (Skipper - Hopper/Tiger) - Stalled out in B-Rank. Still, kept her around to dig me a hot spring. Good monster, but her lack of damage was incredibly frustrating.
Ko (Silhouette - Pixie/Monol) - Uh... yeah. Was trying to use her while broke. Errantry refused to on discount, meaning I was stuck without Int-based attacks. Retired without ever having a battle.
Magic (Gaia - Hengar/Golem) - Another rough follow-up, mainly because Ko bankrupted me. Lifespan got crippled due to repeat and endless stress, but didn't do too badly. Made it to C-Rank, I believe. Retired.
Super (Pink Kato - Kato/Mochi) - Uhhhh... yeah. No idea what to say here. Super literally beasted all over. Made it to S-Rank without a single loss, OHKO most of his opposition, reached 999 Int, and all that. Twister Claw is stupidly overpowered. Unfortunately, beating S-Rank is probably too much for him to do without dying (he's as durable as wet tissue paper). Still, by far my most successful monster.
I'm probably gonna train him up a bit more before retiring him. Still, if folks want to contribute to my next monster, go ahead and suggest some PS-era games for me to use as the discs. Literally any PS games are okay since I'm emulating. Suggest a disc with a monster I like and I'll name it after you!
Dark Souls 2
I should beat this. I'm literally on the last boss.
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Zenny: high-end spells for either sorcery or miracle school should outdamage pyro and usually give you more spell charges, soooo...
I agree that Int/Faith sucks big time. I should add that, in Dark Souls 2, endgame levels are way higher, so you can have both high Int/Faith AND high other stats too, when it's not really an option in Dark Souls 1.
Miracles in Dark Souls 1 are more of a complement to regular weapons, and I guarantee you'd get nothing out of them in an Int/Faith playthrough and you'd just spam sorceries basically all the time, save for the occasional Wrath Of Gods. (Gotten very late)
Fenrir don't tell me you've never immediately run straight down to Tomb of the Giants just so you could revenge nuke Capra's dogs with Wrath of the Gods. (Why did I ever do this.) Miracles are actually great for offense per-hit, it just takes a while for you to get more than one or two actual scrolls. Like, Lightning Spear wrecks everything from the moment you have it, it's just that there's only ten shots and you can never get a second scroll so it kinda has to be saved for bosses.
I once had an Undead Parish invader drop the entire black knight set for me.
I already had the only one of them I even wanted to use for that character.
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Now Meeple gets to spend excess days doing nothing but side quests, and canvas requests, and exterminating monsters, and opening the highways, and farming abilities, and growing greens for monies, and buying all the upgraded garbs from the shop (monsters get stronger, drop better stuff, and shops get upgraded on specific Days) , finding the secret merchant, getting all the treasure orbs, etc! (or you know he could sleep till the end but then he wouldn't get the surprise at the end from doing enough sidequests!) ~
About the Dead Dunes originally it was going to be possible to save Bhakti, but it was cut because of time restraints, which explains why their are excess battery packs lying around, more than needed to complete the quest The Dead Dunes in general seems lacking compared to the other continents. Shame too because Fang. Would have been fun to do more stuff with her.
Yeah, just did my latest "Kill time doing random things" quest. Worst part is, most of the quests I've already finished near as I can tell; I assume more open up in the Canvas of course, but really, this is entirely "kill time harvesting stuff." I don't think I've seen a single time based game (Majora's Mask, Dead Rising, etc.) force so much downtime on you. It's both a good and a bad thing. On one hand, you aren't pressured by the clock as much...on the other hand, plot stuff existed to help you give legitimate things to do in the game.
I guess if I really get bored I can abuse inns, but meh.
And yeah, next few segments will probably involve Side Quests. The side quests I parody will be completely random and based off memory and not indicative of when I actually finished them, just there to fill up episodes because god forbid I actually do a normal gameplay update!
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So specifically you guys are saying that going for both INT and Faith at the same time is a shitty option (but viable in 2), but going one or the other is viable? Got it.
Still gonna club some bitches with my beefstick next character, though. I think I'll wrap up NG+ first, one so I'm not playing as obsessively as possible while I should be packing up to move, but two because meeeeh learning new fighting styles I just wanna light bitches on fire. I think my main problem is that I see my fire quickly starting to not OHKO things and there's nothing I can do to make it better. Like I will actually have to fight things like some fucking plebian.
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I can't lie. I have been planning a build in my head that is a lot like this one. Have been debating going deep Str and picking up Pyro stuff (attunement as tertiary stat?) or going for Enchanted Large/Great Club build and being Sorcerer if I don't mind the grind to buy all the spells and shit.
I also note that this is a testament to what this game does to people. There is a POIZN Club and Fenrir denies it in favour of more applications of Tree.
Edit - All this while considering running 3 different versions of whatever club I am interested in, so either run a Standard/Enchanted, Fire and Divine/Lightning one or some combination of said weapons that seems optimal (need to dissect Titanite chunk accrual more closely to determine efficient breakdown of components).
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Grefter has yet to die in the Dark Souls game that exists in his mind. He's just that good.
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You wish you never played Dark Souls so you could be as good as I am at it.
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Large clubs only do poison status for lore reasons!
Poison on a freaking massive piece of wood instead of, say, A DAGGER or AN ARROW is really never going to kick off in game until you're in NG+++ or something and then hurray for 3 damage every minute.
Large club and great club are pretty similar otherwise, but the large club is an enemy drop (and you shouldn't farm for anything (except the Channeler's Trident (for the Dance))) while the Great Club is lying around waiting for you. Aso I think the great club is slightly bigger?
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Grefter I should have been the one to fill your Dark Souls with liiighttttttttt
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Legasista: N1 dungeon crawler. Better than Guided Fate Paradox, which costs three times as much, amusingly. (Paradoxically? </pun>)
It has a neat graphic style with the heavy use of black instead of more standard anime shading. The actual sprites are Rayman style armless legless abominations but the actual gameplay is a more numbers oriented LoZ with multiple PCs (so... Ys Seven) with an interesting Equipment-as-health mechanic and a Job system.
I'm pretty impressed w it and it gets hard as shit later on (like dungeon 4?). I'm only on dungeon 4. :(
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Suikoden Tactics - Beat this. Around 21 hours, levels around 35 or so.
Pretty fun game but not amazing or anything. I liked the elemental panel system and beyond that it's an enjoyable enough SRPG with damage projections and CTB and charging and all that good stuff. Downsides are that it's not a very deep system (worked well for a 20ish hour game, would have been tedious at 50), it's a bit slow sometimes, and the character balance... some characters permanently die like Fire Emblem, so there's really no reason to not use as many of the "immortals" as possible. Helps that this includes the three OP archers.
The game's writing is kinda middling: it has some moments, like Iskas' charisma, and I appreciate its efforts to patch up all the holes in S4's story by explaining rune cannon, that tree, Graham Cray, the Kooluk setting you somehow never visit in S4, etc. But as a standalone game it's... not bad, but kind of awkwardly written (some scenes feel missing or incomplete). The voice acting, outside of Seneca and Iskas, is also pretty hilariously bad which hurts a lot of cutscenes to boot.
6/10 maybe? 5 if I'm feeling less generous in a few days. Enjoyed it but not high on the replay list, the usual.
EDIT: Also posting my thoughts on my fiesta classes here since they'll purge from GameFAQs.
Thoughts on the classes:
White Mage: I think everyone knows this is great.
Red Mage: Great in world 1, mediocre thereafter. Obviously Dualcast is a nice bonus if you can use it, but even if you can't it's not useless later; I like the utility its skillset provides, and it has a great variety of equipment options for carrying other skillsets. Too bad about the HP.
Geomancer: Let's go over what I like about Gaia:
-Can kill Skull Eaters.
-Destroys the Ronka Ruins with Wind Slash. Makes the dungeon a joke until the last stage of the boss.
-Swampy areas of World 2 overworld have a decent chance of Bottomless Bog, which is multitarget instant death.
-Chance of Earthquake is enough to destroy the Dragon Pod if several people have it.
-High chance of Wind Slash inside Barrier Tower allows randoms to be crushed there.
-Chance (not high) of Wind Slash in Castle Exdeath. Since you have Air Knives now and Magic Dragons are additionally weak to wind this really helps with blitzing the earlier floors, though isn't reliable enough for later ones. SADLY was one of my better sources of offence against the boss too.
-If you want to fight Bahamut, Cave-In (Meteor variant) is great against him, and this is pretty much the only useful place you can ever use it. (I didn't.)
Everywhere else, though, the skillset is pretty bad (and absolutely wretched in forests). The class has very little else: Rune Chime is a nice weapon (though a rare drop, and requires other elemental skillsets to shine), and ignoring terrain damage is handy in a couple places.
Dancer: Sigh. Dancer seems on the point of being good but isn't, really. The dance-boosting equipment comes too late unless you get a thief (tip: if you have a thief, steal a Lamia's Tiara in Ronka unless you know you aren't getting Dancer!). The HP really hurts on a class that wants to be in the front row. It's difficult to port Dance to other classes since most good physical classes can't use any dance-boosting equipment (Red Mage is actually the best that can besides Dancer). It's more interesting than Dragoon was, certainly, and it had a chance to shine against Necrophobe's barriers thanks to ignoring reflect and being targettable, and hey MP regeneration is cool I suppose... but it isn't very good either.
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Xenoblade Chronicles - Just beat down a tentacle robot and lost a plot fight to a face-having robot. I am unsure if the giant man-eating robots are supposed to be campy or not...
I am currently controlling the gunner lady.
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FF5- Beat. http://imgur.com/3MoQLKr SFT was the hardest fight in the game (I had to change gears from offensive to defensive.) I ended up leaving the void and walking all the way out to get more Fumas. The second to last boss was brutally hard but I got lucky and beat him pretty quickly due to sworddance proccing a bunch. The two yellow dragons in the barrier tower were also nasty. Everything else wasn't too terrible.
Opinion of the game's up a little, but I still have a bunch of issues with it. Dungeon design is awful, FF5 plot is FF5 plot and the job system doesn't feel flexible enough for me till the very end.
Knight>Ninja>RM>Dancer for use offhand. Knight was constantly good on offense and could take a hit. Ninja had absolutely fantastic randomsweeping and Fumas were great. Two swords kind of blows RM paid off early and late, but lagged very badly midgame. Throw had great synergy with the class. Dancer was just embarrassingly bad till world 3. Sword Dance was great after that, but the class can never take a hit and has to be in the front row for sword dance.
Edit: I want to expand on dungeon design. FF5 has more than one dungeon where MT ID is a risk. Other games in the series have L5 Death, but every single other FF game after 3 tends to give you characters with naturally different levels. The forest of moore and the pyramid are both in the running for worst FF dungeon due to unspeakably obnoxious gimmicks (And that's impressive in a series with Academia 400 and ice cave bullshit). Just generally found a lot of this playthrough frustrating, because the same design choices I didn't like when I played the game a decade ago where still there.
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Lightning Returns Abridged:
Jihl: Lightning Returns, the story so far...isn't that right my legion of fanboys?
Fanboys: ALL GLORY TO THE GODDESS JIHL!
Lightning: ...
Hope: ...
Caius: ...
Lumina: ... ^_^
Lightning: So...about that recap...
Hope: Right, starting now!
Noel: YEUL!!!!!!
Yeul: CAIUS!!!!!
Snow: SERAH!!!!!
Sazh: DAJH!!!!
Vanille: FANG!!!!!
Fang: VANILLE!!!!! ...stop being so manipulatable...
Lumina: Awww, you're no fun! That ruins the entire scheme ^_^
Fang: Yeah, well, deal with it!
]
*After your token Sacred Phase*
Lightning: So...Hope...about helping Sazh...I think we should do that now.
Hope: Uh, yeah, got any leads.
Lightning: Yes, actually, the Chocobo I got the first fragment from actually gave me a list telling me where all of them are! First stop, CHOCOLINA!
Hope: Why her?
Lightning: Because the list says so!
*At Chocolina*
Chocolina: Hello Miss Mighty Savior!
Lightning: So...Sazh...think you can help?
Chocolina: Yes! Here's Dajh's soul Fragment I have!
Lightning: ...wait, why do you have Dajh's Soul Fragment?
Chocolina: Because I really want to help Sazh out!
Lightning: So why didn't you give it to him directly?
Chocolina: BECAUSE I CAN'T OK!?
Lightning: ...he's close to you, isn't he?
Chocolina: SHHH!
Lightning: I think it's time you go see him.
Chocolina: Only when Dajh wakes up OK!?
Lightning: Uh, ok, sure...
Hope: You do realize Chocolina is the name of Sazh's Frocobo, right?
Lightning: What'd you say?
Hope: Nothing!
Lightning: Next up, ONE OF THE SEED HUNTERS!
*Random Seed Hunter in Yusnaan because shut up*
Lightning: So I hear you have this Soul Fragment...
Seed Hunter: Yes, and it's yours if you find ALL THE SOUL SEEDS!
Lightning: ...aren't there like a lot of those and only appear in Chaos Fields with large enemies? You're seriously asking me to GET ALL OF THEM when they randomly spawn?
Seed Hunter: Well, you could also find this random Moogle Object and give me that, and I'll give you Soul Fragment for that.
Lightning: ...yeah, I'll do the Moogle Item thing, because I happen to have it thank you very much...by the way, why do you have the Soul Fragment of a little kid?
Seed Hunter: BECAUSE SOULS!!!!
Lightning: uh-huh...yeah, I'm just going to move onto the next one...
*At the Champion's Square of Yusnaan*
Scientist Guy: HEY LADY! WANNA HELP ME WITH A PROBLEM?
Lightning: Um, what is this problem?
Scientist: I made a Robot too strong in the Colosseum, but you look capable, CAN YOU DESTROY IT FOR ME PLEASE THANKS!
Lightning: but I didn't...
Hope: Oh just do it; you gotta save his soul anyway, this will get that out of the way.
Lightning: *Sigh* Fine.
*beats up a generic Robot she's destroyed many of in the colosseum, FF Victory Fanfare is sung by the crowd*
Lightning: Ok, so why did that Robot feel slightly alive?
Scientist: Because I shoved my brother's soul into it for SCIENCE!!!
Lightning: ...that is the dumbest thing I've ever heard...well, no, but it's up there.
Scientist: Here, take this Soul Fragment I found! I've no use for it!
Lightning: ...though hey, how convenient...don't tell me you were going to use this for...
Scientist: SCIENCE!!!!!!!!
Lightning: ...so...yeah...time to get the last one in the Dead Dunes...
Hope: Do you know where it is?
Lightning: Yes, yes I do.
*Dead Dunes*
Lightning: Hey, Fang, thanks for helping me do this.
Fang: Well you are helping Sazh and he's a friend of mine, so let's do this...what are we looking for?
Lightning: A special kind of Cactuar, apparently, know of it?
Fang: we could just comb the desert randomly...DO NOT TAKE THIS STATEMENT LITERALLY!
Lightning: Ok.
*They searchn for it until find...well...this (http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140219183323/finalfantasy/images/7/79/LRFFXIII_Cactair.png)*
Lightning: Fang...
Fang: Yeah?
Lightning: Do you think that's the Cactuar we're looking for?
Fang: If that's not it, I quit at life, and coming from me, that's saynig a lot!
*One "Cactuar" fight later*
Fang: Is this what you're looking for?
Lightning: Yes, yes it is! Thank you!
Lumina: Awwww, you got another part of Dajh's Soul ^_^
Lightning: ...what do you want?
Lumina: Well, seeing as I gave Sazh the Coffer, I figured I should see how you're doing ^_^
Lightning: Why are you doing this?
Lumina: I just want to help ^_^
Lightning: ...I find that hard to believe...
Lumina: Isn't it sad? He does anything for his son, ANYTHING! You should be able to relate to that with someone you love ^_^
Lightning: ...
Lumina: I just want to see them reunited ^_^
Fang: So...parting ways again?
Lightning: Yeah, thanks!
Hope: Good, let's go see Sazh!
*Sazh's house*
Lightning: Sazh, I got all of Dajh's Soul Fragments...though thinking on it, not sure how that physically works. Seriously, how do you carry a soul fragment? Why am I thinking about this NOW!? And why do they look like maps?
Sazh: What!? THANK YOU LIGHTNING! COME ON DAJH! WAKE UP! WAKE UP DAMN IT! STOP SLEEPING!
Lightning: Umm...Sazh...
Sazh: WHY ISN'T IT WORKING!?
Lumina: It won't work because of your scary face ^_^ *actual line of dialog*
Sazh: My face!? What am I suppose to do about that? I can't change it! *also actual rough line of dialog*
Lightning: ...she means you're getting too angry, Sazh, and Dajh is scared of you as a result. God I can't believe I'm agreeing with Lumina, I think I need to sit down.
Sazh: Huh? That...I...guess you're right. *grabs toy airplaine* Ok, time to change that, FATHER'S COMING HOME DAJH! TIME TO PLAY SPACE PILOT WITH THE CHOCOBO CHICK!
Lightning: Wait, where did that Chocobo Chick even come from? It totally wasn't here.
*Sazh does exactly what he says*
Dajh: Dad, that's not fair! That's our game!
Sazh: Dajh, you're back ;_;
Lightning: Well, this is a happy ending...
*leaves house*
Lightning: Ok, Lumina, why did you help him?
Lumina: I felt sorry for him ^_^
Lightning: ...yeah, I don't buy that. What's your game?
Lumina: I'm not telling :P ^_^
Lightning: ...Hope, God never said I couldn't slaughter her, right?
Hope: He doesn't want you to kill Humans so, and there's still a chance she is one so...
Lightning: ...I hate being the savior sometimes...
*One sacred phase later...we've done this a lot, I am not doing this joke again*
Lightning: ...great, I'm my soul again, aren't I?
Lumina: Yep ^_^
Lightning: ok, just tell me, what the hell is going on already?
Lumina: YOu know that hole in your heart? ^_^
Lightning: What about it?
Lumina: Well, watch this convenient FF13-2 DLC Flashback to remind you ^_^
*Scene shows*
Lightning: ...Serah's soul was inside me when I went into the crystal, then God took it out of me when reviving me, using her as a hostage...I see...
Lumina: There's more to it than that...how do you know Serah is real ^_^
Lightning: Are you saying GOd is playing me for a fool?
Lumina: Yep ^_^
Lightning: ...Not sure I buy it, but if I find out that God doesn't make good on his bargain, as soon as the world is reborn, I WILL go kill him!
Lumina: Now that's the Lightning I know ^_^
Lightning: ...there's something else you're not telling me...
Lumina: Hope is fake too, by the way...OR IS HE!? ^_^
Lightning: ...
Lumina: And there's other fakes too, YOU MIGHT BE ONE OF THEM ^_^
Lightning: ...now you're not making any sense...
Lumina: But really, the only fake you ever knew...was Serah ^_^
Lightning: ...once all this is over, I am totally murdering you
Lumina: ^_^!!!
*Lightning does a bunch of sidequests for a day, might show off some of these sidequests later, this is filler for the next sequence that happened a day later*
Serah: Lightning, keep pushing forward!
Lightning: Serah...
Serah: remember, Lightning, how much we've been through? The pain and suffering? The hard work we put into it?
Lightning: Yeah?
Serah: I want to forget it all! It hurts! Please!
*she disappears*
Lightning: ...ok, yeah, that's not Serah. Serah would never be like that; she was always one to confront her problems and be stronger from it! God's toying with me...but then again, does Serah really exist? Lumina said she's fake, and maybe it's my belief in this fake that I remember her being something that's she not...god damn it God, that was a completely dumb idea removing my emotions and part of my memories.
Hope: So Lightning...you sound like you're going to betray God.
Lightning: I never said that! I'm just indicating God's methods aren't exactly the most efficient. He's a pretty weird deity all things considered...
Hope: If you say so...
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Bravely Default: So, I've beaten what feels like the primary ending, and am now trucking through such that I am now halfway through Chapter 8. Have still done all the optional fights, which is good in Chapter 7's case since they did some really interesting and thematic teams there.
Currently getting my ass handed to me by the Chapter 3 crew. My current set up does not deal well with a proactive Ninja along with all the rest of that damage. Then again, I might also get out of JP gaining mode at this point and just move to optimal setups. I am done with randoms at this point, and therefore the amount of JP left to gain is mediocre. Might do a bit of grinding just to finish the last two classes I haven't mastered (Freelance and Arcanist), but that's it.
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Oh yeah, one thing I forgot to mention about Suikoden Tactics: what was up with those sidequests? Some of the worst I've seen in an RPG. It's like FFT propositions where there are arbitrary requirements for passing them except passing one or not actually has kind of meaningful rewards in terms of getting new PCs and the likes? I dunno. I pretty much ignored them, which solved the problem nicely at least (the best thing about stupid optional content is that it is optional).
FF6 Eviltype - Started this up again because I'm on a classic FF kick I guess. Eviltype is so good. What I've decided to do is do a "lower" level game where I can only defeat any given enemy formation once (barring unrunnable encounters obviously), I expect this will result in me dying forever. Up to Ultros 1.
Mario Kart 8 - Is fun.
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XCOM: Enemy Within - Replay, attempting to actually beat Classic. Not Ironman.
Classic difficulty in the early game really exposes what is both the biggest difference between the modern XCOM and the classic XCOM, and at the same time, possibly the biggest flaw in the modern XCOM's overall game balance on difficulties above Normal. Specifically, the classic XCOM is a lot more about macromanagement - your waves of soldiers are expendable and cheaply replaced; you go into every mission expecting to lose some, or even most, of your squad every time, and it doesn't matter because your tech matters a lot more than your soldier's stats and levels and whatnot. The game is balanced around this.
This isn't really true of Enemy Within. Soldier skills matter a lot in Enemy Within, almost as much as your equipment does. You get much smaller squads in each mission than in UFO Defense, so you have to make each individual soldier count much more. The end result of all this is that Enemy Within really is balanced around eliminating or at least minimizing your losses as much as possible, which becomes a bit problematic when three missions into the game you're facing opposition that has a 45% hit rate on you in full cover and have a 2-in-3 chance of one-shotting rookies and 1-in-3 chance of one-shotting squaddies/corporals, and that's assuming they *don't* catch you in half cover and kill you with 20% chance crits. (To be fair, the crits still kill you on Normal, but they have half the chance of happening - 10% instead of 20% base.) On Normal, also, they only have 1-in-3 chance to oneshot a rookie and they can't oneshot squaddies (except snipers).
It's all very frustrating, and probably the biggest source of the game's inverted difficulty curve. ANYWAY.
Run is going less than well. Into month 4, have lost UK and France from the project. FINALLY got laser weapons but I still don't even have alien containment, fml.
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FFT: Rako returns. In honor of Rako's amazing run as thief in FF1, I'm doing a modified thief SCC. Settings: Equip sword, weapon guard, move+2 for my thieves and item without phoenix down. It hasn't been too hard... till Wiegraf 1. He was a bastard. Thieves fear counters like little else, and evasion's a problem as well. I ended up winning without buying mithril swords but it took a half dozen resets.
Bright side, I get to turn my thieves into ninjas in C4!
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Roguesouls 1: Screwed up in New Londo Ruins but managed to beat everything else before Sen's Fortress including Sif.
PoiseSorc is my best build yet, would be unbeatable if I never screwed up. Alas.
PoiseSorc is:
- Get through Undead Burg, raise nothing but Int
- Get Wolf Ring and Elite Knight Set
- Then raise Vit to 30 and kill Havel
Phantom Brave: OH NO I got caught up in NI1 aftergame again. Hours lost.
I'm even skipping the precious aftergame cutscene, I'm just there for the mindless grind.
I have 2 godlike uber weapons (one vase for Marona, and one tree) and whoever is wielding them basically doesn't matter. I don't get how stealing works. How can enemies steal my items even with all my stats? It's the number 1 risk I fear, as otherwise Marona is just too overpowered with her vase to die. (and she regens nearly all her HPs every round)
I'm trying to not check too much information, but I don't know how you could get anywhere in the aftergame without knowing about the Failure Title trick, which is fairly obscure.
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Marvel Heroes: Doing pretty well in the anniversary event, got quite a few good artifacts including Gem of the Kursed. Mostly playing Thing right now because Invisible Woman got nerfed into oblivion and my Human Torch hasn't hit 60 yet. Eagerly awaiting Mr. Fantastic. I want to give him many size boosting adds so I can walk around with a Giant Reed Richards.
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Tales of Symphonia.
I dod not remember the. Sky Island Dragon fight. It was a doozy.
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EarthBound- Fin. So, let's put the technical stuff up here. There's some obvious quality of life issues because this game was released in 1995. Setting those aside, though, the game has basically the worst difficulty curve. You'll almost invariably have to stop and grind for each new location until roughly Fourside. That's like a third of the game here. Except after that you go from grind everything to blow everything the fuck up in maybe two turns at most and nothing is threatening in the game ever again unless you let it be. It's like it starts as a Dragon Quest game then changes gears midway and becomes an FF game. For all the annoyance and the overall lack of satisfying crunch to actually finishing, I can't realistically give it better than about 6/10.
Summary: EarthBound is a really easy Dragon Quest game.
The absurdist/quirky/whatever qualities of the game have largely been overstated. It's there, but nothing really ever comes of it. You fight drunks and animate objects for the first half of the game instead of dire rats. The art style is distinct certainly, but the enemies themselves are straightforward so it doesn't stand out that much. Oddly it's the lategame enemies (robots that blow up in your face and Starmen standing a fair chance of OHKOing 3/4 characters on turn 1) that are more memorable, and I think the intent there is that they ARE normal RPG enemies and that's why they're the endgame stuff. The game's stopped being a little adventure for Ness and become epic stuff. Setting aside the artwork, the basic quest structure is really pretty standard with the major exception of Moonside. I can see why people think of it more as parody than anything else, since it is most definitely in the basic form of a standard game even if some of the content tries to be otherwise. That said, there's definitely moments where the game amanges to pull of the 'weird for the sake of weird' it wants to do rather than being a bog standard game with a funky paintjob. Like, the coffee/tea breaks are really just strange and work really well.
Summary: EarthBound is a Dragon Quest game with a new artist who may or may not have been stoned.
At heart EarthBound is not trying to be high concept. Kid with psychic powers is destined to save the world, makes friends. And there's a total lack of conversation between the party, and indeed for the MOST part dialog in the game is NPCs talking at you. There's not a lot of story potential here and the cast is horribly non-talky. But this is where EarthBound really stands out. Uniquely among games of its era, EarthBound puts a lot of effort into the text of the game. The actual words and how they are arranged carry more meaning than the summation of those words. The clearest example is during Jeff's solo segment, when you get to Dr. Andonut's lab. Jeff is still in Protagonist Mode and doesn't talk... so his father just sorta babbles at him. Dude hasn't seen his (early teenaged) son in 10 years, is awkward around people, is absentminded to start with... and what he says captures that emotion beautifully. Would you like a donut? yes/no Yeah, I'd like one too. Um. How have you been? Like science? Wow it's been great catching up. Oh! You need a helicopter! Right this way! Complex concepts are actually conveyed with few words in a very sparse graphical style. It's stunning really.
Summary: EarthBound is the bizarro Dragon Quest Plot.
Anything else I can really think of would just be ways I think the game might be improved, or opportunities I think it missed. And since it's not FFXIII, I don't think anyone wants to read that.
Summary: end document.
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I don't remember having to grind all that much in EB outside of like the very very earlygame, honestly. That said, the rest of your critique is really fair.
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Anything else I can really think of would just be ways I think the game might be improved, or opportunities I think it missed. And since it's not FFXIII, I don't think anyone wants to read that.
Summary: end document.
God, I would much rather read this than another FF13 rant... (for all that FF13 rants certainly -do- seem to pour out easily, it is a polarizing game.)
Legasista:
Finished this! It's short sweet and to the point. It is apparently a ClaDun sequel in everything but name. Breezy and fun, plot was serviceable enough, though nothing special. Equipment and job system was pretty entertaining, though I could have enjoyed it just as well with a lot less randomization in the weapons department.
The Witch and the Hundred Knight:
Continuing on with my non-Disgaea Nippon Ichi spree! Another Dungeon Crawler! Unlike Guided Fate Paradox, it is not turn-based, so it's basically like a solo version of Legasista, complete with a Job system and random equipment setups! Nippon Ichi seems to like these! This one is even more clunky than Legasista/ClaDun's systems and Guided Fate Paradox/ZHP's systems. I'm not liking this trend, Nippon Ichi. It -does- integrate story and gameplay pretty well, at least.
Now storywise, I'm personally rather fascinated by playing as a downright sadistic evil and malicious character. But I can totally see how that wouldn't be everyone's idea of fun and I don't recommend this title to anyone here. Metallia is not pleasant. She's cruel and dark and takes glee in it all. It's not the light-hearted selfishness of Disgaea, it's not the subtle choices of Soul Nomad... but it -is- unique. You're playing as a terrible person, doing terrible things, and in some ways, that's interesting watch and get drawn into. Metallia is a scary terrible person, and the world of Witch100Knight is full of terrible people, and she's still probably the worst one. It's not something I've seen really done before, and the game doesn't necessarily want you to sympathize with her, but you can certainly side with her and enjoy the ride of being vile and malicious. I feel like there's a lot of games that purport "Play as the villain!" as a selling point, but this is one of the only ones I've seen where said villain really does make you hate them even as you're going along with her machinations. It's got a gloss of humor here and there, but never in regards to the cruel things the characters are doing. It's a weird story to watch. I will have to play further to sort out whether the game is being brilliant at making something uniquely dark in game storytelling, or just failing at making likable characters...
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I don't remember having to grind all that much in EB outside of like the very very earlygame, honestly. That said, the rest of your critique is really fair.
The game also expects you to grind when you first get Paula, and again when you get Jeff. Which ends up meaning you're stopping to grind for a suprrisingly lengthy bit of the game, content is fairly frontloaded.
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Marvel Heroes: Doing pretty well in the anniversary event, got quite a few good artifacts including Gem of the Kursed. Mostly playing Thing right now because Invisible Woman got nerfed into oblivion and my Human Torch hasn't hit 60 yet. Eagerly awaiting Mr. Fantastic. I want to give him many size boosting adds so I can walk around with a Giant Reed Richards.
Looking at the bars Doomsaw was using, Reed's travel ability is to blow himself up like a balloon like in Willy Wonka. Some huge round blue motherfucker floating all over the place. Fuck yeah. Best Reed Richards power outside of Lego Marvel.
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I don't remember having to grind all that much in EB outside of like the very very earlygame, honestly. That said, the rest of your critique is really fair.
The game also expects you to grind when you first get Paula, and again when you get Jeff. Which ends up meaning you're stopping to grind for a suprrisingly lengthy bit of the game, content is fairly frontloaded.
Eh, not really. With Paula, Ness is strong at this point to solo things such that the Sanctuary dungeon (if you didn't do it before Carpainter), she'll catch up to some degree, and after beating the boss, everything runs away from you leading to easy EXP without fighting so good to grab some on the way out. In Jeff's case, it's more a few tricks. First off, get all those cookies, sell all those cookies, and buy Cups of Coffee with them, which are just good enough for the time. Casual fighting in Jeff's section, and avoiding the enemies around Stonehenge, you should be fine. The hardest part is inventory conservation, all things considered.
I don't deny the difficulty of the game is frontloaded though, outside of maybe Magicant, but that doesn't necessarily mean these parts need grinding.
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In truth, the only 'mandatory' grinding in the game is either a) to have enough HP to beat Frank or b) to learn PSI Rockin for Titanic Ant. In all of the other rough patches of the game, you should have plenty of experience from fights along the way and your under-leveled characters should catch up adequately. See Meeple's reply re: Paula/Jeff. Some people have trouble with Frank because they don't know about the Mr. Baseball Cap you can get early on, and some people have trouble hitting things in Peaceful Rest Valley because the game doesn't tell you Slingshots are worthless. I won't defend that particular problem, though it's present in many RPGs of the time sadly.
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I wouldn't say the Mr. Baseball Cap is a deal breaker to be honest; missed it my first game and didn't have any problems with Frank. It's only a +1 Defense on the Baseball cap, and even that early, that's not a big deal. Won't deny it's got the advantages of being free, and thus a potential extra Hamburger and such.
I do agree that Onett in general is the only real grinding you have to do, and maybe Peaceful Valley Rest, though that has little to do with Slingshots, and more to do with knowing exactly what you're going up against. Knowing to have at least 3 Teddy Bears and avoid Territorial Oaks like the plague goes a long way in that dungeon (on the trip back, Territorial Oaks aren't so bad because now you're not relying on Teddy Bears to soak up damage.)
Still, I think the real issue with PVR is it feels balanced to be taken on by a party of at least 2 PCs, but they expect Ness to solo it.
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FF6 Eviltype - Up to the scenario split. The early going was fine, improved steal (which I don't think was the case last time I played Eviltype?) was a boon certainly. As was nabbing the Guardian (allows capture, good power) from Marshal.
Vargas - 2 resets. Mostly just needed to manage healing very carefully. Also stop pretending Locke has offence (which to be fair, he did much of the time) and put him in the back row.
Ultros 1 - 6 resets. Ultros is just all-around badass. Would OHKO Banon with "You frighten me!" so I had to defend through that, and actually ended up defending a lot in general so an untimely doubleact wasn't fatal. Did a bunch of damage with Sabin, healed a lot with Edgar and had Terra either heal or use Fire (triggering a counter) depending on what I could get away with. The large MT damage with Flash Rain was a rude surprise and dealing with that was also pretty key...
Ghost Train - 1 reset. Not too bad. Mostly a lot of hoping he doesn't use Scar Beam or Acid Rain, my resources were pretty limited by this point.
Rizopas - 1 reset. Got taken out by his initiative blitz first time. Second time I just healed a bit more, had to use two X-Potions and an Elixir but whatever, it's what they're there for.
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So the sequence of events go, start the game then have to grind. Later you can do a specific set of things to help pull through an area with a lot of foreknowledge so that you can grind easier later when enemies will auto die because you out level the area. Then it does this again.
And this is the player's fault? Fuck that noise.
Dark Souls - Started up a Pyromancer. Played for a few minutes and the game kicked me out because my frame rate was too low to play online. I need to upgrade.
-
So the sequence of events go, start the game then have to grind. Later you can do a specific set of things to help pull through an area with a lot of foreknowledge so that you can grind easier later when enemies will auto die because you out level the area. Then it does this again.
And this is the player's fault? Fuck that noise.
Dark Souls - Started up a Pyromancer. Played for a few minutes and the game kicked me out because my frame rate was too low to play online. I need to upgrade.
Are you using DSfix? It helped me keep a steady 30 FPS.
-
It's been years since I tried Earthbound, but I distinctly remember getting demoralized by the suicide oaks in some valley area and not caring enough to go grind up or FAQ for a solution.
Considering that neither the gameplay nor the art style nor the humor gripped me at that point, I shelved the game and never went back. Eventually I lost the save file due to a PC transfer and never felt bad about it.
-
Using DSFix. I have been having framerate issues on a bunch of games, pretty sure my CPU is on the way out.
FFX - Up to cave of the Yojimbro.
-
FFT: Done with the Rako portion of the playthrough. May do Ninrako later, skipping it for now. I'll save the long rants, but thieves are absolute piles of shit who can get walled by something as simple as a Knight with counter or a reviver.
Hardest battles:
1. Yardow. By far. I actually had to gain levels for this (Got to 22 for the speed and pa point) and it was still hell. Thieves fear range attacks like little else and that's what everything in this match is.
2. Wiegraf 1. Ugh god. A durable boss with evasion and counter. This sucked.
3. Wiegraf 3. Required some luck due to Wiegraf 2HKOing.
4. Izlude. Had to very, very carefully skate around and kill Izlude's support before dealing with him. I should've had far more resets here than the 3~ I had.
5. Wiegraf 2. Not as bad as his other forms, but he could easily destroy me with evasion and stasis sword. I had to get lucky and dodge his physicals, they just OHKOed my thieves who had neutral sign with him.
6. Grog. Because thieves hate revivers. The massive ITE damage from guns was bad too.
Velius was obnoxious too due to sign concerns (2 bad, 3 neutral) but he can be baited down.
-
Yojimbro.
Sup homie
-
Word.
-
So the sequence of events go, start the game then have to grind. Later you can do a specific set of things to help pull through an area with a lot of foreknowledge so that you can grind easier later when enemies will auto die because you out level the area. Then it does this again.
I'm not really going to defend Peaceful Rest Valley, because the first trip through it is honestly the hardest dungeon in the entire game. That said, while Teddy Bears are helpful, they're not completely *necessary*. All that you really have to do is be smart about your resources and inventory, and wandering around is typically enough to get through what you need to do.
Do Slingshots hold your physical damage back? Yes. Are Teddy Bears helpful? Of course. Does the game tell you these things? Only the second one.
Still, the main point where the game gets easier is when you get that second character. Nothing else matters quite as much as that - it's something when the next hardest point becomes Magicant, another solo dungeon.
-
Xenoblade - Acquired Dunban and plodding through the swamp area to get to the High Entia. There sure are a lot of dudes yelling at robots in this game. Xord is hilariously douchey. I'm a little under 12 hours in.
Megaman 10 - Since I've played all the other classic Megaman games, I decided to tackle this one. I took out all of the robot masters. The hardest levels were probably Strike and Commando. Sheep Man's weapon is atrocious trash, but the rest of them seem neat.
New Super Mario Bros. U - Continuing the three player journey, just completed the sixth world. World 5 had a couple of very nasty boss levels which ate through a lot of our team lives. It's interesting how Mario is both easier (only one person of three needs to be alive) and harder (getting in each other's way) on three player. Luigi continues to have a rivalry with Blue Toad. That Blue Toad is a jerk.
-
Dishonored: Beat. Low Chaos ending.
Quick summation of things.
-Blink makes the entire goddamn game. Teleporting around in a stealth game is among the most fun things ever.
-Chaos system, having mulled it over and seen the endings, works decently. If you murder tons of people in a city that is already collapsing, things are just gonna sour further, especially when teaching a young empress.
-Seriously, Blink is fucking great.
-Would have been nice if city areas were a bit more sandboxy. Getting blocked by invisible walls, especially while climbing, sucks.
-You know what is awesome? Waiting at the top of a stairwell, Blinking behind him just as he reaches the top, and choking him out.
-
This next episode is me covering things as I remember them and more just being completely random on what gets covered. If I don't get your favorite quest, I apologize! I obviously can't cover them all, though yes, I did more in-game than I present here; these are just the ones that come to mind.
Lightning Returns Abridged: The Side Quest Edition! Oh, yeah, and there's some plot too...
Gilgamesh: Lightning Returns, the story so...
Lightning: NO!
Gilgamesh: What?
Lightning: I said NO! We are NOT doing that this time around.
Gilgamesh: But, this was to be my big moment!
Lightning: I'm pulling the plug on these segments!
Ultros: So...do I still get my cameo?
*Back at the first day*
Hope: Yeah, Lightning, there are other souls you need to save other than the big ones, they'll make you stronger.
Lightning: Does this mean a montage of sorts of me doing soul collecting?
Hope: It doesn't not mean you won't get a montage that doesn't show you getting Soul Collecting!
*in-determinant time later, at Luxerion*
Kid: Hey there, lady, BET I'M FASTER THAN YOU!
Lightning: OH HELL NO! YOu did not just insult me like that!
Kid: Then I'll race ya!
Lightning: YOU'RE ON!
Hope: ...he's a kid...if 500 years old...you're seriously going to do this?
Lightning: I HAVE DIGNITY TO UPHOLD!
Hope: ...uh-huh...
*one race later*
Kid: Man, Lady, you really are fast! It's like being an athletic adult woman makes you faster than a physically 10 year old boy!
Lightning: You are pretty fast for your age...even if you weren't even close...(and I did kind of cheat but he doesn't need to know that)
*Lightning gets kid's soul*
Woman Hunter: THAT BIG DRAGON OVER THERE KILLED MY FRIENDS! I AM ANGRY OVER IT!
*Lightning kills the dragon*
Woman Hunter: Oh hey thanks!
*Lightning gets soul*
Other Kid: I lost my ball :(
*Lightning gets ball*
Other Kid: Yay! My life is complete again!
*gets soul*
City Girl: I sell my tears! They make people feel better! Gotta make a living!
Lightning: Why do you cry?
City Girl: Oh, they're not real; I'm just REAAAAAALLLLLYYYY good at acting, see?
Lightning: So you sham people by selling fake tears?
City Girl: No they're real tears, I just don't really cry!
Lightning: I'll only buy your tears if you really cry, I don't think you can do it, you've lost a part of your soul after all!
Hope: Where the hell did THAT come from?
Lightning: SHUT UP HOPE!
Hope: Yes ma'am!
City Girl: *sniff* IT'S NOT FAIR! WHY WON"T YOU BELIEVE ME! I'M JUST TRYING TO MAKE PEOPLE HAPPY! ;_;
Lightning: Ha! Got you to cry for real! See, you are capable of it.
City Girl: YOU TRICKED ME! Which makes me want to make people happier with my smile, thanks :)
*soul gained*
Order Dude: So there's these weird boxes put around here by this girl Lumina, I THINK THEY MIGHT BE BOMBS! Can you inspect them for me?
Lightning: Ok.
*inspects*
Lightning: Yeah, there was nothing but useless garbage in them, I should have guessed Lumina would do that.
Order Dude: Hey thanks!
*Soul get! Going to stop saying that from here on because you get the idea*
Armand: Listen to my story...this...may be our last chance...
Lightning: What?
Armand: I was out of the frying pan, and into the freezer!
Lightning: Umm...
Armand: I realized that day, I was the only one really laughing. Laughing must have been what kept them going all this time.
Lightning: So...what does this...
Armand: At that point, I thought Sin and Blitzball were the only things Zanarkand and Spira had in common...turns out I wasn't far off.
Lightning: I'm confused...
Armand: Hey, thanks for listening, can I have my quill pen to write this down?
Lightning: If it'll get you to start making sense, yes.
Order Lady: THESE CLOCKS! I MUST INSPECT THEM! I NEED TO MAKE SURE THEY ARE ALRIGHT!
Lightning: What's wrong?
Order Lady: I have to make sure all the clocks are SYNCED UP TO THIS ONE! There are 13 clocks in Luxerion, please check them for me!?
Lightning: uhh...ok...
*Checks*
Lightning: They're all good.
Order Lady: Oh thank goodness! I couldn't live my life if they were different!
Dead Lady #1: ETRO BEING DEAD MEANS MY SOUL CAN'T MOVE ON! ...or was it that people can't be reborn...umm...OOOOOH I'M A GHOST!
Lightning: Right...
*in the graveyard*
Dead Lady #2: Oooh! I'm also a ghost!
Lightning: You were killed because you look like me, weren't you?
Dead Lady #2: HOW DARE YOU INSULT MYKA! ...and yes, yes I was...BUT I REALLY WAS THE SAVIOR! ...at least, I like to pretend I was...
Lightning: so...can I have that Phantom Rose?
Myka: ok!
*at the clock*
Dead Lady #3: GO AWAY BITCH IT'S YOUR FAULT I'M DEAD!
Lightning: I never met you, how is it my fault.
Dead Lady #3: BECAUSE YOUR PINK HAIR SAVIOR DUH! They killed me because of that! WE CAN"T MOVE ON! BLAH BLAH BLAH LIFESTREAM BLAH BLAH BLAH FARPLANE BLAH BLAH BLAH SOUL!
Lightning: ...did I just save the soul of someone who is already dead?
Hope: I...guess?
Cat named Gem: PLEASE! YOU MUST SAVE MY MASTER!
Lightning: OH GOD! A TALKING CAT!
Gem: Please, get this object and find my master walking around among other cats! He got lost in there thanks to Chaos!
Lightning: Um, ok.
*one fetchquest later, Lightning is told NOT TO BRING THIS TOO CLOSE TO CATS*
Lightning: Ok, there's the boy's body, now to-*Cat steals Object* GET BACK HERE YOU STUPID FELINE!
*after 5 attempts of this, Lightning succeeds, nothing of interest happens so we skip that conversation*
*In Yusnaan*
Seedy: My restaurant is failing :(
Lightning: Most do, deal with it.
Seedy: Lady, you must help me! EAT MY DISH PLEASE!
Lightning: Uh, ok *eats* tastes good, I guess.
Seedy: FIND GORDON GOURMET! HE CAN SAVE MY RESTAURANT!
*Lightning finds Gordon Gourmet*
Gordon Gourmet: Yes, I can help Seedy's! You just need to do these large number of specific annoying steps that involve running back and forth because I'm a jerk like that.
Lightning: *Sigh*
*back and forth quest later, at Seedy's*
Seedy: Here, eat my food now.
Lightning: THIS IS THE BEST BITE OF FOOD I'VE EVER HAD! I might just lick the plate! By the way, Gordon Gourmet is your long lost son.
Seedy: WHAT!? I MUST GO MEET HIM!
*one father son reunion later, Lightning gets a soul*
Alchemist: Eheheheh, TRY MY NEW POTION!
Lightning: ...that's poison, isn't it?
Alchemist: OF COURSE NOT! ...though it is made by 2 poisons...but my theory is 2 Poisons will neutralize themselves!
Lightning: That sounds like saying 1 + 1 = 0.
Alchemist: THAT'S MATH THIS IS ALCHEMY! Here, take this potion, try it out and tell me the results.
Lightning: *Sigh* FINE!
*this happens about 3 more times*
Alchemist: Good! Now go use it in the Colosseum so people can see how effective it is!
*Lightning does that*
Alchemist: YES! EVERYONE WANTS MY POTIONS! Here's a free one!
Lightning: I'm just glad I didn't die from all this...
Alchemist: YOU DON'T TRUST ME!?
FUN FACT: I was tempted to write the Alchemist as FEA Miriel, but didn't feel like grabbing a thesaurus and GRE Dictionary to get the speech patterns right. Sorry for the disappointment.
Hopeless Man: I must get the phone number of the cute Chocobo Girl in the alley! PLEASE GET IT FOR ME!
*at said Chocobogirl*
Chocobo Girl: Good Choco Evening!
Lightning: ...Meow Meow Choco Wow.
Chocobo Girl: EEEEEEEEEE! *hands her fireworks*
Lightning: By the way, can I have your phone number? I might want to call you for...uhh...er...little sister's...birthday party...
Chocobo Girl: Sure!
*at guy*
Hopeless Man: THANK YOUTHANK YOUTHANK YOUTHANK YOUTHANK YOUTHANK YOUTHANK YOUTHANK YOUTHANK YOUTHANK YOU!
Lightning: What the hell just happened?
City Lady: You may not believe this, BUT I USE TO BE A CHOCOBO!
Lightning: ...yeah, I'm leaving...
City Lady: No seriously! Then the Chaos hit, and I became human and I lost my friends, they are 6 Chocobo Chicks around the city, YOU MUST FIND THEM SO WE CAN BE REUNITED!
Lightning: ...after 500 years, you're only looking for them now?
City Lady: YES!
Hope: You don't seriously believe her story, do you?
Lightning: What? About her being a chocobo or the fact that she didn't actually look for them until now after 500 years? Because both reek of lies.
*one hunt later*
Lightning: I found your friends.
City Lady: THANKS! *turns into a chocobo*
Lightning: ...
Hope: ...
Lightning: Umm...
Hope: ...yeah...
Lightning: Let us never speak of this again...
Hope: Agreed.
Anxious Man: Hey lady, I got stood up and already had Restaurant Reservations...can you be my date? I just want to watch the Fireworks with someone :(
Lightning: You got dumped, so you ask a random lady on the street to sit with you?
Anxious: Please :(?
Lightning: *Sigh* Fine.
Hope: Put on that Midnight Mauve outfit, you need to look pretty remember.
*At the date*
Anxious Man: So...
Lightning: ...look, I'm just here for the food, not here to make anything important...
Anxious Man: It's not like that! I didn't get dumped! My girl...we were engaged then she died a day later...I just needed something to cheer me up, if only for a night.
Lightning: ...I'm still only here for the steak.
Trumpet Boy: *plays the FF13 theme*
Lightning: Where did you hear that song?
Trumpet Boy: HA! LUMINA WAS RIGHT! YOU FELL FOR IT HOOK LINE AND SINKER!
Lightning: ...
Trumpet Boy: But she only taught me the beginning, can you fine the other parts so I can finish the song?
Lightning: ...I hate Lumina...
*one quest later*
Trumpet Boy: Yay! I can play the whole song.
Lightning: Please play it as possible; it helps remind me of a point when this plot actually made sense...
Trumpet Boy: Sure!
Diva: I can't sing! I only have 362 songs to choose from, I need my Song Writer! He left me years ago!
Lightning: So if I find this guy, you'll sing?
Diva: Yes!
Song Writer: I'm right here, DON'T TELL HER!
Lightning: Can you...give me a new song for her to sing, so you two can make up?
Song Writer: You need to find it since I lost it!
Lightning: So write another?
Song Writer: I can't do that! I LOST ALL INSPIRATION WHEN I LOST IT!
Lightning: ...now I'm starting to see why this world needed a savior...
*Lightning finds song, gives it to the Diva*
Diva: Thanks! I will now sing it for you!
*Diva sings the Serah's theme from FF13-2*
Lightning: That was my favorite song...even though it didn't appear until the 2nd game which was entirely about Serah so this doesn't really fit into that, but continuity, who needs it?
Song Writer: That was beautiful, can we get back together?
Diva: YES!!!
Biggs: Hey lady, look what I got here...
Lightning: I am not that kind of woman...though given my current outfit I could see how you might confuse me as one...God has a sick sense of humor...
Biggs: No! I mean, there's this contest, you are clearly strong, but I bet you can't win i-...
*Lightning wins it effortlessly*
Biggs: ...shutting up. Hey, Wedge was looking for you though!
*at Wedge*
Wedge: You won't win this DEATH GAME!
Lightning: If I do, you must adhere to any request I make.
Wedge: Fine, but if you fail, we do the same!
*Lightning wins*
Wedge: Well crap, what do you want us to dO?
Lightning: Stop the death games. You only do it so you get amusement out of people suffering.
Wedge: NO! We do it because people are BORED and it gives them one last hurrah!
Biggs: Seriously!
Lightning: So do something else, like I dunno, go to the streets at night and play Terra;s theme from your first game in our series.
Biggs: Hey, that's a brilliant idea!
Wedge: Let's totally do that!
Hope: ...did they take what you said literally?
Lightning: I...uhh...look, there's a guy playing the song "Final Fantasy" by the station and some guy playing Battle on the Big Bridge near the Augur's Quarter, is that really a stretch? Heck, one guy is even playing Eternal Wind in the Dead Dunes!
Hope: ...let's just move on.
NOTE: I didn't make any of that up; all 4 of those songs mentioned do in fact appear.
*NOW FOR SOME PLOT, after a sacred phase*
Lightning: ...I'm in my soul again...oh damn it, I can already tell where this is goi-...
Lumina: Hello there ^_^
Lightning: Oh God, if you truly are listening, please save me from this respite.
Lumina: Awww, but we're friends now right ;_: ^_^?
Lightning: No, no we are not.
Lumina: But hey look, the soul of this person wants to tell you something ^_^
Lightning: You mean that cloud? What, is it going to be Serah and thus a big relevation and...
Lumina: Nope! But hey, all these people want to help you too ^_^ *everyone from before except Caius and Yeul appear*
Lightning: So why don't they?
Lumina: Because they can't, so sad ^_^
Lightning: And who wants to tell me something?
Yeul: I do.
Lightning: ...wait, what? Where did you come from?
Yeul: You wish to defeat god, but one human alone does not have the power to defeat God.
Lightning: I never said I was going to do that! Only if it means getting Serah back...though it does seem increasingly likely this is going to be the case.
Yeul: You must find the truth of your own soul before you can beat God.
Lightning: So...I can't believe I'm about to do this, but Lumina, what is the truth?
Lumina: HEY! You can't do that! That's cheating >:( ^_^
Lightning: *Sigh* back to helping souls I guess...
*Wildlands*
Chocobo Hunter: Hey lady, can you give me these items?
Lightning: Why do you need them?
Chocobo Hunter: Because I'm trying to be a hunter, but I keep failing, I need them to pass!
Lightning: So you're cheating basically...
Chocobo Hunter: No way! They said "by any means necessary!"
Lightning: Lazy bastard.
Chocobo Hunter: Look, when you fail a contest 100 times before, you tell me you wouldn't resort to alternative methods.
Lightning: I take that back, you're quite determined, I admire that! How do you fail 100 times and persist?
Chocobo Hunter; You mean that's NOT normal?
Sarala: So...my dad never came back from getting fertilizer.
Lightning: I'll go look for him!
*Lightning finds some guy with weird glasses*
Lightning: Are you Sarala's dad?
Totally Not Sarala's Dad: NOPE! But I can help you out with him. Take this fertilizer and letter her and she'll understand!
*at the village*
Lightning: So...your dad is dead, and gave me this letter and stuff.
Sarala: Oh, that's ashame, I guess I'll have to live on his legacy!
Hope: You do realize that probably was her dad right?
Lightning: yeah, but we have other things to do!
Cranky Old Man: GO AWAY!
Lightning: Can I use your field to grow some greens?
Cranky Old man: FINE! It'll take half a day but leave me alone!
*Lightning grows some Tantal Greens*
Cranky Old Man: Can you do me a favor and give me some of Sarala's Gyshal Greens? I need to compare the taste of my Tantals to her Gyshals!
Lightning: Isn't this Chocobo Feed? Don't tell me you're really a chocobo in disguise because I've already met one woman like that and believe me, my brain still has not recovered.
Cranky Old Man: WHAT'S WRONG WITH EATING CHOCOBO FOOD!?
*he eats it*
Cranky Old Man: There's no comparison, hers is better. You can use my field whenever you want, thanks! Tell my grand daughter...er...I mean...SARALA, yes, THAT GIRL WHO HAS NO RELATION TO ME THANKS!
Totally Not Sarala's Dad: What do you want?
Lightning: You're her father, aren't you?
Totally Not Sarala's Dad: No I'm not! ...is it that obvious?
Lightning: Yes, yes it is; why would you care so much about her?
Sarala's Dad: Look, I left so she could grow into a REAL MAN!
Lightning: ...
Sarala's Dad: er...I mean, WOMAN! Yes, so she can be a STRONG INDEPENDENT WOMAN! ...also so I could find my mysteriously missing wife...
Lightning: Why not just tell her so she didn't worry?
Sarala's Dad: Pfft, like that'll happen! My father did the same thing afterall!
Lightning: Hmm...
*at the Research Camp*
Lightning: You're Sarala's Granddad, aren't you?
Cranky Old Man: SHHH! NOT SO LOUD!!! YES I AM!
Lightning: ...yeah, your son left his daughter and is doing the same thing...
Cranky Old Man: Oh did he? I better give him a smacking for...ni front of Sarala...go tell them to meet me at Aryas Village.
*one reunion later, Lightning solves this silly family crisis*
Moogle: Look for my friends, Kupo! I lost them in the forest 10 days ago, Kupo!
Lightning: Why not just fly over the forest and look at them from there?
Moogle: I never thought of that! ...but I'm scared of heights, kupo.
Lightning: Ok, fine, I'll go find them.
*in the forest*
Lost Moogle: Kupo, help me get home!
Lightning: Why not just fly above the forest and fight your home that way?
Lost Moogle: Kupo! I never thought of that! Still, can you help?
Lightning: Gladly!
*Lightning throws the Moogle all the way through the forest into Lower Earth Orbit, somehow landing in the forest...no, really, she does this. Repeat this scene twice more, and back to the village*
Hope: Wow, Lightning, you threw those Moogles further than Serah! *actual line of dialog*
Moogle: Thanks Kupo! Where'd you guys go?
Lost Moogle: You told us you had to get something back at the village and wait exactly where we were, Kupo, so we did! But then you never came, but still we waited!
Moogle: Oh...kupo...I guess I forgot, because I saw a giant monster, Kupo!
Lightning: SO this is entirely your fault? *sigh*
*now back to the plot, after another sacred phase*
Lightning: I'm back in my soul again...oh great, don't tell me...
Cid Raines: Hi there.
Lightning: LUMI-...oh, wait, hi Cid...what are you doing here?
Cid: I am not actually Cid, this is just the form I took, I am an empty vessel formed by the Chaos to speak for the Chaos.
Lightning: Wait, so the Chaos is finally going to talk to me? You mean I might actually get some ANSWERS to all this nonsense?
Cid: Yes, actually. All human souls come from the Chaos, thereby, when a human dies, they go back to the Chaos, and then inhabit a new body and form a new being. Such is the cycle of life.
Lightning: Meaning...?
Cid: Souls don't actually disappear in the Chaos. God cannot stop the Chaos because it is stronger and more natural force than him. It is the natural cycle of things.
Lightning: ...so it's the Lifestream.
Cid: NO! IT IS TOTALLY NOT THE LIFESTREAM! THE LIFESTREAM IS TOTALLY DIFFERENT THAN THIS!
Lightning: Ok, give me one difference.
Cid: Well...uhh...er...the Lifestream is Green, Chaos is black! SEE!? TOTALLY DIFFERENT!
Lightning: Right...
Cid: Anyway, the Soul Song will save the souls of those lost in the Chaos, but if God creates a new world, all is lost, he wants the Chaos gone.
Lightning: So the souls I saved aren't the only ones that could be saved, dead people can be saevd too, but I have to make sure God doesn't have his way, because Serah's soul is in there?
Cid: Something like that, however, you cannot defeat God as you are now because you use God's power! That's like using a Fire spell to beat the Fiend of Fire! But then, I don't think anyone is THAT stupid!
Lightning: So I need to use the power of Chaos are you saying?
Cid: Yes.
Lightning: Ok, easy enough. Just call up Vincent from FF7, and the entire villain cast from Dissidia, and I think I'm good.
Cid: ...what?
Lightning: ...what, all Chaos' aren't created equally?
Cid: Look, you can tap into the power of Chaos, though not easily, but first you must find THAT PART OF YOUR SOUL THAT IS LOST!
Lightning: ...crap, I'm apparently not good at this whole "find lost soul" thing.
Cid: Anyway, I've done my part, later!
Hope: Lightning, what was that all about?
Lightning: Nothing you need to worry about, just reminiscing, you didn't hear a thing. Though I can say it's nice someone finally actually said something meaningful!
Odin: Will Lightning tap into the power of Chaos? Will Lightning end up fighting God?
Chisato: Wait, when did Moppy get into this?
Morty: Hey look, I tried to warn him, but he wouldn't listen...
Odin: well, I figured because Ultros and Gilgamesh had a cameo that...
Nate Nanjo: NO! I am NOT paying you guys for this, OFF NOW!
-
Child of Light: Started.
(http://a.dilcdn.com/bl/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2013/02/Hades_9-350x241.png)
Verse. Oy.
Game did a nice job of subverting my expectations so far. I'm like okay, there's platforms that are slightly out of reach, we'll be getting a double-jump abiity soon like every other platformer... WTF we can fly? With no time limit?
-
Finished re-routing ACF. My only conclusion is that Ichigo is god. Finished with 8:20:52. Somehow, I am 42 minutes slower than him. Brb, committing sodoku
-
Lightning Returns: The End of the Beginning of the End
Jecht: Lightning Returns, the story so far!
Garland: Chaos knocked Etro down!
Cloud of Darkness: Then people lived their lives, useless in the Void, for 500 years.
Emperor: Then God wished to take over through usage of the Savior.
Kuja: That Savior being the fabulous Lightning to bring about the final act~
Sephiroth: Using her sister as bait to do his bidding...
Ultimecia: And the Hope, whom had his Time Kompressed to watch over God's Super Komputer.
Kefka: But God betrayed Lightning like any good deity should, uwehehehe
Ex-death: And now Lightning wants to throw God INTO THE VOID!
Golbez: By using the power of Chaos itself against that which told her to destroy it!
Gabranth: And so, our story continues, ONE LAST TIME, TO OBLIVION!
Lightning: ...did...did we just have a coherent explanation of this game's plot?
Hope: Oh just go save the world already.
*12th day*
Lightning: Well, I'm off.
Hope: I guess should say good bye, THIS IS OUR LAST TIME TOGETHER!
Lightning: What?
Hope: ...nothing...
*Lightning does whatever on the 12th day because she's basically killed all monsters and such*
*Final Sacred Phase*
Lightning: Huh, Yggdrasil grew another fruit...
Hope: What!? A new day has formed!? One God didn't expect...of course! It's all the lost time from the previous days! There were 26 hours in a day, then Chaos appeared, and it's 24 hours, but the lost 2 hours of each day have formed a new day, you have ONE MORE CHANCE LIGHTNING!
Lightning: One more chance for what? I completed just about everything and...
Hope: There's a new dungeon that spawned!
Lightning: ...yeah, screw that, I'm just going to get money in the Wild Lands or something...
*Wild Lands*
Gysahl: Savior! OUR TOWN IS UNDER ATTACK BY A CHOCOBO EATER AND CHAOS! SAVE US!
Lightning: Bob, let's go!
Bob: Kweh!
*Battle against a chocobo played to this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEUOOgNzOv4) song*
Lightning: I couldn't save your friends, Bob *said while standing over dead Chocobos* ...can I save their souls so I get a last minute stat boost though?
Bob: Kweh!
*The extra day passes*
Hope: Lightning, listen, I have to go now. I existed to be God's eyes and ears, but now he doesn't need more anymore.
Lightning: Hope, no, don't go!
Hope: Sorry, don't have a choice, good bye Lightning!
*Hope disappears*
Lightning: ...now who am I going to talk to in the base for last minute provisions?
Mog: Kupo! Hi Lightning, I found my way here! I can run stuff, don't worry Kupo!
Lightning: ...I guess that answers that...
LUXERION, THE FINAL DAY
(http://www.zeldainformer.com/?ACT=28&f=2393009-skullkidandmoon.jpg&fid=30&d=8715&)
Lightning: ...where'd that moon come from?
Lumina: Oh, that's just God's sense of humor ^_^
Lightning: Ok, look, the world's about to end, can you just make sense for once?
Lumina: Ok! Souls live in the Chaos only because people remember them, and likewise, people only remember souls because they exist! So when a soul is killed, it's like the person never existed, EVER, PERIOD. END OF STORY! ^_^
Lightning: Except for all written documentation that would suggest the person in question existed...
Lumina: NEVER. EXISTED. EVER!!!! ^_^
Lightning: ...
Lumina: ...ok, fine, you're right, but what good is written documentation when THE WHOLE WORLD GOES BOOM AND A NEW ONE IS CREATED!? You think God is going to rewrite all those medical bills and stuff by hand? ^_^
Lightning: Well, he IS God...
Lumina: STOP POINTING OUT OBVIOUS FLAWS IN GOD'S PLAN AND JUST GO BEAT HIM ALREADY! ^_^
Lightning: Aren't we skipping stuff?
Lumina: Oh, right! So what do you think God's plan with the Soulsong is ^_^?
Lightning: He wants to kill all souls to erase all memories who didn't come to start fresh, I take it?
Lumina: Yep! He thinks that will MAKE HUMANS STRONGER!!!! ^_^
Lightning: Ok, so stop the Soulsong, then kick God's ass.
Lumina: Also, note that Vanille can actually save all the souls of the dead too, she just needs to guide them to the Ark ^_^
Lightning: So...off to save the world...except the world's doomed anyway, so off to...save...my dignity? Yeah, let's go with that.
Lumina: No, wait! Don't leave me here alone, please ;_;
Lightning: Did you...suddenly have a complete 180 turn in character?
Lumina: I don't want to be left alone ;_;
Lightning: Sorry, but I got a job to do.
Lumina: ;_;
*Lumina fades away while Lightning leaves*
*in the temple*
Sanctum Soldier: It's the savior! KILL HER EVEN THOUGH WE'RE SUPPOSE TO WORSHIP HER!
Lightning: You? With a gun? Do you realize how many far bigger threats I've taken down in the past 13 days alone? And you don't even have a name, what chance do you have against me!
Sanctum Soldier: BRING IN THE TWO CHIMERAS!
Lightning: ...ok, I should probably have just kicked his ass. Time for a boss fi-...
*Noel slices one of the Chimeras out of nowhere*
Noel: I thought you're on the Order's side, SAVIOR!?
Lightning: Plans have changed...
Noel: Really *holds knife to Lightning* Well, there's only one reason you'd have a complete change of heart like this...
Lightning: Try me...
*Noel turns around and attacks order soldiers, Lightning mirror's actions*
Noel: Go on ahead, I'll hold things off here. I'm the SHADOW HUNTER after all!
*Lightning beats up Angels, Monkeys, and Egyptian Demonic Dog things, comes across some corpses*
Lightning: Huh, looks like someone beat me to the punch...WHY ARE THERE SO MANY ENEMIES IN HERE STILL!? Gee, I wonder who could have done this? Maybe someone close to Vanille who hasn't lost his or her spirit these past years and has been clearly against the Order the entire time...but nah, there's no one like that left out there.
Fang: Hey, Lightning, wanna give me a hand here?
Lightning: Oh, right, sure thing Fang!
*The two beat up Chimeras, then go off to the inner ritual room*
Vanille: Souls, here my song, I will release you!
High Priestess: YES! DO IT SAINT! GOD'S WILL IS ABSOLUTE! ALL IS ONE! ONE IS ALL! THOU ART THEE ART THY ART SING THE DAMN SONG DO IT DO IT DO IT DO IT!
Fang: No! Vanille, don't do it! You'll die!
Vanille: If I have to die to save many souls, I'll do it!
Lightning: Yeah, about that saving thing...it's not happening. God's trying to kill all those souls so we forget about them, and you'll have died for absolutely nothing.
Vanille: What?
Lightning: Listen to the voices of the dead, Vanille, and tell me what they say.
High Priestess: DON'T LISTEN TO THEM! THEY'RE HERETICS! GOD'S WILL DEMANDS IT!
Vanille: I hear sadness...and fear...but also hope...and not one of them wants to die...how can I go through with this now?
Lightning: You can still make use of your gifts, Vanille; send the Souls to the ark. There they will be transferred to the new world and can rejoin the cycle of rebirth, just as they'd want.
High Priestess: NO! GOD'S WILL DEMANDS OTHERWISE! HOLY CLAVIS DO IT!
Fang: How the hell did she activate the Holy Clavis when it's required the Soulsong by Vanille to do it?
Lightning: Who cares, just destroy the Clavis!
Fang: I'm trying, but everything is in the way, if only we had some form of air support.
*Skylight smashes*
Snow: HEROES ALWAYS WIN!!!!!!
*grabs Fang's lance and smashes Clavis*
Snow: See? I totally came, just 5 centuries late! *rough actual line of dialog*
Lightning: Glad you could make it.
Fang: So Vanille, you wanna make like Yuna and perform a sending?
Vanille: YES!
*Vanille sends the souls to the ark*
Fang: You did well, Vanille.
Vanille: Thanks Fang.
*both girls give their Souls to Lightning and die*
Snow: Well, guess it's time for the new world.
Lightning: Serah, were you among one of those souls?
*Yeul and Lumina show up*
Yeul: No, Serah's soul is elsewhere...
Lumina: It was inside you all the time ^_^
Yeul: But it was cut out of you.
Lightning: So where is Serah's soul now?
Lumina: ^_^
Lightning: I see...you've been watching over Serah's soul this entire time, haven't you?
Lumina: Oh, I'm just an empty vessel who didn't want to see Serah die, so I did you a favor ^_^
Lightning: Heh, well, glad to see she's still around...I guess I have to thank you...god damn it...
Lumina: Say it ^_^
Lightning: ...thanks...
Lumina: Well, time to go, good bye ^_^
Yeul: Yes, good bye.
Lightning: Mission Accomplished, but I can't feel I'm forgetting something...
Hope: PRAISED TO BE YEVON BHUNIVELZE AND GOD'S WILL! IT IS TIME FOR A NEW WORLD!
Lightning: ...oh, right, God...wait, Hope, YOU'RE God!?
Hope: I have taken Hope for my choosing, you will all be saved but have gone against my will!
*Vanille and Fang's souls go back to their own bodies, they come back to life*
Fang: ...what the hell? This is literally the 3rd time I've practically died and been come back to life!
Hope: PRAISE BE TO GOD!
*"Hope" steals the souls of Vanille, Fang and Snow*
Lightning: ...ok, I get it, you want me to follow you, since I'm the only one who can *Sigh*
Mog: Wait, Kupo! I can help too!
Lightning: No, Mog, you stay here, I need you as a convenient shop as I beat up these 4 optional trials for useless spells!
Mog: Ok, Kupo!
*Lightning does the 4 trials, and then gets Ultima Weapon and Ultima Shield*
Lumina's Voice: One last gift from Serah, she wants you to use this to defeat God, awesome right?
Lightning: Let's just see how strong this really i-*2500 Attack and Magic, and boosts Army of ONe, when Lightning has been uses weapons less than half that power* ...ok, that'll work.
Mog: Lightning, be careful Kupo!
Lightning: Don't worry, God won't know what hit him!
*Lightning goes through the doors*
Bhunivelze: *manipulating Hope's body* Ah, Savior, you've finally arrived! Now are you willing to...*gets hit by a projectile Moogle* OW! WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT!?
Lightning: See Mog? Told you God wouldn't know what hit him!
Mog: @_@
Bhunivelze: I will forgive this INSOLENCE if you...
Lightning: Become the new Goddess of Death and replace Etro because someone has to hold Chaos back. Gee, that really worked well last time, don't you think maybe you should do something different?
Bhunivelze: SILENCE! Do you accept?
Lightning: No, seriously, why is it you need a LESSER Goddess to deal with Chaos when your power is absolute? You just really suck at this don't you? You don't even understand the first things about humans.
Bhunivelze: YES I DO! They make good puppets see!? *starts playing with Hope's body like a muppet* SEE!? THEY'RE GREAT TOYS! Wouldn't you want to do the same?
Lightning: No, I'd rather stay the way I am, thanks.
Bhunivelze: Then I suppose you must...die! LINDZEI! PULSE! COME TO ME!
Lightning: Oooh, how cute, you're using TWO OTHER GODS to help you fight one little ole' mortal like me? Just what kind of Omnipotent, All Powerful God of Light are you?
Bhunivelze: SILENCE! YOU WILL DIE OR BECOME THE GODDESS OF DEATH!
Lightning: Oh, I'll become the Goddess of Death, but not the one you want...
Bhunivelze: Wait, don't tell me...
Lightning: Your sins lay heavy upon you, DEFILER OF SOULS! By the Holy Law, YOU SHALL BE OBLITERATED!
*Final Boss fight sequence*
Bhunivelze: Now you will see my true power!
*laser beams and attacks*
Lightning: ...seriously? That's your best? Those Egyptian Dog things and Angels I fought just before this hit harder than you. Got anything else.
Bhunivelze: Yes, I do.
*Almagust*
Lightning: And now you're ripping off Ex-death.
Bhunivelze: YOU DARE MOCK MY ORIGINAL ATTACKS!?
*Starfall*
Lightning: Emperor Mateus now...
*Ultima*
Lightning: Oooh, Kuja now!
Bhunivelze: DAMN IT! I CAN TOTALLY BE ORIGINAL!
*Heartless Angel*
Lightning: Wow, you ripped off 2 villains with that one! A clown and a pretty boy!
Bhunivelze: YOU DARE MOCK MY ORIGINALITY!?
*Hype Nova*
Bhunivelze: HA! No one used that move yet!
Lightning: Look, just because you change the word "Super" to "Hyper" isn't the same as making a new attack. Heck, it even looks the same as the original version! What's next, going to hit me with a Big Bang because you're God and such? Or throw Super Elemental attacks to show you CONTROL THE CHAOS even though you don't?
Bhunivelze: Of course not! (...mostly because I haven't mastered Big Bang yet, can't get the anti-gravity lightning bolts to work right...)
Lightning: Heck, most of your attacks are pretty much just rip offs of Particle Beams with fancy names!
Bhunivelze: As if you have an original Trade Mark attack! HA! LET'S SEE YOU COME UP WITH ONE!
*Lightning hits Bhunivelze with Army of One, fight ends*
Lightning: Created that move back in FF13! Original then, and still the only one to use it! You've had 3 games to come up with ideas and all you can do is rip off other Final Fantasy villains! Seriously, you suck.
Bhunivelze: GOD'S WILL IS ABSOLUTE! NO HUMAN CAN STOP ME!
Lightning: You never could see in the heart of humans, otherwise you'd never have taken a soul of one into you, because he's legitimately holding you back...ok, not really, but I like that excuse!
Bhunivelze: What!? HOW COULD YOU KNOW!?
Lightning: Because I'M AWESOME! I'm taking Hope's soul back by the way!
*Hope Materializes*
Hope: Huh? Why am I alive, in physical form despite lacking a body and...still 16 years old? Damn it, what happened to my sexy adult self that basically ruled the world with science?
Lightning: We'll figure that part out later! Right now, I need to seal that angry god in the Chaos, and go with him because SOMEONE needs to hold it off.
Hope: You know, I'm sure there is an alternative to this.
Lightning: NO! I MUST DO IT NOW!
*Lightning does fancy stuff and ends up inside her mind again*
Lightning: Serah, you're here...no wait...that's not Serah...that's me...
*Lightning sitting in that crystal thrown, locked by Chaos*
Serah: Lightning, I'm not the real Serah, I'm a fragment made by God, but...I tried my hardest to be the real Serah! So you could find that part of yourself! Honest!
Lightning: That doesn't begin to make sense...
Fake Serah: Truth is, it wasn't God who cut away Serah from your soul...
Lightning: What?
Fake Serah: It was you who did it. Long ago, you cut out all the things that made you "weak" so you could grow up and become stronger! Your attachment to Serah was one of them.
Lightning: Ok, no, that's a complete wash as it completely undermines ALL THE DEVELOPMENT I HAD IN FF13 and the limited screen time I had in FF13-2. You can't force an "Oh, I cut out my emotions!" angle now when that clearly was not the case in the previous games.
Fake Serah: But that's what the script says! Anyway, that part of you did live on but not in God...
Lightning: Huh?
Lumina: ^_^
Fake Serah: Yes, that was really you; young, childish, weak...
Lightning: Only two of those words sum up Lumina...
Fake Serah: Still! In thinking like Serah, I can tell you this isn't what Serah wants, and that this isn't what you want! There's another way, and I'm sure Serah loves you with all her heart, as you should do with her!
Lightning: Oh god, did I seriously get written into a lesbian incest story? Because no, THAT'S NOW HOW I WANT MY STORY TO END!
Fake Serah: Go now, Lightning, back out of the Chaos!
Hope: Finally got you! See, I can reach!
Lightning: Thanks...
*Bhunivelze Breaks out of Chaos*
Lightning: So...let's kill God.
Hope: Ok!
*Bhunivelze fires danmaku laser beams at Lightning and Hope*
Lightning: NO! I WON'T LET YOU BEAT ME! But there's a lot of laser beams destroying planets...
Snow: THIS LOOKS LIKE A JOB FOR A HERO!
*punches away a beam, Shiva Sisters block another two*
Fang: You can count on us!
Vanille: Right!
*Fang and Vanille do similar things with their Eidolons*
Noel: ...damn it, I wish I had an Eidolon! STupid appearing only in the sequel.
*Smacks away some beams*
Lightning: It wasn't me alone that beat you God...oh, hi Odin!
*Odin, blocking beams, gives a slightly annoyed face at Lightning for nearly forgetting him*
Lightning: IT WAS THE POWER OF HUMANITY! ...even though I clearly fought you solo and that line makes no sense here because really all we're doing is fancy shenanigans when you'er clearly losing and I could solo you, but STILL, POWER OF HUMANITY!
Bhunivelze: YOU CANNOT DEFY GOD'S WILL!
Lightning: It shall be engraved upon your soul! Divine Assault! DEUS EX MACHINA!
*Bhunivelze dies*
Snow: So...what do we do now?
Lightning: Create a world that doesn't need Gods using the souls of everyone over there in that big white ball of stuff.
*Sazh and Dajh appear out of there*
Sazh: Did I miss the party...AGAIN!?
Lightning: Now if only Serah were here...
Noel; Just believe hard enough and she'll be here!
Lightning: Like that will wo-...
Serah: *in her FF13-2 outfit, with Mog* hi sis, I'm back!
Mog: Kupo!
Lightning: ...I've seen weirder crap, I won't lie. SERAH!!!
Vanille: So what will happen to the souls in the Chaos...
Caius: The Souls will move on, and they need someone to guide them.
Army of Yeuls: Yes, we will guide them, all of us.
Noel: OH NO YOU DON'T! YOU ARE NOT TAKING YEUL!
Caius: Trying to stop me!
Noel: YES!
*Caius grabs Noel by the throat*
Noel: Kill me, I dare ya!
Caius: You will take her place in the Chaos, is that fine?
Noel: If it means she lives, of course!
Caius: *smirk* Then take good care of her *lets go of Noel*
Noel: I will!
*Noel rockets back to the team, Yeul appears in his arms*
Army of Yeuls: She is the last of us, and the only one not bound by the fate of the Seeress!
Sazh: So about creating that new world thing...
Lightning: Right, let's do it! A world that doesn't need Gods...or Crystals...
Vanille: Shouldn't we say good bye to our Eidolons which haven't been relevant for 2 games?
*the team says good bye*
Fang: Wait, is this scene a rip off of FF6's ending or FF10's ending?
Vanille: Yes.
Lightning Narration: And so a new world was created. One without Crystals or Gods. One where humans can strive to be what they want. That was a long time ago though...long before you were even born!
*credits rolling*
EPILOGUE!!!!
Lightning: So the adventure is over, but a new one is bound to start.
*Lightning gets off train, dressed in normal every day clothing*
Lightning: It's a new world out there!
*Pan over planet that is CLEARLY NOT EARTH IN NO WAY SHAPE OR FORM WHATSOEVER THIS IS TOTALLY A DIFFERENT PLANET WE SWEAR*
The End
Onion Knight: So...anyone know what the hell we just watched?
Zidane: I dunno, I stopped paying attention 10 minutes in and just kept an eye out for all the pretty girls.
Squall: Typical...
Cecil: Does this game preach Light or Darkness? I mean, they killed the God of Light but are all still "WE MUST STRIVE TO THE LIGHT." I'm getting mixed signals here...
Terra: I think there may have been something to do with Love conquers all and follow your dreams but...
Firion: ...that would require any of these characters to have dreams to begin with. Did you see any mention of it?
Cloud: Look, if there is a moral in this story, I don't think anyone of us is capable of figuring it out.
Bartz: Oh, I know! The God of Light was the main character and trying to save everyone, right?
Warrior of Light: NO ONE DIGNIFY THAT WITH A RESPONSE!
Tidus: I think it's just safe to say the Story ends here?
Shantotto: The story will never end, until the will of Toriyama bends!
---
For those wondering, a serious rating I'm considering giving the game is 3/10. It did hold my attention to be fair, so I might be generous and give a 4/10 because I could play it for a while, but that was partially me just trying to get to the end ASAP and it's a huge time sink, and I'm not sure I was actually having fun.
-
FF6 Eviltype - Beat Zozo. I tried to limit myself in terms of grabbing Rages, I only used Leap three times and didn't get any of the true powerhouse options. The ones I've used most since are Templar (Auto-Safe + Fire 2), Lobo (2x power physical, every time), Brawler (Auto-Berserk, 2x physical or Stone), Bleary (Doom), and Trilium (Bio), although a couple of others have had a chance to shine. (No Stray Cat, Marshal, or Rhodox, though.)
Narshe battle - 2 resets. Not much to say here, bungled things a couple times. Eventually beat it with a team of Edgar/Sabin to hold one end and Terra/Celes/Locke/Gau as the main/boss-fighting team. Kefka was actually pretty easy with this team, Runic + another healer + good physicals out of Genji Glove Locke and Lobo Gau worked nicely.
Picked Celes/Locke/Edgar/Gau as my Zozo team. Locke's stealing has been pretty useful for financing my team especially with the reduced encounters, and hey he can output decent offence at least thanks to how powerful his weapons are... outdamages Cyan AND I can choose who he targets, although he is fragile. With little chance of Fire Dance before I'm done the Magitek Factory Sabin isn't an appealing choice either.
Dadaluma - 1 reset. I let this fight get out of control and an Iron Fist hits me with Slow 2 which is -horrifying-. One Running Shoes isn't enough when Dadaluma can (and does) OHKO my hasted PC with a throw. Second try I come back and apply the same strategy to him, using the Cirpius rage for Slow/Haste 2 (Gau later dies and I revive him to use Templar) which is amazing since he's vulnerable to slow. I use that and Bio Blaster's seizure to win. EDIT: Oh yes and Dadaluma died from seizure while in the middle of using Jump. This was pretty hilarious. *screen randomly flashes and all enemies disintegrate in a red haze with no visible cause*
-
Drakengard 3: Oh right, this exists. I'll totally get back to alphaville later, right (gaming time has been minimal lately anyway). So within the first ten minutes of the game I've been hit on by my sister and watched a dragon take a gigantic dump. Also later you recruit a UOM that walks around on peg legs and constantly talks about sex and whose bio outright tells you that he has a gigantic dick (thanks for that game). Keepin' it classy, Cavia-in-exile. Most of the humor is flat out not funny and I have no idea why anyone's doing anything. The protagonist is openly and unrepentantly psychopathic.
Dragon fighting is terribad (and constitutes every plot boss so far) but on-foot hacky slashy is okay. You have four weapon types that basically serve different purposes (speed/power/crowd control/range, spears don't necessarily >>> everything like in Nier), and can switch between them instantly without needing to fiddle with menus at all, which is cool. Not earthshattering gameplay or anything but it's perfectly functional. The camera is an intractable foe, however.
The environmental textures aren't any better than they were in Nier. Also your character accumulates bloodspatters in combat a la Dragon Age, except it looks even more ridiculous here because you're running around in lingerie.
Last night I fought the obligatory killer baby and then there were rocket rhinos or something. I don't even know.
So yeah it's pretty much what you'd expect. Oh, weapon stories are back too.
-
I bioblaster every WoB boss myself for that reason, Elfboy. Every little bit helps. I also need to break down and use Rage Gau at some point. Locke's fun in the WoB in general, though his niche vanishes in the WoR. His weapons stop being so relatively overpowered, defensive setups get better and he's competiting against fixed dice.
FF6 Eviltype- At the end of the world of balance. Beat Colossus in the early 20's. Poison did all the heavy lifting there. Been using Strago and Relm. The latter's funnily tanky (Memento ring+Marvel shoes) but not all that good, she just joins too late and too underpowered. Sketch is funny but has the same issues it did in Vanilla with not being that powerful. It's worth using at least once for all the goofy off the wall shit you can see though. ET Strago definitely is a good choice for the FC. The status rages (Including Discord) shithouse a lot of the dangerous FC fights, and Mag8 is excellent damage. I'll see how he holds up in the WoR.
This remains my favorite fanhack ever, just adds tons of replay and value to FF6. I'll see how the WoR goes. I remember Chadernook being an absolute bitch to kill early, but I want Strago and Relm in my team asap.
-
Drakengard 3: Oh right, this exists. I'll totally get back to alphaville later, right (gaming time has been minimal lately anyway). So within the first ten minutes of the game I've been hit on by my sister and watched a dragon take a gigantic dump. Also later you recruit a UOM that walks around on peg legs and constantly talks about sex and whose bio outright tells you that he has a gigantic dick (thanks for that game). Keepin' it classy, Cavia-in-exile. Most of the humor is flat out not funny and I have no idea why anyone's doing anything. The protagonist is openly and unrepentantly psychopathic.
Dragon fighting is terribad (and constitutes every plot boss so far) but on-foot hacky slashy is okay. You have four weapon types that basically serve different purposes (speed/power/crowd control/range, spears don't necessarily >>> everything like in Nier), and can switch between them instantly without needing to fiddle with menus at all, which is cool. Not earthshattering gameplay or anything but it's perfectly functional. The camera is an intractable foe, however.
The environmental textures aren't any better than they were in Nier. Also your character accumulates bloodspatters in combat a la Dragon Age, except it looks even more ridiculous here because you're running around in lingerie.
Last night I fought the obligatory killer baby and then there were rocket rhinos or something. I don't even know.
So yeah it's pretty much what you'd expect. Oh, weapon stories are back too.
Everyone talks about sex very casually in this game, and all of the disciples are one note like this, whether it be penis size, love of BDSM, or just general psychopathic violence. The sisters are also a bundle of neuroses. The only character who isn't immoral is your immature dragon sidekick, and Zero and other characters only have contempt for him.
The game doesn't get any funnier, relying on general misanthropy or gross-out humor. Later there are stupid platforming segments that Zero notes are stupid, but the game still put them in. They're not incredibly obstructive or difficult to get through but they are pointless and apparently the developers know they're pointless because they have the characters talk about how pointless they are. Characters also whine about how enemies seem to never stop coming, pointing out how repetitive fighting the same dudes is. Again, is this supposed to be poking fun at these tropes in general or is it the creators of the game making fun of themselves for the game they're giving you? It's just kind of odd.
The game is pretty bad, and I played through it despite just tolerating the gameplay and not caring very much about the story. It's ugly looking and technically very clumsy. Despite all this, I played all the branches other than D (which I just youtubed because fuck that), and I don't have a clear reason why.
-
Yeah, that's all pretty accurate. The only genuine laugh the game's got out of me was a moment of silence that went on so long as to forcibly recall the Rake Scene.
-
Lightning: Ok, give me one difference.
Life Stream won't destroy the planet no matter how much it is culminated. Chaos will.
Second, life doesn't need Chaos to be born.
BTW, Bhuni ripped off Kefka on three occasion.
Bhuni has not just Heartless Angel, but also Havoc Wing and Dancing Mad.
-
Drakengard 3: Oh right, this exists. I'll totally get back to alphaville later, right (gaming time has been minimal lately anyway). So within the first ten minutes of the game I've been hit on by my sister and watched a dragon take a gigantic dump. Also later you recruit a UOM that walks around on peg legs and constantly talks about sex and whose bio outright tells you that he has a gigantic dick (thanks for that game). Keepin' it classy, Cavia-in-exile. Most of the humor is flat out not funny and I have no idea why anyone's doing anything. The protagonist is openly and unrepentantly psychopathic.
Dragon fighting is terribad (and constitutes every plot boss so far) but on-foot hacky slashy is okay. You have four weapon types that basically serve different purposes (speed/power/crowd control/range, spears don't necessarily >>> everything like in Nier), and can switch between them instantly without needing to fiddle with menus at all, which is cool. Not earthshattering gameplay or anything but it's perfectly functional. The camera is an intractable foe, however.
The environmental textures aren't any better than they were in Nier. Also your character accumulates bloodspatters in combat a la Dragon Age, except it looks even more ridiculous here because you're running around in lingerie.
Last night I fought the obligatory killer baby and then there were rocket rhinos or something. I don't even know.
So yeah it's pretty much what you'd expect. Oh, weapon stories are back too.
Everyone talks about sex very casually in this game, and all of the disciples are one note like this, whether it be penis size, love of BDSM, or just general psychopathic violence. The sisters are also a bundle of neuroses. The only character who isn't immoral is your immature dragon sidekick, and Zero and other characters only have contempt for him.
The game doesn't get any funnier, relying on general misanthropy or gross-out humor. Later there are stupid platforming segments that Zero notes are stupid, but the game still put them in. They're not incredibly obstructive or difficult to get through but they are pointless and apparently the developers know they're pointless because they have the characters talk about how pointless they are. Characters also whine about how enemies seem to never stop coming, pointing out how repetitive fighting the same dudes is. Again, is this supposed to be poking fun at these tropes in general or is it the creators of the game making fun of themselves for the game they're giving you? It's just kind of odd.
The game is pretty bad, and I played through it despite just tolerating the gameplay and not caring very much about the story. It's ugly looking and technically very clumsy. Despite all this, I played all the branches other than D (which I just youtubed because fuck that), and I don't have a clear reason why.
It is Yokototaro being Yokotoraro, offending the players only because he can. He does terrible thing and make sure you recognize it being horrible. On top of that he takes this very seriously. He is trying to pump out as much malice as he can in this title.
And if you are playing this not knowing one, it only means you have been infected and become one of the Red Eyes, secretly enjoying the masochistic pleasure delivered by this game.
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BTW, Bhuni ripped off Kefka on three occasion.
Bhuni has not just Heartless Angel, but also Havoc Wing and Dancing Mad.
Definitely didn't call it either of those in the English version; it was mostly a bunch of a Latin (?) names with Almagust, Heartless Angel, Hyper Nova, and a big fancy name of an attack whose name eludes me in the 2nd form.
EDIT: Technically, Ultima is a Kefka rip off too, for all that I creditted it to Kuja there mostly because Kuja's is more memorable, and it added one more villain into the "rip off" count. Yes, I know Bartandelus had it in at least one form too.
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BTW, Bhuni ripped off Kefka on three occasion.
Bhuni has not just Heartless Angel, but also Havoc Wing and Dancing Mad.
Definitely didn't call it either of those in the English version; it was mostly a bunch of a Latin (?) names with Almagust, Heartless Angel, Hyper Nova, and a big fancy name of an attack whose name eludes me in the 2nd form.
Havoc Wing is the move where he swing his wings in 2nd form, and detonating the spheres in process.
Dancing Mad is the move in 2nd form if you let him finish charging.
BTW, how he looks in the 4th form is actually a rip off of Saruin's 2nd form from Romancing Saga.
Apparently ripping off from FF bosses alone cannot satisfy Bhuni.
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Ah, ok, didn't let him actually pull off Genthialic Hymn. The game says "Attack a lot when he does this" to stagger, so naturally, I did exactly that. Looknig at Split Infinity's FAQ, yeah, it's still called Dancing Mad here.
...and it occurs to me, I forgot he has Giga-Graviton which is Sin's move I believe. So that's another FF Villain he liberally rips off of.
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I kinda still want Drakengard 3 just for the weapon stories?
I haven't really considered really picking it up, despite how much I like the first game. Juvenile grimdark is okay, juvenil sex jokes nope
Phantom Brave: Beat Pringer X, Marona solo. So yeah I'm done... There was no fanfare.
Marona's vase is the destroyer of gods
Chaos Rings: Got this for the Vita.
It's not amazing but decent for a cheap game. Done by the Wild Arms team but it doesn't really feel like Wild Arms (Which is good)
Character design is Last Remnant / Front Mission 4 / Trauma Center guy, who's the best character designer around really.
Everything is gorgeous but they ran out of money in the middle so instead of having full regular dungeons, some parts of every dungeon are the exact same identical looking futuristic hallway.
There's some sort of 999esque story which I don't mind. There's an ultra-1337 bishie at the beginning who immediately gets killed, which is pretty sweet and establishes that the game generally prefers tan assholes with white hair to usual bishie jerks.
Gameplay is standard RPG with two characters. The two characters can use "Pair" to attack at once but risk getting hit by the same attack while doing that. I seriously don't see any point like, at all, yet? It's touted as the game's biggest innovation.
You can turn encounters off, and I did it as soon as I could. Now I'm stuck in a battle with a dumb AI partner and will have to grind for a while.
You get new abilities from random enemies like Soma in Castlevania, so that means I have very few skills.
Also the game's a shitty iOs port so the FPS is stuck to like 10.
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I played the iOS version through 3 of the pairs and dug it a fair bit for a cheap game. Have intended to finish it up and probably even do the sequel and prequel. They are just more of the same apparently.
Paired attack isn't super innovative, but the main reason to do it is it makes characters share passive skills, the game gives you stupid huge amounts of defensive passive skills. Also it lets you be significantly more resource intensive when fighter type gets MP regen.
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Oh okay. Since I barely have any skillsets I couldn't notice!
So there are 4 warrior/partner couples here, established as such, and in all but 1, the man is the warrior and the woman is the partner/waifu.
The only couple in which the woman is the warrior is Eluca/Zhamo, Eluca is this cool no-nonsense pragmatic type (WITH A TWINBLADE) and Zhamo is the weakling with a good heart.
They're on the right:
(http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6HAjiwQ2I7s/UOHxLATbq9I/AAAAAAAAD7Q/mlB9Pf1nFPc/s1600/eschereluca.jpg)
So yeah at one point they have to equip Warrior rings of Warrior or something, and SURPRISE the warrior is actually "FF4 Edward" Zhamo and not "Renegade FemShep" Eluca.
I really hope the justification for this is more:
- "The dude who made this place, and those dumb rings, is just really misogynistic okay"
and not :
- "Zhamo is actually strong thanks to... his pure heart? (And Eluca not that much... Since she's a woman? We haven't really thought about her, honest)"
I just killed my first other couple in a fairly tragic scene. Can't wait to kill that other jerk Escher and his dumb smile.
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It plays out like the latter sadly. I had high hopes too!
FFX - Finished. I had to fight Jecht like 3 times because I blitzed him too fast and got him to Phase 2 without buffs and debuffs up (Sword is strong 2HKO without protect and Power Break up even after filling past everyone's section of their sphere grid. I had forgot that!). I had forgot how fucking weird The Nucleus is. Past a point of no return run around in circles for a few minutes in an enclosed space that the camera pans around constantly. If you run into spikes you will fight a strong enemy before final boss with no chance to save. It showers you in neat weapons and items that you have zero use for in the coming fight mostly, but they would all be pretty interesting powerful gets in normal section of the game. I think that it is ultimately neat, but I have no fucking idea why it is there.
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Child of Light: I instantly went through puberty, and for some reason this doesn't alarm me.
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It plays out like the latter sadly. I had high hopes too!
This was actually way worse!
I thought they'd have the decency to, at least, not make the strong woman appear weak, but nope. She's all "We're all going to die" and he's all "Don't worry I'll protect you" so she's extremely grateful and says all she ever wanted was someone to protect her
...
This could have been acceptable if she wasn't the only strong woman in the game.
The other woman on the screen I showed above is strong-ish, but she's way below the jerk she's paired with, who she tries to kill but can't.
Eventually she learns that she was wrong all along, she acted impusilvely and should never have tried to kill him.
She was probably on her period LOL
Edit: At least that ending ranks pretty high on the crazy anime scale. I liked it.
In just one scene: "Yo this is EARTH TALKING. I sent you 10000 years in the past along with 4 other couples, because Lavos has destroyed everything in the future. You are now immortal. The darwinist experiment you just did existed to choose the extra strong new Adam and Eve. Make babies with stat bonuses so they can kill Lavos in 10000 years.
Yeah, I can grant immortality and manipulate time but this is the best plan I could come up with."
Re-edit: I forgot to talk about the excellent battle advantage mechanic, which made every boss battle fun. It works well with only 2 PCs.
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Drakengard 3: I'd say this about sums it up for today: http://bigsuprises.com/images/2013/January/9/50ed195d5ed4a.jpg
-
what the fuck
WHAT?
-
So you are saying Drakengaard 3 is ripping off way better games (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire_the_masquerade_bloodlines) that were doing shitty gameplay before it was cool?
Noted.
FFX-2 - Started this up. For some dumb reason I am following a guide for 100%. DEM CHIEVOS?!??!? It is honestly a little better than I remember! Dropping the combat speed to Slow and putting it to Wait helps the combat flow a bit better (it is very fast and spammy which I had forgot!). There is like way more interaction with things flowing in real time than I recalled too. I am kind of nearly maybe possibly digging it as a thought experiment.
It is a shame so much of it is brick walled behind an impenetrable wall of trying to make an open world JRPG while maintaining strict chapter based structure.
The plot stuff is even offending me a bunch less than last time. Probably because playing it directly after FFX lets me remember just how fucking goofy the fashion sense of Spira is so things like Leblanc is less WTFGOAWAY and I can truely appreciate how amazing Nooj really is. Also instead of being NOOOOO MAKE IT STOP WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO THESE CHARACTERS like the first time I saw the opening sequence I now realise that FFX-2 isn't a rampant cash grab at "female" market (ie just actually fanservice for creepy otaku). It actually is a rampant cash grab at making an FF game in the style of Charlie's Angels movies (ie just actually fanservice for creepy otaku).
That goes a long way. Also because of the previously mentioned going for dem chievos, I am playing along to Split Infinity's guide. This is like playing through the lens of the target market because holy fuck he is a creep. I have no idea how I missed this back in the day (until he started naming his FAQ versions after female characters in the games). I would refuse to use them due to how pretty gross they can be if they weren't so comprehensive. Sometimes it is beneficial to be Chaotic Neutral, ends justifies the means and the ends are whatever I want them to be.
-
Gameplay? Hahaha. (Obviously it was a cutscene.)
-
That goes a long way. Also because of the previously mentioned going for dem chievos, I am playing along to Split Infinity's guide. This is like playing through the lens of the target market because holy fuck he is a creep. I have no idea how I missed this back in the day (until he started naming his FAQ versions after female characters in the games). I would refuse to use them due to how pretty gross they can be if they weren't so comprehensive. Sometimes it is beneficial to be Chaotic Neutral, ends justifies the means and the ends are whatever I want them to be.
I'm curious to hear more about this! I've read plenty of SI FAQs...but only for battle mechanics where nothing else really can be inserted without it being really weird.
-
He names his FAQ versions after in-game female names and makes lewd comments about the girls. It's very embarrassing.
-
Case in point, his final version of FFX-2 is "Cool Rikku"
To start the first mission after the opening.
An alarm will go off - in the
elevator choose second option to reach bridge hallway. Approach your MN and
it's time for first HS! When prompted, squeeze Yuna's pretty a... um, I mean,
push action button.
'FR - upper tier': Because you can't really do it, you'll get a nice look at
Yuna's booty instead. Awww, c'mon how much longer will you keep pulling her
up, girls? When in control, go N.
-
Dear lord, if he ever ends up in court over a possible sexual harassment lawsuit or whatever, you could mail his entire FAQ collection to the prosecution as behavioral evidence.
-
Dear lord, if he ever ends up in court over a possible sexual harassment lawsuit or whatever, you could mail his entire FAQ collection to the prosecution as behavioral evidence.
Pretty sure his youtube channel is already doing that job:
https://www.youtube.com/user/SplitPlaythru
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I am shocked and appalled that someone who spends that much time on video games is a creepy weirdo.
-
I did the optional stuff in Chaos Rings and I don’t think I want to do it 3 other times?
This game basically has the weakest randoms in any game. I was level 30 and could autobattle some level 91 enemies.
FFX-2 HD: It was cheap. I have FFX HD too if I get bored.
The logic behind which cutscene is skippable and which isn't seems arbitrary so it’s kind of like the lottery!
Paine solo GO
I’m planning to not ever use a guide or else I might end up with reviving Tidus. No way.
- Ormi + Logos : Lol
- Leblanc : Lol
First dungeon. Yuna’s running animation is completely ridiculous. Enemies are so easy, except Ahrimen.
- Ormi Logos + Leblanc : Surprisingly decent! Logos has h4x infinite turns. I died once due to entering the fight blinded by an Ahriman with no eye drop in sight. Then I blinded Ormi and Logos, stole all their shit and beat them with a fan.
- Boris: The game was handing me a bunch 200 HP potions in the first dungeon so I was not very afraid of 50 damage attacks. For fun I ALSO blinded and power down'd the fuck out of him.
Next I can actually explore so I just go raid some villages for their sweet loot.
10 seconds later I am giving balloons to children. FFX-2/ 10
I realize that Paine is actually super lame because she has all these dreadful one liners. “Smoking is BAD for you” *Uses Fire* Still better than Rikku (She probably slept with Brother. Gross) and Yuna (She slept with Tidus. Super-gross)
- Besaid dragon: Another Boss Owned By Blind. I should note that this new dressphere is pretty awesome. Warrior-ish stats + Damage&Status from the beginning of the game. It's FFT Beowulf in FFX-2.
BTW Grefter was 100% right
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Paine solo forbids the use of a turbo-twinked Malboro, does not compute
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New Super Mario Bros. U - Beaten
Really not a fan of the physics in this game.
Happily, I managed to find a bunch of secret exits in the latter half of the game which ended up skipping most of it. No intention of going for any sort of completeness.
Thought the final was fairly entertaining, at least.
Famaze - Beaten
Fairly entertaining the first couple of times you play through, but doesn't really have much staying power?
If I could have found the 7th artifact, I would have played for less than half the time I ended up playing. In the end I got so sick of it that I tampered with the save file. The true ending wasn't worth it.
It's not even like the artifact should have been difficult to find, the other six were all just in each of the miniature levels. But there were only six miniature levels available as far as I could find? One of them seemed to be repeated, so maybe my copy of the game was broken somehow.
Half-Minute Hero: The Second Coming - completed assuming you ignore going for 100 points in Infinite Hero
Pretty great.
Smear-graphics aren't even an option this time, so someone at Marvellous came to their senses.
The game is all Hero 30 style, so on the off-chance that someone actually liked any of the other styles in the original game I guess that's bad news for them, but I thought that Evil Lord 30 and Princess 30 were terrible so it's all fine by me.
The Global system is much more gamer-friendly than the original's level select system - no more having to shuffle your equipment around before retrying old levels - but it does feel a bit like they threw balance to the sharks, letting you take endgame equipment and G-Level into the very first levels. Also means that the storyline is nowhere near as branchy as the original's - and the only branches I can remember are of the sort where they're just letting you choose what order to do levels in, where you still need to play them all in order to progress. So that's kind of a downgrade.
I tried Infinite Hero Normal and got to 89 or so, which feels like kind of a good score but also took long enough that I have no interest in trying again.
Etrian Odyssey IV - beaten
Also pretty great.
I am confused that the party doesn't seem to have ruined everything, per tradition but maybe revealing that is left for the postgame.
Can I assume that the postgame is still mainly for the benefit of crazy people? I guess I have seen people claiming that the dragons in 4 are the easiest they've ever been so I might throw my party at one and see how things go. Did barely beat Iwaoropenelep, which probably technically counts as postgame content, but which I also assume has nowhere near the power of the dragons.
Party was Landsknecht (Imperial), Fortress (Dancer), Medic (Arcanist), Sniper (Nightseeker), and Runemaster (Bushi). I hardly touched the subclasses and mainly just used them for the extra SP.
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I didn't even know you could control monsters in FFX-2. I'll replace Paine with something obviously superior like a Marlboro if it's much better.
I can't help to get sick amount of APs in every battle. I use special abilites, steal from every enemy, etc.
It's especially hard to resist farming White Mage, who's all "Dude just keep your finger on that X button for 5 minutes and you'll have 60 more APs"
Dressphere ranking so far:
- The new Beowulf job: Actually totally overpowered. Best HP, tied for best attack, second best vitality, second best evasion, no weakpoints. Status + Damage attacks, and some Esuna spell that also heals. Wow. The two other girls are stuck with crappy elemental attacks instead of this sick stuff.
- Warrior: Worse than Beowulf in everything but vitality (but the lower Hps compensate). Spellsword is shit. Stat downs can be moderately useful. Mad Rush is fun but Haste wears off after like 2 turns.
- Gunner: High damage against low defense, nothing else.
- Songstress: No
- Thief: Steals everything. High durability thanks to evasion.
- Black Mage: Bad durability makes this job too dangerous. Ethers aren't growing on trees either, even if I'm stealing from every living thing I see.
- White Mage: Inferior to potions so far, but THAT AP FARM
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Yeah you even get a new dressphere for doing the first monster arena thing. Despite its name you can enter with any kind of party.
The Festivalist is actually pretty good on Rikku, the elemental attacks do three half (75% for holy) power chain hits which adds up to respectable damage, or in case of gravity if you're not immune cHP damage+chains = oops you died. Never did try Yuna's
Edit: Oh yeah talk to Shinra for the monster stuff
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Oh man I could have soloed the game with Brother!!
I might switch Paine for a L monster once in a while, but I think the novelty will wear off after a while.
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Thanks Tonfa.
Psychic Paine is the best thing.
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Better than Thief Paine's thong over bike shorts with giant holes in them? Look forward to it.
I am still fucking around with side shit because 100% is 100% stupid.
Also you need to break your solo to win a fight with Black Mage Rikku and marvel at Liefeld Victory Pose.
(http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140410041826/finalfantasy/images/8/81/Rikku_Black_Mage_Victory_Pose_-_Final_Fantasy_X-2_Remaster.jpg)
*WINK*
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Leifeld pose?
dude it is perfectly possible for a human body to bend that way
after like an hour of doing yoga
and only for like 15 seconds
and you have to be sitting down for it while pushing your forearm against your bent leg to get the twist
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Liefeld pose. Like this
(http://static.comicvine.com/uploads/original/14/145984/3273188-4964315512-rob2..jpg)
He is a super successful comic book artist from a strange era of comics, the 90s.
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(http://images.wikia.com/finalfantasy/images/a/a8/Psychic_Paine.jpg)
WOO
In her exit dressphere animation she somehow flies into space with her jetpack arms like Iron Man
This is the only non-bad suit she has that I've seen. Everything else is like 0 or 1/10.
I can't use it yet because I've unlocked it in the arena by fighting with a dragon. She can't beat the arenas by herself because there's a Castlevania Birds formation that's just way too strong for herself alone.
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holy mother of christ
what
the
hell
-
Drakengard 3: All this time I was playing Hatoful Boyfriend and I didn't even know it.
Ending A get. lol go back and get a less crappy ending scrub. La la la la la. La la la la la. La la la la la.
-
holy mother of christ
what
the
hell
You say this like it's somehow not from FFX-2 and is therefore surprising.
-
holy mother of christ
what
the
hell
You say this like it's somehow not from FFX-2 and is therefore surprising.
I haven't yet played FFX-2 and I've seen nearly nothing from it besides the appalling Floral Fallal costumes. Apparently, I did the right thing.
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Huh, an Atelier Iris LP... *pops in the game after reading an update*.
This game is a mess! But holy crap these shopkeepers are awesome!
The best one is "Oscar, the Fugitive Chef!" Escaped from the confines of the kitchen, he travels around turning things into food, sometimes even erstwhile travelers! This is my favorite kind of goofy. :)
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Veola still best shopkeeper.
Game's not really so much of a mess as much as mildly engaging fluff at best. Klein and Delsus are nice, Pamela is good for a laugh occasionally, but Veola steals the show. Says something when the shopkeeper NPC is the best character.
-
There's a reason fans speculate that the game originally WAS Atelier Veola and some drama CDs from Gust definitely wink at the fans on that very fact.
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Professor Layton and the Azran Legacy: It is unfortunately impossible for me to see a "Professor Sycamore" without flashing back to Pokemon XY, with a side of Kill-la-kill since the Aikuro/Sycamore mashup fanart was hilarious.
Not much to say otherwise, gameplay is standard Layton fare.
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I'm not even being ironic when I say that Psychic Paine is great. She totally has that final boss look. In battle she's floating in air in that effortlessly cool way.
Grefter what do you think. You're our fashion expert.
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It's a legitimately solid costume, even before you compare it to the rest of them.
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It is a legitimately solid costume because it is straight up a Shin Megami Tensei protaganist outfit (even has the immaculate shoes). I have nothing bad to say about it. I think Yuna's looks more like a final boss though without having seen them in motion.
I do think you are overlooking some other solid choices (Paine does tend to have the better outfits! Other than Festivalist because Yuna gets generic Kimono look)
Like out of the original outfits I think Trainer is probably some of the best.
(http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20090729095116/finalfantasy/images/9/95/Ff10-2-paine4.jpg)
Like yeah it isn't something I would rate normally, but Spiran fashion trends towards bright orange belly shirt and purple chaps. Trainer Paine is like some kind of fusion of that Spiran trend towards patchworks of natural materials and a ball gown with full length gloves that are functional because she is using them for Falconry.
And her White Mage is kind of phenomenal. The other two white mage outfits are boring as fuck. Paine though gets something that is like what I would hope the WM outfit would be for a Final Fantasy game set in the 70s club scene.
(http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20070716115657/finalfantasy/images/7/78/Ff10-2-paine13.jpg)
Tights, some fucking sick Go Go Boots and that weird jacket/dress/robe hybrid thing goes together pretty great.
Even to the other girl's credit, the WM outfits presented here are probably the best uses of colour the series has had. Even Holly Whyte's better outfit is a minimal use of colour and is just a great use of lines to draw attention.
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a Final Fantasy game set in the 70s club scene.
Day 1
Nice post. TBH yeah those are cool. I haven't unlocked Trainer and couldn't really notice the details on White Mage in game.
As far as Paine's outfits go I specifically don't like:
- Warrior (= Default Paine, Nomura Paine)
- Thief (Yeah...)
- Black Mage (Overdone)
- Gunmage (Way overdone)
- Gunner (Looks reasonable compared to others but shows too much skin and has too many colors)
- Full Throttle (It looks like you're supposed to use this exoskeleton mainly for sex but I don't know how)
- Edit: I'm adding songstress there. Camel toe.
I don't have any other dresspheres but these, Festivalist, White Mage and Psychic.
And Festivalist is inoffensive but boring.
Psychic Paine looks like this in game:
http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140103170804/finalfantasy/images/archive/c/cd/20140408195057!FFX-2_Victory_Paine_Psychic.png
By the way Psychic Paine looks almost as OP as Festivalist Paine. Good stats, elemental immunity, time stop, Haste + other buffs in one spell, MT damage...... And I still haven't unlocked everything.
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I probably would have given her Gendo Glasses.
Not going to lie, none of these are the outfits I am really looking forward to seeing and using the most though.
The one I am looking forward to is Sexy Space Marines in bright orange underpants.
(http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20070716115826/finalfantasy/images/5/59/Ff10-2-paine15.jpg)
“Combine items and master their use.”
Edit - Oh and regarding day 1 purchase of an FF game set in the 70s club scene, I would be right there with you on day 1. Like literally would fly to France and probably grab Tonfa on the way and we would binge play that shit until it was finished.
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Etrian Odyssey IV - Beat Fallen One & Warped Savior (poisoned)
Party was essentially offensively useless against the Great Dragon and carried by the guest member. The following shifts in level cap meant that this was no longer the case for the Storm Emperor and far from the case for the Blizzard King.
Ended up beating Fallen One on levels 92 and Warped Savior on levels 93. Luck probably played a major part in each victory.
I see no reason to attempt fighting the non-poisoned Warped Savior.
Item completion is only missing the special drops from the three Gourds and the Moth Lord, and distressingly the regular drop from the Fallen One, but I see no real reason to finish that off.
I have gained an appreciation for Squall Volley + Follow Trace and Runes in general + (Auto) Blood Surge. Imperial meanwhile seems to be far and away the least useful of the subclasses I used.
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Veola still best shopkeeper.
Game's not really so much of a mess as much as mildly engaging fluff at best.
I'm assuming that when he called the game a mess, he probably means the disaster that was sidequesting/shop upgrades. The game doesn't tell you, but the game will only let you take one "Sidequest" at a time, and is kind of random for what this means. So if you try to do a bunch of stuff without completing whatever random sidequest you last took, stuff will not occur! This is in fact a large mess for a game that about unlocking items and seeing more Veola scenes. It's horrendous to get everything until/unless you realize this limitation.
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Child of Light: Beaten. Final levels were 42ish? I played on Hard mode or whatever it's called.
Overall the game was well-polished but seriously short. They shoot their load too early with the flying so there's not really anything novel left to do platforming-wise. Oh, you have to navigate through sharp thorns! Oh, you have to navigate through sharp thorns with a bigger hitbox!
Enemies were competent and had lots of counterattacks, probably too many really (not sure how it is on normal mode). A lot of times you were pigeonholed into using a specific character (usually the Capilli) on enemies. Game was still easy overall, especially with no penalty for dying and free heals on levelup. Hardest fight was Nox, too damn fast and had a water attack that did 75% to Big Guy even when defending.
Most of the characters were useful in some respect. Rankings!
Capilli - as only source of elemental damage outside Aurora, was needed way too much for randoms and bosses.
Bolmus - Pretty much any time I had problems with a boss the answer was always this guy.
Aurora - Light damage woot.
Big Guy - Taunt.
Comedy - Useful earlygame for speedy interrupts. Bad lategame, weak damage and weak healing.
Temp - Decent but doesn't really stand out
Fish - Joins too late but I did use on last boss. Paralyze hax.
Tragedy - Worthless
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Did you not properly abuse elemental stones, el capitan? Capili's generally still best for elemental nukes, but at least other people can still contribute that way.
I found the final boss to be much meaner than Nox, but that's perhaps because they're fought in sequence and my party's resources were trashed after Nox. To be fair, they're both total status bait once their support is dead. Paralyze is too damn good.
Re: Atelier Iris, yeah there's one item which is required for one of Veola's last quests that as far as I'm aware is a one-of-a-kind find. It's possible to sub this in for a lesser component in an earlier invention if you don't know any better. Not that this was a thing which happened in my game and denied me a proper end to her storyline (NOT BITTER AT ALL). Yeah, she's totally the best part of the game.
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I'm not sure who Big Guy is but the low level Hard mode Let's Play I watched some of used Tristis as the Tank (and gets some kind of cover + buffs) ;o
-
Tristis is kinda interesting lategame (his skyrocketing defenses -do- matter at that point, and his damage reduction buffs can also help there as well), but he takes a long time even -getting- there and his offense is disheartening (Rubella-level damage gets you absolutely nowhere). Óengus' tanking game is honestly more relevant due to providing proactive tanking (and that's HUGE considering the system). His MDef can be an issue, but the HP usually compensates, and you can slap a magic resistance gem on him anyway to mitigate that. Honestly, lategame, Óengus and Finn felt like the best PCs due to overall best offense (Robert even comes close to Óengus' strength with just a little bit of damage buffing, but Óengus mults and easier access to higher-level attacks are hard to surpass, and Finn's magic off the passives just soars ahead of the rest of the cast even -before- weakness-hitting. I was scoring 700 damage on L3 thunder spells after Rage of the Capilli hit L3 against neutral enemies by the end).
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Legend of Zelda: Minish Cap: Beat the first dungeon, now in Hyrule Town trying to figure out what to do next. So many things to look around at and such!
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Child of Light- fin. Cute game with no shortage of valid ideas that never quite come together into a full game. Some of it is just that there's not enough content relative to the tools you have, some of it is being clearly rushed and a bit disjointed (and the rhyming gimmick not being done all that well), and some is some strange decisions in the core mechanics. It's definitely worth playing, a short game that still has a full gameplay arc, just it's not as good as it was trying to be. 7/10.
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FF10 HD: Middle of Thunder Plains. Was going to play more before analysis but...long overdue, so here we go!
First notable thing about Tidus is the Shoopuff stuff. First off, he awes at a city underwater, because hey, that's neat and unexpected! Wakka quizes him on the "Why" and Tidus gives a simple logical answer of "Well, it's really convenient with all that water" and Wakka basically goes "NO! YOU'RE WRONG! THEY WANTED TO PROVE SOMETHING!" Now, here's something I didn't remember; Tidus didn't just take it and move on, he actually went "I'm not so sure..."; he's basically avoiding an argument, but at the same time, expressing he disagrees. This exchange, small as it is, shows two things about Tidus' character:
A. He's got half a brain. Tidus isn't what I'd call a "smart guy" but he's also not an idiot. "Average Intelligence" sums up Tidus pretty well, so while not winning any awards on intelligence, he's not going to trip over his own feet and can put things together. It's rare we see this since so many games either aim for displaying the characters as bright, or just downright morons; Tidus actually is believably middle ground.
B. Tidus isn't simply just eating all the crap he's being spoonfed. Wakka, very confidently, tells Tidus that he is wrong, and Wakka as we know is brainwashed by Yevon like the rest of Spira, Al Bhed not withstanding. Nonetheless, Wakka shows every bit of confidence in his argument, while Tidus is more just proposing ignorant speculation because he doesn't actually know, just "Well, I think this." Thing is, rather than going "oh, I see, guess I was wrong", Tidus' "I'm not so sure" response indicates that while he doesn't know the truth, he isn't convinced that Wakka, as confident as his claim is, is right.
After this, Tidus is pretty quick to point out "if Machina is evil, why do you guys use it for things like Blitzball?" which is fair, but thankfully Lulu responds this time with a logical "it depends on the Machina, Yevon tells us." This is less a Tidus thing and more the game covering its own setting with hypocrisy, using Tidus as a logical point to question it, which is exactly why Tidus I think works as a character, as on top of being a character, he's also a proxy for the player; he knows as little about Spira as the player does, thus asks the questions he asks.
Fight with Rikku, then, another quick exchange happens, with Wakka being all "AL BHED ARE THE DEVIL!" rants because racist. Tidus, much to my surprise, said something I don't remember him saying, but nonetheless, great line to use for people who claim Tidus does nothing but whine; he tells Wakka to stop the useless complaining and just focus on protecting Yuna. Yes, Tidus, the alleged whiner, just told Wakka to stop his whining and focus on the task at hand.
Nothing much happens outside of Guadosalam, where it's mostly Tidus speaking his mind. This is Tidus being naive as he's still not use to the fact that Maester = Super Important Role. He doesn't like Seymour, so he says disrespectful things in his own house (much to Yuna's dismay.) After that, we get the Farplane.
Tidus whines about Jecht again, the one thing he actually does whine about in the game, and to this point, the game tries to establish that Tidus' complaints are justified because Jecht was a total douche. Yuna questions why Tidus hates him so much and Tidus first responds "Everything he does pisses me off!" but then in a surprise, comes to an even more concrete conclusion, that being Tidus loved his mother a lot, but everytime Jecht was home, she'd completely ignore him in favor of his father. IOWs, he has a legitimate Oedipus Complex, wanting to spend time with his mother but competing with his father. In discovering this, he comes to a realization about Jecht as well, that Jecht wasn't entirely a bad person, as he remembers his father sometimes going "Oh, spend time with him, he'll just cry about it if you don't."
This scene is important for two reasons, one being Tidus and the other being Jecht. The Tidus reason is that Tidus finally starts to recognize why his father is an outlet of his anger, and it's the first time he ever looks at his father in something more than just pure negativity. It's not necessarily positive, but it's the first time Tidus started having shades of grey, which in itself shows Tidus is just now starting to doubt his own beliefs. The other side is Jecht; until this point, all the Jecht scenes we've seen were purely from Tidus' perspective so "This guy is a total dick!" Yet somehow, Yuna is capable of finding him "kind and gentle" and it's implied Auron respects Jecht as a friend, so there's obviously a disconnect. This is the first instance we see that maybe there's more to Jecht than meets the eye, which we will later discover Jecht wasn't so much a dick as much as just bad at expressing himself towards his son. In this scene, we see Jecht actually telling his wife to spend time with their son instead of himself, a very fatherly thing to do, but with the "he'll cry about it if you don't" demonstrates that he's just bad at giving a good reason. Obviously what Jecht meant was "he needs you more than me, spend time with him" but said it in a poor, demeaning way. Basically, heart was in the right place, but his ego got in the way. This is the first hint towards the fact that Jecht is a legitimately good guy, just is too full of himself at times to express it properly.
The rest of the sequence is mostly Tidus probing Lulu for info about Yuna, and him thinking marrying Seymour is silly. It doesn't really show much of Tidus' character other than I guess being an early precursor that "yes, the two have a budding relationship." I mean, why would Tidus care so much about Yuna getting married if it's just for PR? I guess you could argue "because Tidus wants his friends to be happy" but yeah, this sequence is mostly Tidus being a proxy of the player again; marriage is not a simple thing to commit too, most players are probably thinking "DON'T DO IT! YOU BARELY KNOW THE GUY!"
Not much in Thunder Plains, outside of Tidus probing Auron for "So...that's all you have to say?" and Auron's response of "The pilgrimage will still go on, I have no objections." Fair, Auron just wants to get Yuna to Zanarkand (the reason of course is not obvious on a first playthrough, but that's not important here), so makes sense he doesn't care what Yuna's decision is if the pilgrimage keeps going. Tidus' reaction is less whiny, and more "seriously, you're really going to go through with it? Just like that? IT'S MARRIAGE!"
...yeah, I had a lot to say for such a small part of the game apparently, guess it's a good thing I talked about this now!
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Grefter that would totally be the best thing to happen to me this year.
We're waiting Squeenix.
FFX-2: Just brought monkeys to other monkeys because We hate tourism.
Whatever guys it's FFX-2.
Anyway this took me like an hour.
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I'll admit, my take on that was always less "But does she love him," and more "But what sort of advantage does this get either of them?" I mean, Summoners and Maesters are big deals, and it's not uncommon for people who are big deals to treat marriage as a sort of business deal, no love involved.
Eventually figuring out the motivations of both parties as they gel in the Bevelle sequence is always fun. Mostly because Seymore's motivations are just so delightfully twisted.
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DQ6 - I have no time at night any more and am only getting to play while I fall asleep. fFX-2 trying to get 100% requires too much faqbait to keep going for a bit. So this. I am trying to do txt as mindlessly as possible. Right down to arena abuse as soon as I find one. So I am trying to secure bankroll for that.
Holy shit is the casino in this fucking dumb. You don't need to include a short cut key to quit playing, then ask me if I want to keep playing after each spin and if I say yes I really don't need you to tell me instructions after I have already played multiple times.
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Would like to be playing more Child of Light, but oh well! Not going to complain about being on holiday.
Random games played recently:
Mario Kart 8, Brawl, various Mario and Mega Man games - Not much to say about these, good times were had.
Ducktales Remastered - Never played the NES game, but this seems pretty fun. May pick it up at some point.
Slowly working through Eviltype while on vacation, of course, so the rest of the post is about that.
After Zozo I did another Veldt run, which I don't normally do, because I was a bit worried about my team's power level and figured a slight push on spells might be appreciated (not that I actually got many). Most notable thing gained during this sequence was the Anguiform Rage, which uses a MT water attack 100% of the time (though which one varies) and is hence amazing.
Opera House - Edgar/Gau team. 1 reset. Took too much time because the rats steadfastly refused to get out of my way ever. Every single one. Second attempt they cooperated a bit better and things went more smoothly. I steal a couple Rising Suns here which are nice.
Ultros 2 decides to be bad, never using a damage-dealing move outside his not-too-threatening physical. Rising Suns (which randocast Fire 2), Templar Rage, and Edgar shenanigans make him take not too long, although he still does two fullheals.
Magitek Factory is a smooth afair because Anguiform largely wrecks it, especially with Noiseblaster to help.
Shiva/Ifrit - Aren't too bad, although they can output a fair bit of damage, since whatever I have four PCs and lots of revival and they have some crappy turns. I use a fair bit of Runic but it doesn't stop everything, and the Lobo rage since it's safe and boring.
Number 024 - Is a defensive boss who relies on turtling against elements and helaing himself periodically. For some reason Sage also removed his Seizure vulnerability. This was a poor choice, as seizure kicking in means his defensive game sucks and he becomes a joke. If there's one change I would make to Eviltype, it is fixing that hole. It's not as if Edgar is in danger of being too weak...
Minecart sequence - 1 reset. The red Mag Roaders hit really hard and although I'm able to tank through them with an ice-nulling rage, sadly they prove to be the formation right before the boss who I die to immediately after. Whoops. Second try I just make sure to keep them very, very confused. I don't have too much to say about Number 128, except that Locke spends much of the fight dead (yay Genji Glove), and that seizure and slow are really useful. Approaching the fight defensively works well, which feels like it shouldn't work but so it goes.
Cranes - In theory the hardest Vector fight but naaah. Their MP is pretty low so they can be quickly Rapsed away from the danger zone. Rasp so good in Eviltype. Float helps for Magnitude8, Protect makes the physicals less terrifying, and Anguiform cuts through them pretty badly.
Okay that went well. At this point I forget that Golem and ZoneSeek exist, which proves a bad idea eventually. I do remember to get Mog and pick up a few dances. Mog's higher level (18 to the ~13 of everyone else) is a big deal.
Sealed Cave - 1 reset in the early areas, Liches and their stupid fire magic prove a bit much. Anyway I run this with a Terra/Mog/Gau/Edgar, Noiseblast what you can and abuse water weakness (Water Rondo, Anguiform) or fire weakness (Dusk Requiem, Bomb) on everything else. Terra should probably get Fire 2 around this point but due to levels mine sadly doesn't, but oh well.
At the banquet I just miss the Charm Bangle. I'll live.
Burning House - 3? resets on the randoms here. This proves the first main problem area in a while, probably since Ultros 1. Enemies have fine damage and my three-PC team will wipe fast if I'm not careful, especially against six-balloon formations. I start equipping a Back Guard for randoms here because ambushes can easily be fatal. Beyond that, a Shiva summon from Terra and an Aqua Rake send the enemies packing, sufficiently boosted, so I mostly just use that and hope the initiative doesn't hate me (Locke can heal mid-attack if he goes before the enemies and Terra or Strago doesn't).
FlameEater - 2 resets. FlameEater has limited MP like the cranes, which is great. Unfortunately I don't have Rasp on anyone here... Terra is close but even getting her Ice 2 involves fighting some superfluous random formations in the forest area of Thamasa Island, which I normally might skip. Fortunately he uses enough costly spells that I can run him out, but this is kind of tricky. I buff my entire team with Safe and Shell (and have one shot of Kirin for MT regen) and try to keep the balloons under control. The best bet is to confuse them with ST muddle and not kill them, as they will blow up periodically on each other or the boss. (One of them blowing up on me is bad, and lots of enemies attacking at once is bad.) I don't want him to resummon too often because I don't want to see a Grenade, but on the winning run I fortunately do not. Anyway he runs himself out of MP quickly enough especially once he starts using reflected Fire 3 (haha, unreflected it would OHKO through Shell, but reflected I can deal with). After that his offence drops some and more importantly I no longer have to fear his Fire 2 counters which could, coupled with his own turns, wipe me out. Ice 2 does him in after enough tries. I use a very defensive setup otherwise since nobody else's offence really matters.
Ultros 3 - 2 resets here. Ultros hits hard. His skillset includes MT Tentacle, 75% ST gravity, Stone (confuse, 2HKO magic), and decently hard-hitting ST physicals. A small amount of this OHKOs before Protect, but it pretty much all 2HKOs after. Not too bad except he sometimes doubleacts (although MT Tentacle x2 doesn't seem possible) so even with all my buffs he can kill people, and reviving with three people AND rebuffing ain't easy. Terra still doesn't have Fire 2 and front row is right out as an option so my only really good damage is Locke. Ultros is inexplicably floating so dual Hawk Eyes hurt real bad, which is good because the longer the fight goes, the more chance something can go wrong. He also has Dischord (lowers level/offence) and L2 Daze which can muddle/stop people of the appropriate level, and Dischord means who is what level changes. Pretty painful, and if he ever got all three people to an even level at once and used it I'd pretty much just wipe (hence the need for a reasonably fast win). I would have won this first try (I got Relm to show up) but he decided to OHKO Relm and then wipe my party as I tried to revive her. Second try I die faster, third I win. Good, tough fight.
I managed to save all my randoms here for after I got Relm (4 PCs learning spells instead of 3 is good) so I'll have notes on the dungeon itself later.
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Elf: Can you make a save for me once you beat Darril's tomb? I want to take another hack or two at the WoR. Thanks.
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Thanks for the input Snow~ Interesting. Will keep that in mind. I have the game now. Definitely enjoying Finn so far though I currently only have the base level Rage of the Capilli. Will keep taking him along that line then~
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That seemed the immediate and obvious best path to me. I headed down the Fire path after getting deep into Lightning, but water and fire seem fairly interchangeable.
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Thanks Grefter :)
Yeah, I am enjoying the game so far. Playing on Extreme and seeing how far I can get with mandatory fights only but I might relax that to allowing fights and rewards from whatever I accidentally stumble into later, that and optional boss types, or maybe only optional boss fights depending. Currently just got the mouse and only have the EXP from the three boss fights so far. Except for the first boss Aurora was only L1 so I eventually winded up having to do it on Casual though put it up to max battle speed for that. This was with DLC perks though (was able to clobber together a Tumbled Emerald, Tumbled Amethyst and Tumbled Ruby from DLC and stuff along the way)~
I still had to be on the ball for the Guardians at L1 and with limited healing items/plant use. Finishing off the second one was a bit of a race helped by the use of plants which eventually recharged. I don't feel entirely great about not doing it on Extreme though wonder if it is indeed possible on Extreme at L1. Game and characters are fun, Aurora is still kind of ehh but she is only L9, Rubella is fun, fast, interrupts stuffs, heals and revives saving some of my items, can take some damage, and Counter Heal well that's just right up my street (problem is all of her lines, Tumble, Heal, Revive, all seem good so where I take her will depend on SP limitations and what comes up), Finn brings the pain with magic, Golem is apparently the early game tank, haven't used the sister yet but Haste/Haste All and Unstoppable look good, actually Slow looks like it could be useful too, like Rubella all of her lines seem solid, just got Robert, not sure about him yet~
Update - Just beat spider dungeon. Sister and mouse were quite good, starting with level advantages definitely helped there, especially on Robert. Rain Arrows for MT physical off speed, I like this. Sister is fastest, and made good use of hasting allies and slowing enemies. Robert mocked the minion spiders then Finn mocked the giant spider with magic since physicals didn't do as much there. Sister, Robert, Rubella and Finn were all useful in this dungeon~
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Robert is a character whose worth goes up and down depending on the game's flow and how you build him. I find it very important to beeline into the Slow-inflicting physicals tree as soon as possible, and he benefits quite well from the crit boosting too. I didn't really update his basic MT, though, since Óengus eventually surpasses him in that free MT damage niche. The base speed and damage attached to Hinder are still quite nice, and getting it MT is great shakes (speed manipulation is really huge in the game, especially against enemies, which makes him valuable no matter what).
Rubella... sigh. Her MT healing really needed to be a bit more accessible in her trees, since that's the one niche of hers where she's unmatched. I found the status immunity spell to be almost useless, since there are so -few- statuses in Child of Light and they get mostly countered by Haste and Slow. She just loses steam as your item stack builds - the game's items are just crazy potent. Regardless, Rubella -does- play a rather Jeigany role in the game dynamics, being downright invaluable early (she -really- eases up on your item usage and fast interrupts are useful as hell) but mostly dismissable late.
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Minish Cap: That moment where you spend an hour trying to find how to get to the next area, when all you had to do was go slightly northwest of a spot you went to multiple times, and somehow kept missing the obvious path.
...I'm really great at doing that in Zelda games, I feel. That happened at least once in both Oracle games! Just got Pegasus Boots, in any event.
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Thanks Snow :)
Yeah, I just got Robert to Hinder All on the Hinder line after beating the Griffon boss and yeah I have the feeling the Slow is going to be critical for upcoming fights now that Norah has left, speaking of which now feel like it was a mistake not to take Tristis down the Quicken line immediately, Norah's Quicken** was especially nice, went the Ultimate Armour/Unstoppable route with Tristis though and just picked up Ultimate Armour All and have Unstoppable** with him. Griffon was an epic boss fight, eventually came up with the set up of starting with Sister and Aurora, having Sister slow down everything with Lull All, then get Quicken** up on Aurora when she got the chance, while Aurora was mainly there to spam Starlight All as much as possible like life depended on it in between using emergency items as needed, if she went down I used a revive potion to bring her back then set her up again, brought in Tristis once Lull All and Quicken** were up and got Ultimate Armour and Unstoppable up on peeps. When things got close and Aurora was down and the fight looked lost I would bring Rubella in for heals or Finn for squeezing in a quick Lightning All, was eventually able to get Finn in for a decent spell and he was able to finish off the Starlight softened minions. I had to toss around a lot of HP and MP recovery items as well, and sometimes Quicken potions if I thought that would be more viable than casting at the time. Robert came in later for speedy item heal/revives.
Later in the fight I relied on Rubella more as I was running out of stuffs. Didn't help that the boss kept on using Revive to bring back a minion but at least that was a lot easier than dealing with three targets, Aurora had field day unleashing Starlight/Starlight all there. Throughout the fight I kept up hastes and slows, ultimate armours and unstoppables as much as possible with Sister and Tristis. Eventually I ran out of healing items so Rubella saw more use at the end. Sister's Petrify move (apparently actually Paralysis?) was also useful on the boss. Switched to physicals whenever I got the Griffon alone. It finally went down and fight was over after finishing off the sole remaining revived minion. Fight took forty odd minutes. Every single character pulled there weight here except for the Golem really >_>
Aurora has definitely gotten better, which is good =) Think I should probably try and take her down the Slash line for Slash All at some stage but not sure~
Edit - Golem, I take back all the bad things. Ended up relying on Golem Smash* to finish off the Crepusculum fight while Tristis the only other character left alive at the end tossed slow downs, damage ups, and defence ups. Good grief that fight was hell, took quite a few retries, thought I was never going to manage it. Yaay plants~
Edit 2 - Child of Light: Beaten :) Final levels were Aurora L33, Rubella L35, Finn L35, Robert L37, Tristis L38, Oengus L38, Gen L43, Golem L34 and Sister was L26 when she left. I missed an optional boss and some forced mob fights from sidequests though apparently. More comments later~
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FFX-2: At the end of Chapter 2.
I unlocked Space Marine Alchemist which is pretty fun. Not very good (she has a big ass gun and does like half the damage of the class with a fan) but I REALLY like throwing grenades at randoms.
Typical FFX-2 scene:
- Youth League NPC: How could you give the megasupersphere to Neo Yevon? They are bad guys!
- Yuna: :/ Sorry!
- Paine: *throws a grenade*
Psychic is so sick now, it's even better than Festivalist. It's two tiers above Festivalist which is already two tiers above the best other dresspheres. The dressphere balance is completely wrecked because of these two. I'll try using them less after unlocking their entire skillset, but it will be difficult.
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The Minish Cap: Finished, not 100%, not going to bother 100%ing it, too much stuff to do, not interested enough!
The first 2/3rds of the game has the same problem a lot of OoT and after Zelda games have, and that's the fact that the game is built around a super formulaic approach. You go to dungeon, walk around dungeon collecting keys until you get Dungeon Item, then you complete 2nd half of the dungeon using said items. It's old and monotonous and when the dungeon item sucks (Lantern and Claws anyone?), it makes it all the more insulting because it gives a "THIS ITEM WAS MADE FOR THIS DUNGEON AND THIS DUNGEON ONLY! Also we forced out a lot of item collecting with it to pretend it's useful." This method of progression is annoying and dumb, and that's why ALBW was great for just cutting out the middleman, letting you get all your usable items OUTSIDE of dungeons, and then the dungeons could focus on real puzzles focused around an item or two.
Also the bosses did follow that cliched "use item on boss to stun -> beat up guy with sword." Oh, but the Wind temple didn't...except you get the Bow right before the temple, so they sort of just add it in there anyway. I guess the Giant Octorock was kind of a reverse situation since it was stun with shield -> set fire to tail, but that was annoyingly set up.
The last 1/3rd, though, is more what should be done: Actual creativity.
Cloud Top Temple or whatever it's called hands you the dungeon item very early on; like before the map or compass. The item itself is interesting (Roc's Cape, so jumping over platforms and useful in combat for evasion), and thus the entire dungeon can focus on actual legitimate puzzles. Not teases like "Oh, you see an obstacle in the way but you don't know how to deal with it because you haven't found the dungeon item!" Zelda games tend to think that's a puzzle, when it's not; a puzzle is something you have all the elements of, and it's a case of figuring "How do these all fit together?" Looking for the one puzzle miss your brother stole from you is not part of the puzzle, it's just annoying!
This dungeon just hands you the dungeon item, and then goes "oh yeah, all those other items you have may seem some use too!" You have everything that can be useful for this dungeon handed to you, outside of a few keys, which aren't hard to find, then you fight the boss who, while using the Roc's Cape, the fight itself wasn't centered around it; it used the cape in the manner it was intended, Platforming. Not "oh, it happens to be this bosses weakness!"
The final dungeon was similar; you enter it getting your last "Tool" which is the 3rd clone, allowing for 4 Links, then sets it up around using every Tool. Final Boss sequence did require 4 Links, but only for specific moments; wasn't a fan of the last minute "NOPE NOT DEAD LOL" tease, with a fight that has misleading features.
Either way, by not focusing on the Dungeon Item, or handing it to you early, the dungeons actually get way more creative, and I'd like The Minish Cap more if the first 4 dungeons were like the last two; not centered around "Find item -> Use item on rest of dungeon -> Beat Boss with item" strategy. It didn't occur to me until recently that ALttP didn't follow this method at all, and the original Zelda didn't either; it really was OoT that started it (well, I guess Link's Awakening did this too thinking on it, but memory is a bit fuzzier.) A lot of times, the dungeon item there had little to do with actually solving the dungeon itself outside of one or two areas that you likely wouldn't get to until after you got the item (which made those moments come off more as tutorials for how to use said item.)
The other thing is because The Minish Cap had less items being forced on you, they actually did create some interesting uses of them; there are unintuitive combat uses for a lot of items, like the Magical Vacuum (I forget it's name, but it's functionally a magical vacuum.) Better yet, game does actually give you hints on using it. The Lantern having combat use caught me by surprise, because a fair number of enemies actually get reamed by it if you use it properly (...I'd still prefer they just put in the Fire Rod though...), Digging Claws are still moronic though; they never try to find any creative use for those. They're pretty much an ideal case of "we made this for a dungeon...and some item hunting...in areas where it's obvious to use...because...you know..."
Basically, first 2/3rds of The Minish Cap are kind of bland and boring, the last 2 dungeons are a considerable step up from everything else and feel a lot closer to what Zelda should be aiming at to stop the formulaic approach! I know this game is 10 years old but I can still say stuff like this damn it! And the fact that A Link Between Worlds took an approach that lines up with the last 1/3rd of The Minish Cap suggests Aonuma agrees too!
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Bravely Default: I think I'm actually to the point where I'm willing to ask for help. C8 Central Command, and I'm blocked. Ominas / Qada / Mephilia / Yulyana. Qada uses Fire Bane and my defensive strategy is *fucked*. Even through Default Guard, Promethean Fire & Firaga smash me up hardcore. And this is all happening on the same turn so Spiritmaster is no guaranteed of defense, I'd have to rig Spiritmaster to reliably go after Qada but before the others, and it'd require 4 actions to Spirit Ward everyone up anyway, which isn't a winning long term strategy. I'm Level 72.
The way I see it, there are two paths forward:
A) Every time I see Fire Bane, Bravely Second, use the 3 BP nullify-all-elements Spiritmaster ability, and go to -1 SP. Then put the game away for a day & 8 hours before resuming the fight. This might be the most boring strategy possible.
B) Unload Summon Friends with the random people from the subway's 50,000 damage special attacks or whatever. Aside from being cheating, this is a one-fight ticket, I'm not getting these back basically ever. Only really worth it if this is the only fight it's needed on.
Are there any other good options out there? Aside from "grind more" of course. Although I'm not even sure how much grinding will help here, that damage is totally nuts with the Fire Weakness up such that the only possible way to survive it is Default Guard, and Defaulting every turn, while cool, won't actually win the fight.
I'm rather proud of how I handled the previous fight which had blocked me, though - I realized that I was using the wrong Time Magic spell. Rather than Meteor, I had to cast Regen. On the enemy boss. And use Gaia Gear / Quaga for the rest. Yes. how do you like that Alternis, I'll kill you with kindness
Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade - Finished, at last. I started this up more than a year ago post-FE Awakening, but got stalled out just at the Ilia / Sacae route split, because goddamn is Ilia route boring and easy. Anyway.... it's interesting, but I definitely far prefer the map design of later FEs. There's too much empty moving around and not enough strategic clashes, and a lot of the events the game hypes don't actually matter. So... a new sandbar path opened up to the castle? Uh huh, whatever. The river froze over? That... doesn't actually matter. Now, if something like Awakening Paralogue 3 - the one with the fleeing villagers - had a suddenly freezing river, allowing a previously blocked force to move in on the civilians, it might have mattered! But really, it's mostly the empty movement. Smaller, denser maps, please, I don't need to feel like an adventurer traipsing around the dungeon - looking at my clear time (which still A-ranked Tactics) lots of those "raid the tomb for the legendary weapon" maps took like 24 turns. Awakening maps usually take ~10 turns, and some finish in ~5, and only a few really stretch to 20+.
Anyway, the difficulty is definitely flaky in this game. There's a lot that can go wrong but it doesn't feel particularly strategic. Main threats are things like misjudging ballista range and getting a healer sniped, status staves (Sleep / Berserk), and screwing up various recruitments (Zeiss suicidally attacking with a javelin... through the still-existing wall... my range 1-2 mage trying to break him out, then dying on the counterattack. Nice job following Gale's instructions just to observe... however it was you were observing from within a locked room.). Okay, the bosses were legitimately difficult early sometimes, but other bosses were range 1, which uh yeah. Then in the second half of the game boss speed stops growing (except for Sacae route apparently) and that's trouble for the bosses. I was playing via emulation and will admit to ruthlessly cheating my way past some of the bullshit, which probably also contributed to the second half being easier than it 'should' be since I only allowed 1 meaningless death (Ellen) to stay on the books. ON THE OTHER HAND getting the 'good' ending requires keeping people alive which would mean a lot of frustrated resets anyway, so who knows.
Also this is not news, but Idoun is probably the weakest FE final boss in the series (that I've played). FE isn't really about boss fights anyway, so it's not a huge deal, but still. FE7 Dragon >>>> alleged "divine dragon" Idoun if you want to have just one scary opponent to encourage you to break out the cool weapons for.
As another random thought, mages are pretty awesome in practice since high-Resistance enemies aren't particularly common, but the stupid old specific promotion items idea starves 'em for Guiding Rings a bit. I suppose they are storebought at the secret store, but still. If Guiding Rings weren't a concern, running all the mages you can get your hands on would potentially be quite reasonable. Except perhaps a certain desert shaman who shall remain unnamed. Kind of a refreshing change from FE9/FE10, which were a lot harsher on its mages. (Of course, FE6 also has the most insane swordmasters in the series, too. Rutger/Fir/Karel > FE10 Mia, who's the only one vaguely in this competition. Dodge everything and get consistent criticals, only problem is Move to keep up killing things, and hey storebought boots in C21?)
I wasn't particularly taken with Zephiel, despite the hype from others going in. He's probably an upper tier villain for the Fire Emblem series but not particularly outside of it. Sure, the backstory is properly sad, but he's ultimately humans-are-bad villain #97, just with an interesting alternate idea for how to fix the problem. This is miles ahead of Sephiran who ultimately boils down to something similar yet less convincing, and way better than crap like Ashnard / Nergal, but only a 6/10 among general RPG villains.
Don't think I'll bother with Hard ever, especially since part of the fun is trying out different characters, and it appears Hard mostly just buffs the characters I used already. It's clearly based on "is an enemy who gets buffed stats because you're supposed to fight them, but you can hack the system and recruit them" but seriously, some of those late joins who badly need help don't get any? Sigh.
Muramasa Rebirth: Took this up out of frustration with Bravely Default. It's fun and pretty, and an interesting combat system. But time to whine as usual:
* The difficulty levels are "repeatedly tap Square button, win" and "owowowow." Legend is beyond easy and thus not fun, but Chaos is a bit TOO difficult for me. I guess I'll suffer through Chaos and just accept a lot of resets on the bosses, but something in the middle would have been nice.
* The kitsune companion near the front has the usual Vanillaware impossibly giant boob fetish. Yes blah blah magical creature, I get it, I'm not nitpicking the plot here, merely noting that this isn't sexy, this is grotesque. If it's fanservice it's not working. And I've played Growlanser games.
* I picked the default route, Momohime's, the swordgirl. Now, this might change later, but this is slightly misleading, as you are in no sense playing Momohime (for the first 3 chapters at least?). Rather you are playing some jerkass murderous assassin named Jinkuro who stole her body and has utter contempt for her (complains about being in a weak girl's body and his need to soul-steal some new host; he had wanted to steal his rival's body, but screwed up somehow and got her as a bystander). He's also crazy and talks about how he plans on murdering everybody who gets near him to provide souls to make awesome demon weapons. This extends to would-be allies - there's some prostitute he finds dead in Chapter 2 that he knew before, and he's all "hurry up and get to the afterlife before I steal you too". Momohime herself doesn't really seem to be in the game (yet), she's just baggage as a soul, not even able to ask WTF is going on. Now, if Hideo Kojima were making this game, this is potentially pretty fun - see, you're a young male who wants to go on a crazy video game rampage by "controlling" a cute swordgirl! Shades of Metal Gear Solid 2 & Raiden, sure. However this is Vanillaware so they probably aren't being as meta, and just think this is straight-up awesome, doesn't everyone want to travel Japan making a swordgirl slaughter everything. Sigh.
We'll see how it goes, being pretty + having good if brutally hard boss battles (so far) isn't a bad start.
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Bravely Default: I think I'm actually to the point where I'm willing to ask for help. C8 Central Command, and I'm blocked. Ominas / Qada / Mephilia / Yulyana. Qada uses Fire Bane and my defensive strategy is *fucked*. Even through Default Guard, Promethean Fire & Firaga smash me up hardcore. And this is all happening on the same turn so Spiritmaster is no guaranteed of defense, I'd have to rig Spiritmaster to reliably go after Qada but before the others, and it'd require 4 actions to Spirit Ward everyone up anyway, which isn't a winning long term strategy. I'm Level 72.
How to deal with it (gameplay spoilers):
Slow Qada down by your method of choice, and make sure your Spiritmaster is very fast, either by natural means or buffs. Qada's bane will reliably happen after his comrades do their damage, and then you get a chance to fix it up before they attack again next round. Whatever you do, don't slow down any other enemies.
I wasn't particularly taken with Zephiel, despite the hype from others going in. He's probably an upper tier villain for the Fire Emblem series but not particularly outside of it. Sure, the backstory is properly sad, but he's ultimately humans-are-bad villain #97, just with an interesting alternate idea for how to fix the problem. This is miles ahead of Sephiran who ultimately boils down to something similar yet less convincing, and way better than crap like Ashnard / Nergal, but only a 6/10 among general RPG villains.
Honestly I think most people who "hype" Zephiel would agree with that assessment. He's pretty cool for a FE villain. He has a pretty interesting setup. FE6 writing is not good enough that it's really pulled off in a way which is super-compelling, but FE6 being a sequel to FE7 in particular means your standards will be pretty low. I tend to mentally throw FE6 in with the 16-bit era (despite when it was actually made) and he's head and shoulders above any other villain from that era save Kefka in my opinion (which again doesn't say much). This is being too nice to FE6 of course - it did come out this century - but it's part of where the kneejerk comes from.
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Zephiel's more what puts FE6 above FE7 in terms of plot than anything else. He's an ok villain, and it adds at least that much to the plot. By contrast, FE7 is just a wild goose chase with a villain who is basically "Rar, I'm evil, TIME TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD WITH MAGICAL SCIENCE!!! ...oh yeah, and there'd a Darth Vader-like plot-twist shoe-horned in because that's totally the same as depth, right?" Zephiel at least has motives, and doesn't completely fall flat on his face the way most "Humans suck, burn them all!" hypocrits are.
So yeah, totally a relative thing; "Good for an FE Villain" is about the extent of it, and that doesn't say a whole lot since most FE villains suck. Really the only other decent one is Lyon offhand and some of FE10's (Jarod comes to mind.) I guess FE4's Alvis because it's rare to see a guy who actually isn't evil, just so practical that the way he views things happens to line up completely against the main (Sigurd in this case), though not sure he counts because he's not really antagonistic until literally the end of Gen 1, and he's not the main antagonist in Gen 2.
That said...
Bravely Default: Started this up, not much to say yet; just got Ringabel.
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Bravely Default: I think I'm actually to the point where I'm willing to ask for help. C8 Central Command, and I'm blocked. Ominas / Qada / Mephilia / Yulyana. Qada uses Fire Bane and my defensive strategy is *fucked*. Even through Default Guard, Promethean Fire & Firaga smash me up hardcore. And this is all happening on the same turn so Spiritmaster is no guaranteed of defense, I'd have to rig Spiritmaster to reliably go after Qada but before the others, and it'd require 4 actions to Spirit Ward everyone up anyway, which isn't a winning long term strategy. I'm Level 72.
The way I see it, there are two paths forward:
A) Every time I see Fire Bane, Bravely Second, use the 3 BP nullify-all-elements Spiritmaster ability, and go to -1 SP. Then put the game away for a day & 8 hours before resuming the fight. This might be the most boring strategy possible.
B) Unload Summon Friends with the random people from the subway's 50,000 damage special attacks or whatever. Aside from being cheating, this is a one-fight ticket, I'm not getting these back basically ever. Only really worth it if this is the only fight it's needed on.
Are there any other good options out there? Aside from "grind more" of course. Although I'm not even sure how much grinding will help here, that damage is totally nuts with the Fire Weakness up such that the only possible way to survive it is Default Guard, and Defaulting every turn, while cool, won't actually win the fight.
This was my only literal road block because Ragex4 spam actually doesn't work.
Have a fast spiritmaster, 2 ninjas, and a performer. Take Commerce secondary on one of ninjas. Ninjas should have equip Katana, Hawkeye and STR+20%. Someone should have hasten world. Use Stillness first turn. Performer should buff stats and BP. Commerce Ninja should use pay-to-play to boost crit and high leverage. When Stillness wears off, launch 4 Brave normal attacks on Qada. With 2 ninjas, it should take an average of 5800 damage per attack to kill him in one round. With high crits from katanas and 150% Patk with high leverage you should easily hit that number. When Qada dies, Enigma makes the fight a free win.
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999- So, still playing this, but for the sake of posterity and possibly having to reverse myself, let's put down some thoughts after hitting my first (Bad) End.
This game isn't very good. It's a complete flop as an adventure game; very pixel hunt oriented, it takes for-fucking-ever to get anything done, and an overreliance on math puzzles which tend to be time consuming without being satisfying at all. Grefter take note, I'm not sure if I've said this that you remember: this game would beway better on PC. Mouse Highlights are essential for something built like this. Maybe I just took all the lame doors! Knife ending does seem like it sucks that way.
Plot flow is also terrible. This is at heart a character driven piece, or at least is presented as one. Except most of the character beats are in the fluff text... which interrupts you while trying to fucking pixel hunt and thus becomes annoying mash-through text. "Shut up I'm working" basically.
So the presentation of the plot is poor and the surrounding gameplay is annoying. The plot, by itself, has to sell this game.
And right now it's just... not. No mistake here: I've basically read all the major spoilers for this game. I was looking forward to playing it. And it's not delivering. The way the plot is unfolding is just not interesting at all. The door order I took was relatively stable until the end; hang out with Snake as much as possible, he seems cool, then Clover because she needs a hug. (though yes I broke this pattern for the last door). Okay. In that time I got... nothing interesting about either character. Aside from the fact that Snake's relatively witty (and see earlier comment about mash-through text problems) there's not plot benefit to spending time with the most likable character available.
And that's where the plot is falling apart. I know the spoilers, the endgame. I'm looking for the game to give me a reason to want to get there and it's not providing one. These people are dicks. I don't like spending time with them. That can work if the characters are INTERESTING. See Evangelion. But the way information about them is doled out, it's not happening. I don't like them and I don't care to know anything about them.
And even that could be fine if Junpei was interesting. Hell, I was pretty okay with the pixel hunting in the first escape, because Junpei seemed alright. And then June shows up. Which is a nice meta joke and all, June is Zero, the main fucking villain and yeah she's trying to keep Junpei alive to save her because causality! But basically June is designed as the Worst Heroine Ever and hey, she's living up to that. Cute joke. Also makes the game suck because lots and lots of screentime is devoted to her and she sets Junpei to Idiot Teenage Boy Mode.
So yeah I am at this time basically sticking with the game because I have it, it's short, I'm gonna collect that "beat a game" coupon. Full on FAQ mode is probably activated and I've definitely decided to skip VLR. Bleh.
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This was my only literal road block because Ragex4 spam actually doesn't work.
Well it's a team fight, so Rage is doin' it wrong anyway. Dark Nebula's the way to go. (And in fact if you're willing to be super-boring and run four Dark Knights, you can one-round the fight and every other one in the tower.)
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Sorry 999 didn't work out for you, CK. Since you've spoiled yourself I'd honestly just abandon it now. Although Knife ending probably is the weakest one to get first? Axe & Sub are better. (Although, as someone has hopefully already warned you, don't pick door 2 if you have a choice. You're forced to take door 2 & collect the sub ending if you're trying to see all doors, so you can see it when it's forced.)
The one thing I will add is that I for one *love* playing adventure games with a stylus, and far prefer it to a mouse. Super-easy to tap around where I want. I never really got stalled by the pixel hunting, though, and it is something that I know is frustrating from other games where I was a worse pixel hunter. (But the 'puzzles' of 999 were basically just a speedbump as far as I was concerned.)
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The main appeal of 999 for me was the crazy plot twists. I can't imagine replaying it ever with the elements of surprise gone, and the mystery keeping me going during puzzle rooms.
FFX-2: Chapter 3. Got the trainer dressphere and a ribbon! (Way to make a puzzle be a lot more obscure than it should, FFX-2)
Omni (the fat Leblanc henchman) was actually way stronger than Baralai. True Fear = His big hug attack and its insane damage.
Trainer is way cool. I ask my little hawk to grab giant wolves and take them Offscreen, where I assume they're thrown into a bottomless pit.
Psychic is mastered. Turns out that the "Immune to physical and magical attacks lol" spell is actually free! And it lasts for like 5-8 turns? Oh man Psychic.
Why does Mt Gagazet has giant rocks that go away when you go run towards them? Somehow I tried walking slowly towards them to make these giant rocks less scared. It worked. FFX-2.
The battle system can get really dumb. This other time I was a poisoned alchemist fighting two wolves. I had selected "Attack", but Alchemist Paine takes forever to steady her gun so she kept getting interrupted.
It went like this:
- READY...... *gets hit by a wolf*
- READY..... *gets hit by another wolf*
- READY..... *gets hit by poison*
This shit went on for at least 4 full turns until she could actually act.
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Oh, I don't think I've mentioned that Psychic Paine gets MASER EYE, which is basically Cyclops' (the x-man) red laser eye beam of death, except she doesn't actually need to remove her special cyberpunk glasses.
Yeah she actually is worthy of the legendary name "Yattaf" at this point.
I wonder if I can change her name during the game.
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Fenrir stop making me want to play FFX-2. I know it couldn't possibly be as fun as reading about it.
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It's Fenrir's gift to the world.
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It really is a bit better than it seemed to be 10 years ago. Like it isn't great or anything, but most of the dumb things in it are pretty obviously stupid, but none of it is really that outlandish in the grand scheme of things. It is definitely the start of Square going in a different direction with stuff, but it is still close enough to that era of FF7 - FFX where Square were experimenting with stuff and putting out a wide range of interesting experiments.
It takes the normally stale ATB system and really makes it more rapid (like its a bit slower than FF8 feels when I play it and I play on Slowest setting for FFX-2). It also adds in variable charge times to that and elements of combo and interrupting slightly due to animation time for a weird melding of concepts you normally see in a Grandia game in a more classic ATB style (I would like it to pause when someone's turn comes up but then it would be pretty much straight Grandia combat I guess).
It of course then dresses it up in net that is casting as broad as it possibly can for Otaku beat off material with the most pointlessly convoluted random shit to do to string together the game (like I described it earlier, it is like they are trying to do a linear story in an open world JRPG).
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Kid Icarus Uprising - Viridi is definitely my kind of gal. Up to Chapter 15.
Trails in the Sky - This playthrough is no more, it has ceased to be. IT IS AN EX-PLAYTHROUGH!
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Oh no! Why'd you give up on Trails? :( :'(
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I still haven't forgiven FFX-2 for the cactuar island quest.
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Bravely Default: I have killed a Merchant and have thus absorbed his soul. Now I contain the true power of capitalism!
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:)
I think FFX-2 is really the game that made me realize what I want in those games and made me stop having completionist tendencies.
It's hard to not aim for 100% in FFX-2 since you get an extra ending and everything. But doing this made my first playthrough fairly pointless and miserable. I was on rails and had to semi-watch terrible cutscenes and play bad minigames I didn't want to play at the moment. AND I probably had to do the cactuar island quest. I don't know what that is but I don't doubt it's very bad.
The game was also very easy. I had learnt nothing from the beginning of the game on, because I didn't have to, so I was just completely helpless against the first roadblock (The Magus 3) and had to stop right when it started getting interesting.
So I actually find FFX-2 REALLY fun right now, but it wouldn't be without my usual rules to free myself from all the BS (Cutscene skip, not much faq use and certainly not aiming for 100%, plus a challenge to make the game way harder and keep me on my toes)
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Walk down road. Talk to guy. Start Mini game. Miss cutscene with someone at other end of road that starts same mini game.
Impossible to get 100%.
FFX-2/10
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FE13- Started. Saw that FE finally made casual mode a thing. Nearly cried tears of joy, because fuck classic mode forever.
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Dark Souls 2: Oh right there's DLC today. I don't actually have any characters on NG anymore but whatevs, the true Dark Souls 2 is NG+, right? (Sadly this is pretty much true.) So let's go punch some dudes. ...Oh game, if you wanted me to bring an archer instead, you should've just said so. Okay finally I give in and go build Roberta a quality bow. Geez fine. Anyway stuff:
-Shulva's a pretty cool zone, you walk in and immediately get the kind of nice, sweeping panoramic view that the base game's areas mostly lacked. It's very reminiscent of Oolacile, lots of verticality at work in a manner DS2's zones mostly failed to capitalize on. The level design is great in that classic DS1 way of immediately giving you a strong sense just from the first glimpse of where you're headed and just leaving you wondering how to get there.
-Acquired totally bitching S-DEX whip-sword. I want to powerstance this thing so bad. But I never fucking want to play through the base game again so that's not happening. (And it's an iron chest so no ascetic cheese.) It's super-cool but seriously you guys I'm sticking with the fisting here (and occasionally machinegunning because BUG).
-Wait a minute, that phantom looks too tall to be a player--OHSHIRT
-Dragon Sanctum is a bag of dicks.
-I found a ring that boosts your attack power if you're lightly dressed. Hey guys guess what all Cid characters have in common. (I mean apart from owning a vagina.) It's quite fragile but still, *glomp*.
-Jester Thomas I thought we were bros!
-I still haven't found a boss, but seriously these phantoms are beastly. I still haven't been able to kill spoilers up there. Actually I've been dying an awful lot in general. Already had to warp back home a couple times to repair my massive collection of insurance rings!
Oh and apparently there's a bonus item for logging in on launch day and raiding the Majula mansion chest. Excitement, what could this special prize be?!
...I got a murakumo.
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Ugh, I didn't even know there was DLC and yet... I don't want it. Bleh.
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Fudo are you ready to point on the doll to where From Software touched you.
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Fudo, are you the doll that people keep touching?
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NOTHING HAPPENED OKAY.
*sobs*
EVERYTHING IS PERFECTLY FINE
*covers face*
I AM A-OK!
*looks away*
THERE WAS NO ABUSE HERE NO SIR
*breaks down in tears*
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If to was abuse we would see it in your eyes. If anything happened you just have swallowed and that indicates consent.
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Walk down road. Talk to guy. Start Mini game. Miss cutscene with someone at other end of road that starts same mini game.
Impossible to get 100%.
FFX-2/10
Is that the Minerva related one? Because I remember that and going "really game? You're going to be that meticulous?"
Bravely Default: No Merchants were harmed in the last session of playing this game; same cannot be said for animals, particularly the undead kind...especially by Merchants. I also might have talked to a UOM.
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NOTHING HAPPENED OKAY.
*sobs*
EVERYTHING IS PERFECTLY FINE
*covers face*
I AM A-OK!
*looks away*
THERE WAS NO ABUSE HERE NO SIR
*breaks down in tears*
Isn't that the normal reaction to playing Dark Souls though?
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Look I can take being flattened trying to bare-hand parry-riposte Havel in 1, but I just can't take 2's crap.
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Oh no! Why'd you give up on Trails? :( :'(
It has some character work / plotting issues which I find bothersome and the rest of its plot didn't really do it me. Gameplay is alright but it's not really a game carrier on its own; too easy and a bit repetitive. The game reminds me of a more modern Grandia 1, which certainly has its appeal to some but I'll note I never finished Grandia 1 either.
(And it's not bad enough to hate-finish like FF2.)
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It was about following a cart with luggage that you need to keep form bandits attacking. You can talk to the guy near the cart and start the mini game, but you get some completion percentage from talking with the guy that wants you to go find the cart and bring it back. It is a cutscenes of no importance at all but is apparently super important.
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DS2: Whup, that's that. Yeah, it's basically one huge zone + a couple other bosses tucked away in side areas. This is fine since Shulva's more engrossing than almost all of the base game's areas. Leans too heavily on the green x gray color scheme the game is deeply enamored of, but the architecture's certainly cool. You do run all that way basically just to activate an elevator, though. Stuff!
-I did actually run all the boss fights with support. They're all pretty mean. Elana doesn't look too bad at first but then Summon Bigger Fish Velstadt kicks in. God why did you think I wanted to deal with that hitbox again game.
-Another chance for Benhart to be useless!
-I cut off the dragon's tail but got nothing for it (except I guess him not being able to hit me with it anymore).
-By the way, the Not!Traitor summon for that fight is pretty boss. Actually heals when she needs it! (Unlike some other people, looking your way here Belleclaire.)
-A Havel by any other name is just as much of a dick.
-The new boss soul weapons look pretty unspecial (although I guess most of them are). I don't even know if they can turn into spells because I'm too stupid for Straid to talk to me on this file. Anyway one of them gave me a fabulous skirt so you know I'm happy.
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Given that your reward for getting 100% is both nonsensical (talking to everyone in the world = happiness!) and kinda pisses on FFX's ending, I can't say I disapprove of anything which makes it less likely that the player gets it.
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It was about following a cart with luggage that you need to keep form bandits attacking. You can talk to the guy near the cart and start the mini game, but you get some completion percentage from talking with the guy that wants you to go find the cart and bring it back. It is a cutscenes of no importance at all but is apparently super important.
Yeah, I failed that too. Prime example of the game dicking you around and how would you figure that out without an FAQ? You'd find it via talking to the guy in first playthrough, and replay, you'd just assume "This guy needs to be talked to in order to trigger the quest!" because that's how these things usually work. NOPE! You need to randomly assume "You can do this without talking to the guy!"
Anyway...
BD: I walked into a forest and the game decided to shout at me "CHAPTER 1 IS OVER! CHAPTER 2 STARTS NOW! DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND!? TO PROVE THIS FURTHER, HERE'S A CUTSCENE WITH THE VILLAIN!" That could have been done slightly more elegantly, I'm sure...
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FE13: Puttering through Donnel's recruitment map right now. Doing the map for the items rather than the PC, as Donnel looks like total bench bait. (He joins the slow Cav, the armored dude, Frederick, and that Archer with appallingly bad stats)
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DQ6 - I am up to Arkbolt. This is where I got up to it on the SNES version forever ago. It is enjoyable enough fluff DQ nonsense. Better than DQ4, worse Job system than any FF game though.
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Dark Souls: Finished moving, therefore this. Beat the 4 Kings. Had to change up my magic loadout to have enough damage to take them down, but once I did and got a hold of dodging their attack patterns (since I couldn't just shieldretard my way through them this time) they went down EZPZ. Dark Wraithe covenant GET... except I still don't have home internet so it's kind of a hollow achievement right now.
get it
hollow
because why spend humanity since i can't pvp
is funny
I've totally forgotten what bosses I have beaten which has lead to me wandering around like an idiot a lot. Probably gonna take out Seath next.
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Eviltype - Finishing up the World of Balance! Fun fun fun.
Esper Mountain - No real issues with the randoms here, probe for the status holes and exploit 'em when possible. I don't have a good team for taking down the Mandrakes but I'm able to slowly grind them down.
Thamasa Kefka - Uh does Fire 3 OHKO? Looked like it might, extrapolating things. That's kind of bullshit if so, since I'm underlevelled but not THAT much and having to redo that entire cutscene would be lame. (Then again, maybe you're allowed to lose that fight? Not sure.) Anyway MEvade kicked in both times Fire 3 got used.
I settle on a Celes/Gau/Mog team here. Celes I use partly because I just like her, partly because I want her to be very strong on spell arsenal for the start of the WoR. Mog I use because he still has 2 extra levels and those help, plus Dance has some really good stuff in this section (also he already knows Safe/Shell). Gau ends up getting chosen because he has the best-built up spell arsenal so far (Rasp/Osmose, Sleep/Mute/Berserk/Slow, etc.), narrowly beating out Edgar. Rage isn't very useful in this upcoming section though (especially since I'm also running Mog) so not sure if I chose right, but oh well.
Spit Fires and Sky Armour gauntlet - 2 resets. They can get the drop on you so it's kinda RNG-reliant, not much you can do about back hits and Absolute Zero really hurts. It's usually possible to recover, especially since the threats can be neutralised pretty quickly (Sleep works on Spit Fires, Muddle on Sky Armours... didn't think to try Shaot but it might work too, dunno). Also with two Earrings and a Magus Hat, Mog can one-shot both Sky Armours (and seriously hurt the Spit Fire) with Wind Slash which comes up almost half the time off Wind Song, pretty great!
Ultros 4 and Chupon - Slow rules. Safe/Shell/Haste rule. I fight this slowly and methodically. When Chupon shows up he gets hammered with Ice 2 until he dies. Ultros has a lot of offence (and it gets worse when Chupon shows up) but slowing both gives me time to recover regardless of what they do.
Air Force - 1 reset. Sooo if Missile Bay uses Launcher (MT gravity) followed immediately by Diffuser from the Laser Gun, really bad things happen. I barely survive it once, but then he proves it's not a fluke by using it a second time. Bad luck or design, I'm not sure! Anyway, past that, the battle presents a few problems, such as slow immunity and the fact that if I kill the Laser Gun, he'll fire off WaveCannon, which at my levels is MT OHKO (Mog might survive with Shell, but FF6 revival is bad enough that this really isn't an option).
Anyway, Safe/Shell to turtle as usual (ZoneSeek helps since Air Force gets on you fast), be ready to heal after Launcher, and the second time I know to MP bust the Laser Gun as fast as possible. Neither it nor Air Force itself have great MP so taking out both of their offence this way helps a lot, as does Golem to block the Air Force's relatively nasty physicals during this key section of the fight. Once those two are controlled I can kill the Missile Bay and then chip away at Air Force itself (Celes' Bolt 2 leads the way). I toss in Water Rondo because why not, though I do toss an X-Potion on the Laser Gun at one point!
Floating Continent - No resets here, which is kind of amazing... I do have a couple near misses though (in particular, Ninjas MT 2HKO although Shadow resists two of their elements with Memento Ring). That said, a Back Guard can prevent ambushes, and everything can be run from (including Ninjas, thank heavens, since there -would- have been resets if their Can't Run flag had been left unchanged from vanilla) if things get too hairy. Beyond that, it's scan and experiment with status options. Shoat claims a decent number of the weaker enemies here, Rasp can quickly deal with certain others, Berserk is a great status, Sleep/Stop have their moments in the sun too, as do Poison and Earth Blues' random gravity.
Gigantos - His damage is imposing and he no longer fears Vanish. Fortunately he still fears Berserk. It feels weird to berserk a pure fighter, but when his damage is coming from multi-acting, high multipliers, and counters, it actually works extremely well.
AtmaWeapon - He has ST OHKO at full HP, but he is vulnerable to both Slow and Rasp and is a limit boss whose limit I don't see, I don't have much to say here.
Naughties - Fire 2 + Bomb rage + Earth Blues, although Sonic Boom missing kinda sucks so maybe Earth Blues isn't the way to go here (but Mog doesn't have any L2 spells).
Nerapa - Carbunkle then bounce some Ice 2 spells.
Didn't get the X-Potion, in large part because I somehow had all my Sprint Shoes equipped on people not currently in the party. No big. Shadow saved, onto the WoR.
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Bravely Default: I killed a little girl and an adult girl, and now can use their powers. Does this make me a bad person? Oh yeah, Agnes just proved she will never fulfill Ringabel's wishes of dressing like someone from FF10-2...please ignore how her Spellblade outfit when considering this...
Wind Waker HD: started this up, just got to Dragon Roost Island. Not much to say other than hunting for the sale was a pain in the ass and caused a great sin in the process:
Made me interact with Tingle.
Crisis Core Expert Mode: Zack just fell to Sector 5. Yay, Healing Wave DMW happens now!
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Oh yeah, Agnes just proved she will never fulfill Ringabel's wishes of dressing like someone from FF10-2...please ignore how her Spellblade outfit when considering this...
There is actually a skit on the very topic of Ringabel & Spell Fencer outfits. One of the rare worthwhile ones in the game. (Most are sadly pretty boring.)
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FFX-2: Fought Yojimbo after a long dungeon. He used HP -> 1 + Dog attack right after.
Fuck dogs officially now.
I then went to play Sphere Break (The NEW Triple Triad) and it is breaking all verisimilitude.
In FFX-2.
- It's supposed to be a competitive game but it has no competitive elements. It's purely a solo game with no interaction against your opponent. Maybe beat their high score? It's like a solitaire competition. It makes sense.
- It's all "Math! FUN WITH MULTIPLIERS!!!"
(http://www.hwdyk.com/q/images/gradeschoolconfidential_04.jpg)
and it's supposed to be this giant thing everybody loves. The fuck? No.
FFX-2 might have fantasy elements like dragons and Sin and Seymour's hair, but a math game being ultra popular? You have to draw the line somewhere.
Anyway I h4x math so I easily got the Gift from Nerdy Programmers to Math Nerds, which is one of the most fanservice-y dresspheres. (Obviously)
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ToV: Finished. Loved the cast. Easily the best of any Tales game. Totally carries it through the weaker parts of the game. Everyone contributes in awesome ways. The game... should have ended up better than it did. It had so much going for it then... hard to put my finger on it.
The beginning of the game builds on itself very well. Each event flows into the next pretty well, and well paced at that. It unfolds plot points decently and leaves the right things in the dark. But... it starts going off the rails, relying more and more on coincidence to keep the plot tight until it's just sort of silly, and not in the usual Tales way either. And the villains... don't help. Good ol' babyeaters. I actually kinda dug the Alexei reveal, even if I didn't like the character. Needed just a liiiittle more buildup.
I like the reveal because Alexei at least understands the concept of "Never interrupt your enemy in the middle of making a mistake." He knows what you're going around and doing, and after confirming that you're actually helping his goals, he sees fit not to meddle and lets you go on your merry way. It's Jaeger of the incomprehensible agenda that screws around. Plus the game is good about giving just enough clues to hint that Alexei is behind things without being completely unsubtle and in your face about it. So Alexei's sudden turnaround was expected. Just... wow, that was abrupt. I had begun wondering when the shoe would drop, and BAM, not only do they do the reveal, but Alexei basically lays all his cards on the table at once. The Alexei's goals are pretty dumb though. He's not really great when he's on the screen.
Duke is pretty bad too. He was relatively well used up until he had to become the requisite Tales final. Felt kinda pointless and drags out the game. In all, the sharp downward arc the story takes after the mid-point and the weakness of the villain cast takes a potential 8-9/10 game and turns it into a 7/10 one. Kinda surprised at the lack of post-final scenes, but the pictures during the credits worked well enough.
Dragon's Crown: Finished Hard mode with Amazon. Flip2Win and Spin2Win. Good challenge in the final here. Definitely more difficult than the Normal final. Really liked the game, but couldn't picture myself playing more, even with other classes available. Overall well put together game though. Was fun while it lasted. Just a little too repetitive to play a mode again.
Started Star Ocean 4 in the meantime.
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FE13- Just beat Gangrel. It's an FE game. I loathe the ninja reinforcements and like a lot of the polish touches the series had added since 10. Gangrel got OHKOed by Sully, about what you'd expect. I've skipped 99% of the game's plot so that gets an N/A. Paired up Sumia/Chrom and Vaike/Lissa.
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Started Star Ocean 4 in the meantime.
...Why? To make ToV look really really good by comparison?
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999- Fin.
This game. One of the things I tend to get passionate about occasionally is video games as a storytelling medium. I know, I'm dumb. And no small number of conversations on the matter come back to "video games have to tell stories through gameplay because that's what they have!" and it annoys me no end.
This game is a great example of why it annoys me. Someone looked at other VNs and said "wait, we should be integrating these gameplay mechanics like NG+ and story branching into the plots." And they wrote a story around that. It's a pretty good plot even. But they're so hung up about remaining true to that original concept and maintaining that connection between gameplay mechanics and the plot that they sacrifice all meaningful storytelling conventions. Aside from the first escape being pretty decent as an introduction the game managed to completely lose me about halfway through and never got me back because I knew the rough shape of the plot twists coming up ahead. And nothing in the telling of those twists was really all that interesting.
This is the sort of thing I mean if I've ever mentioned "indy bullshit" in relation to gaming. And yes 999 is not technically an indy production. But it has the stuff that I don't like about a lot of independent development. Being too caught up in your concept to have good solid fundamentals. Being concerned with verisimilitude and adherence to themes over having engaging writing. Sacrificing both gameplay to plot and storytelling to gameplay simultaneously.
999 isn't really a bad game. It's just also not a good game, and it's not-a-good-game in a way that ticks me off for personal reasons. Still, I also chewed right through all 16 hours I ended up playing it for, so can't be that harsh on it. And at least it didn't have me half convinced I irrevocably screwed myself over. 5/10.
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FE13- Vaike is at 31 speed at L9 warrior. So shiny. It makes up for Chrom being slow. Just finished L13, recruited a couple of the kids. I might use them a little, but not a huge fan of project PC's. Not even bothering with Lucina.
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The Wind Waker HD: Just got to the big Deku Tree Island thing.
Well, I'll give the game one thing that I didn't expect:
Link comes off as an actual character, or at least, as much as you can expect a Silent Protagonist to have. He has actual emotions that extend beyond
(http://www.opendoorwayreflections.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Seriously-face-meme-all-funny.jpg)
and...
(https://i.chzbgr.com/maxW500/3675957248/h3452DF9E/)
No seriously, look at any other 3D Link, everything he does in those scenes can be summed up by those two faces with the rare instance of a smile.
I can see why they chose the Toon style thinking it was a good idea for the time; making it unrealistic allows for far more creative, exaggerated emotions without worrying about the "HYPER REALISTIC!" look. So when Link is caught in an awkward yet dangerous situation, his reaction being basically...well...
(http://thehockeywriters.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/yikes.jpg)
actually works! It'd come off as extremely awkward otherwise. Also, because of the art style, there's definitely a sense of light heartedness in this game; it seems to want to sell "ADVENTURE HO! Have fun!" and less "EPIC STORY!!!" like Twilight Princess (which I've seen the LP of) seemed to try.
Also, branching from that, game seems to be doing a good job of NOT making Link the "CHOSEN HERO!", but rather an incidental one. Look at OoT where the Deku Tree is like "by the way, Link, I think you're the legendary hero...go save the world!" and it's basically "Wait, why this kid? What's so special about him?" and the game sort of dances around why Link is special. In Wind Waker, Link isn't special; he just had his Bar Mitzvah, went to go see something weird happening in the woods so he stole borrowed the one sword in the village, and things sort of snowball from there until "Oh crap, my sister has been kidnapped, better go save her!" which leads to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlXXPVpfg84#t=19s (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlXXPVpfg84#t=19s).
This makes the story actually more meaningful than "CHOSEN HERO!" simply because there's a legitimate motive. The motive here is "Save your sister" contrast to OoT where it was "Go save the world...that isn't actually in danger...and will only be in danger because you're trying to save it...you know, this entire crisis could be prevented if you just stayed home..."
Bravely Default: Ringabel was not happy about someone outdoing him at what he's best at, so naturally, he murders him dead, takes his soul for his own, and in the process earns a modicum of respect from Edea. Also, a Water demon died...I guess that is sort of important...
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SaGa 2: Goddess Of Destiny - played through
Pretty entertaining for a while, starts decaying around the point of Venus's world, levels off in Japanland, then nosedives in Valhalla and doesn't look back. I ended up dodging/running from pretty much every battle in Valhalla onwards because they were so obnoxious. (This was not really one thing leading to another as the members of my party with stat growths were at or near the caps in the relevant stats already.)
Had endless trouble with Odin until I was alerted to the Aegis Shield being A Thing, which just made me more annoyed at the fight apparently expecting you to spam it. Before I started using it, typically half my party would be dead by the end of the first turn.
Party was Human/Esper/Robot/Monster. Monster was proooobably the weakest link in the chain for most of the game, although it could vary wildly. Esper had Blaze pretty much the entire game but sadly the time it stopped being particularly effective coincided with the time that enemy numbers started reaching absurd levels, so that wasn't a fun set of adjusting to have to deal with. Also hardly ever got any speed, depressingly, so that was another nail in the kill-everything-before-it-moves coffin. Psychoguns were pretty rad! But then I found out that they were ultra-rare, and then Human got the absurdly powerful infinite-use Excalibur :S
Final Defence System was also a fight that took me far more attempts than I would have preferred. In this case the tricks were mainly that circlets could be used to block paralysis and that I should give up any hope of the Esper getting a chance to do any shooting in favour of it spamming heal staves the entire battle, with the turn order adjusted to ensure that they went as last-most as possible. Succeeded on the first attempt under these, despite the Human managing to get killed during phase 2. Hadn't seen phase 3 before this attempt either! Monster was a Scylla for the fight... which spent most of phase 2 paralysed... but when it was actually attacking it was fair enough, not as powerful as the Robot but closeish.
I kind of wonder what Final Defence System was actually supposed to be defending! I'll have to read an LP of FFL2 I guess.
Never touched any of the destiny thread stuff because I wasn't in the mood for trying to figure out what it was for, didn't bother actually looking that up until I was in Valhalla and decided that I couldn't be bothered starting with it. Maybe it makes all the difference in the game difficulty. Apparently this indirectly caused me to be locked out of getting any rank 5 monster, which was saddening.
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FEA- Mission 19 is mean. Vaike still rules though.
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Penny Arcade Rainslick etc 4 (Insane mode):
In Yggdrasil. This is breezy. I think the story / plot / humour are noticeably worse than in all other 3 games? The gameplay is even better than in 3 though. It just feels like a stream of boss battles. A rare case of an RPG with no 0 filler battkes. Insane mode is an awesome challenge, but you need some RNG luck (enemies not targeting the wrong ally) for the first two dungeons or so. Afterwards, pro stratz are enough.
I've spent almost all my money (About 85%) on items and by items I mean molotov bottles. They're already maxed at this point. I gave Vendorr all the fire boosting items + Robespierre and I now have Fuschia boost his fire damage at the beginning of battles. Vendorr is GOD now. (He's also my favourite so I'm happy)
Monster balance seems all over the place, there are some uber monsters like Vendorr, Philosofly and Mr Beaks, and then there are monsters like Infinitoad or Grouchopon which bring basically nothing?
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I have been waiting for this since it came out.
(He's also my favourite so I'm happy)
This is why I had been waiting. This makes me so happy that it makes you so happy. Vendorr love for everybody.
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DS2: Yeah still dicking around with DLC. Hey man I've got a lot of characters to try here right. Stuff:
-Holy crap they nerfed the hell out of some magic with the last few patches. I mean, this might be everything in the DLC having nutty elemental defense and me being on NG+ (or NG++)...but also the Abyss Seal barely provides any damage boost now and Great Resonant Soul got its damage cut back. Also Great Lightning Spear now gives you half as many charges and does like half as much damage. I know it was too good before but jesus it's not even worth using against anything in the DLC. R1 > lightning bolts now. God From did Thor run over your dog or something.
-Ring of Jeff Daniels is weird, turns out the attack bonus runs off maximum available equip burden rather than weight of current equipment. I mean same result either way since most of my characters have no more than starting levels of VIT, but I've realized equipping it basically turns me into Latona and I am totally okay with that.
-I have by now soloed Sorceressjerk (daggers) and Dragonjerk (katanas, Not!Sinner, spinspinspin). The NPC trio still scare the shit out of me, though.
-Turns out for one of the sub-areas in the DLC, players without the DLC itself can drop a summon sign outside of the (locked) DLC entrance and have their sign appear for NPC bastard fight. The value of summoning such players is sometimes dubious since it may be assumed they don't know the area as well as a player who's been there and can manually place a sign (non-DLC player signs appear on specific gravestones). It took me a while to puzzle out why there were so many "Be wary of beggar" messages here.
-Speaking of, I think From deliberately placed no bonfire in that opening room just to make restocking spells/flasks after a failed summon run a hassle for people dropping signs. Hey guys you ready to just buy the damn DLC yet?
-*Host stands across the arena watching 2x sunbro beat up Dragonjerk for him* *Host occasionally runs when targeted by boss* *Post-victory, host performs warcry gesture* That's nice work, Lou.
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Kid Icarus Uprising - Chugging along in this, now in Chapter 17. I don't really have a lot to say about the game; it's goofy and fourth wall breaking in plot, its gameplay is reasonably fun, and its cast is awesome.
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Bravely Default: Damn it, Tiz! Just because you're a jRPG protagonist doesn't mean you have to play main character and find an excuse to join a war!
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FE13- Finished! Final time was 20ish hours. I didn't recruit many of the kids, just didn't see the point. I did use Owain (He started with 19 STR and 26 speed, dear god in heaven) and Lucina, almost entirely because Owain amused me and had such amazing stats. Anyway. Listing PC's I used. S supports were Chrom/Sumia, Lissa/Vaike, Robin/Sully, Lucina/Owain (Goddamn it Japan), Nowi/Gaius (JAAAAAPAAAAAAAAAAN), and Libra/Miriel.
Chrom- Started decent, then turned into trash by the end of the game. He was pretty average excepting one stat, speed. Was -8 speed by the time I started the final map. (20 speed at 20/15). *Punt* Got my silver medal for kills at least, though I had 6~ PC's in the 80 to 120 range (Chrom was 121 or so)
Robin- Mage who could take a hit, so useful by default. I didn't use his swords. Speed was on the low side but still useful. Got my bronze star for kills. Ended the game at 20/18.
Lissa- Only staff user, so useful by default. Her stats were garbage, but hey she promotes to Sage so that's cool. Also staves are super useful and she's your only one early.
Vaike- MVP, 253 kills. He was faster than Gangrel to give you an idea how stupid fast he was. Insane offense, he carried my team in the second half of the game. Only issue is that Lissa is a pretty terrible S support, though having Robin/Chrom supporting him works. He (With Robin as his pairup) soloed the final boss. Take Dorcas and give him Guy's speed and you have the result, IE unending slaughter.
Sully- Good early, trailed off later in the game. Mobility is always nice. Her offense was never very good without doubling, which she stopped reliably doing. Oh well.
Miriel- Unremarkable stats other than DEF (I got a slow, high def miriel). Still useful because she's a mage. Should've dumped her for Tharja but was too lazy to change my party around.
Sumia- Awful at first (too fragile), then awesome in the midgame due to stupid high stats. She changed from being an offensive dynamo to a mobile, somewhat durable healer late- she didn't really gain STR for her first 10 promoted levels which brought her in line with her normal STR growth. Still super useful!
Libra- Trashy stats but prepromo staff user who can use axes? SOLD. Offense was useless after midgame but who cares, durable healer.
Gaius-Glass cannon. He got STR on almost every single level before promotion, just lacked Vaike's HP and DEF. He generally murdered things and was super fast in doing so.
Nowi- Useful when teaming with Gaius and durable to physicals. Offense frankly was lacking due to speed woes, and she did not like mages at all.
Lucina- Decided to favor her mom and not gain STR for a while. Oh well. Still useful just for the speed and skills.
Owain- Vaike spawn=god stats. Used him just for my own amusement.
Olivia- Useful for dancing once or twice before being vaporized.
Anyway, game's a 4 or 5, depending on how I'm feeling. I do not like one of the core concepts of the game (Ninja reinforcements) and no amount of side content can make up for that. Nowi as a character is enough to cost it a point as well.
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FF6 Eviltype -
I have a couple of resets at the start of the World of Ruin. I prepare to rant about how Sage scaled up this part way too much. Then I notice I forgot to equip any armour. Well then. After that this area isn't too bad, strats like Wall Ring + Golem work well.
Collapsing House - Scorpions are jerks. But oh well stuff can be run from here, so it's not too bad. I get Sabin who has no spells learned, so he plays catchup for a bit.
1 reset on the overworld Serpent Trench, as I learn that Buffalax's Riot combo hurts like hell. Another reset in the Figaro area overworld, as Maligas also hurt a lot.
Figaro Cave - 2 resets here. The enemy offence can gun down two PCs pretty darn quickly. One reset is due to that as I try to fumble my way through a Neckhunter/Cruller/2 Humpty fight. Another reset is due to learning that Humpties, once no longer vanished, have auto-reflect. Whoops.
Tentacles - Not bad with the two Running Shoes and Bio Blaster to wreck things. I also run Ribbon/Star Pendant to not have to deal with the annoying poison.
I get Edgar who is Edgar and therefore awesome, and Setzer who has no spells. Like Sabin he plays catchup and at least his primary skill lets him output some damage even if it's not great.
Daryl's Tomb - Revivifies can deal with everything here which is a nice get-out-of-jail free card. I try not to use them too much. Unless PowerDemons show up. PowerDemons are colossal dicks who not only hit really hard, but have an innate runic status so you can't actually cast magic (on any target) while they're around. In FF6. Yeah. And they are immune to the key Tools status. Never do beat one of them "fairly" but oh well.
Presenter - 5 resets against Whelk 2.0. This fight is nasty and there are a lot of nuances I could mention about it but I get the handle on them and ultimately none of them matter except one: hitting the Shell triggers a Merton counter which with my current levels/gear is a MT OHKO. So the fight is like Whelk, except it's random how long the head stays targettable and even one timing mishap means death. Sadly the counter works against Rasp too, so that's out, and his former weakness to petrify is also gone. Anyway I don't actually win this; I could have but it involves a bit too much luck / patience for me right now, especially since only Celes can do decent damage here.
Dullahan - Seems nasty. Then I discover Runic destroys him. So Runic, cast Rasp with other PCs as soon as he uses a spell, repeat.
Phunbaba 1 - I didn't feel like fighting him ASAP. He's easy with a full party, Bio to the rescue.
I grab Palidor and Bum Rush, and get Gau back and grab a few rages. I also buy Crystal Shields which are pretty great.
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Popping up to say yay for games I really liked that others finished.
999, re CK: Just for the record I still think this game is totally awesome. Don't spoil yourself though per Fenrir. Maybe I'm misinterpreting CK, but he seems to be complaining about the opposite of an issue with 999 I had? To me, 999's 'gameplay' is practically irrelevant side puzzles that are done & dispensed with. You're actually buying a visual novel which I found pretty gripping and well-written. CK seems to be complaining that the gameplay & story are too integrated? Huh? They aren't integrated at all.
Awakening, re super: Ninja reinforcements are lame-o, but you played Casual, right? They're kinda irrelevant on Casual. Ninja pops up, kills someone, and... oh well. Okay if it's Chrom/Robin that's bad, but you back up 2-3 turns to your in-battle save, no big. I tried to play Classic-ish in spirit my first time - if a character died due to my own stupidity, I reset, but if a character died due to ninja strike, I just continued, and then it didn't matter. And with less pride, I can definitely attest to Lunatic Casual deathmarches with half the team dead by the end. In the same way, no argument that Nowi is ick, but she also has like 3 lines if you don't use her, so whatever. Also, you skip treasure chests or the like? If you didn't use Tiki you should definitely have had spare Dragonstone+s, and even if you missed the chests it's storebought eventually and a good investment, and it's also a pretty RNG-proof way to make Nowi mock mages forever.
I think I also saw you in chat saying that you thought the map design dived in C21 and beyond. Not much to say other than I really disagree. To take a step back, your vanilla Fire Emblem map (FE7-FE10) is something like either "move around in a mob, walk just into range of two enemies, watch them suicidally charge forward into their counters waiting for them, mop up, repeat" or "defend the base by sticking tanks at some chokepoints and healing a lot." Awakening is very good about either having the enemies dive you in a big group, or else giving you an incentive to move fast and not just slowly draw out enemies 1-2 at a time, and more generally setting up diverse and interesting 'feels' to each map. C21 is supposed to be an exciting escape map, so they force you to move forward quickly by the Sorcs, but also lure you to linger for awhile with treasure chests. That's cool (and you can also play it real slow if you want too - see Ciato's Lunatic strat if you truly hate the Mire spam). C22 gives you just a few really badass enemies with skills & Brave weapons & Legendaries, and they come for you in two waves - no taking 'em on 1 at a time at your leisure. But that's it on the map, so no frustration if you lose early, you don't lose any progress. That's also neat. C23 is just a fantastic sense of style with great music - the actual *plot* might be silly, but emotionally it's great and it's a nice callback to the prologue & fits the themes they're selling. Ninjas are also less of an issue than usual because there's just a few staircases which are easily covered. C24 is also interesting - a bunch of cavaliers bogged down in the forest, with a small plain area on top for your own cavaliers to fight on the open field if you want. Then throw in enemy Wyvern Lords who laugh at the puny terrain restrictions and threaten to assasinate your back line. C25 is short but also actually provides an incentive for you to hurry it on up, and the reinforcements usually spawn on the edge of the map or in obvious forts, so it's a well-done vanilla FE map. Final map is fantastic and how every FE final should work - barring the stupid ninja reinforcements that can spawn right next to the final, since it's super-lame to be in combat with the final and then get ganked by surprise reinforcements. But if they'd redone the map so that there was a constant flow of reinforcements NOT on top of the final boss that your allies needed to fight to keep them off the main heros back as they deal with the final, it'd be perfect, and it's still way better than the "1 big enemy" style of FE finals. So... yeah, I suppose the point is that I really like Awakening map design and think it's hugely better than the rest of the series, even if ninjas + hax draining can compromise it somewhat. (Worst map from a design perspective is probably C19 on Lunatic? There is just no sane way to deal with it other than send out Henry & Tharja to spend 120 Nosferatu charges or the like. No terrain, no blockades, no safe spots, just have your tankiest / drainiest units kill infinite cavalry reinforcements forever, attempting to use someone else will get them run down.)
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Things I have played recently:
Muramasa Rebirth - Fun game, glad I didn't really pay money for it. Mash square solves most problems, though things do get dicey in lategame and aftergame fights. Trying to finish up Sisuke's third ending, but grinding him up to equip the Oboro Muramasa is taking forever, esp because the final swords are weighted towards Momohime in their stat requirements(they need higher Vit than they do Str, and she is the high Vit of the two. Sisuke is high Str, lower Vit).
Amusingly, on the subject of another game being talked about, the trophy I got for getting a 999 hit combo was called "Hours, Persons, Doors".
Bravely Default - Got one of the endings. Kinda stalling out on doing more aftergame stuff since talking to Snowfire at con makes alot of it sound less than fun.
Bit.Trip Presents - Runner 2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien! - I just wanted to type out the full name. This game has the best name ever. Fun rhythm platformer, played it a bunch, got 100%, gonna play stages on hard when bored from time to time. Captain Video for best character, because he has the best dancing. Whetfart Cheesborger is pretty close though, for the name and for being a sentient cheesburger man. Also fuck Extralogic with a rusty spoon.
Child of Light - Bought this for random playings. It's....not hooking me, honestly. Like, it's fun enough, but I kinda have to force myself to play it. Not sure why.
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On the subject of 999, I played that awhile ago myself. Got Knife ending which was pretty lame considering...yeah, I had no idea where I went wrong to get that. Got back up to the 3/7/8 split on NG+ and just...sorta lost steam. I'd like to play through the rest of it, but it's hard to get back into it after that end. I'm 90% certain I figured out who the one behind the knife ending was, but couldn't really find any options in the NG+ that would let me prevent that from happening again, even though I thought of a few things. SHould get back to it at some point, but....eh. Hard to regain interest.
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Dragonstone+ is only 2 res on the regular version, so it shouldn't make or break the character's performance against mages. Manaketes should be tough against magic though, blah blah blah RNG applies.
I basically think Super is entirely right about ninja reinforcements. If they don't matter on Casual, you're pretty much saying none of your decisions matter either, since losing someone apparently isn't a big deal. At which point uh why are you even playing this game? <_< Obviously Casual isn't really my thing so take my comments with a grain of salt, though I will say that on Lunatic Casual I found them very significant (and FAQed them to raise my enjoyment of the game). As a general design thing I think ninja reinforcements encourage the player to approach things degenerately (e.g. grinding out a powerful team, moving slowly in a large blob which constantly covers all suspicious entry points) rather than considering the threats visible and planning accordingly. I have a similar problem with fog of war in some of the earlier games although at least torches could alleviate that (and hey, it was a perk for thieves/Janaff).
As far as lategame FE13 map design goes I think it's all over the place. C26 so good, C21 so bad. Broadly speaking throughout the game I feel the game could badly use more primary objective variety and secondary objectives (e.g. villages and chests which you need to race thieves/bandits for), and sometimes goes a bit light on terrain for my tastes (C19 and C23 are both bland open areas) but gets most of the fundamentals done well (good job with enemy placement in particular... as you note you'll almost never face 1-2 enemies at a time). It ends up around the middle of FE map design for me.
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I basically think Super is entirely right about ninja reinforcements. If they don't matter on Casual, you're pretty much saying none of your decisions matter either, since losing someone apparently isn't a big deal. At which point uh why are you even playing this game? <_< Obviously Casual isn't really my thing so take my comments with
Hey, I said ninja reinforcements suck too! But I pretty well already said how I at least played Hard Casual 1st time- my decisions DID matter, but there was a safety net for surprise ninja bullshit which I wouldn't feel like accepting a reset for. I didn't overuse the degenerate strategies you agree are unfun, but also didn't have to reset constantly. Win-win! It's exactly the same as you saying that you played X-COM in psuedo-Ironman style - but don't none of your decisions matter then???
EDIT: To be extra-explicit, a Classic runthrough makes ninjas horrible, and I get the appeal of Classic of course, so I'd understand you complaining about ninjas of course. Casual just really dulls the ninja's blades to me - it's still bad design but it's now less relevant bad design re super.
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Yeah that's fair. You can indeed mitigate the ninja stuff with timely save/reload as you note, it just feels inelegant to do so. I withdraw the larger complaint though.
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Snowfire: *shrug* there's not much to say. I don't find the way the game's structured after a point to be interesting. It's all about dealing with reinforcements. I like that there are a lot of enemies, but for the most part it's about turtling the first wave and being careful about reinforcements. 13 has far, far more polish than FE7 outside of that issue. I'd still rather play 7 hard mode rather than 13 lunatic because of that, it just annoys me.
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Wind Waker HD: Ok, 2 pearls down, what dungeon is the 3rd going to force on me no-...
"Hey, big fish, can you give this kid a Pearl? He kind of needs it to do important stuff."
*You got Nayru's Pearl*
...well, can't say I was expecting THAT. Anyway, ONTO THE TOWER! Also, got the Swift Sail, and I have to say, playing the game long enough without it already gives me this impression of "How the **** did people stomach the original version?" Not only is the speed boost immediately obvious, just being able to turn without losing speed or changing wind currents is so damned nice.
Bravely Default: So I'm going to kill a Chemist Salve Maker now...or at least find some toxin he used to undo his killingness...then probably kill him and eat his soul so we can become Chemists Salve Makers too.
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Kid Icarus: Uprising – Finished. It’s the first action game I’ve played in pretty much forever, and I quite enjoyed it. Half of it reminds me of Touhou and other shooters of that ilk and the other half reminds me of KH. Definitely love the game’s writing, very silly and I like how it has dialogue interspersed with the gameplay. Favorite character is probably Hades, he is a Grade A troll. Difficulty mode settings are quite nice; it means you can play the game at your own level or to your enjoyment. My biggest complaint is that the game seems to take a bit of time to get rolling (feels like it hits its stride in Chapter 10 or so) and that the control scheme is a bit awkward, for all that it works pretty well once you get used to it. I’d recommend it to anyone who likes humorous writing and can tolerate some shooter/action gameplay. 8/10.
Next we will tackle DKCR! Xer made me excited by showing off Tropical Freeze at DLCon, but I should probably play the one I own first. :P
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Well, Chapter 1-9 basically existed for the trailer. I mean, they're nothing but references to the original games for the most part, and the trailers for the game consisted entirely of that, basically for the purpose of "look at all those classic characters coming back!"
So yeah, the game doesn't really begin until Chapter 10, when it stops being fanservice for the first game. That, and Hades and Viridi get introduced there, so it's less Pit/Palutena/Villain of the week in every stage, and now a sense of consistency in cast.
Bravely Default: I killed a Bunny Girl and took her soul! ...except she didn't actually die in plot, which I find oddly strange...power of pop prevails except when it doesn't?
Wind Waker: I got the Master Sword and proceeded to...save immediately and stop playing because timing!
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FTL: Beat the game on normal with Mantis B. Not a big accomplishment since Mantis B is overpowered.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v141/Crystalgate/Execute_zpsa65ae3e6.png) (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/Crystalgate/media/Execute_zpsa65ae3e6.png.html)
The first fight against the flagship ended up being annoying. It hacked my weapons and between the cloak and the hacking, I could never even fire my weapons. The flagship couldn't hurt me though. I also made the mistake of hacking the shields since I'm used to having less fire power and therefore the shields often are a bigger problem than the cloak. Eventually I could kill off most of the crew by trapping them in the shield room and with most of them dead, I could injure the hacking system enough so that I could get my shoots off.
Hacking is overpowered. Often if an enemy poses a threat, they have one single component that can be removed to get rid of the threat. Hacking does exactly that. Heck, even when I screwed up and hacked the wrong system, the mere fact that hacking locks the doors could easily be exploited. Mind control, the other advance system, is extremely weak in comparison. Never mind the fact that hacking counters mind control while mind control doesn't counter hacking.
Has anyone ever been lucky enough to outfit a ship with four Burst Laser II?
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And now, SF reports back on the Alex-approved-platformers-with-limited-flying genre.
Cave Story+: Beat this a ~month or so ago. It's fun! I can see why they had to + it, though. No Achievements in the original version? I can only imagine how people who wasted so much time on the original feel, knowing that their accomplishments were futile and will never be given a Steam pop-up of recognition, especially in a game with so much random weird stuff to do.
Anyway, I like Metroid games, and CS is basically indie Metroid, except actually better in a lot of ways (if a tad smaller in scope?). Reminds me a bit of Metroid Fusion in that it's not very exploration focused - here's your next stage, go run it - and also has a plot, although CS's plot is way more enjoyable than Fusion's of course (a low bar to clear). The combat is pretty enjoyable, which is nice (played on Classic difficulty, not wimp difficulty). I already mentioned this in chat, but this is definitely a game whose difficulty curve amps steeply upward - I felt challenged-but-in-control most of the game, defeating some bosses & stages the first try, and occasionally taking a 2nd or 3rd shot when needed. Then the Egg Chamber revisited shows up, and owowowowowow what stop the pain (#$%^ Sisters Dragons right after non-trivial stage w/ no healing). The prison & island's edge were legit, the plantation's easiness put me off my guard, then ZOMGwat the Final Cave, and then the final boss sequence of dying repeatedly. (Of which Malice (?!!) probably picked up the most kills, yes.) Still, hey, that made winning very rewarding. And apparently if I enjoy pain even more, I can do the final cave without the machine gun and with all my weapon levels reduced to 1 if I'm aiming to do the bonus dungeon + true final? Yeesh the difficulty really does keep going up.
The weapon damage mechanic is… interesting, but I'm glad most games don't have it. It makes things very swingy - you get punished for getting hit in losing life, and then you get punished further by nerfing your weapon. It's not a huge deal for the first half of the game, but by the second half when getting hit = losing the godly lvl. 3 Machine Gun of controllable air-dancing, yikes. Like, say, hypothetically after bumping into a spike in the final cave. Hypothetically. Reminds me a bit of how Demon's Souls allegedly punished you a bit for dying.
The plot was… actually rather charming. Killer robots vs. killer bunnies vs. evil sorceress? It's weird, sure, and switches tone a bunch (zany hijinks! comic relief bosses! search for lost puppies! find out the tragic history of 10 years ago! watch your friends die and/or be transformed into horrible beasts!), but dang, it actually works. The funny parts were funny, the sad parts were sad, the menacing parts were actually properly scary & built up. The one thing I could do without were the two bits where your character gets artificially cutscene 'captured' and sent somewhere inconvenient - surely there's a better way to do that?
Anyway, fun game with rewarding bosses. Not really in a hurry to do the extra content but the fact it's there is cool. Definitely recommended for the odd person out there who hasn't played it yet. (Use a gamepad of course - I used my trusty PS2 controller.)
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Touhouvania 2: I don't like Touhou, but I do like Castlevania, and the fact that one Sir Alex helped localize it piqued my interest. It's pretty good! Neat levels, neat boss design, and adding limited flying to the Castlevania formula was definitely an interesting twist. Visually, the game is a fantastic love letter to Castlevania - they really nailed a lot of the iconic Symphony of the Nightish environments while adding their own twist. I'm impressed at the visuals & play-control for a doujin game - it's really professional (except perhaps the fact each character usually only has 1 portrait) The music was okay, but a tad disappointing? Touhou games usually get hype for their music, but nothing super-memorable… except the final boss music, which is awesome and sounds like a Gust final ripoff, and that is a compliment. Okay, the arena stage music was pretty cool too.
Subweapons were strikingly powerful. However, since they are also very helpful vs. the bosses, and you don't get hearts back if you die vs. the boss (well, except the 50 minimum), there was an incentive not to cheese the regular stages too hard with subweapons, except the super-cheap Dagger. Definitely one of the best Daggers in a Castlevania, as a side note. Subweapons were also a tad kept under control for some of the later bosses because they potentially blocked your view of what the heck was going on, which was death.
As another semi-random fact, the damage knockback in this game felt gigantic, especially if you were airborne at the time. Whee go soaring across half the screen. Definitely was the potential for chain lock-ups here, although less likely in normal stages… on the bright side, the invincibility-post-damage time was quite long as well.
Difficulty curve… well, see Cave Story+. With 7 lives per continue, I steadily advanced through the stages; usually something like die to boss, continue, defeat boss, get through next stage on remaining life stock, die to boss, redo stage + boss with 7 lives, die next stage, repeat. I didn't have to learn the boss patterns too deeply because just plain trading damage to get in was often times viable, and then finish with daggers or the axe summon. Alex encouraged 20 lives no shame by !Richter's Arena stage, which helped, but she still wasn't so bad comparatively. The difficulty for stage 7 & 8, though, ouch. S7 Evil butterfly girl slaughtered me repeatedly until I figured out a conservative enough style to get damage in without trading (I did manage to double-KO against her twice, for all that this doesn't count!). Still I must have died a good 40-50 times figuring it out, so pretty respectable. For the final stage, I cranked it down to a more honorable 12 lives per continue to make the stakes a tad higher. S8 !Drac1 was a good fight in that it killed me a bunch early on, but was very clearly 'learnable' - if you don't get hit by beams of doom or the blood-suck attack, all of which are very evadable, the fight's pretty easy. Yukari is just plain easy - she goes down fast and it's very easy to play conservatively vs. her. By later continues, I easily 1-lifed both of these. !Dracula2, however… OW. That was a lot of me just dying and then dying again as doom lasers damage knocked me around the screen into more doom lasers. If you foolishly knock off some of the barriers, I think there are even new beam patterns to learn & die to! Anyway, slowly, agonizingly, I learned the safe spots and how to get to them, and flight patterns that kept me alive and ones that got me dead. The fight is pretty routinized, at least, so I really could feel like I was learning as I went. Oh and running out of magic is of course hilarious instant death usually, so don't accidentally use the spread sword attack or jump kick. So after a ton of deaths (much faster than Cave Story's final sequence at least?) I triumphed, which was properly rewarding, as it was definitely a different kind of Castlevania final battle. More to the point, it didn't feel like a "keep trying till you get lucky" deal; you really have to learn it, and I'd be much more confident in my abilities to defeat her again.
Sadly, if there's a part I didn't like, it'd be the script - sorry Alex! While *visually* the game is totally a Castlevania, the dialogue & plot end up clearly Touhou (with the occasional exception - thanks for 'take you to a good place' at least). I obviously can't complain too much about this - press start to skip & all - but meh. If Cave Story succeeded in being both serious & silly, Touhouvania 2 tried to alternate between them as well, and usually whiffed at both. I will say that as far as menace goes, at least evil butterfly girl succeeded: direct, threatening, to the point, "water the ground with my blood" indeed. The whole style of the fight + music amped up Srs Bizness tension too, nothing like a slow moving instant-death red butterfly to keep you on edge. In the same way, some of the early bosses had some amusing goofball moments (the Marisa battle perhaps?). However, too much time is spent on lame plot exposition of a pretty weak plot (where's my mistress? what's going on? oh something about fighting and unlocking ultimate power, 'k). I think I'd have tried to pick between either straight silliness or tension; and if I went for tension, I'd have actually had there be some sort of evil plot with consequences, and amped up the melodrama for Sakuya betraying her boss. Instead, the game is theoretically serious by the end, except !Drac *wants* Sakuya to fight her, which kills the tension. Like, either Remilia has gone mad with power and Sakuya decides she needs to be put down (srs) OR do the silly case ("let's training! I call vampire lord!!1! isn't this outfit crazy, Sakuya?") I can't blame Alex for any of this, of course, I imagine localizers are somewhat locked down when every other word out of Sakuya's mouth is "Ojou-sama" for the final bits.
Anyway, the above whining is not really relevant to the game and totally skippable, and the game itself was pretty fun. I never liked how the shooter Touhou games seemed to just encourage holding down the fire button and concentrating on nothing but dodging; give the main character a sword and tell 'em that if they want to do damage, they have to get in on enemies, endless dodging won't cut it. So yeah, solid game with good bosses, I approve. Now if only the extra phantasm stage will stop slaughtering me...
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On the note of the above two games, this is a silly idea, but since I've been playing a fair amount of League of Legends lately... LoL is based a lot around dodging 'skillshots', so it seems like it'd make an interesting Metroidvania itself, if Riot ever wanted to dangerously branch out. Which they probably won't (contract it out to someone else, assume lots of brand risk; do it yourself, and risk getting distracted from the true cash cow that is the MOBA). But plenty of LoL characters translate very well to bosses; whee dodging Lux lasers (apparently a Touhou reference anyway, a fact I learned thanks to GlenVeil) or pretty much any other character with fun attacks (Katarina dagger storm?!), and later in the game you get to fight more than one character at once. Rig it so the main character is someone who doesn't really have an ultimate and who has both ranged & close-range attacks - Jayce or Blitzcrank I guess? - then they get to dodge various telegraphed AI ultimates while collecting new weapon upgrades themselves in the castle. And of course in the final boss sequence, there can be the horror in Riven being turned by the evil summoner into her Battle Bunny Riven form if they want to do Cave Story callbacks… well I'm amused thinking about it, at least. Rito pls.
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Penny Arcade 4: Took me hours to figure out how to beat the four shadow PCs and Cthulhu on Insane.
Ultimate pro strats:
- Vendorr under Hestia (item boost). Spams Nihilators, throws a potion when things get terrible.
- Coral Golem under Hestia, he becomes Defend Monster of Defend. He gets all sorts of stat bonuses and protects the team and regens Hps and shit when he defends (Honestly at this point I don't know what all the bonuses are. I just know that they are many), so basically he defends the entire battle.
- Fuschia under Moira with Clean Energite (Always at 2 MPs -> Can spam MT healing). Uses Friendship (boosts magic stats) before actually spamming MT healing
- Philosofly under Moira with Wind Boosting Item. Uses Let's Positive Thinking!! for constant healing, then spams its 1MP MT wind attack which does crazy damage thanks to all the boosts from everything.
The rest of the game was easy afterwards. I only got a reset against the final boss. That's kinda the problem with Zeboydgame: Once you've got a good strategy, you rarely need to change it and can use it every battle.
Vendorr isn't that great by the end of the game unfortunately, Brodent with Moira is probably a better choice against solo enemies. Brodent just doesn't stop getting turns. I liked setting up his POIZN attack against the final boss, (Perforate + Cheese + Buffz + Coral Golem defending. THEN poizn) so it could do 5000 Damage per turn and vastly outdamage any summon I could get.
I've also decided whether I was too old for Fish Force.
I'm not.
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Crystal: While I haven't gotten 4 Burst Mk II's, I HAVE gotten 2 Burst Mk2's and a Glaive Beam with pre igniter once, that was glorious.
So, I play games also. Been playing a bunch of FTL recently also, right now on easy because I'm mostly focused on unlocking ships, only have the Stealth C and Crystal A & B left to unlock. After a lot of initial failures with the earlier ships I've managed to get to the point where I consistently win even when trying out the new ships within the first or second run on easy. Stealth B is looking like it will be hilarious if I can survive the first few sectors what with the starting Glaive Beam. Favorite ships so far are the Fed A, Zoltan A, Mantis B, and Lanius A. Least favorite are Fed C, Rock A & B(Only Missiles to start? No Door system/venting capabilities? Horrible layout on both? FUUCK OFFFF) and Slug B. Highlights include aforementioned duel Burst Mk II's + Glaive on Kestral C, complete Lucker drops on Slug B and Rock C that basically had me set to beat the flagship by Sector 2 in both runs, running into a ship with a beam drone my second jump in in sector 1 with Stealth A and having the game bend me over whilst it violated me without lube, and forgetting to remove 2 crew from the medbay for flagship 1 on my second run of Stealth A and watching them slowly die as the medbay gets hacked right at the start >.>. Also, fucking space spiders in my earlier runs, I now avoid those guys like the plague without blue options.
Orcs Must Die: Picked this and OMD2 up because steam sale and craving a TD game recently, fun so far, can't wait to see ifI can pull off frue pathing shenanigans with the barriers.
Valkyria Chronicles 2: I play this off and on when I'm watching streams and find a particular segment boring or something. Basic gameplay is cool, class system and weapon upgrade system is pure bullshit, and I kind of just ignore the story. Currently in November, just about done unlocking all the weapons that I can at this point, which requires replaying some levels like 7+ times. Class balance was good at first, but is now rather broken. Commandos are stupid overpowered, especially the ones that can access Max vs Personnel. Flamethrowers being aoe, ignoring accuracy, being the only thing that reliably ohko's bunkers and towers and reliably ohko's infantry with the aforementioned potential(some even when they evade if you aim it right!) all with non fail durability and serviceable mobility is too good a package.
Scouts have become mostly useless because interception fire rips through them now and they can't reliably kill units without headshots. Their sniper line has some uses mostly for boss unit slaying by attacking far enough away that they don't abuse their 80% evade. Troopers have their commando branch, which is already covered, and the gunner side, which is good but generally outclassed by commando since flamethrower is just a more reliable aoe weapon the Gatling guns, they gain some favor for being the line you need to unlock max vs personnel in. Lancers Kill tanks, while they can kill most infantry with headshots this can be hard and not something to be relied on, but killing tanks they are great at. The Mortarer line just sucks and should be avoided because they're aoe is no better then commando/gunners and you basically want your lancers to be dealing with tanks 95% of the time anyways. Engineers have been basically useless on both lines, they need headshots to ohko any infantry, have no way of decrouching enemies to do so if needed, have trash durability, and their healing/ammo resupplies are just not needed, I also haven't found a need for anthem corp/melodist buff/debuffs yet since commandos and lancers still ohko their primary targets handily enough. Techs are...okay... the actual tech line is somewhat pointless, since laying mines is a waste of time and lancers, techs themselves, and to a lesser extent troopers can use enemy mines as a sort of rocket jump to move further with some hp expended instead of ap. Their good side is their defense meaning they basically give no shits about interception fire, and the Fencer/Mauler line rip infantry/tanks to shreds respectively like nobodies business, too bad their mobility is awful and half the time they need to spend 2 cp to get to an enemy that any other class would only need 1 cp to get to.
So uh, yeah, guess I'm trying to say I like the game but can only play it in short spats due to awful class system/balance and whatnot.
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And apparently if I enjoy pain even more, I can do the final cave without the machine gun and with all my weapon levels reduced to 1 if I'm aiming to do the bonus dungeon + true final? Yeesh the difficulty really does keep going up.
No don't be silly. You do a different, harder final cave.
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The machinegun is amazing the first time you play the game, but the alternative you get for waiting until the end of the game to trade up is much more suitable for Frue Final Dungeon (and if you get the jetpack upgraded then you barely even miss machinegun hovercraft of some kind; what jetpack v.1.0 lacks in staying power it more than makes up for in maneuverability). The alternative is also a weapon that never downgrades and does single bursts of powerful damage instead of a billion shots of decent damage, which basically frees you up to take careful shots and otherwise focusing on dodging...which you will need to do an awful lot of vs Frue Final.
Hell lives up to its name. You thought final cave was bad? Hahahaha. (Final Cave is bad. Just, you know, Hell.) I can't comment on Wind Temple though because I never finished it. I dunno if there's even a boss because the precision platforming with lethal result for failure defied my patience.
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Bravely Default: Time to kill a
Chemist Salve Maker! Would have done it already but pressed for time!
The Wind Waker HD: Swift Sail is amazing. I seriously cannot see how the game would have been barable without it, which is to say, I can see why sailing was such a big fuss in the Gamecube version. Doubling Speed and always favorable wind makes a hell of a difference. It still takes time to cross the entire map, but...
-That's what fast travel is for. You still can't always go exactly where you want, but going even one panel on the normal sail was a pain, Swift Sail makes it completely tolerable.
-When you want to explore stuff, that's not a bad thing, and just having this thing called "Mobility" is great!
Also, nice that they address why, despite having the Master Sword, you don't feel like an invincible bad ass. yeah, it's a cheap "not at full power" excuse, but at least it's addressed. When you have a super awesome sword that's suppose to be able to rival the power of the Gods, you should feel like a bad ass, something OoT really failed to do. Saying "oh, not fully awakened" at least shows there's still ways to get stronger despite having the best sword ever.
And again, I like how they are NOT acting like Link is the "CHOSEN ONE!" at all. For example, they don't go "YOU HAVE THE TRIFORCE OF COURAGE!" but rather "Go find the Triforce of Courage!", as it gives more a sense of "Link proves himself a hero" rather than "Link is a hero because DIVINE RIGHT!"
Yeah, being light hearted in a Zelda game definitely does it help it, and Link having actual body language makes him that much more enjoyable, at least compared to other 3D Links.
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Xenoblade Chronicles - I have met the ~joke character~. I know this because there is silly music.
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DQ6 - I just finished the most amazing part of the game so far. So we all know how Dragon Quest games take terrible jokes and drive them home as hard and far as possible right? Well sometimes it is worth it. This is one of those times.
The Castle of Swanstone has a Princess who has been cursed to be stuck in a mirror for a thousand years by an evil wizard called Speigel (German for Mirror). The king of this castle has grown up pining for this princess. He knows the spell to free the princess but it doesn't work. He implores you to go find the tower that the evil wizard lives in and defeat him.
You climb to the top of Speigelspire and encounter Speigel, he reveals that the princess' name is Miralda (because of course it is) and that he can free her whenever he wants to, she just has to agree to become his bride. You kill him obviously.
So you then go back to the castle and tell the king you have murdered the evil wizard for him. He then goes and frees the princess from the mirror with the spell he knows. As soon as she is out of the mirror he declares that they are getting married and she ........s and they walk away.
You can now talk to a bard who delivers this line
"He's starting with the princess in the mirror...~
She's been a victim of a selfish kind of love....~" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PivWY9wn5ps)
And that is the greatest joke a Dragon Quest game has ever had and now I know what I am going to listen to for the rest of the day.
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SaGa 2: Goddess Of Destiny - played through
Pretty entertaining for a while, starts decaying around the point of Venus's world, levels off in Japanland, then nosedives in Valhalla and doesn't look back. I ended up dodging/running from pretty much every battle in Valhalla onwards because they were so obnoxious. (This was not really one thing leading to another as the members of my party with stat growths were at or near the caps in the relevant stats already.)
Had endless trouble with Odin until I was alerted to the Aegis Shield being A Thing, which just made me more annoyed at the fight apparently expecting you to spam it. Before I started using it, typically half my party would be dead by the end of the first turn.
Party was Human/Esper/Robot/Monster. Monster was proooobably the weakest link in the chain for most of the game, although it could vary wildly. Esper had Blaze pretty much the entire game but sadly the time it stopped being particularly effective coincided with the time that enemy numbers started reaching absurd levels, so that wasn't a fun set of adjusting to have to deal with. Also hardly ever got any speed, depressingly, so that was another nail in the kill-everything-before-it-moves coffin. Psychoguns were pretty rad! But then I found out that they were ultra-rare, and then Human got the absurdly powerful infinite-use Excalibur :S
Final Defence System was also a fight that took me far more attempts than I would have preferred. In this case the tricks were mainly that circlets could be used to block paralysis and that I should give up any hope of the Esper getting a chance to do any shooting in favour of it spamming heal staves the entire battle, with the turn order adjusted to ensure that they went as last-most as possible. Succeeded on the first attempt under these, despite the Human managing to get killed during phase 2. Hadn't seen phase 3 before this attempt either! Monster was a Scylla for the fight... which spent most of phase 2 paralysed... but when it was actually attacking it was fair enough, not as powerful as the Robot but closeish.
I kind of wonder what Final Defence System was actually supposed to be defending! I'll have to read an LP of FFL2 I guess.
Never touched any of the destiny thread stuff because I wasn't in the mood for trying to figure out what it was for, didn't bother actually looking that up until I was in Valhalla and decided that I couldn't be bothered starting with it. Maybe it makes all the difference in the game difficulty. Apparently this indirectly caused me to be locked out of getting any rank 5 monster, which was saddening.
Destiny threads are a mixed bag. They're the one addition to the DS remake over the original GB game - if you ignore them, in fact, the gameplay of SaGa 2 DS is 100% identical to FFL2's - and, if used, they do make much of the mid-late game markedly easier.
There's a catch: there are actually two versions of the final boss. If you don't use any threads ever the entire game, you get the final boss' normal form which is identical to the original FFL2 endboss mechanically. If you did use threads, you get a powered up final boss that has like twice as many phases and is honestly probably the hardest final boss I've ever seen in a commercial RPG, mainstream OR doujin (Yes I'm saying it was harder than Genius of Sappheiros' final, _jesus_).
I never liked how the shooter Touhou games seemed to just encourage holding down the fire button and concentrating on nothing but dodging
This describes pretty much every bullet hell shooter I've ever played, not just Touhou (in fact, other bullet hell games I've played feel _worse_ about it to me, since the bullets coming at you tend to be faster and rely more on rote memorization). Dodging is very definitely the gameplay focus of every Touhou shooter though, yes (and, if you're not playing Reimu, staying vertically in line with the boss matters). Positioning does matter somewhat but it's mostly a much-higher-level-play-than-me thing.
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I actually beat that final boss with four robots!
Pretty hard but I had more trouble with other RPGs (Arc the Lad 4, Atelier Iris, Fallout, Shadow Hearts 3? + The Egg / Battle of South Moundtop super-combo from SaGa Frontier 2)
Rogue Legacy: Oh yeah also beat this. Trying to beat the super bosses now, and I'm stuck on Alexander IV.
I really like roguelikes carrying over bonuses upon death but this might go too far? A starting character can't get anywhere lategame; death is pretty much inevitable.
Otherwise, the gameplay is randomly generated modern Castlevania.
The game got popular in part because of the random traits your characters can get, and I admit that they're pretty great.
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Donkey Kong Country Returns - Got through World 1. It is very challenging so far! Reminds me more of a harder modern Mario than of the old DKC games, though.
Xenoblade Chronicles - I can't believe I forgot to mention Alvis, who seems to embody every bad stereotype of the stupid cryptic character. He doesn't answer any questions ever, he disappears randomly, and stands on a rock wistfully as his bishie hair blows in the wind. I'm really uncertain if this whole game is some kind of surreal comedy or what.
Mario Kart 8 - Back in the clutches. Trying to get three stars in Mirror Mode on all of the cups.
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Mario Kart 8 - Two stars on everything, got the stickers for beating a cup with each racer.
Child of Light - In the undersea dungeon. Game's gotten a bit harder recently, the last two bosses were pretty legit. I may be a bit underlevelled though, since I've fought relatively few randoms throughout the game. The game remains quite fun gameplaywise and is neat aesthetically, although the writing hasn't really gotten me to care much.
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DKCR - Beat down the World 2 boss, the Pinchin' Pirates! They are so cute. :)
MK8 - Definitely not addicted to this.
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Bravely Default: mommy it hurts make the fire stop
Nice strategy, Ephraim, I'll definitely pretend I used that in my head. Instead I attempted to use Elf's strat, but... it didn't really work (Fire Bane happens too often, losing trade on turns). So instead I used Elf's strat in combination with my really lame strats of sleep abuse + friend summon. After spending ~20 SP or so later (hence the 2 week delay), I am pleased to announce I have 'won' via such massive cheating. Hooray! (Thanks, BD, for letting SP regen in the middle of battle...)
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Bravely Default- Just beat Chaugmar. Bitch of a fight. It took a few resets, but I finally did manage to kill him (in a round after transform!) without seeing his big damage move. Two Valkyrie/Sword Fencer Combos+Special Moves+Healing Special Move that ups BP by 2. 4x Lightning Judgement=40,000+2 More Special Moves of 7,000+6,000 from Thundara. Fun fight though.
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Xenoblade Chronicles Tales of Xillia - I can't believe I forgot to mention Alvis Alvin, who seems to embody every bad stereotype of the stupid cryptic character.
Fixed
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Xenoblade Chronicles Tales of Xillia - I can't believe I forgot to mention Alvis Alvin, who seems to embody every bad stereotype of the stupid cryptic character.
Fixed
Nah, Alvin does belong to a separate category for clichés, but not that one.
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Xenoblade Chronicles Tales of Xillia - I can't believe I forgot to mention Alvis Alvin, who seems to embody every bad stereotype of the stupid cryptic character.
Fixed
Did ToX steal bad plot ideas from XBC??? Is there some reference that both is based on that I'm missing?
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Bravely Default: mommy it hurts make the fire stop
Nice strategy, Ephraim, I'll definitely pretend I used that in my head. Instead I attempted to use Elf's strat, but... it didn't really work (Fire Bane happens too often, losing trade on turns). So instead I used Elf's strat in combination with my really lame strats of sleep abuse + friend summon. After spending ~20 SP or so later (hence the 2 week delay), I am pleased to announce I have 'won' via such massive cheating. Hooray! (Thanks, BD, for letting SP regen in the middle of battle...)
Hmm. You need 3 BP worth of actions to undo Fire Bane, which shouldn't really be a problem at all if you have a Performer as well (or two Spiritmasters I suppose) to donate actions. If you have neither and Fire Bane comes often I suppose you might run out of actions on the appropriate PC though? I found that fight pretty easy once I hit on that strategy, personally.
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Bravely Default: I finally killed the fat ass. I need to play this game more often <_<
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Hrm? 3BP? I am now curious as to how you come by that.
I am now also going to make a point of finishing that fight.
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Alvin is a lot more charismatic than your average "MYSTERY PC!!!". He jokes around with the cast, he develops legitimate friendships and relationships, and so on. Teasing Jude is not an action that a 'normal' cliched mystery PC would take.
Yeah he belongs to another cliche.
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Performer or massive Spiritmaster MP-BP abuse could have done the trick, it was more that I wanted the fight to take less time in-game, since my offense would have been *putrid* if I had both of my Spiritism users on constant anti-Firebane duty. So by making the game take far more time outside of game, I wasn't locked into near-constant defense that could still get disrupted by a bad turnsplit (even slowed, Fire Bane wasn't always guaranteed to go last...).
I haven't set Singing lately, but fair point that My Hero is p. good in such situations.
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I was thinking of Greater Spirit Ward which is 3 actions worth of BP (2 + the turn spent using it), though now that I think about it I'm pretty sure I was actually using Enigma for the nullification (which is 4). Regardless this doesn't need any sort of grand abuse. At least for me, Fire Bane wasn't coming more often than once every two turns on average, so between the BP generated by my Spiritmaster and the BP generated by my Performer (who used One More For You, btw, not My Hero, since only the Spiritmaster's BP matters here!) I was assured to always have enough. If Fire Bane had come even more often then I would have thrown in a second Performer probably. I was kind of fortunate though, since this was pretty much the makeup of my team anyway, since I was all about Performer/Spiritmaster to enable Dark Knight MT 9999 spam.
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Rogue Legacy: Attempting to get the <15 deaths trophy. It's not going well.
Kero Blaster: Cave Story discussion reminded me of that game (which was made by the Cave Story guy)
It's not really Cave Story 2. it's a pretty short action game with levels. But it's neat. VERY neat. The opposite of Rogue Legacy, which is kind of a (lovable) mess.
I suggest playing it if you want what might very well be the Neatest game Of All Time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ej2AtlVNvjM
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DS2: Have by now soloed the graverobber trio (a couple times!) Actually not much of an issue*? Try Circling Around. The biggest problem is honestly just the greatbow sniper jerkass. Unless he's on the other side of the arena when he fires, he basically doesn't miss. The tracking on that thing is just way too good, rolling when he fires in melee-ish range just means you don't get knocked flat on your ass when he inevitably tags you because DS2 hitboxes and I-frames, they be a handful. And the computer prioritizes sniping and you can't reliably pin him down in melee because of his asshole buddies. Backstabs are awesome in this fight except for the fact that DS2 doesn't let you be invincible during the animation and Not!Alva can still inflict bleed on you while you're ganking Havel. Not cool. So yeah, looks scary because it's three-on-one, but whatevs, just run in circles and play hit-and-run. Even on NG+ they don't deal that much damage individually.
Basically done here until the next round comes out (on my birthday!)
(*Except for the part where I got greedy trying to land a killing blow, which missed because DS2 greatclubs hate lock-on, then I got knocked down to like 10% health and rolled into the pool with the petrification spitters in an attempt to escape for healing and everyone followed me and oh my god how did I live through this.)
Have succumbed to sudden urge to replay FFT because I dunno man it's been a couple years. Ramza's born on Bastille Day because why the fuck not. I have no idea what this means for zodiac compatibility because I never bothered to understand how that works (and then I wonder why my healers have crap hitrates).
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If you hit select while on a character's status screen and move the cursor to the zodiac sign, you can see a list of signs they have good or bad compatibility with. (Unfortunately you have to learn to recognise the zodiac signs, which out of all skills I have picked up while playing video games is the one I am most ashamed of.)
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Yeah, Child of Light isn't going to win any prizes for plot/writing but I find it oddly endearing/charming none the less especially from the chat exchanges various characters have with each other after random battles a lot of which I didn't encounter or realize what was triggering it until my third run through the game on my second NG+ run since my first runs were spent on no randoms challenges~, exchanges like the temp's assessment of Aurora's group of friends, she seems genuinely complimentary of Rubella and Tristis, especially Tristis for some reason, calling him brave to pursue his dreams, a conversation Rubella has with Oengus about her Dad being a carpenter and apparently it turns out he helped do some building for Oengus's tribe, Oengus thinks her dad would be proud of Rubella now, a convo between Gen and Tristis where Gen wonders why Tristis is always so sad, she queries if the parents of Tristis and Rubella are dead, Tristis doesn't want to talk about it, he feels the pain, and he feels for Gen's loss as well~
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Gods Will Be Watching trip report.
This is a game that exists. How does this game exist? How did this get made and to a point where it is actually being sold to people? I am kind of in awe.
It is a hostage situation/POW torture simulator and resource management game. A lot of reviews hide this for whatever reason, they really shouldn't because the people who will not like this game will REALLY not like this game. It is like Papers, Please turned up to infinity. I am not even sure I like this game. I derived some form of enjoyment or satisfaction from it... I THINK... but I am not sure I can recommend it to any other human being. I can't even think of a better way to talk about it than to just describe what it is.
You start by playing a group of rebels who have invaded a facility and taken some hostages. The gameplay is turn based and consists of choosing actions in order to not die. You have to negotiate with the police and stop them from encroaching on your position, both physically and electronically, and manage the group of hostages. They have different personalities, if confident hostages get too comfortable they'll try to fight or escape, so you have to yell at them, kick them, maybe shoot some of them in the kneecaps to keep them in line. But if you're too intimidating, then the more scared hostages will panic and make a break for it or do various suicidally dumb things. Your team members also have different personalities and some of them can object if you're too violent or cruel or lax. There is some amount of RNG in the decisions and outcomes as well, which is mechanically infuriating but plays to the theme. It is definitely possible to play optimally and still have things go south very fast.
Then the next encounter reverses the situation, your characters get captured and tied to chairs and you must survive several days of torture and interrogation. Your options are "PROVOKE, BEG FOR MERCY, LIE, THINK OF MORE CONVINCING LIE, CONFESS." Your captors wrench your teeth out and blowtorch you and various other things in gruesome pixel art. One of the torture options is Russian Roulette, 1 bullet in the revolver and anything your captor doesn't like earns you a pull at the trigger. It is legitimately randomized and can fire on the first shot. That is the sort of game this is.
The game continues. It does actually get less brutal in the later stages, which involve things like "merely" having to decide on an acceptable lethality rating for the drug cocktails you're live testing on someone and then waiting to see if they wake up from their sedatives or not.
After every mission you get an online stats comparison where you see what percentages of people behaved in the same ways you did and are tantalized with how things could have gone differently. Walking Dead, eat your heart out.
This is a video game experience that somehow exists.
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If you hit select while on a character's status screen and move the cursor to the zodiac sign, you can see a list of signs they have good or bad compatibility with. (Unfortunately you have to learn to recognise the zodiac signs, which out of all skills I have picked up while playing video games is the one I am most ashamed of.)
Naturally the high-faith recruits I grabbed have worst compatibility with Ramza. Oh well, never stopped me before!
EDIT: though it does mean I don't give a shit about friendly fire, which is fun.
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Bravely Default: Liam O'brien has been murdered, that is all.
Wind Waker HD: About to do the Earth Temple, I think. It's "I think" because I'm not sure what I expect when I bring the bird person to the temple and things happen and...
...wait a minute...
A BIRD person (which are apparently descendants of the Zorras because THAT'S how evolution works, right?) is the Sage for the Earth Temple, which was originally run by a Zorra, aka a Fish person? And I can already tell the Sage for the Wind temple is going to be a Tree Person...
...correct me if I'm wrong, but shouldn't those be like swapped? Ok, forest and wind fit, but forest and earth fit a hell of a lot better than bird and Earth, and Bird and wind seem like an obvious connection.
...also, I killed a gauntlet of enemies that included no less than 6 Dark Nuts. my reward? 200 Rupees! THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN HEART CONTAINER WORTH DAMN IT!!! Ah well, at least my limit is 5000, so it's going to be hard to reach that "YOU GOT A BUNCH OF RUPEES! ...but you already have max so you can't care, go spend it on useless stuff so these can pretend to be rewards again" moment.
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FF6 Eviltype - Doing WoR stuff now. I actually don't want to go too recruitment-happy too fast for level re-averaging reasons, so I figure I'll do a somewhat different order than I often do. I do grab Gau right away because (a) Setzer really sucks right now and (b) Gau knows craploads of spells from all his WoB playtime + hey some Rages are useful.
Narshe - 1 reset. The enemies here are certainly legitimate, being able to output plenty of damage, and Red Wolf seems to tank every status I throw out. I die to Wizards when they break Ice Rods on me. :( That's what I get for not having any elemental resistance I suppose. Anyway some status (I think it's Stop) deals with them. Mog get, Moogle Charm get.
With the Moogle Charm I raid the final dungeon for among other things a Minerva, an Aegis Shield, a Force Shield, a Force Armour, and the Fixed Dice. This is kind of a big deal.
Veldt Cave - Toe Cutters aren't too bad, MT poison damage isn't negligible but thanks to my newfound elemental resistance doesn't threaten to just MT 2HKO me or anything. Similarly, it lets me tank Allo Ver's nasty Snowball spam which is quite dangerous, especially since he has runic so I can't heal against him normally (Harvester Rage is a big help).
SrBehemoth - 4 resets. Screw this guy. First stage deals some brutal elemental damage which can be dealt with by Rasp (at low HP he pulls out Meteo which is MT OHKO to whatever it hits, extrapolating from his other damage. Yet another reason to Rasp him). The second stage is of course the real problem since Lullaby->Lullaby->Overcast what the hell is that. One reset from forgetting that Ribbon = permazombie in this battle, the rest just from getting too hosed by Lullaby. At my levels I need two good rushes so have to survive two of his killer status turns. Unicorn, I realise, will heal one used of Overcast, which is great, and Runic can block one Lullaby. Still pretty much just need to tank the other with MBlock (could have used Ribbon once I realised about Unicorn but it's risky). Oh well, I pull it off eventually.
Current levels are 21-22.
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Dragon Quest 6 - Got up to the Dread Realms and have got most of the way through it. Probably up to the second last dungeon or so based on pacing. I am still enjoying this even in its simplicity, which is unexpected to be honest.
Dragon Quest 8 or 9 with Tension stripped out? A shitty version of class system that is only introduced 1/3 of the way through the game? Clearly this is terrible. It isn't really though, it is kind of a kludgey pile of functional sub par ideas. It is like Lufia 2 kind of, a bit more polished, but a bit less "fun". It is an "okay" game.
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FFT: I considered taking Gaffy's equipment before he inevitably stabbed me in the back but decided I valued my sense of immersion more.
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Sadly for the sense of immersion, but happily for your inner kleptomanic, all of his equipment shows up in your inventory after the battle anyway.
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During the battle, really. If you leveled a thief enough, you can steal all the gear he was equipped with and have two sets of it.
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Child of Light - Finished this. Levels were 36-39 or so, took about 15 hours. I had some definitely trouble with the final boss which was mostly fixed by noticing there were some armour occuli which resisted general magic damage and using more Lull Elixirs.
Game was pretty enjoyable. Grandia-style but gives you a bit more control. Being able to use your pet firefly to slow down one enemy is probably a tad OP especially once you're down to one remaining enemy (especially once I noticed the in-battle flowers) but I like it in principle anyway since it gives you some more ability to influence the system, and hey the game is hard enough if you play HM and skip most randoms. (Probably isn't hard enough otherwise, of course.) The game has two notable flaws gameplaywise I think. One is that healing between fights is annoying. You sit there slowly firefly-spamming yourself back to full, or you try to find some flowers without accidentally running into more randoms, or you use one of a finite resource. Not even towns provide inns or anything, c'mon. Game could probably have just used full HP restoration after each battle (which it kiiiinda has since you get all your HP/MP back whenever you level, but consistency would have been nice). My other issue with the game is that two PCs feels strategically limiting. Switching being a free action helped and was very welcome (whereas in some games it feels a bit too powerful) but it meant things like multitarget buffing or using Ally X (usually Rubella) to heal Ally Y's HP felt cumbersome. It's not the end of the world, but I don't really think it's a decision which worked in the game's favour.
Boss fights were enjoyable but did feel a bit too similar to each other. Especially disappointed that Nox didn't have the skillset she really should have had. I think some of this is that enemy space is limited to 3, and having less than 3 tends to be too weak given how potent slow/firefly are, so always 3 enemies, all the time. I did like some of the things they did with interrupt-countering though. A fun idea there. Also I think they hit a good balance between single- and multi-target damage, though I ended up favouring ST a bit more because usually getting one enemy dead would make a battle controllable.
The game's aesthetics are nice, but the story seemed a bit confusing/messy. I didn't really "get" the confessions which probably didn't help. I don't really have patience for that kind of thing in my games though. Music was good but a bit repetitive (despite having three random battle themes and multiple boss themes).
Dunno where it ends up falling for me. Probably that 6/10 to 7/10 region which lots of RPGs I've found good but not mind-blowing of late. Definitely worth a play though.
Ace Attorney Investigations 2 - Downloaded this, patch seems to be working nicely. Too early to say much, but really glad this game got a translation.
Also still playing Mario Kart 8 and have started up a new file of New Super Mario Bros. U with friends because why not.
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CK and Grefter told me to post more so ok sure.
Antichamber: For those who liked Portal for the gameplay and not that annoying computer woman.
There is no plot. There is no characterization. You are dumped in a surreal maze full of non-euclidean geometry and puzzles. After you complete a puzzle, there is usually a sketch on the wall with some pithy aphorism about life. Oh, and there's a countdown in the hub room.
Eventually you obtain a portal-gun-like device that can manipulate the colored cubes around you in various ways. Solve puzzles. Continue onward. Get more powers for your block gun to solve more puzzles. Hallways that once led to one area now take you to somewhere else entirely. The eyes on the walls may be staring at you. How the **** do I get that door open there aren't enough cubes?!
If you like 3d physics and geometry puzzles you will like this game. If you want plot or story you will not find it here. It is pretty simple. Other than the dry presentation, the only major complaint I can muster against it is that there are some puzzles you encounter early on but cannot solve yet, so it can be hard to distinguish whether you are spending 20 minutes on a puzzle that looks impossible but is actually the thing you must figure out to progress, or wasting 20 minutes jumping around a puzzle that is actually currently impossible. The game's internal logic does hold up most of the time though and you can eventually figure out where to go.
It does pull you to want to keep on solving puzzles. It does this very well. I was easily enticed to marathon the game in one sitting, and so were both of the streamers I've watched run through it. Good game.
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Ultra Street Fighter 4: AI characters with command throws are the worst. Also, I suck.
Persona 4 Arena: I also suck.
Starting to improve in the general fighting game category though. Starting to respond to blockstrings for once. Go me.
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Crusader Kings 2- using the Clash of Kings mod because I am gonna fix all of Robb Stark's mistakes. Currently on my second generation. Robb married Margaery Tyrell to keep the Reach out of the war, then finding and taming a dragon after an absurd number of failed attempts. Dany invaded, killed Stannis, put Dany on the throne. She's an idiot so I sent for a Faceless man. She dies and the throne is passed to a Florent, for some reason? This will not stand so I take it for myself.
Robb and Margaery have a son, a hunchbacked dwarf who is super sickly. Not a good start. He dies and then there are six daughters until I get someone to sit on the Iron Throne after me without having to use Dornish law. At Prince Anthony's fifteenth birthday, Tyrion (the only Lannister whose head Stannis did not chop off) gets real drunk and asks me if he can sit on my dragon. I say yes. The dragon eats him.
I'm currently conquering Myr, Pentos and Braavos right now, because I can. Not sure how Far I want to go east yet but it will at least be to the Dothraki, where House Martell fled to after I went sick house on them.
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The Fall - short point & click adventure game with light combat, starring...the AI of a combat suit, operating autonomously because the suit pilot is injured and unresponsive. The AI's mission is to save the life of the pilot, but the suit's diagnostic functions are damaged, so the AI has no idea what condition the pilot is in, or even if the pilot is still alive. Nice setup, eh? AI's functions are constrained by its own internal logic (no misrepresenting reality; no risking the life of the pilot) and unlocked only when needed in order to accomplish the AI's mission. The AI's voice acting in is fantastic, typically the lull and cadence of artificial speech, with occasional bursts of annoyance and urgency. Setting is also great - abandoned science facility creepy enough (and containing enough wry humor) to give Portal 2 a run for its money. I took a little under 4 hours to finish it, and it was time well spent. Story ends on a cliffhanger, and a direct sequel is in development. when it comes out I won't think twice before picking it up.
It's on sale (https://www.humblebundle.com/weekly) for the next 11 hours or so.
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Cloé’s Requiem (http://tosiaki7.tumblr.com/post/85280561912/cloes-requiem-finished): RPGmaker Psychodrama Horror Mansion: Taste Poison: Revengeance
So there's this subcategory of games: freeware Japanese "light" survival horror in some flavor of RPGmaker or similar engine, usually starring young children, exploring some sort of spooky and/or cursed locale and uncovering some dramatic plot about simple emotions, child abuse, thinly veiled Japanese social commentary, something like that. You explore the place, hear some stock music, solve some basic item or environment puzzles of the "put the creepy doll on the correct shelf" variety, maybe there's a chase sequence or two (or twenty) and feel sad about kids getting killed or whatever.
In recent years these sorts of titles became popular as amateur translation projects, thanks in large part to vgperson's (http://vgperson.com/games/) translations of Ib and The Witch's House. Those two games are definitely the most well known titles in the genre, and also generally agreed to be in its top tier of general quality (in Japan, too, not just counting translated works). They're amazing, you should play them if you haven't - and Cloé’s Requiem amassed quite a bit of pre-translation hype as rivaling them. So I was anticipating it eagerly, or thought I was, but then summer events happened and apparently tosiaki finished translating months ago and I never noticed until now.
So here's Cloé’s Requiem, in English. Does it live up to the hype? Well...
Y...eeeesss but also no. The game's overall craftsmanship is strong and easily apparent, the plot hits the notes it needs to and the gameplay is interesting without being frustrating. It doesn't really do anything wrong, not exactly, but it doesn't do anything spectacularly right either. There's no real spark of creativity or flavor that would elevate it above the general mental 'norm' for this style of game, nothing on the level of Ib's incredible atmosphere or the hilarious deathtraps of The Witch's House. A solid hit to first base, rather than a home run.
The characters are probably the game's strongest point. Michel and Cloé have to carry the entire game on their disaffected 12 year old shoulders, and that's an area where most of the genre drops the ball. CR does come through, though! I was actually left feeling more than token empathy for both mains at the end. This rarely happens, especially with such a basic plot, so props for that.
Puzzles are ok, environments are above average if small, music is pretty decent. Not earthshattering though. That's something of a shame, since the thematic premise is all about classical music, but it feels... underutilized? Yeah, definitely could have done more with the musical aspect, as it is it does have links into the plot, but mostly just as "something the leads happen to do" and art or sports or something could have filled that gap just about as well. Plot itself is shallow but well executed, except for the overly long Michel flashback. It does characterize him, but could have either been far shorter or have a greater eventual payoff than one lategame scene.
Unfortunately the ending really holds the game back some. Lord knows there are worse, MUCH worse, but... ehn. Do some moderately unintuitive thing, receive "True End" that doesn't really make a ton of sense. It concluded the story appropriately, but nothing more.
Overall rating: "... but nothing more" works. If you're wondering why I've described the game so heavily in comparisons, it's because it's extremely difficult not to, because it doesn't do anything original and cribs points from dozens of other similar games and polish them up. Definitely an execution-based title. It's ok, good even, enjoyable, probably very good for people other than me who don't have standards that could be described as stupidly high. But... ehn.
Not on Ib/Witch House level. Probably below those two and Mad Father, but above the rest of the genre that I've played. Still quite enjoyable and worth a look if you're interested in the genre though, just play those other three first.
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Final Fantasy 10 HD: I just killed Seymour! I guess I'm in the aftergame now!
...joking aside, back to Chronicling stuff! So Macalania Woods provides no plot sans the Bartello stuff which is basically Auron being awesome, and little else. Then we fight Spheriomorph who is as godlike as ever, then we get the Jecht Sphere.
While the first hint of "Jecht cares about Tidus" was in the Farplane, this is the first instance where the game demonstrates the real issue. Farplane, we just saw Jecht thinking of Tidus, but with little context other than "Tidus is starting to second guess himself." Here, we learn the problem is that Jecht did care for Tidus, he just was really bad at expressing that part of himself. Even sitting in front of a camera, he has problems fessing up, and can only finish it by going off the camera, and being a bodiless voice. Opens with Jecht saying "stop crying" which really is a metaphor for "you need to grow up sometime"; this is actually a really neat thing considering a Tidus rant in Zanarkand but I SHOULDN'T BRING THAT UP NOW OH GOD SPOILERS WHAT AM I DOING AAAAH!!!!!
*Camera fuzz*
We Are Experiencing Technical Difficulties. Please stand by. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvX7TFA4jV0)
*Camera fuzz*
...anyway, at first, it comes off as Jecht just being "man up already" but you see he's trying to pass a message onto Tidus, and ultimately, the theme of it is what he says at the end, being effectively "You're my son, and I believe in you."
Auron does note that Jecht did change throughout the pilgrimage, going from "Is in it just to kill time til he finds a way home" to "is committed to helping Braska at all costs, to the point where even if he could go home, he'd stay behind." Thing to keep in mind though is this Sphere is clearly done early in the Pilgrimage. Remember, they started in Bevelle, the next image is in the frozen lake area, and then the woods, so we can deduce they went Bevelle -> Macalania Temple -> The Woods. This gets the point across that "Jecht cares for his son" wasn't a revelation he came across late in the pilgrimage like you'd expect, it's something he's always felt, and he just never had the words to describe it. The message of course suggests this is about where Jecht starts to resign to the fact that "He can't go back home to Zanarkand" and thus, is making this message in case he never sees Tidus again, and Tidus somehow finds his way there. Sounds Xanatos Roulette like, but then consider Jecht doesn't sound sure of it; he opens it with "If you're watching this, you're probably in Spira too."
Anyway, Auron relays some info to Tidus, most notably that Jecht loved Tidus, and felt bad that he couldn't go home, but despite that would have stayed in Spira because he was that determined to help Braska. Tidus tries to act cool by blowing it off at first (though he does have a narrative in between stating he understands where Jecht was coming from, and illustrates he completely relates to Jecht's situation), but he ends, as Auron is walking off, with "Thanks." That "Thanks" is important because it demonstrates that while Tidus on the outside is still "My old man is a jerk!", internally, he's starting to legitimately take this stuff to heart and accept "maybe he's not as bad as I thought."
Then we get the "Rikku is an Al Bhed!" scene. Tidus doesn't do much special here other than "Rikku's just Rikku, that's all that matters." Basically your typical "He's the good guy, he's gotta always say the right thing!" line; it's completely in character of course, especially since Tidus has no reason to dislike the Al Bhed (heck, they DID save his life initially), but doesn't really expand his character.
Now what does expand here is Rikku vs. Wakka as this is the first moment where they argue. It also demonstrates that Rikku is not a total moron which is why her dimwitted self in FF10-2 is kind of facepalm inducing. The conversation being basically this:
Wakka: Machina are bad and cause Sin!
Rikku: Proof?
Wakka: Yevon said so!
Rikku: What is Yevon is wrong?
Wakka: HOW CAN YEVON BE WRONG!?
Rikku: So you're just going to do whatever Yevon says, without questioning it?
Wakka: That's right!
Rikku: So how do we stop Sin?
Wakka: We atone for our sins!
And basically circle jerks like that, but Rikku's doing what Tidus was doing the entire game, except there's an actual argument, but that's because there are two key differences:
-Rikku actually knows Spira, Yevon, etc., Tidus is completely ignorant to all this, hence Tidus really can't form an argument, just the innocent perspective and derive his own conclusions. Rikku actually knows what Yevon says to a degree and Spira's history, by contrast, and knows "Uh, yeah, that's not working now is it?"
-Wakka hates Al Bhed, so "HEATHEN DOESN'T KNOW WHAT SHE"S TALKING ABOUT AND MUST BE GIVEN A LESSON!" and basically sticking finger in his ears to her side because "YEVON IS GREAT!" By contrast, with Tidus, it's more a general "hey man, you just don't know, but that's ok, I'll be your teacher ya?"
In any event, while the game doesn't declare a winner, anyone with half a brain would say Rikku won, simply because she used the Socratic method of "question the other side" and kind of proved Wakka doesn't have an argument other than "Yevon said so."
As far as the Snow Mobile scene, this time I got Lulu. I don't remember what the Rikku variant was like, so I won't discuss that but the Lulu one is neat because Tidus simply prompts Lulu for what she knows, and brings up a fact that Lulu never considered, namely "No one really knows what Sin is." Lulu's response is a fair "No one needs to know, so no one asks, you run or fight." This sequence displays that Lulu is still subjected to the same Yevon brainwashing as Wakka is, but she's capable of being respectful about it (eg not shouting "YEVON IS THE TRUTH!") Ultimately, Tidus doesn't really change Lulu's perspective, but then that's not his point; he simply wanted to learn more, due to the whole "Jecht is Sin" thing, and ultimately Lulu's response is "You really did come from a world where there is no Sin..."
Seymour sequence, mostly just demonstrates Wakka is having an existential crisis as he's forced to stand against everything he believes to protect Yuna and it's making him go crazy (and he's all "I'm sorry Seymour, we don't mean this honest!"), the rest of the Guardians are all "SEYMOUR IS EVIL, PROTECT YUNA!" because...well...he is. When Seymour dies, Tidus tries to raise spirits by going "Hey, it's ok, we'll just explain the situation! Seymour's the bad guy, we'll be fine!" Auron's quick to go "It's not going to be so simple..." and well...yeah, it isn't.
And that's more or less where I ended, because I didn't feel like dealing with the whole "everyone is freezing under the lake" sequence yet. So far, the whiniest characters in the game are Rikku, whose more just typical Hyperactive Impatient Teen whining more so than anything else, and Wakka, whose got the Yevon Zealot + Al Bhed hatred thing going on.
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SPACE GAMES
Teleglitch: Roguelike action.
Amazing first impression (! the shadows) but it gets very repetitive fast. Would be deeply atmospheric, if not for the logs which are not afraid to joke around a little, which is the worst that could happen in that kind of desolate game. In the end this feels more like top down Doom with resource management rather than survival horror, despite the crazy fucking hard difficulty. It's kind of a wasted opportunity.
FTL: Roguelike strategy.
2 playthroughs, got to the end of the game each time and died there.
Blah. Playthroughs are way too long to have a game where the beginning and middle are so easy and the end so hard. Spelunky should be the standard for length / difficulty balance in roguelikes. I doubt I'll play that much more.
The Swapper: Puzzle.
The best one. Metaphysical and lonely, reminded me of sad space movies like Solaris or 2001. Amazing art direction too.
Puzzles were just the right amount of difficulty, which usually never happens. Lategame puzzles were all brain teasers but I never had to spend more than 15 minutes to figure them out.
Worst part of the game is the name of the studio. The devs basically only made this serious contemplative game and still named teir studio Facepalm games?
Waiting for Routine.
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Tales of Xillia: Trying to finish up my third playthrough in preparation for Xillia 2. But I'm sooooo grossly out of practice it's absurd.
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AAI2 - Beat the first case! Definitely the longest and twistiest first case ever. It'd be very intimdiating to play as your first Ace Attorney case (although they do still do the tutorialish things at the start) I think, but I guess they figured hardly anyone would. The appearance of Shelly de Killer was of course awesome. Not sure what I think of it as a case past that, beyond that it feels more like a second or third case in a game. Interesting to see where the game goes from here.
I will probably look into downloading a completed save file for the game, though. I can't stand not being able to speed up text on a first playthrough. Can't believe it took them seven games to fix that.
Eviltype -
Mucking around as usual. Owzer's house wasn't too bad (exploding birds are hilarious and I almost lost to them, but not quite).
Chadarnook: 2 resets. No one thing would make me instantly lose, but some combination of death sentence, lullaby, cold dust, and the OHKO moves to lower defences, and Rage (MT 2HKO at my levels before Shell) would eventually hit a perfect storm and kill me. The most frustrating of the two resets occured when I put in a command to revive with a PC who had 9 left on the death sentence clock, then boom bosses use Pearl -> immediately transforms to get rid of all that time on the clock in one clocktick. Goddamnit. Anyway Super then points out that Demi/Quartr work on him, so I use those. Despite poor accuracy they speed up the battle a lot, so I have more time to keep things from going wrong (and am able to finish the battle around the times thing seem to be going wrong).
I then decide to hit up Narshe again, and pick up Snowman Jazz. I also beat Tritoch, who I debilitate then start hitting with various magic damage, though really Fire 2 alone does bad things to him.
Dirt Dragon: 1 reset here. I use Snowman Jazz's uber-gravity and poison to grind him down, while constantly maintaining float and dealing with periodic OHKOs from Honed Tusk. Then his death counter wipes me out. I could probably beat him, but I'll save it for when my offence is a bit higher.
Triangle Island: 2 resets here, as Tap Dancer/Covert MT damage wipes me out and Wooly/Karkass also take me out with a Slow 2 followed by a couple badly timed Ice 3 OHKOs. But I master them, and a combination of rasp, sleep, stop, etc., deals with things. I get Gogo.
I also get Strago and pick up a few more rages/lores. Both Woolly and Karkass have some pretty great rages, and I'm able to get Quasar (which is insanely badass right now), the Lx spells, Blow Fish, and a few others (I already have Dischord and Pearl Wind from Esper Mountain). I should probably look into getting CleanSweep / Aero / Big Guard too.
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Endless Frontier: Beat. I'm not entirely sure why I just sat on the game so long, when I beat a much longer and less good game in a similar style last year. Eh, silliness. Anyway, very charming and breezy in the SRW manner. It can be a tad one-note at times, but the smaller cast benefits it relative to OG SRW I think, the nuance for each character is relatively greater I guess. 8/10 feels right.
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MK8 - Got all of the stamps after doing all of the time trials. Game is fantastic, my second favorite Kart after 7. Better graphics without bad game design like Wii does that; I think the series benefits a lot from being graphically beautiful.
Xenoblade Chronicles - The game managed to pass the Bechdel test in its seventeenth hour, much to my surprise. Most previous scenes had just been a single woman surrounded by a bunch of dudes until Melia joined. (Not that Sharla and Melia have passed the Bechdel test...) Also, God, this game's bosses are stupid and annoying. They are like a bizarre combination of plot fighty, gimmicky, and slow to kill. At leas the game is pretty and has Melia.
Thornheart - ~ fires the bechdel test into the sun ~
Donkey Kong Country Returns - About to fight the fourth boss, but I've been too busy collecting letters. :-[ Great game. Read to play Tropical Freeze next.
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Tales of Xillia: I nearly died against Veywind Eye. The ultimate in poor play.
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Gods Will Be Watching trip report.
This is a game that exists. How does this game exist? How did this get made and to a point where it is actually being sold to people? I am kind of in awe.
After playing Binding of Isaac I'm convinced it could only have been made by utterly deranged minds for utterly deranged minds. It sold like 2 million copies?
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Not doing this Steam thing right as I'm buying games that aren't even for sale. WTH
Crypt of the NecroDancer:
Rhytm based roguelike, still in alpha, all awesome. It's a roguelike in which you have to move to the beat
The game actually works because, while the standard roguelike difficulty applies:
- The game's rather merciful about beats, it's not Guitar Hero, you can be slightly out of sync.
- You can not get hit at all without much trouble. Enemies have fixed attack patterns and are easy to manipulate.
Essentially it is a pretty easy game that forces you to make a decision every second or half second
Now that I've dissected the game mechanics I have to say it's hella charming too. With the best OST.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhFC8pd7oZvxexNzqt8xtzItaTyMBqTCj
I was a bit wary of it since it used a Ben Kuchera quote for its promotional trailer (That's like the only game journalist I know and he's terrible) but hey. You have to promote your game
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Captain K, have you tried out Star-Lord yet? I'm only like level 25 and he's really goddamn fun so far.
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Guacamelee: This game was a lot of fun. Dark Souls's exploration had me itching for a Metroidvania and this fit the bill. The combat system was really fun, and I enjoyed hard mode quite fun up until the final dungeon, where it got so hard it stopped being fun.
Dark Souls: Finished playthrough 2 with pyromancer, probably gonna remake because now I am too high level to PVP with anyone except other highlevels and specialization drops off a looooooot at the place I'm at. Started two new playthroughs, Welcome to the Club!! starring James Murphy (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5gQidrzojU), and a Sorcerer run. It's amazing how Sorc and Pyro are almost exact opposites in what is difficult and what is easy. Almost everything that was a cakewalk as a Pyro has caused multiple resets (Iron Giant aside), while some things that caused resets were stupid easy. Club is club. I like clubs. But only if they're giant.
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Captain K, have you tried out Star-Lord yet? I'm only like level 25 and he's really goddamn fun so far.
Not yet, mainly Pimping my Reed (hur hur). Prestiged him once, will probably do it again this weekend for pretty blue name.
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FFT: How have I never gone the punching ninja route before? Because seriously, knocked out final Wiegraf in one punch, pugilism souls strikes again. Probably could've taken out Velius before he moved because Ramza inexplicably got two turns immediately upon starting the second phase of the fight, but...I didn't notice he was going to get two consecutive turns (how does that even happen) and instead had him run to a corner because he had 20 HP left and I forgot to give him Chakra. So instead someone else had to do it, it's all thanks to DanceNinja.
Latter also unexpectedly outspeeds the assassins so uh so much for the rooftop battle. Ninjas!
I am almost entirely ignoring optimal armor HP/MP boosts in favor of sticking with outdated stuff that just happens to boost speed/PA/MA this time. Not really my usual playstyle in RPGs, I avoid unnecessary risks and gambles basically all the time, but maybe after too much Souls games I just prioritize murdering things faster over all other concerns now. Although this is perhaps proving less than ideal as enemies start to learn what OHKO damage is. Or like when the game fucks over auto-potion reliance by giving me a hi-potion for Riovanes 1. Yeah thanks for that it's not like I bought 99 x-potions and dumped everything else for a reason.
FFT auto-equip why do you like Feather Boots so much.
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Captain K, have you tried out Star-Lord yet? I'm only like level 25 and he's really goddamn fun so far.
Not yet, mainly Pimping my Reed (hur hur). Prestiged him once, will probably do it again this weekend for pretty blue name.
It wouldn't be that hard, seeing as they turned everything up serverside for this week. I gobbled down all the boosts I had gotten from promos lately and I'm up to level 40 in one day.
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Ciddy: Bare fists ninjas of doom inflict horrifying amounts of damage. You are doing the correct thing by keeping them with twist headbands/power sleeves. You'll probably want to give them thief hats, otherwise don't bother changing their gear. Enjoy the smash.
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Probably could've taken out Velius before he moved because Ramza inexplicably got two turns immediately upon starting the second phase of the fight, but...I didn't notice he was going to get two consecutive turns (how does that even happen)
Short answer: Ramza usually starts the Velius leg of the fight at 100 CT, meaning it's quite easy for him to get two actions in a row if he has comparable/better speed than Velius.
Long, technical answer which most people probably won't care about: Any battle which transitions from one stage to another (this one, Dycedarg, and Altima) will transition only at certain points. If the action which ends the first stage (e.g. killing Wiegraf) occurs in the middle of a character's turn (i.e. after he acts, if he still has a move left), then the transition occurs immediately. If, as is more common, the character's turn is ended by that action, then the transition occurs at the start of the next turn anyone on the battlefield gets. In the case of the Wiegraf duel, that will be either Wiegraf himself (if he was reduced to critical HP and is still able to get turns*) or Ramza. In your case the transition occured at the start of Ramza's next turn, meaning that he is at 100+ CT, ready to get a turn when the game brings in Velius, the demons, and all your allies (who all start at 0 CT).
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Wiegraf was actually knocked to critical rather than properly KO'd (he dodged Ramza's first punch) and after I'd moved (had to to get into melee, because his first turn was Lightning Stab). So I dunno man.
Anyway Zalera didn't get to act. Doubleninjateamed trying to cast a spell. Huge shock. Elmdor was way more trouble! (Stupid sexy Blade Grasp.) Crit HP Agrias as the lone survivor broke out of Stop at the last possible moment to Lightning Stab his ass. And despite the assassins being bizarrely Ultima-happy, and Ramza getting hit with it, I didn't get the spell (not that I'd use it anyway). I guess he has to survive the fight? He survived the spell but then got Muramasa'd or something.
Now it's time to train up Melly and Reis even though it's completely pointless! Beo/Reis specials are MA-driven, right? You know, after not playing the game for quite a few years, it's really striking to see how poorly I'd optimized offense previously. I don't think I'd ever bothered to look up how the game calculates goddamn anything.
At one point I ran into the Bariaus Hill rare encounter and it was 100% oh my gahhhh. (I'd brought the B-team for the JPs not having any idea what I was in for. It went poorly.) Now I'm totally paranoid walking back and forth through there for all the special character crap in Goug.
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Now it's time to train up Melly and Reis even though it's completely pointless! Beo/Reis specials are MA-driven, right? You know, after not playing the game for quite a few years, it's really striking to see how poorly I'd optimized offense previously. I don't think I'd ever bothered to look up how the game calculates goddamn anything.
To be fair, it's not like it's WoW where they straight up lay the damage formulae in front of you. That they don't expect you to do that after not providing the information to do so up front is very reasonable of them.
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Wiegraf was actually knocked to critical rather than properly KO'd (he dodged Ramza's first punch) and after I'd moved (had to to get into melee, because his first turn was Lightning Stab). So I dunno man.
If you were the same speed (8) then you'd both have gotten your next turns on the same clocktick, ensuring Ramza would be at 100 for the transition point.
Beowulf's status hit rates depend slightly on MA but it really doesn't matter (1 MA = like half a % of spell accuracy), you're better off trying to raise his faith if you want to optimise him (otherwise focus on other stats, speed and/or durability etc.). Reis' breaths are based off magic, yes.
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Now it's time to train up Melly and Reis even though it's completely pointless! Beo/Reis specials are MA-driven, right? You know, after not playing the game for quite a few years, it's really striking to see how poorly I'd optimized offense previously. I don't think I'd ever bothered to look up how the game calculates goddamn anything.
To be fair, it's not like it's WoW where they straight up lay the damage formulae in front of you. That they don't expect you to do that after not providing the information to do so up front is very reasonable of them.
It's true, the game really falls apart when you know how everything works, to such extent that they clearly didn't expect you to. I dunno if I can play it again after this because it's just not as satisfying to utterly humiliate the game (this goes for most games, really). I found it quite challenging the first time through!
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After playing Binding of Isaac I'm convinced it could only have been made by utterly deranged minds for utterly deranged minds. It sold like 2 million copies?
Yeah, but BoI is a solid zelda-ish roguelike under the scatological surface. It's the kind of game where you play it a hundred times and don't even notice the skin anymore; "Isaac" and "Satan" don't register to me any more than "@" and "h" do. Actually h and H are way more scary than anything in BoI to me.
Gods Will Be Watching, on the other hand, is 100% about the skin, there really isn't any gameplay beneath it.
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Wild ARMS ACF - Did more practice this afternoon with some minor tweaks to the route. Just need to do more practice.
Wild ARMS 4 - Learned 3 new skips, one of which is really tricky. Gonna aim for sub 5:10 the next run attempt I do. Then maybe a full record for SDA. Kinda amazing how the new tech I learned since joining SRL IRC has improved my time to the point that the 5:04 doesn't look that great anymore. Theoretically, 4:50 is definitely possible.
Persona 4 Golden - Working to get a file for DL data testing. Turned on EXP boost and Money Boost. I'm at level 51 already before Mitsuo. Halp.
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OMD1- Been watching Glen clear this on warmage. It's always great when someone gets to Hard climb! Dialog's still hilarious and it's fun to watch setups of doom being unleashed upon the poor orcs.
Kid Icarus Uprising- Played the first three chapters of this. The game's pretty, the dialog's sharp and the music's fantastic. I see why people like it! Just I'm not enjoying the gameplay at all. I'm a leftie who doesn't use the stylus whenever possible so so you can imagine the frustration. Went with the alternate control setup which is at least playable. Specifically, this game really needs a mouse, trying to aim with the XYAB buttons is a step down. Donno how much of this I'll play.
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That's pretty fair. I enjoy the stylus controls myself but they're not for everyone and I'm not sure how well the other schemes work in practice. If you do give up on playing it, I definitely recommend checking out a video playthrough of it just so you can see the rest of the writing (and music), which only gets better once the other major characters are introduced midgame. You can also drop the intensity to 0 at which point the game all but beats itself if you'd prefer.
FF6 Eviltype - At this point I have Gau, Relm, Strago, and Gogo in addition to the initial four PCs, so I can actually take a run at the Phoenix Cave and get my hands on what is probably the best Esper in the game. But I figure I need more good equipment before I do this (unless I feel like constantly shuffling equipment between teams. I don't.), so... Mt. Zozo it is! Not much to say about the randoms, they're balanced for being done as the first thing post-Falcon probably and I have no major difficulties. I grab the three shiny shields, the Red Cap, and the Force Arm- ohshit
Storm Dragon (1 reset) - The big problem here is Rage, which is gross MT non-elemental ITE damage, OHKOing my lower-MDef PCs. Shell to the rescue! Slowing him and getting the entire team in Shell helps a lot. He can OHKO people with Wing Saber, but I get very lucky in dodging it. Cyclonic mostly proves that I need Cure 3, since it takes three castings of Cure 2 to fully heal it (Rage hits that hard, I care about getting back to full). Not too bad past that, although he has a lot of HP to cut through.
Phoenix Cave - I actually don't have any resets in the randoms here, but they're nasty and I have to run away several times. Trixters are particular pests in their reflective, status-resistant ways, Necromancers are extremely dangerous but can be revived, Chaos Dragons use an evil Disaster but can be controlled by Stop. The common enemies of the lower floors aren't as bad but they do hit hard so take nothing for granted. Relm uses Control, otherwise I mainly fish for status holes where possible, gravity/damage where not of course. Still, whatever things I could say about the randoms, they're nothing compared to...
Red Dragon (4 resets) - Celes/Strago/Gau/Gogo is my party here. Possibly the hardest boss in this playthrough so far, there is so much that can go wrong with this fight even IF you block fire on most people. The first big problem is Meteo, which easily OHKOs anyone it hits. Its accuracy is mediocre, but it still usually kills 1 or 2 people, and that's with me prioritising MBlock a fair bit on my setup. The second problem is that some of his other magic damage is also brutal, with Flare in particular OHKOing who it hits and Southern Cross being brutal to anyone who doesn't null fire. These can be solved by maintaining a Runic shield, so I do so. That leaves Level 3 Flare, which sadly does down one of my PCs, and Eraser, his ITE physical which OHKOs the people with lower defence (MBlock twinking ensures they exist) and makes me heal (after a revival from Meteor) the others. But after a couple resets, I'm able to manage all this.
Unfortunately, below half HP, things get serious, and he summons four Vectaurs. They have 10k HP and are status immune, I can't blitz them quickly and they have solidly 2HKOing physicals which they spam until I die (as well as some low-level fire magic which isn't too scary but absorbs Runic so that I get hit with Flare, Red Dragon's favourite spell). I die once to this, horribly. The second time I summon Fenrir to absorb their initial barrage, and also come up with a way to blitz them quickly: a Tritoch summon followed by a Mimic, which does insane weakness-hitting damage to the Vectaurs letting me kill them off in two actions. Which, I then learn, causes him to instantly summon more. I die horribly. Finally, I settle for one Fenrir, one twinked Tritoch, one MT Ice 2, and a barrage of ST Ice 2's/Bum Rush/similar damage to KO three of the Vectaurs before they can overwhelm my image status. I rasp the survivor (they don't have much MP) then continue the fight as before, just with added damage from the Vectaur, although slowing him helps. At one point Red Dragon buffs himself like crazy but fortunately I do have Dispel learned, and I learn Big Guard from this! Anyway, past that and needing to revive periodically from Meteo/L3 Flare/Eraser, juggling actions as always... not too bad.
Cave to the Ancient Castle - I learn CleanSweep from Enuos and Magnitude8 from Goblins. Randoms are annoying with all their anti-magic tricks but by and large gravity still works, so that + pick them off.
Master Pug (1 reset) - Step Mine counters OHKO, but he doesn't have much MP so I rasp that away but before I do Quake KOs my entire team. TRY AGAIN WITH FLOAT. Same strategy, I'm a bit worried because of course Step Mine removes Float as it kills me, but once his MP is gone he's a chump.
KatanaSoul (1 reset) - What a difference elemental resistance makes! First time I get three people OHKOed by his opening Air Blade. Next time... Minerva, Thunder Shield, and two Force Shields put me in a much better position to recover. Then I learn he is vulnerable to Dischord. WELL THEN. (This is especially good because his GP Rain does about 900 MT damage, not far from unblockable OHKO, although I think I could have won without Dischord? Still, it helped a lot.)
Blue Dragon - After how badly Red Dragon slapped me around this guy is pretty simple. I mean, insanely so, he's vulnerable to Level 5 Death. Still, he doesn't seem too bad anyway, so I dick around and steal from him, then he casts Quick and the resulting action puts me in a bad position I have to scramble to recover from. I do so, get everyone revived, and kill him off.
I decide to keep Odin over Raiden. Meteor!
At this point, with the Offering, I take a run at getting Snow Mufflers. One more Veldt trip gives me two more Behemoth Suits (and a few more shiny rages, such as Goblin and Tyranosaur). I recruit Shadow, then promptly hand him the Assassin+Striker 8-hit combo and try to instant death Outsiders for my Snow Mufflers. RNG is with me two times out of three. I also get a couple Pearl Lances since I don't intend to use Cyan, Mog's 255 defence setup means poor Aquila has no chance.
I also get Terra at this point. My average level hit 24 so I figure now's as good a time as any, I won't hit average level 25 until I do the final dungeon most likely. That just leaves Umaro...
Dirt Dragon - Time for some revenge! And revenge I get. Offering Fixed Dice let me carve into him pretty quickly, so I focus on other PCs healing/buffing while Setzer does the damage. Then Dirt Dragon knocks him into critical with Quartr right before he attacks and... he uses Red Card, charming him. HAHAHA. Actually this isn't -that- big a deal because the thing I am actually worried about is his death counter, which I still see. But I'm ready for it this time. With Gau raging Rhinox for Life 3, and summons of Fenrir+Starlet right before I kill him, I'm able to easily tank the death counter... in fact I get lucky and everyone lives! Also, him hitting himself with Honed Tusk for 9999 is hilarious.
At this point I remember that with Locke I can get Ragnarok, so I do. I opt for the sword just to not have to work on another 1x learn rate with my encounter limitations, and head to the colloseum to turn it into Illumina. With fire immunity and reflect there's not much Didalos can do to Gogo, who I just have set up with Blitz to Bum Rush as quickly as possible, hopefully.
Next up is recruiting Umaro and getting Terrato.
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Okay Alex, really good point.
I'll grab this thing when it goes on sale too...
Rogue Legacy: Got the platinum. Finishing under 15 deaths wasn't hard (I actually did it on my second try) It just took a long time since I made sure to go through the whole castle with every character to farm for gold, equipment and runes. I'm not very good at fighting the final boss so I prefered to just get uber stats instead.
All my money went towards unlocking the ninja (Who edals very high damage) then health and attack only.
After 5 or so characters I had a ton of vampire (HP drain) runes and equipment, and could survive the hardest parts of the castle without much trouble (I would go back to the beginner area and fought a few monsters there if I ran low on HPs) All of this gave me a ton of blessing runes (lowers the level of enemies, and lowers rewards) Final boss was pathetic with three blessing runes on.
The new bosses you have to fight with fixed characters were insane though. (Except the slime) I found a glitch that made me only fight one Brohannes at once and I had no remorse abusing it after the pure hell that were Neo Khidr, Alexander IV and Ponce de Freon. (I had to fight each one more than 100 times, I swear)
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Donkey Kong Country Returns - Finished! Holy crap this game is hard. Not sure why you randomly turn Donkey Kong of all things into some ridiculous platforming deathfest.
Most of the worlds have at least one or two really tough stages, but World 8 has like four. I did notice that the skip on World 8 has you do the same numbers of stages but the skip one is sooooo much easier than the other one. I ended up having to stockpile tons of lives from Cranky as well as the Heart Booster. The final boss is a giant douche. Also, holy shit, the World 8 really decided to steal the Mario motif of lava, including a time-honored tradition of lava chases.
Incidentally, I love Cranky Kong. New Smash character perhaps?
I decided not to collect all the KONG letters. I had enough trouble with World 8 without trying that. :/
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Bravely Default: Earth Temple is started. If I say anything else...it will be meaningless, because really, that line says everything doesn't it?
Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze: Beat World 2. This game is more of what Ciato said for DKCR,
Wind Waker HD: Beaten, I'll make a bigger rant about it later, just not in the mood to do it right now. I can say, however, it is easily the best 3D Zelda title I've played (and based on LPs, seems a fair bit better than TP and SS), as well as I can tell why many weren't too fond of the original; the improvements have that much of an impact.
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Xenoblade Chronicles - Finished Melia's dungeon and beat the boss. Now doing a couple quests to be able to buy scrolls and sadly I can't sell Reyn into sex slavery. I've been rotating between Reyn, Shulk, Sharla, and Melia as PCs (and anticipating Seven's joining).
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AAI2 - Up to the fourth case. Enjoying this, unshockingly. The translation's not up to AA's high standards in terms of humour/cultural relevance but it is competent and far, far better than nothing. The game does a pretty good job with cast size; there are still a good number of cameos, but lots of new folks too, and they're balanced well. Sebastian is too stupid to live; hopefully Courtney actually has a good reason for propping him up. All the cases are a bit odd in one way or another but that isn't necessarily a bad thing... but the cases are interwoven enough that I'll probably have a lot more to say about their subjective quality when I'm done.
FF6 Eviltype: Narshe and random other stuff before the final dungeon.
Ice Dragon - Ice and physicals, which means Snow Mufflers largely take care of things. Or do they? As his forms fall he gets rather vicious and kills off everyone but the people who are auto-acting, and his repeated healing means that I can't overwhelm him... until finally Poison Frog kicks in off Dusk Requiem (which I had mostly used to fish for gravity vulnerability) and I win.
Umaro's Cave - Largely easy.
Pugs - Knife is shockingly unscary, I'm unable to avoid seeing three of them but physical spoiling handles it. They also relentless counter with Pearl... but can be silenced.
Pug - I actually have more trouble with this jerk. Step Mine counter to everything (OHKO), and uses it a lot on his own turn, plus good immunities means I can't really overwhelm him! Eventually am able to get in the actions I need though.
Umaro - Easy. The second boss to die of poison while mid-jump this playthrough.
Doom Gaze - I choose a party of people who AREN'T Level 25 and start cutting into him. Not much to say, ice and death protection good, fire and holy damage good, cursing when he runs away... isn't good, but it happens anyway.
Cyan's Soul - 1 reset to L? Pearl against a solo PC it hits, screw that. Once I recruit the others though the randoms here aren't too bad, that start is always kinda dicey.
Dream Stooges - Ugh this takes forever since they apply slow a lot and I wasn't blocking it, and somehow don't have anyone with Haste 2 on the team I bring here. Ugh. Delta Attack however is their own really scary move since I equip lots of elemental defence for the fight. Curley's healing is nasty but Rasp to the rescue, along with Dispel to remove Rasp. Just yeah, fuck slow. Fight becomes much easier once one of them dies of course.
Train/castle sections - Not much to say here, the usual fishing for status holes etc.
Wrexsoul - I drop my MBlock and make sure nobody is blocking petrify, because Break is my favourite way to get him to reveal himself. Once he does, hit him with all the ice or ITD damage I can muster. His offence again is largely dealt with via lots of elemental defence.
Fanatics' Tower - I don't do the whole dungeon, but I figure I do want to go after White Dragon so I can get Crusader, and hey there's some useful gear here I suppose. The randoms are legitimate enough, particularly L70 Magics who have reflect and are really tanky until I find their status weakness.
White Dragon (1 reset) - Scar Beam + Pearl doublecast really hurts as Pearl can OHKO most and Scar Beam picks off people I try to revive... yeah that's a bad combo as soon as my one PC with Life 2 drops, the fight's basically over. So I change my team, go grab a Titanium from a TumbleWeed and bet it at the colosseum for a Cat Hood (Doom Dragon can't deal with Flame Shield + Snow Muffler for maxed def), and come back with a setup which includes the only three holy-halving equips in the game (besides Paladin Shield) and crazy MDef twinking (Force Shields!), Auto-Shell on everyone (Pod Bracelet, Graedus, Force Shield)... and now Scar Beam + Pearl can't kill anyone! ... though it comes kinda close. Anyway, slow him, battle becomes kinda rote now...
White Dragon phase 2 - Or so I think. Below half HP he starts healing with Pearl Wind and using Big Guard. Yes yes dispel Big Guard... which also gets rid of slow, argh. And I promptly have terrible luck reapplying it because he has lots of MBlock. Anyway my damage isn't wonderful here as he has pretty good MDef and my only ITD spells are Meteor and Quake (and only on one PC each), but between those and Fire 3 I'm able to finally start punching through his limit healing/buffing I think... then he uses WallChange. I scan him and he absorbs water (one of two elements I don't have access to via magic). Anyway the healing still exists so yeah this is hopeless, and I can't get him to use WallChange again. So I drain his MP, cursing his MDef/MBlock all the while, until finally that's gone (having to watch out for Scar Beam/Pearl as always, as I do it). Once it's done... well, I've won, but have to settle for berserking my Illumina and Trident users (the water elemental spear, yes). It works eventually. That took too long.
Moogle Charm the way down because no not redoing that fight thanks!
So yeah, not bothering with MagiMaster or GrandTrain I think, I've done everything else and am ready for the final dungeon, using everyone but Locke/Cyan. I restock on everything, buy enough Bard's Hats and Earrings so I can equip an entire team of 12, and yeah, ready to finish this over the next day or two. I'm sure Kefka will be super-easy guys.
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The extra fixed dice and AP from Hidon would be nice at least!
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Right I totally forgot extra Fixed Dice were a thing.
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I've been playing Shining Force Sword of Hajya for no particular reason aside from the fact that it's there. This game is very unbalanced. To give an example, I faced a wizard boss on one map who dumped a Blaze 3 on a bunch of my units. It did around 20 damage to the ones that it hit when they had around 30 HP at most. The range for the blaze spell was the usual FFT summon spell range whereas all of the previous spells had used the cross shaped pattern. Naturally, I was looking forward to when my basic mage learned the level 3 Blaze Spell.
It turned out that the second mage to join the team learned Freeze 3 much faster than the other mage learned any of her level 3 spells. Freeze 3 is completely nuts. Whereas Blase 3 does about 20-25 damage to everyone in range for 8 mp, Freeze 3 does around 40-50 to everyon in range for 10 mp. Most enemies have around 40ish hp so doing this huge amount of damage is pretty substantial.
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Mega Man II GB VC - played through
Fine enough. Didn't remember Quint being so pathetic. Game in general was pretty easy, I don't think I game overed at all... the same can in no way be said for MMIIIGBVC.
Going to say that MMIGB is better but that could be nostalgia talking.
SaGa 3: Shadow Or Light - played through
I was apprehensive going in because I'd heard that they'd SaGa-fied the game, and I guess they somewhat did, but I still found it much more enjoyable than SaGa 2 GoD.
The game offered to let me play it in easy mode, so I took it up on its offer. Now, I don't know what most of the changes in easy mode were, but the one which I found most striking is that weapon deterioration is disabled.
You might think that this just makes the weapon system the same as FFL3... but no, it's kinda broken. Magic was changed to have charges in this game instead of feeding off MP, so you now have endless magic as well. Furthermore, every weapon in the game actually has four different possible attacks, which eat increasing amounts of charges - for example, the Tome of Fire Magic has Fire for 1 charge, Fira for 2 charges, Figa for 3 charges, and Hellfire for 4 charges. In easy mode you can just spam the most expensive attacks without regard for this (once you learn them, anyway). I have to say that I would probably have found this system kind of annoying if I had to deal with it! So I'm not too broken up about that.
Since stat gaining is more SaGa style now, I was originally planning on rotating the... classes my characters were using, but given that skills learnt for each weapon need to be relearnt for each character I ended up keeping people using the same set of classes throughout the game instead. Specifically, I had Dune (Arthur) as Beastperson & Monsters, Bolnarev (Curtis) as Esper, Milphy (Gloria) as Cyborg and Mecha, and Shilew (Sharon) as Human.
It's a small thing, but I really like how stat gains happen midbattle in this game compared to happening after battles in SaGa 2 GoD. Don't know if any other SaGa games have ever used that.
One thing that I'm not too happy about is that they gutted Mecha. Instead of being a set of creatures parallel to monsters, they're essentially just SaGa 2 GoD Mecha. They did put some of the mecha from FFL2 into the Monster set, but that just makes things make no sense when you eat meat and turn into a tank, and then implant parts and turn back into a beastperson.
The overworld was replaced with a node-based system. I was incredulous! The game with Float, Dive, and the Talons, really? But given how railroady most of the game is, it ended up growing on me.
...until you get the Stesslos and flying over a node-based map is just as dumb as you might imagine. You can't even find any new locations with it or anything, despite being able to see shipwrecks on the map and so on. I haven't actually enumerated all the shipwrecks, but it really feels like there are some that I haven't been able to visit in any era.
...until you get the Stesslos 2, and it turns out that the remainder of the Pureland is actually built around you flying around the map. But still. Flying around the regular maps: almost pointless. In some cases it can be slightly faster than following the nodes. Especially in the future because they didn't put a route between the Palace and Viper so you need to go around through New Dharm.
They let you go back to the regular eras once you get the Stesslos 2 now, but there's almost no reason to do so outside of taking up the Times Gear options which require negative Times Gear points.
Never ended up using the remote control in battle, so I can't say how awesome Stesslos attacks are. I have to say that powering them up by having the Stesslos abduct enemies seems like the most tedious thing ever, for all that it's vaguely hilarious.
I don't recall if anyone's ever linked the design for adult Nemesith (Faye) here before so I'll do that (http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/gmw/docs/417/714/html/saga022.jpg.html) because it's kind of terrible.
[EDIT]Oh right, I was also a big fan of the Stack Battle system. Much, much better than just flooding you with enemies like SaGa 2 GoD was doing.
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This just makes me want to play FFL3 again
Anodyne: Zelda Link's Awakening without tools.
Storyline is "Dreamlike" (YMMV, but I got no greater meaning from anything, and nothing made sense, so I just stopped talking to NPCs after a while) and gameplay is unremarkable. (I just kinda went up against enemies and smashed them? I only lost agains the final boss)
The Stanley Parable: Short walking simulator.
The game's point is mostly about mocking New Game Design (Think Bioware or Assassin's Creed) But they are easy targets, really.
I like the game more when it deviates from this point; as it can have a wicked sense of humour. The employee lounge was my favourite part and I always checked it.
Jazzpunk: GREAT name. Killer art style. As far as walking simulators go I liked this one less though.
I enjoyed my time with this overall, but it should have had less references, random humour, and walking. (Much like in classic adventure games, the funniest parts of the game are about being a total jerk) The New Zealand resort level was really boring (esp. compared to the first and last levels) and the game lost its momentum there.
Shovel Knight: Kickstarter game that looks like a NES game ans has Ducktale's classic Pogo Stick attack. It's pretty much the best NES game, and a better effort than Megaman 9 at a classic retro game. It actually feels more like Megaman than Ducktales with its carefully tuned single screen rooms, and crazy game mechanics unique to each stage.
I feel that enemies don't really do enough damage, pits and spikes are too large of a threat in comparison. That's my only complaint.
Serious Sam The Random Encounter: Crashes after the first battle.
The Binding of Isaac: Oh god I'm pulled in. Help.
The Void: In the tutorial, already lost. What is this about my left stomachs and my right stomachs and my heart...s?
My mouse is acting like crazy so I can't play much more.
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Warframe: Started this a few weeks ago, since it finally has enough polish to where it looks like an actual game instead of Big Rigs 2. Started as Volt, and made a Valkyr frame because that booty go clap.
Just hatched my very own Kudrow to follow me around.
(https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQNOzH7si5mldBozbNCWzgyssjaR9hI5x2Kq_rJTJOv_99XUtmF)
Wow she has not aged well.
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PW1 - Downloaded the iOS version of the game and I'm replaying it. I'm on the last trial day of 1-3. I can definitely see why I almost quit after the first two cases, but the third is a gem. Wendy Oldbag is my hero.
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Ace Attorney Investigations 2 - Finished.
Quick, no-spoiler summary: This was pretty fun. I have a hard time rating it compared to other Ace Attorney games. In general, its lows aren't as low, and its highs aren't as high, as many of the other games. I haven't decided which case is my least favourite but there's a good chance that whichever it is is the best such "worst case"; the vice versa of this is also very likely true. (edit: except that its best case is certainly better than that of Apollo Justice. Duh.)
The cases in this game are very... zany. Like, they're a crazy chain of events, even by Phoenix Wright standards. Check your sense of disbelief at the door. I don't think they're generally super-well-put-together, but they have lots of good ideas. Just... the cases seem to reveal stuff in narratively unsatisfying ways and have plot twist after plot twist after plot twist for the sake of plot twists. It sounds like I don't like the cases, but I do; they're a lot of fun and the game constantly tests your understanding of all the evidence, which it dumps mountains of on you and really forces you to think things through. It's probably the best game in the series "gameplaywise" for keeping the player involved and thinking, even if things are a bit crazy.
One other interesting thing the game does is that... even more than any previous game (AAI1 coming closest), the cases really do link together into one overarching plot. The player is expected to keep past cases in mind for a few plot points in later cases... and unilke most previous games, characters from previous cases tend to remain relevant... in particular, every single killer is relevant to future case(s).
One thing I really liked about this game is that, if you missed something, the game would give you a small hint. I recall Snowfire's complain about the hints coming too early in that game, which is probably fair even if I wasn't overly bothered; in this one, you get those hints... AFTER you waste a bad guess. (The hints are just that; they aren't givaways, and there were several things that took me multiple tries.) I really liked this; you were still rewarded for thinking things through yourself first, but it meant if you weren't thinking in the right direction, you'd get a little poke to where the game did want you to go, reducing the number of times that I would just stare blankly at the screen wondering what the fuck the writers were getting at. This is cool!
The game is almost inevitably a slight letdown after Dual Destinies which I loved. There's no holy-crap-they're-awesome level of new characters that we saw in that game like Athena/Simon/Fullbright. Not that the new cast is bad, though; I quite liked the main rival Justine Courtney and the goofy comic relief prosecutor Sebastian Debeste, though with some reservations which keep them out of the upper tier of favourite Ace Attorney characters. In particular, both just feel like they get pushed to the side in the last ~60% of the last case. Not cool, game.
The translation's... decent enough. Love and admiration for the folks who made it happen, since I was never going to play this game in Japanese. They did a pretty good job with the voice acting. The actual translation is fine mechanically (beyond the odd minor bug here or there) but Ace Attorney is a high standard, and the translation doesn't generally feel nearly as funny or clever as many of the other games. This in turn makes the game a bit less humourous overall. Or maybe it is anyway, hard to tell. To be sure, it's still a humourous game, and there are lots of great moments. Franziska von Karma vs. Sebastian Debeste, and Debeste's logic chess, for perhaps my two favourite.
Logic Chess is a pretty fun gameplay addition. Although the "chess" setting is goofy it is fundamentally just a timed dialogue tree where you have to talk to people, read their emotions and prod them into spilling their secrets. Seems a very appropriate thing to have in a investigation game!
Don't know where I rank it. Better than Apollo Justice, worse than Dual Destinies or Justice For All okay I'm not narrowing this down very much. I'll have to think about that. Still, good game, one of the better ones I've played this year.
WHAT FOLLOWS ARE SPOILERS, DO NOT READ THEM UNLESS YOU LIKE BEING SPOILED
(for this and every other non-DD Ace Attorney game, since I figure anyone who has played AAI2 will have played those and/or won't give a shit i.e. is Grefter)
Justine Courtney... I liked her design, first off, and I thought she was a very effective rival, probably one of the most intelligent ones we've had to deal with. Super-logical and difficulty to deal with. Her face turn in case 4 worked very well too. In case 5... while I thought her interaction with John was great, she was a bit disappointing in this case. I was expecting her to be deeply involved with it when it was revealed she met the president early, but that turned out to be barely relevant. When it came time to deal with the main villain, she barely mattered.
Sebastian Debeste... okay. OKAY. I had this CRAZY THEORY that Sebastian Debeste was the mastermind. Part of this is that I had heard that the game's final villain was a plot twist, and indeed narratively you knew the mastermind would have to be someone you had already met. Plus he wielded a Conductor's baton, and after case 4 you knew that was bad news! And he always managed to be offscreen whenever the mastermind communicated with Edgeworth. And he wore a red jacket! And when he talks to Edgeworth on the phone he talks a lot like Blaise (but can't be Blaise, so someone who takes after him...?). And his "serious" pose/theme music after Edgeworth cheers him up looked rather sinister. I was so convinced of my own theory that I actually presented him as my first guess for the mastermind even though the game was in hindsight obviously hinting at someone else by then. Anyway enough about the character that could have been, let's talk about the character that was. Sebastian himself is just good fun. He's mostly a great comic character (be it his silly misuse of vocabulary, the way others treat him, his incrediable animations, etc.), but the character growth wasn't bad... not so much for Sebastian's sake, but for Edgeworth's and Franziska's. Always nice to see the evil dad thing explored. Then he disappears for the endgame entirely, grr!
Franziska's role is mostly a cameo in this game. She's fun as always, especially around Debeste. I'd rather have seen a bit more obviously.
The mastermind... ha. When it was revealed who s/he was, I was disappointed. I had thoguht Sebastian as that had a lot of potential, and didn't really give a fuck about this character prior to the reveal. And then s/he just proceeds to steal the show at the end of the game, holy crap. Great presence, great animations, and a delightful troll of an opponent. I -loved- how s/he just set in motion all the murders of the game, giving all his/her enemies the rope to hang themselves with; it was great. I wish the game hadn't made him/her a murderer and you'd dealt with them some other way; it kind of betrays what the character stands for to kill someone. Plus the method of murder is one of the stupidest yet, c'mon.
Blaise Debeste is the type of scumbag the series usually uses as a final villain. He is the most "evil" character in the game; it was an interesting choice to make him ultimately secondary to the mastermind, but one which worked really well. Blaise himself, I can take or leave. He's okay. The game has done his trope better (Alba, Manfred) but also worse (White, Gant, Gavin).
Body double was a lame character. Lots of neat things they could have explored with him (why did he plot against the real president? What has he done as president? Why? etc.). None of it is. His role in the story, and even his murder, is a goddamn afterthought to the game's plot, EVEN THOUGH YOU MEET HIM c'mon. Also a coward who literally hides under his furniture at one point had the guts to murder someone? Yeah I don't think the writers knew what they were doing with him.
Lang is still a moron. The game made me kind of feel for him at points, that is something. But overall yeah I could have done without him in this game (he is notably worse/less useful to the story than in AAI1), and his sudden promotion to major character again in the final case was needless. I've already alluded to this repeatedly but the final confrontation sorta suffered from too many cooks; keep him off the stage so Courtney/Debeste/Ray can have their day.
To combine the past two paragraphs... Everyone from Zheng Fa is a moron. Quercus Alba was right to ruin that country!
Wait, I got this far without mentioning Kay! Kay's fun. Great interaction with Edgeworth; the writers seemed to realise this as he's around her a LOT in this game, rather than anyone else. Her woobie moment in case 4 was rather sweet, though I did get a bit sick of her refusal to believe in herself at a certain point mostly because the series does this a bit too often (ironically enough, with Edgeworth himself originally!).
I don't have much to say about Ray Shields. A solid character in cases 2-3 who then largely disappears. Pretty funny too. But... yeah, just not much to say about him!
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VVVVVV: Finished, 502 deaths, 2 hours, most deaths go to that one room where you have to lead Vermillion around and he's an idiot.
Pretty damn nice but not timeless like Super Hexagon. Speaking of which I completed every challenge in that one but the super hardestestest one, which still looks insane but still easier than surviving 60 seconds in the Super Gravitron in VVVVVV. (which is an achievement)
I loved the sad elephant.
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(http://i.imgur.com/S2hrGXj.png)
Bury - If You Mess With Her Tea Party, She'll Murder You With Butterflies. (http://i.imgur.com/doc9azw.png)
Once again, I return to the realms of translated Japanese RPGmaker horror games. (There will probably be a few more of these coming soon, too.) Or close enough - technically Bury is made in Wolf RPG Editor, which from an end user standpoint seems.... completely identical to RPGmaker except with fewer features. Okay.
Like Cloe's Requiem, Bury is a relatively well known and well regarded game in its native language. Unlike that game, and indeed all the other games I've talked about, Bury was not the subject of an eagerly awaited and ethically sourced English translation. Its author explicitly declined and forbid any offers to translate the game, on the grounds that they didn't feel comfortable not being able to personally assure the quality of the story in other languages. Buuuuut, as you can see, some anonymous person came along recently and translated the game anyway, against the creator's wishes.
It's out there now, so I played it, and it's ok, and the controversy in translation circles has already made the game notorious enough that I don't feel completely spammy posting about it. But I won't be linking the actual game here... which might be just as well, since actually playing the darn thing for yourself is a massive slog.
The game cannot be fullscreened, which is a strike against the atmosphere right away. Character movement is tile based and absurdly, painfully slow, with no run button. Text cannot be sped up and cutscenes cannot be skipped, at all, ever. Music doesn't loop smoothly. Save files don't give you any information other than time and party members, and even that isn't accurate. There are save prompts whenever the story forces a PC switch, but using them will make a file showing your previous party instead of whoever you're switching to, so when you're trying to see multiple endings it's hard to go back and identify where in the game a particular save was from.
Now, all those things appear to mainly be Wolf RPG Editor's fault, but then the gameplay delivers some groin shots that the engine can't be blamed for. Many puzzles damage you when you mess up or have the temerity to examine the wrong thing, and healing is strictly limited. Everything, everything is strictly linear and trigger based. See that bundle of herbs over there? You can examine it, and it just says "A bundle of herbs." Can't pick it up or do anything, looks like a background object, until 30 minutes later you find a puzzle and then go read a book hinting that herbs might help. THEN you slowly walk all the way back to the herbs and now you can magically pick them up. This kind of stupidity pervades Bury's gameplay. Even if you know the answer to a puzzle, you have to do everything in exactly the order the game wants you to, and every step has 30 seconds of slow walking to go to some room with several obviously important objects and check on which one (if any) of them the game will let you interact with yet. And if you don't know the answer, or you were wrong, it's time for more walking to check other places.
Even better, there are multiple times where you actually can't do anything, and you need to walk around and enter some hallways and rooms you've already been to in order to trigger some sudden new event. And you absolutely have to replay the entire game at least twice making different choices to see all the endings and unlock the final bits of content. And the choices you have to make are all kinds of unintuitive. I had someone warn me beforehand and tell me what the requirements were, and I STILL got stuck for an hour trying to get the last ending. Wanna know what was stumping me? There's a place where there are two books and a sheet of paper. You must read both books, but must NOT read the sheet of paper, in addition to having made all the correct choices - normally, in the other endings, you must read the sheet of paper in order to progress the game. Yes.
And all that is really a shame because the story's pretty good! An absolutely gorgeous, incredibly well executed theme of classic nursery rhymes runs through the whole game. That is clearly the selling point and makes me want to forgive all the other flaws. Characters... don't really exist like you think they do, not really, but that's ok. The story is strange, subtle and subdued, although the ending bits piece everything together pretty clearly. It doesn't particularly overreach or underreach, just is what it is and invites you to figure it out. I really adore that method of storytelling.
If only the gameplay wasn't so bad, though! It's... it's not the worst I've suffered through. I can give it that much. The ideas behind the puzzles make sense, you can't get permastuck, and the harder riddles tend to not damage you and instead give you hints if you answer wrong multiple times. Save points are relatively common. There's only one chase sequence and it's very easy. If the walk speed was quadrupled and the puzzle triggers eased up and let you interact with some things out of order, I might be calling the gameplay good and the game as a whole great! But as it stands, there's a great 1 hour Let's Play to be had wrapped up in 4 hours of tedious bullshit shambling through the same hallways over and over.
Final verdict: Good story, but aaaaauuuuggghhhhdfhkdfkdjfkhdfhdklhjdklfhjkl;'sdgf RUN FASTER COCO WHY/10?!?!?
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Grabbed Wario Land 2 for the Club Nintendo reward, since the other gold tier games were ones I've already beaten (SML2) or not interested in. Platformer where you're immortal is kinda odd as an premise, but R&D1 did a decent job at making the gameplay interesting enough. Intentionally getting hit by enemies for a 'powerup' is certainly a novel experience.
Worst idea in the game by far would be the concealed enemy blocks, ugh. I had to faq both instances of that since I would never have guessed in a million years that you could even do that otherwise.
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DQ6 - I finished this last week. The final bossy is pretty bullshit and I ended up grinding about 6-10 levels on all my dudes unlocking Hero on the main (so I could have some more offense annd Disrupting Wave away Oomph and Kabuff on the boss, which weren't the bullshit parts).
I did two runs against it before the grind set in. Pretty much easy until the final form, the both times dying to a barrage of 100~ damage MT fire/ice attacks while constantly Disrupting Waving away my Insulatle. Kind of hard to deal with when everyone's HP was floating around 160 - 220ish in Sage (because holy shit is Sage amazing compared to all the other advanced classes). You could probably deal with it after shuffling some equipment around to specifically resist Fire and Ice damage (and not Frizz and Crackle damage) and not Magic damage, but then you would be punished by the rarer Kaboom a bit harder. That would be fine if resistance was better documented in game and there wasn't 2 different resistances for "Frizz" spells and other kinds of Fire damage. DQ breaks down its "elements" fucking weird and all over the place. I could also have juggled party members to try and get in Healie to use Omniheal and protect people using the Wagon. Unfortunately introducing that kind of freedom for a single boss fight really fucks with a player since you have no training to do that other than the final dungeon itself, in which there is an enemy type that shuts the wagon. Soooo high fives.
Coming back with Gigaslash and being level 40ish so the pool of things you can get from Summon being much much better with more people in classes with more HP (sacrificing some of that mad mad MP conservation), using Seeds to buffer up weaker HP pools and a few rare drops (MKS helm and a Duplic Hat which is pretty lol but only saw use for Kabuff really) generally made it much easier. Just more offense cut down the time it took to get through the HP pools so I saw less Disrupting Wave and less chance for just eating 300HP worth of fire/ice in a turn and a half due to RNG fuckery. Beat Mortamor, no motivation to do after game super secret special dungeon.
I had more fun than I expected too. The game is really unpolished and clunky with its stuff, but it is kind of functional. That it came out 3 years after FF5 and has a job system that is probably worse than FF3 isn't super great or anything, but is better than DQ7 copy pasting it again. I focused characters on their strengths which was probably not the optimal strategy. I should have probably made Carver a Priest and then headed him down Sage and kept using him (instead of Nevan probably?) since his high base HP would carry him pretty far with those classes, where taking a HP deficit on Nevan was super spikey in where it mattered and didn't.
That said, Amos is the bomb. A second party member that can use Boomerangs? Great and should aways be used.
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Wasn't the job system a bit better in DQ7? I remember being extrmely unimpressed by DQ6's. Maybe because I knew DQ makes cool things boring.
I've never seen such a massive sudden grind at the end of a game like the DQ6 final boss. He is exactly like every DQ boss ever, with the same spells and all, except with way higher numbers so you need to grind for a few hours.
La Mulana: Now that I have it for Steam with Steam achievements I have learnt something. That crazy trap I activated last time I played (and re-activated now) is actually Hard Mode. So that's why all the bosses were insanely tough! And now that I've activated it again there's no escape!
I actually found a few new things compared to last time, before getting completely stuck (Temple of Moonlight for exemple) I could beat bosses but hard mode, knife and whip being too dangerous, shurikens doing one damage, etc.
Checking some maps, I notice that I don't actually miss that many clues, but it sure doesn't feel like it in game. In game I feel lost and weak all the time.
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DQ6 - I finished this last week. The final bossy is pretty bullshit and I ended up grinding about 6-10 levels on all my dudes unlocking Hero on the main (so I could have some more offense annd Disrupting Wave away Oomph and Kabuff on the boss, which weren't the bullshit parts).
THERE IS SEXWORTH 2 AND YOU SPENT YOUR TIME GRINDING IN DQ6, GREFTER? :'( :-\ >:( :-[
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All your wagon characters in DQ6 gain full exp/job levels even in dungeons where you can't access the dungeon, so it is in fact possible to train a full team for endgame, so long as you can equip them acceptably. You can also send someone down the Luminary path without having to endure the awful Gadabout phase and then switch him/her over to Martial Artist for a character with free MT healing and decent durability/speed, which made lategame bosses a whole lot easier.
I don't remember having to do any grinding for the final boss personally beyond going through the final dungeon twice (once to loot the treasure, second time for the boss), but I suspect I had more MT healing then you did.
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I don't mean training like characters. I mean that is the only boss fight (maybe one earlier?) where you have 8 people and the ability to dump people into the back row so they don't take damage but are able to be healed. That opens up a ton of strategic choices you haven't had for 30+ hours of game.
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Also Ciatos I don't understand what you are saying. I can't hear you properly over my Suikoden 1 and Trails in the Sky replay on PC.
Suikoden - The thing that blows me away each time I play and notice little things each time at the start is how weird the sound design is. Normally you first notice it when the dragon makes straight up elephant noises or some of the weirder instrument choices in the soundtrack (that Marco gambling music, Japanese retelling of a high fantasy medieval epic? Banjo and bush band instruments). Since I play without music on a bit I also note the crazy loud fountains right outside Gregminster Palace. They sound like a sample of a small waterfall or heavy rainfall and it is white noise that just wipes trough the entire audio range.
The thing that got me this time though that I hadn't noticed before is that when you first go home from the palace you get dialogue choices to fuck around with Pahn and Gremio that I hadn't seen before. These elicit horn honks and boioioiong sounds like they are in a Three Stooges short.
So can anyone think of a time they use a slide whistle in Suikoden 1? I am certain they do at some point based on that, I can even hear it in my mind, but I can't place where it happens.
Trails in the Sky - I am up to Chapter 2 of this. It breezes by much quicker the second time when you are skipping dialogue and when I could sit down and play it for long sessions instead of just playing it mostly portable. Playing it on PC because there is supposed to be some carry over stuff from LoH 1 to 2 that I would like to have and I want to play 2 when it comes out since I can and because I do remember finishing it genuinely being interested in a JRPG series with recurring characters over multiple games again. Haven't had one of those like that since like Shadow Hearts 1 and 2 really? Maybe something in the Atelier wheel house that I haven't touched yet, but nothing else springs to mind. Suikoden is more shared universe than a clear byline through an overarching story. The only other thing that springs to mind is Arc the Lad of all things.
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Xenoblade Chronicles - what % of this game's scenes are men yelling at robots
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Suikodens - So the line from Kanaan right after Ted casts Hell on the Queen Ant is "What the hell?"
10/10
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Xenoblade Chronicles - what % of this game's scenes are men yelling at robots
...there are points in the game where there aren't men yelling at robots? I thought that was the whole thesis of the game!
"Robots eat humans, Men yell at them for eating humans!"
Bravely Default: Rusalka is a lot easier when everyone has Abate Water and you have 2 Iceflame Shields. Granted, forgetting it had charm is embarassing, having Agnes with the Lamia Tiara by chance sure helped though! Also, Agnes clearly wants sexy time with Tiz in a cave...er...I mean...BECAUSE THE SAGE ASKED HER TO BRING ONE ALLY!
Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze: NINJA. BABOONS. This isn't that weird, except that the Snowmads are all suppose to be arctic animals, and well...NINJA BABOONS!!! Also, gotta say, I think this game may have some of the best swimming mechanics I've ever seen, particularly because:
A. Not 3D
B. They don't remove your offensive capabilities, just adjust how they work, so lateral shift
C. YOU CAN USE CRANKY!!!
...ok, C is pretty much a given for anything in this game
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Trails in the Sky - I am up to Chapter 2 of this. It breezes by much quicker the second time when you are skipping dialogue and when I could sit down and play it for long sessions instead of just playing it mostly portable. Playing it on PC because there is supposed to be some carry over stuff from LoH 1 to 2 that I would like to have and I want to play 2 when it comes out since I can and because I do remember finishing it genuinely being interested in a JRPG series with recurring characters over multiple games again.
I am lost here.
LoH 1 and 2 has carry over to Trails? Something has to be mistaken here.
Also, you sound like only PC version supports carry over. But actually all versions of Trails supports carry over, just that you can only carry it over between same type of console/handheld.
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Trails to the sequel is what I mean and PC version of the sequel is the only one we are getting in English.
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Xenoblade Chronicles - What in the ever loving fuck was that scene I just watched? If you are going to going to go full and complete idiot by sacrificing your chance to save the world because you have a boner for some girl, you could at least make sure you get the girl in the exchange. A horrible execution to a genuinely terrible trope. And then we had the reveal to who Metal Face is, which made me chortle. Why did the writers think this plot thread was a good idea? Is this guy going to be like Wheel of Time Slayer, who you yell at in impotent rage as the character mega overstays his welcome? Most of the goodwill the game had generated from the High Entia arc was just obliterated by the utter stupidity of the last 10 minutes.
(And then I fought a boss fight and I was underlevelled and it was borderline impossible and since strategy seems to barely matter I gained a level and then it was just merely kinda annoying!)
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The Binding of Isaac: NO MORE. It is the Antechrist of games, abhorrent but tempting and addictive. Why am I playing a game that's making fun of a terrified bullied kid over and over and covering him in shit? I'm not going to trust anyone who has played it for more than 5 minutes. Oh wait I played it for 9 hours. Well ok, I'm not going to trust anyone who has played it for more than 10 hours.
Nuclear Throne: Tried this to compensate, as it's another top down shooter roguelike thing. It is a loud fast game which rewards really aggressive tactics. It is excellent, but like Spelunky it's more skill based than luck based, so maybe it's not going to be as addictive as Binding of Isaac (Its addictive nature lies in seeing whatever cool powers you're going to get and how they're going to mesh together, for this run). I'm not going to stop until I get to the Nuclear Throne anyway, and this should take a really long while.
The robot and plant look like the best characters but my favourite is Yung Venuz the Freemason/Illuminati Triangle Thing.
(http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140618011732/nuclear-throne/images/9/9a/Yv_counting.gif)
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FFT: Oh right I finished this at some point. The only thing really to add is that I still hate Balk 2. It would be moderately problematic if I just wanted to kill Balk, but no I have to drag it out trying to steal because guns guns guns (even though the only thing past this point is a couple joke fights and I won't be bringing the gunners to either of them). The first try I forget that his dragon pals can basically murder the fuck out of people in one hit, so *reset*. Second time I hang back as far as possible trying to lure the gunners into ambush range. They prioritize shooting Ramza of the 100% Auto-Potion success chance for some reason, so this basically works, chemist jumps the gap and alright let's break that hat of yours so you get less turns while I'm trying to nick the Glacier Gun. ...0% hitrate, what? He spawned with Maintenance. ffffffffffffffff *reset*
Okay! Ramza yells at my chemist until she's like 17 speed so she can comfortably throw phoenix down at anyone who needs revival (which she does constantly since on average 50% of the team is dead at any given time; obviously everyone has Auto-Potion, but this hardly matters when the dragons get multiple chances at OHKO damage per turn). Melly breaks people's hats and mantles. Reis converts the tiamat which almost completely fails to hit anything for the rest of the fight despite having very advantageous terrain opportunities that limit it to usually two panels to strike. DanceNinja morphs into StealNinja, gets a lucky Don't Act to land while beating up the behemoth, and then manifestly fails at the one steal chance she actually gets. Why just one? Well naturally she got shot to death immediately afterward because she was running around at 10 HP (chemist girl is fast enough to keep everyone alive by this point, but not to heal them to non-OHKO range). No big deal, I'll just revive her again--oh wait, chemist girl can't make it across the gap to the far side of the arena because there are too many corpses in the way. And with her 3 move she'll never make it all the way around the room in time.
...
Okay, fuck it, fine! I'll just punch Balk to death for more HP than he actually has and then call it a day!
But at least I got a tiamat out of it. I brought it along for Hashmalum. This didn't matter because that fight proceeded thusly: Hashy moves forward, starts charging Meteor -> Ramza punches him for over a thousand damage -> DanceNinja stabs him for like six hundred damage. Fin~ The lesson here is that all you need is ninjas (wah wah-wah-wah-wahhh).
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Star Fox 64: Never Give Up! Trust Your instincts! Do a Barrel Roll!
...it seems I forgot how to do most of that, because I went entirely the blue route this game. I am out of practice. Ah well, got it for free thanks to Club Nintendo!
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Gunvolt - So, Inafune's new game is out. GV is so distracting of a character despite being the PC, for he is a shota voiced by Ishikawa kun. Just how am I going to concentrate on the gameplay if I am being induced of yaoi fantasies every other second?
The game design is also not what I expected. It is a pretty easy game with bunch of gimmicks that makes sure the player don't die. (auto invincibility shield, auto revive!)
But on the other hand, it is very time/score attack oriented that none of the gimmicks in the game is going to help and depends entirely on player skill if aiming for high scores. (you lose all stacked points upon a hit regardless of shield on or not, no stack points at all if in revived mode)
Haven't dig into the customization yet. But the game seems to flow pretty well even without it.
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Child of Light- Endgame. Stat topicing this will probably be relatively easy (considering that the annoying way it dealt with saves. I guess for a game like this I wouldn't typically care, but man it makes this a pain).
May need to replay on normal because it changes both enemy defenses (which are so mathematically easy to deal with since it's easily tested straight division I think) and EXP growth (obviously super important. Also more levels=less needing to come up with as many minute alternate builds, so that's also a plus).
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Bravely Default:
Things I should probably stop doing: Refights with the Asterisk Bosses
Things I probably should be doing: Continuing the main game
Things I will most likely end up doing: ???????
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FF6 Eviltype - Doing stuff in the final dungeon.
Team 1: Terra/Strago/Relm/Gogo (fight Goddess)
Team 2: Umaro/Shadow/Sabin/Gau (fight Atma, Gold Dragon, Doom)
Team 3: Celes/Edgar/Setzer/Mog (fight Inferno, Skull Dragon, Guardian, Poltergeist)
Team 3's the one I have the most confidence in (nobody with bad armour + great spell levels) if you're wondering why it got fed into the two-boss route at the end.
Randoms haven't been tooo bad although Great Behemoth Meteo just horribly overkills whatever it hits. Still blah blah various status tricks and such work, the usual (Controlling Evil Oscars and having them use Sneeze is my favourite way to kill some things). Two resets on randoms, both to the dreaded Outsider/Madam formation which aside from an HP boost isn't even too different from vanilla, one reset due to trying to blast them with MT and getting shredded by counters, one more after I learned to Odin the Outsiders but then got MT OHKOed by a Madam's Meteor. (Sleep on her completes the win, though.) Bosses...
Atma (8 resets) - Good lord. To be fair, part of the problem here is that I don't have Cure 3 on anyone in this team yet, but still this guy's nasty. Above half HP he's fine, elemental damage blah blah vulnerable to slow yay! He does have a mean counter where he uses his physcical and it does quite a lot of damage. Safe on everyone to the rescue. Hell, Shell too. Regen too. Haste. Float. Why the hell not he doesn't dispel. Let's talk about below half HP. First of all, he starts doubleacting, following up other actions with Bio, Stop, Demi, and Sleep. Nothing too terrible there but it's an unneeded complication. Oh, and some things can be followed up by HyperDrive which just pureers one PC (if you survive it you're horribly overlevelled, it's like 5k damage).
The real real problem his primary skillset expands to include CleanSweep (accurate, of an element that can't be nulled without sabotaging your defence, so it's great at picking off the recently revived, and means that Flame Shield is out for an elemental option), Quake (MT OHKO, Float or Gaia Gear or die), and Meteor (MT 1500~ or so). Meteor is completely brutal. Only Umaro and a PC with a Muscle Belt can survive, and only barely. Sometimes Sabin with a +25% HP item does too. But... this is ultimately the problem. Meteor is killer, very difficult to recover from, and since revived PCs don't have Float you're asking for problems there ("Gaia Gear on everyone" is not a solution, the physical counters start OHKOing then, through Protect, and it also tends to mean a loss of elemental defences which are crucial as Fire/Ice/Bolt 3/S Cross fly like mad in this fight and they'll do nasty those with no protection at all). Anyway I hone my strategy more and more (learning to re-apply Slow when he goes through an HP loop, and using Rhinox Rage to get Life 3 and hopefully survive) but ultimately after seven failed tries I give up, and gain one more level (within the rules of the challenge of course, non-Umaro people go from 26 to 27). Now everyone -can- survive Meteor with appropriate HP boosting, and things are smoother. I still die one more time.
Inferno - Compared to Atma he's nothing, mostly elemental damage and physicals and petrify, i.e. nothing that can't be reacted to. HP also isn't too bad.
Skull Dragon - Well the game glitches out when he hits a limit and uses a bugged attack. :( So I have two resets on that if that counts. The third try, Celes gets turned into a zombie and I revive her after her ATB gauge fills up but before her attack executes, so when her attack DOES execute she's at critical. And apparently her desperation attack just instantly kills the target's MP. Skull Dragon dies!
Gold Dragon (1 reset) - I remember this guy being a total badass but I'm a bit more prepared I guess. He's still no slouch. Anyone without lightning defence is obviously in huge trouble, his physical tech is an ITE OHKO to pretty much everyone not named Gau or Mog, and his charge turn for Phantasm/Wavecannon/Shrapnel (the latter being large MT non-elemental damage) is nasty. Shell's a big help, and mostly just staying on top of things since obviously he can kill things and I have to rebuff. Fortunately by now I do have both Cure 3 and Life 2 so those go a long way.
Guardian - He's a long way from a save point which makes me a bit nervous as always. Fortunately, he's more of a marathon fight than he is super-nasty, which is fine. The fight goes through different phases. The first has healing and gravity but isn't too bad, buff up then keep the pressure on. The second is Atma, which is most notable for tossing out decent double physicals (not too bad with Protect, but notably if two hit Setzer he drops, Protect or no) and Flare which OHKOs people but hey Runic can block that! There's Air Force which isn't really too bad, mostly runs into lightning defence although would shred a party less good at it (Minerva/Force Armour/Force Armour/Thunder Shield). Then there's Dadaluma who has tricks to get around Vanish, periodically X-Potions for 10k healing, and can just do ST 9999 with throws (removing all the buffing work) but it's not too bad. This softens me up though for Ultros who you REALLY want to be buffed for. I definitely come close to losing this stage as he can double MT Tentacle and that hurts! And various other doubleact combos. He also has Entwine, 100% MT slow which partly prevents Vanish strats but also is a huge pain, good thing I have Haste 2 to counter it but I pretty much need to have someone ready with that at all times or terrible things may happen. I consider trying to solo this with Mog as he has no magic damage, but I'm glad I didn't. Last phase just goes invincible and isn't too special outside a really nasty Bio Blast which uh OHKOs Edgar and Setzer without Shell (Mog's just tanky enough, Celes halves it). I scramble to get them revived and Shelled but it doesn't really work. Fortunately he finally self-destructs and takes out Celes with his dying Suplex, Mog is the only one who gets magic points but whatever I'll take it.
Save point! Levels are mostly 25-27 right now.
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Xenoblade Chronicles - Just beat the boss fight where you have to kill the Face Nemesis minions. As someone who doesn't really like to grind in games, I feel like I've been grinding for almost every boss in this game. After the fight, there was a plot fight (which was great and joyous fun) and then we had a set of cutscenes that would do Michael Bay proud. Seventh PC get, though! :)
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ToX2
It's like Xillia, but is it better?
First off. Silent main in a Tales game is really awkward. Ludger talks, sometimes, but he feels like the guy from Waiting who was always getting interrupted. Minor complaint I guess. He is freaking awesome in fights. I can't recall a main Tales character this overpowered before. Three different weapons that he can swap on the fly, has a super saiyin mode, and does everything else good too.
And the rest of the X1 cast is back too.
Jude's new look reminds me of Bowman Jean. I dig it more then his X1 attire.
Just got Rowen back. He's old and has that old man charm.
Can Leia ever buy a normal looking outfit? First she had that nightgown gone wrong in 1, now she is all sorts of tacky looking. At least you can take off her hat? I dunno. She's still fun to play with, so I can ignore that for now.
Elize is whatever. Her character seems much less annoying, but then you have Teepo. Fucking Teepo. I don't get what they were trying to create with him, but he just annoys me. Nothing about him makes much sense. But he does love dem titties. I guess that's a plus.
Poor Ivar, he got shot and squished by Ludger. He gets no respect. I hope they make him playable. He at least deserves that after Milla pretty much tosses him to the side for her boy toy Jude.
Still not sure what's going on in the story. Lots of crazy time altering, warp things I guess. Who knows. I don't!
The debt system sucks, the rewards suck...I do a significant amount of grinding in these games since fighting is so rewarding and you get stuff for killing monsters repeatedly in this one.
I dunno if any of you guys are playing this game, but it seems like it has improved on most things the first game did. The leveling system is gone and now there's this Materia-like system in its place.
Oh, and my girlfriend does not agree, but Rollo is by far the most bad ass Tales character ever created.
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Tales of Xillia 2: Finally got the full party. So many things anger me about this game. I don't even give a shit about the debt system. But so much shit has been changed into complete annoyances. Can only change parties in town! Shops are now back to set inventories! Custom orders where you need materials from the start of the game to complete! Along with the equipment from the start of the game! Restoratives are stupid scare. Trying to get the Large food dishes involves waiting 15 minutes and hoping the cat army brings back the required ingredient. The Power Hit system in battle is just an excuse to crank up boss HP to absurd levels and make it utterly baffling to you when the Power Hit meter just suddenly goes away when it's halfway through it's timer. Or when you hop into Chromatus and it just poofs away despite you laying into the dude endlessly. Allium Orb development is utterly tedious holy crap.
The Xillia 1 casts non reaction to the fractured dimension situation is also ludicrous.
Good things? Well Elle and Nova are pretty neat. The idea of the fractured dimensions themselves are fine if the circumstances surrounding them weren't so idiotic. When the Power Hits actually work correctly they're spiffy. But that's only like a 1 in 50 chance though.
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On the plus side, cat army?
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Yis. Xillia 2 has cat army. Xillia 2 auto wins~
I really like the Cross Costume feature. Currently have Leia in her Santa outfit (yes it's not Christmas and I am using this since I didn't have time to use it in the first game before >_>) with Soccer hairstyle (I like the yellow ribbon), two huge mittens on her hands, and a Christmas pin ^_^ Jude is digging the Yuri costume currently and Ludger pulls off Emil's outfit well especially since I have him with a beret, bow and arrows too. Niice. Rowen is rocking his default with his spectacles, a lion cloth and a beret (Elle's cap)
Kitty Dispatch. You can view kitties with R3. It's great.
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Cat Army is great(some of the cats even look like their namesake) but requiring it just to make stuff is crap.
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ToX2 proves how incompetent cats are. Even with 72/100 cats, they can't be bothered to collect at least one rare item from an area after 5 or 6 tries. Probably being lazy and fat instead.
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Is it Gaius Dumplings? I bet it's Gaius Dumplings.
It took me like 30 tries to get enough for that job...
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Hey all, been...a long while my life has been.....very entertaining the past year or so! My gaming has been steadily declining lately, but has been partially salvaged thanks to a few gems I just found a few days ago! ONTO THEM!
Currently playing
7th Dragon
Nintendo DS title I stumbled across today. OH MAN. I love the "it's to hard for Americans" games that don't get brought over. (still waiting on that magical vacation english patch tho!). A PITY I CAN ONLY COMPREHEND KANJI. Playing a bugged english patch version :D. Excited for the game crash or if I will quit out of difficulty level frustration before then!
Fortuna Magus
Has a bromantic overtone at the beginning between the drive of the story's main characters (whom you do not play as! (yet?! im not far into it!)
I'll have a review forth coming in my topic once I am a bit deeper in the game
Band of Monsters
LOL this is pretty awesome, another i'm only 10 minutes into it and hooked and I haven't even seen the combat system yet!
ITARUS
WOW been waiting for a 2D(2.5D) MMORPG style game for awhile that does it well. Shockingly good story. Gonna be getting same treatment as Fortuna Magus. Its "hard" in the "MMORPG" sense in that you will die a LOT to monsters all the time and it will cost you xp and gold(which you need a lot of often).
EpicHearts PLUS
This...This has been the game I have been waiting to exist since I first played through Secret of Mana with my brother when it first came out. Its getting big slow treatment by me, looks like there will be at least 3 play through (1 of which i will skip entirely probably since I don't like that character's player style or archtype), has an online auction house between players so it shirks normal freemium "pay for it too" games. THIS brought me back into gaming. And I am only about 20 minutes in. SOOO fun though the characters move around a bit TOO speedily, pretty shocking for a mana style action-rpg. One of the characters moves twice as fast as the one I'm playing so its CRAZY fast. Perfect and ideal graphics for me as well. At most I am gonna need 300 or the 500 "coin" they gave me for starting the game to "complete" it ;) (bought the "plus" version so I wouldn't be inundated with adverts).
It am engendered in me the old feelings of wanting to design my own game, now I know its feasible since this has all the features I wanted with the ultra high quality 2D/isometric mix (think Legend of Mana if it was sized for mobile) and the financial feasibility to both give it away free WHILE making an income off it when I succeed. Just have to "acquire" the engine they used to build it and slow down the movement a bit... pretty excited, I haven't worked on much video game design since...I went to school for it...so this will be fun now that tech and platforms are "at that point" ! LAZINESS ALWAYS PAYING OFF OH MAN. Hahah!
Recently finished playing "World of Warcraft" Finally beat the game forever!
Thinking about Starting up Super Mario RPG: Lotss
Thinking about picking up Super Smash 3DS and Kirby Triple Deluxe.
Has it...occurred to anyone that Kirby is basically an organic Vacuum machine and one of/the most famous vacuum company of history was "Kirby" as well. COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS MAN, break free of that hive mind.
DAT PS4 though...Nickola Tesla as a steampunk Order associate?! Humina Humina!
GRAPHICS SUPERIOR TO REAL LIFE? yes please! Oh...that price tag tho.... pass!
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Xenoblade Chronicles - Just fought a plot fight with Jade Face in Mechonis Field; damn, that was quite a long dungeon. New PC is a bit damselly for my liking and Shulk has continued to disappoint me by being a moron. At least there's still Reyn Time.
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Dragon's Crowns - THAT ISN'T HOW BREASTS WORK, VANILLAWARE.
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Dragon's Crowns - THAT ISN'T HOW BREASTS WORK, VANILLAWARE.
roll dorf.
seriously dwarf picks dudes up and chucks them at other dudes all day long and it NEVER GETS OLD. DO EEEEEEEEEET.
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Mega Man III GB VC - played through
Much more precision jumping required than I prefer.
Stick It To The Man - played through
Pretty entertaining, but the controls let it down somewhat. The main issue is that the game flips into scanning mode if the GamePad is tilted more than 30 degrees or so from the horizontal, AKA at less of an angle on which it's typically held, and scanning mode disables all your other controls. And enemies aren't paused during this mode! So many times I'm trying to evade someone and the pad creeps up over the point in question and I die before I get back out of scanning mode.
To be fair, you can disable using the gamepad for scanning, but I'm not sure what it would actually replace it with. If enemies had been paused while in scanning mode, it would have been annoying but not especially so - there's not really any reason why that couldn't have been the case. There are some enemies you can scan in order to make a temporary distraction available, but as far as I recall you can always scan the enemy from outside their line of sight for that, you never need to do it while they're chasing you.
With regards to controls, you also aim with the right stick and jump with one of the right buttons, which makes it impossible to aim and jump at the same time. This isn't ever required, but would have been helpful in some of the chase sequences. Feels like it would have been nice to have been able to jump with L.
I did find the parts of the game that weren't chase sequences to be fairly amusing, so I think it was still worth my time. Almost feels like the chase sequences could have been dropped altogether.
Mega Man IV GB VC - played through
Still great. Ring & Crystal levels gave me more trouble than I was expecting so I guess I haven't played it recently enough. Hopefully the current trend continues and MMVGBVC comes out next week rather than either of the Xtreme games, as I have no interest in replaying either of those.
Anodyne - played through
Fairly entertaining gameplay-wise, outside of the fact that the jump mechanics are fairly mediocre. The storyline feels somewhat non-existant.
On-hit invincibility seems to either last for much less time than I expect, or there are at lot of things which pierce it, because I died a lot while thinking I was invincible. Oh well.
I do have to say that I'm seriously not feeling the postgame. It doesn't help that there are conspicuously blocked passages at the end of the final three dungeons which each only open up into small empty purposeless rooms. There are some conspicuous locations earlier in the game, but I played most of the game last week and I don't remember any of them now, and postgame things aren't only in conspicuous locations. It really doesn't help that most of the things I've found so far have been fairly uninspiring.
[EDIT]
Detective Grimoire - played through
I somehow forgot that I also played this. It was pretty entertaining, but didn't have much in the way of gameplay. Fairly nice graphics.
The game never explains the suspicion meters and they end up not mattering in the slightest outside of an achievement related to them.
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Yes! People are complaining about ToX2's lack of party member change in battle and the stupid shop inventory.
More! I need to hear more people flame it.
Gunvolt - Game beaten. So odd the the last bosses are like the second easiest bosses in game and it is their stage I got my first SS grade. Har.
They also need to give the Gluttony dude a bit more HP. There is something wrong when a boss in a side-scroll ACT game can be OHKOed.
The game was fun, but only the zombie horror stage left an impression, and that is mostly because of the shock value.
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If I can't change party members in battle I'm screwed if I forgot to unequip Minimum damage. If I run into something guard heavy I can't bring in Alvin to break it. If something's resistant to an ally's elements, I can't replace them.
I spent over hours over a debt repayment time grinding out materials for armor that was invalidated in the character stories themselves. I had to scour the shops to find a weapon to make another weapon. I had to find and armor to make an armor to make another armor. I spend almost hundred of thousands of gald a chapter to buy the Jewels that are needed in almost every single piece of equipment that'll be invalidated next chapter.
Also the equipment inventory is all sorts of nonsense and messed up. Shit is just thrown about randomly or trying to follow Xillia 1's order so as a result the strongest weapons and armor end up being wherever instead of the bottom of the list. Best Equipment doesn't account for STAT bonuses so it'll sometimes equip you with actually worse gear because it doesn't account for a DEF boost from stats.
If I want to use a Large food item, I have to buy the Small and Medium, Custom order the large. Leave the shop, eat the Large, go back in, buy the Small and Medium, make a second Large, then buy the Small and Medium again.
I am almost entirely going through the game to get my sweet sweet Bonus Dungeon rewards at this point.
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So you are saying ToX2 is a Nippon Ichi game?
okay.
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ToX2 likes to play hardball with you ^_^~
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No, it is an unforgivable lack of polish and Namco deserve to get smashed in the face.
It is like they look at everything that made ToX gameplay fluent and then toss them out in ToX2.
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I can't even change my Display Character in towns!
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Dragon's Crown - Breasts still don't work that way. On the other hand, Sorceress skillset is pretty fun and I like the mobility on the class (jump cancelling shenanigans on a character with an air dash and a bunch of cancellable aerial projectile moves - one of which is homing? Whoa, sign me in. And I hardly even touch the teleport, which is a nice dodge as well. It's all about speed). MP recharge woes are a bit of a doozy, but that's a lot of damage and crowd control. I should try out the status, too.
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Fate/Extra- Goshujin-sama, GETTO DESU!!
What really makes this game is the small touches of presentation and little story decisions. Dan and Archer are basically the same person, but at different stages of their lives, and their show of respect at the end sees them finally figuring this out. Alice is just fantastic. The way that week 5 is really about Assassin and Julius comes later works well. And I really like the way Caster presents her backstory, being herself while Ms. PC fills in all the real emotions? Strange and very effective.
Anyway so the nature of the game does mean that there are times where it's just so much bullshit, and yeah I did use Caster but I also set the game on Easy. If it was more selective about the bullshit, I could see it. Like, Lancer's ability to use Gae Bolg on different actions from the start of the fight is pretty mean since y'know, the nature of the system means you dump statted Luck. But if he was the only fight where he had reasonable odds to straight up OHKO you it'd kinda make sense: Rin is SUPPOSED to be basically the strongest Master in the war, Lancer's ability to spam Gae Bolg is his defining strength in context of the series, and it's supposed to be more or less the emotional climax of the story (the path not taken, etc) so it being different and lethal would be okay. except MOST of the boss fights to that point were basically the same except slightly less so. Kinda loses something. But no mistake for all that the game is still really effective and the bullshit doesn't offset what it does right. 8/10.
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Suiko Dan - Finished again. 15ish hours. I am sure you can comfortably finish it (ie not speed runanz) with 108 stars and level 16 weapons on the transfer characters in 12 hours if your memory works and you get Prosperity Rune at the start.
Other things I only really noticed this time. Tuber and Pesmerga literally have no interaction in this game. I need to watch for this in 2, because if they don't then that makes the "omg epic rivalry needs to be completed!!!!" section of the fan base really hyped for something that had less setup than the pay off tha was Schtoltheim Reinbach in Suiko 4.
Also I apparently completely space out by the end of he game normally when it comes to the audio. Those crazy loud fountains aren't making their crazy loud sound on the return to Gregminster and the mix of the sound of wind blowing through the empty city with the normal town music mixed really soft in the background is a little more evocative than I expected. Probably the best bit of sound design in the game really.
Something else really dumb though that gets noted a lot, but is more dumb than I had thought of. When you beat Emperor Elfbooties and he is a load bearing boss the castle starts glowing bright red and screen shakes in RPG standard communication for "this place is collapsing". When you go to Toran Republic in Suikoden 2 the castle is exactly the same. What happened there? Did they replicate the former Emperor's palace room by room? That seems incredibly wasteful for a new Nation State economy.
Edits to fix some phone typing. Deliberately leaving Autocorrect of Yuber => Tuber in place.
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Dude Pesmerga and Suik1-2 Yuber
- are really the most generic badass dudes when you're a 10 year old. Super dark armor, immortality, max brood (you can barely see their face), either long hair or a cape, swords. Including one sword being called crimson sword despite not being crimson, because crimson is the most badass color, but come on a crimson sword would just look weird.
- hint at the true end of the series that will never happen, with the epic battlez and all the true runes together. Final boss is Killey + Lorelai after they have murdered the super pope at Harmonia Castle.
Only one guy mentioning the other would have been enough for everybody to go crazy.
Anyway did you use Blackman?
La mulana: I'm at the point where I'm just playing with a playthrough next to me since all the puzzles go right above my head. "Use a statue there? Face left, attack three time, face right, attack three times, jump there? ... Sure"
I like games that respect my intelligence and all but there's one problem: Nobody is intelligent enough for La Mulana.
This would be a good game to play if you only had one game to play. This is game that could take years to complete and analyze the lore and it might actually be gratifying and not just soul crushing. La Mulana does not feel like a dumb faq bait adventure game, it feels like solving the Rosetta Stone.
I understand why the Kickstarter for La Mulana 2 did not do that amazingly well despite La Mulana 1 being so brilliant.
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Tales of Xillia 2: Beaten. Bad, Normal and Good ends all get. Bad End is my favorite because I can take out all my frustrations on the game in a giant mountain of corpses and yet it's still the least reprehensible option.
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Bit.Trip Runner 2 - Playing a pirouetting pugilist pickle pursuing perfect pluses. Perfect Perfectionist obtained. There is nothing left for me here.
Should prolly get back to playing one of the...what, five Vita RPGs I have and got distracted from?
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ToX2- Poker solves so many things it isn't even funny~
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Fenrir do I really need to point out that it isn't just crimson it's King Crimson
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I didn't use Blackman, I am a failure. I tried to use different people than normal. Used Millich a bunch and a few other random people, but the only really different person outside the norm I grabbed was Ronnie in the final dungeon because she can hate things to death with fireballs.
Otherwise I can't help myself but use Mister Crowley and well the game forces you to use Cleo late in the game so she never hits the final dungeon with a level deficit and Cleo is pretty fucking amazing.
One other thing I did do was grab the Fortune rune at the start of the game and equip it to Victor all the time until the final dungeon just to see how big an impact it has. It made home about a level higher the the rest of the party all all the time. Such a great rune.
Edit and yeah King Crimson is actually super Suikoden
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f8/In_the_Wake_of_Poseidon.jpg)
Album covers like this.
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Bravely Default: In the middle of chapter 6. yes I'm dragging my feet with this game, what about it? Don't blame me, blame the fact that Zatz is ugly as sin!
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Fenrir do I really need to point out that it isn't just crimson it's King Crimson
It's worth noting that it goes Crimson -> Death Crimson -> King Crimson
Anyway Blackman's how/hoe is stronger. BOOM.
We can't know about Yuber's sword but I bet it's
Gun sword -> Scythe sword -> Gunscythe sword
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BTW Suikoden isn't a game where level deficit matters. You have no excuse Grefter. None.
Thinking back, it's weird how cool Suikoden 1 and 3 feel to me while Suikoden 2 and 5 feel totally utterly uncool. 4 being pretty uncool but weird enough to compensate with its super slimy cast.
I want to play Suik1 again sometimes for Qlon & Blackman & others, but the forced characters all the time were too terrible.
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It doesn't matter for performance with some minor work, but the spike in impact of spell slots just makes mages look attractive without the level deficit. Like I said, Cleo is really that amazing in practice (hitting that point between spells slots and decent physical that Flik and the other sword/shield dudes do, trading Shield for better hats and L range along with Power for like 2 more L4 slots). Having her at level 50 just makes her a super attractive pick.
That said, I should have used him. 2 Cyclone Runes, a Rage Rune and a jetpack fueled by HATE wiped out Gold Dragon ridiculously quickly and just cleaved down all the heads within 2 or 3 rounds of each other.
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Fenrir do I really need to point out that it isn't just crimson it's King Crimson
(http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20121104064616/jjba/images/3/3e/KingCrimson.jpg)?
(sorry CK's bandwidth)
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I think that would be more of a Suikoden random boss fight than a character. Those robo hitops are fucking hot as shit though.
I know I personally would use the shit out of Smug Pirate PC on the "In the Wake of Poseidon" cover.
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LFT - Jesus it's been a while since I played a PSX game. Circle for confirm? WTF is this bullshit.
Also christ I am bad at this. Multiple resets on both Sand Ra-a-ats Cellar and Algus. I think part of that is being really rusty and the other part being that I'm playing around midnight and get tired.
Oh, FUCK! is the best name for Ramza btw.
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FUCK! It is I you must fight with!
Yeah I have no counter-argument.
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It also works well if you pretend that Ramza yells his name before everything he says.
"Oh FUCK! It's the guards! Let's deal with them before the others come."
"Oh FUCK! Delita, are you OK?"
"Leave me, Oh FUCK! After I'm done with Algus, you're next!"
"Oh FUCK! Delita..."
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Circle for confirm fucks me up constantly. Seriously you guys, why.
DS2: Thar be more DLC.
Though suffering from an unfortunate and persistent grayness in some areas, the level design and architecture are still head and shoulders above most of the base game. Exploration's a lot of fun. Boss quality mixed. From still thinks the best way to make bosses tough is to just give them too much damage and absolute boatloads of HP (disclaimer of course that I've only played this on NG+). Fume Knight is mostly pretty fair as far as moveset goes, but seriously that damage is just wrong. I've been overkilled at close to two thousand HP by some of his attacks.
*Mystery Boss* is the biggest strike against DLC round 2 just because he's a motherfucking palette swap, and basically the last one you'd want to see. I guess it shouldn't be a huge surprise given the area, but come on. I still hate him and I still hate his ass-face. The flame aura on his sword now covers most of the arena (which is no bigger than it was last time) and they fiddled with his moveset just enough to ensure you'll get murdered for relying on reflex memory alone. It doesn't help that getting to him is possibly the worst run in the entire game so far. The only possible shortcut requires you to have near-perfect timing on two consecutive sequences of dodges (missing basically ensures death by Enemy Horde Ahead) and doesn't so much skip anything as give you the opportunity to snipe the most obnoxious dudes instead of fighting them all melee. Running past everyone is much easier said than done considering there are three horrible enemy groups to navigate around and they all include dudes with Tranquil Walk of Peace (or whatever it's called in DS2). And the loot for the entire area is almost wholly worthless! Your prize for all this is just a beardy mask. From be trolling.
So yeah, fuck Iron Passage, probably the worst place in the entire game, but apart from that side area Crown of the Iron King is pretty cool. Sir Alonne is basically the kind of fight you wanted the entire base game and mostly failed to get. Unquestionably the highlight. Dude's just some random samurai but he's absolutely terrifying (and for once in DS2 the music is of outstanding contextual benefit, which may color my judgement a little). Unfortunately, cool as his sword is, it's a tactical nuke rather than a main weapon. While not Old Whip fragile, it still won't last very long. But you can commit seppuku to get a damage buff! (It looks like straight-up double damage from limited usage so far.) Other stuff:
-Just waiting for someone to extract the statue audio clips from the game so we can actually tell what the hell they're saying. (Other than "I am sinful," because come on lady you're a Souls NPC, I mean duh.)
-"Predators invaded."
-Arty's sword is back! It explicitly benefits lefties, which is outstanding.
-I got a ring that makes me invisible while rolling. OP.
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FF6 Eviltype: Nearing the end of this, all that's really left is the final bosses. They are, at these levels, unsurprisingly terrifying. Hope you guys like stupidly long challenge recaps (if not, you know where the page down button is).
Doom (2 resets): [Terra/Relm/Strago/Gogo] I'm a bit fuzzy on this fight now, beyond that it isn't too bad early. Ice magic everywhere, so resisting it is certainly key, and the physicals are mean so maintaining a good defence is important. The second half of the fight is where things get hairy. Part of the problem is Forcefield which shuts down a fair bit of my offence (namely, Relm's Pearl is the best thing I have), part of the problem is her triplecombo of Reverse Polarity / Demon Rage / physical which kills one person for sure and possibly one other person (yeah I should have had Gau or Mog in this team), and notably removes Protect which is necessary to not get blitzed down by the physicals. Also Step Mine can murder people too. But... really not too bad overall!
Goddess (8 resets): [Umaro/Shadow/Sabin/Gau] So once she enters a certain HP loop Goddess gains a crap-ton of damage moves and multiacting, including Flash Rain, Cleansweep, Scar Beam, Pearl, and Quasar. I could talk a bunch about the various defensive shenanigans needed to survive all this (in particular, which hits both sides and which don't, makes a big difference!) but none of it matters because uh holy crap Quasar does like 1900 MT ITE ITD damage to both sides oh god I'm dead. The solution to a limit OHKO move? MP kill the bitch.
But I didn't incur 8 resets on Quasar alone, which meant the other seven came from how nasty the fight is even in the first stage. (Made extra hard by this being probably my weakest party.) The crap I have to deal with:
Bolt 3: Crazy amounts of lightning damage, also used as a counter sometimes. Block lightning or die, even halving it is pretty bad and may KO. Unfortunately this party lacks much innate lightning defence beyond Umaro's Rage Ring, so once the two Thunder Shields are gone I don't have much else unless I want to use a Force Shield, which isn't an option for reasons which will be clear later. The solution? Well, Goddess does damage in one of two ways: physical and lightning. And Gau can be set up to null physicals. So... drop the lightning defence on him, just cast Reflect, and I never need to heal him, though recasting Reflect is a concern. I consider a Wall Ring here but I opt not to for relic slot reasons.
Physicals and Drain Kiss: So aside from a bucket more HP and a small magic power boost, Goddess isn't that different a boss from vanilla. This is probably the biggest change, out of nowhere, she learned how to hit like a truck. Safe is absolutely necessary on Sabin/Shadow to not get pureed and even then Drain Kiss comes very close to OHKOing; it also means I need to equip them into relatively high-def setups past their Thunder Shields. Drain Shield's also ITE because fuck you. (All the goddess special physicals are.) One nice bonus is that while MP-killing Goddess, Drain Kiss gets less deadly, unfortunately she does periodically damage herself off counters which I can only get rid of in exchange for making Sabin notably worse. Oh, and Relic Ring doesn't stop Drain Kiss. I tried to make it relevant, I really did. If she focuses physicals on Sabin/Shadow they can die, not much I can do about that.
Overcast: MT death sentence is horrible enough and by itself justifies the use of a Memento Ring and Safety Bit. Worse still is the zombie-upon-death effect which persists forever. Oh and if you equip a Ribbon you become a perma-zombie if you die. (Something I have to relearn the hard way.) The non-death-protected person just needs to be revivified upon death, which sadly brings them back to trivial HP.
Charm: Fuck this move so much, if I get hit with it I have to kill the afflicted person myself before. Shadow is good at doing this with his targettable ITD/ITE throws. If Shadow is charmed it's really damn annoying and I kinda mostly hope Goddess will smack him around. Thank goodness dying into zombie state cancels charm (it doesn't cancel Rage, something else I learn the hard way).
Love Token: Mostly this just makes Umaro hilariously useless even before I decide to MP-kill the boss. Wow, never take him to this fight, she counters everything she does by making him take physical hits for her, which uh yeah means all he can do is a 25% chance of Storm against her stupid-high MDef. Umaro spends most of this fight dead, which is a shame because he's tanky enough to draw hits well but I can't justify reviving him constantly as he kills himself.
Megazerk: grahhh this merits status immunity, but no ribbon as per above! Peace Ring to the rescue. MT ITE Berserk is terrible. I can't protect everyone from it, and it's a pain to get rid of because I don't have Dispel, but fortunately the afflicted PC doesn't act against me while I kill him or wait for him to die (usually the latter).
Lullaby: Well no Ribbons means this will certainly hit, but compared to the above it's not too bad. Doesn't hit both sides at least, unlike the other MT status.
Yeah that's pretty much it. One useless PC, three PCs with non-super-stellar magic power, trying to Rasp away a magic tank's 19000 MP while all sorts of things can go wrong. I pull it off eventually. Once I do, I burn through the rest of her health which isn't bad without MP, seeing "Quasar: Need MP" is cathartic. Good thing I never have to deal with THAT again.
<Super> Having trouble with Quasar? You're fighting Poltergeist then?
<Elf> ffffffffff-
Poltergeist (5 resets): [Celes/Edgar/Setzer/Mog] Good news is I have a better team for this fight! Bad news is that Quasar is back, slightly stronger, and no longer a limit. WHAT THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO- *Dark Holy Elf is hit by half a dozen planes and explodes*
Okay. OKAY. I could learn Life 3 though trying to survive against Poltergeist's offence after everyone revives from that is messy (as a fast boss, Poltergeist is guaranteed the next turn after a revival of that sort). And anyway nobody has Life 3 yet. I consider grinding for it but then I die once more to Kefka's Tower randoms and decide I have too far to go... and anyway I remember a way around this: Celes' desperation attack Spin Edge, which does 40k MP damage, taking out all of Poltergeist's MP. I just have to use it before she uses Spin Edge. Great.
After some messing with the setup, I create a Celes who will mostly be safe at low HP. She naturally nulls Poltergeist's fire and wind spells, and I give her a stupid-high MBlock setup with Illumina and all that so only Psychrip is the real threat, and whatever, reviving someone brings them back to critical at least! The problem is dropping her into critical to start the battle, but fortunately W Wind is really accurate (or I'm lucky?). If W Wind misses, don't heal seizure and I can use it again, this time hitting nobody else since apparently it misses those suffering from seizure already, which does make mechanicaly sense. Fortunately desperations can't be used the first few rounds. Or not so fortunately.
My other tactic to buy myself some time is to cast Stop on my lowest-MBlock PC. Why? Because Poltergeist will waste a turn instantly killing anyone suffering from Stop. Ha HA! The other two PCs can revive and re-stop. Unfortunately Poltergeist is too fast for this to lock her down, not to mention my own Stop sometimes misses. So it's not perfect, but it helps. Once the Spin Edge lands, the fight... isn't trivial because of the last big trick I should mention. Anyway I should note that this is the only time in my hundreds of hours of playing FF6 that I have purposefully fished for a desperation attack. For the purpose of it being useful, I mean, instead of just to see one.
Anyway I haven't mentioned all of her damaging arsenal yet, but it is relevant. Psychrip is a nasty ITE physical, she has fire damage for days (with Minerva, Red Jacket, and two Flame Shields I'm in the clear, even halving it didn't really work), Aero (at least Celes nulls it), Bio, and Shrapnel. Shrapnel is the big problem here: it's non-elemental and very powerful. If used ST it OHKOs anyone it hits (doesn't usually hit Celes), if used MT it OHKOs anyone except Celes, or those in Shell. Shell/Safe of course are staples, and if someone gets Stopped/IDed or otherwise killed they get reapplied quickly. Once the MP kill is in place, Shrapnel and Psychrip remain threats, but the removal of a few other turns goes a long way and the fight isn't TOO bad.
Okay, let's talk final battle. After some thought I decide to go with a Celes/Terra/Gau/Mog team. It provides a good spell arsenal (Terra's a bit behind, but whatever she has Cure 3 and Life 2), two Minervas which greatly easy elemental damage, and two Snow Mufflers which null physicals. Gau's also my only source of Life 3 (besides Gogo). Edgar and Setzer are on standby but I really don't hope to use anyone else.
Setups are simple enough, aside from the armours, Terra/Celes rock Aegis Shield + Red Cap while Gau/Mog get Thunder Shield, Muscle Belt, and enough Def to hit 255. The HP boosters are explained later. Relics are mostly Earrings/Hero Rings and Gold Hairpins to speed things up, aside from the requisite Muscle Belts. Maybe I should have opted for more defensive gear (Pod Bracelet, Ribbon), I'm not certain.
First tier: Not too bad. Slow the part that can be slowed, and buff like mad. Haste, Regen, Safe, Shell, Rhinox rage for Life 3. The damage is pretty decent before the buffs are in place, but nothing that can't be managed. The problem moves are Reverse Polarity which pulls Terra/Celes to places they take real daamge (Row command immediately) and Dread which petrifies someone making me put all my buffs back in place again. Oh, and a nice thing about finishing each tier is it pulls me out of Rage/Dance (I also use Snowman Jazz to help speed the fight along once I'm comfortable I'm set up well, since Surge and Snowball are both great, and hey Ice Rabbit is MT full healing).
Second tier: This is where things get nasty. The punchy dude in the front isn't too bad, as my party tanks physicals pretty well. When it dies it launches 10 Hits, and in one of my attempts it would be better named 10 Misses. :D
The mage dude in the back can be silenced! Sadly this does NOT make him negligible, since he has a Stop-inflicting ITE physical of Sage's creation called Eternity (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUjxPj3al5U) (0:08 is how I feel if he decides to spam it) which is a colossal pain in the ass (stop can't be blocked), so I have to plan out my turns being down a PC or two pretty often). Oh yeah it hits hard, OHKOs Terra or Celes without Protect or comes very close. Fortunately it wastes a lot of turns on magic.
The woman in the centre fires off all sorts of Magitek nonsense, of which the nastiest are Launcher which leaves my party a critical-HP mess (not as bad as it sounds, but some magic can kill Gau/Mog and physicals kill Terra/Celes in this state), and Delta Attack, which is petrify, now in ITE mode! The rest is mostly elemental damage which looks pretty evil but yeah no I'm nulling/absorbing everything important except fire which two PCs half.
Finally there's the tiger. Blah blah fire damage who cares. He has two big problem moves, North Cross which freezes, and Doom Tusk which zombies (mercifully, both blockable). However, a status assault combo involving zombie, freeze, and stop is a big threat.
I never do lose but I come very very close once. Mostly just have to carefully manage all my turns and keep the buffs in place, and always keeping a turn handy to respond to Launcher. I should mention the mage picks up a new trick or two when low on health, he starts countering like mad and while MOST of what he uses is magic, there's also Imp Song (MT imp, waste all my time with green cherry nonsense) and Cold Dust (freeze, burn it with fire). Oh and when he dies his death counter isn't affected by silence, and it dispels. Just more buffs to set up again in phase 3, since I leave him until last.
Third tier (1 reset): Two parts here. The first is a healer who heals so damn well I can't really outpace what she does (in no small parts because she absorbs all elements, so Celes' Flare is about the only thing I have which reliably and consistently does good damage). She also uses ITE sleep physical which is pretty damaging against front-row Terra/Celes but otherwise not too bad. Oh and if you kill the other part first she full-revives her buddy. Ha-HA!
The damage-dealer of the fight is of course the real problem. Meteor as usual is the demonspawn move, and it does 1500 MT. My first reset occurs because this could KO some people in one shot, so I came back with the HP-boosting gear above. Keeping everyone topped up is important so this doesn't kill. The rest of his skillset includes W Wind, which also merits a massive burst of healing and an Antidote spell, Merton which was brutal even halved until I made sure everyone could null it (Minerva, Thunder Shield). He can Reverse Polarity and chain it with physicals which of course is nasty. He's also got a bunch of status: he'll use his immunity-ignoring ID special Calmness on occasion, as well as MT confuse, mercifully not too accurate so I just have to hope for the best there (fortunately my actions aren't the type which backfire horribly if I get confused). His scariest move is Condemned, which if he casts it MT is a brutal Overcast-style effect which I can get around by letting people die early and reviving them. Fortunately MT Condemned is rare.
So it's a fight which requires me to stay awake during it, and constantly clearing off status. Once the right equipment is on place, though, it's not TOO bad.
Unfortunately blitzing the fight isn't really going to work, since once his HP falls below a certain threshold, he gains Meteo (inaccurate MT OHKO) both at will and as a counter. Even one Meteo could wipe me out; seeing two back-to-back due to a counter would bring the odds unacceptably high. So Rasp it is! Fortunately his MDef isn't silly high like Goddess' was and he "only" has 10000, and once that's gone he's a joke outside the odd Calmness. I do indeed see two Meteos back to back while killing him!
It turns out, though, that I need to MP-kill the healer as well, as I can't outpace her Pearl Wind spam. Fortunately she, as the attacker before her, likes to burn through her own MP which helps a bit, and again the amount to burn through is manageable, but yeah it means this fight still takes a long time. Kill the caster first so that I don't see Calmness knocking people out before Kefka.
Kefka (1 reset): So at low HP, Kefka gets a whole bunch of crazy things which I'd rather not deal with: Meteor, Quake, Goner, and Ultima (though the latter is at least only a counter) all of which costs MP. I figure the safest way to approach this is to kill Kefka's MP too, because what the hell this fight isn't THAT long yet is it? (kill me) Anyway this means just dealing with Kefka's high-HP phase which isn't too bad. The elemental spells and Aero are useless except Fire 3 which isn't too scary, Bio is easy enough to heal and Antidote away, Fallen One requires some big healing Doom and Havoc Wing sometimes claim OHKOs but whatever, no big, revive and move on. Actually this is remarkably straightforward. Unfortunately his MP is 39000 so it's a long, long slog, which I get increasingly impatient with.
Once that's done I start to work on chewing through Kefka's HP. He gains HyperDrive counters but whatever, revive and move on. He gains Revenger which dispels everyone but whatever, who needs buffs. I get to see delightful messages such as "Quake - Need MP" and then he charges Goner. I give no shits. The charge resolves, and... the spell actually goes off, KOing everyone except Gau who was raging in brainless damage mode. Gau dies not too long after.
SIGH.
My fault for being cocky I suppose, but the Eviltype docs note the change to Goner's damage formula but make no mention of its changed MP cost! The insulting thing is that with Shell and/or Morph I could have tanked it but had gotten lazy with reapplying buffs since I figured I had the fight wrapped up and really didn't want to drag out the already incredibly long fight further. I don't really want to redo everything to get back to this point, so maybe I'll hack the tiers down to 1 HP and Kefka to 0 MP and redo the fight from that point again, since whatever I've already proven I can deal with them. Bending the rules a bit but if I can't really justify spending all the time again (about two hours) to get to the same point.
Regardless, one way or another the challenge is almost over. Hooray~
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FE 13- Beat this a while back. Definitely my favorite FE. Well balanced for grinding+actually giving you a reason to grind was nice. Hard mode no permadeath (which also was a very big boon. Helped balance not having save states very well). Certainly my favorite FE by lightyears. Probably 7/10 (and in playing this, I kind of want to move all other FE games down at least 1 or 2). I got 6-7 children (Cynthia, Inigo, Kjelle, Wyvern Knight Rider, the Taguel off the top of my head. I'm sure there was at least 1 other though), most of which were just beastly when leveled (Cynthia especially when compared to Sumia).
Child of Light- Second playthrough. Up to the point where I'll be getting temp stats. Sitting a lot closer to the TV this time as the game loses some details from faraway. Much prettier when I'm closer.
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FF6 Eviltype: Annnd done.
Kefka was pretty damn legit even without MP which is uh telling how well I would have handled it if I didn't get to breathe a sigh of relief whenever he used a turn on Ultima (which is uh not just a counter, yikes, well I guess it's just an improved Meteor due to eviltype Ultima nerf), Flare, Pearl, or Quake. He's pretty much reduced to Havoc Wing (KOs Terra/Celes, sometimes used after other actions except Goner), Revenger (dispels everyone), Train (silences everyone), and Goner. With the setups I used Goner would KO Terra/Celes even in Shell (but not Terra in Morph), and would KO Gau/Mog unless they were in Shell. So I eventually settled into a battle plan of removing silence ASAP in response to Train, reviving in response to Havoc Wing, ensuring Gau/Mog were always Shelled and that Terra had a turn ready if I thought Goner was about to be charged. If he charges Goner, Morph and Fire 3, then as soon as the attack ends, revive Celes and have Terra revert and heal everyone up (sometimes tossing in a Cure 2 if needed, I neglect this and Mog dies to one of the Goners which is terrible, I blow my Phoenix on this error which fortunately was equipped on Gau). I do have Palidor to dodge one of them. Without Dance/Rage Celes' Flare is my biggest source of damage (though it occasionally misses), along with the morphed Fire 3's. I don't attack with the others much late in the fight to keep their turns handy and to trigger fewer counters: the counters aren't THAT bad (HyperDrive OHKO 1/3 of the time, physical 2HKOs but this only matters against Terra) but meh no need to risk everything on Meteor/L2 spells (Gau and Mog's best spell damage since Quake is blocked and neither have L3s/Flare/Pearl). If I'd left my Force Shields unequipped (and thus able to be re-equipped midfight) this would have been notably easier since they would have given Terra/Celes the MDef push to survive Goner, probably, plus undispellable Shell! Everyone was around 170-180 MDef which resulted in Goner doing 2300-2600 before Shell (1550-1750 after).
No resets on him besides the one already detailed above.
Whew, it's done! Not sure where this ranks among RPG challenges I've done, pretty high though for sure (if not PS4 LLG level terrifying). Final levels were around 27. This isn't THAT much lower than I'm used to but FF6 levels are relatively important (if not, like, original TO level or anything) and Eviltype doesn't fuck around much to start with. At first it didn't seem like the challenge would be that bad (Ultros 1 aside, he's always a douche) but as the WoR went on it pretty much got worse and worse. Red Dragon, Atma, Goddess, Poltergeist, and the final battle were all brutal, brutal fights.
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Dark Souls - Up to Bell Gargoyles. I am fucking bored as shit of this run up. I can kill one of them before the second one comes sometimes. As long as it doesn't do one of many things that will stun me or hurt me over my shield or just breath fire fucking everywhere. If there is two it is GG.
Joined The Club +5 to handle it.
Bored bored bored bored bored. Punitive run ups is the worst punishment when you die in 2 or 3 seconds.
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Gold pine resin wrecks their day pretty handily if you still have any.
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BD: Chapter 7. Oh look, more refights! I think I'm addicted...
*Goes to beat Ominas Crowe, gets something completely unexpected*
...ok, this is defintiely worth it for challenge purposes. Also hey, seems to give a lot of really good gear. Just wish 2 of my PCs didn't die on the last turn and I was spamming healing or something, ah well.
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I still have 3, but using it when I still sometimes die in a few seconds seems like the not smartest decision.
I have nearly won a few times but die to breath attack, breath attack and ooooooh another breath attack. Y U NO DODGE!?!?!?
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Try not locking on, so you can see both gargoyles at once.
There's always one gargoyle which is fire breathing, which is a good thing since you can get away from it fairly easy and focus on the other gargoyle or heal.
Don't be afraid to use consumables since this is the best place to use them.
Upgrade max HP
You can also get human and summon solaire right before the boss room
Or restart as a mage and nuke
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It'll be hilarious to you how much easier that fight is on repeat plays. I generally just run up to the gargoyle, roll through attacks, then smash them with something, but there are various approaches.
The Reinforced Club might be a better option here since it can inflict Bleed. Clubs are good for most of the game in either case.
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Two tries and I beat it this morning. The key elements were being less tired so being able to easily recognise that they will just Dodge R2 club swing by flying up and their flying attacks are punishes, thinking about the fact that it was HP based trigger for the second summon, so moving out into the middle of the roof (it goes further along than I thought) before unloading on the first one and when when fighting the second one finding that a double roll to the right dodges the fire breath and lets me punish with R2-Club2 face. Still not super comfy on ability to get Tail weapon if I gave a shit, but yes. Fight easy when you know how to dodge. Problem is long run up, massive spikey damage, no time to learn to dodge.
So many wipes did give me Gargoyle Hat, Shield and Halberd though so woot lewts.
Also because I was mad I forgot to cheer about getting the fully sick Pig Hat. Because the Gargoyles spit hot fire I opted to go back to my Tattered Cloth Manchette (totes a porn name) and Pals instead of rocking Pig Hat and some boots. Pig hat is pretty fucking metal though. Glad I got that drop.
Edit - Also torn on if I want to try to fight Capra Demon properly or just throw shit over his wall.
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...Wait, can you seriously do that?
EDIT: also the Fenrir advice to disengage lock-on is sound. You get so used to using it that sometimes you forget that you can get away from AoE attacks just slightly faster when you're moving in a straight line rather than circling around someone.
DS2: Oh hey Fume Knight's actually not just some plotless roadblock after all. I guess that squarely sets the DLC zones as existing contemporaneously instead of being crazy past realities or something (I guess I just assumed that because AotA). For proper irony, go into the fight with the Rebel's Greatshield equipped. For OH MY GOD OH MY GOD WHAT IS HAPPENING go in wearing Velstadt's set.
Someone without the DLC was eager enough for Sir Alonne's armor set (storebought after you beat him) to trade me the entire Shadow set for it. Aw yiss, finally a proper pugilist mummy now.
Also this DLC adds extra red phantoms in NG++ (vs. NG+). And since the zone's related to the Iron Keep, you can guess what the worst ones are. Whyyyyy.
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Now to talk about things besides Eviltype, specifically things returning.
Lightning Returns: Finally started playing this. It's interesting, not sure what exactly I think of it despite having sunk a decent number of hours into it now (17?). Its premise and setting are pretty interesting, quite reminiscent of Valkyrie Profile. Is the writing good enough to make good on the setup? No, not really, although I will give it credit for having a more coherent story than 13-2, and Lumina is more enjoyable than any of 13-2's new characters (though topping uh Noel is not much of a feat for me). Its main story does threaten to be interesting but it's constantly derailed by the deluge of sidequests of which approximately one so far (Bhakti) got more than a "meh" out of me.
Gameplaywise it is probably the weakest of the trilogy just because I don't think solo RPGs are where the genre shines. Still it's pretty solid for a solo RPG, FF13 battle system mixed with some timed defence and management of three ATB gauges, there is definitely some thought/strategy in fighting the most efficient way to fight things. The game's take on resource management is an interesting one, fighting things gives you more EP which essentially translates to more time so you fight things not for Exp (which you don't get at all) or money/items (which matter some but are secondary) but for time instead, and then you use that time to finish quest objectives which give you your Exp. It's novel enough to be engaging, though no idea what I ultimately think about such a system. On the note of the time limit: I like the time limit, I don't really like when the game makes you essentially treasure hunt blindly in said time limit, way to just reward FAQing. There's only been one really egregious case of this so far (hunting for the code in Luxerion), sadly it came quite early, though fortunately it was mitigated somewhat by there being other stuff to do simultaneously and you essentially having 18 hours to do it in.
It's keeping my attention more than I feared but less than I hoped, considering my two closest friends out of those who have played the game have ridiculously disparate opinions on the game. <_< Clearly it's not going to measure up to the original to me. It's too early to weigh in on it vs. 13-2 though my respect for the game is higher because at least it isn't completely coasting on "hey the game before this had an awesome battle system, have some more" (for all that said approach may still prove more fun in the end).
Donkey Kong Country Returns - I have less to say about this. It's a platformer. I haven't played DKC since like the 90's when I played all of 1 and some of 2. I find it interesting that this game upped the challenge rather ridiculously (despite doubling your hit-taking ability) compared to those, especially those "-K" bonus levels, man what the hell the two I've done are ridiculously rude. That's probably the most notable thing about the game. It's at its best when it's throwing all sorts of nastiness at you and hoping you don't notice that the way Donkey Kong plays is very limited that its stage design is a bit scattershot. I'm enjoying it but am not really in love with it either, so far? Elf positing ambivalent opinions about games part 2. (On the good side of ambivalent, at least.)
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Magic the Gathering - played 3 player EDH with my brothers. UB mill deck for me (not much of a winning deck honestly, but annoying and okay at Kingmaking, which is better than winning right?), BG deck that just raises strong cards for my older brother(probably should be a dredge deck but none of us are good enough to play or make one), younger brother plays a RG beat down deck that he always plays that is simple and doesn't push new keywords or complex cards much. He thinks he is worse at Magic than he is and is super attached to the way the game was circa 4th edition.
Was a long game with lots of stalling. Younger brother could have won earlier if he was more aggressive, older brother won about 3 turns after I think he had win on the board. I was killed by my older brother swinging his 7/7 Jarad at me, me choosing to eat it to the face (still at 31 life). Younger brother Bloodlusts and then uses some Red instant to give Jarad double strike. Kills me with Commander damage.
He has no idea of the specifics of rules in EDH. Pretty good play entirely by accident.
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I still have 3, but using it when I still sometimes die in a few seconds seems like the not smartest decision.
I have nearly won a few times but die to breath attack, breath attack and ooooooh another breath attack. Y U NO DODGE!?!?!?
Grefter, are you not using a shield or something? Because you really should be using a shield. I'm fairly sure the Knight Shield you can get just before this boss has pretty high fire damage reduction, too...
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Kirby: Triple Deluxe - Pretty boring so far, but I'm only in World 1 and those are often bad.
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Was using shield. Might have needed to overcome natural response to not trying to block giant waves of fire breath, but I didn't have the stamina to block 2 of them in a row (especially while two Gargoyles were up) even if I did block. The answer really lay in better positioning an control of distance (which I could do when I didn't explode the first 50% of Gargoyle 1's health in about 4 seconds of entering the battle field). Over invested in Strength because I knew I wanted to use Large/Great Club and that Zweihander looked fun (I don't use it enough) and I wanted to see in practice the difference between swinging with stats vs not.
Anyway, realised I wanted to go back and get some missed stuff. So went head to head with Havel. Won on the third try. Feel pumped, okay lets go do those Black Knights. Fought the one in Burg and the one in Parish. Win those pretty handily (Some deaths on Parish one). Killed Titanite Demon near Andre. Mostly just clearing out non-respawning things so I can leg it around easier. Did Moonlight Butterfly, died once to seeing what attacks actually look like. Threw Fireballs and some Firebombs at it next time. As lol as expectation has been setup. I still need to kill the Halberd Black Knight blocking Valley of the Drakes entrance I think (just forget). I died embarassingly often to treedude hugs from the pair of 3 pulls of 2 treedude and 1 Stone giant. Stone Giants are also great. Run up to them. Give them membership twice while they are standing up for free 600 souls.
Torn as to what to do next. I could do The Depths and get Laurentius unlocked so I can actually build up Pyromancy (no points in Attunement so far. Feel bad.) but I really was thinking of hitting up New Londo Ruins to get access to Vamos and a Green Titanite Chunk so I could throw together a Holy Weapon and try Catacombs and get the Rite of Kindling.
What I am doing especially bad though is NPC quests. Like. I didn't see Lautrec, couldn't work out how to get Solaire to offer to let me join up with the Bros (so I guess that is out). Never gone human, so never seen their summon signs. Killed Butterfly without summoning Beatrice, so she apparently won't show up for 4 kings (though understand that isn't greatly beneficial anyway).
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Halberd black knight's guarding a pretty nifty shield. I mean, it's terrible as a shield (crap stability and resists, not even 100% physical) but handy as an accessory (stamina regen up). I don't use it just because it's so awful for blocking and a later ring can serve the same purpose, but it's probably the most widely used shield in the game.
Solaire never disappears (unless you totally flub his quest near the end of the game, which you probably will because lol Chaos covenant). If he's not still in his starting location (the ledge before the wyvern bridge) then eventually he should turn up on a platform by the bonfire just past the wyvern (you can run past between fire barrages, he might fly down to try and land on you but just keep running).
EDIT: Four Kings are easier without Beatrice. She inflates their durability without materially contributing and her presence alone makes their AI less predictable. She can solo the butterfly with ease, of course, but whatevs it's Moonlight Butterfly.
DS2: Master samurai downed through dagger spammage. Daggers are pro. Sadly, he's in the 2/3 of DLC bosses so far that look completely immune to poison.
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Demon Souls: oh gosh the story is so wet noodle thin plot and adopted sister complex I can't take it, the gameplay is so cool, USE YOUR POKEMONS SOUKS TO FORGE NEE EQUIPMENT is SOOO cool. Difficulty level is super weak too.
Monsters: what this battle system is completely automated, but what's this story it's teasingly interesting with its music concept.
Fortina Magus: the bromance is strong with the non player characters! Random little girl super badass THE high priestess appears, sociopolitical interest and intrigue, far to easy random fights and brutal boss fights. STORY is probably the most hits all my favorite notes, never seen a jrpg go there, kinda thing. Feels like the best rpgmaker game with HD sprites.
EpicHearts Plus: so addicted to your battle system. Apparently this was originally a regular mobile game and everything, so high quality.
KH HD remix 1.5: Yessssssss
Super Mario RPG: LotSS - sooo fun still, kinky music I'm noticing now.
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Bravely Default: Chapter 8! Ok, game, this is kind of getting out of hand with this ridiculousness. Did we really need to do this again?
At least the Asterisk Refights in Chap 7 were cool, dunno what to expect in Chap 8, and yes I'll do them all because I've been doing them all thus far, I CAN'T STOP NOW! COMPLETIONIST POWERS TO THE MAX! ...just so long as it doesn't have dragons involved...
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BD- Chapter 4. Speaking of Dragons, I just beat them. Having a hell of a time with the asterisk fight afterwards. I guess I could train up more Ninjas and go cheap, but that's really not my preferred method (I used one Utsusemi spam for Dragons. It's weird that that they de-emphasized elemental resists so badly because it had been a long time since I last paid attention to them (minus some unimportant summon gaining) and that would have made them matter a lot.
Of course, I also realize that I don't really want to track down all the Vampire moves, so I'm not sure why I did this anyways (Extra challenge works I guess. Dragons were often fun fights, if overly similar).
By the way, Utsusemi is technically not 100% against everything. Specials go around it! (Yes, obviously this can only be discovered on enemy usage of it unless that changes with a later boss). But worth noting (So I guess it arguably doesn't like limits. Depends on how you feel about the fact that enemies can't take advantage of it. Certainly should by held against Kikyo).
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Suikoden 2 - I hadn't realised how annoying the music is in this. I probably normally turn it off. All the instruments are super synthy and honestly kind of boring. Most tracks either range from "Annoying dude at a renfaire that you would punch" to "Is this a 3 bar loop of annoying things?". Some of them stand out as okay. Some of them is Gothic Neclord which is good but you never hear often enough. Then you have towns like Two Rivers, it has three different tracks used (one is a commonly reused one, but still...). There is even one that I swear is a reject from Wild Arms 1. There is just tons of music in this game and it is all just kind of meh as a whole. Compared to Suikoden 1 which still wasn't great, but was way more batshit weird and quirky compared to 2. Weird since I remember really digging Suikoden 3 and I have downloaded the OSTs in the past.
Dark Souls - So I fucked around in the Darkroot Basin a little bit, got mad at Hydra because his MIRV of water likes to hit you in the back even if you blocked one of the spews. Went back to the Asylum, got Rusted Iron Ring and Crest Shield (which is my guy now), didn't bother going back to Hydra though. The Black Knight guarding the cell with the doll seemed to be scaled up way more than others and I hadn't worked out how to backstab consistently when I was there (knowing you need to drop shield is key), so gave up on that figuring I would come back with more gear. Probs can kill now though. Poked at Stray Demon. Massive AoEs is boring. Flew back. Went to Catacombs. This area is terrible and super easy to get lost in. Lost a bunch of souls accumulated by running the area approximately 1 billion times. Got a bit mad once when I was trying to find second bonfire and made it to the boss instead. 0 Estus left, like 1 dot of HP left. Saw a drop into boss room. Homeward boned out. Lost all those souls anyway (should have levelled obviously). Got down there again without finding the bonfire. Have heard a million times how EZBRO he is. Went in, got wiped hard by clones. Went to bed.
Next morning, get bonfire easy after looking up that it is another fucking hidden wall and is right next to Patches spawn point so I had made it past that things consistently most tries. I spent a long time in Catacombs in 2 play sessions. Still no where near getting all the loot. That place is terrible. If this is the map design people miss in DS2 in favour of more linear stuff? Give me the linear stuff. Running through Burg and Parish was best parts of game to me so far and I know between Depths and Blighttown coming up I am going to just miss them more, so sounds like DS2 might be more my kind of game. Anyway, Bonewheel Skeleton gangbang valley, that place really isn't fun. Found it easy to pick them off one by one from Vamos area, but no sure how do any other way. They do crazy crazy damage and have no HP. Out of proportion risk/reward, but that is the game's MO.
Pinwheel himself killed me once more because fire hurts. Second time he did go down. Long fight because I wasn't really sure how to tell his clones apart, but this time had way more success keeping them under control. Even with +5 Club and level 30ish he doesn't have a ton of HP, so I can see how if you are coming back end game he goes down super easy. If he will die in 1 or 2 hits there is no chance for his clones to reach a critical mass or anything.
Figured I would do the sprint under Hellkite Drake for giggles. Did that. Saw he despawned when I went a bit into the Parish. Then running out he landed again and ganked me when I futzed around on the bridge. Not sure what do. meh move on.
Still was tossing up if I poop on Capra or do him properlike. Figured I would go in once and have a look. Died in about 2 seconds because I rolled left instead of Right (straight at the stairs instead of away from them) and got caught up in a clusterfuck of hitboxes. Okay, that is the rep, so it goes. Go in again after unlocking shortcut to Firelink and stuff. Dodge around, kill both dogs. Get killed by Capra. Figure I have the fight worked out. Decide that poop is more fun. Should only take 4 pies to kill him if you hit him with all. I bought 15. Killed one of his dogs. Got down to 3 and still didn't have him poisoned. Meh lets throw the last over the wall. That got him. Satisfying way to kill a boss honestly, just because the vendor that sells poop is right next to the boss and everything.
Forget if I babbled about New Londo Ruins, but I have done those also if I haven't mentioned. Ghosts were generous and I have like 4 Jagged Ghost Blades, so only really used one Transient Curse. I am not a fan of them as enemies. Yeah it is cool having ghosts being able to move through walls, but it really doesn't work well when anything being on a different vertical plane than you is mega fucked. You fight about half of them on skinny platforms where they can approach you from multiple angles. It is just incredibly unsatisfying play. Neat concept, but I don't think the engine really supports it well. Also approaching a building super slow waiting to bait out any ghosts only to have like 6 of them float through walls as soon as you set foot in the building you spent 2 minutes approaching is boring as fuck. Having it happen twice is even more boring. zzzzzzzzzzz stick to dudes around blind corners please.
Also fuck that they can attack through walls, but my Ghost Blade still bashes against solid surfaces. That could have been a cool trade off for those weapons to let them clip through walls.
Funniest things from all play sessions is finding out that between flying out of Asylum and returning someone took the time to repair the wall to where Oscar was fucked up and reset the rolling ball trap that never reset between bonfires. Look forward to seeing if it resets every time you fly back. Also of course I ate it in the face again.
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Working through some games I got from bundles / Trips
Torchlight 2: made a shotgun-focused outlander on Veteran and made it to Act 2 before just getting really bored of the combat. Like it's cool that I'm clicking the skeletons and they're dying but wouldn't it be cooler if I were actually aiming the shotgun and could maybe dodge enemy attacks with a roll or something? Why am I doing this instead of playing Bastion? Is it the loot? I guess I thought my extended hiatus from this genre would leave me fresh and eager to push through the campaign but that didn't happen. Someone said Diablo 3 was more interactive and cared about positioning or something, maybe I'll try and get my fix there.
One Finger Death Punch: so this is Torchlight 2 but instead of exp bars and the chance to find some heute leute you've got high scores and no-miss rounds as the OCD hooks du jour. Adjusting speed to your performance is sensible design and serves as an extra incentive (you don't want to beat a stage only to get the "congrats, but, game speed down because you suck" message). Beyond that, I mean, it's a browser game that tests reflexes, I played while listening to some podcasts and finished the Grandmaster levels. It would be sorta cool to set up a 1v1 survival-mode challenge on Twitch (since realtime competition is more fun than comparing your best runs) but outside a situation like that I'm probably done with it.
Guacamelee!: I had no idea this was a Metroidvania or I wouldn't have let it lie dormant in my Steam library for so long. Ran through it in one sitting yesterday, ran through Hard in one sitting today and got all the secret orbs for the good ending and grabbed all the gold medals in El Infierno. I really have no complaints except that it's over now and so I'm not playing a Metroidvania anymore. If it were up to me I'd get to play a new one every week.
FEZ: this's the one Trips gave me, there's platforming and puzzles and the big idea is that you can rotate the perspective. So far there is not much to the platforming and you solve every puzzle pretty much the same way and so I'm not really impressed yet, but I'm still pretty near the beginning? I wish it made a better impression sooner but for all I know it could get really good soon.
Dark Souls talk is making me pretty jealous. Jealous enough to slog through researching USB controllers? By several accounts it is not much fun to play by keyboard, so, for now I am watching speedruns and reading lore and seething. Something was bound to make me miss consoles sooner or later.
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just get a wired 360 controller. It's basically plug and play for dark souls
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just get a wired 360 controller. It's basically plug and play for dark souls
It's basically plug and play for every PC game with a console version since like 2008.
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Grefter: no one misses the Catacombs. They are terrible.
I tend to just shoot all the ghosts in New Londo because screw vertical melee tolerance (get a bow if you don't already have one).
Trick for hydra is to start from the left side of the valley (where there's a slight rise hidden by a wall) and charge diagonally across to where the corpse is lying in the water in front of him. Most of his projectiles will target where you were a second ago just so long as you're not running straight at him. Once you reach the water he totally forgets he can fire spitglobs of doom and goes exclusively melee instead, which is no threat whatsoever so long as you've got a decent shield (which you do). Hydras are incredibly boring, probably the dumbest enemy design in the game (okay zombie dragons might win out here). Glad there's only ever two of them.
You have to get past him if you want to be as fabulous as possible, though. You do want to be fabulous, right?
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Tales of Xillia 2: Everything about this game is drenched in such absolute unfun shit it is actually fucking impressive.
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Bravely Default: Hey, I can take on the Blood Rose Legion! I beat the other two legions no pro-*gets slaughtered multiple times despite various different approaches*
...screw that, I'm going to make actual progress in the game now; seems these last refights don't even offer significant rewards.
That said, just defeated a Pokemon that Mega Evolved. What the hell do I mean? Well, see, it was a Bug type and it was weak to Fire, so it clearly was a Pokemon. And since it transformed middle battle, clearly it Mega Evolved. it did use more than 4 attacks, but I just call cheating bullshit AI hax there.
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I've been playing some games in the time I've been gone.
Been fiddling around with Romance of the Three Kingdoms 7 around when I dropped offline. First playthrough was a nice one, decided to play a combatworthy thug with some charisma, but dumb as a rock and no good at politics. Tried seeing if I could help vault a minor power to a major force up in the northern plains, but the guy never actually did anything, so I left and joined up with Cao Cao who was busy conquoring the joint. Got plenty of fights that way, and eventually got to be a governor and led a major campaign southward, eventually getting to be a part of the collapse of Sun Quan's Wu. (The Liu family's Shu got taken out by the Sun family.)
This led to The Legend of Cao Cao, because I found an english patch for it, and it's rare to see a FE style of game that is not FE itself. I've gotten up to the battle of Chi Bi, which is as brutal as it really ought to be, and the game is kinda fun. You're given choices, some of which are story choices which move you on this Good/Bad, or perhaps Orderly/Chaotic meter, which will apparently branch the story sooner or later. And some of which let you decide on your objectives in battle, or even if you're going to retreat instead of fighting on. And picking the correct answer there can net you more powerful equipment.
This leads to the next game because the two above both prominently feature one class. The Tactician/Strategist. Complete with their fluffy war fan. So, naturally, the next game in the chain is Suikoden 5, because Lucrecia is the closest thing the series has to a proper Chinese Strategist.
This game, the plot is still strong. Probably not as strong as 3, but that's not really a failing. On the downside... loading times are a big one. The games used to be great at keeping battle times down, but here it's just terrible. Recruitment is also bad, with several recruitments getting their own quests or dungeons. And with their trolling you with the old school "Please join me" options. Fortunately, I was able to borrow a strategy guide which got me all the characters, but still. Finally, the army battles, which have two major flaws. The more easily seen one is that it's a real time strategy thing where you have no ability to pause or slow things down to give commands. Or even, really, to move around the screen without cheating the system a bit. This is troubling, since the game will outslug you if you don't give good commands and the game seems to love following up a skirmish in one location with a Barrage on the other side of the map so your response is delayed. But, the bigger flaw, in my opinion, is that the game gives you very little freedom in building your units. This is a series where you have 108 characters, and most of them get to play in the army sequences. But, a lot of the battles have forced units, and the naval units are probably the worst about this. After you get the beavers, the rest of the naval units are basically just support for them. And the Dragon Horses should just add to that. But the game always forces them to take up a land unit slot. Because a godly naval unit should start off as a passable land unit, AND should force you to make another floating Recover repository instead of getting another land unit that'll actually fight.
Ah well, at least the plot is still good. Just at the final dungeon now.
And finally, the portable games.
Seventh Dragon - I've been fooling around with this. Currently in the first arc after the prologue. Don't know if I'm actually going to finish, or if it'll eventually feel too grindy, which is part of what turned me off EO3. But right now I'm digging the actual dungeons, and the attempt at a plot. And the benefits for dealing with the Dragons properly.
Edgeworth 2 - Currently in the middle of the third case.
I'm not sure exactly what it is, but I'm having a hard time really getting into this game. That said, I did dig the second case once it got near the end. And I suspect I'll do the same with this case. I also really enjoy the interaction between Courtney and Edgeworth. But... DeBest... on the one hand, I do find him kinda funny. But on the other hand, his logic makes my head hurt. And I am having such a hard time dealing with why Courtney is putting up with him at all. So, yeah. Kinda want to finish the game just to see what the deal is there.
Also, one random thought. You name your ship the Red Rum in the Phoenix Wright universe and then are surprised when a) a corpse shows up on it, and b) you're accused of killing them? It's tempting fate in the same way as running around in a thunderstorm holding a lightning rod as high as you can is asking to get electrocuted.
9 Hours, 9 People, 9 Doors
Completed. I had an old save where I got the Submarine ending from a year ago, and decided to take another crack. Basically, I did five and a half playthroughs (the half is where I was going for the Coffin ending, but decided to save before locking myself into it to check a door option that was still white. Got a repeat of the Sub ending, which was expected, then went back to my save and did the Coffin ending as planned) in rapid succession. It actually worked fairly well since each repetition revealed something new, and it felt like I got the appropriate progression.
I kinda wanted to make this post while the ending was still fresh in my mind, instead of about a week old. But c'est la vie. Regardless, I enjoyed the game a lot once I got into it. Each ending did a great job of adding a little more to my understanding of what was going on. And the twist in the True end was actually pretty good, though it added some questions of it's own. That said, I've since resolved some of my speculations by reading the Answers section on the game's website. So, yeah.
I knew something was up with Akane. Everyone had their reason for being there, but Junpei's only connection was her, so I knew something about her had to explain why Junpei was there. Was not expecting that the bottom screen narrator was going to be pre-teen Akane though.
The other thing that really caught my interest is the climax. It's weird. On the one hand, I was thinking "So, a nine year conspiracy to commit kidnapping and murder for the sole reason of time travelling sudoku solving." On the other, I was totally caught up in the moment. I cared. Which means that as ludicrous as the climax objectively is, it did it's job.
And that, as they say, is that.
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Professor Layton vs Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney- Haha, man the ending is Layton-y and kinda dumb. Not really in a bad way I suppose. Very hard to take seriously though, but like I said, Layton. Just a pity because some of the earlier bits are pretty effective.
So the game is largely two games with one plotline, which probably doesn't surprise anyone. I've only played one other Layton game, the first (Curious Village). And certainly this is a better Layton game than that, but in Layton game terms this came out... like in between the eighth and ninth games in the series or something like that, so there's obviously going to be a huge gap in polish and quality-of-life stuff there, especially since far as I can tell most of the game-development side of things was Level-5's people to start with. The PW aspects meanwhile feel kinda throwback-y and reminds me of the trilogy more. This is largely to the game's detriment as newer games were much better about having to retread press-chains and presenting the right evidence several steps too early. Still, it's not like the earlier PW games were bad and thusly it's still got its strong points as a PW game as well.
So let's talk about it like a PW game for the rest of the post. Case Order: 3>>1>>>>>>>>ohgodcase2burnit. Case 4 is... not normal and I find it hard to judge. Breakdowns in smalltext.
Case 1 is, well, Case 1. it's pretty good at it: there's just two witnesses, but they're reasonably memorable and the case is that rarest of Phoenix Wright cases that is in no way murder. Between those two things and the British Judge being pretty danged cool it's llikely the best Case 1 in the series. But as a Case 1 it's also half-length and so it's just solid overall.
Case 2 is so, soooo bad. I managed to game-over myself into the middle-point of the case TWICE due to outthinking the game. A lot of the case is meant to teach you the new courtroom mechanics, basically the idea of having multiple witnesses at once and one witness's statements triggering new information from the others, or using conflicting statements as an Objection. Okay, tutorial mode, annoying but we deal. Except you start with four witnesses and they are ALL TERRIBLE. I get that, narratively, you want to introduce how Labyrinthia works, and that these are irrational peasants on a witch hunt but oh my god. Nevermind that their particular quirks are basically "Be annoying as possible." One witness carries around a goat. Her main mannerism is "squeeze goat so hard it cries out in pain." Almost every time she says something. Repeatedly when hyou have to Press her. I found myself dreading Pressing her.
Basically the only positive here is that it introduces Emeer, and Emeer is kinda great.
Case 3 is quite nice meanwhile. It's basically all about Emeer's misadventures in terrible personitude. The prosecutor rather bluntly admits at this point that he'd tried everything possible to keep the man off the stand and I love it. It's also got a lot of emotional weight, and not for the obvious reasons but because the game pulls off, about as successfully as 5-DLC, a non-murderous 'killer' who Phoenix fights to keep from the fire. Good stuff all around.
Case 4 is very crossover-y. You take some breaks for puzzles (it does make sense in context at least: you need to prove a bit of evidence means what you claim it does) and a sizeable portion of the trial is breaking for exposition-dumpage on how the magic isn't magic (I'm given to understand this is just a THING for Layton) As such I find it just too hard to judge as a PW case, though as a bit of game in a vacuum it's... alright, but y'know stupid as noted in the very beginning of the post.
Decent enough overall. 7/10 feels right? Yeah probably.
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I liked the Catacombs! A LOT. It's one of my favourite areas actually.
Having to rush for necromancers instead of just playing defensively like the rest of the game
Kicking skellies so they don't get necromance'd
Wheelies
That evil spiral staircase
Getting lost
Patches
Invading people and tricking them like Patches
Trying to rush for Pinwheel just for the 20 flasks when I'm obviously too underleved for it
I don't mind the more linear design in DS2 though.
Megami Tensei 1: Got a translation.
Weird to see an RPG with a NES approach to plot (Small cutscene where a ton of stuff happens in 10 seconds, then you're in a dungeon, no more story, and it's all hallways now, hallways everywhere. Also the cutscene is really stupid)
Finished the first dungeon, died lots.
The game's surprisingly a lot better balanced than Shin Megami Tensei 1/2 so far. Essentially you have 2 characters, Girl and Dude, they're both pretty strong but aren't enough. You can recruit and fuse demons and stuff, but summoning a demon costs money and resurrecting a demon also costs money, so it's pretty easy to run out. So yeah. Money management. (Additionally demons require MAG but I've always had more than enough) First boss (Minotaur) was tough as hell. You can't just barge in with demons from the first dungeon, you need to fuse them into Nekomatas and all.
Then ten seconds after the fight Nekomata is already obsolete.
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The hilarious thing is once you know where to fall the catacombs are hilariously quick.
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Invading people and tricking them like Patches
Okay, yeah, I'll give it that. Chameleon + flipping people off bridges definitely some of the best trolling to be had in the game.
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Dark Souls - I went into depths. Found out all the things I cared about is right at the entrance. Got the Ember, got Laurentius, got a blob stuck on my head. Left and stopped for the night.
Suikoden 2 - Did the wander to Matilda bit. Struck again by how much of a bag of dicks Miklotov is. He directly says he would have treated Riou differently if he knew who he would become when they first encountered him at Muse. He objects to watching civilians being slaughtered in front of him because it will make them look bad.
But the douchebaggery is all eclipsed by Gorudo being in or directly after discussions with Miklotov.
Also incredibly accurate representation of Monarchy/Chivalry mentality of divine right, so I can't complain too much, it just really clashes with the rest of the City State. Which I suuuppooooose makes it make sense that they align somewhat with Highland, but damn if that arc isn't really rough. Currently fucking around in Muse trying to get another Double Beat rune. I swear every time I think I get enough at the start of the game I want N+1 more. Also didn't remember to fuck around and get a Fury Rune or two from Muse at the start of the game, so I feel weak. Not using Death God Yoshino because without the perma berserk it isn't doing her justice.
But seriously fuck Miklotov. Camus is a bro though (even if he wants to give everyone the D). Flik and Victor are the real Yaoi Knights of this game.
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All of the leaders of the city state from a generation ago are total fucking dicks. Unsurprising there was so much war between the highland and the city states considering that+incompetence.
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I think it was just three of them who were particularly dickish (Gorudo, Alec Wisemail, and the Muse guy whose name I'm blanking on) but yeah. The game definitely avoids painting the city-state as a simple good-guy country, and I do like the portrayal of Matilda.
Donkey Kong Country Returns: not sure whether being chased by a giant bat while in a rocket barrel or being chased by millions of spiders was more terrifying, probably the former but yeesh. Be afraid of wildlife, be very very afraid. (Also of pits.)
Lightning Returns: I'm finally in Yusnaan now, dealing with people's stupid problems before getting on with the Snow-related plot there.
Marathon 2: Randomly decided to continue the series playthrough I started last year. Highest difficulty, currently at level 21 of 28.
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Fortuna Magus: COMPLETED after two additional 6 hour binge playing sessions. I must say this is probably the 3rd best mobile RPG on the iOS. Extra Dungeon boss was reasonably difficult vs my max leveled hax overpowered as hell party, died to its attacks and instant death many times, thankfully PMs swaft of AOE self revive items if been hanging onto paid off. Giga damage onnislashs feel so cheap now though.
While definitely lacking in difficulty it's nice to 101% complete an rpg with this yummy of a story in a mere 14 hours! Cash shop(u can earn the cash in game via battling any monsters x5) items are super ultra broken and at least two are needed to fill the log book to full in non frustrating manner. Got to level 90 by the first boss in BAD end, and 100 in the extra zones after continue+
I just have to say they did not dissapoint with the bromance back story, though I'm left wanting a but more detail... CLEARLY main character is their bro love child when you every alternate line in the story into account.
jRPGs also have way to much BrotherSister complex love stuff. I know Japan historically was oriented to marrying in the family particularly your brother/sister/first cousin you spend the most amount of time with. But DAMNNNN. At least the bromance between the plot starters/finishers was something fresh and trendy.
Can't wait to finish writing this review thing on it.
YES IT WAS SO GOOD I halted the 9 other games I'm mating entirely to binge play this over the past two days. SOOOO GEWD
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Masoukishin F COTE - So far so good, just a bit too easy. though, a couple of early stages felt unnecessary. Those stages could have been used to resolve some plot thread that was not concluded yet.
Yotennai also didn't have enough screen time, despite being the mid-game big bad.
Though, points to Shu for finally going "WTF I don't even!"
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All of the leaders of the city state from a generation ago are total fucking dicks. Unsurprising there was so much war between the highland and the city states considering that+incompetence.
Their contemporary Highland counterparts, inversely, always seemed far less shitty than the people who followed them. Like Genkaku or that guy you murder right before the end of the game whose name evades me. The old guard seemed a lot more rational, at least, in that their goals were things like "take strategic territories from the enemy" and not "kill everything that lives."
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Pretty much, but I don't understand Agares' aggressive action against the City State in that case. He generally seems competent and effective, but his crazy son has clearly usurped a great deal of political power in something that should really be an absolute monarchy.
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I got the impression that Agares was supposed to be rather weak actually, and that the aggressive action pretty much happens because Luca orchestrates the plan to make it happen (with Rowd, at the start of the game).
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It's definitely worth remembering that Agares, confronted with kidnapping and assault on his family clearly orchestrated by the City-States, basically ran away and hoped for the best. It's pretty believable that Luca was able to get the support he needed in the court and army out from under him. Granted, at the same time basically everyone except Rowd and possibly Gorudo were also in on the "Get Luca killed before he can genocide TOO many people" plan. Have to wonder how down they were with offing Agares. Like, were they just following Luca along because he had too much support to openly oppose, or were they aiming from the start to get someone else on the throne through Jilia? Odd thing to think about.
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Alternatively they may have been following him because he was a killing machine and trying to oppose him too openly meant he would come down on you. Hard to say no when someone says "do what I say or I will go all Mortal Kombat on you."
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I liked the Catacombs! A LOT. It's one of my favourite areas actually.
Having to rush for necromancers instead of just playing defensively like the rest of the game
Kicking skellies so they don't get necromance'd
Wheelies
That evil spiral staircase
Getting lost
Patches
Invading people and tricking them like Patches
Trying to rush for Pinwheel just for the 20 flasks when I'm obviously too underleved for it
I don't mind the more linear design in DS2 though.
Catacombs has some great elements and some ffffffffffff elements. I love how necromancers and skeletons work. Once you know, it incentivizes gutsy gameplay in a game that usually rewards caution. But figuring it out? Not so much. Also, bonewheels? Hilarious. But. Climbing back up from the boss if you do the dungeon early? Not hilarious.
I wonder if there is another dungeon in the game where the difficulty varies to such a degree based on previous knowledge of how it works. Probably not, even if you don't take the shortcut down.
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I love how necromancers and skeletons work. Once you know, it incentivizes gutsy gameplay in a game that usually rewards caution.
Or you just use a holy weapon. Which frankly is just as easy to figure out as the way you're "supposed to" (especially since it's not obvious there even are necromancers when you first reach the auto-reviving skeletons), and if you ask for help / use a guide / pick things up by osmosis on the internet is the way you'll probably learn instead anyway. Regarding the second point, I was always a bit mystified by why you'd do that dungeon early (even with holy weapons I found it annoying and unfun, though I guess having more flasks for O&S isn't a terrible move); didn't even realise you'd have to do a long walk out if you did. That's terrible. The game was usually pretty good about creating shortcuts back from locations so it's weird that Catacombs doesn't have one.
tl;dr put me down for team Catacombs hate.
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I love how necromancers and skeletons work. Once you know, it incentivizes gutsy gameplay in a game that usually rewards caution.
Or you just use a holy weapon. Which frankly is just as easy to figure out as the way you're "supposed to" (especially since it's not obvious there even are necromancers when you first reach the auto-reviving skeletons), and if you ask for help / use a guide / pick things up by osmosis on the internet is the way you'll probably learn instead anyway. Regarding the second point, I was always a bit mystified by why you'd do that dungeon early (even with holy weapons I found it annoying and unfun, though I guess having more flasks for O&S isn't a terrible move); didn't even realise you'd have to do a long walk out if you did. That's terrible. The game was usually pretty good about creating shortcuts back from locations so it's weird that Catacombs doesn't have one.
tl;dr put me down for team Catacombs hate.
The only reason you'd have to walk out of the Catacombs is if you lit a bonfire in Tomb of the Giants before placing the Lordvessel, which is not recommended under any circumstances. As long as you don't do that, a Homeward Bone gets you out of the Catacombs no problem.
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Doesn't it take you back to the last bonfire you used, i.e. one in the catacombs itself? If my memory is failing and there's no bonfire in the catacombs then that's an even worse design problem than having to walk out.
(Alternatively if my memory is failing even more and a homeward bone takes you back to Firelink Shrine or something then never mind.)
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Doesn't it take you back to the last bonfire you used, i.e. one in the catacombs itself? If my memory is failing and there's no bonfire in the catacombs then that's an even worse design problem than having to walk out.
(Alternatively if my memory is failing even more and a homeward bone takes you back to Firelink Shrine or something then never mind.)
The only Catacombs bonfire most people will use is the one right at the entrance, which is before the drops. It's a very short walk back to Firelink Shrine (you can pretty much ignore the skeletons on the way even) There IS a hidden bonfire in the Catacombs, but it's less convenient than the entrance one and I have never actually found it myself, so I'm not sure how often it gets used. Even if you used that one, walking out of the Catacombs themselves is not that tricky; getting out of the Tomb of the Giants is an enormous pain. I did it one time because I was using a Faith build and wanted the Large Divine Ember early (not worth it; normal weapons will still do more damage probably) and will never do it again.
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The Ballad of Bobstein.
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Regarding the second point, I was always a bit mystified by why you'd do that dungeon early
The only reason you'd have to walk out of the Catacombs is if you lit a bonfire in Tomb of the Giants before placing the Lordvessel, which is not recommended under any circumstances. As long as you don't do that, a Homeward Bone gets you out of the Catacombs no problem.
Because you didn't read a guide that tells you there's nothing down there worth the while and it would be more productive to do it later, natch.
p.s. I totally lit that bonfire before placing the Lordvessel.
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Han Cunningham, possible father of Hugo. Agares himself struck me as a pretty weak king in general but not a bad person. (To Rob since it didn't quote my post)
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Doesn't it take you back to the last bonfire you used, i.e. one in the catacombs itself? If my memory is failing and there's no bonfire in the catacombs then that's an even worse design problem than having to walk out.
(Alternatively if my memory is failing even more and a homeward bone takes you back to Firelink Shrine or something then never mind.)
The only Catacombs bonfire most people will use is the one right at the entrance, which is before the drops. It's a very short walk back to Firelink Shrine (you can pretty much ignore the skeletons on the way even) There IS a hidden bonfire in the Catacombs, but it's less convenient than the entrance one and I have never actually found it myself, so I'm not sure how often it gets used. Even if you used that one, walking out of the Catacombs themselves is not that tricky; getting out of the Tomb of the Giants is an enormous pain. I did it one time because I was using a Faith build and wanted the Large Divine Ember early (not worth it; normal weapons will still do more damage probably) and will never do it again.
Ditto except I wanted Wrath of the Gods early instead. Whatever the reason, climbing all the way back up from Tomb of the Giants on foot is basically the worst thing in the game.
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Play online for the "Fake wall" messages. That bonfire actually saves a bit of time if you do the Catacombs properly (which you're probably not doing)
You meet a necromancer pretty early in the catacombs so it's easy to find out how they work.
Holy weapons are hard to get and pretty crappy against skeletons early on. You have to level it up and uuugh.
I beat Catacombs before Blighttown IIRC. Less "NOPE" first time through the game.
Megami Tensei 1 (on Snes): Beat Medusa.
Got access to the least important mode 7 world map ever made. It has to be seen.
Good job.
The gameplay is very similar to SMT1-2 except you never get these totally awesome guns. So it's very different.
I hope I'll get some MT damage beyond Cerberus's attack at one point, because right now PCs are just attacking enemies at random, and that's a terrible thing when there are 8 enemies. It's FF1 except ten times worse.
Kingdom of Loathing: Went back to it after like 10 years from some reason? Let's see:
- Finished after one month as a Sauceror, ascended to an Avatar of Sneaky Pete/Fonzie.
- Playing takes like one hour per day. It's crazy.
- There is so much shit now, so much shit. So much. That's what happens when you have guys working full time on a game where what takes the most time is not creating graphics or balancing gameplay but writing flavor text.
- The game unfortunately becomes very faq-baitish near the end. I guess you had to be there and collectively solve the puzzles. All alone it's just not happening, after the earlygame.
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Bobstein spent a couple hours fighting Vince and Niko because it turns out they're actually kinda tough if you're not an end-game murder machine.
Especially when you're a poorly equipped SL1 run too.
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I wouldn't recommend trying to blitz down necromancers without a Holy weapon first play through either. The game just doesn't support that kind of play well at all. Doing it with a Divine Gargoyle Halberd was bad enough. Was doing 69 damage a swing to skeletons, that took 4 swings to kill them. To really sanely do it early you would need to know to use and have an upgraded Crushing weapon (gods help you if you try with a piercing weapon) . If you have a Divine weapon you at least can still play slowly and there was only one or two Necromancers that I wasn't able to pick off with a bow when I wasn't having to manage skeleaggro.
Having run around fucking everywhere trying to find that second bonfire (online, got no messages, lol DS1 connectivity) even with a map and having no success, I honestly found the walk back up not really that bad. I had become familiar with the bits that get me from A to B just fine. It is trying to find all the bits and pieces heart at are tucked up the games arsehole that annoy the fuck out of me. Stll have 0 clues as to where you jump off to get the cleric starter gear.
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Ok I'm going to show that world map
There's a Floating Castle. Problem: Medusa controls it. You kill Medusa, then meet the Captain there who can teleport you to two places
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/36/1409949694-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00002.png)
Select the Corridor and you see that:
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/36/1409949698-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00003.png)
That thing in the middle is your castle. Everything but the castle zooms out, to show that the castle is rising.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/36/1409949694-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00004.png)
And then the castle moves to black square above
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/36/1409949697-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00005.png)
Select Infini instead,a nd you get to that blue building you saw in the last picture
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/36/1409949688-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00007.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/36/1409949691-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00008.png)
I am pretty sure this will be the last time I'll see the world map in that game.
Mode 7, more like Mode 1337.
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All these other SNES RPGs are mode7 compatible! Why isn't our remake mode7. We need to be able to tell people our game has mode7. YOU NEED TO PUT IN MODE7.
Siiiiiiiiiiiigh fine okay.
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I wouldn't recommend trying to blitz down necromancers without a Holy weapon first play through either. The game just doesn't support that kind of play well at all. Doing it with a Divine Gargoyle Halberd was bad enough. Was doing 69 damage a swing to skeletons, that took 4 swings to kill them. To really sanely do it early you would need to know to use and have an upgraded Crushing weapon (gods help you if you try with a piercing weapon) . If you have a Divine weapon you at least can still play slowly and there was only one or two Necromancers that I wasn't able to pick off with a bow when I wasn't having to manage skeleaggro.
Lemme teach you this little thing called running past enemies. When you're blitzing down Necros you're not fighting skellies. It's still obnoxious but less obnoxious than the catacombs regularly are.
Kingdom of Loathing
Nonononononononnonono this game doesn't exist this game DOES NOT EXIST
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I'm pretty sure you haven't permed -every skill-
The new hardcore path things are pretty fun. Well, Sneaky Pete at least is.
(http://cdn.coldfront.net/thekolwiki/images/1/10/Peteavatar_f.gif)
I have a talking motorcycle as a familiar, and a live audience that follows me in battle and approves whenever I smirk at them / say my catchphrase (Babababoo!), disapprove whenever I steal stuff.
There are 2 other characters with new skillsets, one path were you're back to school and have to spend 40 turns in school every day, one where bees hate you for no reason and this affects everything, one where you're a bare handed monk, etc.
It's at least great reading the wiki
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Bravely Default: Completed, got the better ending before the "Good but not ideal" one. I didn't even know that option was available and just progressed with plot. Dunno if I'll bother with the other because sounds like it's mostly just a less complete version of the original that suggests "You saved the day...for now..." but whatever.
I'd rant but honestly it's probably what everyone else says about the game. It's a good game for the most part but with two main problems being that it overstays it's welcome and becomes repetitive as a result, as well as "Tiz is such a generic phoned in hero it's not even funny."
Ok, minirant about Tiz now!
Worst part is the game tries it's best to make Tiz out to be the hero when you can clearly see the story was written with Agnes being the protagonist, but mid-development pulled an FF12 and went "people want their generic teenage* male hero Main Character, so we'll give it to them! Wouldn't have been so bad if Tiz had a character beyond "Morally speaking, I'm completely perfect; if there's ever a question about what is the right thing to do, going with my thoughts is ALWAYS the right way!" Not quite a Mary Sue, per se, more like a character taken directly out of an Afterschool Special. Then scene that stands out most is the Bravo Bikini part.
Sage: No woman would dare wear this.
Edea: Is it really that bad?
Agnes: I must do anything to get Olivia's attention.
*gets it*
Edea: ...does this even COUNT as clothing?
Agnes: I can't be seen like this!
Ringabel: Ah, but you'll win the contest for sure! Sometimes you must do things you despise! Who wouldn't want to see you in that, right Sage?
Sage: Indeed!
Edea: Well, Agnes, it's your call?
Agnes: No, I can't go through with it!
Ringabel: Oh come on! Tiz, what do you think?
Tiz: You should wear what you want. You shouldn't do things because others tell you. I think you look great without it!
I swear, all Tiz needed was a little jingle and it'd basically be a "Be yourself" PSA moment. I get that they wanted Tiz to be different than the two pervs, but they could have done it without it sounding like a phoned in PSA moment, like, say...what if he said this...
Tiz: Well, on one hand, there's no doubt that would get you a lot of attention, I'm not sure that's the kind of attention that'll help us.
In this case, while Tiz is going "you probably shouldn't wear it", he's giving a more logical reason, not just "Be yourself!" He's trying to demonstrate a "Con" compared to the pros. Oh sure, doesn't display much more character, but it's at least not "perfect jesus boy" gag inducing like what he said. Then bringing up the Vestal Garb because "everyone is dressing so flamboyantly, you dressing in a more simple manner would make you stand out as well, if in a different way!" would have worked, rather than the "I think your vestal Garb is super pretty, you should wear that!"
I've seen bland heroes in colorful casts before, good god was Tiz especially bad about it. Again, wasn't just he was bland, but also the "everything he says is the morally right thing to do!" There is on except that worked and that was the Egil arc, because it actually felt like it was a reflection of his character. Main character fails to protect little brother in game's opening -> sees little boy in danger that reminds him of brother and decides to help him against all rationale. Still the morally right thing, but at least there's a legitimate sense of motivation beyond "I'm playing the Main Character!"
So yeah, Tiz sucks. But hey, 3/4 aint bad! Especially compared to FF4HoL which was 0/4 <_<
*Tiz is 15 in the Japanese version, the entire cast was given +5 years in the US version to make them adults IIRC)
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Dark Souls - Killed the Gape. Buffed up the Zweihander a bit in prep for Blighttown. Pyro Hand is up to +7. Debating whether I back door my way in or not. I don't think I want any of the loot... Edit - Other than clubs.
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Masoukishin F - So, the game's solution to Neo Granzon and Possesion Masoukishin stomping things everywhere? Gives every grunt stupidly amount of hp. But it really doesn't help. Blackhole Cluster is 20000+ damage up front and super cheap.
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Dark Souls - Killed the Gape. Buffed up the Zweihander a bit in prep for Blighttown. Pyro Hand is up to +7. Debating whether I back door my way in or not. I don't think I want any of the loot... Edit - Other than clubs.
Notable things in Blighttown:
-The whip (you don't care about this. Trust me).
-Power Within (pyromancy, but you shouldn't care about this either unless you're trophy-hunting).
-Eagle Shield (admittedly nice, but no longer the best middle shield since it got nerfed to 95% physical).
-Ninja suit (which is great but only because FASHION SOULS).
The only truly important find--the bonfire keeper soul--is more readily accessible through the backdoor anyway.
While I'm babbling more about Souls games, have I mentioned how completely and utterly nerfed to oblivion magic has become in DS2? It still looks perfectly fine in the maingame, and in NG might even be passable in the DLC...but hit NG+ in the DLC and dedicated caster builds are simply non-viable. Full stop. It's kind of like what they did with AotA in DS1, except much more extreme. Enemy elemental resists are just completely absurd in the new zones, especially given the health pools the nastier ones have. Get used to dealing half your normal spell damage, at best, and you'll run out of charges in no time flat if you think you can actually rely on magic as a primary form of offense. My sorcerer on NG++ for example? Had to toss on Crystal Magic Weapon and poke Sir Alonne to death with her shitty rapier because even with like 60 attunement and the fast-casting ring I couldn't reliably get off a Soul Spear without getting stabbed in the face--and even when I did, a couple sword pokes would deal as much damage as my best spells could. Bring a couple allies along and the boss resists ramp up to such extremes that even with top-tier spells you might as well be tossing spitballs at them. Like your best, limited-usage spells chipping 200 hp off a 14k health bar. The only thing I ever see people using magic for in co-op anymore is the buffs (which also don't help a ton, but hey it's a free action before a boss fight), because offensive magic is just so totally worthless in the new zones.
Obviously NG+ isn't the thing they specifically balanced the game around, nor do I suppose it really should be, but this is still pretty crazy on top of all the other hits casters have already taken in recent patches (CSS now taking two spell slots, CSS and regular Soul Spear taking longer to cast, GLS charges being halved, all Lightning Spear variants dealing less damage, GRS dealing less damage, abyss covenant ring bonus reduced to utter worthlessness, the fast-casting ring having a less potent effect). NG+ in the DLC seems calibrated to cater to all those dudes who like to mock caster-types as being easy-mode wusses.
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There's also the Crimson Set in Blighttown, for Fashion Souls. I've used it too much.
Plus one of these things that upgrade your estus.
The Blighttown slugs are the only enemies I ever farm because they can drop a bunch of green shards at once.
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Power Within is pretty great; it buffs almost everything's damage. It's a bit better if you're already pro at the game, though, since it has an HP leak effect.
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All the good loot is honestly closer to the swamp anyway.
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Donkey Kong Country Returns - Finished. Pretty fun, good but not great, mostly relies on that nasty platforming difficulty it has and handles pretty well. Doing the ninth world now.
Also beat Marathon 2. Not much to say here.
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Tales of Xillia 2: I desperately want to be done with this piece of shit so I can tear into its awfulness but so much of the post-game content is blatantly unfair bullshit it's a completely painful to play through. I should not be getting one-shot from game-max-HP on FUCKING NORMAL!
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You are using Leia + Multi Item + Immediate Consumption + Chain Consumption + both HP Surge skills + both TP Surge skiils right? I haven't been using Elize much this time but I'm sure she has some broke stuff like from before as well (and this time the game actually needs it) I just got done with the arena party mode Elite on Unknown (which unlocks after beating the game) starting from L75/76~ AVG (characters are L77 afterwards now) and it took all my Lemon Gels, most of my Life Bottles, all of my Syrup Bottles, most of my Panacea Bottles, and a good chunk of my Pineapple and Miracle Gels but did ultimately beat it thanks to Leia and Leia/Rowen Stop Flow (and this serious item efficiency blowout was without using any of Leia's healing spells or Resurrection) Well one of my characters is Agria and Ludger is Ivar now heh.
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Kirby Squeak Squad: Up to world 3. Not much to say other than "It's a Kirby Game."
Well, ok, an amusing thing is I always say Kirby vs. DeDeDe rivalry isn't Hero vs. Villain, but rather, 2 Kids fighting over the last piece of cake. This game's plot?
Opens up with Kirby eating cake, then his cake gets stolen, so he goes to beat up DeDeDe to get it back.
...no, I'm not kidding.
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Folklore - This game is slow-paced, sorta grindy and very strange, yet it's enthralling thanks in no small part to its incredible art direction and sense of atmosphere. Rolling two different, concomitant perspective characters that also play -very- differently helps as well. Currently doing the Undersea Capital with Ellen and going back to power up Fraxinus in Faery Realm because I kinda can't say no to ranged, comboable slash-elemental damage.
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You are using Leia + Multi Item + Immediate Consumption + Chain Consumption + both HP Surge skills + both TP Surge skiils right? I haven't been using Elize much this time but I'm sure she has some broke stuff like from before as well (and this time the game actually needs it) I just got done with the arena party mode Elite on Unknown (which unlocks after beating the game) starting from L75/76~ AVG (characters are L77 afterwards now) and it took all my Lemon Gels, most of my Life Bottles, all of my Syrup Bottles, most of my Panacea Bottles, and a good chunk of my Pineapple and Miracle Gels but did ultimately beat it thanks to Leia and Leia/Rowen Stop Flow (and this serious item efficiency blowout was without using any of Leia's healing spells or Resurrection) Well one of my characters is Agria and Ludger is Ivar now heh.
I bow before your godly ways.
I don't have as much of a problem with the Bonus Dungeon anymore, or the Arena Party stuff(because I don't have the Cameos unlocked yet) but the Tag is just UGH. The Tag battles are just the WORST. I was getting one-shot from 9999 HP. Lemon Gels aren't gonna cut that out!
The transformations are honestly the high point of the game for me. (http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i312/Fudozukushi/Xillia/TALESOFXILLIA2_6.png)
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DKCR - Beat the ninth world. Honestly that was kinda disappointing, the levels fell outside the sweet spot of the DKC experience, the first eight levels were pretty bland/not especially challenging and then the last one was brutal... but also overly long with no checkpoints, meh. Still a fun experience overall of course. Now I have unlocked the ability to play through all the stages mirrored! ... with no Diddy, no items, and one heart. hahaha oh this game.
Probably done with it for now though.
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Xenoblade Chronicles - Finished! Ended up having to grind a bunch to beat the final three bosses, which ended up taking about three or four extra hours. Will do a bigger post after I am a little less annoyed with the game over said grinding. >_>
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Heh not me, not that godly if I couldn't beat the Ultimate Tag either :P Made it to the last round pretty much depleted item wise only to rapidly deplete the rest of my Life Bottles and things because the bosses wouldn't stop going after Rowen and Taunt wasn't doing what it was supposed to do. I'll need to check for setting skills that might sort that out. Did discover Eagle Rage > sidestep > etc was a valid escape move for Leia for getting out of being surrounded by a crowd during the whole thing though. Meh lowered the difficulty from Unknown and beat it eventually. Dunno if you know Fudo but there is a shop in the Deepwoods that actually sells stat boosting herbs post game. I haven't bothered with it at all in the buying sense yet but I am tempted especially given enemy stats, I might max at least Leia out for a future Unknown run or something~
Heh Agria x 4 including floating Agria, nice. The transformations are good stuff yeah. I am disappoint that there doesn't seem to be a Rollo one though. For some reason I thought there was~ At least these transformations are going to be good for a future run full of satire and hilarity.
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Yeah I know. I've mostly been buying the herbs to make the Cameo Weapons and the occasional useless piece of armor.
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Xenoblade Chronicles – Finished in 62 hours. It’s an interesting game; a hybrid between a Xeno game, an MMO, and a shounen anime. I only kind of like Xeno games and I really don’t like the other two things, so it was an experiment that was destined to fail (in my defense, I didn’t know it was so shounen anime until I actually played it).
Gameplaywise, the biggest problem that I ran into was being underlevelled. Because of the system of increasing the enemy’s stats when you become too underlevelled, the bosses become borderline impossible (for a first time player, at least) if you are more than five levels under their level. I’m not sure exactly how it works, but the enemies seem to get a 50-75% evasion (and accuracy?) boost from being six levels above you instead of five. The most striking example of this was when I fought a boss, hit around 5-10% of the time, and on a subsequent try put in a party member one level higher and magically could hit most of the time. This is such an absurdly bad design decision, particularly in a game that does a poor job of curving experience (especially lategame) to start with. I am fine with bosses being challenging because you are underlevelled, but making the enemy’s stats rise because you are “too” underlevelled is really terrible. I ended up being a few levels too low for all three of the last bosses, so I ended up grinding a bunch.
The randoms in the game are kind of dully enjoyable in a way that doing mindless activities can be, and some of them can even be interesting due to deciding where to control aggro and when to execute moves. I thought one of the best parts of the game gameplaywise was the superdungeon chain of Mechonis Field / Central Factory / Agriratha that had a lot of randoms in interesting formations. The bosses in the game are largely terrible, they mostly fall under “hit arbitrary level threshold” which I often didn’t meet or are plot fights. The game really could do with less plot fights. I enjoyed Egil and Yaldabaoth well enough as boss fights because you have to balance the multiple enemies with trying to kill the boss, which adds a bit of spice to the otherwise dull single-enemy boss fights. My biggest problem with single enemy fights in the game is that your victory seems to mostly depend on at what moment your tank didn’t mark the enemies properly and when the boss starts hammering on your squishy DPS character.
I mostly used a party of Reyn/Sharla/other person. Since I was generally understatted due to levels, I found not using both Reyn to occupy the enemy’s attention and Sharla to heal was difficult. I could get away with using a more DPS heavy party against easy randoms, but anything actually challenging I generally liked pulling out both of them. I generally used Melia for inflicting multi-target doom, including on the final boss. Her HP was a bit of a hindrance though, and if I ran into trouble with Melia’s durability (like I seemed to be in most of that big dungeon chain I mentioned) I generally used Seven. I also used Shulk for times when I felt like Shield was useful. Dunban was a bit too evade reliant for my generally underlevelled strategy, and I hate Riki and want to throw him into a fire pit so I didn’t use him.
*spoilers*
Plotwise, I think the game has some interesting ideas. I enjoyed a lot of the plot behind the High Entia, with the various conniving factions, and learning about the Mechonis and its soured relationship with the people of Bionis is quite interesting. I also enjoy the setting, it has a bit of a robot apocalypse survival feel going on, which is pretty neat. It has a lot of plot twists at the end of the game but most of them are heavily foreshadowed (with a hammer). At the end you learn about the mythos surrounding the Bionis and Mechonis, which I honestly have very little opinion on.
Ultimately, though, I think the game has too much yelling for me to take it very seriously. There are too many scenes which could be effective and could have interesting dialogue but the game opts to inform us, once again, that the characters are VERY ANGRY! at the robots / other villains, usually forcing the characters to run at the villain while yelling.
Shulk in particular seems like a character with a great deal of promise but ends up as a one-dimensional caricature of anger and tired main character clichés (we won’t give up no matter what, opposition of evil doers, has super powers which make him super cool and ~amazing~). Reyn is a nice comic relief character, not particularly deep but he is fun. Sharla falls a bit into the trappings of being primarily motivated by anger, but she’s not awful. Dunban is pretty cheesy and seems to exist mostly to provide exposition to the player and to have an anime rivalry with Metal Face. Melia seems to have a bit more emotional complexity than the other characters; while she is angry at the villains, it doesn’t seem to dominate her character interactions in the same way that I feel like Sharla’s does. Riki is a failed joke character. Seven seems to straddle this line between damsel in distress and a kind of interesting mix of flirtiness and badassness. I’m ultimately fine with her, and it allows me to talk about having a killer robot as a PC so that’s a plus.
The villains are a mixed bag. I’m very amused by the penultimate boss; not really a great character, but he is effective at making you want to punch him in the face. Egil is a bit of an emo loser but his motivations at least make a certain amount of sense, and I liked that the game points out that he is not all that different from you. Final boss is an amusingly terrible person (although what was up with his final outfits? He looked so much cooler before his transformation). His motive of wanting friendship, though… did he take friendship advice from Bender (Hey sexy mama, wanna kill all humans)? Metal Face is a hilariously bad villain, zomg plot twist he’s the evil guy from the intro that you don’t give a shit about! Now let’s yell at him a lot. He was a better villain before he talked.
*end spoilers*
The game is pretty nice looking; I liked many of the environments and found piddling around the various cities to be quite fun. I like the variable outfits for characters showing up in the cutscenes, for all that I would have liked to give Reyn some suboptimal gear so he would look less silly. I decided to make Shulk with no clothes for the final cutscenes because it amused me. The music is solid; I particularly like the overworld theme on Bionis.
I FORGOT TO MENTION KALLIAN! HE IS SO BISHIE! I WANT TO HUG HIM AND GIVE HIM KISSES~!
I’m glad I played the game, even it wasn’t necessarily my cup of tea. I’d be interested in playing the sequel if it cleans up the gameplay problems I mentioned above.
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Kirby Squeak Squad: Over half way in, both treasure wise and stage wise!
Kirby is more effective at beating up mice than most animated cats.
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I forgot two things in my Xenoblade post.
1. It's almost Reyn time!
2. noble sacrifices are the bomb, according to this game
Anyway, decided to play some older games.
CT - Just beat down Magus. Ice Water murders randoms, Ice Sword murders Magus.
Zelda 2 - Never played this before so I decided to start it due to being filled with self-hatred. Beat the first castle and am now trying to figure out how to beat boomerang guys without dying horribly.
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Dark Souls: so I started playing this a couple days ago. Between speedruns and Northern Lion's Let's Play I'm totally spoiled on the game so I'm just gonna embrace that. I got to Anor Londo with a pyromancer and then a sorcerer, basically just getting a feel for stuff, sorcery seemed hellafied but maybe it's less impressive in the lategame or something. Anyway since I'd gotten the hang of the first few bosses I decided to start over again this morning and do the Great Club thing mentioned a little while back in this thread, because that sounded awesome. Slow weapons seemed bad though so I figured it'd be sort of a challenge run.
Instead it's been the easiest start yet. Right away I made a dash for the blacksmith (pausing to note how Taurus died to my second plunging attack), got my Great Club to +5, thought about fighting gargoyles but decided I needed more damage first. So I killed Capra on my first attempt, grabbed the Ember real quick from the Depths, and got to +6 using the large titanite I'd picked up while getting the club initially. Then I tested it out on Moonlight Butterfly just to make sure it was up to code. This thing is disgusting; Capra's been pretty tough every run but the jumping attack just crumpled him up, and I barely fell short of one-rounding the Butterfly.
Gargoyles killed me once when I flubbed the switch between two-hands and shield, then I got it right and killed the first gargoyle before the second showed up and it was cake. Then I repeated the skip to Quelaag and killed her first try, enabling me to Homeward Bone right back to Firelink Shrine. I feel sorta bad about skipping Depths and Blighttown but I got cursed and murdered by awful gecko monsters and a giant rat when I took my pyro down there so for now I'm alright. Taking my act to Sen's Fortress next where I'll try to make the Iron Golem ledge kill work. Best game of three years ago etc, all it took for me to try it was constant assertions of that fact in this thread over and over ever since it came out.
edit: wow okay Stray Demon's dead now too. I checked the wiki for what I might be trading up for later (if anything) and noticed the Dragon Tooth. It seems to have better base damage but worse scaling? I can't find an intelligible explanation of damage scaling via stats anywhere, so, does anyone know if the Great Club's better in the end? I hope it is.
edit x2: O&S are dead, got Dragon Tooth but ignoring it in favor of my Great Club +10, eyeing Smough's Hammer but I think it's just too heavy
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Best game of three years ago etc, all it took for me to try it was constant assertions of that fact in this thread over and over ever since it came out.
While you're catching up on vintage 2010-12, play Civilization V (w/ Gods & Kings). Laggy needs more souls to harvest from the nuked wastelands.
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edit: wow okay Stray Demon's dead now too. I checked the wiki for what I might be trading up for later (if anything) and noticed the Dragon Tooth. It seems to have better base damage but worse scaling? I can't find an intelligible explanation of damage scaling via stats anywhere, so, does anyone know if the Great Club's better in the end? I hope it is.
Smough's Hammer is unfortunately pretty much trash (most boss weapons are). Even if you pump up your strength to the absurd heights required to wield it one-handed, it'll turn out a little weaker than the great club. It's also way too fucking heavy to be worth the bother. And Dragon Tooth uses super rare upgrade materials you likely won't have enough of without farming and/or PVP, and is also weaker. Gets you a bonus to fire resist though. zomg
EDIT: I guess Smough's might turn out better if you two-hand it? Whatevs, it still weighs too much.
Scaling? A or S = awesome, usually indicates one of the best weapons of its type (if you're pumping the relevant stat). B is passable. Less than that tends to indicate something garbage for bonus damage that's best off as an elemental weapon.
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But how else can you gimmick O and S phantom killing O and S?
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Best game of three years ago etc, all it took for me to try it was constant assertions of that fact in this thread over and over ever since it came out.
While you're catching up on vintage 2010-12, play Civilization V (w/ Gods & Kings). Laggy needs more souls to harvest from the nuked wastelands.
Sounds lame. Maybe. I was always trying to get Laggy to play StarCraft with me, maybe we'll be able to play this instead at some point. But right now it's not Dark Souls so no.
edit: wow okay Stray Demon's dead now too. I checked the wiki for what I might be trading up for later (if anything) and noticed the Dragon Tooth. It seems to have better base damage but worse scaling? I can't find an intelligible explanation of damage scaling via stats anywhere, so, does anyone know if the Great Club's better in the end? I hope it is.
Smough's Hammer is unfortunately pretty much trash (most boss weapons are). Even if you pump up your strength to the absurd heights required to wield it one-handed, it'll turn out a little weaker than the great club. It's also way too fucking heavy to be worth the bother. And Dragon Tooth uses super rare upgrade materials you likely won't have enough of without farming and/or PVP, and is also weaker. Gets you a bonus to fire resist though. zomg
EDIT: I guess Smough's might turn out better if you two-hand it? Whatevs, it still weighs too much.
Scaling? A or S = awesome, usually indicates one of the best weapons of its type (if you're pumping the relevant stat). B is passable. Less than that tends to indicate something garbage for bonus damage that's best off as an elemental weapon.
Yeah I decided against Smough's so I am now rocking Great Club +13. How that happened is I saw you needed the Very Large Ember for more upgrades and that it was in New Londo, so I thought, here's an area that hasn't really been spoiled for me much, I'll try to run all over it looking for this Ember.
5 deaths later I find Ingward (in the meantime I had to run up and buy transient curses from the female undead merchant), now I can buy cheaper transient curses and have that Key to the Seal thing, cool. 2 deaths later I find the valve that lets me drain the waterpark. 3 deaths later I get frustrated after dying to three badass black knight-looking dudes and just look up where the Ember is. None of the souls from all the times I cleared out the ghosts ended up persisting, kinda like the ~20k I lost when I got cocky on O&S. But now I can leave this place until everything else is dead.
So after a hop, skip and a jump around the burg and parish for black knights bearing titanite chunks, I've got my +13 weapon (good enough for the time being) and no direction at all. I'm thinking about heading back to Quelaag's crib and murdering her sister for the firekeeper soul (my estus flask is depressingly at +1 still), and past that maybe I'll buy a Reinforced Club or something from the merchant so I can make it Divine and take it to the Catacombs. The world is my oyster really. I'm leaving strength at 32 for now, it doesn't seem to keep paying off much and I'd rather pump end/vit (everything else is default still).
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Divine clubs are for scrubs. Just run & gun the catacombs til you gank all the necromancers. You'll probably be 1-shotting the skellies anyway.
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Dynasty Warriors 8 Xtreem Legends Complete Edition - Sub-subtitles are awesome. Slugging my way through Ambition mode with Zhurong. Boomerang is kinda trashy early then turns BRUTAL when you get the C6 and have good elements on it. Cyclone/Induction/Slash all at 10 = the C6 can do half an officer's health in one shot. Through guard. Nasty piece of work there.
Everything else - I am being ADD as hell about games lately and unable to focus on anything in specific longer than like an hour or two before changing games next time I play something. Dunno what the fuck.
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I had seven hours worth of nightmares about Dynasty Warriors last night.
I haven't played a game since 3.
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Were you being killed by archers from outside of draw distance? DW3 will give people nightmares about that.
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No I was barraged by an endless amount of names trying to politically maneuver around. Do you know who Chung Gao is? I don't! But he kept taking control of my right arm and trying to cross a river.
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Kirby Squeak Squad: I beat the Red Mage Rat who is the leader of the other rats, and then Meta Knight steals Kirby's cake, and seals it behind a door.
...Kirby's cake is somehow key to unleashing the latest Cosmic Horror, isn't it?
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Otter officially better than me at all video games again. It was good while it lasted. Maybe I should play an hour of some platformer that is only available in early access so I can make outrageous claims of superiority for 30 seconds.
I am still in Blighttown because I decided that poop is my weapon of choice so Large Club was preferable to Great Club. Bit of grind to get it to drop. Went back to kill Stray Demon and Black Knights in Asylum. Got Knigts dead, have Demon worked out and should have killed him, but went in aggressively for the kill and got sat on when I needed one more hit to kill him (bad play is bad). Went in again and just ran down the hole. Hollows follow me down. Sigh. Figures I would just get my souls back and eat a wipe. I died up the butthole of fucking middle of nowhere in the room last time. Tanked before I could get souls. I was only like 4k souls and a humanity, so nothing to tear up over, by it did signal me to go mehhhhhh let's play some Suiko Dan instead. Zwei and Large Club are +6, bit sure if want to swap the Zwei to fire or Lightning. Club gonna be Divine. Fire Zwei and skipping Lightning elemental coverage frees up Titanite for armour I guess? This was the thing I was juggling cost:benefit most before I started and it has solidified a bit but it is still the thing I bounce around on the most at least in practice I don't mind the trap of spending Slabs on something with a bad move set isn't nearly as much of a thing as what I built up in my head. You should know the move set well before you touch slabs. Boss Soul weapons on the other hand are a bit looser. I shudder to think of how disappointed someone that turned their +10 Zwei into Cursed Greatsword of Artorias must feel if they don't like the moves (let alone... Everything else wrong with those swords). I suppose they are somewhat mitigated by Demon Titanite being one of the more farmable resources, but daaaaaamn there is some popular once off items in the game that noobs might eat wih boss souls.
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Are you even getting Faith, Grefter? Divine sucks without faith...
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I mean my basic Club, not Large/Great club as divine. It gives me a light weapon swap to keep Skeletons dead at the cost of some Green Shards competing with fire upgrade path and 2000 souls. The opportunity cost of building it up is pretty low.
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keeping skellies dead overrated just run and gun it #yolocatacombs
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Jim's right. Keeping skellies dead is the stupid way to play that dungeon. Moreover, you're being a fuckin' idiot. You get an occult club for free in Anor Londo and can downgrade that to Divine+5. That's the only reason that is even a strategy at all. Don't waste materials building up a club to Divine +1 only to make all of that even harder than it already fuckin' is.
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You're allowed to keep them dead by kicking them into pits but that's it.
Really glad you're all enjoying the massive clubs.
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Club Souls: rolled credits on this by continuing to mimic dungeon skips from speedruns. Nito killed me about five times before Andrew mentioned that I should let him walk up to me so I wouldn't have giant skellingtons in my grill. I didn't want to use anything ranged on Bed of Chaos and the speedrun didn't show me the melee way, so I decided to do that by trial and error; I died at least ten times and could probably do the run-up through Lost Izalith with my eyes closed now. Four Kings didn't get to team up on me because Great Club +15 and I was so tanky by the time I got to Seath that I could pretty much run up behind him and start flailing around and he died first.
Gwyn took a couple tries, I wasn't prepared for how relentless his combos can be when he backs you up against a wall. Other enemies in the game kinda train you that you'll be okay if you block through the combo and then roll away and heal whereas Gwyn just keeps going. I wasn't confident parrying so the basic strategy was to bait a grab attempt, punish with a jumping attack, and then run away like a little girl and try to interpose a pillar so I could heal up. After three jumping attacks landed I just started in with normal attacks to finish him.
So apparently there's a sort of NG+ but I'd rather start over and not skip dungeons, maybe do the saving Solaire thing, go see Priscilla, do the DLC, all that stuff. Not sure yet what I'm gonna build because I don't know what could be more fun than the club was. Big slow two-handed weapon was a really enjoyable style, maybe I'll go for a halberd or something. I could also try and see what the deal is with Faith, maybe do some miracles and rock a divine weapon.
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Divine weapons are perfectly functional for a dedicated caster. Take minimal physical requirements for the weapon and dump everything else into faith (bonus: you can permakill skellies without gimping yourself) and they're passable enough for standard melee offense. No other build should ever use them outside of the catacombs.
I loved running a cleric in DS1 just because I don't think there's anything in the game more stylish than chucking giant fucking lightning bolts at people. Your firepower is kinda limited, compared to a sorcerer* getting a billion shots of basic spells from gamestart, but you can get some pretty outstanding power per shot. Personal favorite build for the game was probably DEX weapons + weapon enchants. Pushing 700 attack power on a light weapon is amazing times. Took some of the cheese out of sorcery by just sticking to buffs and utility spells (it is basically just a different flavor of cheese though).
(*In answer to your earlier point: no, sorcery never really stops being ridiculous. In fact, if you stopped at Anor Londo and didn't hit the DLC, you didn't even see the worst of it. Sorc is easymode.)
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So I could upgrade a Club that I used at the start of the game that was +5 with a single Green chunk to get it to Divine and do an area early (noting that I was really thinking for stuff I might encounter in Tomb, but whatever) or I could wait until an area I haven't been to yet to find a club I haven't found yet in a game that even with maps and shit I have still pretty consistently missed stuff?
The thing I have now is the known answer to problems I have and have had and may have again. The nebulous thing I might find in the future is less tangible. I will play super optimised next time I roll up on the game.
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Otter: For other builds... Great clubs are best honestly.
You can try regular greatswords, with are slow with 360° regular attacks.
Halberds are fast and damaging when they hit, but they punish you a lot for missing.
Whips / fist weapons are fun and really bad. You might want to wait until playing Dark Souls 2 to try them out, because not doing damage gets annoying.
Miracles can kinda help first time through but afterwards... I'm not crazy about them. You don't care about healing, magic protection, Force, shit like Karmic Justice. Pyromancy is fun if you like fireballs, without being completely broken like sorcery.
Obligatory Channeler's Trident mention.
Nuclear Throne: Got up to 6-1 once! Died immediately.
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Dark Souls: started over and did more speedstrats to get the Great Scythe immediately. When I clear out the church and go to release Lautrec, I find he's gone already. I get back to Firelink and Anastacia's dead. What. How did this happen.
Anyway since the Great Scythe scales with dex and that helps you cast faster too, I guess I'll minor in pyromancy this time around.
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Divine weapons are perfectly functional for a dedicated caster. Take minimal physical requirements for the weapon and dump everything else into faith (bonus: you can permakill skellies without gimping yourself) and they're passable enough for standard melee offense. No other build should ever use them outside of the catacombs.
I loved running a cleric in DS1 just because I don't think there's anything in the game more stylish than chucking giant fucking lightning bolts at people. Your firepower is kinda limited, compared to a sorcerer* getting a billion shots of basic spells from gamestart, but you can get some pretty outstanding power per shot. Personal favorite build for the game was probably DEX weapons + weapon enchants. Pushing 700 attack power on a light weapon is amazing times. Took some of the cheese out of sorcery by just sticking to buffs and utility spells (it is basically just a different flavor of cheese though).
(*In answer to your earlier point: no, sorcery never really stops being ridiculous. In fact, if you stopped at Anor Londo and didn't hit the DLC, you didn't even see the worst of it. Sorc is easymode.)
While I agree that Sorc is Easymode, it does have some difficult parts. Generally, I found that everything that was hard as a pyro is dead easy as a sorc, but some things that were easy for Pyro were really hard for Sorc. Granted, this is part because I was using the Estoc, but still. Just could not get enough damage done to Orstein and Smaugh without running out of charges, and ended up ragequitting that run.
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Kirby Squeak Squad: Finish. It's a Kirby game, not much else to say. Something mundane happens, Kirby goes on a quest to solve it, beats up DeDeDe, Meta Knight, and a Cosmic Horror along the way. You know the drill.
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Dark Souls: started over and did more speedstrats to get the Great Scythe immediately. When I clear out the church and go to release Lautrec, I find he's gone already. I get back to Firelink and Anastacia's dead. What. How did this happen.
Anyway since the Great Scythe scales with dex and that helps you cast faster too, I guess I'll minor in pyromancy this time around.
I'm pretty sure if you get 3 Firekeeper Souls, Lautrec will kill Anastasia whether you've seen him or not. It might just be the soul in Blight Town though.
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Things I have read say either Blight Town and Parish souls or the two bells, whichever you do first.
Dark Souls - Got through Sen's. Died more times on Golem than I want to admit given I was just hiding behind Tarkus. Killed the two Gargoyles in Anor Londo and decided I wanted to go back and get more fire stuff with all those souls I had floating around still after 2 level ups.
Pyro hand at level 11, bought all of Quelana's pyromancies after force feeding all those stray non-boss souls I had lying around.
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Halberds are fast and damaging when they hit, but they punish you a lot for missing.
Except the Halberd, which says it punishes you for missing, but has a short recovery anyway. I always end up using it.
Also to elaborate a bit more on the catacombs, skeleton resurrection really isn't a big problem as long as you have the damage to quickly dispatch them, which is a big issue for someone who wanders into the catacombs swingin a sward. The important part about using a divine club isn't the divine part, it's the club part.
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I thought halberds were great myself; you shouldn't be missing much anyway. The slower weapons I found unbearably slow, and most other things just did considerably less damage. (Didn't explore magic or ranged weapons.)
Phantasy Star 4 - Replaying this, just got Wren and Raja. Nothing special to the replay (the LLG run I did a few years back was more than enough), just enjoying a breezy playthrough. The pacing of this game remains great, and I appreciate that all the more after experiences with Xenoblade, Lightning Returns, etc., recently.
Lightning Returns - Speaking of which... have now wrapped up the main plot quests in three of the four available towns. I'm enjoying this well enough though I feel like I've accomplished relatively little seeing as I've been playing it for more than 20 hours now. The game can probably be streamlined but I'm reluctant to do so on a first playthrough; the sidequests are just fun/rewarding enough to do and I'm a bit terrified at letting myself get underlevelled in a game like this if I don't.
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I am finding I like the heavy weapons because the let you control range well, which seems to be a big key to combat, but they also make combat very short and sharp, so less chances to fuck up (Two hit killing Snakemen for example).
I am a little torn on weapon choices. Large Club is great and I have my Fire Zwei now, but I got Man-serpent Greatsword as a drop from first snakeguy I killed so using one of the chase rates is tempting and the Butcher Knife looks really nice too...
Speaking of chase rares, went to kill the last Titanite Demon I had left in the Fortress on my run through to go back and buy some stuff before hitting Anor Londo deeper. Got the Titanite Catchpole, so if anyone wants one for a funky build sometime can try this trade thing out.
Edit - Also meant to comment on that even though I have heard that enemy design in Dark Souls isn't scared to be goofy as fuck, while Basilisks are goofy as shit, I was prepared for them. Opening up Sen's I knew there was Snake Men, but I had in my head something like from X-Com, not regular dudes with giant snake heads. Had to make sure to kill them before laughing.
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Dank Souls - I accidentally set Sigmeyer on fire and now he mad. I got up to O&S, walked into the room and died pretty much instantly. Okay.
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Best Boss. (http://youtu.be/T3d94pxVRQU?t=3m24s)
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Grefter: having Oswald (priest in tower after gargoyles) absolve your sins should reset Siegmeier back to non-hostile (assuming you didn't outright kill him).
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I plan to reset him, I just need to kill a stupid boss so I can start teleporting again. He likes to body pull through the roof on the way to said boss (Unless I hug the right wall). I am not sure what impact summoning will have on that as well. So guess I see how Solaire responds next time I feel like playing.
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Broken Sword 4: The Angel Of Death - played through
I had somehow gotten the impression that the game was going to be terrible, but it wasn't anything like that bad. Possibly the most aggravating thing was that there didn't seem to be a hotspot highlighting function, I was held up several times due to having missed a small or indistinct item. In addition, not everything that ought to have been a hotspot was actually considered a hotspot by the interface.
For example, near the start of the game you're on a fire escape and need to go up a level which is only accessible by a ladder, but clicking on the upper level does nothing, and manually walking into the ladder does nothing either. The regular 'cold' cursor is still used when you mouse over the ladder, but you need to click on it to actually get on it anyway. Not too much of a problem once you know that it's necessary, but I was stuck on that section longer than I would have preferred (and ended up making several trips back and forth along an annoyingly slow wall-hugging section assuming that I must have missed something somewhere).
There's also some fairly dumb interactions required throughout the game. One of the most striking is early on, when you're trying to escape a building which is falling to pieces with Anna-Maria, after you've become separated and need to provide her a path to your area. You do this by knocking a brick wall down over the gap. That's certainly unlikely to have any detrimental effects!
The game also became unresponsive several times during the Phoenix segment, requiring a reload each time, which was disappointing (especially the first time as my most recent save at that point was essentially at the start of the segment). Didn't happen anywhere else.
Finally, the ending of the game seems thoroughly incomplete. To set the scene, Nico is chained to the Ark to be used as a sacrifice, with her life energy/soul/whatever being sucked into a void above it. You've smashed one of the two statuettes on the Ark, which didn't seem to affect it. Mevlut is in the doorway to the room threatening to shoot you if you do any more damage, and Anna-Maria is standing between the two of you threatening to shoot him. The priesthood who are running the Ark are just standing around and seemingly don't care that you damaged it.
Now, you smash the other statuette, which also doesn't seem to affect the Ark. Mevlut goes to shoot you but it is shot by Anna-Maria. One of the priests, for some reason (trying to stop you from doing any more damage?), jumps over the Ark and is sucked into the void, at which point the Ark shuts down. (Unclear whether this is something it was going to do anyway due to the damage or if it was because it can only run on women, which was something that had been brought up earlier.) Nico's chains disconnect from the Ark for no apparent reason, Anna-Maria turns out to have been shot by Mevlut and dies! Roll credits (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM2DSonZUPw&t=3m10s)!
When the game wasn't being stupid it was generally fine! Just it was stupid a bit too often, especially now that I'm casting my mind back over earlier segments.
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Tales of Xillia 2 - Unsealed cameo weapons for Leia (Bestower of Graces), Rowen (Light of Symphonia), Alvin (Shining Legendia, Tempest Unbound), Muzet (Paragon of Xilla), Elize (Abyssal Ruin) and Ludger (Ardent Vesperia), just Gaius, Jude and Milla to do. Decided everyone would get at least one cameo ultimate and then Alvin somehow ended up with two. Not too fussed on where I go from here, might try to get at least Gaius sorted since he's kind of been part of my main team when I'm not using Ludger otherwise I want to beat the rest of the EX Elite monsters and EX dungeon, then get the rest of the devil fell arms from the arena, and stuff so Jude and Milla will be depending~
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Ha, those are the exact Cameo Weapons I ended up getting. Leia has her Devil though so she doesn't have her Graces yet. Gaius got Eternia based solely on me having all the materials on hand instantly by sheer chance. Jude got Hearts and I think Milla got Destiny.
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Zelda 2 - Successfully took down the final boss in a glorious, epic duel. Fun little game, feels like a strange place to find a spiritual predecessor to Order of Ecclesia, but there it is. I had the most trouble with the boss of the third castle, where I had to master the art of the jump-eye-stab to beat him. Obviously there's some stuff to be majorly polished in this game but what's there is quite cool. Suffers from old game problems of being periodically obtuse about certain things (Hidden Village is quite annoying for example) and it is rather annoying that you have to go back to the beginning of the game castle when you die.
Probably will tackle a non-platformer next, since I have played too many of those already this year. :D
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Started messing around with Donkey Kong Land, and egads the attempt at replicating DKC's prerendered graphics style on a monochrome 8-bit system are a disaster. Not only does it look awful, but it has a serious negative impact on visibility compared to graphically simpler games like Super Mario Land 1/2.
Still the mechanics are decent and the length is short, so it works as gaming filler in-between Layton vs Ace Attorney and Smash 3DS. It's also something that I won't feel bad about dropping for whatever reason midgame.
Edit: Just reached the first water level and must explicitly exclude those from the "decent mechanics" part. Just what we need in a platforming game, swimming levels where you have no ways of damaging the enemies whatsoever. Ugh. Luckily savestates are a thing.
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Ha, those are the exact Cameo Weapons I ended up getting. Leia has her Devil though so she doesn't have her Graces yet. Gaius got Eternia based solely on me having all the materials on hand instantly by sheer chance. Jude got Hearts and I think Milla got Destiny.
Heh, Hearts is what I was going aiming towards for Jude as well, he has it now, Gaius winded up with both Eternia and Abyss, Eternia was what I was going for since him and Alvin burn TP like I don't know what but ended up with Abyss unsealed first, then finished with Eternia later. My Milla has Crusader of Rebirth and with that everyone has at least one ultimate, and both Alvin and Gaius two~ My Leia has her Devil but only about 4550~ P-ATK and less A-ATK on it so still a while before that will be max power, the speed, defence, and casting time reduction from Graces is nice though~
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Chrono Trigger - It's been a long time since I played this. Just got the Epoch~
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Bravely Default: Ganked Super's 3DS and started this up. It's a slow, grindy, bizarrely clunky (you have speed adjustments, encounter rate toggle, etc, etc, but no way to quick-heal outside of walking back to the last inn and then retracing your steps through the current dungeon?) version of FF5 that was co-developed by Zynga. I'll keep at it until the job system opens up more -- I stopped at the boss in the Rainbow Thread cave -- but so far the only redeeming aspect is the bad guys' voice acting.
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Ha, those are the exact Cameo Weapons I ended up getting. Leia has her Devil though so she doesn't have her Graces yet. Gaius got Eternia based solely on me having all the materials on hand instantly by sheer chance. Jude got Hearts and I think Milla got Destiny.
Heh, Hearts is what I was going aiming towards for Jude as well, he has it now, Gaius winded up with both Eternia and Abyss, Eternia was what I was going for since him and Alvin burn TP like I don't know what but ended up with Abyss unsealed first, then finished with Eternia later. My Milla has Crusader of Rebirth and with that everyone has at least one ultimate, and both Alvin and Gaius two~ My Leia has her Devil but only about 4550~ P-ATK and less A-ATK on it so still a while before that will be max power, the speed, defence, and casting time reduction from Graces is nice though~
I'm gonna grab both of Milla's since the one I don't have has a full set of elemental resists. Which is kinda nice.
I think Leia only has 2800ish on her arm. I stuffed her hard after hitting 8 affection. Ugh...
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So ToX2 is an Ar Tonelico game? Interesting.
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I wish.
At least then I could enjoy it in a bad way.
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Final Fantasy IV: The After Years (Android/iOS version)
Playing this primarily to document the (significant) differences for DL consumption. Finished Ceodore's tale last night.
The astute may remember that Android/iOS devices also previously got a port of the original FF4, specifically one based on the DS version. This port of TAY is probably better classified as a remake, as the game is running in the FF4DS engine and rendered in 3D. Unlike FF4DS, though, the mechanical differences in this version up front are more subtle - I've noticed already that buffs like Protect, Shell, Haste, etc. work like their (good) FF4DS incarnations rather than their (poor) FF4 SNES incarnations.
The moon phase system is still around and unchanged.
Bands now work completely differently. You no longer have to hunt and peck for them by experimenting with combos of different commands from the involved PCs (with no hints on how to unlock them); instead, the bands not unlocked by events now simply unlock when you fight X battles with the correct characters in the same party together. If you continue to leave the characters in a party together, the bands will gain levels as well, making them more powerful. Hooded Man and Ceodore's Cross Slash, for example, got a 5% attack power boost for each level it gained, and it was level 3 by the end of Ceodore's tale (maximum is 5). They seem generally stronger as well; I fought Tunneler in the +Attack moon phase, so damage was higher than normal, but I don't remember Cross Slash hitting for 2000 damage under those conditions before. (Hooded Man and Ceodore were both level 25 at the end of Ceodore's tale.)
I'm told some of the dungeon designs are different in other parts of the game (generally shortened), but I didn't particularly notice any cuts to the length of Ceodore's tale's dungeons. The Mythril Grotto was the same as ever. Devil's Road is still an annoying teleporter "maze" (it's actually a hallway, really) and no longer has damage floors (yay!). Underground waterway looked identical to its FF4DS incarnation I believe. Mist Cave also looked more or less the same as I remembered the Wii/PSP versions being, except that the room with the Mythril Gloves chest has a second chest added which contains an Adamantite.
The biggest change, then, is noticed when you complete the tale and save your clear data: there is no challenge dungeon.
Speaking of save data, this version of the game gives you 3 save slots *per character tale* - they are restricted, in the sense that you don't have 21 or however many total save slots. You have 3 save slots for Ceodore, 3 save slots for Rydia, etc. etc. You cannot save Ceodore data in a Rydia save slot, and so on. You get 5 save slots for the final chapter. Nice user-friendliness move on S-E's part to prevent dumb save-overs.
Beating Ceodore's tale unlocks all the other tales but Kain's, like in the PSP version. I'll be starting Rydia's tale shortly after this post!
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I did not know that.
So FF4:TAY got a remake before FF7 did. This is the reality we live in. This is the reality we deserve.
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You aren't being nearly negative enough here, Grefter; it's two remakes, really. (PSP had a number of graphical polish upgrades on Wii, plus not being episodic.)
At this point I have to wonder if some high-up SE exec has a bet about how many ports/remakes they can churn out without doing one for their most popular game ever. Expect an announcement for 3D FF1 any day now.
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You know, I wouldn't even complain about that (even though that is what I thought Heroes of Light was [an exceptionally shitty] supposed to be). FF1 in say the Unreal 3 engine you could probably do for relatively cheap and launch on everyfuckingplatformever since that stuff will run on tablets now.
As much as I don't like FF1, a full blown graphical update isn't something they have done in the last decade (everything still uses DoS versions of sprites doesn't it?). It could move units and you could release it super broadly.
They also might actually fix some of the problems with the game. Probably not, but hey, it is more salvageable than FF4 is.
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You aren't being nearly negative enough here, Grefter; it's two remakes, really. (PSP had a number of graphical polish upgrades on Wii, plus not being episodic.)
At this point I have to wonder if some high-up SE exec has a bet about how many ports/remakes they can churn out without doing one for their most popular game ever. Expect an announcement for 3D FF1 any day now.
FF1 for 3DS was actually announced yesterday. No US dates yet, releases January 2015 in Japan, but people who buy the first print run of Final Fantasy Explorers get it for free a month early.
http://www.siliconera.com/2014/09/17/final-fantasy-1-coming-nintendo-3ds-eshop-3d-support/
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Well that is pretty much the most underwhelming 3D remake I could imagine. Which is par for the course, but still that won't stop me from being disappointed at the lack of aggression and overwhelming application of their market dominance that Square are not using enough of.
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LFT - Jesus it's been a while since I played a PSX game. Circle for confirm? WTF is this bullshit.
Also christ I am bad at this. Multiple resets on both Sand Ra-a-ats Cellar and Algus. I think part of that is being really rusty and the other part being that I'm playing around midnight and get tired.
Oh, FUCK! is the best name for Ramza btw.
This is the best idea. Learning FFT route so naming him this towards practice makes everything more amusing when I screw up. My favourite so far:
"Oh Fuck! She was Wiegraf's sister?"
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From what I understand, FF4TAY iOS was made pretty much the same way FF4TAY was:
Reuse a bunch of assets from the other games, add a few new original ones in, call it a new game. In this case, they were running of FF4 iOS instead of FF4 proper.
Still silly that they feel the need to constantly churn out FF4 all the time when there's demand for like all the other FF games. Considering the way Square-enix operates, there's definitely some level of obsession with FF4 over there. Heck, even Chibirhythm displays that; Kain being a 3rd FF4er when most games only got 2 (FF7 was the only other 3 character one, and well, it's FF7, I'm willing to let any favoritism that game gets slide simply because it's freaking FF7.)
As far as FF1 3D goes...they took pretty much the path of insured success. Copy and Paste game to another format, sell like 10k copies, break even. FF1 is so cheap, even in it's later renditions, it makes sense. Betting FF2 is soon to follow, because wherever FF1 goes, FF2 is petty much immediately after.
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there is no challenge dungeon.
That's incredibly disappointing. Some of the Challenge Dungeons were actually kind of fun, unlike pretty much everything else.
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I did not know that.
So FF4:TAY got a remake before Great Greed did. This is the reality we live in. This is the reality we deserve.
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I did not know that.
So FF4:TAY got a remake before Great Greed did. This is the reality we live in. This is the reality we deserve.
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I did not know that.
So FF4:TAY got a remake before Great Greed did. This is the reality we live in. This is the reality we deserve.
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So FF4:TAY got made in the first place. Not to mention FF4. This is the reality nobody deserves.
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I did not know that.
So FF4:TAY got a remake before Great Greed did. This is the reality we live in. This is the reality we deserve.
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what am i fighting foooooooor.
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League of Legends: After a long, 10 month grind, I have finally hit level 30. WTF, Riot.
Duck Souls Remastered: Pretty fun. And no nostalgia-tinted lenses here, I didn't play the old NES game nor watch the TV show. Seems appropriate enough to mention what with the Scottish independence vote and everyone remembering how Scotland really only became enthusiastically British when it sent poor, talented Scotsducks all over the Empire to rule the world in the 1800s and collect gems by jumping around on the native's heads... unless of course the native was a carnivorous plant. Something like that, anyway.
Random thoughts:
* I went through the stages basically in order. Amazon / Himalayas / Vesuvius were the only stages to wipe me; Africa, Transylvania, & Moon were EZ. Of course, Amazon has the "only 3 hearts" issue + "learning what exactly I can and can't do" so.
* For bosses, Dracula / Incan statue / Yeti were all legit. Magica, Evil Beagle, & Terra Firmie king were bad. Moon rat was pathetic, perfected 1st try.
* The difficulty curve isn't quite to my preference. Once you start racking up the heart containers, you basically won't die to damage to anything except "I don't know this boss's pattern yet", but there's still lots of insta-death lurking in the shadows, and you only have 3 lives per try at a stage. Potentially makes things a bit random. And... checking Jo'ou's old post, Hard mode replaces life-restoration items with extra lives?!?! FFFFF, there's already too many full-life restorers that don't matter, they'd only be better than 1-ups if continue checkpoints were very rare AND you're taking a ton of damage. Extreme is basically the same game apparently except you don't get any continues, so yeah, rather than make the game harder, you simply have to be more perfect at beating its existing difficulty level. Meh.
* Okay I haven't technically beaten the game yet, fine, whatever. Why did they decide to stick the toughest, least forgiving platforming section at the end during a Super Metroid-esque escape sequence? I'm sure once learned, it's doable, but it costs a life each time to learn the jumps you can and can't make, and then you get to do the whole damn stage & boss over again after you run out, because 3 lives max and I probably blew a random jump earlier so more like 1-2 lives to spend on the escape.
* Is it just me, or is this game's 'plot' the same as Castlevania Bloodlines? Evil sorceress trying to resurrect Dracula, needing 5 parts (okay this is more C2/SOTN), only a McBelmont can stop her, etc.? Although it's kinda weird that the NES version had you fight Dracula in Transylvania, and the remake has it be in Vesuvius?! (Please do add a new stage, but can't it be called the Volcanic Transylvanian Underground or something?)
* How many games do you get to play a genuinely old person (duck) running around beating people on the head with a cane?! Sure, there's the "she's a thousand years old but looks 16" trope Japan loves, but that's a little different. Checking the Internet, it seems the voice actor for Scrooge McDuck was in his 90s when he recorded the well-done work for the game, so yay for some age diversity in protagonists.
* http://what-if.xkcd.com/111/ , for those that haven't read it yet.
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I'm kinda baffled at the rant against the final platforming section in Duck Tales, since I perfected that first try. >_> Past that, your assessments on the difficulty curve are pretty much correct. Hard and Extreme also remove three of the extra heart containers so your durability isn't so grossly inflated. Still, honestly not really too hard. And, quite frankly, I've always felt Amazon was way too unforgiving for a starting stage. Better idea to go Transylvania or African Mines first. I also forgot to mention Extreme's checkpoints are a -lot- less forgiving than Normal's and the full life restorers become single health pickups. And both Hard and Extreme lose the (honestly irrelevant) invinco pick-ups.
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Checking the Internet, it seems the voice actor for Scrooge McDuck was in his 90s when he recorded the well-done work for the game, so yay for some age diversity in protagonists.
Magica DeSpell was voiced in the game (as in the TV show) by June Foray, who was the original VA for Rocky and Natasha on Rocky & Bulwinkle. No shit.
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Also, regarding Vesuvius as being the last stage: that's also a Ducktales/Carl Barks Scrooge canon nod. Magica is an Italian sorceress and her homebase -is- in the Vesuvius.
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Final Fantasy Dimensions - Finally got a smartdevicethingy, so of course I pick this up asap. Trying to convince some dragoon girl that we're on her side. Doesn't go so well, so of course an NPC shows up and succeeds where we failed. No one is surprised.
Having to pick what jobs to increase the level cap of for each char is....interesting. I find myself waffling quite a bit, though for right now I'm mainly focusing on one class for each person(though also getting everyone to RM3 for HP+20%). Aigis = Warrior, Sol = Monk, Dusk = RM, Sarah = Summoner. Not sure what I'll do once more jobs open up, though keeping Aigis/Sol as phys and Dusk/Sarah as mag is p.obvious.
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Sadly, the problem with that comic is that you cannot swim through all that money. The ability to swim through metal so long as it has been duly minted into coins by some soverign power is Scrooge McDuck's greatest super power.
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SSB 3DS Demo: Wow the graphics are amazing. Looks nothing like a handheld game. But the button layout is wrong and can't be changed! RAGE
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SSB 3DS Demo: I am about as laughably bad as you would expect for someone who hasn't played a Smash game for over a decade (and only the original, too). The fact that I can't pull off a throw to save my life with the wonky default control scheme isn't helping, either.
Gonna have to spend a lot of time in training mode when I get the real thing.
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I tried the demo and I did find myself pressing L when I should press R and vice versa. But that doesn't matter, yesss playable Mega Man.
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Dark Souls: finished my SL1 run. Not leveling up didn't seem like a huge deal, I think next I'm gonna try giving up my shield or something. The challenges I remember from here were Fenrir using fist weapons (seems way too hard) and Cid using whips (I haven't found any but can wiki it up) but if there were other fun ones let me know.
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First whip is Blight town. Notched Whip is... Painted World from NPC invader. Best whip is tail from Dragon boss in the DLC so good luck with that only using whip.
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I'm pretty sure "whips only" is way harder than "fist weapons only". It's range vs speed + way more options
Crypt of the Necrodancer: Finished one run because I got RNG blessed as hell. Got a blood spear (Deals 1 damage, regens 1 HP after killing a few enemies, range) + War ring (pushes back enemies, deals one more damage, best ring) + The double hearts that doubled my hearts + The healing spell + Good armor. Damn.
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I haven't tried SL1, but it sounds less of an ordeal than one might expect simply because it means you're a pyromancer and have two slots for spells that are in no way stat-dependent for their offensive power. Two high-end pyromancies can take you a long ways against DS1 bosses! Sticking at beginning SL for most of the other classes would probably be genuinely tougher than SL1.
Whips-only was turrrrible. Full conditions for the Indy run were: all whipping all the time; no shields; no summons; no magic; no ranged weapons; only armor = leather armor + Pharis hat; and every item in the world must be looted, however useless. I did allow punching because Indy does spend a remarkable amount of time punching dudes; in practice this manifested itself only in a divine cestus vs skellies. I also allowed use of a bow for precisely one fight because of this scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YyBtMxZgQs (It was Moonlight Butterfly.)
I think the death count was in the fifties somewhere. Whips fucking suck in DS1 (they're amazing in DS2). Start with master key, die a whole fuckton trying to get the basic whip through the backdoor to Blighttown, pump nothing but DEX and stick with that the whole game. Notched whip is actually weaker and bleed almost never matters against anything but fatties, guardian tail is actually the weakest whip and poison is fucking weak in DS1 (it's amazing in DS2!)
If you really want to make the game harder on yourself, then no shields is probably the most terrifying condition you can impose when you've never done it before. Block + poke is just such a basic strategy for like all randoms in Souls games.
Dragonfist vs. the world was also pretty fun but requires a lot of prep before you can really get going: master key + run to Great Hollow at starting level, then either farm drakes (ugh) or murder other players (slightly less UGH) a whole helluva lot, then run all the way back down to the Great Hollow to drop your thirty dragon scales on the covenant. Totally worth it for landing a OHKO vs Taurus Demon at starting level, though! (Dragonfist is not stat-based, so that + dragon buff + plunging attack = 2,000 or so damage.)
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Yeah SL1 was easier than Fist Weapons Only and Bow Only, because of pyromancy and clubs.
Going with a 0 magic slot class and not levelling up is probably the hardest "normal" challenge.
Bow Only was only fun after doing countless other challenges, but not that great. Maybe Bow + Whips only or Bow + Fists only would be a decent compromise.
Otter if you've done SL1 what's the problem with no shields? I remember not really being able to rely on shields in SL1 at all. Two handed lightning spiked club > Them
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I need to play DuckTales. It's been sitting on my gaming PC for months.
Bravely Default: Chapter 2 now. The game picked up considerably once I tackled the Thief and Merchant sidequests. Levels gained there made random-sweeping much more doable, which drops the overall frustration level of the game, which lets me keep my sanity without having to turn off encounters, which means I'm gaining EXP and JP without having to grind. All good things! I finished the Ranger and Summoner sidequests as soon as they opened (blitz, blitz, blitz) and now I'm heading back to the tailor to progress the actual story. Party is:
Tiz - Ranger alternating between Thief and Magic Fencer secondaries
Edea - Magic Fencer with Stomp
Agnes - White Mage/Time Mage
Ringabell - Monk. Looking for something else to do with him since punching damage has fallen off, but I'm not sure what.
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Two handed lightning spiked club did indeed see a lot of use but I was constantly swapping back to one hand so I could use my balder shield. I actually had to ditch my tattered hood and manchette to keep fastrolling but I thought getting even squishier wasn't a big deal. Like, with cloranthy ring giving all your stamina back between strikes and an upgraded balder shield, you can just block through Sif's attack patterns instead of learning when to roll. It also kept me from having to learn parry timing for the silver knights in Anor Londo and the black knights everywhere.
Just running it back without magic/pyromancy seems appealing too, maybe like an SL4 hunter run. That would also let me try out rapiers.
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For what it's worth, while punching falls off, Monk can use other weapons well (mostly staves where it has an S, and some pretty good ATK-oriented staves show up soon) so if you like the class it will continue to be relevant.
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Phantasy Star 4 - Beaten the latest replay. Not much to say about this one, still an enjoyable little romp of a game. Took 15 hours, finished 0-1 away from standard stat topic levels, etc. I realised I'd never taken on the final boss with just four PCs before, so I did that, and it was suitably terrifying, but I won first try anyway (the key was to hand over as much healing as possible to Rune/especially Wren so that Chaz/Rika could focus on offence). 'twas fun.
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Cave Story + : This game has a ton of problems I never noticed because it was free! Too much screen clutter, levelling down system can make action super-annoying, faq bait stuff everywhere, furries, etc.
I appreciate it as some Ur-indie game but don't feel it's very good in 2014
Nuclear Throne: Finished the game (well, one loop) with Steroids, Golden Hammer + Shovel until I got an Energy Sword later. Dual wielding melee weapons feels wrong but awesome. No ammo.
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Smash Demo: Played around with everyone, here are my thoughts!
First off, game is Smash. It's faster than Brawl, slower than Melee, and...hard to assess otherwise because 3DS makes the game feel very different than both. Not sure if this is a quirk of the game or the controller, or a combination of both, but anyone who played the demo will probably attest to the game just feels odd compared to previous entries due to this, at least initially anyway. As far as the characters go?
Mario: Never played Mario much, so really can't say. What I can say is "WHY IS FLUDD STILL IN THE GAME!?"
Link: Definitely feels better. Link actually has killing power now and his recovery is notably improved.
Pikachu: ...is Pikachu. Some adjustments, but overall, still feels like the best "go to" character for beginners who is still solid in his own right.
Villager: A lot more fun to play as than expecting; his moves are silly but fun, and he's a little easier to grasp than I was expecting...
Mega Man: ...where as this guy is not easy to grasp at all. I've seen high level play of him and yeah, I can tell he definitely has a lot going for him, just requires using all of his options. Then again, he was promoted as being exceptionally unique and they got that part right, just feels weird. one thing that hurts and this may be the 3DS control aspect kicking in, is that whenever I try to use his Slide (the down tilt), I will use Flame Burst (his Down Smash) instead, which is a pain since his slide is a good "get in" option.
So yeah, OCtober 3rd can't come fast enough!
Chibirhythm Curtain Call: Good thing I have this! Anyway, just fooling around in solo songs, have about 3k Rhythimia, and unlocked 4 additional characters. Started with Terra, Zack, Serah, and Ramza because I like all 4, and have since unlocked due to hatbotting Firion, Bartz, AC Tifa, and Ace (someone from Type-0.) This game is pretty much the first game but with a lot more to it...which is fine, that's you needed for an improvement! ALso, way easier to unlock characters which is a huge "Thank god" moment because the original Chibirhythm had one of the worst unlock reqs ever (need to get 10 of randomly dropped items? Seriously?)
THAT SAID, I will now review the Collector's Edition CD That came with the game. This is from memory, so songs I don't recognize may not have their titles announced!
The CD has 20 songs on it, all from different games. The 14 mainline games are repped, along with 6 spin offs.
FF1:Final Fantasy Main Theme. Good choice, and as far as the "original version" goes, it's definitely way better than Prelude (which is completely absent on this disc.)
FF2: Rebel Army theme. About as good as you'll get from this game.
FF3: Crystal Tower. Solid choice; dunno if it's the "best" one, but still a good one.
FF4: Boss Theme. Good choice, don't think anyone would complain other than "it's not Battle with 4 Fiends"
FF5: Home Sweet Home. Yes, it's not Battle on Big Bridge, but they clearly wanted a non-battle theme and this is one of FF5's better songs so...
FF6: Searching for Friends. Good choice, much to the aiel's dismay.
FF7: Let the Battles Begin. Iffy choice; it's not bad, but FF7 has so many good songs, why go for this one? "Fight On!" (aka "Those Who Fight Further" aka "Still More Fighting" aka "That awesome iconic rocking boss theme everyone loves from FF7") would have been a far better choice. This isn't like FF4's scenario which while yes, wasn't "the best" they still chose a strong piece, FF7's just feels very...middling. And yet, it's not the worst choice on the CD simply because...
FF8: Blue Fields. THIS SONG. THIS SONG RIGHT HERE. What the hell? Ok, at least the FF7 Battle theme, while questionable, isn't a bad piece, Blue Fields just sucks. It's boring, slow, long, and I know there's a lot of good music in FF8. Even if you didn't want two battle themes in a row, there's still good songs like The Oath (though that might not be in the game?), Ragnarok's Flight theme, or something. Just grah, they chose probably the single worst choice you could do.
FF9: Those I Must Protect (aka that song that plays when Beatrix and Steiner beat up a bunch of Mistodons on Disc 3.) Good choice; may not be "the best choice" but FF9 has so many good songs, that'd be hard to do, so just getting a song that's good is fine by me (and after the choice for FF8's song...)
FF10: Battle with Seymour. See FF9; good song choice from a large list of potentials!
FF11: Some song I don't recognize, too lazy to check, but it was good sounding and distinctly stylized, so I won't complain! I was expecting something actually from the first game, so I'd recognize it, but whatever; FF11 has good music from what I've heard, this is just another one to add to the list.
FF12: That Dramatic Boss Theme Music that plays when you fight Gabranth, name eludes me. FF12 is bit more limited on good music because it has a lot of atmospheric pieces that don't really work out of context...this song isn't one of those, as it's actually decent stand alone, so again, good choice!
FF13: Sunleth Waterscape. No complaints, one of the more memorable songs from the game. Though why they didn't just use Blinded By Light, I dunno...ok, I do, it'll be explained later!
FF14: ...pass. While the FF11 song I didn't recognize, I remember it being good; FF14's kind of went in one ear and out the other. Dunno if it's because it was bad or because I have no experience with FF14 music while FF11 I have some so there was bias involved but meh, whatever.
FFT: Antipyretic. ...who the hell is going to complain about this one?
FF7AC: One Winged Angel. ...well, they had to sneak it onto there SOMEHOW, might as well go with the movie version, so they can leave room for...
FF7CC: Price of Freedom. This song. Pretty much the Antipyretic of Crisis Core.
FFT-0: We Have Come. I feel like this song would gain something from context; it's over dramatic, with a distinct theme (it was played in just about every Curtain Call trailer at some point as an EMS example!), but I dunno, knowing nothing about the game's OST beyond this song, I really can't comment.
FF13-2: Etro's Champion. ...see Antipyretic and Price of Freedom.
LRFF13: Crimson Blitz: And this is why FF13's wasn't Blinded by Light! Crimson Blitz is an inferior version of the song, but not inferior enough to whine about it, and frankly, "inferior Blinded by Light" is still better than pretty much the rest of LR's original tracks, so if you have to put LR music on there, might as well put this one, and it works for an excuse to use a second FF13 song in a sense.
Overall, it's a good selection of music. The FF14 song I don't know if it's the song's fault or my unfamiliarity with it, nor do I know if there are better songs in the game, so I won't hold that against it, the Type-0 theme is in a similar boat though more memorable, and FF7's theme probably could have been something notably better. So really, the only major complaint I have is "Why the blue hell is Blue Fields on this distinctly not blue CD?" As bonus points to this selection, no FF10-2 Music. I realized after listening to the whole thing how much of a bullet was dodged there seeing as FF7 and FF13 got both it's spin offs repped in Chibirhythm on the disc.
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Bravely Default: Chapter 2 is where you discover how completely goddamn ridiculous weapon specials are. What's that, Rusalka? You have a MT OHKO? Tough, you're also weak to lightning and have a monster family, so I can set all my specials to hit both those weaknesses and deal 9999 damage. DeRosa has no weaknesses? Cast Withering Ripple and give him one, then take him down in a turn.
Sword magic also falls into this category of craziness.
(Possibly I wasn't supposed to max out Norende this quickly. Not my fault I leave the 3DS sleeping for most of the day.)
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I was the same, Shale, I maxed Norende in mid-Chapter 1.
That said I considered setting up specials to cream the boss to be an only-after-reset thing. Withering Ripple being generally ridiculous meant it wasn't a huge deal, at least! Rusalka did deserve some Lightning punishment, though.
On the bright side for the game's difficulty, normal attacks eventually catch up, and specials are not a big deal post-C5, at least on sheer damage. (The buffs can still be worthwhile.)
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Overall, it's a good selection of music. The FF14 song I don't know if it's the song's fault or my unfamiliarity with it, nor do I know if there are better songs in the game, so I won't hold that against it, the Type-0 theme is in a similar boat though more memorable, and FF7's theme probably could have been something notably better. So really, the only major complaint I have is "Why the blue hell is Blue Fields on this distinctly not blue CD?" As bonus points to this selection, no FF10-2 Music. I realized after listening to the whole thing how much of a bullet was dodged there seeing as FF7 and FF13 got both it's spin offs repped in Chibirhythm on the disc.
Meep, I know your hate for Blue Feild.
But as far as I know, its reputation in the FF music community is pretty positive.
And, despite I agree with the 10-2 comment, they could have put KUON in, which is actually one of the two good themes in 10-2.
What reall puzzels me is why they didn't use Blinded by Light for FF13, and use soemthing more iconic for FF13-LR (say, the Ark's related themes) instead of a redux of FF13 theme.
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Civ 5: Beat the game on King as Japan. Diplomatic victory. President Oda Nobunaga spread the glory of Moeism through the world and then became their world leader after nuking the shit out of Japan. Learned some new things that game, including the ability to resurrect destroyed nations.
X-Com: I never beat this game, so time to play again. Not doing Iron Man since I'm rusty.
Dark Souls: PS3 exploded, so this seems like a good excuse to replay this and beat AotA. Going Strength + Pyro.
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But as far as I know, its reputation in the FF music community is pretty positive.
Quick research shows it's not exactly high on the popularity list either. Using Youtube Views as an example, because it's probably the closest we'll get to indication of popularity (these all come from the same user channel, so that should keep things relatively fair):
Force Your Way: 960k
Don't Be Afraid: 432k
Never Look Back: 208k
Blue Fields: 209k
Man with a machine gun: 1.26m (...was there really any doubt?)
The Oath: 207k
Premonition: 360k
Maybe I'm a Lion: 696k
Ride On: 150k (mostly demonstrated to show a "lower" end song)
Dance With Balamb Fish: 125k (see above)
Shuffle or Boogie: 203k
Eyes On Me: 790k
So Blue Fields is about "average" for FF8 music in popularity based on this. Pretty strong indicator it's not high on the list of songs people care about. This quick research shows that MwtMG kind of crushes everything. I could look more (quickly glanced at "The Extreme"; it's about Force Your Way level), but I'm not convinced Blue Fields is a highly regarded FF8 theme. Maybe not hated as much as I do, but it's definitely not a song I'd go "yeah, that's totally one of the most popular songs in that game and should be put on the OST!"
By contrast, I'm confident something like Sunleth Waterscape would fall closer to Blinded by Light, so while not the "ideal choice" it's not far off.
It doesn't work with all games because some games have one song that, no matter how good the OST is as a whole, completely destroys the rest of the competition it's not even funny. I'm confident Battle on the Big Bridge would have that effect vs. any FF5 song for example.
Either way, nothing I look at suggests Blue Fields was a good choice to represent FF8.
As far as the FF13 thing goes, none of the songs feel like they went for the obvious picks, at least for the mainline games. For example, they didn't choose One Winged Angel for FF7 or Battle On the Big Bridge for FF5. The former did get in via the AC version granted, which may explain that, but then by the same token, that's why Blinded by Light didn't get in; they were planning on Crimson Blitz anyway. The Ark theme I fail to call "iconic" because you spend so little time in the Ark, and it's honestly not that memorable. Crimson Blitz is a clear variation of what is possibly FF13's most popular song; I'd say that makes it more iconic than anything else LR has by default. Also seems The ARk theme isn't even in Curtain Call, at least pre-DLC anyway (post DLC, honestly don't know, didn't check.) They were clearly using songs that are in the game, as a starting point.
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X-Com: I never beat this game, so time to play again. Not doing Iron Man since I'm rusty.
Enemy Unknown or Enemy Within?
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Interceptor obviously.
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X-Com: I never beat this game, so time to play again. Not doing Iron Man since I'm rusty.
Enemy Unknown or Enemy Within?
Within since I picked up the bundle up on Steam when it was cheap. Figured there was no reason not to use new stuff.
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Been a while, but I'll only post what I've been playing recently-ish.
Mario Kart 8: Did this for a job, and have also played a bit with Elf/Ciato/Excal. Got to really learn the tracks as we did Time Trials and had prizes. My best times were 1:24 on N64 Rainbow Road and 2:09 on the new Rainbow Road. There is an odd delight in seeing young children and teenagers race desperately against your ghost. >_>
SSB4 Demo: Got this the same day it came out. Played it a bunch against CPU and played it a bit with Elf and Ciato. It's good times. Mario is still looking to be kinda average, but still not an intuitive character for me. Pikachu is... uhm... Pikachu. But a little better. I can't play Pikachu, however, but I'm sure Elf is happy about this. Link is looking so much better. He's got power, his moves look more fluid, and his attacks just feel better. Villager is surprisingly fun to play as. I wasn't certain what I was expecting, but Villager is quite easy to pick up and learn. And it is so satisfying to drop a tree on someone's head and watch them fly off the screen. Megaman is very unintuitive (Hello Side-Smash) but I look forward to playing him when the actual game comes out. He is fun, and he is pretty good I think.
Going to agree with Meeple on the game being a bit weird, though. It feels... different, though still like a Smash. The art is gorgeous however. And really, the biggest roadblock I have is being unable to use the L button to block and dodge and all that. Still getting it as soon as it comes out.
Chibirhythm: Curtain Call: Adorable, fun, and just all around great, minus the X-2 parts. It feels a lot like the first one, but it's much friendlier to both new players and veterans of the game, which is nice. It also has so many wonderful tracks and so many ways to unlock characters (and an easier time unlocking characters) that it's hard not to love this game. Also it has Ramza. And Agrias. And Zack from Crisis Core. HOW COULD I NOT LOVE THIS GAME 20/10 WILL PLAY FOREVER.
Prof Layton Vs. Phoenix Wright: Haven't gotten terribly far in, only on Chapter 3. Got interrupted by chibis. But it's very cute and fun, and it definitely feels like more of a Layton game than a Phoenix Wright game. Good writing, good gameplay, and unique gameplay elements get it as a 8.5/10 so far, for me. It's hard to think of ways to have a better Layton/Phoenix Game.
Civ 5: Andy made me want to play it again. Did a quick run-through as Boudicca to get a feel for the game again. Still fun. Going to try and actually play through a whole game this time, though. >_>
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Bastion - You probably haven't heard of this one, it's this weird indy game. Luckily I will delve into the 2011 obscura so you don't have to.... wait, it sold 2 million copies? Okay fine.
Anyway, it's good-if-strange. Reminds me most of Threads of Fate, of all games.
The good: Great soundtrack, the gameplay is at its core fun, you can play as long or as short as you like, lots of weapon options to mess with, it's short but there's a NG+ for replay value, the challenge level has amazing customization, etc.
Neutral: The narrator thing is... weird, but sure it works. I like all the contextual comments they threw in. Still, silent protagnonist is still a bit meh, and the plot is vaguely pretentious but doesn't actually *mean* anything, kind of like the vague philosophizing Wild Arms games like to do. Although thankfully they avoided the Chrono Cross tendency to make Our Hero screw up when he's silent - I'd have raged had the game been all "lol by silently following whatever you were told you actually brought ruin!" when there's no *option* to question your missions or anything. Also, I suppose this is a + for some, but getting 1st place in many of the weapon training courses was *extremely* difficult. Totally optional of course, so I simply settled for 2nd place usually, but I wouldn't have minded a few mild nerfs to not require near-perfection for a 1st place run.
Bad: Okay, the counter-blocking is actually part of the "good", I loved that part of the game. A nice skill-tester that's very rewarding when you pull it off that isn't too brutal in the timings, but isn't a get-out-of-jail free card either. However, in the tougher mob fights later in the game, you can and will get screwed over by the auto-targeting system targeting the wrong direction so you screw up your block. Wish there was some way to force a direction on blocks, a la the Mancer doom cannon which doesn't autotarget. Also, why are the grind zones the hardest areas of the game in gameplay where you give away all your XP if you die?! I mean, it's not a huge concern, turn off some shrines, but I wasted a bunch of time via not realizing I was about to enter a grind zone and going in with full idols + the wrong weapon setup, then dying after 17 waves completed. Look, people are completionists, they're gonna want to finish a full wave for achievement / story purposes anyway, just let people keep the XP they earned before dying? And god forbid you're bad enough at the game that you have trouble with all 20 waves with all idols off... you can't grind then! (okay short of turning on infinite continues mode. so it's not really THAT bad. but still!) Finally, more of a nit, but WTF, why did they force the least fun weapon at the very end of the game? The Battering Ram is lame-o, and should feel bad.
Appropriately enough, my main complaint with Threads of Fate is that the auto-targeting in that game can be a little over-strong to fix your mistakes, and it's a complaint I have about Bastion a bit! But Bastion is better, and usually lets you switch back to the weapons you want to use while forcing you to try new things compared to ToF Rue getting basically forced by the dungeon into a new set that you have little control over.
Fun stuff. (This has been part of SnowFire's "playing Steam games that require an XBox controller" catch-up. Ducktales & Bastion down... sort of... probably Child of Light next? We'll see.)
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Curtain Call: Wow there are a lot of Final Fantasy games that I don't give a crap about! I mean I've never even heard of Type 0!
But on the plus side, all FF5 PCs playable. ;D
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Curtain Call: Just got Chibi Sephiroth, now I am hacking away at getting A's on all of the BMS and SS on all of the FMS. FF8 battle songs seem to exist to mostly impede my goals, though. D:
Chrono Trigger - Crono just passed away. ;_;
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OR DID HE???!!!!!
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Not after we retcon history~
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Marvel Heroes - Got Rogue, am playing her. Only level 20 but so far the formula seems to be "combine the powers of Gambit, Human Torch and Dr. Doom" which results in running around shooting flames, explosions and lightning in all directions and everything fucking melts. The spread of options available to the character are fucking enormous. You gotten around to playing her, Captain K?
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No, been busy at work so not much time for Marvel Heroes in general recently. She looks like she's really good at anything (that Madame Hydra passive for summoner build O_O ) but melee build is popular for raids right now.
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Must be based on all stolen powers. Tried her built in punches and they all feel slow and don't hit hard enough. Tried out the power stolen from Reed though and it could be a good basis.
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Almost the whole steal from enemies tree is from the raid bosses. Apparently the go-to power for the build is Fangs of Farralah from Dr. Strange.
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Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D: Bought this since it's on sale for $20 right now. Got my ass kicked by the first world's Kong level.
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Valkyrie profile. Playing the PS version and having a lot of fun. Makes me think of looking at the stat topic again with a more balanced weapon setup.
Curse the game for making me transfer Lucian. I had a Gram and wanted to smash more things with him.
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Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D: Bought this since it's on sale for $20 right now. Got my ass kicked by the first world's Kong level.
Strangely the first is actually one of the hardest straight-up, especially if you're still getting the hang of the timing for bouncing off of enemies.
Super Mario Bros. 3 - Played through this again. As much as I love this game I think it was the first time I'd played it in close to a decade which is kind of crazy; I was a bit rusty. World 8 was pretty brutal.
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Suikoden 3 - I had forgot just how long his game can be if you do dumb shit to drag it out. Getting people ASAP and killing treasure bosses is dumb and I shouldn't bother. Smashing through the individual chapters early would feel less like it drags on forever. Cherry picking some recruits for Thomas and moving on would be best. But that didn't happen. Hugo and Thomas done, Geddoe 1 was my first chapter, doing Chris 2 now because I had forgot how little there is to Chris 1 (Chapters are always much shorter than doing any optional stuff in this game, but Chris 1 is exceptionally minimal).
Pokedudes - Black 2. I had this sitting around unfinished with only 3 badges down. It is possibly the best Dudes game ever thanks to that one town I just finished. First of all the gym leader fucks around on a roller coaster just because. Get to her there and she moves back to her Gym that is in the theme park. It is a Catwalk where you walk down it to some Persona as fuck JPop. There is a giant projected screen at the back of the stage that displays images of her at all times.
Beat her and he image changes to your PC and you parade down the catwalk with her and her flunkies in step.
Here is also a Ferris wheel that you can ride once you beat the guitarist standing in front of it. While you ride it you get to read the lines of a Pokemon themed power ballad "My ghost-typed love! You can't feel my Normal-type touch!"
Then when ou leave town you see a dude on a motorbike being swamped by a crowd. Heartbreaker Charles teaches you Rotation Battles.
10/10 can't wait for Gen VI remake.
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Chrono Trigger - Just finished the Black Omen. Prism Specs to boost damage + Flare is gross and disgusting. Lucca has made pretty short work of the randoms. Using the damage team of doom, Lucca + Robo + Ayla. Not too much else to say, the game is an enjoyable romp and doesn't meander too much.
Theathrhythm Curtain Call - FF8 is my bane. Been hacking away at the different games, but FF8 BMSs still elude me.
Hyrule Warriors - The game is great aesthetically, has good music and the graphics are beautiful. I've only played a couple of Zeldas so I am not so familiar with all of the creatures and other references, but the game still makes enough sense. It's pretty plot light and the gameplay is a bit mindless if satisfying. I probably like Sheik the best of the people I've controlled so far.
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Theatrhythm Curtain Call- Far as I can tell, unlocked all the songs in the game and cleared everything on Ultimate, so aside from some laid back character unlocking and maybe score running to get everything above A I can say intense, hours-long play sessions are done.
So. This game. Did you play the original Theatrhythm? If not just skip to this, it's got all that game's stages plus its DLC, albeit with some minor tweaks here and there. And if you didn't finish Tr and say "wow I want more of this game and the DLC just isn't filling that need" you can probably skip this. OTHERWISE this is basically the bestest thing. Despite, god, tripling the character count? More? Getting characters isn't nearly as much of a grind because the game guarantees you a certain amount of crystals for not failing, plus you can get bonus drops and blah blah blah. The game gives you some free crystals for rhythmia very regularly and far as I can tell reading online they raised the cap another digit and you get more free crystals every 1000 until you get them all after a point. All the other unlocks are WAY earlier, like the last one is at 40k. Medley Quests are much much more fun than Chaos Shrine was, and the fact that the songs there actually apply to your scores on Basic/Expert/Ultimate (if sometimes it might toss a little rotating action on you, but it's random and rare although I imagine that changes at level 90+ maps) is a change I really appreciate. While Stoic was an interesting idea, I can't say I'm sad to see it go and scores subsequently scaling to go naturally to 10 million gives me a much better sense of how I'm doing on each stage. The game feels a bit easier overall, I think you have a very slightly wider time frame to register hits and it makes a noticeable difference. As well, because you have a defense stat in addition to HP now, you don't take damage nearly as fast at reasonable levels even with the frailer characters. Airship stages are kinda dumb but I think most of the songs are middle of the road for FMS difficulty so that balances out the unnatural difficulty of the Airship mechanics a bit.
Anyway so yeah you probably noticed everything I just said was comparison between this and Tr. There's just not enough different between the games to talk about it as anything besides a sequel and I similarly don't think it'd be proper to rate it too much higher than the original, so 8/10 it is.
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Chrono Trigger - Lavos has been owned with the power of maximum Uzzi Punch and Flare. It was quite sad, really. I managed to kill both the Past form and the Future form before they got off their nasty attacks. :D
Hyrule Warriors - Just found out that Sheik was actually Princess Zelda. *hides behind pillow, gasps*
Curtain Call: Finally got an S on Crazy Chocobo. Possibly the hardest FMS in the game?
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Half Minute Hero 2:
Yeah I don't really get what happened with that one?
They just turned it into some ultra generic game. With lots more dialogue that wasn't really needed by anyone.
Super dumb RPG elements in between chapters that fail to get the point.
Time Attack is now a joke since you can equip lategame equipment to deal with early levels.
It is pleasant enough to play if you turn your brain off, but the first one just seems much stronger. Wouldn't surprise me if they changed the whole developer team for that game.
Endless mode is fun. The first thing I did was beat it (well, get to level 100) on normal and hard. Now nothing is a challenge in the main game anymrore.
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http://imgur.com/a/ZMmXT#2
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You know, I'd feel worse about Gremio dying in Suikoden if he was more useful. But he's fucking terrible so when he dies I'm rather relieved that I don't have to keep wasting a party slot on him.
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Smash Bros 3DS (in glorious moonrunes) : Been playing this, it is very Smash. It doesn't lend itself to on-the-go playing as you'd think. Whenever I play it, I feel like I want to genuinely start unlocking all the game's secrets in one mad rush, but that would require a whole lot more time than the 20-30 minutes of commute I have every morning and evening.
There's also the issue of "Jesus Fuck the 3DS LL is uncomfortable after like an hour..."
That aside, the game itself kinda floored me with how much it is exactly what I wanted out of a new Smash Bros game. I think my only complaints might be the lack of Snake and Ice Climbers, and the new "break the Targets" mini-game isn't nearly as fun or creative.
Field Smash (Smash Run, I think the English version is called?) is tons of fun and I can't wait until I can play this in a room full of Smash nerds someday soon (I need a day off of work...). I still haven't figured out a 'perfect' route through the Field to maximize stat gains and equipment drops, but the equipable field items are gonna be the key to it, I'm thinking.
Having trouble figuring out who I want to Main. Since 64, I always mained Pikachu - he was fast and maneuvered well, plus "yay,RPGcharacter". But he's been nerfed pretty hard since Brawl... and I even feel like he's down compared to Melee, his weakest showing. Also, there's a lot more options since Melee. I continued to main him in Brawl since that's his unequivocally strongest appearance, but with this new roster and his weaker performance, I might be ready to move on.
In Brawl and Melee, my secondaries were Samus, Peach, Kirby, and Snake. I also started playing around a bit with Captain Falcon just as people stopped playing Brawl much anymore. Peach was my best secondary, and she seems just as powerful, if not more than her Brawl self. Kirby still feels the same, but he was a secondary of mine for a reason. Samus being unable to turn into ZS Samus midbattle kinda bugs me and takes away some options that I enjoyed in competitive play, so I'm shying away from her as well. Snake doesn't handle well AT ALL in this game, FOR SOME REASON~. Captain Falcon I still haven't actually tried out (dear god there are so many characters in this game, it's awesome).
So Peach and Pikachu are the only returning fighters I initially considered. Of the newcomers, there's A LOT I'm excited about. First off, just look at all the "yay,RPGcharacter"s there are! The FE crew, Shulk, New Pokemonz, heck, even the new Kid Icarus game has some significant JRPG stylings. (I'm still mildly sad that we got Pac-Man instead of a Tales character, but I concede he is the more important character to video game history.)
My first hope was to jump to Robin. Heck yeah, a FE main whose mechanics actually work like FE. Very cool concept. Very unique playstyle and moveset. Very difficult to actually use. She's just too light for as much damage as she needs to do to get kills - and she's not agile enough to really mitigate that lack of staying power. Palutena and Shulk have proved more competent - much heavier fighters with stronger smash attacks. I feel like Robin's limited ammo attacks are -way- too weak considering that they are inherently unreliable. Shulk's on-the-fly stat-min-maxing achieves a much more controllable version of what I think Robin (and possibly Shiek/Zelda from Melee/Brawl) were intended to do. While it can be difficult to switch up stats midbattle against a human opponent, it's just a very satisfying mechanic and allows him to counter different threats very well. Lots of damage and your opponent has strong smashes? Switch to the defense monado mode and now your staying power just tripled! Fighting a slow and damaging opponent? Speed mode or percent damage mode for exploiting his weaknesses.
So I'm leaning towards Shulk as my new Main, but despite how fun he is, I find myself doing much better when I'm using other characters I don't even care about. Link, Bowser, and Peach just feel like Easy Mode compared to trying to use most of the characters I -want- to use. I might've mained Palutena, but since I'm 100% positive that Meeple will main her, I feel like I should just have her as a secondary to avoid Meeple-mirror-matches when we inevitably smashdown.
Also, my opinions on customizable moves because that's the popular thing to do:
-Yes, they are kind of obnoxious to unlock them all.
-No, I don't think that's a bad design choice overall. When I played the previous games, I LOVED unlocking stuff and I feel like it's good that they put more stuff to unlock in for the people who have the time to play more of the game. And hey, they even made it optional stuff! But... it's not great for me since as mentioned, my play time is limited.
-Yes, I like the customizable moves. Pikachu's in particular feel like they put him back into his Brawl-level self. With customizable moves though, I feel like Mii Fighter might be the most broken thing...
-Yes, I'd like to see them in competitive play. I think it kinda sucks that you can't use them in Classic and All-Star modes, though I can appreciate that it was done for balance and for making them optional enough that casuals shouldn't feel the need to collect them all.
Final thoughts: I still want Simon from Castlevania.
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Hyrule Warriors - Woah, the game makes a attempt at giving Link a character flaw! Arrogance in the face of having a super weapon! That was unexpected. Also, finally got to play as Zelda once she decided to not be Sheik anymore (the whole Sheik thing is played closer to an inside joke that the game shares with the players than any real secret). Zelda's quite enjoyable to play as, the stabby stabby / light arrow combinations can be quite fluid and fun. Now I've played as all of the PCs except for Darunia. My favorite is probably Sheik, Impa, or Zelda and my least favorite was Midna. Lana, the original character, is also quite fun to play as, particularly with her spear.
*spoilers, I guess, if you care about HW spoilers*
Then the game pulls a fake ending, and you get to play as Ganondorf for three maps. Amusingly, you get all of the stuff from the good guys available to use, including their money to level Ganondorf up. I didn't level him before he had accumulated money; it just didn't feel right. As a result, the first map was a bitch. We fought against the first three bosses of the game in the other path. Your objective was to kill him before they reunited and inevitably kicked your ass (letting them reunite, while not technically a lose condition, may as well have been). The love is not there between Ganon and his minions; he mostly mocks them for being incompetent. Other two maps were against the allies; Link is a surprisingly terrible boss, while Zelda was quite competent. One wonders why Link isn't the one always kidnapped.
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Megami Tensei 1:
As a kid first person dungeon like in Phantasy Star always seemed super scary, impossible, seemingly infinite, with tons of arcane shit I couldn't possibly deal with.
The Sea of Flames in Megami Tensei 1 is that!
- Super long first person dungeon
- Taking damage every step (It IS a sea of flame)
- Enemies that can petrify (Only the main female can unpetrify in my team and her MP is really badly needed for healing / teleporting) If she gets petrified, LOL
- Enemeis that can paralyze (Same as petrify)
- Enemies that can level down (permanent, super mean)
- I also have to figure out where to go...
Summoned demons seem to have very little defense compared to humans, so a basic strategy would be to put humans on the first row, but then they become more subject to status... Whatever you choose, you feel like losing.
Nuclear Throne: Beat with crystal. EZ. She had a golden laser pistol, which works wonderfully with a good shotgun.
Half Minute Hero the Second Coming: I have to appreciate how you can loan money from a company in game and it is the absolute worst idea you could think of. Don't do it you are never going to get out of this debt.
I got tired of ally skills activating in battle so I got rid of them all. (the allies) Game is still dead easy of course.
Skills are the best examples of the kind of dumb additions the sequel added. They're not interesting, they're not useful, and they take too long.
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Souls of Ice and Fire: I mean, just stick Poison in there somewhere and that's the DLC trio composed.
So DLC round 3 is where From points at Grefter's comment about DS2 probably being easier to deal with due to greater linearity and goes trollololol. This is without any competition the most confusing zone ever to appear in a Souls game. It's sprawling, multi-leveled, full of alternate paths and dead ends, not to mention the gaps between bonfires are just appallingly long (there are shortcuts, but they open wayyy later than you'd like them to). I still haven't found the optional boss/dungeon. Beat the plot bosses without a ton of trouble though (certainly way less than the last round of DLC bosses gave me). Dragging the Sentinels to a boss fight with you is pretty neat. Also, Ellie was actually useful for once! (Apparently she's been taking lessons from Jester Thomas.)
I have to give this one points off for mandatory backtracking. You make one pass through the dungeon's main run, fight a boss, and then an NPC dispels the ice barriers blocking up the level. Now you have to run back through everything to get stuff you missed (which include necessary unlocks for the area boss).
I did get a seriously bitching pimp hat out of it, though.
Also you can now wear a giant bell on your head.
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All the resounding sound from the internet echo chamber seems to be that the DLC are each providing a bit of a response to the negative feedback the internets had about DS2 compared to 1. It is "Oh you wanted this type of thing? Here it is distilled to the point where it might be too much of it" as a response. I am honestly not certain that this is the best approach to DLC (if you didn't like it then why are you buying the DLC? If you did like it do you want DLC that is significantly different?). I have heard they are generally pretty hard in different ways than the main game is (which is already hard?).
Also you can now wear a giant bell on your head.
This is bullshit and should have been on disc. Fuck you From.
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Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn - Doing a No Resets run because why not. (Not true Ironman, I continue if I game over, but no resetting for dead PCs). Up to 3-2. Laura and Jill died on 1-E which was its usual terrifying self, Mist died in 3-1 due to fog of war-related sheningans. Pretty fun.
Lightning Returns - Finished all the main plot quests, day 6. Mm, the game's probably about run its course for me, so time to save then skip time until the ending I guess~?
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All the resounding sound from the internet echo chamber seems to be that the DLC are each providing a bit of a response to the negative feedback the internets had about DS2 compared to 1. It is "Oh you wanted this type of thing? Here it is distilled to the point where it might be too much of it" as a response. I am honestly not certain that this is the best approach to DLC (if you didn't like it then why are you buying the DLC? If you did like it do you want DLC that is significantly different?). I have heard they are generally pretty hard in different ways than the main game is (which is already hard?).
DLC 1&2's bosses were incredibly mean and took forfuckingever to die*. This is basically okay since DS2 original had a ton of pansy bosses; nonetheless, it's kind of a relief that DLC3 bosses are somewhere in between the extremes while at least having tons of style (something that many of the base game's bosses also lacked).
The level architecture in the DLCs is way cooler than most of the original zones, but also seriously grueling due to perhaps excessively long stretches of bitchy enemies between bonfires. The balance plays enough to my preferences that I'm okay with them occasionally being an irritating ordeal.
(*Usual caveat that I've only fought them on NG+ or NG++ applies, of course.)
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We're aaaaaaaaaaaaaaabsolutely faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaabulous
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YjDMmjgKec)
Your testimonies about Dark Souls 2 make me feel like the game's actually about Middle Ages scavenging fashionistas.
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Gref, you should be playing Wasteland 2 if you're not already. It's the tits.
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We're aaaaaaaaaaaaaaabsolutely faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaabulous
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YjDMmjgKec)
Your testimonies about Dark Souls 2 make me feel like the game's actually about Middle Ages scavenging fashionistas.
http://i.ytimg.com/vi/gMWGla_CMFE/hqdefault.jpg
Isn't it?
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Yeah, what is Wasteland 2 like? Also, has anyone played Divinity: Original Sin?
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Since so much of the original Wasteland/Fallout/Black Isle team was involved, a lot of that DNA shows through. I just made my first "multiple emergency calls are coming in, Ranger. Whatcha gonna do?" decision and felt that the decision had the appropriate heft to it, where some people are pleased and some are angry. My decision to assist the ag center left me with something that I think might be important later on, so I'm interested to see how that develops.
There's a lot of exploration on the map. Hidden locations exist, some you can just stumble upon but some you need to be told about. I stumbled upon an abandoned railway overrun with robots so I got the fuck out of there. Your ability to travel the map is limited by the amount of water you can carry (replenishable at wells in towns and also oasises on the map), and your movement is generally restricted by the large clouds of radiation that you need to find routes through.
Speech is broken up into three types of persuasion, which was something BIS wanted to do for Van Buren but didn't get to. Likewise, many things that would be one skill in Fallout (like lockpicking and safecracking, or all the types of guns that would be considered small guns) are split up. Part of this, though, is that the team you get (four Rangers you can create, plus people you can recruit. I think the limit is 6) needs to diversify their skills, so specialization is important.
The art design is fantastic, especially in the level design. It captures that same aethetic of the Fallout games, which again, is no surprise.
Basically it's really good so far but I'm only a few hours in, so I can't say more yet.
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We're aaaaaaaaaaaaaaabsolutely faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaabulous
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YjDMmjgKec)
Your testimonies about Dark Souls 2 make me feel like the game's actually about Middle Ages scavenging fashionistas.
http://i.ytimg.com/vi/gMWGla_CMFE/hqdefault.jpg
Isn't it?
Indeed.
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@ NEB shops upgrade with new stuffs and enemies get stronger later on, from Day 7?, I think, if you're at all interested in that. Final dungeon is rather a jump up in difficulty from what I remember so might be worth getting in some practice vs stronger foes for that at least~
Have you done all moogle village and chocobo stuff (with the return of the chocobo eater) as well?~
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Found Moogle Village and tossed some moogles across the horizon, yes. I've beaten the required Chocobo Eater and a few others, if there is more with them I apparently missed it.
I'm actually on Day 7 now and I haven't noticed any upgrades yet but I'll look around.
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Persona 4 ULTIMAX ULTIMATE SUPLEX HOLD IN GLORIOUS HIGH DEFINITION SUNDAY ON PAY PER VIEW!!!!!- Finished story mode, including Episode Adachi.
So...
This game.
This game is defined by disappoint.
That is unfair to the game. It didn't do anything, specifically, wrong. Just. They wussed out. About everything. Um. Maybe spoilers later, but not now. There's still plenty of good stuff. They changed the format around so you have two identifiable main characters (Yu and Labrys) and while Yu's stuff is all standard blah blah blah, Labrys as Persona 3's main character is pretty neat. And of course this new format means there's quite a bit less retread so that's good. I'm not sure I can rate it as high as P4A, but still. Mm. Anyway.
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Yeah, what is Wasteland 2 like? Also, has anyone played Divinity: Original Sin?
Is Wasteland 2 really that good?
And yeah, I've played Divinity: Original Sin. What would you like to know about it?
As for games I'm currently playing:
Chibirhythm: Curtain Call - Mostly just been playing around with the Music Stages. Been attempting to get up to a place where I can reliably play through a whole Ultimate Score, but some songs are just very difficult for that. >_>
Aside from that, just been playing a bit of Smash 4 demo to prepare for tomorrow. Very excited~
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Yaay moogles~
Final chocobo plot stuff involves the Chocobo Eater at full HP in a Chaos field and receiving a special weapon after :) Also more with the frue identity of the chocobo who is not actually Bob, not Snow, but!?~
I think the absolute best gear is sold on the final day but is ridiculously expensive or something. Extra/optional/ultimate lair dungeon also opens up later if you get enough Eradia from doing sidequests but might want to save that for a replay dunno~
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Persona 4 ULTIMAX ULTIMATE SUPLEX HOLD IN GLORIOUS HIGH DEFINITION SUNDAY ON PAY PER VIEW!!!!!- Finished story mode, including Episode Adachi.
So...
This game.
This game is defined by disappoint.
That is unfair to the game. It didn't do anything, specifically, wrong. Just. They wussed out. About everything. Um. Maybe spoilers later, but not now. There's still plenty of good stuff. They changed the format around so you have two identifiable main characters (Yu and Labrys) and while Yu's stuff is all standard blah blah blah, Labrys as Persona 3's main character is pretty neat. And of course this new format means there's quite a bit less retread so that's good. I'm not sure I can rate it as high as P4A, but still. Mm. Anyway.
Gameplay wise? This game is better than the first one on almost everywhere. Except the Shadow characters. They can be... very stupid at times.
Plot wise? This thing can burn, BURN. Cheating the player's expectations like this is the least thing a game developer should do.
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Is Wasteland 2 really that good?
So far, yes. If you liked Fallout 2 you'll be all about it.
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Not hit Wasteland 2 yet. Working out of town for a couple of months without access to a decent internet connection that won't cost me an arse and a leg for a bit, so console backlog it is for me.
I haven't played Divinity yet, but my brothers were playing it coop before I left home and had reported it as fun. Sounds like it hits a lot of old school RPG design points. There is a pretty hard level curve and they missed an area, skipping ahead was pretty punishing. Was fine when they went back a bit. It sounds pretty much what I would expect from a multiplayer divinity game. Very traditional and not quite as polished as a AAA game is, but solidly put together and doing some interesting things.
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DKC Returns 3D: Up to world 4. Thus far, I like the level design for pretty much every stage that doesn't involve riding a minecart or rocket... incidentally, the world I'm currently on seems to specialize in minecart levels. >_< Welp, Smash 3DS is releasing tomorrow, so now's as good a time as any to take an extended break.
Screen size has been mostly a non-issue thus far thankfully, aside from a few bonus levels and a few sections where a barrel sends you to the background of the level without zooming in. Everything ends up small enough to be disconcerting there, though not to the point of hindering playability seriously, thankfully.
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DKC Returns 3D: Up to world 4. Thus far, I like the level design for pretty much every stage that doesn't involve riding a minecart or rocket...
Wow, really? That's pretty close to the opposite of how I feel. (Through the first few worlds the only "normal" level I really remember now is the one with the giant octopus... though there is one non-minecart/rocket level I really love which is still to come!)
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Hyrule Warriors - Final boss has been vanquished in Legend Mode. I thought that the final level was the most challenging in the game by far -- I had about 7 or 8 resets, and had to cave in and use the Master Sword after a few tries as Zelda. Even with the increased power, it was still very tough. Now I'm hacking into Adventure Mode. I got Ruto and I'm working on getting Agitha now.
This game is quite interesting! It is very beautiful and has good music, and its treatment of female characters and quantity of them puts most games I've played to shame. It has more female characters than men and isn't some bizarre Charlie's Angels gimmick and doesn't throw it in your face; it just simply has a composition that many other games have in reverse. It is just weird because it's freaking Nintendo, a company which has traditionally not been the most pro-female company in the world. The gameplay is pretty weird but reasonably enjoyable, even if the scale of combat is ridiculous (I just killed 30 enemies with one well-timed limit!), and managing the different win conditions varies from super easy to trickier and more thought-provoking. The plot is breezy and for the most part stays out of the way. I enjoy the storybook style that they go for for the in-between-chapters plot.
The game seems to be a love letter to 3D Zelda, with characters from Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword. The Adventure Mode and the boss reference Zelda 1, but there doesn't seem to be too many references to the other Zeldas. I have no real opinion on this, since I don't really follow the series very closely, but it's just something I noticed.
I also figured out that my avatar is from Zelda's victory pose at Hyrule Castle. Makes sense.
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DS2: Apparently there's also coffin bobsledding.
So poking around for things I missed I find...a new fist weapon?! Finally. The Bone Fist is amazing (amaaazing). You basically have some monster's oversized hand strapped to the outside of your own. It's so fucking metal you guys. I ascetic'd the bonfire to get two* and Roberta is a proper queen of the frog-hopping mutants now (it's a natural match for the shadow set's longclaw toes). The moveset's all flying kicks and hadokens and SWEEP THE LEG. Not to mention kicking dudes off cliffs+1**. The poisebreaking is great, I can stunlock basically anything that's not a boss. Lot of wind-up or cooldown on the attacks though, so...doesn't really replace the cestus for bosses (who generally can't be stunned and will more readily exploit a moment's immobility), but fantastic for everything else.
Worth the wait.
(*which was a terrible idea because it functions exactly the same powerstanced with any other fist weapon in the opposite hand, because the powerstance attacks are actually less worthwhile than the incredible R1/R2s, because 45 DEX for powerstancing even though the scaling comes more from strength ffffff)
(**flying off cliffs after dudes kicked off cliffs also +1.)
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Wow I forgot how badly Doel mocks Albert, 300+ damage/2HKO with Rose Storm -up-
Legend of Dragoon JP-
This was like...35% boost to enemy HP and some other stat boosts, right?
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Just HP I think. I do remember Albert does not like that fight much.
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Curtain Call: I am reminded how jealous I am of my son. He just busted out an All Critical on an Ultimate song the first time he played it.
ArcheAge: Trying this out. I have created a mighty warrior named Adray who hurls firebolts at foes, then charges into them and destroys them with a nodachi.
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ArcheAge: Trying this out. I have created a mighty warrior named Adray who hurls firebolts at foes, then charges into them and destroys them with a nodachi.
Let me know how it is. I might also be interested in trying.
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Eh pretty standard Asian mmo, the main draw is the very large crafting system. And you build your own class - you start out with one skillset (sorcery, etc.), get another at level 5 and a third at level 10. These 3 combined determine your class.
But there's a lot locked behind a paywall. You can't have a house or a farm unless you're a subscriber, and there's more stuff you have to pay for besides that (notably inventory space).
But on the bright side, Adray is riding a Tauntaun.
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Pokedudes - Black 2. I had this sitting around unfinished with only 3 badges down. It is possibly the best Dudes game ever thanks to that one town I just finished. First of all the gym leader fucks around on a roller coaster just because. Get to her there and she moves back to her Gym that is in the theme park. It is a Catwalk where you walk down it to some Persona as fuck JPop. There is a giant projected screen at the back of the stage that displays images of her at all times.
Beat her and he image changes to your PC and you parade down the catwalk with her and her flunkies in step.
Here is also a Ferris wheel that you can ride once you beat the guitarist standing in front of it. While you ride it you get to read the lines of a Pokemon themed power ballad "My ghost-typed love! You can't feel my Normal-type touch!"
Then when ou leave town you see a dude on a motorbike being swamped by a crowd. Heartbreaker Charles teaches you Rotation Battles.
10/10 can't wait for Gen VI remake.
Forgot to mention that I definitely approve this and felt the same way when I played.
Half Minute Hero 2: You know how RPGs / anime love to have their lists of X major villains that get introduced at the same time? Like the 10 Wise Men in Star Ocean 2.
(Somehow this doesn't seem to be on TV Tropes)
Anyway Half Minute Hero 2 LOVES this. It's amazing. There are a whole bunch of sets of bad guys.
They all:
- Have some super detailed (though strangely low res) artwork in the gallery
- Get like 7-9 lines in game, max
- Die the same way, getting unceremoniously run over by the allmighty protagonist
Artwork on each boss set was given to a different character designer, so you get a lot of variety.
First you fight the Eight Elements (http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/40/1412375658-2.jpg). This earth t-rex is one of them.
Then the Four Ultimate Kings (http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/40/1412375655-1.jpg) (meh)
Then the Seven Grimoires (http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/40/1412375661-4.jpg), which can get pretty fucking metal
You could add the Three Generals (http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/40/1412375659-6.jpg) there too? They do get a bit more plot than the others though.
Anyway, then there are the art nouveau God Nine (http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/40/1412375649-3.jpg)
Then the anime Venus Seven (http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/40/1412375659-7.jpg). I picked one of the least anime ones.
I'm not done with this game yet (though near the end), I'm hoping for EVEN MORE.
I like the God Nine and the Grimoires the most. My favourite has to be this guy, the mimic-Moscow (http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/40/1412375654-5.jpg), who also was pretty much the most difficult boss so far.
I don't know whether the game should be described as very generous or just completely wasteful.
Edit: I forgot the Ten Evil Lord Weapons!! But only three of them have art :(
Nuclear Throne: Beat with Robot. Aww yeah
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Gender Equality Bros: So who knew Japan would be the one to finally get it right? Lots of female characters, lots of characters that can be *either* gender, and you can still be PacMAN or Mega MAN if your testosterone levels are called into question.
Thoughts on some new characters:
Rosalina has good moves but her final smash is terribly weak. Anyone who dies to that deserves to lose.
Pit might as well be a new character, he's totally different. Not bad overall but Power of Flight is horrible compared to his old flight.
Palutena I couldn't get the hang of. I probably don't understand how Autoreticle works. Might be better after I see a guide or something.
Little Mac is pretty good overall. My son's favorite character.
Robin felt weak overall. Not enough punch, and final smash is weak also.
Wii Fit Trainer is awesome, may end up as my new main. Down B is like having a built-in final smash if you can pull it off.
Pac-Man is pretty good. Gotta be careful with the hydrant cause you can launch yourself off the stage pretty easily.
Greninja seems pretty good, I like the wall cling.
And I'm probably forgetting about 20 other characters.
The Kid Icarus Uprising influence is strong, wouldn't be surprised if the same crew worked on both games.
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Hyrule Warriors - Just got Agitha, next is Zant presumably? Just piddling around in Adventure Mode, having a good time. Played some multiplayer with Excal by using the Gamepad and the TV. It works pretty well, although made showing off the different characters harder than if it were splitscreen.
Curtain Call - Mostly just doing odds and ends now of games I like the music from. Downloaded a couple of new songs this week; Vivi's Theme and Ovelia's Theme.
Smash 3DS - Well, this is about the first fighting game I've ever played near its release date for more than like 30 minutes, so hopefully I can learn how to play it adequately. I've been using primarily Lucina, Palutena, and Dedede.
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Megami Tensei 1: How nice of you guys to set up shops in the Sea of Flames. I thought the whole 'The entire place is burning" thing would be a deterrent, guess not. I did buy all your Orihalcum stuff for 50000 demonbucks.
Magic restoration items are now available! Everything would be easy except I now run out of MAG, the money demons eat to stay in ther party. DAMN IT GAME
I found that keeping 2 super strong demons instead of 4 average ones works much better for the same MAG cost, so. I have a Ganesha and an Odin, and they rock.
Edit: The final dungeon is the worst dungeon in the history of Megaten, seriously
Half Minute Hero 2: Finished, everything except the DLC done, etc. I liked the way there's this Cave of Ordeals like dungeon at the end where my global level shot from 20ish to 100+, THEN there's a super special mission just for this. Only in this mission did I manage to get rid of my debt collector by killing it. (Worth trying, Argentina?)
There were no other real sets of bosses, but they were sets of 10ish angels / mecha-angels that looked the same but with different weapons, so that's something.
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Harmony of Despair- Played this today. Got a double gods garb. Quit in disgust. HoD in a nutshell, there.
Defense Grid 2- 7 missions in. My laptop can't play this so I'm using someone else's computer to play through. There's a lot of love and effort put in but it man is the plot stuff awfully more... there than DG1. Lot of voices is distracting. Gameplay is Defense Grid and thus a ton of fun. It's got tweaks on the old game but it's still the same system. Scoring is the biggest change but I haven't had too many issues gold medaling any mission so far.
Dark Souls 2- Well, more watching than playing. I actually fell asleep watching this. Pretty game and some of the PVP stuff is hilarious but it seems to put me to sleep for some reason.
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Has anyone tried out Pier Solar? It's that game that someone made for the Sega Genesis in 2013. It looks charmingly retro and I heard generally good things about it, but I was wondering if any DLers were gonna pick it up.
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I'm interested but would prefer to pick it up on the WiiU among available systems, so looks like there's a wait there yet.
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DS2: fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck
So yeah, fuck Iron Passage, probably the worst place in the entire game
i was wrong
who could've guessed reindeer would be the most aggravating Souls enemy ever
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Remember that Cat is the hardest enemy in Dark Souls 1.
Megami Tensei 1: Finished! The final dungeon was less difficult than I thought. I thought you had to go through teleporters (that are never shown on the mini map) to finish the game but that's not the case.
Turns out I skipped a few bosses and events, and I never even met the goddess that was resurrected / I was supposed to resurrect. (The title "Megami Tensei" meaning Resurrection of the Goddess) This could have given me some fire protection for the Sea of Flames!
So yeah, that's like playing Sword of Vermilion, never getting the Sword of Vermilion and just beating the final boss with the Axe of Yellowish Brown instead.
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Niu wants a hug
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/41/1412550359-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00009.png)
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Remember that Cat is the hardest enemy in Dark Souls 1.
Megami Tensei 1: Finished! The final dungeon was less difficult than I thought. I thought you had to go through teleporters (that are never shown on the mini map) to finish the game but that's not the case.
Turns out I skipped a few bosses and events, and I never even met the goddess that was resurrected / I was supposed to resurrect. (The title "Megami Tensei" meaning Resurrection of the Goddess) This could have given me some fire protection for the Sea of Flames!
So yeah, that's like playing Sword of Vermilion, never getting the Sword of Vermilion and just beating the final boss with the Axe of Yellowish Brown instead.
I got every reference in this post and now we are going to hug.
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South Park: Stick of Truth: Everything this game says about Canada is 100% correct
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Oh good we finally got one of the Canadians to play that.
Remember that Cat is the hardest enemy in Dark Souls 1.
Megami Tensei 1: Finished! The final dungeon was less difficult than I thought. I thought you had to go through teleporters (that are never shown on the mini map) to finish the game but that's not the case.
Turns out I skipped a few bosses and events, and I never even met the goddess that was resurrected / I was supposed to resurrect. (The title "Megami Tensei" meaning Resurrection of the Goddess) This could have given me some fire protection for the Sea of Flames!
So yeah, that's like playing Sword of Vermilion, never getting the Sword of Vermilion and just beating the final boss with the Axe of Yellowish Brown instead.
I got every reference in this post and now we are going to hug.
I didn't and feel left out. please love me
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Bravely Default: The C8 refight slog continues. Third time's the charm for these folks? Or maybe more like 7th time?
Jeanne d'Arc: Okay, I admit it, I'll play even bad SRPGs, because the SRPG is basically the pinnacle of gaming. Quit in disgust by early Chapter 2 ages ago, giving it another shot since a few months ago. Plot & script is still mostly awful, except, strangely enough, the love triangle, which is written well enough. System is mostly fine, but let me whine about the cause of a recent battle loss, and the cause of a near-miss awhile back. JDA battles have a turn limit, which is fine, it encourages aggressive play and reduces some of the issues with a MP & transformation point gain-per-turn system. Don't encourage sitting around waiting for transforms to turn on, good, yay. There's ALSO some good FFT-ish AI that wounded enemies will sometimes run away to the backlines, especially if they have healing, heal themselves up, then return to the fight afterward. ...you see the problem? Yeah, there isn't a "surrender / enemy fled permanently" trigger for such enemies. So you can clean up all the enemies, then spend the rest of your turns futilely chasing the lone surviving healer around the map, then lose because that 1 dude kept running & healing and your mob of 6 characters are clearly doomed by said healing. GRAHHH. (The C3 mission with Richard & Slinker, for those that played the game. After lovelingly murdering the entire map with plenty of time left, too... sigh...)
Child of Light: Finished. It's really good! Not a lot to say. Beautiful art & animation, fantastic music, and excellent gameplay. Go play it yourself.
Okay, I guess I will say a little more. There's an old saw that it's better to end early and leave your audience wanting more than to drag things out and have your audience wondering 'when will it end?' Well, CoL is definitely the former, taunting players like me with sequel possibilities and some hanging plot threads, and being a little TOO short in its gameplay. Oh well!
Other semi-connected thoughts:
* A game designer mentioned Grandia II among their top 5 favorite RPGs (along with the usual suspects in Chrono Trigger / FF6 / FF7). I'm shocked, simply shocked.
* But this game is better than G2, because everything is sculpted around making you care about and manipulate the turn gauge. At least on Expert. Lots of the other usual RPG features are either absent or heavily nerfed (fight-winning status, defensive & offensive buffs), but speed manipulation features heavily - do you want little damage fast or huge damage slowly that might be interrupted? Or do you need to just admit defeat and defend to cut your losses? In something like Grandia 3, where you have 4 allies and 4 enemies, it doesn't really pay to try and think through the flow TOO carefully, you're more just sniping targets of opportunity with cancels & defends when turns come up. CoL gives me good threats, but then gives me the tools to deal with it - Igniculus is a fantastic idea, it's great that I can do key slowdowns of enemies to sneak out slow abilities or get off cancels, and it's equally key I can screw up with Iggy and slow an enemy it's actually *bad* to slow. Just 2 characters keeps things comprehensible too. You *can* get stunlocked and die horribly if you aren't careful, but you can feel like a badass and perfect minibosses if you do everything right. Sweet.
* On that note, I looked at a few YT vids for sanity checks when writing up the boss stats in the stat topic. Lots of people are *awful* at these systems. I've long thought that the designers balanced G1/G2 on the easy side due to how swingy such systems can be; I can totally see why CoL needs a casual mode. (Players using skills they didn't particularly level with their build, players #YOLOing slow charge abilities into enemy turns and not even bothering to Iggy, people noting how they had to spam revive items against bosses, etc.)
* I already said the music was fantastic, but to add on that, something I expect out of video game music is 'excitement' / event tracks - which is fine. Stuff like Uematsu's boss themes. It's usually what your average VG soundtrack does well. CoL, instead, sells *drama* amazingly well, which is much rarer. Which is kinda weird! If you told me "fairy tale game" I'd assume the composer would write a bunch of saccharine feel-good tracks, but no, the tragedy / somberness is strong here. Aurora's Theme is fantastic and gets referenced a bunch, so good times.
* Speaking in verse was weird and definitely something you can only get away with in a short game, but sure it's something different so whynot. Best line, a rather silly joke but I liked it anyway: [What lurks in this box] inside? Homicide! (For a monster-in-a-box, of course.)
* Random rambling: What's the minimum party to complete the game? I *think* that Robert & Norah are the only required recruits, and I'm not even sure about Robert, so I wonder if the dialogue toward the very end changes at all.
Vague spoiler zone:
* The game could definitely have used an extra final dungeon. Which the game's staff confirmed (http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/24t9ht/i_am_jeffrey_yohalem_the_writer_of_child_of_light/) was intended, as is really obvious - flying ruined castle in the sky? I'm there - but wasn't included for development time reasons.
* The game did a pretty good of selling some absolutely magical moments.... while not (usually) detracting from the gravity of the game world or the setting. Like, "surprise this key plot element is resolved by deus ex machina" is lame (albeit common in real fairy tales) and detracts from the importance of what you're trying to do. But 'surprise you are now more awesome' is fine, as was completely audacious problems and goals ('sup, the stars & sun & moon are missing, you're on the case). In particular... the part at the altar where suddenly, you can fly, because, was *great*. I'd forgotten from the ancient previews you even could, and they even force you to do an annoying block-pushing puzzle first, and now you're free! A+. Aurora's aging after defeating the key bosses was neat too and could easily have played for some pretentious symbolism about kids secretly growing up fast when their parents don't notice, although they don't really do that. It was cool anyway, though, and felt like it fit much better here than say what would have happened had this game been made by Japanese rather than Canadians. (The Japanese version would have sexualized this kind of thing way more.)
* The Confessions & backstory were really cool... after you've heard the dialogue from the very end of the game to have a clue WTF was going on. [They appeared to be incomprehensible ramblings before.] I get that there's a certain appeal to optional backstory digging that casual players can skip and careful readers can feel like an intellectual badass for puzzling out, but I'd have been happier with putting some of this plotline more front & center, so you can appreciate what the statues are, the names of the places, etc. earlier rather than in retrospect. I suppose I'll have to wait for the sequel.
Definite spoiler zone:
* The flood threat didn't really do it for me. I guess the timelines don't have to match up perfectly between Lemuria & Europe, but I'd kind of assumed they *would* from the backstory, and a flooding threat would be something that would happen over the course of hours, not the days or weeks the adventure takes place over (never mind Aurora's aging, interpret that as you will). Did they build this castle & town at the bottom of a dry lake or something?
* I suppose I can guess why the Duke married Umbra (loneliness), but why'd Umbra want to marry the duke? To get access to kill Aurora? She was already able to kill Aurora's mom without need for that... for that matter why'd she want to kill the Duke, as well? She surely doesn't care about inheritance of wealth or titles back in Europe...
* I think the scriptwriter like Harry Potter with the bit about Aurora's crown & the altar.
* I was kind of surprised Umbra was willing to offer Aurora, whom she killed twice, to be her heir since she's noticed her own daughters are dead. Guess she really is a zealot for "an Explorer's heir must rule?" Maybe there'll be more in the sequel when we find out what exactly was going on with the Rift, the Hollow Pact, and what exactly Umbra's mother's crimes were.
* Umbra also kinda has a point in that the Explorer's line clearly has vast magic beyond the rest of the Lemurians. Doesn't justify being a dick like Umbra, of course. While Aurora & her mother might be champions of the Lemurian people, they definitely are not *of* them, what with the ability to cheat death and the like while the Lemurians suffer normally.
* On that note.. I thought that Aurora reporting Gen's parents death to her was a wonderful and heartbreaking scene, well done. It makes the game world richer to see that not every magical problem is resolved with a handy magical undo button, like the Populi village had. The death of Aurora's father was also fair enough - clearly the scriptwriter was also sick of heroes offering to sacrifice the world for one person's life. However... Aurora's mother is a stranger case. She appears so late it's hard to say what is really going on, and perhaps she was just a spirit / apparition a la Igniculus which would be fine... she's a character most effective dramatically when her death is irreversible. And it'd strain credulity to imagine why she'd want to fake her death and cause so much pain to her family. It was nice to see her again to see the obvious comparison between the mother & daughter at least, but that'd have been fine with her as a spirit. Oh well. If she really is still alive, that crosses a little too far into "plot undercutting deus ex machina" territory for me; you want it to be true, but it can't actually be true.
oh hey look I stayed up until 3 AM when I have to get up early rambling about this game to say "a little more." Must have been good. Maybe I'll grab the DLC quest just to support it some.
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It was pretty basic Gref nothing fancy. Helping the goddess in MT makes you immune to the constant fire damage from the building-on-fire dungeon. In the Genesis game Sword of Vermilion you eventually get the Sword of Vermilion and it is the best weapon. Also vermilion is a color.
Play more terrible games Grefter?
Incidentally I just learned from Megami Tensei 2 that: If You Get Levels In Video Games, You Get Levels In Real Life.
= Duck and I are gods of destruction
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Igniculus is a fantastic idea, it's great that I can do key slowdowns of enemies to sneak out slow abilities or get off cancels, and it's equally key I can screw up with Iggy and slow an enemy it's actually *bad* to slow.
Yeah, it's pretty neat that slowdown really is a thing you need to use tactically and can punish yourself with for using too judiciously, I.E. by slowing down an enemy so much that your next hit on them winds up missing the cancel stage and thus subjecting you to attacks you could've voided if you'd been more careful.
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Gref and Fen have you guys played Deadly Premonition
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Smash 3DS: Been playing this, stopped playing Chibis as a result, I'm a bad person. Anyway, beat Classic Mode with at least one character from each multirepped franchise and a few extras along the way, just missing 4 characters to unlock, and beat All-Star Mode on Normal with Ike.
Game gets easier once you get use to the controls, and compared to the Demo, it has the distinct advantage of being able to swap the shoulder buttons. You'd be surprised how significant that minor change is.
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No.
I did think I might have made an accidental reference to a game I hadn't played there, the way you said that.
Go me.
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I haven't, but know enough about it to have opted out of many hours if terrible to get short bursts of brilliance. I also don't have time to watch Twin Peaks and pay more attention again.
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Luckily for you, there will be new Twin Peaks to watch soon!
Deadly Premonition may work by watching a Let's Play, but that doesn't give you a great idea of how clunky its mechanics are and you may miss out on some of the weirder shit that goes on. I can't tell whether it's shit or great shit.
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I wanted to play it, but then I read that it was basically one of the worst games re: Women in videogames, with some terrible unsubtle metaphors.
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Specifically the villain metaphor-rapes women.
Then these rape victims want, and get honor killings. And the whole "honor killings impure rape victims" is not shown as being terrible.
Also there's a crazy evil trans.
As I understood it.
So yeah. Pretty bad.
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The victims are killed by literal planting of evil seeds inside them that grows into trees.
It is pretty standard slasher film stuff played completely literally.
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Doesn't he only "plant his seeds" in women?
I re-read the wiki and this looks pretty damning to me.
Anyway, if there's no hidden implication for something this important and it is just a dumb slasher plot, then the rest has to be weirdness for weirdness' sake.
If there is some hidden implication, then it's terrible
So either way the game loses.
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Yeah, it is not great, and it's hard to see whether that's due to its emulation of Twin Peaks (which has its own problems) or because it has the sensibility of a Japanese dude who is a lunatic.
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I always just figured a Japanese guy that into Twin Peaks is a bit crazy.
Even of it is weird for weird's sake, it is pretty fucking good at weird from the bits I have seen.
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Re: Snowfire on Child of Light
I hadn't noticed some of those lingering plot threads about Umbra and Lemuria. The Fairy Tale atmosphere sort of lulled me into a "don't worry about details like why someone would want to take over a kingdom, that's just what bad people like to do."
Also total agreement about that scene with Gen and Aurora. Well written and somehow the rhyming verse didn't spoil it. An accomplishment all on its own in my opinion. The rhyming verse in general mass it hard for me to take most scenes too seriously and I felt the best use of it was when our resident bad jokester broke it...
On the whole optional PC thing... I hadn't realized that many of them were optional. Man that would have made the game pretty boring.
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You have to be Fenrir-level perverse to miss them, though, so I don't consider it a big deal. (e.g. refusing to help Oengus, ignoring Rubella's request, not going back for Gen, etc.) It's an interesting alternate way to play the game, I presume (but maybe they force you to go recruit 'em at some point anyway. Hence the question!).
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Fenrir, I have a request. Play Child of Light in a Fenrir-level perverse way.
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Yeah, they're near impossible to miss, but I still think making them missable is fundamentally a mistake, as it limits the amount of interaction they can have in the main plot. (This is a bigger deal in plot-heavier games than it is in Child of Light, though.)
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Last recruit was the only one I missed and that was because I had expected them to spoon feed them to the same level as previous recruits. Sooooo yeah.
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DS2: Now that I've exhausted my stock of profanity for a few days, I guess there are a few other final notes to add. Crown of the Ivory King has the best/worst NPC invaders in the game. Sometimes they're the same person:
-Witchgirl doesn't understand that Dark Orb has less range than bows. Near-worst due to incompetence.
-Hexjerk embodies everything that was wrong with dark magic in DS1. Wrath of the Gods + Affinity combined into one spell that fires as quickly as DS1 WotG did? What. Why. What did we do to deserve this, From. Maybe it's survivable on NG, but on NG+ it's purely trollololol oops what do you mean you didn't have two thousand hit points to spare? Definite worst due to being an obnoxious OHKO machine placed after an extremely long and unskippable line of normal enemies.
-Holy knight has precisely one gimmick, but it's an awesome one: Chameleon! I'm glad From finally went there.
-The last invader is...special. In a lot of ways. Spoiler-texting for the Fenrirs. It's an unannounced invasion, and he's wearing the White Ring to make himself look like a helpful phantom. He'll even do the friendly wave gesture, and then calmly follow you around while you look for the switch to open a nearby gate...Of course, he's a repeat invader from DLC2, so I recognized him and attacked him immediately. The fact that you can lock on to him should be a tip off even if you don't recognize him. But later I loaded up another file to see what happens if you actually trust him: he stays friendly just long enough for you to be engaged flipping the switch and then...*backstab*, of course, which is a OHKO because horrific lance crits. And then he does the I Don't Think Sooooo taunt over your corpse.. So basically every dickish thing a PC invader is likely to do rolled together. He even runs off to hide behind chibi-bonewheels and recolored bosses to heal up after taking notable damage! Mauldron is a meta motherfucker.
By this point I've managed to collect a couple wins in the optional zone. It is horrific, sadistic and wrong--and, like the optional areas of the other DLC installments, plainly meant to be navigated in co-op (there's a reason these specific areas are the ones people can warp into as summons even without the DLC). This is the Frigid Outskirts:
-80-90% of the time area is covered in near-whiteout blizzard conditions. It's actually a straight line to the boss gate, but in no way is this obvious when you first get there. There are a scant few landmarks, but following them isn't actually the safest way to progress (which again is not remotely obvious). I at least give the zone credit for being incredibly unpleasant in a way different from every other area of the game. No gray hallways here!
-But I don't even want to play any reindeer games! Dear god, they're everywhere. They're durable, evasive, have a plethora of irritating spells and knockdown effects, and spawn at random near constantly whenever the blizzard's active (which is almost always). The game will not wait for you to kill one before producing another, and if you're too slow doing that you could easily wind up with two or even three of them after you at once (which is basically guaranteed death). It's especially bad near the boss gate, where they seem to spawn with doubled frequency and where it seems almost inevitable to get stuck in a chain of "kill reindeer just in time for another one to show up." You can't run from them--they will track you relentlessly, all the way across the map, blizzard be damned, and not only is it very likely you'll get jacked right outside the boss gate by a reindeer you didn't know existed, I'm actually more surprised now when this doesn't happen.
-The boss is a duo, and appallingly tricky to track while both of them are in the field (second activates on an HP trigger, which looks somewhat easy to blitz through based on YouTube videos of NG but that isn't remotely feasible on NG+). You really have to mind what's going on everywhere in the battlefield, because the two of them--like most of the other DLC bosses--have an unnerving tendency to disengage combat just to charge across the arena and smack someone who's busy trying to fight a different enemy. Just because you happen to be the player constantly attacking the boss is no guarantee he'll actually pay attention to you. I'm not sure if this is deliberate programming or flaky enemy AI (there's certainly plenty of the latter to go around in these games) but they do seem to pointedly target distracted players. Anyone still suffering under the delusion that they can safely stand across the arena casting spells just because they've got friends to distract the boss isn't likely to last ten seconds--it seems like the AI for these bosses avidly punishes anyone attempting to rely on range (because From hates focused casters now).
-The worst part of the fight might just be that they can smash you with falling damage from landing on you during an evasion (sorta like what happened constantly with Sif in DS1 except whups there goes half your health instead of oh noes four or five HP). I'm not even sure this is deliberate--it feels like genuine B.S., because everything else in their arsenal has a genuinely useful tell, but half a ton of smilodon instantly landing on you really doesn't and it's just the lamest way to die.
The place is a nightmare. You can apparently permanently despawn the reindeer after enough kills--which is actually what happened before I managed to land a successful boss run. So much death. What can men do against such reckless caribou?
Oh, but there's a ring that lets you look all sexy and human while a phantom in someone else's world. Is it worth wasting a ring slot on this? Guys, please. (Of course it is, why would you even ask.)
That's pretty much it, I think. Like the other DLCs, occasionally aggravating but there's some nice loot and bosses, and the environments are notably cooler than most of the base game's so I'm mostly happy with the balance.
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Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor: So, bought this based off two videos and I'm just really liking it. Probably gonna be my Game of the Year(though not like that's an accomplishment with what little I've played). Gameplay is Assassin's Creed + Batman Arkham Series just with a helluva lot more decapitations so it's pretty spiffy. I wasn't too attuned to Arkham's combat but this combat flows really well to me. I think my highest combo in Arkhams was like... 20. I've already broke 100 here so yeah. The sheer chaos that can happen in combat just makes it a DELIGHT too. My favorite fight was me getting swarmed by orcs so I shoot the lock off a cage to free a captured beast(Caragor) who strats tearing into them and giving me breathing room. So I climb up, mount the beast and waste the guys. Meanwhile their reinforcements get attacked by wild Caragors and because I'm mounted the wild ones ignore me so I clear like 50 orcs in no time. Or that time I needed to sneak by some orcs so I shot the locks on two cages to get a big fight going then dropped a giant bee's nest on them all. Or when I got caught by like 30+ orcs I lured them over explosives and blew them all up. Also you can poison orc grog and they'll start fighting each other because they don't know who's to blame.
So, yeah, I kinda like the game's gameplay a lot and it's not even complete.
The most intriguing thing is the NEMESIS system. Enemies have their own sets of stats that power up as they complete their own goals or kill you. The stronger they are the better reward you get from them too. So you can secretly support some orc on his rise through the ranks to pillage him for better stuff later.
Story's about as simple as anything LOTR narrative is; so good vs evil yadda yadda. It's played very nicely so far though.
Climbing can be pretty finicky, but I don't have any complaints about the controls otherwise.
In other news, I'm not gonna beat the bonus dungeon in Xillia 2. I just hate it too much to play anymore.
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Hyrule Warriors - Did some 2P with Magey yesterday, got my final character (Ghirahim) and a new weapon for Zelda. I will try it out soon~ Magey said he was pretty enjoyable to play as; I may need to try him out myself.
Smash 4- Piddling around with this, played Magey and Elf last night and got my ass kicked. Alas. I think the person I've had the most success with so far is Dedede, but that's mostly due to familiarity.
Kirby's Return to Dreamland - Finished World 1. Fluffy little game like the rest of the Kirbys I've played. Never will be an all-time favorite but enjoyable enough I suppose.
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Suikoden 3 - Finished this the other day. It is still good, but feels weirdly long right after Suikoden 1 and 2. The series starts as this pretty tight punchy thing into something I have easily sunk 60+ hours into multiple times, but it never really feels like its just a pointless long grind out for time. There is definitely things that pad the time out with regards to travel, but the game generally moves along all its points pretty smoothly.
I think my biggest criticism of it now is the Strategy battles. As an aged game that isn't being compared directly to is predecessors in a vacuuum, for all that they are way way more interesting compared to 1 and just better put together than 2 by many magnitudes, they are introduced really poorly. You have a couple of "unwinnable" battles to learn from in Chris 1 that your performance really doesn't impact anything. There is the optional Thomas 2 where you can get a quick crash course in them, but it is incredibly short and incredibly stacked in your favour to turtle it out (For good reasons). Then it doesn't come up again until Chapter 4 and your first couple of battles are actually plot retreats where you don't get to use ANY of the characters you have recruited so far. You are stuck with a bunch of mostly shitty characters (Lizards) you have never used before and a handful of good characters (Lucia) you haven't used before. Everyone you have sucks, the enemies massively outnumber AND are statistically superior, so you are better off just disengaging completely. You don't get much of a chance to learn how you actually use the system. After that there is the Brass Castle fight that is pretty easy if you know what you are doing, except there is invincible Yuber there. Then you only have like one more fight in the last chapter. It is a whole system that is actually kind of interesting with the way you get to choose your parties and can prioritise grouping of units, who is the Leader, making a Support team who pretty much only exist to use as Cover and support skills or to sit in the area and buff everyone else. It is very mechanically appealling to have party members performance directly based on your normal battle stats and runes etc. Just very satisfying to have your two game systems interact like that and it helps you predict units performance because of it. The only really disapointing component of that is that there is some characters that are usable in game that are strictly support in Strategy battles.
The actual Strategy battles themselves feel pretty flavourful too in the abstract of your lack of finer control of the units during engagements, but they do enact what you tell them to do etcetc. It is just a shame that once you are there, you just don't get to play with it much and it is the last time the series really plays with Turn Based Strategy game as a side mechanic (since S4 is puzzle game really,Tactics is kind of the whole of it and 5 is more Real Time with Pause Ogre Battle style gameplay) and it feels like they were heading in a pretty decent direction with it.
The final strategy battle shit me pretty hard too, since I did it twice to try and get the Major Victory spoils (which I shouldn't have bothered with since its just a Wind Hat, which is functionally worse than Chief's Hat in most situations). First time through I had a massive grind to get through the minions to even get to Sarah, then Yuber suicided on to someone I had over on the other side of the map (I think he ran into Chris critting him in the face for like 800 damage). The whole time Sarah bouncing around behind a pile of 2/3 guys that I couldn't blitz down fast enough to pin her down (Or she would dump an Explosion on your face). Second time, move bigger party to the left, kill the second wave of summons, Sara moves forward and attacks instead of being super defensive. Eats crits to face and dies. Final strategy battle prety much finished in 5 minutes. It was just two polar opposite experiences and the fight is super swingy as fuck based on random AI choices from Sarah (whether it be "ATTACK KEKEKEKEKE" on the macro level or "blow up entire opposing party with a super fast Explosion in first round"). Really the biggest issues with the Strategy maps comes down to developer choices with the plot bosses. When you are systemetically dismantling regular units the combat flows nicely. As soon as they introduce boss units that capable of randomly destroying an entire combat unit; either via spells or via being straight up fucking invincible and randomly busting out 3x damage crits; the flow is just gummed up into a slow dribbly shit.
The second plot retreat fight for example (From Duck Vilage IIRC) , I actually lost that at one point because I pressed the attack and you can actually hold up pretty okay against the statistically superior Harmonian Infantry (that also love to bust out them rando crits for massive damage) going on the offensive. I pushed all the way through to being able to engage Sarah directly with the shitty shitty lizard guys before the Geddoe cutscene (which from memory does get you a win?). They were completely wiped out by a Breath of Ice before I could do anything. Don't even know why I fucking tried.
But yeah. Everything else? Game is pretty solid. I even fucked around with Trading more than I have before to get Thomas some money to recruit Watari. I am pretty sure everything is rejiggered from normal so that Thomas can get some mad profits from stuff though. Crystal Balls you can buy at like 3 towns for a few hundred potch to sell at duck village for 6-10k? Ancient Texts for a few hundred to sell for 10+k at Vinay Del Zexay? Craaaaaazy. This was a waste because I recruited too many people as Thomas aaaaaand didnt ge to use him in the Strategy battles since you can't reform parties there. I did get to use an unlevels Nei/Toppo/Shabon party though!11!1!
Black Pokedudes 2 - Did stuff. Got 6 badges.
Atelier Rorona - Tal said this is nothing special as far as Atelier games go, nothing realy much experimented with here. Agree. It is just repeating the same basic quests over and over. It just feels like an Atelier game made with the absolutel minimum threshhold of effort. I don't know if quests are randomly picked from a pool or there is assigned ones avaialble on a table, but either way is done boringly and incredibly haphazardly (Failed a few quests due to time now because I saw a new thing I know the recipe for but the materials are literally unavailable as far as I can tell...). I really should overcome my need for Data and play it pretty blindly since it is pretty bland and I don't need to obsess over data for it. We shall see.
Dragon's Crown - I picked this up cheap second hand on the strength of Jim's like of it. I wasn't expecting my biggest complaint to be the controls. Too many things are on Square. As Dwarf you use it for Attack, Block and Run. You use one button for offense, defense and motion. The Triggers go largely unused at this point to other than Dodge. I also am REALLY fucking shitty about different move inputs. I can move left and right while doing attack strings, but up and down change the move I am doing and I don't move in those directions. Unless the attack type I am doing is an aerial attack (? I think?), then I get to move more freely. This is a 3D game with a 3D space. Don't lock me to 1 plane of movement because of how you get me to input attacks. This just straight up feels fucked. I know old side scrollers were likely to just lock you in place to attack too, but you had consistency there so it is a whole lot less jarring. I could probably get used to it, but I wasn't exactly going into this game with a whole lot of good will towards it to start with.
That said, before I took the game out of the PS3 and swapped it back for Frilly Lace Friendship Sim RPGs I did get to watch Dwarf ride around on a giant sabretooth tiger (which is to say he sits on it with his arms crossed doing nothig while the tiger mauls the fuck out of everything). That was pretty fucking metal.
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Smash 4: Been playing pretty much just this since it came out. I have over 16 hours logged in for play time, and I think it was 9 hours or so of actual time spent in fights, which considering most of those were in classic and took on average 1-1.5 minutes, uhm, yeah. >_>
Without people to play with until recently I've been muddling around in Games and More. Played a bit of All-Star, some Trophy Rush, Target Blast, etc. Just got R.O.B. (the last character for me) yesterday, shortly before playing against Ciato and NEB. I've been trying, for the most part, to just play through Classic with everybody however. I am missing 7 characters, 9 if you want to count the 2 Mii Fighter types I didn't use.
My thoughts so far are that I feel most competent with Little Mac and Lucina; Little Mac being my exact playstyle and I really enjoy the fact that some stages are just going to wreck him 5ever because they don't have much ground for him to be on, and Lucina just feels a little more like Melee Marth, who was one of my favourite characters. I really want to enjoy Robin, but ze is just... so underwhelming. None of zer moves are terribly great, and it feels like once you finally get to a point where you're finally doing shit, you run out of all of your tomes at once because it doesn't seem like they recharge until used up which is kind of terribad and probably the nail in the coffin. I don't enjoy playing a game that tries to promote varying up your moves, only to have that exact strategy screw you over. Everyone else seems fun and fairly unique. The AI is way too good at Duck Hunt and Ness IMHO, but as far as tier-type things, nobody seems to be just so far away from everyone else that there's no hope for them, aside from I feel Little Mac is kind of OP, and Robin is kind of terrible. Everyone else has a chance against everyone else, I feel.
Lots of the items, however, are just too unequivocally strong though. They introduced a lot of new items, and I'm glad for that, but the fact that so many of them come with almost no downside is just... too much. The new collect-the-pieces item is a huge beam that acts like a Home Run Bat but in a straight line, the bombs now rarely, if ever, have a chance of hurting you, the vaccuum is way too fucking strong because it goes on forever and has such strong pushing power. Why they didn't make Mario's F.L.U.D.D. have as much pushing power as an item, the FLUDD being a charging option and with much less time on its pushing too, is baffling and makes me look down on Mario more for it.
Going to take a bit of a break from the game for a bit, though, since I may have logged a few too many hours, and I'd like to not have NEB and Ciato and such refuse to play with me. >_>
Hyrule Warriors: Played this yesterday with Ciato, as well as about 10 minutes on a demo at an EB Games a week ago. I really enjoy it. It's simple but has fun and interactive gameplay, which was the part about Dynasty Warriors I liked, but it also adds in the Zelda elements pretty seamlessly. If you like Dynasty Warriors this is definitely the right game for you. I played as Darunia, Link, and Ghirahim. Darunia was a little boring until I figured out I could just roll around and pick up enemies and just sort of kill them as I made my way elsewhere. Link was... interesting? Didn't really stand out in any way whatsoever, though. Not against playing him, but he's not going to be my first pick either. Ghirahim, however, was amazing. He runs around slashing things apart, shooting things with magic, and making enemies explode. One of his combos that got unlocked was that he will slice at people, make them explode, then do a little dance as he creates a magical ceiling above them and at the end of his dance he magically tosses them into the ceiling. He also has some move where he acts like some sort of vampire as he shoots a red beam at someone, attaches it, then licks his blade. I don't know what it did (maybe amplify damage to them?) but it was fun and cool and stylish. He was so fun to play as.
My only complaint was how little there was in terms of fulfilling objectives. I liked having to strategically take outposts, and make sure you planned when and where to fight the various generals because the mooks actually mattered during boss fights. I'd still rate it 7.5-8/10 though. It fills its purpose wonderfully and is still very fun.
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Going to take a bit of a break from the game for a bit, though, since I may have logged a few too many hours, and I'd like to not have NEB and Ciato and such refuse to play with me. >_>
Dude don't worry about it. You just serve as motivation for the rest of us to git gud.
Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn - No resets run. Up to 3-11. Death so far: Laura (1-E), Jill (1-E), Mist (3-1), Leonardo (3-6), Edward (3-6). This should not be an especially surprising list outside of Jill, which was unfortunate but man is that map mean. Other things of note: my Nolan missed gaining speed for his first 8 levels (and has still only gained 1). He has a 60% speed growth, so the odds of that are about 1/1526. <__< Terrible. Not used to seeing Leonardo, Micaiah, and Aran all with 3+ speed on him. Ike has also doggedly refused to gain any speed, but this isn't as big a deal, since he just becomes Gatrie trading a second weapon type for +1 move and better supports or something. Does mean I'll have to give him a Speedwings if this keeps up, since he does need to gain 2 speed to not be doubled by Zelgius.
Smash 4 - Fun times, etc. I really love the expanded roster, as everyone probably knows. Mega Man! Palutena! Bowser Jr! Roy! FE characters who aren't male sword lords! Bowser who doesn't suck! Elecman as an assist trophy! So far I've had most success with Pikachu (my Brawl main) and Palutena, but I really need to play more; there are so many characters I want to try out more. There are so many modes it's hard to know where to focus and what the best way is to gain skills at human-to-human play which is what I actually care about. For items... I will give a special shout-out to the air bellows item being awful. Thank goodness for being able to control which items spawn! (However, possibly my biggest complaint about the game so far is they seem to have removed the ability to change the rate of item spawning, it's just on/off now. Which is a shame, because I really think that items on Low or Very Low is a better Smash experience.) For stages I really enjoy the Rainbow Road stage (no shock, I usually like the F-Zero type stages which it reminds me of), while I do not enjoy that Mario stage with the rotating Bowser statue (which you can't even hold onto... okay) or Magicant, which keeps alive the tradition of EB stages which aren't Onett being terrible (I want to fight other fighters, not flying men, thanks).
But yeah, I'm certainly enjoying the game a lot. I've always enjoyed Smash so yeah the roster being such pure unadulterated Dark Holy Elf fanservice pretty much guarantees the game being a hit in my eyes.
Lightning Returns - At the final dungeon. Mmm. Unfortunately the gameplay of the game never really evolved to be that great. It's not terrible by any means, but compared to the first game (which was brilliant) and the second (which had a great system if only sometimes well-used), man it's disappointing. I'll say more about the game when I'm done.
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Wasteland 2- Finished. About 45 hours long, I would say? Overall quite good, with a couple of problems. I enjoyed myself all the way through.
The game is, to a large degree, carried by the atmosphere it creates. Every area just drips with the work of the art staff, and they're all pretty distinctive in their own way. It's a much smaller game world than Fallout 2, but I wasn't expecting it to be of that scope in the first place. Another thing that sets it apart from FO2 is that unlike FO2, where you had the early reemergence of industry and the inklings of moving away from a scavenging-based economy, WL is still set firmly in the mindset of scavenging and refurbishing. This means when you buy that last magazine of 7.62, that's all they have. They don't have an Adytum to mass-produce bullets for them, let alone guns. Vendor stocks tend to be pretty decent but I've cleared out one or two in my time.
Skills have a lot of granularity (What would be "small guns" in FO2 has been split up into four different guns, safecracking and lockpicking are different skills, ect), but generally they give you more than one way to do a thing based on what skills you have, with differing difficulties. A chain link fence is easier to open by force than it is to pick the lock, for instance, but something might be nigh-impossible to force open but pickable. Combat is XCOM-lite, with less emphasis on how good your character is at combat as the single metric of whether you should use them. A character with computer skills, for example, can override the targeting program of a robot enemy and turn it on your side (a tactic that saved my ass many a time) or someone can win over an animal to your side. Healing items that anyone can use are generally too weak to make a difference past the early game, where they are a valuable safety net, so having a field medic (or preferably two) on your team is an important thing, as is having a surgeon. Characters who reach 0 hp don't die immediately, and can be saved by a surgeon if they can be stabilized before bleeding out. So with a few exceptions, the game rewards you if you diversify your skills as much as possible and cover a lot of bases with your maximum of 7 characters (4 rangers, three recruitable guests).
The writing is generally pretty solid, with a lot of descriptive short passages that go into your combat log like an old-school narrator. Dialogue isn't the high point of the game for the most part, but the dialogue tree is pretty robust and allows you to poke around and investigate the background of things or not as you please. I cut off the final boss' big speech about how the danger I represented to the world after four words with "Fine, whatever, I'm dangerous, and now I'm going to kill you to prove it."
On the downside? Weapon balance is not great. Assault and sniper rifles become good quickly and stay that way almost the entire game, but everything else is all over the board (except heavy weapons, which chew through ammunition at an unsustainable rate for a game where vendors don't restock and you are finding bullets 2 or 3 at a time in caches). Blunt weapons are extremely bad to begin, become servicable if you get the skills to use weapon modifications, and then get stupidly good once the sledgehammer enters the picture. Bladed weapons would be better if they didn't rely on causing bleeding for extra damage in a game where you fight a fuckton of robots all the time, but are solid early on and fall off a cliff. Pistols and SMGs are okay until you make it to LA and then stop being able to penetrate armor, and energy weapons do more damage the more armored something is, so they only get better and better until they're practically mandatory. Shotguns are bad, then amazing, then kind of bad again. Committing to one type of weapon seems to be a bad idea unless it's an AR or sniper, which is frustrating. Also, Hollywood and the Bastion, the last major quest hub, is an amazingly complex interwoven set of quests and story triggers, which of course means in this, the first post-release patch, it is easy to break, and I locked myself out of a quest or two on accident when I don't think I should have been (when you fuck up a quest, you get told you fucked up).
All in all, though, I greatly enjoyed it and would like more in the future.
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Smash 4: Damn it ROB, stop being elusive and unlock already! I'll find you yet if it's the last thing I do...which may very well be the case!!!
Also I suck at Smash Run it seems, but seem to win the final battle pretty consistently anyway.
Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze: Finally got back to this, finished World 4, did first stage in World 5, and lost 30 lives over the course of 4 stages. This is a situation where if I say "I only lost 30 lives!" someone will go "that's a lot for 4 stages" but if I say "man, that took 30 lives, evil!" someone will respond "ONLY 30 in 4 stages!? Man, the game is pulling it's punches! You're suppose to lose that many in ONE stage!"
...it's still fun in that frustrating, masochistic way of course, just like DKCR, and it's far prettier too. May have said it before, but also one of the better handling of swimming mechanics I've seen in a platformer, if for the simple reason of your still have offense. Yeah, gameplay changes, but at least an enemy is not just a glorified hazard outside of a power up like in other games.
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Shadow of Mordor: I beat an Orc Captain so damn hard he actually wanted me to eat him. That was hilarious. Another of the Orc Captains is a poet and that's just PRECIOUS. One other time I was just traveling along when I tried to sneak kill an orc and WHOOPS it was a Captain who it didn't work on. EXCEPT it was the very same Captain who'd been plaguing my efforts for a long ass time despite me killing him like three times. And then three other Captains and a whole garrison joined the fray! It was an utterly bloody affair and I had to let two go, but my nemesis and another died along with another fifty orcs.
That fight allowed me to unlock the final Tier of abilities too. Combo requirement to get my insta-kill finisher down to five hits? Hell yeah! Two finishers off of one combo? SIGN ME UP! The upgrades in this game just FEEL strong. My stun combo now ends with a head explosion, me regaining my health and enemies being frightened. My bow now allows me to teleport to enemies. I can make Death Threats against Captains and power them up for more LOOT. This game is pretty crazy awesome.
I think one of the things I like most is that the Bonus Objectives are just some small thing instead of hugely elaborate and stupidly hard. Assassin's Creed 3's were so agonizing and my own compulsions forced me to complete them each time and it made a bad game even worse. Even AC2: Revelations had so many bad ones, "get through this area filled with guards without being seen also there's literally only one route and the guards come in groups and if you fail enjoy climbing for 5 minutes to get back!" The most difficult bonus here? Get a 100 combat multiplier and even that was pretty reasonable.
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Dragon's Crown - I picked this up cheap second hand on the strength of Jim's like of it. I wasn't expecting my biggest complaint to be the controls. Too many things are on Square. As Dwarf you use it for Attack, Block and Run. You use one button for offense, defense and motion. The Triggers go largely unused at this point to other than Dodge. I also am REALLY fucking shitty about different move inputs. I can move left and right while doing attack strings, but up and down change the move I am doing and I don't move in those directions. Unless the attack type I am doing is an aerial attack (? I think?), then I get to move more freely. This is a 3D game with a 3D space. Don't lock me to 1 plane of movement because of how you get me to input attacks. This just straight up feels fucked. I know old side scrollers were likely to just lock you in place to attack too, but you had consistency there so it is a whole lot less jarring. I could probably get used to it, but I wasn't exactly going into this game with a whole lot of good will towards it to start with.
Wait you chose Dorf and are doing things other than throwing dudes into other dudes?
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Megami Tensei 2: Damn! The atmosphere!
Check out that shirtless guy with a sword + pink pants + long blonde hair, on a pink and green motorcycle
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/41/1412894274-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00025.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/41/1412894273-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00026.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/41/1412894279-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00021.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/41/1412894272-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00024.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/41/1412894278-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00013.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/41/1412894278-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00015.png)
Still a constant grind though
Edit:
Fenrir, I have a request. Play Child of Light in a Fenrir-level perverse way.
Eventually.
Reminds me that I really really did like playing P3 as a loner who only ever comes home to play MMORPGs and who shuns his friends constantly.
I eventually stopped because P3, kinda boring on replays
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Good man. Also, checking, it is possible to abandon Robert too (don't follow him into the vault) so an antisocial CoL solo is probably legal. If probably impossible at reasonable levels (have one of your frailest party members getting stunlocked by 3 enemies in a game without the ability to grind for broken items, have fun.). At least there's stat boosters...
DLC isn't much FWIW, but it is cheap. It's just a new character; there isn't really a quest to go with them, unlike say Mass Effect 2. Oh well.
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Shadow of Mordor: The teleport allows me to continue my combo chain across vast distances. I managed to get halfway across the map with just one combo because of it. It's AMAZING. Combat in this game just feels sooooo fun and this is a more enjoyable experience I've had in gaming in a year.
Now for the absolutely best part: I can Mind Control orcs. This allows for such an absurd amount of fuckery it's amazing. I can command captains to murder other captains, command warchiefs to start riots, pick and choose who lives or dies! Well, more than usual anyway. Even the generic grunts I control keep under the spell when I'm on the other side of the map. It's so cool!
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FFX-2 Yattaf solo: NOT FORGOTTEN
I kinda was stuck on Dark Yojimbo.
It's an optional mission but... I didn't want to just leave it there.
Dark Yojimbo is fought after a long mission with no savepoints, He has a dog who can't be targeted and attack basically whenever the fuck he wants. He also has Zanmato, which reduces HP and MP to 1, and which can be immediately followed by some dog attack or poizn damage for the kill. He doesn't use it every X turns so it's unpredictable, and the rest of the time he either does low damage or MP damage + Poizn.
But it turns out you can basically cancel the mission with no consequences. So you can get the teleporter to Yojimbo, cancel the mission, then be able to get back in and fight him in a few seconds from the savepoint. (and learn his attacks more) Neat.
I noticed that Zanmato is the only move with a charge time.
Equipped the HP+60% and status immunity rings
Equipped the +strength mantra
Started the fight hasting Paine and activating all the +strength nodes then just staying with the Furry (/Berserker) class
Always waiting for Yojimbo to act before acting myself to not get caught by Zanmato by surprise. Whenever he started actually charging a move instead of using it immediately, I picked a mega ultra chocolate potion to fully heal HP right after the Zanmato.
Otherwise, berserker smash
It worked!
I could have used supervillain flying Iron Woman Paine with physical and magical immunity (it works on Zanmato), but applying the immunity every X turns is a shore.
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Nier - I started this up when I wanted a change of pace from Atelier Rorona because while I was enjoying it, it was super repetetive and I wanted to break things up and Dragon's Crown wasn't pushing buttons in ways I wanted to.
So I finished the Forest of Myth last night, which was cool at first and then had 2 more sequences more than it needed. Spent today finishing off the last of side quests in Part 1. THen dismounted a boar to kill some shadows. Game hard froze. Hadn't saved. Lost a lot of really tedious side questing. Kiiiiiiiiiind of think I might move on. Apparently 4 years has been a long time in standardizing Auto Save.
Game is neat writing, but gameplay is shitty (as in Normal isn't worth my time, it isn't nearly good enough to want to crank it up to Hard, so I am seriously considering putting it on Easy because if its boring at least I can make it quicker). Neat writing isn't worth the time it takes to do things. Side quests are really good for setting tone but again time:pay off is too high.
It is okay, but its my first Cavia game, so I don't have mega boners for seeing how it plays out. I am just not super invested in it. The soundtrack feels pretty overhyped from what I have seen now too. This amazing that you guys have hyped is orchestral stuff with some okay female vocals over the top? Eh, I will stick with Shadow Hearts and SMT as the stand out more interesting JRPG music.
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Valkyria Chronicles - Anime meets World War I. That's some stunningly pretty art direction, though.
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Grefter: in fairness to the music, most of the standout tracks (in my opinion) turn up fairly late in the game. Song of the Ancients ~ Fate, Emil ~ Karma, Shadowlord all endgame songs, though I also quite like the sisters' duet and the gloomy Aerie BGM, and the mansion has some really nice tension-building mood music. OH RIGHT, Gods Bound By Rules, outstanding fight theme for a totally random boss, shows up nowhere else in the game. Those are some drums right there.
The songs you hear the most (for the wilderness around your hometown) I grew deathly sick of over the course of too many repetitious sidequests.
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Valkyria Chronicles - Anime meets World War I. That's some stunningly pretty art direction, though.
Learn to love the scout rush.
Defense Grid 2- Near the end of chapter 3. It's not clicking with me quite as much as defense grid 1 but it is a lot of fun even so.
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Valkyria Chronicles - Anime meets World War I. That's some stunningly pretty art direction, though.
It's definitely anime World War II. Note that Gunther's father fought in *First* Europan War in the backstory? Also throw in an oppressed minority whom both sides hate? Less with the trenches, more with the tanks, too.
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IIRC most Nier sidequests are filler and can be skipped (outside of the lighthouse one)
Grefter: in fairness to the music, most of the standout tracks (in my opinion) turn up fairly late in the game. Song of the Ancients ~ Fate, Emil ~ Karma, Shadowlord all endgame songs, though I also quite like the sisters' duet and the gloomy Aerie BGM, and the mansion has some really nice tension-building mood music. OH RIGHT, Gods Bound By Rules, outstanding fight theme for a totally random boss, shows up nowhere else in the game. Those are some drums right there.
The songs you hear the most (for the wilderness around your hometown) I grew deathly sick of over the course of too many repetitious sidequests.
Word.
I hate Hills of Radiant Winds so much. So much.
As far as I'm concerned in-game music reaches a peak earlygame with the first dungeon (and its seamless music transition between voice + instruments (during a fight) and just instruments (outside fights)) and the Aerie.
Outside of the mansion music and some boss fights nothing grabbed me as much.
FFX-2 Yattaf solo: Finished Chapter 3, got all dresspheres except Mascot.
Dark Knight is pretty cool, finally there's a class with competent MT damage. (Black mage and Lady Luck are the alternative. Fuck them)
Berserker is also fun. I have a dressphere with +15 str nodes everywhere (that activate if you switch dresspheres the right way) So against some enemies I just use Haste, change clothes 4 times for +60 strength, then use Berserk. Very Psycho Cyan-esque.
I'm pretty sure this +60 Strength thing would be even better with Gunner's Trigger Happy. I'll try that out later.
I kept X pressed for ten minutes as I was fighting a monster, spamming Free Hi Potion every turn to unlock Free Ether. Don't judge me. Free Ethers, man.
The biggest threat right now is all those gravity attacks. 30% cHP, 50% cHP, 99,9% cHP. They're everywhere. There's also that weird skeleton in a wall thing that does 100% cHP damage (lol) for his physical attack.
I'm not sure if gravity protection could actually protect me against these, or if it only works against spells like Demi.
Edit: Oh god, the dance minigame
In horror, I just left my vita sitting there and got 0 points
The game still awarded me with an accessory
Neat!
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Add me to list of people who thought Nier's OST was nothing particularly special. Has some pretty tracks, but there's so much forgettable filler, it's your typical jRPG OST in that regard.
Chibirhythm Sequel: Return of the Chibis: Unlocked a few more characters, notably Cloud, Onion Knight and Zidane. Actually, Cosmos is the only Red Shard character left! I blame Street Pass defaulting to a 3 Red Shard short map and Comic-Con. Still haven't played an Ultimate Song, been too busy playing...
Smash: Smashing stuff. Lots of Smashing. Still haven't given Pac-Man or Duck Hunt Dog actual use yet, and I feel bad about it!
Bayonetta 2 Demo: Well, it's the same as I played as Comic-con last year, but now I can do it at my couch...14 more times...that should be enough to last me until I get the actual game. It's basically more of the first game with a few new features, and I totally approve of a Devil Trigger like option in Umbran Climax to use instead of Torture Attacks. Makes your magic gauge meaningful against Bosses.
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My global smash power in All Star mode with Bowser is 1,101,056. 8-)
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Valkyria Chronicles - Anime meets World War I. That's some stunningly pretty art direction, though.
Learn to love the scout rush.
I'm still on C2 and the game's already telling me Alicia's destiny is to commando the universe.
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Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn: Lost Aran in 3-12, Fiona in 3-13, Rhys in 3-Endgame, and Leanne in 4-Prologue. I'm on a roll! Fortunately I'm through the part I was most worried about (Dawn Brigade part 3) and 3-13 was actually surprisingly easy despite being five PCs short and having a super-trashy Nolan (who decided to become less trashy by gaining 4 speed in a row during that fight). Honestly, having the yellow units wall the west side and at least five non-Micaiah able-bodied units, only two of which really need to fight (and Sothe/Tauroneo are forced/can't die), should be enough to handle that map, although at the bare minimum it could be dicy. I was well above said minimum though.
Smash 4 - Having lots of fun with this. Palutena, Bowser, Bowser Jr., Mega Man, Lucina, Sheik, and both Samuses are the characters I'm using most, though I'm of course experimenting with a bunch more. I've mostly retreated from using Robin, s/he just really wasn't working out for me. Pikachu I also feel way, way worse at than I did in Brawl. I keep trying to use Thunder as a killing move and it doesn't work. This could be the first Smash game where Pikachu isn't at least in my top five for use.
Lightning Returns - Beat this. 44 hours or so, 42 sidequests done.
An interesting game which for the most part doesn't manage to be more than that. Its gameplay is fine for a solo RPG, with just enough timed defence mechanics to keep you interested and a pretty nice setup for choosing attacks (three paradigms means you can switch between them with L/R, four attacks each easily mapped to the face buttons). But ultimately it feels pretty shallow. Staggering is still important but the game is now very vague about it; the stagger gauge is mostly hidden except for a far more qualitative sinewave thing. Really dampens the otherwise potentially interesting system of staggering different enemies in different ways. Past that it's just timed block what you can and hope your resources hold out otherwise. Debuffs are still neat at least, nice to see that FF13 series staple returns.
The way the game handles resources is quite unique. Healing is strictly limited by a tight inventory and a limited EP gauge. Battles are fought not for levels but for gold and EP which replenish these resources, and in the case of EP can also be used to prolong the amount of time you have in the game which is key to doing quests (which do give the game's "levels"). It's a different paradigm than the norm and I found that shake-up rather pleasant. It was arguably at its best early when gold was handed out in small enough amounts so that just getting enough to affore more potions required attention, but that part melted away quickly as potions became dirt cheap and gold become useful only for buying the super-overpriced equips which you didn't really need anyway since you got enough good ones through plot and the odd random drop.
One thing I really missed was the old FF13/-2 retry option. If you came in with the wrong skills (say you really needed lightning to stagger a certain enemy, but it wasn't on your setup) then you had to waste resources on the fight because you weren't psychic. You could use Escape but one hour of game time felt like a really punitive measure for that. Definitely a step backwards, and I appreciated that the final dungeon made Escape free again. Should have done that all game! On the plus side, though, randoms were back to being fully avoidable so you could make the decision as to whether they were worth fighting yourself (important given the aforementioned balance of resources the game has going).
Writing-wise yeah it's not very good. There are some positives. The setting is excellent, pretty much asking "what would happen if everyone stopped aging + no new births for 500 years" and running with it. It's neat! Unfortunately the dialog is bad and overly wordy, and the main plot just isn't much. It has some good ideas but they're not strung together very well, and suffers badly from literally only giving a damn about one new character (the Order being a faceless mass was a huge mistake IMO). Lumina was a fairly fun character but her resolution was weak, and the game didn't really add much to the returning cast, outside of maybe giving some closure for Noel which he lacked in 13-2.
Music's largely forgettable. I dunno. Graphics are nice enough though a bit glitchy at points; the game certainly keeps alive the Final Fantasy sequel tradition of being low-budget.
Decent enough game and I don't regret playing it. But not really great. 5/10 seems right.
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Atelier Rorona - I just watched a sequence where a teenage girl was sexually assaulted by a middle aged widow. Then the next day the teenage girl awkwardly trying to go to the widow's shop and buy something and being thankful that the widow was too drunk to remember molesting her.
Still more interested in it than going back to Nier...
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Oh my god we could have had this in Layton vs Phoenix and didn't: http://31.media.tumblr.com/43ded5a5966b441b0679193069b75d69/tumblr_mnes0pMahp1qgtwgso1_500.png
LOOK AT THAT.
Grefter. Grefter we need fashion policing on this shit stat.
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Grefter: re: Nier
Doing sidequests in a cavia game and then complaining it's boring? *shrug* Though I agree the Forest of Myth is kinda trolling, particularly if you're not in the mood for a text adventure. Still, the gameplay's best feature is probably its 'let's randomly change gameplay genres in quick succession', so if you're not liking that dissonance, then that's understandable and I honestly wouldn't defend it as a 'for-everybody' gimmick.
Didn't you also spoil yourself on the entirety of the game's story and its supplemental stuff or am I thinking of some other DLers?
As for music, maybe it's just preference, but I really like the vocals and the generally powerful tracks. I hear a lot of JRPG OSTs that generally just drone in the background, but Nier's presentation seemed to highlight the music very well. The layering method for transitioning between tracks in different areas or for ramping up the intensity in battle just really made the music shine in-game. Admittedly, I like the entire OST out-of-game just as much because the full intense songs sound like actual songs to me instead of just 'ambiance setters'. I concede that Shadow Hearts and SMT music tend to do this pretty well too! These OSTs also find themselves on my playlist quite often, though I feel there's a lot more 'forgettable' tracks on their more expansive OSTs. The only tracks in Nier I generally find myself skipping are the plains music, but even those I tend to enjoy when I haven't heard them in a long while.
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I could talk plenty about Edgeworth there, but I don't have much on Larry other than renfairedjinn.png
I will complain about sidequests being shitty in a game when the game goes out of its way to be all about style and presentation, has those side quests be really good methods of presenting this theme of parenthood in a lot of really interesting ways, going about it in the most boring grindy way it possibly can and then my game hard locking and eating 3 or 4 hours of progress. Like literally it is that last thing that is the problem here. I chose to do the side quests while I sat there and listened to podcasts I can enjoy. Just the concept of doing it again isn't appealling, the rest of the gameplay is also not super appealing enough to push me to just deal with it and move on when I would rather just play something else.
I will give you the game mixing of the tracks is pretty good yeah.
POKEDUDES - Caught Aramis. I am super disappointed they present them to you in the wrong order. Athos, Aramis then Porthos? laaaaaame. I have d'Artagnan in a box to use if I reaaaally feel like, but d'Artagnan is snooze town. Tempted run Musketteer team once I get Porthos.
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Kirby's Return to Dreamland - Beat the final boss but didn't access the frue final boss. Oh well.
Smash - Trying to mostly free-for-all the Level 8 CPUs to train to play other players.
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Warriors Orochi 3 Ultimate - In the new content now. Tamamo can apparently just walk up and one-shot my slightly underleveled officers that I manage to clear the rest of the map including several officer rushes with. *SIGH* Time to grind I GUESS. Or be non-stubborn and just use my already build up peeps to play instead of insisting on using the recommended team. But where's the fun in that, I like swapping chars every level~
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Pokemon Black 2 - (http://cdn.bulbagarden.net/upload/d/dd/VSDrayden.png)
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"UOM Cap'n K would like to battle!"
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And yes that is my real facial hair.
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Vandal Hearts: Got bored and decided to replay this, blew through 4 chapters in one marathon sitting. I decided to go for maximum class variety over optimum setup, so Clint went down the Guardsman tree, Diego and Amon went down the Hawknight tree, and Eleni and Sara went down the Monk tree. Game is generally easier than I remembered it, which doesn't surprise me much. Really I think the best way to sum up VH difficulty is that it is actually decently hard if you want to perfect stages but the actual incentive to do so is fairly low (while you lose money for PC deaths in a stage, the game still gives you approximately 3 times as much money as you can possibly use by midgame).
I honestly think the Guardsman tree is kind of underrated (or, perhaps, more accurately, that the Swordsman tree is overrated). Guardsman and Swordsman feel pretty clearly like the two worst classes in the game to me; both have extreme trouble moving over bad terrain, height differences, etc. (Guardsman is even worse in this regard), Swordsmen do consistently unimpressive damage and really are not very durable at all (they tend to get 3HKOed, maybe 4HKOed at best). Guardsmen may be weak to magic but they weather physical hits a hell of a lot better _and_ they output better damage as well, and VH is an SRPG which actually fairly strongly rewards defensive play much of the time in a way that, say, Fire Emblem doesn't nearly as often, which makes the lack of movement less of a liability. If you want to get into arguments of what's optimal, I'd say it's probably optimal to make Clint a Guardsman, Dolan a Swordsman, and Grog can be either. This has nothing to do with stats (they all differ from each other by no more than 1 stat point), but rather to do with battle-start formations, since you cannot customize them in VH. Clint almost always starts at the front of the party, and Dolan almost always starts at the back of the party. Grog alternates at various points.
I'm generally inclined to feel that Hawknight is the superior class tree to Bowman, but with that being said, making Diego a Hawknight is a seriously bad idea in retrospect, since it leaves you completely archerless for almost all of chapter 3, which is full of dangerous flying enemies that an archer Diego could handily OHKO. On the reverse side of the token, Hawknight is pretty clearly superior for Amon because it makes 3-5 (the first part of the prison escape) waaaaay easier when he can just fly over the juggernauts and stab them in the back. If I replay this again I'll probably go 3 hawknight/1 bowman with Diego being the bowman.
Monk is a tricky case. It's very clearly the inferior promotion option for both of the classes that get it (mage and priest), but having played with 2 of them in this run, I am emphatically convinced that you want to have one in your team ultimately. (And probably only one.) Priest->Monk is less of a downgrade than Mage->Monk is. I'd say that Sara is probably the optimal candidate to take up martial arts; it frankly kind of fits her aggressive personality, too. I say that you definitely want a single Monk because their complete ignorance of terrain penalties combined with what I think is the second highest movement stat in the game (behind hawknights) is an incredible asset for, say, charging in and destroying enemy archers. They don't take hits any worse (or better) than swordsmen and they do fairly similar damage (a little lower but usually enough to OHKO archers still), and their magic, while inferior to either the bishop or sorcerer spell lists, does have some uses. Making all the spellcasters monks might make for an interesting challenge play sometime, given how much magic normally bends VH over (LOL PHASE SHIFT). Monk Eleni makes 3-6, which is already probably the hardest map in the game, notably harder, but I still got it on the first try.
I wish more SRPGs had map objectives as varied as VH's sometimes are.
FF4 TAY Android: No real progress on this, but may make some this weekend as I'll be out of the house for 4 days (starting Friday morning) and I'm not taking the 3DS with me for various reasons, so this and FFD will basically be the only games I have with me.
I really wish S-E would bring out FFD on a non-phone platform of some kind though, tilebased movement on a phone (especially a small one) is incredibly clunky with touch controls and to make matters worse it's the kind of game that kind of wants you to have an FAQ handy due to (apparent) missables. Sigh.
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Pokedudes Black 2 - Recruited Porthos.
"This dress is comfy and easy to wear..."
(http://cdn.bulbagarden.net/upload/5/57/Spr_B2W2_Marlon.png)
Literally the best pokemon game ever made.
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Super Smash Brothers 3DS - When did they give Robin Shadowgift!?
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Devil May Cry - Decided to finally give this a spin. Finished the first two missions with one death, but then I encountered the always-lovable Phantom. Had 12 resets last night, then I turned the game on this morning and kicked his ass on the first try (with the aid of a trusty Vital Star). Seems fun so far aside from the hilariously bad camera.
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Super Smash Bros. 3DS - I love Mega Man.
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Re: Nier side quests, they are literally trolling. The easier they are to do the better the awards. The ones that are time-consuming and super frustrating usually give no reward.
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Pokemon Black 2 -
<Ghetsis>
After being defeated
(steps back) "How can this be? I'm the creator of Team Plasma! I'm perfect! I'm the absolute ruler who will change the world! And I've lost to some unknown Trainer not once, but TWICE?!" (paces, then turns to N) "I can't accept this! This isn't possible! I can't be bested by fools who can't even use Pokémon correctly!"
<Captain N the Boring Master>"It's hard to call you this, but... Father! Please understand. Pokémon are not tools. Pokémon and humans take each other to greater heights. They are our wonderful partners. Some humans understand this. Why can't you?"
<Ghetsis> (turns away) "Shut your mouth! Shut up! Shut up! Shut UP! Don't talk like a person, you freak! No real person could talk to Pokémon!"
All that Ciatos.
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FF10 HD: So...I played through the rest of Makalania a while ago, stopped when I got to Bikanel due to time reasons, sat on my ass then finally picked it up against nearly a month later. I need to stop being lazy with this game! So I rewatched the scene I was struggling to remember just in case right before this.
So the team falls under the ice, so Tidus' reaction? More or less what he does all other times: Talk to everyone! Auron gives him advice and Tidus has an immature impatient reaction of "oh boy a lecture!" This is more Tidus trying to act cool and making an ass of himself more than anything else...not whining...yes, I have to emphasize it's not whining.
Wakka has an existential crisis because "OMG I AM NOW A HERETIC HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN!?" Tidus is quick to remind Wakka to not blame Rikku because she's in the exact same situation and "BLAME THE AL BHED!" solves nothing. Rikku, by contrast, is taking the situation pretty well and is more curious how everyone else is doing. This somehow leads to Rikku insinuating "we could totally date when I'm older!" Ok, what it really was is a talk about maturity and how Lulu is all grown up, but the way Tidus backs off and changes the subject to asking Kimhari how to get off, yeah, pretty sure we're suppose to assume Rikku was going for that double entendre.
By the way, this sequence is more painful in retrospect. Why? Because in FF10-2, Rikku is 2 years older, and clearly acts way less mature. One thing I am noticing is that for all of Rikku being clearly the youngest member on the team, and despite the sequence, she's actually fairly mature for her age. Oh sure, she has those teen moments, but the way she composes herself in serious moments, talks about real life issues, etc., she's actually pretty grounded in reality. It makes her FF10-2 self, who basically exists to be a pure slap-stick parody laugh to contrast Paine that much more painful, because "let's compromise one of Rikku's more subtle qualities just to emphasize LET'S PART GIRLS WHEE!!! OH NO THIS IS DISASTERIRRIFIC!"
Anyway, that tangent aside, Rikku notices the change in subject (see? She's not an idiot in this game! GOD DAMN IT FF10-2!), and Kimhari finds a way to answer both Tidus and Rikku at the same time:
"We climb. Only those who try become."
How convenient that speaking literally and metaphorically manages to work here! I guess what I get out of this is...Rikku climbed the latter of maturity, then fell off it and fell into the basement between FF10 and FF10-2. One problem with this scene is FF10 sort of spells out what Kimhari is saying by Tidus mansplaining it to Rikku, but whatever. Kimhari ends with "I think Rikku should stay Rikku" so this is totally a "Be happy with yourself!" after school special. What I'm reading from this is if the Gagazet Ronso didn't all get nearly genocided by Seymour by the end of the game, Kimhari wouldn't have become Chief and instead would have created his own special educational TV series for kids: "Kimhari and Friends"
In the end, Rikku gets angry at this, and Tidus laughs it off. This is actually neat because it shows a good sense of cast chemistry, with Tidus being able to laugh at his friends...again, as usual, Tidus is very good at dealing with bad situations, and staying positive, despite what many think. Rikku obviously is too, considering she's more angry at the "HEY, WHAT DO YOU MEAN I CAN"T BE LIKE LULU!?" and not the "WE'RE DOOMED!!!!" situation. Wakka gets angry at this. Way to spoil the moment Wakka!
Then Yuna wakes up, explains her motivations which were pretty clear to the player at this point but good to establish the party members understand. Auron tells Yuna to stop worrying, it's in the past, and move on (Rikku complaining that Auron is being a little too mean); Auron is just concerned with the pilgrimage, even stating that if heresy is the price to pay to finish the pilgrimage, then so be it. Naturally, the team is surprised by Auron's statements, but this line is important because it shows where Auron's loyalties lie, or at least finally implies it:
He doesn't care about Yevon or any of this. He just cares that Sin dies and believes the Final Aeon is the only method (at least, so we're to believe here; replays you know Auron has ulterior motives.) It's clear he was siding with Yevon because why make them your enemy? We all want the same thing, better Yevon support you than try to kill you. Here Auron establishes that if it's a choice between Heretics on a Pilgrimage or Loyally Following Yevon, always go with the former!
Wakka goes on about circular reasoning here. First says he wants no part of it, and to ATONE FOR SINS! Then says he never liked Maester Seymour anyway, so hey, not bad that they killed him I think he's implying...then states fighting Bevelle makes no sense. I have to wonder if there's a slight translation mix up here though. I'm wondering if when Wakka said "It's not like I ever liked Maester Seymour anyway", he meant to say "I'll admit I was never a fan of Maester Seymour, but still, this is wrong!" The way he words it, it almost sounds like "I don't like Seymour" was a way of justifying his actions but it just doesn't mesh 100% here. I dunno, but in short, Wakka's being Wakka.
Then Yuna says "off to Bevelle, we'll speak to Maester Mika about Seymour." Hey look! Yuna's taking charge, just like she's suppose to, and even better, she made this decision entirely on her own and even justifies the reason for it. It's not just "Let's go to bevelle because that's the next part on the world map!" I mostly just bring this up because a lot of people forget that Yuna is the leader of the group, not Tidus, and this is just a prime example of Yuna playing that part. It's worth reminding that despite Tidus being the PoV character, the only real decisions he makes are pretty much "What can I do to help Yuna?" and the like situations. Yuna's the one controlling the team, being the summoner and all that.
Then a bit of fun cast chemistry happens! Auron calls himself the troublemaker, Tidus just bounces off that and teases Auron about it, Rikku joins in, and Auron reciprocates "I never asked you to follow me" with a slight facetious tone and Tidus goes "well, that's what friends are for!" Cute to see the team poke fun at Auron, mostly, because it almost never happens, and Auron retorting in a way that is both in character but also in-line with the teasing.
Then the Hum of the Fayth scene occurs, mostly just being the moment where Tidus finally realizes Zanarkand and Spira have some connection. He also gets a little annoyed Auron eavesdropped, understandably so because it's embarrassing, but Auron did justify it saying it made him nostalgic for Spira, and it wasn't because "what the hell is he doing?" Also it's when Tidus finally has proof that Sin = Link between Zanarkand and Spira; seems he expected that to be the case, but still hoped it wasn't it, but after Auron's Non-response, he just stopped trying to fool himself. I'll repeat myself; Tidus may not be a genius, but he's not an idiot either, he's very average in intelligence, so I'm more convinced he would expect the Sin connection given how he got the Spira, and the "proof" was more "any hope that he could be wrong just got flushed down the toilet."
So...more character work right? NOPE! RANDOM SIN OUT OF NOWHERE BEWARE THE TOXINS!!! Ok, this is like the last time the Toxins get brought up and might be the only instance to support they really exist, as Tidus does go into a hazy moment. On the otherhand, why would he see Jecht's thoughts and why would Jecht's thoughts disappear as soon as Tidus says "You're Sin now." Basically, yeah, not Toxins, Jecht using mystical Sin bullshit powers to cause a psychic link between him and Tidus, and was showing him his own dreams and yo know what? Fuck it, WE GOT CACTUARS TO SLAY!
So Bikanel, Tidus ends up alone, rejoins with the others pretty fast. Auron and Lulu mostly just meet up uneventfully, Kimhari's insistent on trudging along to find Yuna, though sort of directionless, but hey, at least he's trying to do something about it. Wakka's sitting around moping about how life sucks and how he fails as a guardian. Then we have Rikku who adds a glimmer of hope to the team, by stating this is where the Al Bhed live, so they're not completely lost, and chances are Yuna's safe at Home. Wakka of course tries to blame Rikku, the others tell him to shut up and move on.
CUE LONG GAMEPLAY SEGMENT WITH LOTS OF PLOT! I'd show an 80s Montage of Bikanel Island stuff, but I don't think it exists and my video editting skills are not good enough. And yes, there would be Wakka doing sit ups.
At Home, it's under attack! This is a segment where Rikku acts 100% serious from start to finish, a rare instance mostly because Rikku's character is very much a "team cheerleader" so she's got to be optimistic, so it's hard to find in-character moments for her to take this stance. Luckily, Home is one such instance that Rikku being serious with no strings attached is completely understandable, so it's good they actually took advantage of this. Anyway, team doesn't know what's going on, Wakka again tries to label the blame entirely on the Al Bhed saying they deserve it. After some discussion, you find that Yevon and the Guado attacked Home looking for Yuna.
One could argue this is a plothole, as "how would Yevon know of the Al Bhed's hidden home?" Rikku just had a whole "DON'T TELL ANYONE, OK?" moment, with Wakka being all upset about this, but whatever, it's almost like Wakka hates Al Bhed or something! A few arguments I can think of to explain this:
-Yevon always knew where Home was, they just never bothered to take action because the Al Bhed were behaving, and let them think they were hidden to give a false sense of security. They were only kidnapping Summoners recently, and there was no proof linking it to the Al Bhed until very recently at Macalania. Now that they know this, Yevon has an excuse to attack the Al Bhed head on. Why not kill them before and cut out the only people using Machina? Well, not everyone hates the Al Bhed; there are plenty of people in Spira who, not liking the Al Bhed methods, still view them as people. Proof of this is of course how the Al Bhed are allowed to play Blitz Ball with the others, so clearly there is some level of acceptance in Spira among the general populace. If Yevon were to attack the Al Bhed with no legitimate excuse, things could get ugly, fast, and with a giant death whale flying around...well, one could say Sin's next attack would be blamed on "YOU ATTACKED THE AL BHED!" spun against Yevon quickly, POLITICAL BREAK DOWN!
-Yevon merely followed the bread crumbs. The game specifies it's the Guado, who were in Macalania at the time. Now, following the river and all that, very possible they traced it down to Bikanel Island, and saw hints of the Al Bhed there, and just came to the conclusion "SHE'S THERE!" How they got there before the team? Well, if you watch, you see Garudas and such flying around, so the Guado probably just jumped on birds and flew towards it.
It's still debatably a plot hole, but one that could probably be explained, I guess. The game never does cover how the Guado/Yevon found Home in any event, when it's suppose to be hidden.
BACK TO THE STORY THOUGH!
The big thing that happens here is Rikku exposits some of the Al Bhed's past after Wakka notes how Home is basically fucked. Now what's interesting is why would Wakka care about Home and be the one to say that? It suggests that Wakka, being right there and seeing the Al Bhed being murdered left and right and the building collapsing, is finally understanding that the Al Bhed are people just like everyone else, and starting to feel bad about it himself. Combine this with how his faith in Yevon has shaken and how they're the ones who staged the attack, it makes sense that Wakka would have this reaction instead of "This is what you guys deserved!" Rikku simply explains how the Al Bhed have been screwed by Sin in the same way as everyone else, and she starts to break down crying. In a nice little attention to detail, it's Wakka who acts as the sleeve for Rikku to cry into, which unfortunately isn't much of a moment because it's off to the side and they're quick into the "we must go!" thing.
After discussing the Summoner kidnappings, Tidus goes "well, Guardians just do their jobs and the Summoner is safe!" Then awkward silence, and Tidus finally starts to get a hint. Then the big reveal by Rikku happens moments later, and Tidus goes on his whole crying fest, feeling betrayed, and that he's been an idiot all along, etc. Everyone else seems to agree with Tidus that "Summoners dying aren't good" except Donna and Isaaru, the other Summoners, who assure Tidus that part of becoming a Summoner is being resolved to make that sacrifice for everyone.
Now before someone says "Well duh Yuna was going to die from the Final Aeon, it's obvious!", that's not true at all. The game doesn't really throw many strong hints that Yuna is going to die as a result of the pilgrimage; I don't think they even state that "Braska is dead" anywhere. We just know that Jecht disappeared, Auron came back, and there's no mention of what happened to Braska one way or another; if nothing else, that at least hints his fate is known and since he's nowhere to be found, probably dead. Additionally, and this is something so many people seem to forget about fictional characters:
They are not genre savvy. They don't know the cliches and tropes that affect them, that's kind of why they're part of the story. It's fiction, but to the characters, you need to remember they're treating this as reality. So it doesn't matter how obvious it is to the player, the question is "how obvious would it be to someone who is thinking this is real life and story conventions won't apply?" This isn't a 4th wall breaking comedy, it's drama. You don't assume a Hollywood ending to tragedies in real life where everyone comes out a-ok, you don't assume that the ruler of a country is really planning to unleash a cosmic horror on the world in an attempt for world dominat-...ok, that's a bad example.
In the end, it makes perfect sense for Tidus to have been completely in the dark. He knows nothing of Spira, "obvious genre conventions" don't apply to fictional character knowledge, and why does everyone else know but he doesn't? Well gee, it's almost everyone else grew up in Spira and was taught the obvious lore, and lived with that their entire lives. It's almost like the WHOLE POINT of the character is that he DOESN'T know anything, thus being a proxy for the player that the characters can explain things to. When all is said and done, Tidus' reaction is completely understandable here. A total mental break down and everything; everything he was glorifying just took a huge negative turn.
Oh, Isaaru and Donna both state that the Al Bhed deserve a sending for protecting them. From what I gather, this scene further highlights that the main issue with Al Bhed is that they sacrificed all the benefits granted by Yevon due to their blasphemous ways, such as sending, aide by the Crusaders, etc., but they're not considered horrible people. It's just a case of "If you follow Yevon, Yevon will protect you" and the Al Bhed chose not to. Giving the a sending is of course the summoners' way of saying "Thank you for your sacrifice"; Isaaru even says something along the lines of "they deserve at least this much." No, this isn't really anything new, more just further emphasizing that Al Bhed are not viewed as "bad people" so much as just aren't part of Yevon.
So Tidus takes his anger out on Cid next, mostly demanding to find Yuna, Cid and Tidus argue a bit with Tidus ultimately saying "SHE WON'T DIE" and Cid going "remember those words." I think this part just emphasizes why the Al Bhed took action recently and not sometime earlier:
It's entirely Yuna. Remember that Cid and Yuna are family, so it makes sense that Cid would finally care about the Summoners dying and take action. Yes, it could be argued a selfish position, but it's based on an emotional context. He wasn't acting out of idiocy is my point. This was discussed a while back that the Al Bhed were being morons preventing the Summoner pilgrimages because this is the only known way to stop Sin and they're preventing it. I think the way Cid talks about Yuna specifically suggests that it's not summoners he's worried about, it's Yuna; he doesn't want Yuna to die. So why go the Summoner route? Probably as a smokescreen; by stating "we're preventing all pilgrimages!" it makes sense to send multiple Al Bhed out to do it, but saying "We're protecting my niece!" does sound selfish.
So with Home being blown up, the Al Bhed are upset, THEN WAKKA TO THE RESCUE!
"Hey cheer up, it's like Happy Festival Fireworks, ya!?"
Yeah, that'll do it, thanks a lot Wakka. Let's be fair; Wakka's heart was in the right place. He was trying to put a positive spin on it for purposes of cheering Rikku up, going with a "But man, wasn't that explosion so cool looking!?" The problem of course is Wakka's an idiot, so he completely drops the ball on this one. And just to make things clear, Wakka being an idiot isn't a bad thing, as that's how the character was written intentionally; just see Lulu's constant "Wakka shut up" statements early game and the way he responds to anything that Tidus and Rikku second guess him on.
And that's more or less where I ended. Tidus did have a major whine moment here...except technically, "whining" is unjustified complaining and considering what Tidus just learned, I wouldn't call his outburst unreasonable. In fact, no one is even telling Tidus he overreacted; the character's responses seem to imply they actually understand what he's going through, as there was no way he was mentally prepared for such a reveal.
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Smash: Got first in Smash Run with all characters. Insert generic complaint about Smash Run randomness.
Also got 4 kills in Cruel Melee with Shulk Counter cheese.
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FFX-2 Yattaf Solo: I'm in the last chapter!
Chocobo breeding is terrible, worse than the cactuar sidequest. And still better than FFX minigames.
The cactuar sidequest boss has an attack that does 10 hits of 20% mHP damage, so it's guaranteed death. It can be prevented by killing its sentient arms, but I need to do that right at the beginning of the battle which I can't.
I'll try using a strategy like "Start as Alchemist, use some OP item to kill the arms, then while he's trying to resurrect, change clothes like Arturo Brachetti to get a bunch of + strength bonuses, then switch to Dark Knight and spam Darkness every round"
We'll see how it goes.
I got an Iphone 6 as a gift.
Terra Battle: This is some free to play game made by Mistwalker.
It is Othello (the board game) as a free to play RPG.
Surprisingly it gets pretty varied and strategic.
Free to play elements are not terrible so far.
In your character roster you get named characters with backstories and monsters.
Monsters, as in every RPG ever, are vastly inferior. You get 2 initial named characters, plus 1 later in the story, otherwise you're stuck with monsters unless you spend FTP Coinz for named characters. BUT so far I got enough FTP Coinz (They're also given for ending chapters and entering some code) for 4 other named characters, so it's not like I have to be stuck with crappy monsters. The only problem is that these 7 named characters don't really synergize well (I have 3 sword users in a game with a weapon triangle, and 2 healers) but it's not like FTP Coinz would have given me some big advantage.
It is definitely not a game for completionists anyway as finishing everything must take hundreds of real cash + hundreds of hours.
Worse is that the game doesn't let you play forever. This sucks.
Also basically every girl is fanservice (except the underage ones, thank god) Artwork is overall nice, as it's made by the Drakengard guy. Since the game has no animations whatsoever that's pretty important.
Super Hexagon: I think that's the only game I bought 3 times? It's really a classic for me. I think I'll have the most nostalgia for this game out of all of them, when I grow old.
Little Inferno: To quote Tristan, I've seen some fucked up shit in my life, but that is the fucked upest
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Little Inferno was beautiful the first time I played it and still held up 12 months later when I did it again.
Pokedudes - Beat normal game. I didn't realise they had difficulty modes in BW2 until I as near the end. That is because you need to beat the game to unlock it and trade with the other version to get the other difficulty mode. This is really fucking stupid and is the most Pokemon thing ever. Basic functionality that should really be in the game forever if you are going to do it! Arbitrarily locked away and requires trading.
SMT: Strange Journey - picked this back up. It is dense and unintelligible in ways I expect.
VP: Lenneth - picking up play I had sitting at chapter 7 to play while I nod off since SMT aren't great for that. PSP controls for platforming are worse that I remembered. I was raging at Amenti pretty hard. Nearly wanted to break things in the part with the floating heads that teleport you, but found out that Timer Ring seemed to completely break them. They would slowly hover around barely moving then reset position after a few seconds, so pretty much eliminating them as a thing even. Weird.
Got to chapter 8 and save scammed for a Gram. Current party is Bow Lenneth, Grey, Jayle (for the bounce) and Lyseria. Will probably swap to Gandar for giggles after Dragon Palace. Stay tuned for me raging about the Dinosaur jump when I am not using spear people.
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Little Inferno was beautiful the first time I played it and still held up 12 months later when I did it again.
Did you just want a hug?
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Pokedudes - Beat normal game. I didn't realise they had difficulty modes in BW2 until I as near the end. That is because you need to beat the game to unlock it and trade with the other version to get the other difficulty mode. This is really fucking stupid and is the most Pokemon thing ever. Basic functionality that should really be in the game forever if you are going to do it! Arbitrarily locked away and requires trading.
I think the worst part is that you have to delete all your data to start a new game, so you can't even use Expert Mode on replays unless you know someone with Expert Mode unlocked to transfer it over. Unlockable difficulty modes is nothing new for Video Games in general, but Pokemon took it to a new level of stupid. Much as I will rave about BW2 being one of the best entries in the franchise, I will never defend how they handled the difficulty modes here. I find it hard to even defend it on a "better than not existing at all" level because it functionally doesn't exist for most people until the aftergame, and worse, it only helps Black 2 players because that gets Expert mode. White 2 gets UNLOCKABLE EASY MODE for aftergame which is stupid unless you are compulsive about 100%ing the after-game and the Super E4 and such scare you.
ANYWAY!!!
FF10 HD: Zombie Seymour just got defeated. Ok, NOW I'm pretty sure I'm done with him for good; Zombies are being rekillified is usually being deaded and such.
So we open with Tidus running around Airship. The only thing noting here is the discussion with Donna, notably where he says "Who cares what everyone else says? Do what you want with your life" and she agrees despite the disgrace. Why is this line meaningful? Well, earlier in the game, Tidus has a flashback with Jecht where he's telling Jecht that people are saying he's getting worse due to drinking and Jecht's response is "let them talk!" Tidus having the same mindset of "Who cares what everyone else thinks?" fits in with this because first off, he is a celebrity too; he knows the public talks. Secondly, this demonstrates he has more in common with Jecht than meets the eye, since he's pretty much taking the mindset of "who cares what the public says?" and telling Donna that.
So the rest of the Airship stuff is nothing major. We have Wakka finally learning Yuna is half Al Bhed, Auron and Cid arguing over the pilgrimage (further proving that Cid's concern is for Yuna, and not the pilgrimages themselves), and then AWESOME ACTION SEQUENCE WITH WEDDING!!! Well no, we do see Rikku's back to her fun-self again when she openly imitates Cid to show how ridiculous a notion of "BLOW UP THE AIRSHIP AND TAKE THEM DOWN WITH US!" which was an amusing scene, in character, and just a good example "This is how you do a fun energetic character!" I can't stress enough how FF10 Rikku is so painful not because she's bad a character, but because she's a GOOD character, and we know she turns into...well...
(http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20080807130917/finalfantasy/images/thumb/c/ce/Rikku_Poster.jpg/250px-Rikku_Poster.jpg)
...no, I won't stop with this nonsense. Taking a fun character and ruining them horribly is nothing I will ever drop and damn it, you're all going to suffer with me, either through reminders about this change, or the fact that I will simply piss you off with the repetitiveness!
But enough of that, ACTION SEQUENCE!
(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/--e8-2ELlqnk/TdBOASuTnNI/AAAAAAAAACw/KxridumjToc/s390/nuke.jpg)
(http://www.hgsitebuilder.com/files/writeable/uploads/hostgator798837/image/t-08.jpg)
(http://www.shadowlocked.com/images/stories/features/001_NOV_2010/22/starwars.sl.5.jpg)
(https://wiki.base22.com/download/attachments/56397167/ed209.jpg?api=v2)
(http://images2.fanpop.com/image/photos/10800000/Blackmail-monty-python-10867801-400-312.jpg)
(http://thecafeallegro.com/randomthoughts/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/automotivator.jpg)
(http://scienceblogs.com/startswithabang/files/2010/11/77fceeb85081430f8d7c423dc98632a4.jpeg)
I think that covers everything.
Bevelle Cloister happens, proof Yevon is lying out of their asses, Yuna basically tells the Maester's how it is, then gets in trouble because SHE KNOWS TOO MUCH!!! Honestly, while this sequence isn't bad or anything, there really isn't much to talk about; it's a straight forward "Yevon is corrupt, Seymour is even more corrupt, and the team breaks out of jail. Oh yeah, Isaaru is incapable of saying no" so I won't follow up.
So onto Seymour Natus! Now, neat thing here is Auron tells the team to run as Kimhari holds Seymour off, obviously with the intent of "Kimhari is going to die, he's buying us time so we can retreat, don't let his sacrifice be in vain!" Then Yuna goes "Wait, I'm the one in charge!" about half way down the bridge and says "we're going back to help him!" Tidus' response is of course to whine and moan and be a little bitch about it because that's what the haters would assume!
...or, you know, calmly state "I'm your guardian, I'll follow you wherever you go!" It's almost like Tidus is understanding his position as a guardian. The rest of the team agrees, and Auron just has a chuckle to himself before following suit. Well good to know he's not entirely against Yuna's decision!
This part stands out to me for a reason that only came up recently, not because of FF10 itself, but rather things as a whole. Namely, Yuna's role in FF10.
See, I casually stated that Yuna is proof that characters like Rosa are awful; she's a soft spoken, nice girl healer who is the Main Character's love interest, but that description is only surface level for Yuna, where as for Rosa, it's the ENTIRE CHARACTER. Yuna has depth, Rosa does not...this isn't anything new, but the angle I'm thinking of is directly related to this scene.
In FF4, it's stated Rosa became a White Mage for Cecil. She left Baron to look for Cecil. She got kidnapped for the expressed purpose of baiting and taunting Cecil. Her entire character is hinged upon beyond Cecil's girl. There's literally one scene where she elevates above this, and that's Mt. Hobbs where she actually encourages Rydia to use Fire, being nice and supportive of her. Unfortunately, one exceptional scene does not override the fact that Rosa's entire character is otherwise linked entirely to Cecil. To make matters worse, the only reason you care about rescuing her (both times) is because she's Cecil's girlfriend. Heck, she's even introduced into the game with "Cecil, are you alright? I was worried sick!"
Now look at Yuna. Her role in the game is entirely independent of the other characters...quite the reverse, the other characters exist around Yuna. Notice how Tidus said "I'll follow you!"; Yuna makes the decisions, Tidus is following her. Yuna on multiple occasions calls the shots in the team, as she should since being the Summoner, she's the de facto leader. When she gets in-trouble, the incentive to rescue her isn't because "Tidus loves her!", it's because she's literally the only person on the team capable of finishing the pilgrimage. Guardians are expendable demonstrated when Kimhari attacked Seymour and was willing to stand alone, with Auron mostly agreeing. Yuna would never admit to this of course, and that's fine; Yuna puts value in her guardians are more than just warm bodies to take bullets for her. That's part of her character after all...as in, she actually has a character to be able to make a statement like that about.
It's the complete opposite scenario of Rosa, really, because Tidus does a lot of actions for Yuna's sake...or really, the entire cast as a whole acts on Yuna's behalf. Contrast to Rosa where everything related to her leads to "because Cecil."
What made me think of this is when someone argued that from a certain perspective, Peach and Zelda could be argued not "Distressed Damsels" because part of what makes the trope is the female needs to be an object of desire for the male's personal reasons. In Peach/Zelda's case, they also play a larger role in the grand scheme of things, being political leaders of their countries, and so even if Mario/Link didn't have personal reasons to care, they have universal ones and being the only competent enough individual to save the day, they'd go out and do it anyway (in fact, half the time, Zelda isn't even Link's Love Interest!) Not sure I agree with this perspective, but it's an interesting way to look at it, namely "Do these characters serve a purpose other than being the love interest to the main?" and when it comes down to it, Rosa completely fails at this.
And that's where I left off! Next up, Tidus and Yuna make out underwater and GAMEPLAY SEGMENT IN THE CALM LANDS!
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Did you just want a hug?
I wanted something to kick my arse and get me to do something with my life.
And yeah Meeo, easy mode was very specifically the one that really bothers me. I suppose you can use it to grind BP easier in the PWT or something?
SMT:Strange Journey - Asura kicking my arse going in blind. Need to make some better suited demons.
Since you have just recently played early SMT games Fenrir, do they have anything as rude a Macca Beam? Losing 10k of your stock of 50-60k of macca is rough.
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I haven't finished MegaTen 2 yet!
MegaTen 1 has the Sea of Flames I mentioned earlier, with tough enemies + Stone/Paralysis on your only healer/teleporter = Death + Delevelling enemies + Damage every step (unless you do some sidequest I couldn't find)
SMT2 has Satan. I don't remember why but I just couldn't get past him in like 20+ tries. To be fair I rollercoasted the rest of the game so I didn't pay attention and anything challenging would have kicked my ass. (SMT 1 and 2 have the most broken normal weapons I've seen in an RPG outside of some obscure japanese-only Dragon Slayer spinoff)
I'd say Early Megaten games are actually a bit easier than Late Megaten, with slightly harsher earlygame (where they expect you to grind I suppose. But you don't have to) Nocturne, P3, Strange Journey, Devil Survivor definitely have nastier stuff.
Asura is really fun. If you can't beat him, try soloing him
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Defense Grid 2- Finished. Fun game, there is a lot of replay value in there as well. The maps are well designed, gameplay is a fantastic tweak on the defense grid 1 model. The plot's awfully busy with a bunch of empty personalities talking over each other, but hey. I appreciate the effort put in there.
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FFX-2 Yattaf solo: For the first time ever, 1000 needles has been not only useful but absolutely necessary.
Incidentally that Via Infinito level 40 boss was dumb. He can just cast Ultima whenever he wants.
Nothing like starting the battle and getting immediately hit by max damage on everyone.
As far as I know there is nothing to be done, there's no Auto-life in this gale. Dude just decides to use Ultima, you're dead. Boss design, guys.
He also has monster defenses but only 9999 HP. I just slapped an auto-reflect ring to reflect his Flare, and spammed 1000 needles. After about 10 tries he didn't use Ultima, so I won. Yay.
There are way too many awesome accessories and I can only equip two! I have:
- Status immunity (except death)
- Death immunity
- 2x max HP (can be stacked for 3x max HP)
- Auto Reflect
- Auto Haste
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I recall it having some obscure usefulness in FFV also.
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SMT:Strange Journey - Up to Eriadnus which the game insists is completely and totally the last zone. I named my main character Bitch Please all those years ago. "Yo Bitch, I see you made it past the dark area. The place up ahead is a bitch, too. I've been having problems with the floor traps."
10/10 from Jimenez. Weird punctuation aside I would do that all day every day.
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I really can't remember 1000 needles possibly being useful in FF5.
FFX-2:
I could beat the level 60 via infinito boss easily if something showed me when physical immunity runs out. As is I don't really know how to handle him. He does 63000 unevadable physical damage. And this isn't Valkyrie Profile so I don't have 63000 HPs.
I might allow the super-sphere for bosses like this. I'll see.
Anyway I got another great accessory by complete luck.
It was a drop from an oversouled uber-cactuar (what were the odds that I would run into that monster)
The accessory raises luck by 100, which sounds bad (Luck in an RPG) but basically urns Yattaf into Gladstone Gander. She always hits, and evades any evadable attack, which means nearly any status in the game.
I've now used every dressphere extensively, and they are not equal. At all. Berserker is my new favourite class. I just beat the super hard arena by equipping the auto reflect and 100 luck accessories, and only using Berserk. Counters everything, with high speed and high damage.
Terra Battle:
I give this guy's sword a rating of Kingdom Hearts / 10
(http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20141019210952/terrabattle/images/c/c3/Kuscah.png)
BTW, is that a kilt?
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Started up Divinity: Original Sin yesterday, played through tutorial stuff to the first town. You get to make two sexy alternate self protagonists instead of just one*, which is neat because come on you guys you know that's a substantial part of the attraction with games like this. Also apparently you can have them disagree in dialogue? This hasn't actually happened yet because it's me and I'll always pick the nicest option, but I guess I should make a point of doing it just to see where deliberate intra-party conflict leads (maybe it's more of a multiplayer thing, I dunno).
EDIT: apparently if your protagonists persist in disagreeing, they rock/paper/scissors (not the sexy kind) it out. The net result of this first attempt is that I first encouraged a starving man to steal to survive and then turned him over to the guard when I won/lost successive internal arguments. ...Not exactly the desired outcome, but I'm amused in a horrible way.
Anyway, I built a possibly obvious wizard/knight combo, switched out the wizard's "INT bonus but bad at talking to people" trait because I don't want to be bad at talking people. Actually I didn't need to do this because I could just use the other character as the party front because NPCs respond to whomever you direct to talk to them. Also I eschewed some of the more tactically useful starting perks in order to take one that lets me talk to animals. I already found a draft animal that can see the future! But he refused to tell me how I die (no Clyde Bruckman, this one).
God this game has so much random shit to pick up, it's just terrible for me. There's a million random things in my inventory already and I have no patience to check what they all do. It's very pretty, but plot looks like the most generic fantasy setup. Also I really have no idea where I am in relation to anything or whether there are proper countries or whatever, and if this is one of those games where most of the setting flavor is conveyed through dry textdumps (hi Dragon Age/Skyrim) then I'll never find out, either. Also just based on poking around the front gates of the starting town I already want the townie NPCs to quit repeating their soundbytes every five seconds. Obsessive and regular repetition of noises is something that seriously irritates me in any context.
But it's overhead turn-based combat, so that's promising enough mechanically (real-time with pause would be close enough for my preferences, but I really can't stand anything purely real-time in point-and-click format).
(*But there's a perk that makes you run solo instead, so it's still Yattaf-friendly.)
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(http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20141019210952/terrabattle/images/c/c3/Kuscah.png)
Bro, that belt isn't fooling anyone, we can all see you are wearing the scabbard so high to try and hide your gut, we can all see your overhang there. Nice "pecs". I think we can all tell from this that your brooding head tilt and beard are just an attempt to hide your jowls at this point.
BTW, is that a kilt?
See how low it rides on his hips? It isn't just a kilt (with the furrrrrrrr). It is a kilt for sluts. Also it appears to be some kind of kilt of plates or some other form of armouring.
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I actually find the ridiculous KH sword to be quite contrasting with the older, bearded artstyle I would associate more with something quite non-Nomura indeed. It's a bit jarring.
Also 1000 Needles has definite uses in FF5 if you get it in World 1 via Control, where 1000 damage is still quite impressive. If you miss it there then you won't get it until World 3, at which point it has the odd corner use on challenges (e.g. against Omega if you don't have lightning or other good ITD available) but yeah isn't actually any good.
Smash Bros 4 - I finally unlocked the second challenge board and instantly qualified for like half the challenges on that. On the plus side I can now turn off stages I don't like on random stage select! Mains: Bowser, Palutena, Bowser Jr./Roy, Peach. Also messing around with Lucina, ZSS, Sheik, Mega Man, and various others.
FE10 - Three maps left! Nobody has died since 4-P.
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I just found out that if you are really adamant about abandoning Nanami in Suikoden II after you get to your hometown, you can actually do it. Just fucking leave her behind. It was GLORIOUS.
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Smash 4 - Have 3 leaderboards unlocked, and it is good times. Playing it here and there between other things and just trying to unlock challenges, currently. Beat Classic with everybody, and did Target Blast with everybody. One was more fun than the other, and I'll leave it to your imaginations which is which. >_>
Mains are Robin, Lucina, and Little Mac. Villager and Megaman also make appearances, though significantly less so, though I'm trying to learn how to play Villager more so I can commit mass murder with that charming smile on their face~
C. Falcon is now far too good to be a goofy PAUNCH play, so that now falls squarely on Ganondorf's shoulders. He has yet to fail me in amusement.
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel - Been playing this a lot. Tried out all 4 characters to level 6, and got Nisha to 10 before deciding I like Wilhelm best, at least for solo playthroughs. He also punches things with a robotic exploding extendo-fist, and bulks up laser weaponry. How can I say no to that!?
Gameplay is definitely solid and the writing is good, but the game is a lot quicker paced than either of the previous games. You start out action-packed, and you get Action Skills at level 3 now. I'd say it's Borderlands 2+ in terms of how I'd rate it. Looking forward to the DLC, which will hopefully be more on par with Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep from BL2. Not done the game by a long shot though, as I've been accomplishing all the sidequests when they show up, when possible.
If anybody else has it, let me know. This game is built so much more towards co-op than BL2 was.
Chrono Trigger - Decided to pick this up and see where I had left it off. Turns out I was in the middle of finishing endgame quests, but can't remember for the life of me what I had left to do, so I just up and killed Lavos, which had each and every battle/form/whatever you want to call them either dying horrendously easily to my Chrono/Ayla/Marle team, or else almost causing a game over in about 2 turns.
Now I am in Black Omen, going through battle after battle of OMNILOCK. Seriously. Fuck Omnilock. It's annoying, and that's about as far as it goes. I have fucking Chrono and Ayla. EVERYTHING WILL STILL DIE, WATCHERS. EVERYTHING. WILL. STILL. DIE.
Flight Rising - It's technically a website, but it has Dragon breeding, and games on it, and I'd call it a game same as Neopets. Only prettier. And with dragons. I get to breed dragons, okay? It's glorious. 10/10 will play into eternity.
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(http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20141019210952/terrabattle/images/c/c3/Kuscah.png)
Bro, that belt isn't fooling anyone, we can all see you are wearing the scabbard so high to try and hide your gut, we can all see your overhang there. Nice "pecs". I think we can all tell from this that your brooding head tilt and beard are just an attempt to hide your jowls at this point.
BTW, is that a kilt?
See how low it rides on his hips? It isn't just a kilt (with the furrrrrrrr). It is a kilt for sluts. Also it appears to be some kind of kilt of plates or some other form of armouring.
I wonder if the hourglass in his sword is functional? Either way, I freakin love that sword completely unironically.
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Well presumably there is an air gap in the hourglass between both ends and we can clearly see sand in it. Basic physics covers off the rest of it "working". We have no idea how long a time period it goes for though.
What I can guarantee is that a slowly shifting balance point losing a sword like that is going to make it a serious motherfucker to use.
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Dude he even has a roman numeral. X... I think that's Luxord. The time dude! IT ALL FITS. THIS IS CLEARLY LOURD THE SOMEBODY THEREOF
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Why are you guys looking at the obese when there are better old man to look at in that game?
Try Ｅｌｌvern and Sorman.
http://i.imgur.com/AojCvd4.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/NGLNWcx.jpg
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http://i.imgur.com/AojCvd4.jpg
I agree, Mark Ruffalo is hot as hell.
Edit - And that isn't just because we have the same hair cut.
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Grefter's life has really improved since he discovered he too could hulk out.
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It isn't a secret that I am always angry.
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Thanks Gref.
The hourglass works, you can see the sand flowing.
I think now that there's an actual hourglass inside a sword, all rules have been broken and there can't be anything more ridiculous.
Like, I don't know, a tofu-elemental sword? No, less ridiculous
Why are you guys looking at the obese when there are better old man to look at in that game?
Try Ｅｌｌvern and Sorman.
http://i.imgur.com/AojCvd4.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/NGLNWcx.jpg
- That guy only looks 40ish. I guess Spanish people aren't credible as evil masterminds so he brought out the tackiest colors he could find for his outfit.
- Pure nightmare fuel. Thanks Niu
I looked at all the UOMs in that game and I much prefer Old Elven DJ Adam Jansen.
(http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20141017214600/terrabattle/images/thumb/a/a3/Gegonago_Job3.png/432px-Gegonago_Job3.png)
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Is that a vacuum cleaner? And you know that keyboard is a Casio.
All this stuff, 100% less amazing than Maken Shao was though. For real.
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What the hell is that game.
Smash 3DS - Things I like: Mega Man's side smash, Kirby's side special, Peach's parasol. Things I don't like: Marth's moveset, Birdmen, Ness' moveset.
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I want to play the game of UOM but it won't work on my Ipad. Sad times.
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Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn - No-reset run beaten. Six playthroughs in the books! Final death tally was Laura/Jill (1-E), Mist (3-1), Edward/Leonardo (3-6), Aran (3-12), Fiona (3-13), Rhys (3-E), Leanne (4-P), Nealuchi/Marcia (4-3). Did manage to avoid any deaths in endgame despite a few close shaves.
Endgame PC notes:
Micaiah - Capped everything but skill, used Fortify or made anything with less than 30 speed unhappy.
Ike - Kinda not great on speed for the most of the game which cost him some key doubles, but still solid due to str/def/Ragnell/Hammer of course.
Sothe - One of the better Sothes I've had, he actually felt useful in endgame! Kinda fragile but eh, doubled things reliably (not a given with him) and even hit 39 speed by the end, although I mainly had him hunt spirits.
Sanaki - Speed-screwed. Blah.
Rolf - Around mid part 4 he suddenly stopped gaining speed for a while which hurt him, but still, Double Bow is pretty great, and he did eventually gain some for the last couple maps.
Nephenee - The usual pretty much. She never felt dominant but she was always solid and quietly got lots of kills due to that availability.
Titania - Nice Atk/accuracy thanks to Urvan, and Canto. And hammers. Not much to say.
Elincia - Smash things, heal, canto, amazing versatility as always.
Calill - Also got to most of her caps. Had some filler staff use though was the worst of the three at it (I shoulda just given her two arms scrolls ASAP) but fling Rexflame/thunder tomes off enough speed to double spirits and indeed most other enemies was pretty excellent despite low defence.
Mia - Blah blah blah speed and decent enough everywhere else and Ike support.
Stefan - See Mia but worse at everything, still did fine with Wyrmslayer for the dragon map and speed everywhere else. Is it a coincidence I had as many sword-users as I had Wyrmslayers, and as many axe-users as I had Hammers? No.
Ulki - SS strike and is virtually invincible. With canto. Yeah his attack could be better and no turn 1 sucks (Laguz Gem of course) but man it's hard not to be impressed.
Naesala - Ulki with Formshift but who can actually die. This felt like a losing trade, but hey, it means we get cool Naesala boss conversations, so it's worth it.
Nailah - Capped everything except luck, highest Atk save Rolf + 40 speed + ridiculous durability = obvious best Endgame PC, even without Canto or 2 range.
Kill leaders were Nephenee (89) > Rolf (86) > Micaiah = Mia (78) > Volug (72) > Marcia = Titania (70) > Sothe (67) > Calill (64) > Ike (62) > Nailah = Haar (60). Marcia is notable because I don't think I've ever had anyone get that many kills despite dying before endgame before (although she did die on the second to last turn of 4-3, as I made the amazing strategic decision to attack the boss somehow forgetting she was at 5 HP. Player phase deaths are the coolest deaths.
I found myself kinda wanting to watch the story again this by the end this time, I'll have to do it someday. I do increasingly think it is probably the best FE plot, which doesn't say that much of course but eh it's been five years since I watched it last.
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http://www.siliconera.com/2014/10/15/console-version-terra-battle-still-planned-2-million-downloads/
Just sayin'.
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Let's be clear here, this game is not going to rock your socks. Amounts of socks rocked = 0. It is just kind of nice.
Didn't I introduce you to Maken Shao Gref?
FFX-2 Yattaf Solo: I'm basically done!
I could completely destroy the final boss. I'm like level 84 and have all the important abilites.
What's left doesn't look very fun:
- Unlocking that stupid chocobo dungeon and beating whatever is inside. To do that I have to do a stupid chocobo ranch sidequest where I catch chocobos, feed chocobos and send chocobos in various places, then heal them and send them back, reloading if they have fled, etc. The exact requirements for unlocking the dungeons are not known.
- Beating the level 60 via infinito boss. It's the one that does 60000 damage.
This can probably be done with Full Throttle, the Melfice-like class that I didn't want to use.
- Beating the Super Ultra Grand Cup for the 5th and 6th time to unlock the Omega Ubar Grand Cup. This is difficult because it is 100% sure I'll either run into Mega Tomberry (acts first, instant-kill) or Evil Orb Thing + Evil Mushroom (They can both cast Ultima). I need massive RNG luck, twcie. Ugh. This probably cannot be finished easily with Full Throttle either.
- Beating those big dragons in the final dungeon that appear if you screw up the weird synth puzzle thing (This is FFX-2, synths are involved in the final dungeon). This looks actually manageable, if difficult.
- Beating the desert super boss. I might have a chance at level 99 but not sure. He's a 3 part boss, always use an instant kill on turn 2, and can even cast it if one part is down. I'll try killing both parts to see what happens, but that's difficult. (They have around 6000 HPs each) Otherwise, I'll only be able to beat him with Full Throttle
- Grinding
It was a fun challenge even with all the FFX-2 bullshit; since solo challenges are always cool in games with job systems.
Except Dragon Quest games.
Here is my dressphere tier list:
OP International Tier
- Psychic: I ranted enough about this
- Festivalist (Paine): Available at the beginning, best stats in the game, knows basically every status, good healing too.
Super Awesome Tier
- Berserker: Obviously great in a solo with very high HP, high speed and attack, and counters.
- Dark Knight: Darkness + High stats. Wrecks randoms, bosses too. I saw a faq writer angrily rant about how everybody's strategy in every fight is "Use Darkness, GG" and how this isn't varied at all.
- Trainer (Paine): This class feels like a red mage of sort with incredible ID, the only source of Haste if you don't have Psychic. Would be only high tier, but its most important move, Carrier Flurry, has such an awesome animation that I'm putting it up there.
High Tier
- Gunner: Has all kinds of damage and a lot of speed, but not much defense. I think it's the coolest job. A gunner SCC would be fun.
- Alchemist: The mixes are not awesome this time around. It's the best healer class anyway, and it gets the best MP healing in the game.
- Gun Mage: As usual with blue mages, you get some excellent (but expensive) MT damage earlygame. Absorb is also really, really good, MP healing. I used 1000 needles once. The killer abilities could be useful... I guess.
Middle Tier
- Samurai: Weak-ish stats, but very high damage with Sparkler/Fireworks. Comes a bit too late to really shine.
- Thief: The items Thief can steal are not incredible until you're way late into the game, and I'm not impressed by any of its abilities really. Still, it has surprisingly decent stats.
- Warrior: Warrior is disappointing; its skillset would be very nice if the abilities didn't take so long to use.
Low Tier
- White Mage: Vastly outclassed by an alchemist throwing Potions / Hi-Potions
- Lady Luck: Err... Has Exp + / Gil + / Item + ? Slots are probably good but I hate slots.
- Songstress: Useless in a solo, but pretty worthless anyway; it's often not worth sacrificing one character to enhance the two others. (Blind is good though) The buffs take too long to use, on a class with abysmal defense.
- Black Mage: Does less damage than physical classes, more slowly, with an MP cost and with less defense. Has some weak use earlygame hitting weaknesses with MP absorption (until you get Absorb)
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- Dark Knight: Darkness + High stats. Wrecks randoms, bosses too. I saw a faq writer angrily rant about how everybody's strategy in every fight is "Use Darkness, GG" and how this isn't varied at all.
It's pretty much the only reason I actually bothered to beat FFX-2. Can I roll over pretty much everything with the same boring strategy? ok let's do it
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Berserker was my favorite class in X-2 by far.
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In Case 4 of Ace Attorney Investigations 2. I am in utter shock so far. The first AA:I was my least favorite game in the series with its plodding pace and lack of court scenes, but this game has been magnificent so far.
Case 1 shakes things up even more than 4-1 and involves a great cameo.
Case 2 has a great set-up/location, more fun and unexpected cameos, and an ending I didn't see coming until late.
Case 3 was easily one of the best in the entire series, being a prequel to one of my favorite cases and providing Edgeworth with ample character development.
So far, Case 4 is interesting too.
Overall, I thought fans were being hipsters lording over people who hadn't played the game via translations, but now I'm inclined to agree this might be the best Ace Attorney game. As long as it keeps up this level of quality, anyway. Oh, and the fan translation is spot-on; feels like the official localizations of the previous games. The only problem I have with the game is that the text speed is horrifyingly slow, so it's a blessing in disguise I had to wait and play this on an Emulator since I'm playing at double speed (still slightly too slow for my reading speed).
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I downloaded a completed save file almost immediately so that I could speed up the text (I guess frameskip would also work but I don't like what that does to the music). Why Ace Attorney games insisted on that glacial first playthrough text speed I'll never know; thank goodness Dual Destinies finally ended that crap.
I definitely disagree with placing it towards the top of the series but I can see it. In particular I agree that it gets rolling very well and the three cases you've completed so far are all very solid.
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As always, multiple things on the go at once.
So, I remembered recently that I was borrowing a copy of Mana Khemia 1 for the PSP. Now, this is a case of good news/bad news, with the good news being, Mana Khemia 1, it is an awesome game of awesomeness! And the bad eing PSP port, it has the loading times of ultimate suckage. Fortunately, the save was basically just before you get five people so there's an actual battle system as opposed to a game where you are expected to use MP like crazy, but you have no method of getting more. Also, Roxis and his ability to play around nicely with the Time Card system.
Anyways, been making some progress with it, both as something to play on the move, and otherwise when at home. Forgot about Anna and her awesomeness. Seriously, when Flay eventually gets to the point of being He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, Vayne might be the one who plays the part of The Boy Who Lived, but it's gonna be Anna that gets the title of "The Only One He Ever Feared." I mean, seriously, the guy has spent half his time running away from her.
Majora's Mask - Doing a replay of this because it is freaking awesome. And because the other Zelda game I kinda want to replay will either involve me finding all the pieces of my NES and getting that operating, or trying to play Zelda 2 on a GC controller, which, no. Just no. Currently up to the boss of the swamp temple, after which I'll probably get me a Goron mask and then do some mask hunting around town. Probably looking forward to that tower the most. That place was nice and creepy.
My Life as a Darklord. Like peanut butter cups, the mix of Final Fantasy and Tower Defense is a fun one. And, oddly, I've never finished it before. Regardless, I've made it to chapter 3 and am trucking along happily. About to get Behemoths which will help to start leading to more choices about how to deal with annoying archers. I hope they have Guard... because I want some way to deal with those annoying room destroying Thieves.
And then we hit the Intelligent Systems games. Yup, two of them. Both played on the Wii. Both from different non-Wii systems.
Paper Mario - Yup, the first one. Played it for the N64 back in the day, but always felt kinda bad about it because the controllers for that system were, let's be diplomatic and say poorly designed. So, whenever I did some of the action triggers it felt like I was destroying the poor controllers which, to be utterly fair, I was. Hell, the N64 is practically junk these days because the controllers have been wrecked by the process of using them. The GCN controller on the other hand, is beautifully designed for this. And if the years (almost a decade... damn does time fly) of using them for Blue Sparking and Smashing haven't wrecked 'em, Paper Mario won't even phase them. Just wrecked the "invincible" Tubba Blubba and need to move on to Chapter 4, so making good time. Kooper has been invaluable as a sidekick and easily got the first power up. Goombario got the second, and those two are basically by power duo, though Bow the Boo has taken a good third place due to her badass slap. Even though she does fear defense like nothing else. Having played a lot of Fire Emblem since this came out, it's easy to see that this game was made by the same guys.
Speaking of Fire Emblem. I've been playing Path of Radiance, because I kinda want to go over the story of the Tellius games again. The moral of the early game was a party wide aversion to gaining strength. I mean, a point was gained here or there, but Ike managed to hit Level 14 with only 8 Strength to his name. I mean, a few people were blessed with Strength. There was Gatrie, who cut and run, and Boyd, but that was about it. On the other hand, Ike has also been averaging 4 point levels. Specifically, he's been Averaging Speed and three other non-Strength things. So the guy capped Speed at level 17, and is otherwise accurate and durable. Also, after I gave him a Energy Drop, he seemed to get the hint and started gaining Strength, so after promotion her was sitting at 16 Str.
So, mid game, starting with hitting the shores of Begnion is where the core of my team started developing. I mean, Rolf is turning out great, Nephenee is being quietly competent in pretty much every stat. Boyd is a solid member as always. But the real star at this point is Jill. Remember how I said my early party seemed to have issues with Strength? Well, that's because everyone's strength growth seemed to be funneled into Jill. The girl has only three stats she gets with any regularity, but as they are Strength, Speed and Defense, there is little else to say. She also has been getting timely crits, so she's been doing a lot of hopping out of unhittable locations off of ships or from the other side of trees, murderkilling dudes, then darting back out of reach. She's kinda been benched since reaching Daien, not because of keeping her from murderkilling her countrymen, and more because I need to cut someone from the team to make room for thieves or people to talk sense into Crow Kings, and because she just has that huge a level lead at the moment that I want people to catch up to her.
Also, special mention go to the less good members. Oscar is one of the few people on my team who rarely doubles people. And who rarely kills even with that. Guy is just lacking anything that isn't defense, really. But, easy and early Earth/Earth with Ike, plus bonus crit for Rolf/Boyd and potential for Triangle attack means he gets to stay on. Meanwhile, Kieran got his final chance in Chapter 17. He got a level, great! It was a 0 point level. He is benched indefinitely.
Of course, now all of these games have an insidious and invasive competitor. I got the new Smash. Already unlocked Gannon and Pittoo. Sadly, Marth lost to a little kid. And Ike was bested by some kind of ridiculous Space Falcon Laguz. But they will lose sooner or later.
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Devil May Cry 1 - Just got through the horrible underwater section. Are games contractually obliged to have the most drunken fridge underwater experience possible? Other than that the game has been enjoyable. Grenade launching puppets is my new favorite thing.
As for bosses, I'd say Nelo Angelo 2 and Griffon 1 are the ones I found most challenging after Phantom 1. So far. I assume some hateful bosses are coming in my future. Nelo 1 and Griffon 2 were both rather embarrassing. Honorable mention for the scissors miniboss, who is a giant asshole.
Stage design is kind of like 3D Megaman. The big spike room was entertaining. Who the hell sets up their elevator to be activated by a skeleton hand and to immediately activate a deadly spike revolving room? Asshole.
The game aesthetically reminds me of Resident Evil with more camp. And Resident Evil (1, aka the one I actually played) was already fairly camp. The game feels pretty disjointed storywise, you just travel from area to area without rhyme or reason. "Get artifact, put artifact in artifact holder, kill douchey boss and/or miniboss."
Smash - Haven't been playing as much lately for whatever reason, but I've mostly settled into using six characters; Palutena, Zelda, Dedede, Lucina, Bowser, and Bowser Jr. I like Robin but she doesn't seem all that great so I stopped using her.
Hyrule Warriors - Bought the DLC, currently hacking through the villain campaign. Cia is quite enjoyable to control, whereas Wizzro is too slow for me.
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Bravely Default: Why did no one hype boss Chocolina yet?! I got owned in the face by 'em repeatedly until I gave up and moved on to the final boss sequence. Suspect more DK hax is required for that fight; Firaja is good & all, but mages get wiped too reliably when not Defaulting by Blade Waltz, which is quite spammable thanks to doge. Relentless MT offense to lock more turns into resummoning is probably the right way to go, but I just don't have it.
The game aesthetically reminds me of Resident Evil with more camp. And Resident Evil (1, aka the one I actually played) was already fairly camp. The game feels pretty disjointed storywise, you just travel from area to area without rhyme or reason. "Get artifact, put artifact in artifact holder, kill douchey boss and/or miniboss."
You probably know this already, but Devil May Cry was in fact Resident Evil 4 before they decided halfway through development to throw out limited ammo, add more badass, and make it its own game.
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What on earth is boss Chocolina.
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Boss of Dimensions' Hasp on F10. (The Adventurer & his dog. Look, they're both traveling salespeople stalking you with deals...)
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Oh right. I read about that. Anyway I suspect the reason nobody talks about it is because it's obscure (I did Dimension's Hasp and missed it entirely) and lots of people are pretty done with the game by that point, so very few DLers have actually fought it.
Hyrule Warriors - Playing this on Hard Mode, I've done the first four chapters and the first Skyloft one. I'm not really a DW expert so this makes the game pretty legit. Game's a lot of fun, which isn't really news at this point, and I did the aesthetics.
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I was pretty done with the game in June, hence the long break before finishing it, but fair enough.
Dreamfall Chapters: This exists! Just started it, though. Amazed it finally came out.
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DOS: Confound your toll, troll!
So I'm futzing about outside town and come across a bridge warded by a troll. Talk to him, he grumbles a bit, and we get the general impression he wants money. He gets exploded instead, and then my PCs are all, "We killed an innocent soul, we're such awful people." Bwuh? Oh, I see, there's a book in my inventory that would've translated everything he said and apparently that encounter could've been handled completely peacefully with minimal cost. BUT WAIT I hadn't actually read that book so how did my party know what the hell he was saying anyway, game? Apparently it assumes if it's in my inventory, they've read it, even if I haven't.
Anyway, I have a fullish party by this point (you get four characters at a time). Recruited 1x viking chick raised by bears and 1x swordgranny. The alternate option in town was a mage who at first looked more useful than either, but every other sentence out of his mouth was "Oh every human on Earth is conniving backstabbing scum, animals are much more noble and honest and I want to live in the forest" and barrrrf. So I kicked him out almost immediately and went all-girl party despite misgivings of swordgranny being an obvious schizophrenic and viking chick being all of a dust cloud away from Pigpen. I probably should've picked the cool mute rogue bro instead since I don't see any immediate way to solve the mystery I was sent to town to investigate without stealing underwear from people so I can have a talking dog smell it (I wish I was making this up). But by the time I found him the old Baldur's Gate syndrome of hrrrrng can't let those XPs go to waste by ditching a party member was kicking me in the ass hard and I'm probably just sticking with who I have indefinitely. So the rest of the group will just have to pick up rogue skills somehow.
Game throws some fairly mean fights at you relatively early (you're free to wander all sorts of places you're not ready for almost immediately) but team's working out well enough. Both of the fighters have Battering Ram and it is great--warp across the field doing damage in a line and knocking down everyone in your path. Extreme cooldown time, but good for getting the slow bruisers into action immediately. Mage girl hastes, sets people on fire (occasionally allies, this is a risk with haste status in this game), calls spiderrrrrs. Viking chick's running as an archer and is pretty obviously the weak link here. Ricochets are awesome when you have a mob of squishy dudes to hit (I still have no AoE magic), but earlygame is full of skelemobs so piercing damage not necessarily ideal here. Probably not using her optimally, I should be spamming specialty arrows like the computer (at times infuriatingly) loves to do against me. But you know, give me an outstanding but apparently finite resource and I'll just never use it at all because what if I run out when I really really need it?!
Game also really likes environmental effects and really wants you to pay attention to them. (Protip, poison is incredibly flammable for some reason. Fire/poison magic combo chosen at chargen accidentally an excellent selection.) Continues to be mostly generic fantasy romp and talking to the animals is more fun than talking to the people*, but battles are tense enough that winning them feels satisfying. Encounters are pretty much all planned setpiece fights so far as I can tell; if anything respawns, it takes longer than I've spent in-game so far for it to happen (which yeah kinda solidifies that I'm probably never changing the party again just because I'm not sure getting a new PC caught up is remotely feasible even relatively early into the game).
(*I've decided that knight girl spends so much time talking to animals that she must be a vegetarian and will never eat any of the meat recovery items clogging up my inventory. They're kind of useless anyway!)
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I hope the irony of you not liking the hippy Mage and running your own hippy Mage was not lost on you.
Really you just want all mages to be Xan right? At first hearing complaints about how the city is terrible and overwhelming only to go to the forests and hear about how the wilderness makes you feel so insignificant.
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Man I really want to Yattaf this as a mage.
FFX-2 Yattaf Solo: Yes the final bosses were indeed very easy.
I also beat the uber enemies in the final dungeon. They weren't so bad with a little strategy, just time consuming. They mostly use a very damaging, fast physical attack, they also use an attack that does 50% mHP damage every 10 turns or so, and they automatically use a magic spell that dispels and does around 56% mHP damage, at 75% HP, 50% HP, and 25% HP.
It turns out the songstress defense song is very effective after being used 10 times (As it should be. It reduces damage to 10% or so), so I Just spammed that after using Psychomancer's physical immunity. Then switch to Samurai for Protect, and switch to Berserker for damage. Use a potion everytime he does the mHP move, and start from the beginning everytime he uses Dispel.
This strategy could also work for the annoying Via Infinito boss, we'll see.
Gods will be watching (dogs): I haven't even gotten past the first scene!
It definitely looks interesting but I feel that the high difficulty sabotages the game itself.
This is supposed to be a tense, nervous experience, and it is at first, but then you die over and over and begin to see the exact mechanics at work. (Negotiating with the cops always gives me 3 turns, etc) At this point the game isn't a psychological experience anymore, but a math problem to solve, and not an especially fun one.
PERHAPS THE SAME COULD BE SAID OF ALL RPGS but here this really doesn't work for me. You're supposed to reflect on the fact that, for example, you've hurt hostages, but the game only keeps track of the 657th try, the one where you did succeed. So there's no emotional impact.
Also I have already seen one thing that makes no sense whatsoever. When you have no hostage under control the cops throw a grenade and you die. BUT when they come close, even if you have still hostages under control, they also throw a grenade, killing the hostages. -> ???
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I hope the irony of you not liking the hippy Mage and running your own hippy Mage was not lost on you.
Really you just want all mages to be Xan right? At first hearing complaints about how the city is terrible and overwhelming only to go to the forests and hear about how the wilderness makes you feel so insignificant.
I wouldn't know! I never used Xan because BG PC recruited halfway through the game.
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If you did Nashkel mines in the "Middle" of Baldur's Gate then you really need to do it earlier on a replay. It is just kobolds bro. They are meant to be beat at level 1. Given that you will probably be level 2 just from the walk there the place really isn't that bad... (And more Cid replays and posts about BG I wouldn't knock)
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I can never get the hang of playing BG. I have it, but I always end up dying within the prologue. I'm really not certain what I'm supposed to do at any given point. >_>
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You are supposed to put up with 2nd Edition being really stupid.
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So Grefter if I decided to run a bard in BG how bad an idea would that be.
(I'd guess Very because Haer'dalis.)
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Actually it isn't that bad in either game really. It is far from optimal, but it is also hella far from the worst. It is a little dull a lot of the time, but it has peaks of stupid (see my rant on 2nd Edition scaling and Level being prominent in spell scaling last time I played BG...). If you see it all the way through to BG2 end game then there is only three things you really need to know for crazy stupid degenerate cheese. Enhanced Bard Song effects the entire map. Enhanced Bard Song stacks with other Enhanced Bard Songs. Mislead clones can sing.
At the start of BG1, man you think it is going to be bad? You are a Mage with better THACO, can use Bows, throw on a suit of armour after you blow your load, have D6 HP will level literally twice as fast for a long time in the game where Magic Missile is still a decent spell by end game for mages. Add in the ability to pick pocket some of the nicer hidden treasures without the opportunity cost on your thief? Bard is a pretty legitimately decent choice for BG1. You will not be shining quite as much once you get to the city itself (I personally think Bards taper off around level 7 through to HLA in BG2, which is why Haer Daelis is kind of bland), but on the way there man? You will be a fucking rock star if you play your cards right. BG2 you might spend most of your time throwing Skull Traps at dudes and debating whether to even bother with Melf's Acid Arrow or not, but it pays off okay in the end.
Also straight bard or Skald/Blade? (Jester... Man Jester is straight up broken in BG1Tutu, I forget if EE did anything to hiner the OP power of AoE IFF Confusion at level 1).
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Fen, I honestly don't think The Gods Will Be Watching is worth the frustration. Later stages can take upwards of 40 to 60 minutes, and some of the stage mechanics are really nonsensical/inscrutable or subject to randomness that can really just screw you over even if you know the optimal strategy. One stage in particular is randomized each time, which makes success less about skill and more about hoping that you get a favorable random generation. It is kind of a shame because there are some interesting things they do with level design/situational tension and some of the moral choices can be interesting... for the first time. Again, once you fail a stage a lot, these choices become really rote and uninteresting (which may be the point?).
I did beat it but mostly out of begrudging spite.
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Yeah ok I'll stop. Shame about that pixel art.
I really like the idea of random things being completely entirely out of your control in a game like this, but this probably shouldn't have that much of an impact on whether you can continue playing the game or have to restart. (over and over)
They did add some easier difficulties but I wanted to play the game as intended?
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Adding easier difficulties seems to me to have been something of an admission that they way they intended it to be was not really a way that people could actually get the message of the game. Unless quitting in frustration halfway through is part of the message. And who knows? For this game perhaps more than any other I could see how that might be part of what they were going for.
Totes the Vito Acconcis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vito_Acconci)of videogames amirite
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Also straight bard or Skald/Blade? (Jester... Man Jester is straight up broken in BG1Tutu, I forget if EE did anything to hiner the OP power of AoE IFF Confusion at level 1).
I was just asking out of curiosity really, since it's one of the few classes I've never really had in the party. Probably not actually touching BG again for a very long time, played it twice through the whole saga in the past year or so and it's a huge time commitment and now I have a computer that can actually play some of the shinier things my Steam library has accumulated the past couple years, so. Wasteland 2 is probably up whenever I finish Divinity, jumped in to have a look at character creation yesterday (probably didn't min-max to anywhere near the degree I should, will likely restart whenever I get around to playing the game proper) and obviously After the End is a setup I've always been greatly attracted to.
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Ahh well then, to get a finer answer. Straight Bard works like I described. Blade is okay with some applications of cheese (Ring of Free Movement overwriting the snare on Defensive SPin for example). Mostly works like regular Bard and then in the middling sections can be OKAY at fighting with Offensive Spin. Skald is just regular bard. So if you ever did play again I would pretty much recommend Jester. They are broke as fuck early on, play like normal bards otherwise (Enhanced Bard Song overwrites Jester's one and you get OP stacking song buffs right when it starts to blossom into stupid broken).
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Is there any reason Fenrir couldn't use the Auto Life garment grids or the Lady Luck trick for Auto Life slots for the FFX-2 run?~
I'm guessing some of the new dress spheres give some of Songstress's benefits such as MP 0, Magical Immunity, etc hence the lack of Songstress/dance love also?~
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Adding easier difficulties seems to me to have been something of an admission that they way they intended it to be was not really a way that people could actually get the message of the game. Unless quitting in frustration halfway through is part of the message. And who knows? For this game perhaps more than any other I could see how that might be part of what they were going for.
Totes the Vito Acconcis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vito_Acconci)of videogames amirite
Cavia is Rem Koolhaas
Is there any reason Fenrir couldn't use the Auto Life garment grids or the Lady Luck trick for Auto Life slots for the FFX-2 run?~
I'm guessing some of the new dress spheres give some of Songstress's benefits such as MP 0, Magical Immunity, etc hence the lack of Songstress/dance love also?~
One of the new jobs does have magical immunity. I'm not sold on MP 0 being that good in a game with awesome MP restoration skills. Few games are as generous with MP as FFX-2
I didn't find any Auto Life garment grid so far.
I had checked a guide for slots and somehow missed Auto-Life! Huh. Thanks! This might help beat other bosses (though probably not the arena, sadly) Another great, possibly even better slot result is the one that gives you Mighty Guard +, which is completely awesome.
The pause trick is definitely super annoying to pull off, not something I'd use if I could use any other strategy.
The reason why I don't care that much for slots in this game is that you get severely screwed for not getting any combos with slots (Every PC gets their HPs reduced by 3/4), unlike FF6 in which you just get weak healing.
I just beat the level 60 via infinito boss the weirdest way:
Fighting its oversouled (supposedly way better) form, which loses its 60000 damage attack, and gets more HPs and a lot of reflectable spells. Reflect ring, haste ring, defense + songs= Berserker could auto battle this with his weak regen
Let's find out if the level 80 boss is an even bigger bastard
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Level 80 boss is Yunalesca and she's extremely angry.
I could beat her by getting an absurdly awesome accessory by beating one annoying minigame
I'm so out of here.
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Getting this absurdly awesome accessory by beating one annoying minigame. AVOID!
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FF10 HD: So not much plot happened here...but there was some!
Tidus goes to find Yuna, she's having second thought about the pilgrimage. Tidus now of course says "hey, why not quit! Forget it all, let's go to my Zanarkand and have fun!" Tidus is being irresponsible here of course because he's basically saying "Fun over duty, huzzah!" but he does mean well; he doesn't want Yuna to die or worry, and is trying to make things right, but he's also still a teenager so his judgment isn't the greatest of things. I know I keep saying Tidus isn't an idiot...but I've also kept emphasizing he's not super smart either; he's very average, so naturally, a bad idea is to be expected on occasion. Yuna eventually declines and the two make out underwater to the game's vocal theme because "Well shit, we need SOMEWAY to prove they're totally a thing now and there's no awkward anti-gravity spaceship situation going on!"
The real thing to get out of this is just how...jarring Tidus' lines are compared to everything else. He's been pretty honest to Yuna before this point, mostly because he never had a reason to lie. "Hey, we'll get to Zanarkand, you'll defeat Sin, I'll go home, everything will be awesome!" He's being optimistic, but still, he means what he says.
Then here, he's lying to Yuna for the first time so openly...and to himself. You can tell by the way he's saying things, he's struggling to convince himself of all these things. As far back as Macalania Temple at the latest, Tidus has resigned himself to the fact that "I'm never going home" so really, his whole "LET'S HAVE FUN IN ZANARKAND!" lying to Yuna is a way to express his own homesickness in a way that isn't "WAAAH! I WANNA GO HOME ;_;." As in...it's the complete opposite of whining; he's twisting homesickness in a positive light, such that the feelings are entirely internalized but he's making it sound like a good thing.
Yuna, of course, is too impressed by everything he says to see through Tidus' own lies and what is really going on. This isn't Yuna being stupid but more Tidus talking about things she didn't even consider. "Wait, you mean people stay up that late in Zanarkand? IT MUST BE AMAZING!" Of course, Yuna then says "no" to giving up, and then Tidus is brought back to reality. Following that, Tidus reminds Yuna he'll follow her, no matter what decision and protect her; he's his guardian. He then tells Rikku later "we just need to think of a way!"
CALM LANDS! Ok, so Yuna's predecessor, in the sense that Wakka/Lulu were his guardians, appears and is clearly Pro-Yuna, nice way to give a little bit of backstory to Lulu and Wakka because they had a pilgrimage but we know nothing about it. Here we see the summoner in question, and he clearly has no ill-feelings towards either of them. Not much to say here. Tidus then tells Rikku to stop complaining about the failing and just to "KEEP ON THINKING! IF WE CAN'T THINK OF A WAY...WE'LL THINK OF ANOTHER WAY!" Uh, Tidus, to think of ANOTHER way you need to think ONE WAY. That might be an oddly translated line like it could have been "If the first way doesn't work, we'll think of another!" Either way, it seems clear Tidus' #1 goal is "make sure Yuna doesn't die."
The rest of this sequence is...well...best way to sum it up?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyXTgqJtoGM&spfreload=10 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyXTgqJtoGM&spfreload=10)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEUOOgNzOv4&spfreload=10 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEUOOgNzOv4&spfreload=10)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2lBZ8I06S0&spfreload=10 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2lBZ8I06S0&spfreload=10)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aTjSALWV58&spfreload=10 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aTjSALWV58&spfreload=10)
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Bravely Default: Finally. It is finished. 104 hours later.
Final boss was weird; for the most part he's freaking pathetic, yet he still managed to make me use Bravely Second toward the end. Minor gameplay spoilers: Most of his skillset is just *trash*, for all that solo bosses in any RPG have this problem in general. Physical is not scary, Demonic Touch is waste-a-turn on buffs (oh noes), Celestial Touch trades 1:1 with Dispel giving me 3 other turns, Divergence is worthless, etc. Disaster is an MT OHKO, but because this is BD, MT OHKOs are strangely not that scary - oh no, MT 4HKO thanks to Default Guard, revive anyone who wasn't Defaulting. Well, unless he uses Disaster 2 turns in a row - then both the healer and the revived person die. Still, the remaining party members can easily patch up - oh wait, there might be a 3rd Disaster so somebody *must* Default, crap. Despite his AI fairly rarely using Disaster before (1 in every 5 turns, perhaps?) I had a sequence of him using Disaster 4 or 5 times in a row, which is not survivable without some Bravely Seconding in there, hence the battle taking a few extra days of real time to get the SP back.
As a side note, Spiritmaster strangely kinda worthless in the final sequence, despite being awesome for Bugzilla 1 & 2 (both in Finale: LA, and the earlier battle in Finale: Bravely Default). Bugzilla 3 spams Acedia way too often to bother trying to undo it, and Singing for MDef boosts would have been far more useful for the Beast, although I guess the MT status immunity is vaguely okay vs. Zero Dimension.
Plotwise, Finale: Bravely Default was frustrating, although the one plot twist they saved for it (rather than in Finale: LA) was amusing, I thought. I thought the implication toward the end of C6 was that if you continue onward, the party is "in on it" who the Deceiver is, but are playing along because they have a Cunning Plan, or trust Agnes to do something surprising. They have to lure out Oury to end this once and for all, or they need to steal the power of the connected worlds themselves to restart Creation, or something. Instead everyone acts just as surprised as if you do the ending earlier. Sigh.
The "invade the Celestial Realm" stuff was amusing though. Haha at using the 3DS facecam for that, I see what you did there. So Tiz has the fragment of a celestial = he's being controlled by me, and Oury wants to invade the real world. Got it, Hideo Kojima would approve, etc. Except... they seem to go a different direction in the ending ending? Which may be fine, I suppose it does have more sequel possibilities. So... Tiz was in a tank remote-controlling zombie Tiz the whole time, and being really really coy about it? Is where "real Tiz" is from the Celestial Realm? Or is it the future, hence the comment about "the same era as me?" Future would be weird though, since I know Agnes is supposed to show up in Bravely Second... for all that I'd rather they tell a different story, sigh. If it's set in a new world, that'd be fine by me, though, move on.
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Shadowrun Dragonfall, Director's Cut:
Started.
Got scared at the skill select screen and closed the game.
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Re Spiritmaster and the penultimate boss, they cancel Acedia, which I'm really surprised you didn't find worth it (though you can use Dispel as well of course)? Once debuffed, Exaflare will overkill anyone not defaulting and 2HKO anyone who is, that just feels an insurmountable situation for the exact same reason you found out with Disaster spam (which yes is the only good thing about the final. It's even worse if he opens with it several times in a row! Well, Divergence is okay) since she can certainly spam that and/or mix it up with Slaughter. Guess you got it to work, and I dunno what the rest of your level/setup was so maybe it was more possible for you than it was for me.
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Shadowrun Dragonfall, Director's Cut:
Started.
Got scared at the skill select screen and closed the game.
To break the game, choose a Elf, pump Quickness, Dodge, and Rifles. Congratulations you can now one-shot anything from halfway across the map while never getting hit, ever. Though it does take awhile to get to that point.
If you want a good build that isn't quite as OP try some sort of melee build or mage. Decker is more useful than the vanilla game but still not that great.
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I actually just decided on having a human decker with a shotgun (I want to cyberjack into the haxtrix. And I like shotguns), so I just might have made the worst build.
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Human is the best race. They get 3 bonus stat points, trolls get 2, everyone else gets 1. Caps don't matter because there's not enough experience to hit them even at the very end.
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Acedia is undone by *death* as well. And death is not that bad.
Okay, I was a bit unfair, being able to use Spirit Guard / Adaptation on my healer was useful, but not attempting to undo it everywhere, which would be a turn-negative trade (boss uses 1 turn, I spend 4 turns on my healer - ouch). Default Guard on everyone, which makes Acedia'd Zeta Flare quite survivable via spamming Default (as it better be, as her Acedia->Zeta Flare combo is gg otherwise). So... just default a lot, then have 1 person at 3 BP bravely smash in (but only for 3x actions) a round. If they die from MT doom, whatever, just revive & heal 'em back up afterward. It felt like 1 out of every 3 turns or so was spent on Acedia, so if I just accept it and harvest BP, it's not so bad.
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Gods Will Be Watching yarr
I have not played the game, but this conversation sparked a binge-watching of a let's play of it. I'd recommend doing at least that much of it since the plot itself is kinda cute if hamfisted as my anus on Sunday. A couple of the puzzles actually looked pretty neat to figure out (chapters 2, 3, 4, and maaaaaaybe the second to last one) but yeah definitely look like they took too fucking long. Definitely a neat concept that I am disappointed to hear (and kinda see secondhand) is pretty dang lame in execution.
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Shadowrun Dragonfall, Director's Cut:
Started.
Got scared at the skill select screen and closed the game.
To break the game, choose a Elf, pump Quickness, Dodge, and Rifles. Congratulations you can now one-shot anything from halfway across the map while never getting hit, ever. Though it does take awhile to get to that point.
If you want a good build that isn't quite as OP try some sort of melee build or mage. Decker is more useful than the vanilla game but still not that great.
Yeah, fast elf rifle(wo)man was exactly what I ran through Dead Man's Switch and it was crazy good. Melee's decent (I went ork melee brute for Dragonfall), especially if you main the slashing weapons that negate enemy turns, but it really can't compete.
I always left hacking for the hires. It's usually a means to complete secondary objectives or get extra goodies rather than mandatory, and Dragonfall gives you a perfectly decent NPC decker pretty early.
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Snowfire: His big MT damage move really is the only scary thing he has, but the fact that he can whip it out at a moment's notice and do so multiple turns in a row is alone an issue, leading to a reset you really have no way around. I myself had only one PC survive an instance like this, managed to pull through thanks to Bravex3 -> Phoenix Down x3 + Megalixir.
I wouldn't mind this so much if not for the fact that the entire final boss arc takes forever. Reset against a final boss? Fine. Reset against a final boss with multiple forms? Frustrating but this is a final boss. Reset against a final boss who has a long cutscene you can't skip beforehand? Annoying, but I can overlook that (Valkyrie Profile comes to mind here, for all that I've never lost to Loki.) Reset against a Final Boss with multiple forms, several of which are scripted fights AND there's long cutscenes in-between that you can only partially sceneskip? Go die please.
Shame too because BD was really good at being fair about the bullshit. Even deaths through back attacks, annoying as they are, is fair because of both auto-saves and how often enemies use things you can prepare against once you know they're coming. The Final Boss sequence just irked me because there really had to be a better way how to handle that.
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It isn't like wiping to Cloud of Darkness though right? I died to the final fight once to something I could have Bravely Seconded out of and it was kind of annoying but for the game to fuck it up once isn't that colossally damning to me., but it does make it stand out significantly more (since the game does have a Hard Mode and legitimately strong optional boss fights that could likely have caused wipes so you likely have run into a reset or two before).
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All I have to say is that I thank the lord for the Time Mage reset battle ability. Saved my ass in both of the multiform boss fights. It starts you at the form you died to, which is pretty awesome.
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SMT:SJ - Just beat Maya in Grus, so nearly done. This zone being all about illusion and hammering home the usual Chaos/Law split of SMT is mixing two pretty great things. The illusion thing is a fairly whatever excuse to use palette swaps of old zones, right up until you fight Maya and her background is this (http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120822042916/megamitensei/images/8/8e/Mother_Maya's_stage_(SMTSJ).jpg) which is a pretty fantastic image and is going to be my new lock screen for a while.
I started rolling Law because apparently I forgot just how much Law always ends up grating on me in SMT and how great Chaos is at being a bunch of Bros when they aren't killing you in the face. Also Loisa Ferre is way better than Loius Cypher, but I think I am going to be gunning for Neutral. Partly because Chaos is going to end poorly and mostly because I want to see more of Zombie Gore becoming Neo in the Matrix.
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It isn't like wiping to Cloud of Darkness though right? I died to the final fight once to something I could have Bravely Seconded out of and it was kind of annoying but for the game to fuck it up once isn't that colossally damning to me., but it does make it stand out significantly more (since the game does have a Hard Mode and legitimately strong optional boss fights that could likely have caused wipes so you likely have run into a reset or two before).
I don't hold this too heavily against the game, no, but it's not a note you want to end the game on either. Dying to Cloud of Darkness is way worse, I'll grant, to the point where it's not comparable (and yeah, BD does have Timeslip to alleviate it some, though you shouldn't be expected to use that.)
It is like you said though; it stands out a lot more in a game like this because it's the only time it happens. Now arguably, that's a statement about the rest of the game being good at handling that and I'd agree to an extent. And yes, on Hard Mode, I expect plenty of resets throughout because lots of unexpected ways to die, just BD is generally very good at handling resets. Either you use Auto Save and lose very little progress, or you don't, and just take note of what killed you and prepare for it from there (or be like me, NOT prepare for it despite dying 3 times, and just stubbornly keep trying until it frustrates you enough that you give in. This isn't the game's fault, to be clear, it's totally my own!)
But like I said, I don't hold this too heavily against the game, but still leaves a sour taste in my mouth after the game was overall very positive about things like this. Think of it as a very "the exceptions stand out more than the norm" scenario.
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Gods Will Be Watching yarr
I have not played the game, but this conversation sparked a binge-watching of a let's play of it. I'd recommend doing at least that much of it since the plot itself is kinda cute if hamfisted as my anus on Sunday. A couple of the puzzles actually looked pretty neat to figure out (chapters 2, 3, 4, and maaaaaaybe the second to last one) but yeah definitely look like they took too fucking long. Definitely a neat concept that I am disappointed to hear (and kinda see secondhand) is pretty dang lame in execution.
One of the best parts of the game is the initial feeling out period where you just try and experiment with things in a new level because you don't really have any real idea how your actions will play out and thus you don't have a real strategy in how to approach things. It was gratifying when you gained the understanding of the levels as complex systems that interacted with each other and that could have provided a really satisfying experience, but again, it's held back by the fact that failure is incredibly costly (you fail at the end of a stage, you've basically lost an hour or so) and some aspects of the randomness are just kinda dumb. A Let's Play is a good way of taking in the concept though.
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Gods Will Be Watching yarr
I have not played the game, but this conversation sparked a binge-watching of a let's play of it. I'd recommend doing at least that much of it since the plot itself is kinda cute if hamfisted as my anus on Sunday. A couple of the puzzles actually looked pretty neat to figure out (chapters 2, 3, 4, and maaaaaaybe the second to last one) but yeah definitely look like they took too fucking long. Definitely a neat concept that I am disappointed to hear (and kinda see secondhand) is pretty dang lame in execution.
One of the best parts of the game is the initial feeling out period where you just try and experiment with things in a new level because you don't really have any real idea how your actions will play out and thus you don't have a real strategy in how to approach things. It was gratifying when you gained the understanding of the levels as complex systems that interacted with each other and that could have provided a really satisfying experience, but again, it's held back by the fact that failure is incredibly costly (you fail at the end of a stage, you've basically lost an hour or so) and some aspects of the randomness are just kinda dumb. A Let's Play is a good way of taking in the concept though.
Yeah, I agree. The first chapter explains every possible action you take, then afterwards only the basics get explained. I still don't know what provoking during Chapter 2 does, for exemple.
I restarted on Easy and got through Chapter 4. Lost on chapters 2, 4 and 5 (twice).
Losing progress in this game feels incredibly frustrating, as the game is very slow paced and you're not going to change your strategies that much. I'm saying this as the guy who tried going through Dark Souls 2 without dying 50 times.
There are a lot of little inconsistencies.
I'm a bit surprised that Jack didn't scream like mad before horribly dying in Chapter 2
In Chapter 3, every character could act in the same "turn". Then they stripped that away in Chapter 4 and just gave you 5 actions per day? (which could be the same character hunting 5 times while nobody else does anything)
Two other really strange things (one obvious: Every character being resurrected, one a bit less so : Burden not needing to eat any meat) are at least acknowledged by the plot. I hope this will lead somewhere.
...
SMT:SJ - Just beat Maya in Grus, so nearly done. This zone being all about illusion and hammering home the usual Chaos/Law split of SMT is mixing two pretty great things. The illusion thing is a fairly whatever excuse to use palette swaps of old zones, right up until you fight Maya and her background is this which is a pretty fantastic image and is going to be my new lock screen for a while.
I started rolling Law because apparently I forgot just how much Law always ends up grating on me in SMT and how great Chaos is at being a bunch of Bros when they aren't killing you in the face. Also Loisa Ferre is way better than Loius Cypher, but I think I am going to be gunning for Neutral. Partly because Chaos is going to end poorly and mostly because I want to see more of Zombie Gore becoming Neo in the Matrix.
Be warned that Chaos is the only path that doesn't have a crazy hard final boss.
Yeah, fast elf rifle(wo)man was exactly what I ran through Dead Man's Switch and it was crazy good. Melee's decent (I went ork melee brute for Dragonfall), especially if you main the slashing weapons that negate enemy turns, but it really can't compete.
I always left hacking for the hires. It's usually a means to complete secondary objectives or get extra goodies rather than mandatory, and Dragonfall gives you a perfectly decent NPC decker pretty early.
After seeing how unexciting hacking is, yeah I'm going to restart. I'm also going to stay with shotguns no matter how crappy they are. Maybe just play as a dumb samurai this one time, there's enough costumization everywhere else in the game to have to worry about my skills too.
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Oh look! Bayonetta 2 is out! You know what that means!?
Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze: I just defeated a Polar Bear wielding a giant hammer by dropping him into grape juice repeatedly. This game still hates you and everything you stand for. At least I'm finally at the final world!
...this could end in my cutting myself...
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Losing progress in this game feels incredibly frustrating, as the game is very slow paced and you're not going to change your strategies that much. I'm saying this as the guy who tried going through Dark Souls 2 without dying 50 times.
Speaking of? I'm making a note here, huge success.
I thought I was out. I thought was done. But one more crazy character build idea got hold of me: Ignus wishes to burn. From nerfed the other casting classes pretty badly, but I thought pyromancy was mostly spared, right? I figured I'd find out how good it was on its own, so here is plan: run as sorcerer through No-Man's Wharf (for the pyro hand) and Harvest Valley (for the Fragrant Branch of Yore; this honestly seemed more accessible to me than jumping down the pit); as soon as both the pyro hand is acquired and Rosabeth is free to provide the first stock of spells, nothing but pyromancy may be used for the rest of the game; hitting dudes with the pyro hand is fine in order to conserve spells (this actually matters earlyish when you have few pyromancies and can save a spell by just punching someone who barely survived a fireball or whatever); initially I intended to go full hollow, toss on Ring of Binding to mitigate HP reduction, and rock the dark pyromancy flame. That last component fell by the wayside since by the time I reached the thing I still hadn't died. I wasn't about to ruin a good streak by jumping off a cliff just to use a gimmick item! So I stuck with the regular flame the whole time, would have liked to go full Jester Thomas and dual wield them but unfortunately the dark flame has strikingly negative scaling when you're human. (And you can't get a second regular flame, I realized with some chagrin after wasting the time and effort of running No-Man's Wharf ascetic'd.)
Pyromancy is actually pretty crazy good! You're just so limited in spells early on that you have to chunk through a few early zones to get going, which is pretty lame. Stats matter a lot more for pyro damage than I thought. I think before I made the mistake of testing the wrong enemies--those dudes who run around in the river by the first forest bonfire? Probably I didn't realize at the time that being soaked vastly increases fire resist in DS2. Actually, with optimal stats you're probably getting a couple hundred extra damage out per spell. Stat spread was as follows: 60 ATT (I want all those spells! I even ascetic'd Shaded Woods to kill NG+ Najka for her ring), 30 VIG/END (HP is nice, and Combustion spells eat a lot of stamina), 30 INT/FTH (practically speaking, pyro damage caps out at INT + FTH = 60). Everything else stayed at the sorcerer base (it had the highest starting concentration of mental stats), which meant I could never use any weapon but the dagger (which is fine, because the plan ultimately was no weapons). Knew I wouldn't be able to use a bow, ever, figured what the hell, I've done the game without range before, at least I can chuck 'nades this time. That's gotta be easier, right? No adaptability, all my agility had to come from attunement. And vitality is just pointless! Specialization is always key in these games, I've found (at least until From patches your character into obsolescence, hi there clerics/hexers).
A bunch of optional stuff I skipped because dude I'm halfway through the game and I still haven't died, no unnecessary risks. Chariot stands out as a gigantic fucking unnecessary risk even though he's guarding a stack of pyromancies; I waited to come back and kill him in the most humiliating way possible after completing the game (we'll come back to this). Ditto Royal Rat Authority, the spell you get from him is just worthless. Did kill Royal Rat Vanguard as early as it seemed safe to do so (Flame Swathe 2HKO'd him) because oh my god you guys I need Toxic Mist.
Worst parts: Iron Keep, predictably, because everything has massive fire resist and I still can't fucking dodge Alonne knights worth a damn. The bosses are poison bait but Old Iron King has trucks full of HP and outlasts all my poison spells. This is terrifying because he takes like 20% damage from fire and the risk of falling into the lava dwarfs the potential to die from direct damage in that fight (he hits hard, but there's so much wind-up on his attacks, you always have a chance to heal). Probably even worse? Shrine of Amana, because I have no fucking bow in the Shrine of Amana. Also everything has enhanced fire resist from the water and the lizard dudes genuinely can't be hit with fireballs when they're fully submerged. Since I still hadn't died and in effect this had morphed from a themed run into a no-death run, I decided to break conditions and at least shoot poison arrows even though I wouldn't be able to do any real direct damage with them. It turns out that without meeting the stat requirements of your bow you can't benefit from the poison arrow effect either...at least until you've fired like twenty of them into the same target, as I learn in the room immediately preceding Demon of Song (the absolute worst room in the game to do without a bow, probably responsible for a full 50% of deaths in Pugilism Souls run, and the only place where I was desperate enough here to actually try killing an enemy with 18 damage arrows at a time). Excepting those areas, it was a remarkably effective build! And no, I'm not too proud to summon both NPC phantoms for the throne duo fight. Fuck those guys.
So yeah, completing Dark Souls 2 without dying, a thing I did this week.
Anyway, having finished all mandatory content and acquired my totally useless invisible hand ring as a reward, there were three things that still needed to be done:
1) Kill chariot in the most humiliating way possible.
I'm sure as hell not fighting him legit ever again, but shooting arrows takes too long in a normal game and would take years in this one. Tools at hand! I always wondered, what would happen if you reduced his healthbar to zero while the chariot was still running? Poison doesn't deal enough damage to whittle him down all the way, it'll always run out before he crashes. So instead: wear him down halfway through Firestorm, then fill the corridor with Lingering Flames. Lingering Flame is amazing (amaaazing) and I'd never used it before. Floats in the air until an enemy approaches, then explodes for 600-800 damage each (and a ghastly degree of console slowdown if you use multiples at once). I can toss four of them down in between chariot passes (very long casting time). There's no way he's living through all that! ...Except he does because he's apparently programmed to go HP->1 on a killing blow, so I still had to run all the way down and poke him in the face like usual. Dammit!
2) Troll other players with invisible pyro hand.
This is honestly unfair. I brought the starting dagger back out of storage to sit in the right hand for misdirection. Poke ineffectually at people, act like I'm going for backstabs. And then 3x Forbidden Sun to the face when there's no cause to expect I'm actually a caster. Forbidden Sun got nerfed but that's still reliably 2,000+ damage in like five seconds and practically speaking you just don't get more than 2,000 HP in DS2. So yeah, 100% invasion success rate (excepting the dude who exited the zone before I could find him, which apparently is a thing you can do in this game).
3) DLC.
...And here we go back to being staggeringly incompetent because now From's all no guys you can't be a caster, don't you understand that's not our idiom?! At best 60% damage vs regular goons (who all have bloated HP counts), maybe 30% in Crown of the Old Iron King because Brume Tower is the fetid womb that spawned Smelty. Great Combustion's fantastic in the regular game, ranges anywhere from 600-1,000 damage depending on the enemy; in DLC zones you're lucky if you get 300 out of it. I just don't understand why they thought it was necessary to make the most fun areas in the game torture for specific builds. Fume Knight (Crown of the Old Iron King's boss) is by far the worst ordeal, he probably has 90% fire resist. Had to be a solid fifteen minutes I spend dodging, chucking fireballs, and chewing amber herbs to replenish spell charges in the one attempt it took to beat him. At least most of the other bosses I could take with just the stock of spells I walked through the door with! So yeah, fighting Raime with just fire damage, not a challenge recommend for those valuing their sanity.
I did die a couple times in the DLC (precisely twice, one an incredibly stupid falling death and once because Burnt Ivory King is a jerkass who mocks fire damage and makes you fight through a horde of goons that mock fire damage just to reach him). And I skipped the optional zones in the latter two DLC campaigns altogether because they're frankly just anti-fun even with a competent melee fighter. But the game doesn't care about that because it happened after I beat the final boss, so I don't care either.
Anyway, show's over here. Even if another ridiculous character idea seized me, I can't see any point in playing this again.
~
Also speaking of restarting PCRPGs--
Wasteland 2: I wasn't in a fantasy mood this evening, perhaps for obvious reasons, so I gave this a couple hours' test drive after dinner. I feel like I must be doing lots of things wrong. I'm mucking around in the basement of Vault 22 Ag Center in the first substantial quest/dungeon I've encountered so far, and I have no immediate idea how much of the place is left but I already look likely to run out of bullets and healing supplies before finishing. My team fails at hitting people, I'm about out of ammo and every box and door I open explodes on me and no one in the party can detect the traps. I just don't know. I guess I should've specialized more, then maybe hitrates would be composed marginally less of ass? I tried to give everybody skills in a couple different weapon types figuring the extra options would offset limited availability of ammunition, but maybe that just bit me in the ass through people wasting bullets instead. Doesn't help that I went low strength on everyone but the melee specialist and I belatedly notice that strength determines HP in this game.
This is the PC gang I built:
-Mizuki Maki: the party Face. Supposed to take the charm/outwit options in conversation while the rest of the party carries combat, but this has hardly mattered so far. Point or two in handguns because it seemed the simplest option for the least combat-focused PC. Also dumped points in leadership because the bonuses sounded nice (this is probably the most useful thing she has, actually, full-party accuracy boost and all).
-Gordon's Alive?!: hits people with clubs and talks to animals. Basically Sulik without the bone through his nose. Charming animals is neat since it basically removes an enemy from the fight altogether, except you don't get XP for this and that's a problem since full heal on leveling up is a godsend and something that actually looks vital if the game is going to have a lot of lengthy dungeons like this.
-Abigail Micah: doctor, took both first aid and surgery. SMGs were supposed to be backup but actually they were totally boss...until she ran out of ammo. Now she's doing piddly damage burning through the few energy cells I have on a crappy starting phaser.
-Ghost: team sniper, fucking scary, woo. That part works. Backup skills in assault rifles (less impressive), weaponsmithing and security of minimal import thus far. Lockpicking got me some extra loot, yay? But the doors and boxes always explode on me anyways so whatever healing supplies I find in the process are basically null gain.
The game looks neat and all, but I feel like I'm going to be in a resource exhaustion scenario within an hour if I keep playing.
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Gods Will Be Watching yarr
I have not played the game, but this conversation sparked a binge-watching of a let's play of it. I'd recommend doing at least that much of it since the plot itself is kinda cute if hamfisted as my anus on Sunday. A couple of the puzzles actually looked pretty neat to figure out (chapters 2, 3, 4, and maaaaaaybe the second to last one) but yeah definitely look like they took too fucking long. Definitely a neat concept that I am disappointed to hear (and kinda see secondhand) is pretty dang lame in execution.
One of the best parts of the game is the initial feeling out period where you just try and experiment with things in a new level because you don't really have any real idea how your actions will play out and thus you don't have a real strategy in how to approach things. It was gratifying when you gained the understanding of the levels as complex systems that interacted with each other and that could have provided a really satisfying experience, but again, it's held back by the fact that failure is incredibly costly (you fail at the end of a stage, you've basically lost an hour or so) and some aspects of the randomness are just kinda dumb. A Let's Play is a good way of taking in the concept though.
Yeah, I agree. The first chapter explains every possible action you take, then afterwards only the basics get explained. I still don't know what provoking during Chapter 2 does, for exemple.
I restarted on Easy and got through Chapter 4. Lost on chapters 2, 4 and 5 (twice).
Losing progress in this game feels incredibly frustrating, as the game is very slow paced and you're not going to change your strategies that much. I'm saying this as the guy who tried going through Dark Souls 2 without dying 50 times.
There are a lot of little inconsistencies.
I'm a bit surprised that Jack didn't scream like mad before horribly dying in Chapter 2
In Chapter 3, every character could act in the same "turn". Then they stripped that away in Chapter 4 and just gave you 5 actions per day? (which could be the same character hunting 5 times while nobody else does anything)
At least as far as this is concerned, I believe the concept for the game was developed during one of those 24 hour game jams, and the result was chapter 4. So chapter 3 came later in the development cycle probably when they realized the c4 methodology wouldn't work for that. Also note how C4 is easily one of the least complex chapters of the game.
Provoke in C2 has only one of the characters take damage during that turn so you can balance damage between the two until you lose Jack.
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Gods Will Be Watching yarr
I have not played the game, but this conversation sparked a binge-watching of a let's play of it. I'd recommend doing at least that much of it since the plot itself is kinda cute if hamfisted as my anus on Sunday. A couple of the puzzles actually looked pretty neat to figure out (chapters 2, 3, 4, and maaaaaaybe the second to last one) but yeah definitely look like they took too fucking long. Definitely a neat concept that I am disappointed to hear (and kinda see secondhand) is pretty dang lame in execution.
One of the best parts of the game is the initial feeling out period where you just try and experiment with things in a new level because you don't really have any real idea how your actions will play out and thus you don't have a real strategy in how to approach things. It was gratifying when you gained the understanding of the levels as complex systems that interacted with each other and that could have provided a really satisfying experience, but again, it's held back by the fact that failure is incredibly costly (you fail at the end of a stage, you've basically lost an hour or so) and some aspects of the randomness are just kinda dumb. A Let's Play is a good way of taking in the concept though.
Yeah, I agree. The first chapter explains every possible action you take, then afterwards only the basics get explained. I still don't know what provoking during Chapter 2 does, for exemple.
I restarted on Easy and got through Chapter 4. Lost on chapters 2, 4 and 5 (twice).
Losing progress in this game feels incredibly frustrating, as the game is very slow paced and you're not going to change your strategies that much. I'm saying this as the guy who tried going through Dark Souls 2 without dying 50 times.
There are a lot of little inconsistencies.
I'm a bit surprised that Jack didn't scream like mad before horribly dying in Chapter 2
In Chapter 3, every character could act in the same "turn". Then they stripped that away in Chapter 4 and just gave you 5 actions per day? (which could be the same character hunting 5 times while nobody else does anything)
At least as far as this is concerned, I believe the concept for the game was developed during one of those 24 hour game jams, and the result was chapter 4. So chapter 3 came later in the development cycle probably when they realized the c4 methodology wouldn't work for that. Also note how C4 is easily one of the least complex chapters of the game.
Provoke in C2 has only one of the characters take damage during that turn so you can balance damage between the two until you lose Jack.
Man that is amateur. I didn't expect this from a game with such good pixel art. The problem is that some characters become total dead weight (mostly the scientists) when realistically they could contribute.
Near the end we had completely repaired the radio so I decided to make a speech about it to raise morale. Inexplicably, the speech could be summed up "We really need to repair the radio!!", everybody went "Oh shit he's totally lost it" and morale was actually lowered.
I think both characters got hit when I used Provoke so maybe this sometimes fails? Hmm. Maybe I didn't pay enough attention.
Grats Cid, I'm jealous.
Megami Tensei 2: Usually in MegaTen, the maximum number of demons you can have raises as you get levels, or progress through the story.
This is clearly not hardcore enough.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431286-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00026.png)
What could go wrong?
Oh yeah, aside from that one time an NPC talked about a cruel trap that should be right about here
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431291-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00027.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431285-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00029.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431405-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00024.png)
"LOSARM" status effect. Great. It means you cannot do anything in battle and lose HP every step.
If you haven't forgotten about the cyber labs in Ginza...
(I did forget, so I panicked the hell out and checked a faq here)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431296-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00032.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431296-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00036.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431292-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00037.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431295-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00038.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414431646-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00040.png)
Jesus man, I lost my arm, please be slightly less enthusiastic about this +16 megabytes of ram thing ok
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Why be jealous? You did it first!
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SMT: SJ - So the guide for this game on Gamefaqs has passwords for super strong demons specially picked to fight bosses. When I got to Ouroborous I had no way of breaking its regen without spending a significant amount of time rejiggering my party wading through SMT fusion system fairly blind. So I summoned 2 out of the three listed ones for that boss and they have suited my purpose for pretty much the rest of the game. I intend to get ones suggested for the rest of the game as well because I want to do all the side quests and meh end game SMT can get curb stomped.
In my endeavours to do this I have had to level grind a little bit. To do so I am soloing wandering around the opening area of Horologium before you are forced to pick a path. The strategy is pretty much
(http://gamercheese.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/joel-fps-doug-gardiner.jpg)
BOOM! HEADSHOT!
Repeatedly.
Surprisingly cathartic way to spend a morning while getting ready for work.
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Yeah but you almost didn't even try!
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Is it better to be born to greatness or to have worked for it?
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Cid was born to greatness then worked to greatestness. The jerk.
Other highlights in Megaten 2:
- These guys
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414462991-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00041.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414462992-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00046.png)
- This guy. I want him to teach me all about the wonders of the body.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414463000-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00042.png)
- "We need new demons. Let's go do some "demon conversation" *wink* *wink*"
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414462994-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00044.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414462996-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00045.png)
- Gingers. Is there no end to their evil?
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414462994-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00043.png)
- NO NOT ANOTHER FLESHY DUNGEON INSIDE A GIANT WHALE-LIKE THING
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414463002-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00047.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414463007-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00050.png)
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Smash 3DS: I just spent about half an hour online playing For Glory, alternating between Link and Duck Hunt and just mindlessly spamming projectiles as much as possible in FFAs. I also somehow managed to win 3/7 matches.
I'm not sure whether this is hilarious or terrible. Or both.
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Fantasy Life: Got some Gamestop giftcards for my birthday so I picked this up. Haven't played much but I made an Angler named Adray. Seems very sandbox-y so far.
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After seeing how unexciting hacking is, yeah I'm going to restart. I'm also going to stay with shotguns no matter how crappy they are. Maybe just play as a dumb samurai this one time, there's enough costumization everywhere else in the game to have to worry about my skills too.
I ran shotguns in my game. You straight fuck shit up with them, especially once you get the ones that have burst fire mode. But yeah, no real point in playing a decker, since the game gives you one early on and then, to make sure you can finish the most difficult decking challenge, you can get a second one for that mission who is absurdly good.
My party was me, the decker, the mage and the melee specialist most times.
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Smash 4 - Still just messing around. Currently aiming to clear Classic Mode at Intensity 9.0, but not sure who my best character is yet. Probably Little Mac, but we'll see, I suppose.
FE10 - NEB inspired me to start my own No-Restart playthrough of this, so I did. Currently on P1C7. Had a hard reset on the map where you recruit Aran because I accidentally left Laura in range of an enemy I forgot about entirely, so she got sniped through the tree. Other than that, people are generally turning out quite nicely! Other big mistake I've made since then is that in Chapter 6.5, I had Tauroneo in range to one-shot the boss, and had a guarantee of at least one person on my team dying that round. However, because I thought that the win condition was Route, and only thought that during that one turn, I didn't have Tauroneo finish him, and thus I lost both Laura and Leonardo that turn. Leo I REALLY don't care about, because he was even worse than usual, but Laura was actually turning out pretty decently.
As for how the living are coming along... Micaiah is kinda great; she capped magic already because she literally had 1 level where she didn't gain it, though she is pretty frail with not gaining any HP for about 5-6 levels in a row, and now gaining it slowly, and also being kinda mediocre on Defense, which is fine. She has great skill, great speed, and great Res, so she'll do just fine. Surprisingly, Edward is actually turning out quite nicely, and is entirely usable for once! I mean, he's still kind of under-leveled because he isn't tanking a million things like Nolan and Aran (go go Dawn Rangers~) but he's definitely not getting benched. Other than that, everyone is coming along about how you'd expect, maybe slightly better (have had quite a few VERY nice levels on people).
Now that I can finally bench people, Fiona/Ilyana are first on that list, and I don't even remember who the third person is, but I suspect Tauroneo because I don't even get a choice in the matter but whatever. Aside from a couple blunders, things have been going quite well. I held out hope for Leo to not be GOD AWFUL but his first level was HP/Luck/Res only, then Luck/Res, then HP/Luck/Res. For multiple turns I have come within the possibility of someone dying, and so thrown Leo out into the front lines to get chewed on as a Marthian sacrifice because he was that bad go fuck yourself Leonardo oh my god
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Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze:
(http://zacshipley.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/firehell.jpg)
(http://www.uvm.edu/~inquiryb/webquest/sp08/pmontgom/avalanche.jpg)
(https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/231809018/Rhino_1_1_.jpg)
(http://www.goes-r.gov/users/comet/volcanic_ash/volcanism/media/graphics/arching_lava_fountain.jpg)
(http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2013/195/6/e/viking_walrus_by_gentsai-d6dg8f7.jpg)
(http://www.marriedtothesea.com/072308/dance-of-the-walrus.gif)
The only accurate way to portray the final world of DKCTF.
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Devil May Cry - Nelo Angelo 3 is very difficult! Ended up burning through a Devil Star and Vital Star just to beat him, and I regret nothing. Probably had around 12 resets on him? I hate the floating green blade moves, fuck him when he does that. Then I fought Nightmare 2, who I only had one reset on, albeit with a Vital Star use. I'm sure I will never have to fight Nightmare again. In the next level, I fought some cuddly demon things (Nobodies) and ended up kind of cheaping them out after four resets by luring them one at a time onto a roof. Now I'm in hell.
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Megami Tensei 2: I'm near the end, the game is throwing evil shit at me.
- Pitfalls, that aren't indicated on the map even after being thrown in one, including one that throws you all the way back at the beginning of the dungeon
- De-levelling enemies en masse. Hurray we're at a lower level after finishing that dungeon than before
- One dungeon where you can't use the map (but can still use the girl's automap) and which also has a revolving floor and teleportation tiles.
- One dungeon where the girl is taken away (She's so incredibly important)
- TWO instances where various earlygame demons only available through fusions are required. Fucking hell. There's no demon compendium by the way.
Also since I'm now in the demon world, the environments are way less interesting (I prefer big buildings in the post-cyberapocalypse to this generic hellish place)
Despite that, this game still feels better than SMT1 and 2. I think that's because of the overworld map. You don't have to navigate a giant maze to find shops. And IIRC you couldn't teleport everywhere in SMT1/2 like in this one.
Megaten 2 is a lot less unbalanced, too.
BTW:
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414625272-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00058.png)
Other locations include: Gloomy Village, Angry Village, Scary Village, and the Mountain of Horror
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Demon negociation is a lot less involved, and way way easier in this one too.
In Persona 2 there are enemy types that react differently, but always in the same way, and I just dread doing demon negociation.
In classic MegaTen (SMT1/2/Nocturne/SJ) the same demon types react differently, so you just pick any options and who knows what the hell is going to happen. There are a few specific enemy answers though (Lilim just keep asking for more and more money in Nocturne)
In MegaTen 2 you can:
- Ask the demon to join the team (he'll ask for money, and then either join, or leave (By saying something like "Thanks, sucker")
- Do a few nice actions (smiling, trying to persuade the demon, etc) The success rate of asking a demon to join the team depends on whether they liked the nice actions you did.
- Intimidate the demon by pressing a knife against its throat.
Super effective strategy: Do one or a few nice actions, if it works ask the demon to join the team, if it doesn't scare him. This very basic strategy gives you something like a 50% chance for a demon to join the team, which is super ultra high for Megaten.
Most of the time I have to resort to intimidation, but honestly intimidation just works. This means that most of the demons in the team are just terrified of the main characters.
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(http://a5.files.biography.com/image/upload/c_fill,dpr_1.0,g_face,h_300,q_80,w_300/MTE5NDg0MDU1MDQ5MzA3NjYz.jpg)
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Devil May Cry - Plot twist Nightmare is back. This time, he was actually quite difficult, taking about 12 tries. Damn those boomerang and stabby attacks!
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Devil May Cry - Plot twist Nightmare is back. This time, he was actually quite difficult, taking about 12 tries. Damn those boomerang and stabby attacks!
That sounds pretty normal for Nightmare 3 in a first playthrough!
Bayonetta 2: ...stuff...that is all.
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Xenosaga 1- Endgame! Basically ready to delve into stat topicing, but I seem to have come up with a bit of discrepency. Based on the time when KOSMOS rejoins, Shion seems to have about 1500 more skill points then everybody else. Before L25, I was switching characters in and out. I'm wondering if she just has that large an advantage from being in the party the most or if she just got really lucky on when battles I put her in. Does anyone who remember XS 1 remember if she had a relatively large lead naturally?
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Not... really. You may have just massively lucked out on Skill Point roulette bonuses early. Though I tended to pump her full of SP items myself because you want her passing her skillset around to everybody ever anyway.
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I don't know why but I instantly recognized Machiavel. Huh.
So I finished MegaTen 2. God is dead. (kind of)
Spoiler alert: Satan was the head of Suzuki Motor Corp!
I had enough fun playing this. It is the kind of game you should play while doing something else though.
Anyway, considering how many MegaTens have I played and finished (17. lol) , it was nice to go see the beginning of the series.
So to recap:
- MegaTen 1 is simple. There's Lucifer, he's bad, here's a giant dungeon, go beat him.
- MegaTen 2 takes place after 1. Between the two games the apocalypse happened, as shown in a pretty cool intro sequence in the remake:
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414718376-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00095.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414718387-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00096.png)
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414718363-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00099.png)
199X !!
You start in a shelter, then there's a zombie breakout, then whatever you go outside.
Law/Chaos isn't a thing yet, you just kind of go beat everybody up in the world just because, and join God in the end. If you do a few certain choices, you can get based Lucifer on the team and eventually betray God, but Law is definitely the regular path.
- ShinMegaTen 1 adds law/neutral/chaos alignment. It's a whole new story, and the apocalypse happens during the game.
Law = God, Satan, Pazuzu, Angels, etc
Chaos = Lucifer, Beelz, Astaroth, etc
Neutral = Kill everything
The demons you choose + the choices you make affect the demons you can use + which path you can take.
- ShinMegaTen2 takes place after SMT1, and is SMT1 except harder better faster stronger. There's really not that much to it.
- Nocturne removed alignment alltogether, and added three paths, each as horrible as law/chaos in the other games. The game still has the law/chaos thing going on, but it's much more subtle than in the other games.
The apocalypse happens again! Right at the beginning of the game! Geez! It is Inception with heavy abuse of Inverted Colors.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-ETxWmgjaE
Also the game says that all other MegaTen games are in parallel universes. Convenient!
- Strange Journey is back to having alignment again. IIRC you can get demons from any alignment, but you can't do super combo attacks with them if you don't have the same alignment. So neutral doesn't have an unfair advantage with access to every demon like in SMT1/2.
- I haven't played SMT4.
Other relatively cool things in MegaTen 2:
- This guy. I love the way he stands.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414718359-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00080.png)
- In the ending sequence, you meet your dead bro's mother. Wow, game. Dark.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414718367-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00081.png)
- Have I already mentioned the Baphomet orgy rave party yet? Because they remind you of it in the credits.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414718369-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00087.png)
- They also remind you of Yattaf just standing there acting cool here on a pentagram in an hospital.
Yattaf is badass.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414718913-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00085.png)
- I'm not sure you can actually ever get Lucifer in the team again in one of the MegaTens?
He's the best demon, and still waaaay inferior to the two protagonists.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414718730-kyuuyaku-megami-tensei-00066.png)
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I don't have a job right now and I haven't played a lot of videogames this year so you know. I'm doing yet another solo Yattaf challenge. SaGa Frontier.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414758834-emelia.jpg)
10/10
I'm not going to use a trick to get infinite money but I'm still checking faqs somewhat to grasp the mechanics. Did you know that Emelia, despite being the token gun character, has the lowest chance to learn gun skills in the game?
Despair prison is a pretty difficult first dungeon, especially since Yattaf has way worse stats than the two other Roufas' angels.
In a solo playthrough you can really appreciate how a single stat gain can change your life. In a few minutes, the bazooka found in the beginning of the dungeon went from total lifesaver to worse than 0WP slash attacks.
I still had to restart a lot of times, especially because of this kind of OP monster:
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/44/1414758852-psogl003.png)
It's an ape on an unicycle and it's >>>> bazookas.
I tried using crappy punch attacks against weaker monsters to unlock enough skills to get the gift crown, which reduces the cost of every skill by 1. This got me a 0 WP Doubleslash for the boss. He wasn't too difficult with this, Deflect, a shield, and two cure items; just a standard attrition war.
After the first dungeon Roufas takes Yattaf to an italiant restaurant and she asks why they're in a warehouse. Life in prison was so harsh she can't tell the difference anymore, I guess. Roufas asks her to join his vigilante group, and she GTFO to raid the sewers and travel the world.
However whenever she goes to the airport she has an existential crisis and leave, so there's really not much choice but to go to join Roufas' angels. Or, you know. Raid the sewers. Which is what I'm doing right now. She doesn't have existential crisises there.
Learning abilities is very easy so far, somehow. I have 3/4ths of DSC and have just barely made it out of the first dungeon! Yattaf fanservice costumes are going to make this even easier, as they affect skill growth in a major way.
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For anyone who knows SaGa Frontier mechanics well (WHY):
Does a piece of equipment that raise quickness lower your chance to get a boost to quickness after battle? Knowing this would help a ton.
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Yes, it does. Stat growth is based on the exact value of the stat at the time the battle ends: the lower it is, the better a chance to gain stats. In addition to stat-boosting items, this also means any buffs which directly raise core stats themselves (e.g. PsychoArmour, but not Shield) also make it less likely to gain stats after each battle.
Fortunately bosses are no more likely to make your stats go up than any other battle, in general, so feel free to throw on stat-boosters/buffs for them, but yeah if you can get by without you're better off not using them otherwise.
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Thanks!
I weep for my newly acquired AngelArmor
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Bosses DO offer a higher-than-normal chance to Spark new skills though, so it might be worth your while to savescum them earlier on for DSC hax.
Emelia also has that nifty trick where she can change her talent list for what skills she's good at Sparking, so you can get DSC or any other money skill much easier with some FAQing.
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No need for save scumming, I just got it from that unwinnable solo Pink Panther vs Berva fight in the arena.
Which I've won.
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- I'm not sure you can actually ever get Lucifer in the team again in one of the MegaTens?
He's the best demon, and still waaaay inferior to the two protagonists.
Apparently you can kinda sorta get Lucifer on your team in Chaos route of SMT4, for what it's worth. (As an uncontrollable guest.)
As a side comment I don't really like the design they went with of him in SMT4 - nor in SMT2 from that screenshot. He's the *morning star*. He should be beautiful. Evil beautiful, perhaps, or maybe marred beauty with some kind of giant scar or the like, but this is someone associated with arrogance / pride / vanity / etc. SMT4 goes more for the "hospital patient with giant tumors" look (http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130906211305/megamitensei/images/b/b9/Lucifer_smt_4.png).
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That is like a Frankenstein of David Bowie.
Also, I see Fenrir is reaching for the deepest depths of insanity. Your people that understand SaGa mechanics don't exist, there is just people that can read the stars and auguries written in blood (and Elf).
SMT SJ - can go fight the final boss now but know it is bullshit in Neutral path, so grinding.
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I never post here but the sound of SaGa coerced me out of hiding
Fenrir I look forward to your Riki solo
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Grefter, you sounds like you are complimenting us SaGa fans or praising Kawazu san to be some mystrical being.
- I'm not sure you can actually ever get Lucifer in the team again in one of the MegaTens?
He's the best demon, and still waaaay inferior to the two protagonists.
Apparently you can kinda sorta get Lucifer on your team in Chaos route of SMT4, for what it's worth. (As an uncontrollable guest.)
As a side comment I don't really like the design they went with of him in SMT4 - nor in SMT2 from that screenshot. He's the *morning star*. He should be beautiful. Evil beautiful, perhaps, or maybe marred beauty with some kind of giant scar or the like, but this is someone associated with arrogance / pride / vanity / etc. SMT4 goes more for the "hospital patient with giant tumors" look (http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130906211305/megamitensei/images/b/b9/Lucifer_smt_4.png).
Lucifer have two forms. A angel form and a menacing demon form.
You can see both in SMT2, depending on the routes you take.
SMT4 is an outlier, as Kaneko didn't do the art there. And geeish, SMT4 just felt so out of place without Kaneko.
Not to mention SMT4 completly destroyed the character they have cosntructed for him since SMT3.
He is just a text book cliche tool in SMT4.
Where is that manipulative bystander who have been slapping YHWH's face with minimum effort?
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Bosses DO offer a higher-than-normal chance to Spark new skills though, so it might be worth your while to savescum them earlier on for DSC hax.
Not innately. Some bosses do have high spark values, but some may well have lower than the randoms you are fighting at the same time. Obviously this varies depending on the randoms (which in turn is tied to your battle count) and bosses in question.
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SMT:SJ - Okay those password demons were fucking crazy broken. Game is over. You get some pretty sweet RP options through the whole game topping out with the final one in the end of the Neutral path.
Wil you give the "power" to Arthur?
- Yes
I had fun with this, it scratched the itch that Etrian Odyssey does in a different way. It stands out as a good SMT game for an even more niche audience than your normal SMT games. If it wasn't chock full of annoying shit I would recommend it to elves because it is a JRPG that stays pretty consistently difficult the whole time, but holy damn is it full of SMT bullshit the whole way. So, do you like SMT bullshit to get through to SMT craziness? Do you have a tolerance for old old old school dungeon crawling akin to a significantly more polished Persona 1? If so, play this. It is pretty great at it! If you can't, you probably don't even know this game exists.
Edit - That said, cutscene audio being tied into the music track in a game that came out on a handheld in 2009 can fuck right off. Seriously, get your shit together.
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Just to point this out to folks, *I* did not have the patience to slog through Strange Journey. And I like EO and SMT games. And I got a steady stream of Toro-hype for the game as well, which is one of the few hypes I listen to. And I just dropped it around the third zone because I was so tired of the evolved form of SMT bullshit. Grefter is not even slightly exaggerating when he says that the game is full of if the whole way though.
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I never post here but the sound of SaGa coerced me out of hiding
Fenrir I look forward to your Riki solo
Isn't that straight-up impossible thanks to the last Ring?
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I don't know about that last ring, but it's impossible because of Virgil, and don't get me started on the magmaslimes anyway. I highly doubt freaking Riki can get his hands on a super overpowered mega MT attack to defeat them all at once.
Also it's a solo with a monster in a SaGa game. I already hate FF6 Gau and SaGa monsters are even worse
Solo Asellus/T260G/Blue could also be potentially interesting, not sure I'll bother but hey. Red is probably too good, Lute too boring.
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Riki might be able to MT OHKO the slimes, but they have initiative and do 1 LP to anyone who doesn't block them. So you'd pretty much have to be in a monster form with a shield and high LP and pray for ludicrous luck. Virgil's a dumb stall point and I'd probably just use pathetic base-level PCs to get the combos needed.
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I went to start DQ5 and my copy doesn't seem to work oh noes
Wouldn't you be able to solo Riki with someone else after the opening sequence just by the way SaGa handles party members?
Lute solo for all quests!
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The game forces Team 1 for story bosses, generally, and the main character can't be removed from Team 1 (with the exception of Lute). So it's really more like Lute's quest is the most practical for soloing with any character who isn't a main.
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Amusingly enough, I'd probably have been happier if the SMT4 final bosses had some of the apparent BS the Strange Journey finals have (well, judging from Taishyr's stat topic - didn't play SJ here, ack, no, hate EO-style first-person dungeon crawlers). SMT4 has SMT bullshit early, but it doesn't really ramp up, while the amount of counter-bullshit your PCs can throw keeps growing. So the SMT4 finals are sorta scary on paper but not too bad in practice. (At least it isn't the cataclysmic dive Nocturne bosses take by the midgame, I suppose.)
I like that Taishyr stole Elf's FFX Anima comment with "no, this is not a typo" for one of the SJ bosses damage.
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The game forces Team 1 for story bosses, generally, and the main character can't be removed from Team 1 (with the exception of Lute). So it's really more like Lute's quest is the most practical for soloing with any character who isn't a main.
I guess you could solo with a monster in Lute's quest and pretend it's Riki (whatever), but not fighting Mei-Ling solo ever is sad.
It's kind of weird that SaGa Frontier has no mystic main character, thinking about it. Asellus doesn't really count.
I love almost everything about Strange Journey. SMT BS 4 life.
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Donkey Kong Land VC - played through
Not as good as I was remembering? In particular the controls were a lot dodgier than I thought I remembered them being.
Exclamation marked all levels.
I never had DKL2, but I did have DKL3 and in contrast to DKL I don't remember it positively, mainly problems like terrible minecart-style levels and distressingly restricted saving opportunities. On the assumption that the series goes flatly downhill, I'm not going to bother getting either 2 or 3.
Super Smash Bros. 43DS - 105/105 challenges complete
Hammered the 50-hour challenge because plain smash mode is the most boring thing. Also hammered the get-all-custom-moves-hats-and-suits challenge because I just couldn't be bothered finishing the collection - got around 40 custom moves left to get and most of the time I even get any they seem to tend to be doubles more often than not, despite the weighting the game puts on giving you new things. Still, got most of them.
I've never been able to beat Classic/etc in the older games on harder difficulties, so I guess that says something about this one (referring to having beaten Classic on 9.0 for the challenge). I suppose the older games didn't let you stack +100 attack on your characters though.
Smash Run is good fun and I will probably continue to play it, and might end up finishing off custom move/hat/trophy collection eventually. For all that there only being the one map is likely going to get old at some point. But with the challenges being completed, and SMT4 having come out recently, seems like a good time to stop for now.
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Bayonetta 2: Congrats Masked Lumen who is totally NOT Bayonetta's father from the first game, nope, no chance of that, you've proven yourself a way more interesting Lumen Sage than Pope Vader, at least in combat. Plotwise, he's mostly just there because "we need a shonen rival."
No seriously, Mask Lumen fights are fun and really do sell you on the "they are the opposites of Umbran Witches." Pope Vader mostly just threw generic holy blasts and angel feathers at you...it really didn't feel stylized just "He's a Light Aligned Bad Guy, watch as we give him generic attacks and oh right, something angelic looking!"
Mask Lumen? He fights like Bayonetta, except no guns, instead throwing fireballs at you. Instead of Wicked Weaves, you see random Bayo 1 bosses come out of nowhere and attack. His feather attacks now feel like Bayo's bird moves, he uses a few melee moves reminiscent of things like Stilleto, etc. I think he even has an "Sage Time" because there are moments where you suddenly stop moving briefly and he readies and attack (you can still dodge as the time wears off just before he connects, but mostly there to throw off your momentum and make you learn the timing.)
Basically, what I'm saying is "Mask Lumen, you are a decent substitute for the Jeanne fights in Bayo 1, well done!"
I hope this guy is unlockable in subsequent playthroughs or you can play as him in Tag Climax; he seems like he'd be a fun Vergil equivalent from DMC3.
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Riki might be able to MT OHKO the slimes, but they have initiative and do 1 LP to anyone who doesn't block them. So you'd pretty much have to be in a monster form with a shield and high LP and pray for ludicrous luck. Virgil's a dumb stall point and I'd probably just use pathetic base-level PCs to get the combos needed.
In my LP, Riki was a Black Dragon with Magnetic Storm and it couldn't OHKO them, but perhaps something with slightly more min maxed stats might be able to do it?
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DOS: More flames and burning. Finally brave enough to clear out the firey area looming in the center of the map all game. There's convenient water barrels scattered around that you're supposed to break to neutralize the fire field and weaken the enemies, but there aren't enough to be of use around the boss's hill. This is kind of a problem since he can do a three-turn chargeup to a 10X PCHP bomb! So I went back to town and raided all the water barrels I could find there. They won't need to put out any fires any time soon, right? (Did I mention there was a ship on fire in the harbor since the start of the game? There was a ship on fire in the harbor since the start of the game. I never troubled myself with fixing it, the barrage of panicked NPC chatter repeated ad infinitum around it flagged the entire area Avoid.) And even then survival hinged solely on getting him frozen so the countdown would actually pause long enough for me to kill him. Also the goonsquad respawns automatically and I don't get extra XPs for rekilling them and there are not entirely obvious instakill panels and ffff. So that was pretty brutal. I actually had a weapon break!
Apparently I could've solved the murder mystery like four levels ago. I just needed to engage in more breaking and entering! (I'm not really in the habit of robbing people unless it's a blatant plot necessity.) So hey let's see how confronting prime suspect goes massively overleveled. *A one-rounded boss fight later* Yeah, level is really the god stat in this game. Go up against a team of enemies two levels above you and you'll get utterly demolished; even one up is pushing it. Anyway after all that there's an ice area and it's kinda yawnsies. The boss trundles around aimlessly triggering AoOs and summoning mooks that get toasted in one round.
I have proper nukes now, but they're not all that great. Nice way to start a fight when there are enemies clumped up that don't know you're there, but you'll get way more out of buffs and summons over the course of a lengthy battle. Haste + berserk on the party melee specialist still best way to wreck faces. Summons actually level up with the caster, so the starting spider spell is still immensely useful (and not one I've found a book or scroll for anywhere, so definitely a good call at chargen). Damage is just alright, and the poison infliction almost never lands, but there's great meatshield value there. Can reliably toss one out in front at the start of the fight and watch the enemy archers waste all their specialty arrows on it.
I'm supposed to go into a mine next, so I'm going to take a little break from this.
I do have one notable complaint to lodge against the game: targeting. This shouldn't be any issue in a game where you just click on an enemy and your dudes attack it, right? And if the game just had a reticle or something circling an enemy's feet that you could select, there wouldn't be any issue. But there isn't, you have to click on the exact enemy model, and that's occasionally a nuisance because enemies will casually shift their stance while waiting for their turn. So the enemy you were about to click on is really just empty space because the dude shrugged or something, and now instead of shooting from across the map your archer is wasting the turn charging all the way over there (and probably triggering attacks of opportunity en route). So that's annoying. (I've actually restarted battles because of this.)
~
Wasteland 2: Restarted, now with 10% more sound party planning. Managed to get almost all the skill bases covered after a level or two; and really, for the most part it's enough to have just a level or two in a lot of the exploratory ones (at least so far). Conversation skills you can't fudge, but most everything else can be savescummed so long as your level's not so low as to give you 0% chance (and you better believe I'm savescumming). Fought through Ag Center with a lot less fuss; honestly, just understanding in advance the kind of resource scarcities you'll have to deal with in this game is a big help. I mean, it's not New Vegas, game is pretty harsh on you right from the beginning, first dungeon I hit the party's operating under a death timer. You really have to build as complementary a squad as possible. You can't be good at everything solo in this game. You can't even be competent at everything solo in this game.
Captain Mercaptain, huh? I better find a Major Mermajor out there somewhere too.
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Riki might be able to MT OHKO the slimes, but they have initiative and do 1 LP to anyone who doesn't block them. So you'd pretty much have to be in a monster form with a shield and high LP and pray for ludicrous luck. Virgil's a dumb stall point and I'd probably just use pathetic base-level PCs to get the combos needed.
In my LP, Riki was a Black Dragon with Magnetic Storm and it couldn't OHKO them, but perhaps something with slightly more min maxed stats might be able to do it?
Black Dragon's a great tank with terrific strength, but isn't really that impressive a mage (Magnetic Storm is a spell) so you could probably get more milage out of various other monster forms (Crystal Tree has the highest Will and is probably your best bet). I also don't think Magnetic Storm is the strongest MT monster attack offhand (except against mecs) but I'm too lazy to go leafing through skill data to try to figure out what is.
Thaaat said, something else I did notice since making that post: while MagmaTouch is evadable (with Deflect etc.) and shield-blockable in theory, no shield actually blocks the element it is. So while there are various non-monster abilities which can stand in its way (such as Deflect and Kasumi), there is nothing a monster can have which would prevent it, which means a guaranteed 5 LP damage every battle. Unless... maybe the RING/Thief is the solution? It has initiative, like MagmaTouch, although how the game breaks high-initiative ties is something I've yet to figure out. I also forget the exact mechanics of invisibility: the only way you have a chance is to use it turn 1 and hope it goes before most of the MagmaSlimes, then use a big MT attack which kills/statuses (is the latter even possible?) all of them turn 2, and invisibility needs to wear off when the action takes place, not at the start of the round (which I don't recall).
EDIT: Never mind that won't work. I forgot the Magma Slimes are technically one big fight, not a chain of them, and since the RING/Thief is once-per-battle, and no non-healing, non-ring monster ability has initiative... think you're just screwed.
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Captain Mercaptain, huh? I better find a Major Mermajor out there somewhere too
MERMAN!
SMT: Soul Hackers - So I probably shouldn't have started up another first person SMT dungeon crawler straight away (or gone back to a long destitute Persona 1 run), but this game is so fucking metal that I just had to do it.
I really dig the early SMT setting that is more closely aligned to Neuromancer a than the usual post demon apocalypse ones are (which I already like a fair bit). The others feel like the more Shadowrun side of Cyberpunk (with the Metal turned up to 11 because summoning Internet Demons is more metal than Orcs).
I had to restart right at the beginning though, because I picked a name, first name and last name both have 9 characters. So MOTHAFUKA JONES was started, then I got to pick a Handle as well. Power off.
The adventures of Crash "ZeroCool" Override were begun. Hack the planet? He will hack your very Soul. Mess with the best, die like the rest.
He is a member of The Spookies. Hacktivists before Hacktivism was a thing?
Then he wandered around Second Life for a bit, tripped on LSD and spoke to my spirit animal. Hacked the soul memory of the owner of this random Gun Computer he found lying around in The Spookies HQ (some older dude's camper van). I am in the process of watching him die.
Pretty good acid.
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Hyrule Warriors - Beat Legend Mode. HM, played as everyone but used Zelda for the final two maps because I'm a copycat apparently. Also beat Cia's Tale.
This game is the pleasant surprise of the year to me, I think. I wasn't really sure what to expect of it: it's a Zelda fanservice game and I'm not a Zelda fan, it's a Dynasty Warriors-type game and I didn't much care for my brief experiment with that my few years back. But after watching some of it it looked good, and it plays even better. It very much one of three games in the discussion for the best game I've played so far this year (the other two being Mario Kart 8 and Bravely Default).
One thing which was a big turnoff of the Warriors games was how terrible regular enemies were, and the scale of the slaughter of them. These enemies are still terrible in HW, but ultimately not what the game is about. They are generally better off ignored unless you need to clear them out to conquer a castle (in which case speed/efficiency matters a lot) or you just feel like practicing. Not the best part of the game, but not as bad as I feared. Fortunately fighting against mini-bosses and bosses is quite fun, especially when the game mixes up combinations of them; it actually starts to feel like a very solid action game then. And the game really hits its stride when it has you balancing a whole bunch of objectives: keep your allies alive, conquer spawn points, defeat various bosses, keep your own base from falling, etc. Many of the Legend (story) Mode maps come down to pretty epic finishes against one or more bosses as you desperately try to keep everything from falling apart. The varied objectives also but a bunch of extra pressure on your fighting bosses or mini-bosses, so there's a bit of risk/reward in fighting them defensively or offensively, with the scale sliding based on other things going on in the battle.
Where the game really shines gameplaywise is in its large cast of very varied playable characters. There are 16 PCs, probably close to 30 unique fighting styles, and they're quite different and it's a lot of fun to try out different ones. I'm pretty much a sucker for things like this in any game (SMB2, MMX8, Castlevania PoR, etc.) so it's not really a surprise that I enjoyed this.
The game's plot isn't much, though it's probably fair to say it exceeded my low expectations? It does a couple unexpected things which resonate well, and has a few good lines. The game does this crazy thing where the majority of its key characters are women and the game actually respects them and somehow Zelda makes it through the entire game without being kidnapped. The game seemed to wear this on its sleeve especially coming out of this year's disgraceful E3 on that front and it looks good on it.
Aesthetically, the game has some great music and character designs, and some very stylish attacks. The environment graphics are serviceable enough, but I care about those far less anyway. The game has loads of content as well: the core Legend Mode is pretty standard action game in length, but Adventure Mode attaches a ridiculous amount more.
It has some flaws certainly. The game managed a stylish and "better than I expected" plot, but that's obviously still a long way off from having an actual good plot. The game makes a few questionable interface choices (it's great that it places your allies' health gauges on the lower screen, but I really wish they placed the Allied Base gauge there too so I don't have to keep going into the menu to check that), and it's possible for the game's checkpoint system to lock you into a near or entirely unwinnable situation (although since you can save any time you want and reload those, it's not too big a deal, and generally the checkpoints do come at good times). And man could the game have used voice acting; the game's action is often too hectic to read the mid-battle dialog easily and the KIU treatment would have served this game beautifully. I blame the Zelda fanbase.
But yeah overall I have remarkably few bad things to say about the game. I've put about 20 hours into it so far and I can already tell there's ridiculously more to come. I just wish the overlap between "will actually play action games" and "owns a Wii U" weren't so tiny in the DL, so I could beat more people into this one.
SSB4 - I completed all of the first challenge grid but the second had way too much garbage, done with that. I don't enjoy Smash Run or target-breaking or homerun contest and in general am pretty lukewarm on everything which isn't the core Smash gameplay. Fortunately that itself is good fun, so I'm just sinking all my hours into that, multiplayer when possible of course. Palutena, Bowser, Bowser Jr./Roy, Peach, Lucina, Sheik, Mega Man, Dedede, Rosalina are all characters I've been using more recently.
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Chaos Ring 3 - I... I... this game truly exceeded my expectation! What is with the adorable bishounen that the game paste on to my face!? Matsuoka also has the problem to sound like a man like he always do, which makes this even better!
Ahahaha, and I can abuse Vita's clock to get all the goodies first! Time to dress up! AHAHAHAHAHA!!!
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SaGa:
Killing Dullahans in the Bio-Lab! After having explored every area I could.
I got annoyed by how sparkle chance is drastically lower without a weapon crown, so I made Yattaf learn every sword skill she has the talent for, which is every skill but 4. These four unfortunately include Lifesprinkler!
I haven't beaten EarthDragon yet, but I have beaten King Sei and he was super hard. I just went to go tackle him several times through the game, thinking "this time, maybe, this could work", but noope, and I couldn't actually succeed until after having 700 HPs or so.
The skeletons he comes with like to combo (400 damage right there), so they need to get smashed ASAP, and that takes some good MT damage and luck. Afterwards he's difficult to outslug solo with that 1000 HP / round regen. He also gets his own 350 HP attack, so you can't just attack him constantly. RosarioImpale works nicely, but it costs a lot and Sei likes to block it.
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If you didn't know, you can change Yattaf's costume to change what she has talent for. The Liza costume (Pink Tiger, I think?) has talent for Lifesprinkler.
(Although Lifesprinkler's still pretty annoying to learn even if you have talent for it.)
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SaGa:
Killing Dullahans in the Bio-Lab! After having explored every area I could.
I got annoyed by how sparkle chance is drastically lower without a weapon crown, so I made Yattaf learn every sword skill she has the talent for, which is every skill but 4. These four unfortunately include Lifesprinkler!
I haven't beaten EarthDragon yet, but I have beaten King Sei and he was super hard. I just went to go tackle him several times through the game, thinking "this time, maybe, this could work", but noope, and I couldn't actually succeed until after having 700 HPs or so.
The skeletons he comes with like to combo (400 damage right there), so they need to get smashed ASAP, and that takes some good MT damage and luck. Afterwards he's difficult to outslug solo with that 1000 HP / round regen. He also gets his own 350 HP attack, so you can't just attack him constantly. RosarioImpale works nicely, but it costs a lot and Sei likes to block it.
Why are you fighting King Sei? His sword is a pitiful trade to the Water Mirror Shield.
But never mind if you already got a Dullahan Shield from the Dullahan farming...
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Hyrule Warriors - I just wish the overlap between "will actually play action games" and "owns a Wii U" weren't so tiny in the DL, so I could beat more people into this one.
I just beat the Legend mode on Normal in one long sitting at a friend's house (no WiiU for me, but he's a huuuuge Zelda fan, so he practically forced me to play it, not that I needed much convincing). I haven't beaten a Zelda game since the SNES because I hate doing puzzles in 3D adventure games, and I am generally uninterested in games with only a single playable character. BUT, this game made a bunch of LoZ famous characters actually -playable- and really that was all the excuse I needed to get interested in the entire franchise again, and have just recently beat Majora's Mask as a result. I'm thinking about trying out Twilight Princess since I liked the grimdark-lite setting in MM.
How's the Adventure Mode in HW, though? It looked interesting but after marathoning Legend Mode, I was done with this one for a while.
SSB4 - I completed all of the first challenge grid but the second had way too much garbage, done with that. I don't enjoy Smash Run or target-breaking or homerun contest and in general am pretty lukewarm on everything which isn't the core Smash gameplay. Fortunately that itself is good fun, so I'm just sinking all my hours into that, multiplayer when possible of course. Palutena, Bowser, Bowser Jr./Roy, Peach, Lucina, Sheik, Mega Man, Dedede, Rosalina are all characters I've been using more recently.
Nine mains is a lot... I'm just barely able to get a handle on Pikachu and Shulk. (And spoilers, Pikachu kinda sucks now.) I'm not sure what your issue with Smash Run is... It might just be that since my mains are pretty well suited for the platforming of it, I enjoy it more, but honestly Peach and Sheik at least should make Smash Run a blast. And Palutena is so customizeable for it, you should try playing around more with her varied moves.
I'm mostly going through Classic mode and Smash Run to pick up as many tools as possible to unlock all the custom moves.
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Tales of Xillia - This is also in lay as something of a comfort game. This misnamed. It is Tales of RICHARD. Where Tales of Graces fffffffffffffffffff had RICHARD and Zombie Ghost RICHARD, this instead lets you custom make everyone with RICHARD and RICHARD accessories.
I am lame and boring and Mila and Alvin are both just rocking Framed Glasses. Everyone else is getting Aviators. Jude wears a pair of sunglasses tucked up on top of his head as well as his aviators. All RICHARD all day.
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I've been using costumes. (I've been using the Pink Tiger costume for most of the run)
The data/mechanics faq says Liza/Basic Emelia/Annie don't have the talent for Lifesprinkler, and I haven't checked anything else. It seemed reliable.
I probably could learn it anyway byt smacking Dullahan for hours with the WonderBangle shield and DodgeTrample tech on anyway.
Edit: Yeah she smacks Dully 61 times with a regular physical as PinkTiger, and she hasn't learned Lifesprinker so I don't think she has the talent? Also this is too boring even with frameskip, I'll do fine with just RosarioImpale and DSC. Or I'll come back.
Also, beating EarthDragon is not happening. I haven't found a way to spoil his RNG canon attack (WallRune not working on this, whatever this was supposed to do), and I don't want to make a sacrifice to the RNG gods.
As for King Sei, this was more of a "wait a minute, I lost the three artifacts?" moment. I regret nothing, I haven't found a better sword yet. (Except for Asura. But I didn't pay the 3LP for Asura, just in case I ran into some LP damage monsters. Didn't think so but I didn't want to take risks)
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Liza does have talent for Lifesprinkler. I think your problem is trying to use basic physicals: while it's possible to learn Lifesprinkler off that, it's very difficult (and is impossible off many enemies). Spam ShadowCounter (katana move) instead for best results. If you don't have ShadowCounter yet spam basic katana physicals and you should get it quickly off high-level enemies: I think everyone has talent for this one but you might want to doublecheck.
WallRune stops a single piercing attack. IIRC the best way to deal with iron orb spam is just get your defensive stat high and use a good shield but woof, that's still probably going to be too much for a solo.
HW Adventure Mode is basically oodles of more non-canon maps with varying objectives, they're usually quicker than the Legend Mode ones. They don't have the same story grounding as Legend Mode so I would assume you wouldn't enjoy them as much but they're oodles of more contenet for those who like the gameplay, plus you can hunt down lots of weapons/artwork/etc. in them, including a few new fighting styles.
Smash Run just isn't much fun, doesn't matter who I use! It's five minutes of kinda awkward, low-tension platforming followed by one final challenge which renders most of said platforming worthless anyway. It's like one of those game shows where you get to the final round and it's worth 10x as much. But even without that, the game's mechanics are optimised for a fighting game and it shows.
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Where did you get the info about Liza having talent for Lifesprinkler? My reference is http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps/198537-saga-frontier/faqs/58412
I'll try this. I probably do have Shadowcounter, last time I checked I had 30 sword skills learned.
Man, fuck WallRune then. Such a crappy "high level" skill.
I know I shouldn't have trusted that "Blocks projectile" description, because it's SaGa Frontier.
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Hyrule Warriors - I just wish the overlap between "will actually play action games" and "owns a Wii U" weren't so tiny in the DL, so I could beat more people into this one.
I just beat the Legend mode on Normal in one long sitting at a friend's house (no WiiU for me, but he's a huuuuge Zelda fan, so he practically forced me to play it, not that I needed much convincing). I haven't beaten a Zelda game since the SNES because I hate doing puzzles in 3D adventure games, and I am generally uninterested in games with only a single playable character. BUT, this game made a bunch of LoZ famous characters actually -playable- and really that was all the excuse I needed to get interested in the entire franchise again, and have just recently beat Majora's Mask as a result. I'm thinking about trying out Twilight Princess since I liked the grimdark-lite setting in MM.
How's the Adventure Mode in HW, though? It looked interesting but after marathoning Legend Mode, I was done with this one for a while.
Adventure Mode is reasonably enjoyable, but it certainly feels like aftergame content and fine to skip. I've mostly been doing a bunch of it because I both own and really enjoy the game. It gives you new and higher level weapons (I'm currently trying to get the Great Fairy weapon for Link, where she puts Link in a bottle and wrecks shit. It sounds and looked from Youtube absolutely hilarious) and unlocks a few additional playables as well (Zant, Ghirahim, Ruto, and Agitha). Did you do the Villain Legend Mode with Cia, or just the maingame maps? And to be honest with you, playing HW makes me want to play Twilight Princess too... >_>
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Yattaf just learned Lifesprinkler but this was literally the only sword tech in the game she hadn't learnt at that point. ...Still think this faq was probably accurate about this skill not being on Liza's talent list?
Elf your stat topic is pretty great BTW.
BTW, Slime disappeared entirely from my game. Is that normal? I got it before the Baccarat quest, and just left him rot in the "third party". The Baccarat quest has a small solo segment at first, so he just left the team and has never appeared again.
Oh no, what will I do without Slime and his groundbreaking lore, etc.
Edit: I really regret not getting the Asura sword now. Oh well.
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I've played the Warriors games not because they're particularly good games, but out of an interest in the history behind those historical periods. Elf makes it sound like there's more interesting boss encounters and that it actually balances the pressures of constantly competing demands, so I may give it a shot. I need something other than Mario Kart 8 for that system.
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I was heavily debating getting a Wii U solely for Hyrule Warriors.
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Bravely Default- Chapter 7. Trying to take down the multi boss challenges. So far...
DeRosso/Victor- Pretty easy, didn't really need any preparation. After this many DeRosso fights, his pattern is easy and Victor isn't too dangerous.
Alternis/Kami/Braev- Biiiiiiiitch of a fight. Made me actually use Examine. Knock Alt and Braev to near half HP, get everyone ready and swarm. Alternis and Braev may go down the same turn if Braev doesn't default with a big MT rush. Took several tries. Needed to switch back to two people with Dark Knight skillset.
Girl Power- Took a few tries with some setup readjustment (I'm still pointlessly idling in non-mastered skillsets for now real reason).Artemia is too random, so went for her first. Spiritmaster and Dark Shields deal with Victoria. Kikyo can throw in a roadblock by going first and killing someone with low HP.
Summoners- First fight I tackled. Took a little work to get used to what was happening. Ninjas for Utsu, rush Mephilia. Worked out well enough.
Holly/Einheria/Sword Fencer- No real prep needed here. Lack of MT made this one very easy.
Late Bloomer as a skill is like...offensively bad almost. Someone will generally always be using one attack stat, and defensive stats aren't checked enough. I think you'd have to master 6!!!!! classes in addition to Freelancer to get to a point where I would even consider using the skill over a straight 10% attack stat boost. That's just really, really bad, considering that it's a skill that it only of at all any use late and makes you run in a very sub-optimal class. Not sure what the thought process was on there.
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Dhyer: Late Bloomer was clearly balanced around people who obsessively max every job. It makes Freelancer a lot better if you do that, of course! Of course you've already powerleveled the game into the ground, but some people like that...
I agree the Alternis / Braev / Kami fight was pretty crazy, by the way. Tough one, although Dark Nulling helps a lot. Both it & the Eternian Board of Girl Power were dealt with pretty well via Knight hax I thought, even on Hard non-Kami opponents have real trouble breaking her defense, and Kikyo is guaranteed to attack the lowest HP member. So Phoenix Downing your Knight and leaving them there is pretty strong as Kikyo lockdown after your healer gets wounded is pretty scary.
Elf/Djinn/etc.: Smash Run *could* have been good. I guess it's okay as a party game type thing, but solo it's a whiff. I'd actually be interested in a Smash platformer, possibly with time pressure, but the random final showdown is meh.
Basically I'd be fine with a Warioware esque party mode that did nothing but shuffle betwene various final showdown challenges, and a platforming mode that did platformy stages, but combining the two ends up doing a disservice to the platforming. I'd be totally down for Harmony of Despair style co-op platforming with light time pressure. Or, for a more solo experience, simply giant maps that you can explore, get powered up, fight minibosses, and then fight a boss at the end. Score based on both completionism & time a la Super Metroid. Alas, that isn't what we have.
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Fantasy Life: Beat the story. ~25 hours. I found the game quite enjoyable, better than the reviews it has gotten.
I stayed in the Angler Life (read: job) for the full game, completing every fishing challenge except the final one. Golden Swordfish was regenning hp faster than I could damage it. I didn't have the hero clothes equipped though so I could probably beat it with those on.
Overall, the game has a nice sense of balance. You can switch jobs at any time, although I chose not to. You can avoid combat for 99% of the game (there are some plot fights, but they're dead easy and they give you allies to help). But even though you don't have to engage in combat, enemies block off routes in the game. So by defeating them you open up more rare materials, etc. Likewise I could have gotten better-than-storebought fishing rods by switching to Carpenter, better-than-storebought daggers by switching to Blacksmith, better-than-storebought clothing by switching to Tailor, and so on. So the game encourages switching jobs, but doesn't shove it down your throat. You can play any way you please.
I also liked how the game treats each job as its own RPG. When you reach Master as an Angler you get an "ending" song which is totally awesome and I am sad it is not on Youtube so I can show all of you. Likewise the previously mentioned Golden Swordfish has epic final boss music of its own when you fight it. Music is by Uematsu and very good overall.
The writing is good and pun-heavy, Dragon Quest style. Ciatos keep your distance. It also does a nice job turning the typical RPG tropes on their head.
Anyway really enjoyable game overall. I will probably get the DLC once I fool around with it some more.
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Yeah, I know who it was intended for...but I don't like games that ever make any skill worth that insane amount of powerlevelling. Maybe if they did not make it the innate skill on Freelancer it would not feel as stupid (Should have been...Divining Rod). Just annoying considerating that the Freelancer skillset has one amazing utility skill, and then basically nothing at else going for it at all. If they made Late Bloomer 2% (or included all stats in the 1%), even mastering 2-3 classes would still make it a valid choice.
And I probably should have been using Knight more for sure. I kind of switched off when their damage got anemic, although Utsusemi spam was at least a workable strat.
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Yupyup. Dual Shields Super Charge the way to go, or Templar Desperation. I like the strat because it's still really good but feels more interactive than just mass Dark Knight blitzing.
I do agree with you of course on Late Bloomer; if it was balanced for SnowFire tastes, it'd be something like "10% for the first job mastered, 4%/3%/2% for the next ones, 1% for all others" (but keep it as the free passive for Freelancer). Freelancer stats are still not THAT amazing so it'd still be pretty reasonable. If everybody sets Late Bloomer if you max out, whatever, it's okay for a skill to be centralizing insanely late so long as it's worth a damn earlier. (See also: FEA Limit Breaker, how *not* to do it. 100% worthless early, then oh boy everybody has only 4 skill slots in late aftergame.)
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Yeah, my bad about Liza having Lifesprinkler; the mechanics guide is quite right and I was just misremembering, probably just assuming that Liza has virtually everything. <_< My bad!
Late Bloomer is pretty bad even if you master all jobs. Even with those stat boosts they still won't have the Atk/Mag stats of a job dedicated to them and they have only B in equipment ranks.
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Dhyer: Late Bloomer was clearly balanced around people who obsessively max every job. It makes Freelancer a lot better if you do that, of course! Of course you've already powerleveled the game into the ground, but some people like that...
For what it's worth the enhanced BD version that we got has a ton of downloadable Norende bosses who are designed to challenge even L99 teams with all jobs mastered, so this isn't as gratuitous as it is in, say, FF5. Still not great design on paper I'd agree,especially since Freelancer isn't a great offensive class even with everything mastered due to meh weapon ranks+bad speed+limited skillset. My Hero+Mimic is a degenerately good combo endgame/postgame that you probably want on your slowest PC, which is about Freelancer's real niche, but it's admittedly a useful one.
Elf/Djinn/etc.: Smash Run *could* have been good. I guess it's okay as a party game type thing, but solo it's a whiff. I'd actually be interested in a Smash platformer, possibly with time pressure, but the random final showdown is meh.
Basically I'd be fine with a Warioware esque party mode that did nothing but shuffle betwene various final showdown challenges, and a platforming mode that did platformy stages, but combining the two ends up doing a disservice to the platforming. I'd be totally down for Harmony of Despair style co-op platforming with light time pressure. Or, for a more solo experience, simply giant maps that you can explore, get powered up, fight minibosses, and then fight a boss at the end. Score based on both completionism & time a la Super Metroid. Alas, that isn't what we have.
The one minute finale is way too short to be satisfying at all - I've had four-way Sudden Deaths on several occasions, which is about the lamest ending possible. On the other hand, it's short enough to not distract too much from the mook beat'em up portion for me, and I do enjoy that. It's not as good as a proper single-player mode like SSE, but then it also took a fraction of the dev time that SSE did so I can live.
What I'd like for the next Smash game is a mode where you beat up random enemies from various series in randomly generated dungeons for loot and fun and maybe fight a mini-boss at the end. Hopefully that would provide decent replayability while not requiring a large timesink to get into or huge development resources which are ultimately better spent on the core mutiplayer gameplay.
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Liza's skill tree doesn't -quite- have everything, I used Emelia's skill tree instead a few times.
Like 10% of the time.
I basically never used Annie's though.
Anyway, I finished the SaGa Yattaf solo!
I also beat the EarthDragon!
This was a nice enough challenge, not very varied (because crowns make magic a liability here, see below) but short and challenging enough. Inferior to FFL1 and Romancing SaGa 3 solos. I'd really like to try Minstrel Song or Unlimited SaGa solo, but my laptop can't run a PS2 emulator and I don't have my PS2 anymore.
Strategy talk for the SaGa fans.
Shiva the Diva / Diva the Shiva just ate a few 19960 damage dream super combos.
Plus one doubleslash.
EarthDragon was a lot harder.
Against fully powered Uber-Yattaf (876 HP, Powered Suit, EMES tag, Budowear, Angel Broach) most of its attacks do pretty bad damage (double digit-ish) and can often be blocked. Its ultimate ball canon attack thing (I forgot the name) does 1 to 6 hits of 190 damage, but these attacks can be avoided (unlikely), deflected by a sword or blocked by a shield. I have a bunch of full healing items available, but using them means no deflecting attacks this round, which is very bad. The battle is very long as the bastard has 60 000 HP and is immune to DSC.
I had two strategies, with crown (offensive) and without crown (defensive), and neither worked until the very end of the game, but both came close!
With crown: I just tossed a bunch of useless attack moves on Yattaf just so she could get the weapon crown. In battle I used VictoryRune (Damage buff) from the Rune Sword (I bought this only for this battle), and then spammed Lifesprinkler and DoubleSlash (when I ran out of WPs). The problem is that I eventually had to heal, but was likely to be toasted if the dragon used BigIronBalls during the same round, because deflecting attacks is seriously important to survive against this.
Without crown: Same strategy but I equipped the VitalityRune magic, which gives pretty good regen per round. (170 HP) Yattaf was pretty much always at full HP for the Dragon's big bad attack, which is really nice. The big problem is that Deflecting costs 1 WP with this setup. So I had to conserve WP like mad, and use very basic attacks, which do pitiful damage and are easily blocked. I couldn't outslug the dragon in any way using any of these freaking 32 sword skills I had learnt.
I eventually won with the weapon crown strategy (so much for doing useless magic gift sidequests)
I noticed that EarthDragon never use SuperBallz two turns in a row, so I only ever healed immediately after getting hit by this attack, just so I was sure I could deflect anytime it used the super move.
This meant that I had to face the GiantBalls attack after getting hit by a few weaksauce attacks, with only 500-600 HP remaining at times. But with both a decent shield and a 0WP deflect, the RNG was clearly on my side. I only had to try that strategy twice to win with these stats.
(http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/45/1415058308-psogl021.png)
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One thing which probably would have helped a lot against IronBall spam is LightSword, which gives you another independent Deflect chance that doesn't require WP or for you to be using a sword attack that round. It's based on your magic stats for activation rate instead of your physical, but has a higher base chance to succeed, and either way it stacks with regular Deflect. Of course that involves grinding up light magic a bunch. Good job beating him, regardless!
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I was heavily debating getting a Wii U solely for Hyrule Warriors.
Although I probably wouldn't buy a Wii U for HW (or any one game, really), it is really enjoyable, beautiful, and pro-female. It has a lot of aftergame content which can keep you entertained for a long time, too. I wouldn't say that it is kick-you-in-the-junk challenging like some 3D action games, but it definitely offers a pleasant challenge on Hard (and I found it decent on Normal). Not sure how you feel about either of the series involved, but from my limited knowledge of Zelda it does seem to be a good homage to them.
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I'm going to echo that Smash Run is kind of lame now that I've had a chance to play it a few times. They really hyped it up for the 3DS version and wasted a lot of PotDs talking about it when outside of the fan-service opportunities it allows due to enemies (like a few extra Pokemon, KIU enemies, Kremlings, Mettaurs, etc.), it really just comes off as 5 minutes of time wasting + a finale that ends too fast to care.
Maybe if the finale was a set of matches, you'd care more; then the 5 minutes of prep time would be more meaningful because you're doing it for more than one quick match that's likely over in a minute.
I know it's based off Kirby's Air Ride's City Trial, but watching videos of that, my opinion is unchanged. I was thinking "Seriously, is that it? All that prep time for...a 30 second match?" The fact that it's based off something prior makes it worse, not better, IMHO, because that implies they tried the formula before and rather than trying to find a way to improve it, they just did the same thing with a different genre.
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I was heavily debating getting a Wii U solely for Hyrule Warriors.
Although I probably wouldn't buy a Wii U for HW (or any one game, really), it is really enjoyable, beautiful, and pro-female. It has a lot of aftergame content which can keep you entertained for a long time, too. I wouldn't say that it is kick-you-in-the-junk challenging like some 3D action games, but it definitely offers a pleasant challenge on Hard (and I found it decent on Normal). Not sure how you feel about either of the series involved, but from my limited knowledge of Zelda it does seem to be a good homage to them.
I've gotten whole systems for worse reasons(really) and if there's one thing a Warriors game can do, it's eat up a lot of hours. Enough to justify a full purchase anyway.
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I was heavily debating getting a Wii U solely for Hyrule Warriors.
Although I probably wouldn't buy a Wii U for HW (or any one game, really), it is really enjoyable, beautiful, and pro-female. It has a lot of aftergame content which can keep you entertained for a long time, too. I wouldn't say that it is kick-you-in-the-junk challenging like some 3D action games, but it definitely offers a pleasant challenge on Hard (and I found it decent on Normal). Not sure how you feel about either of the series involved, but from my limited knowledge of Zelda it does seem to be a good homage to them.
I've gotten whole systems for worse reasons(really) and if there's one thing a Warriors game can do, it's eat up a lot of hours. Enough to justify a full purchase anyway.
Bayonetta 2 has reviewed quite well if you are interested in that subgenre at all (I'm probably going to tackle Bayonetta 1 on the Wii U at some point soon myself.). Other than that, Wii U is mostly Mario Kart and platformers. I've heard good stuff about the Wonderful 101 but it's not quite up my alley.
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Trade Route Simulator Pro Beyond Earth: Hugely disappointing. Okay... that's unfair. It is a *great* tech demo in the sense of some of the art assets, music, and so on with some placeholder rips from Civ5 for a system. It missed out on 6 months of balancing, giving good options, and having a real writer actually make things worth a damn. Here are some good reviews that mirror my thoughts:
http://www.pcgamer.com/civilization-from-alpha-centauri-to-beyond-earth/
http://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2014/10/25/occasionally-thrilling-beyond-earth-cant-quite-get-beyond-civilization-v/#more-33473
On the bright side, Civ5 vanilla with a new coat of paint isn't *bad*, exactly. But there's just plain bizarre unforced errors. The style / writing / environment just plain is not up to snuff with SMAC, and I'm fairly certain this isn't just misty nostalgia talking. The balance is awful. But most damningly, the gameplay isn't compelling. Everybody knows that Civ games are secretly giant board games where you're filling up meters in the background so you can fill your meters faster; more food -> more pop -> more dudes -> more science -> etc. However, there need to be some key decision points that allow you to customize your game. And it's okay if the human is better at doing this customization than the AI, that's what more cheating is for.
In SMAC, this was done via Wonders (Secret Projects) that offered unique powers, the faction abilities, and social engineering. You could use these combinations to create genuinely different playstyles, and hey, the ideological nature of the factions ALSO tied gameplay into a good reason to brawl. (Or, for that matter, to make allies - perhaps at the cost of others!) Just looking at the military, you could have an army of mindworms, which fought differently than out-of-date Believer rovers with an attack boost that made them scary anyway, which fought differently than an endless Hive horde, which fought differently than Morgan bribing your units with probe teams, which fought differently than Zakharov who was 4 techs up on you. And beyond that, there were a ton of customizations, so you could go equip nerve gas pods and get a big attack boost but screw up your trade income, or get anti-air / anti-psi boosts, etc. And yes, the AI wasn't perfect at handling this, but whatever. Same thing economically - Green does not play the same as Free Market which is not the same as Planned. In Civ5, the civ abilities are huge, and then there's the culture trees, which are flavorful and also instruct how you play the game - going Wide with Liberty is different than Tall with Tradition or religion-mongering with Faith.
In Beyond Earth, it's all just bigger numbers for those gauges mentioned above. I'm fine with making Affinity matter more than nation-sponsor choice, but it doesn't really matter which Affinity you pick, it doesn't instruct the way you play the game much at all. A Harmony player might get units styled Gaian-y, but they really aren't that different from Supremacy robots or Purity humans. They all have a bigger number, which is about it. A Gaian we-like-fungus strat isn't really doable. The Wonders are all fine as *placeholders* but are incredibly lame. They're basically like standard buildings except cost more and have random technobabble behind them - oh boy, extra energy & defense in a city, or extra food. A few simple Wonders like this are fine, especially when it's something flash like "double science in one city." But they're almost all really safe and boring and flavorless! WTF. I'm fine with *weak* Wonders to make getting them not too crucial, but at least offer unique, splashy, MTG Mythic Rare effects that can't be easily duplicated [even if overcosted]. The virtues (=Civ5 culture) system is way too bland and also unbalanced, with Prosperity >>> you, but the blandness is the real problem. It's harder to balance crazy powerful boosts, but at least encourage different playstyles rather than "your bars fill up faster!" Which is really what everything there is.
This game horribly violates the maxim of Sid Meier that it's better to offer a few compelling choices than many irrelevant ones. Beyond Earth gives you lots of almost meaningless, flavorless technobabble about whether you want to use your super-algae for production or food, or use some building for science or orbital coverage, but who cares, the difference is generally tiny (and in the two cases it isn't, there is one Really Right answer and one Wrong answer - Autoplant & Ultrasonic Fence).
There's also some baffling omissions - SMAC had the Planetary Council, Civ5 had the UN, you're doing vast planetwide terraformy things, why can't you have some international council? It's already coded up in Civ5, surely...
Anyway, I can forgive unbalance, maybe I'm asking for even more unbalance, but *support different modes of play*. I want the patches to go all-in on making running a Supremacy civ totally different than a Purity civ which is totally different than a Purity civ, and if one ends up "better" oh well. And to get some memorable characters and story going. As is, the strategy is just to spam ridiculously OP trade routes and manage them with some awful UI and watch as your gagues go up faster than everyone else. They need both UI help *and* a savage nerf. Hell, go back to SMAC / Civ4: make trade routes 100% automatic but weaker. Sigh. (as a side note, I found out I'd been interpreting BNW trade routes wrong; I thought internal trade routes COST one city food & resources to power up the other city, hence being a Venice-only thing. Sheesh, they're probably OP in BNW too, although less so, since you need a few external ones to keep the AI pacified, and it's per-civ trade routes there rather than 3-per-city trade routes of doom in Beyond Earth.)
To be clear, there's some solid ideas in BE, so I'll hold out hope for a patch. I like the Affinities & the victory conditions, for example, even if the UI is grindy in practice for finishing them (oh boy wait a bunch of turns). We'll see.
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Damn, Snowfire. I was definitely fairly interested in BE, but I will definitely wait a while on it now.
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Soul Hackers - Holy shit. I was just running through Warehouse dungeon to get treasures I missed. Talk to a Night race demon like you do in SMT games. There is a little ASCII mini game where you pick up letters and avoid *s to not crash into a wall in the dialogue box.
This game man. HOly shit. This is like Gourry making an SMT game or something. It literally has drug trip vision quests as a main plot point and the entire thing plays like a sober team making a game who's design docs were put together by someone on a drug trip.
10/10 wish I was Fenrir and could do this justice.
Also of note, I sort of caved and put it on Easy. Not because I didn't think I could handle it, but because I am enjoying the ride significantly more than the gameplay here, so getting through it at a quicker clip so I can see more stuff like the truly amazing logo of your hacker crew (http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120523215035/megamitensei/images/a/ae/Spookies_3DS.jpg) and the dude in a suit and designer (VARSECE) turban that summons demons with his Saxophone computer (http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120721181622/megamitensei/images/6/60/Yuda_Singh.png) the better.
Edit - I nearly was going to complain about how extraneous VA feels in a game as old as this is at its roots.
Then I got in to the follow up fight with this guy.
(http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20121228083857/megamitensei/images/f/f9/Carol_J_render.png)
Part of the VA has him do air guitar noises. Edit 2- Obviously the guitar is how he summons demons. Note that not all demons are summoned by musical instruments. The main character has a GUN COMPUTER and another bad guy had brass knuckles. Only the COOL characters summon demons with musical instruments.
I fucking love this game you guys.
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It sounds like the game is 90s as fuck. And directly based on the actual movie Hackers?
I kind of want to compare it to Earthbound, which is -also- a drug trip version of the 90s but from a completely different mindset.
Amusingly enough, both games are bound to score lowest in their gameplay categories compared to their story/style categories.
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Correction Djinn, Soul Hack has been treated as having the best gameplay in the SMT fandom, unless you are the post Persona 3 generation.
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DAMN, I'm so getting a 2DS for like only this and SMT4
The Spookies logo sealed the deal
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I cannot compute this, why are people hyping the spookies logo yet I see no hype for the Captain Victor?
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You mean Space Pirate Captain Dracula?
(http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130220221756/megamitensei/images/1/17/Dr_Victor_DSSH.jpg)
Yeah he is pretty fucking hype.
The gameplay isn't terrible, but it isn't the best SMT stuff out there. It is very solidly in its original era, floating around Persona 1. I think it plays better than P1, not sure how many concessions are made for the remake. It is probably still worse than P2.
That said the gameplay IS more interesting. Persona 2 plays much more like your standard JRPG with weird spikes in polish and unrelenting SMT obtuseness. This has demons that don't level up, a main character that can't use magic in your classic SMT style and another human character that levels up on a fixed path of elements based on selections you.make at the start of the game, so it is kind of a more refined version of the original Megami Tensei formula up to that point. It really pushes the button on demon summoning though, since they don't level there is a big push on Fusion, it is literally the only way you will keep up. Skill transfer paths are very strictly locked to one element if my understanding is right, but if you do fusion outside of dungeons in the main area then transfer of Buffs and Recovery spells is almost guaranteed. So you are pretty much going to always get some of the most useful skills to brute force your way through the game. Having demons out during a dungeon costs one of the games kinds of currencies. So there is a real incentive to push through dungeons with as few demons out as possible (and then gangbang the bosses with a party of 6).
To help with all of that, there is one demon you get that is special and doesn't cost Magnetite to have out. It is your Zoma. It has a bunch of unique forms based on what you fuse it with, what level they are etc. it also doesn't level up but inherits a percentage of the stats of the base demons you use to make it (itself included). So you can build it up that way.
So there is a huge part of the gameplay that rides on one of the historically most impenetrable systems JRPGs have used.
The contact/recruitment of demons is one of the roughest I have seen. Some of your success is apparently based on your Int stat (magic defence and magic hit rate) which is a pretty bad stat for the main. You aren't given much direction on how things work, I have had long conversations with demons that I can't really tell if i am not making progress and just wasting time or indication if you can even recruit that demon without some trickery. When it does work the conversations are super easy though.
To counter that though, this game has the absolutely most reasonable priced Compendium I have seen in an SMT game. Like to the point where I think it might be under priced, but that said, you use Magentite for absolutely everything in this game. There is two currencies, but one of the things Magnetite does is convert to Yen.
Generally the feeling I was getting and what seems to be the general consensus in then go community is that it is actually one of the easier SMT games as well. Like I said, I may have put it doe not EZ MODO but that is because I want literally no barriers between me and crazy town.
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Wasteland 2: I walked into a place called Happy Valley and a cheery prerecorded greeting told me the place was run by the Red Skorpion Militia. Everything here sounds pretty upfront, right?
Long story short, I had to leave before clearing the area because I collected more guns than I could carry.
Team's working out well enough so far (Gordon has a crowbar now!), but the penalty for running half the party low INT is starting to rear its ugly head. It's hard to see any attribute in this game as really clearly being the dump stat, even charisma has the important benefit of being tied to XP gains (the team leader's almost lapped everyone else in levels). For the most part I shafted luck (as I'll always do when this is ever a stat in a game) and awareness, haven't seen any hugely obvious ramifications? Maybe I'd get hit less otherwise, I dunno. But yeah, a couple rangers are getting to the point where one level won't give them enough skill points to rank up one of their existing skills. I guess I will have to leave most of their skills at rank three (mildly competent, and the lowest rank at which one level = enough skill points for ranking up a skill) and probably for the rest of the game just focus on maxing the combat skill they were meant for.
I am very pleased to see that proper reverence for the Andy Griffith Show survived the apocalypse. (How far after the war is this supposed to be, anyway? The intro movie gave me the impression it was maybe a couple decades at best, but there are a lot of suggestions in the way people act that it's more like generations. No one's made personal mention of Beforetimes, for example, and when I made a bad joke about a cure for cancer, a doctor said, "Yeah, maybe 150 years ago.")
A little perplexed at the profusion of Teddy Ruxpins, though.
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The war took place in the mid-90s. Can't remember when the game's start date is and I'm not at home.
Anyway, Awareness is a dump stat for melee and skill monkeys. It's very important for anyone using ranged weapons since it is basically a secondary limit on max range of weapons.
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Yeah, I've actually had some range issues on, like, everybody. Whoops! Well, not restarting now. Interception fire is a thing, anyway.
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Playing Smash 3DS and actually doing matches to practice skillz now instead of just unlocking moves and equips. Computer fighters are getting easier but there's such a huge leap in difficulty between playing with items and random stages vs no items and final destination. I can consistently beat a four player set of level nine AI opponents without items, but even just turning on random stages slaps me back down to losing against level sixes. It's really frustrating. Main is Shulk, which might have something to do with it? His recovery is pretty tricky. (I have backslashed myself to death trying to recover so many times...)
http://youtu.be/6SezVDf66YA
Also: this is a thing. A new IntSys game in the works! It looks vaguely Valkyria Chronicles esque. Which I suppose is also XCOM esque? But made by IntSys. It's not a new Advance Wars game, but I am hype for it. It's some kinda Steampunk version of early 1900s fiction and tall tales, with PCs like the Cowardly Lion, Tom Sawyer, John Henry, and lead by The great President Lincoln himself. I dunno what to make of it but I'm buying it!
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Wasteland 2: "I call that a bargain. The best I ever had."
Obviously the game is very fond of its pop culture references, but I wasn't expecting Who lyrics to crop up in dialogue. Needless to say, I'm quite pleased.
Sgt Woodson was missing half his HP for no discernible reason, so I blew some healing supplies patching him up. No acknowledgement at all. Gratitude!
I have 1x reprogrammed unit of human-cyborg relations following me around now. I thought maybe the folks at ranger HQ might have something to say about this since our ultimate adversaries are obviously robots (both Robpost and the game over screen* told me so), but nope, no one comments on it at all! Anyway, I'm mostly poking out odd corners of Arizona and doing my usual obsessive map clearance thing since other apparent avenues are presently inaccessible:
-Prison vicinity has been scoured clean but I see no immediate way to approach the prison itself. The turrets have 4,000 HP and cut everyone down in one or two hits. I would dearly love to get in there and crotchpunt the everloving shit out of the upjumped bandit chief who calls us all murderers because one ranger accidentally shot a kid years ago while he himself lords over a ghetto slave empire, but that's obviously not happening yet. Geez, tell me I don't have to fix the toaster, I've almost totally ignored that blatant novelty skill.
-The obvious plot destination is blocked off by radiation that kills most of the party before I can reach the safe zone. Sure I could make it with a couple people alive, but why? Presumably I'll find better radiation suits somewhere; I don't see any other way through. Oh wait I just remembered I'm supposed to talk to a prisoner at HQ about precisely that. Whups!
-I walked into Rail Nomad and some kid drowned and everyone started going on about rangers killing kids again. God dammit, game! I reloaded and decided I'd come back when I had, I dunno, a fucking rope or something (there wasn't anything I could obviously do first time in). EDIT: apparently the solution is Gordon breaks shit. Fine by me.
I'm exploring zombie central now where oh god dammit I'm on a death timer again. EDIT: not diseased anymore! Flipside, there is now a naked mutant green baby thing following me around and reminding me incessantly that he is allergic to peanuts. I'd tell him to take a hike but my only conversation option is to offer him candy. Whyyyy did I let him out of his cell.
(*There's a baby nuke on display in the ranger HQ museum. There was a button on it. Look, what else could anyone expect me to do?)
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I fucking love this game you guys.
:D
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Smash 4 - I mostly just play this when other people are around. King Dedede is still the best. :D Not a bad game, but not necessarily my favorite.
Hyrule Warriors - I have about 80% of the Adventure Mode map revealed and just got the Great Fairy Link weapon, which is extremely silly.
http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140820205417/zelda/images/e/ed/Great_Fairy.png_(Hyrule_Warriors).png
This is Super's fate.
I'm approaching 50 hours in this game at this point, which is rather impressive. I've quite enjoyed using Zelda, obviously, but Impa, Sheik, Cia, and Link are also enjoyable. Some of the other characters I have an appreciation for their existence even though I have mostly stuck with the more traditional characters.
Probably going to tackle Super Mario 3D World next, in honor of Captain Toad, who is of course the bestest.
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This is Super's fate.
WRONG
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-Prison vicinity has been scoured clean but I see no immediate way to approach the prison itself. The turrets have 4,000 HP and cut everyone down in one or two hits. I would dearly love to get in there and crotchpunt the everloving shit out of the upjumped bandit chief who calls us all murderers because one ranger accidentally shot a kid years ago while he himself lords over a ghetto slave empire, but that's obviously not happening yet. Geez, tell me I don't have to fix the toaster, I've almost totally ignored that blatant novelty skill.
Toaster repair is never a game-changer (though it helps save a LOT of time for one quest around the halfway point) but it does provide you with access to the best energy weapon in the game. I believe that you can get it by simply picking up the Rail Nomad kid who can join you, who has enough toaster repair skill to fix it and get you the Gamma Ray Blaster.
As far as getting in, there is a back route in. Did you find that bigass crane? It gives you access to a new route past the defenses.
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Wasteland 2: You're in a desert. You look down and you see a tortoise. The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can't. Not without your help. Why aren't you helping, Leon?
Actually, I did, and I regret it more than anything else I've done in this game. This is in the Rail Nomad camp, a huge sprawling area with a lot of winding paths and little of genuine interest apart from a Return to Sender. You get some very minor experience from helping the turtle and then he plods off...where, exactly? I have to find out, so I start following him. He goes everywhere at the minutest incremental pace, and I mean like goddamn everywhere, at one point it looks like he's bent on walking through a minefield that I'll have to rush to defuse before he can reach it, but at least the game wasn't that sadistic. I keep after him because seriously, after all this time there's gotta be a good secret in store, right? After what must genuinely have been half an hour of creeping after him, he points out a spot of buried treasure and then promptly dies. I dig up the treasure, because after all this time it must be outstanding!
It's randoloot equal to or worse than storebought gear I already have. God dammit, game!
Ralphie is good at fixing toasters, but unfortunately that's all he's good at. I'll take him on the grand tour once I know where a sizable amount of toasters are. In the meantime Takoyaki Takayuki is the seventh wheel. He has respectable starting levels in a couple skills I'd otherwise had pegged to a couple other low-INT characters that couldn't really afford to keep up with them and he doesn't compete with anyone for ammo, so that's good enough for now.
I'm actually not done with Rail Nomad yet, sadly. Lacked the security ranks to steal the artifact, which looks like the only avenue I have for resolving things peacefully--which is less something I mean to do out of principle in this case and more an act of spite to ensure that neither of those stupid pricks can walk away proudly declaring victory at the end of the day. I'll check the prison again later too, presently heading down valley of cultists from Beneath the Planet of the Apes now that I have quality rad protection. Speaking off, goats really really shouldn't make those kinds of sounds. (Any excuse for Wilhelm Scream is fine by me, though.)
I found a CD-i today, and it was actually a quest item! Sellable loot in this game is the proudest mix of kitsch and dead tech--I've picked up snap bracelets and chia pets and furbies and a merkin (why is this in a game). So much absurd shit. (Even actual shit, it's a pretty lucrative resource.) I can't die yet, I haven't read the Richard Grieco story!
Forgot to mention, I like the radio chatter in this game. You overhear dispatches between HQ and other ranger squads while you're out trundling around the world map, and they generally present the impression of an organization that has its act together. Sometimes they cut off mid-transmission when someone gets ambushed or something, and in a lot of other games that'd probably be your cue to rush off and save the day, but so far they've always survived to report back in later (maybe with casualties, but fundamentally intact and successful). So many RPGs tacitly communicate the sad fact that no one other than the protagonist ever does goddamn anything that it's nice to see a developer put in the effort to convey a contrary impression. They're pros, man, just like you! (Actually, you're the rookie team, so presumably they're more pro than you.)
I found a tombstone dated 2102 so yeah, 100-150 years since armageddon sounds right.
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I actually just got there too! When I played the first time I hit a couple of issues with the quest forking that have since been fixed, so hopefully I don't get railroaded (HYUCK HYUCK) this time and can still change how things play out even though I fucked up the treaty negotiations.
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Tales of Xillia - Got to a town where you meet Alvin's mother and learn about her dementia (or dementia symptoms to some HORRIBLE THING). There is a side quest to get a Heart Herb to help Mila deal with pain she has. Alvin mentions how he tried to find some to try to help someone he cared about (ie his mother) but they are pretty rare and he had no luck and they are hard to find. Go to the next zone. I find 6. Use one to help Mila.
You don't quite acknowledge this game, that shit is fucking dark.
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I actually just got there too! When I played the first time I hit a couple of issues with the quest forking that have since been fixed, so hopefully I don't get railroaded (HYUCK HYUCK) this time and can still change how things play out even though I fucked up the treaty negotiations.
Yeah, ditto. I had enough charm to talk Big Chief Crazy Cone Kekkabah into letting Jessie free and starting negotiations, but lacked the wit to meet the subsequent check for getting him to compromise (woulda made that easily if Shrekette had still been in the party, dammit Ralphie why are you so useless). Oh wait a minute, the last thing I triggered in the meeting hall was Kekkabah telling his dudes to get the macguffin out of its case for the confrontation. So I might not even be able to steal it anymore. Bah! Well, not going back there for a while anyway, easily the most boring place in the game so far.
It looks like the idea with skill books is to conserve them for rank 10 because you save more skill points that way? I foolishly used the first couple I found on rank zero skills, but if they bump someone up one rank regardless of what they're currently at then yeah, definitely saving them to max out skills. It looks like most non-combat/conversation skills you can leave pegged at eight to save skill points, since success with those is percentile based and at rank eight you at least have a (poor) chance of making max difficulty skill challenges.
Angie better get her ass back in the party at some point. I thought she was just going to be Distaff Jeigan when she first joined up, but she's still the absolute embodiment of her surname with an M16 (though she's often using the wrench to conserve ammo, there's competition for 5.56mm bullets).
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Demons's S'souls's - I wanted to be playing Dark Souls but that isn't feasible at the moment on my okay through, so after someone at work was talking about this I decided to go see if I could dig up a copy shopping tonight. I did so.
Just off finishing 1-1 and not having finished Dark Souls, it feels like Dark Souls respects me and my time way more than this does. Big long levels with no stopping, no pausing, what feels like lots more guys etc adds up to feeling like it is difficulty circle jerk for the purpose of difficulty circle jerk. I am not sure if it is actually that or just more primitive design where the mix of Bonfires and Estus in Dark promotes much better feeling of pacing and rhythm. That said Dark is way more generous with souls in the opening sequences. Levelling at bonfires instead of a central NPC who is locked away until after you beat the first area is also pretty shitty.
Also I tend to think of Dark Souls as "Guys Hiding Around Corners: the movie: the game". Based on 1-1 this is "Two Guys Hiding Around Corners While A Third Hides In The Pitch Black Dark Corner: the movie: the game". Also way more multiple pulls than Dark has. Soul Arrow OP of course, but mehhhhhhhhhh.
So with that out of the way I should note I picked easy mode, Royal and I am going to focus on magic and get Second Chance and don't mind sitting on my hands to regen mana. I chugged Spices during Phalanx and spammed all my Fire Bombs, so I don't feel like I am that pointlessly item sitting.
Got out of 1-1, levelled up to like 20 magic from eating all my loose souls. Now I have no idea what the fuck to do. I dipped into 4-1 because I hear that is the farm town to go to, so wanted to see what enemies were like. First dude took half as much damage from Soul Arrow and took 3-4 to kill, so bailed on that, especially after realising I forgot to kill myself in the Nexus before leaving.
Poked into Tower of Latria since that has been talked up a lot, lives up to the hype. The audio work there is pretty amazing with both the chimes on the mindflayers, the moans of the tortured and the way the chimes of the mindflayers intermingles with the sound of their Soul Arrows firing. Suffice to say at midnight I bailed after killing the first one, leveled up one more time and finished for the night. I am not doing a dark Lovecraftian torture dungeon that late on a Friday night.
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4-1 is farmville, but the barrier to entry is preeeeetty high. You should try it with edged weapons sometime. It will make you :(
If you look at levels like a course to get to the finish line on, it's gonna be a long game. Instead, look at levels as puzzles that you chip away at the answer with every life. Also you'll be happy for all that spice you get from mindflayers later.
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Yeah Demon's Souls has no checkpoints, so the way back to the boss if pretty long, unless you found a shortcut.
But most of the bosses are a lot easier.
After 1-1 usually I go get some ores in 2-1 then do whatever. The easiest levels for you should be 1-2 I guess or 3-1.
4-1 is indeed one of the hardest levels at the beginning, and 2-1 has a difficult boss. 5-1, let's not talk about 5-1.
You should be able to kill at least a few 4-1 enemies and get out, for farming. They're intimidating but not that hard to beat. With a weapon and a shield at least, I forgot how magic went against them.
Magic is pretty boring in Demon's Souls, but at least you don't have to deal with weapon upgrading IIRC? Waiting for MP to recharge without using spices is like healing by waiting in Vampire Bloodlines, don't do it when you feel like you can afford spices.
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Just off finishing 1-1 and not having finished Dark Souls, it feels like Dark Souls respects me and my time way more than this does.
Reading this sentence has brought forth mental anguish. Congratulations, Grefter.
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You do futz with weapon upgrades on magic, but just for more mp regen than damage.
Just off finishing 1-1 and not having finished Dark Souls, it feels like Dark Souls respects me and my time way more than this does.
Reading this sentence has brought forth mental anguish. Congratulations, Grefter.
I really can't describe it better than that. I am envisioning the impacts of dying a long way into a level. Oh sure I can get my souls back, but you need to get through a massive chunk of the level again of you didn't find shortcuts and to my knowledge Demons's doesn't have non-respawning enemies, so the pacing is even more jarring than just bonfires and estus. The reward cycles are also much much longer between each other form what I am seeing in front of me.
Edit - research says I am wrong on this, but there is significantly fewer of them.
Thanks for the direction guys.
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I think that's all pretty accurate and it describes in large part why I can't bring myself to replay Demon's Souls (the grammar there drives me nuts as well) even after playing its successors way more times than I'm comfortable admitting. They're just so much more user-friendly in spite of also being more difficult. Demon's Souls initial levels are really imposing when you don't know where to go, but the X-2 stages are all substantially easier since you know the rhythm of the zones and in general the game's bosses are pretty sad. Just crush it to dust in the cheapest way possible, Grefter, it deserves it.
Boletaria = lots of healing supplies, Latria = magic supplies, Stonefang = ore, Shrine of Storms = souls, Valley of Defilement = did you really expect to get anything of consequence from a place called Valley of Defilement? Latria probably has the easiest first round boss and gives the best rewards for a caster; getting through the place is just such a psychological ordeal. Getting the easy ore out of 2-1 for weapon upgrades and ignoring the boss for a while is probably good advice.
Latria is really cool, the swamp succeeds admirably at being the most depressing place ever (Valley of Defilement's end boss is the high point of the game by far), but otherwise I found the game's environments sorely lacking in personality. Too much of it's just grim and grey for the sake of being grim and grey. At least the prison and the swamp kinda have a reason for it and having some lost souls around lends them a little humanity in contrast to the overpowering awfulness.
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Boletaria is grim greys and browns for a reason as well! That way they can hide more grey and brown dudes in a mess of grey and brown that auto lock refuses to pick up. I meant to say that game literally feels like Cameras's Souls's in my first post.
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Bayonetta 2: So I beat a demon in hell using another demon and then Rodin was all "I'm awesome, deal with it, here's another weapon." If this sounds too sane for Bayonetta, just remember this is the cliff note's version that leaves out...well...everything.
Crisis Core Hard mode: I've been not playing this for too long, I should finish it...so I made some slight plot progress after doing missions! In Sector 5.
Curtain Call: Reset Terra and Zack's levels and they're back in the 40s, working on various other characters, I have unlocked all Turquoise and Red Shard characters, and all but 10-2 Rikku for Peach Shards.
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I liked 1-1's greyness. It felt very grounded. It is anti Saints Row 4, in a good way.
In general I think the only thing Demon's Souls has over its sequels is the atmosphere in World 1 / 3 and particularly 5 (The Valley of Defilement has to be my favourite place in a videogame)
Shadowrun Dragonfall: The hit rate % are lying. This is worse than FFT.
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Did you ever stop to think they might be miss rates???.?.
Demons's Souls's - Got up to robot spider in 2-1. Panicked and died not knowing what the fuck like Capra. Research, get Thief Ring I missed when saving Ostrava, have ability to stand in doorway and look around. Die again looking around. Read more carefully. Find cheese mode spot. There is a spot that you can only get hit by webs that do fuck all damage to you and not any fire. Soul Arrow for victory. I still have no idea why those fireballs were clipping on anything, but eh, a win is a win. Less satisfying than throwing shit at Capra though.
ToX - Back in Fennmont. I thought I had a joke to make, but can't remember it. Alvin is pretty great but all the villain cast is pretty bad. Guide I am reading says that this random language a guy started speaking is Melnics, so that is a random thing for them to have dug back out to use over a decade later.
Soul Hackers - Got told to go to a super popular club and meet the DJs that own the place. They are really super elite hackers.
(http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130514024555/megamitensei/images/c/ce/EL-115_Alpha_and_Beta_DSSH_Official_Artwork.jpg)
These guys form the DJ crew known as Reticulan. Alpha and Beta say they normally wouldn't do work by request but because Spooky asked them to and because ZeroCool is so good looking they will sell you computer program's for super cheap and tell you not to complain about piracy.
The super elite hacker crew leader sent an underage kid to a club to get hit on by creepy dudes because they know how to run a torrent client.
That said Beta (the one with the VR goggles) is my new favourite though because if the script is going to force you to be a ridiculous offensive stereotype you may as well own it like he does.
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This all makes sense!
I bet the Soul Hackers final boss will be Satan.
Wearing red/blue 3D glasses.
I've been listening to the music and it's pretty disappointing though. Especially since the prequel has a boss theme that sounds like it's from Barkley Gaiden https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZv3hjJz4NI
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I actually kind of dig that track, it has a pretty relentless bass line for a chip tune. That is for Devil Summoner though, not Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers. The lineage of SMT spin offs involved here is pretty fucking loopy.
I dig the soundtrack a bit actually. It isn't a stand out use of rock like DDS is , but here (http://youtu.be/qeQnnPAT0EI)s the EL-115 background track. For a song that just plays in one store in the game? I think it toys with more than it needed to.
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Pretty sure it's spelled "Zer0Kewl" Gref
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Oh I absolutely love the track I linked.
I meant to say that the (probably much worse) prequel gets the cool music while Soul Hackers has mehish battle tracks in comparison.
That track you listed is groovy though.
I have restarted Shadowrun Dragonfall 5 times now. I just can't decide on a build
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(http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120730075853/megamitensei/images/9/97/Speed_Demon_Soul_Hackers.jpg)
Side quest.
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I choose not to be insulted that you think that Soul Hackers is something that I could have created.
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Demons's Souls's - I am doing 2-2. Bearbug things are an excuse to play more of an infinitely more fun game. I just lost thousands upon thousands of souls because I clipped some lava and died instantly then died running back because the blind corner random exploding thing wouldn't fucking trigger after running around the corner 3 or 4 times then the one time it did trigger I got caught on something because the camera fucked around.
I fucking hate this game.
Edit - And then die twice to the same thing on the ones at the start of the stage on the mine carts. After every other time when sprinting straight past them avoids the explosion now it hits me in the back and one shots me.
Okay.
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Now go try the valleeeeey
In Shadowrun Dragonfall I have settled for a katana wielding, racoon worshipping girl.
I'm playing on Very Hard, everybody is great in combat except Glory. (who's just pure healer I guess? She could at least be better than the decker in combat)
I now understand why I have a weird desire to smash absolutely everything in sight in that game. (but can't) It's because the hyper detailed isometric 2D items look just like Bastion's !
The hotel mission was pretty fun, but the game lost some cool factor there.
The background text says the club is the most hardcore club ever. Visually and audibly speaking, no way. The music is very low, the graphics are super bright. There are like only 10 NPCs in the club including guards. WTF, Shadowrun Dragonfall. Are you serious? Okay, the bartender -does- sell drugs but that's about it.
Here is my RPG nightclub ranking:
Vampire Bloodlines > Mass Effect 2/3 > Persona 2 > Shadowrun Dragonfall
But I'm still waiting for the Citizen Kane of RPG nightclubs there, Vampire Bloodlines wasn't enough.
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Ok let me update the list after checking my RPG ratings list for more nightclubs within RPGs.
Official list is:
Alpha Protocol > Vampire Bloodlines > Mass Effect 2/3 >>> Shin Megami Tensei 2 > Persona 2 > Shadowrun Dragonfall > Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne
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Hyrule Warriors - Currently fucking around trying to put together ~pretty pictures~. There is no point to doing this at all, I can get the pretty pictures on the Internet, but I want them. >:( Is this what being a completionist feels like? I'm working on trying to learn to use the alternate weapons, such as Zelda's Wind Waker and Link's Great Fairy/Gauntlets. I also still need to get the chicken summoning weapon for Lana. Overall my fav people to play as have been Zelda, Sheik, Impa, and Cia.
Chickens in this game are such massive dicks. (This sounds like a recurring thing in the Zelda games.) One of them even took over a base and sent out Captains to invade other bases.
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Dark Souls - Died again losing a fuckload of souls I had made going the long way to boss of 2-2. First death was climbing up the shortcut and walking off a platform I was trying to roll off of. Lost the stain because I tried to walk up off a platform on to solid ground and instead of stepping up the slight elevation I walked along the edge of the "wall" and walked off the edge.
I have died more times to character controls being shit than enemies.
Fuck this game.
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Smash: See Elf, basically. Think I'm about Smashed out for single-player, don't care enough to finish the 2nd panel of challenges I just unlocked. Happy to play online though if anyone wants to...
Transistor: Not very far in, but... what. Points for audacity, but the idea of "Action RPG where you can stop time every 5 seconds" seems totally broken in favor of the player, and not particularly fun. It's like Valkyria Chronicles if the enemy side didn't get turns, and you could only die to the plinky reaction fire that happens when you move around. You stop time, beat the crap out of the enemy however you please, then run around evading the enemy until time stop recharges again. Repeat until dead.
Can't say I'm particularly enamored with the story, either. Computer-town is 100% deserted, the only people you meet are dead bodies and bosses. You are soul-sucking the other programs into your sword, which sounds pretty interesting, except that only the first guy soul-sucked (code-sucked?) seems to actually talk or react. I ate the enemy boss's memories? How does she feel now that she's stuck inside my sword? Is she angry? Has she been mind-controlled to be my willing slave? Who knows, it happened, but she doesn't talk. Shame, because I think I like the idea here (inside of a computer environment, hostile process attacks virus-style), but making the world deserted was the wrong choice. I suppose it was fine in Bastion, but even Bastion quickly introduced characters who you could sort of interact with; actual people, rather than random news flashes or emails, would have been nice. They could have gone for silly, they could have gone for horror, but nope.
Well, maybe it's too early to get angry, I'll see... although since the game is supposed to be very short, it doesn't have much time left.
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Demons's Souls's - Pulled Flame Lurker once because hey I have lost all my shit anyway and I can get there easy. Okay that is probably beatable, but I would like to get some more bits and pieces. Hey the Talisman of God so I can start using Miracles is really early in 4-1 lets try that.
Things that are going to give me bruises and break a controller.
- Absolutely retarded lock on ranges that refuses to start when you can see the opponent a hundred billion miles away.
- Dying because you get caught on geometry.
- Lock on removing itself because I wanted to back out of range of the berserker skeleton that will run me down instantly.
This is all after I was going to praise the game on how nice and fair the camera controls actually feel during Flamelurker.
Fuck this game.
Edit - Worked out some basic fuckery to mess around with to handle some pulls. Got Talisman. Now can top up health between pulls. The exact kind of generate play Dark Souls actively avoids. Can still die because game decides to drop the lock on to Silver Skeletons though.
Also lock on works fine for weird flying manta ray things. They actively chose to give regular dudes shitty lock on ranges.
Fuck this game.
Soul Hackers - Crash Override's sister got her soul hacked by a dolphin from the internet. I beat up a dolphin on the internet to get back her soul by overloading him with magic (it claims to like Magic attacks, but a kid in front of the painting the Dolphin was inside told me that if Dolphin's are as intelligent as people say then Dolphins mush lie and assassinated JFK)
(http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130501173540/megamitensei/images/2/2a/Snapy_DSSH.png)
I wish you were the primary antagonist Snappy, you were not used nearly enough.
I fucking love this game you guys.
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Also lock on works fine for weird flying manta ray things. They actively chose to give regular dudes shitty lock on ranges.
Aren't lock-on ranges just determined by what weapon you're using?
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Wasteland 2: So I'm walking in the valley of the shadow of the mushroom cloud, and the local conflict is between a band of crazy, nuke-worshipping kamikaze monks and a gang of paramilitary creepazoids (who aren't actively crazy but who are also, you know, paramilitary creepazoids). I instantly dislike the monks because they casually inflict collateral damage on the people they're supposed to be protecting, indifferently extend their protection to bandits, and threaten to detonate an ICBM if anyone messes with them; the only good thing they have going for them is that they maintain a functional hospital. But, since I don't exactly have a good track record with outfits calling themselves the [color][animal]Militia, I decide initially that this last point seems to balance things out slightly in the monks' favor. I humor the monks' leader a bit by agreeing to track down and kill a rogue monk who found his own nuke and is trying to activate it for nefarious purposes, then move on to my actual goal on the other side of the valley. I don't formally pick sides just yet because I don't trust either of them and want to see exactly how much Brother Enola is lying to me before making a decision.
So we move on to Damonta, where I'm supposed to to mess with a radio tower so we can find the baddies' HQ. We have the misfortune to arrive in the middle of the robocalypse and our rescue efforts are, uh, a little mixed. I fail to save the water merchants or anyone in the water company building (and I'm curious to know what the deal with Sarah's pendant was now) because I'm distracted elsewhere saving the lesbians (duh). I do save the DJ. I save Red and later give him his share of the Sierra Madre gold (he was pretty helpful shooting down the robots in town). I fail to save Binh, but figure out the gimmick after the boss fight, reload and do it right. So in practice I think I only let like half the town die? As we'll see later, this is somewhat better than my average for this game.
I briefly have a sentient discoball in the party but it proves to possess a very poor sense of self-preservation. I do get a more permanent recruit out of this semi-debacle, though, because in a cage behind the boss is the 41st century definition of the word dictionary (is this a Legion of Super-Heroes reference or something?) He's got metal joints! Decent skill point accrual for a brawler! And he does as much damage with one punch as Takayuki could manage on crits (stabbing robots, how well does that normally work out, right?) He's also freaking Lex Luthor so this is a pretty winning package, the only thing I really have to give up in trading followers is reliable bomb-defusing skill. That's not something I'll need any time soon, right?
My local plot business done, I head north to invade the renegade monk's missile silo and immediately outside the front door is a huge minefield. ffffffffff But okay, this is salvageable, the team lead has enough minor demolitions talent to get us through with the magic of mashing F11. I march inside and unsurprisingly we were completely misled, he just wants to defuse the bomb before his crazy friends get a hold of it. But he isn't up to the task because that sort of heroic risk is entirely the preserve of playable characters. With our measely three ranks in demolition, can we neutralize a nuclear missile?
After exploding the world an embarrassing number of times, yes we can.
This is where it gets great (and later not so great) because the head monk was monitoring the status of the nuke from his own command center and all his flunkies got to witness me disable it in real time. "They killed a god! There is no god!" The transmission cuts off violently and I laugh all the way back to the valley. Then I stop laughing because the firefight following the collapse of authority indiscriminately cut down civilian, doctor, monk, raider scum, etcetera. Some of the militia's hanging around, and you'd think they'd be happy with me because the valley's theirs to tax now, but alas, they wanted it with, you know, actual living people to tax, and they go hostile the moment they see me.
Everybody in the valley is dead solely because I didn't want either party of wackjobs getting their hands on a nuclear missile.
Also I feel it my duty to disclose that the militia officer was carrying a dildo in her inventory at the time of her death. Did I mention this game has weird ideas of what constitutes loot.
The prison's between me and home after this and I have some unfinished business there*. Walk in and see the guards have restocked; the townspeople are not in evidence. Dead or enslaved, I'm sure. The sick woman who begged me to kill her last time and who I didn't because I wanted to try and find a cure is now definitely corpsified (really wondering if there was more to this that I didn't pick up on). The lone civilian I find tells me the militia captain has flown into an insane rage because someone deliberately infected his beloved dogs with plague and then told him we did it. We talk the survivor into admitting yeah, it was him, look here's the cure so maybe you can talk this guy down? I have no intention of even attempting the latter because the guy's a slaving sack of shit, but hey, I can save the dogs, right? I run the massive prison boss fight fight a couple times and just can't get Vax to survive. Goodbye robot buddy, you were very helpful when you weren't shooting me in the back and screaming KILL ALL HUMANS. Anyway, something good should come out of this other than the simple obliteration of awful people, so let's see to those dogs.
They go hostile almost immediately after receiving the cure. I'm not sure if it's because I killed their master or because I have a stunted green abomination toddling along at my side. They're dead in the end either way.
(*The prison turrets are such a mechanically ridiculous means of railroading, by the way. They have four thousand HP. The robot you can activate to suicide against them deals five thousand damage. Failing the demolitions check with the ICBM and detonating it deals only five hundred damage! It would take sixteen nuclear warheads to kill the Night Terror!)
Please let me know if there's some other way we can screw up today. Oh, what's that, Rail Nomad camp? I didn't finish that? Okay, let's see if I can break into the meeting hall this time. ...I can! But the MacGuffin has indeed vanished into the ether. There's no peaceful resolution available any longer. If the chiefs try and talk it out, it'll just descend into violence. I opt to prevent this by massacring Kekkabah and his one-armed bandits because he's the bigger bully. Imperfect solutions, etcetera. This looks like an exit for my team until I take a few steps away and it turns out all Kekkabah's townspeople psychically know he's dead and have gone hostile. They're trying to stab me now so I do the sensible thing and shoot them first. Then someone calls my boss. (He isn't happy.) Fine, fine! I'll stop murdering people and just run for the exit! I bypass the remaining townsfolk and individually move my entire seven-person team towards the exit across this huge and winding town in combat mode, only to be told that I can't exit the town in combat mode. Jesus fuckin' Christ. I reload and manage to sneak out with just one civilian casualty, but still, fuck this town forever.
I'm pretty sure that by now every town in the game has been left unintentionally decimated in my wake. It isn't always me doing the murdering, but results are the same, aren't they? I'm supposed to go to Los Angeles next so I can accidentally disrupt and demolish the social fabric of wholly new communities, but I've a fair amount of work to do on personal projects this week so I'll probably call this a good place to take a break.
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Demons's Souls's - I poked around a bit and built up enough strength to use Composite Short Bow so I had a bow to take out dragon in 1-2. Then found out I could have done it with Soul Arrow at start of the game. Oh well, some Str lets me use a bigger shield I guess. Also determined I put more points in faith than I need, might get to 24 so I can use Second Chance and either heal or evacuate. Aaaaand turns out I have put way more headed into 4-1 than I thought there was. That level is way short, like nearly a Dark Souls area length. I obviously need to examine some of the other areas, but it could be that the game just is super rough on design instead of being deliberately shitty like it feels? Am I assuming the same level of intentionality that Dark Souls seems to have where I could be assuming growing pains?
Regardless of having found a way to handle them I still think the 4-1 skeletons are unfair, their roll randomly makes spells miss and shit, they are just so inconsistent.
Next thing on the to do list I suppose is to go back to 2-2 then kill Dragon God after clearing out Flamelurker. Do whatever White world tendency thing I want to do and then suicide a bunch and get that talisman of the Beasts.
Contemplating item dupe tricks for spices and human form things just to compress time spent.
Soul Hackers - I am stuck doing a twitch based optional thing which is wrecking my Obsessive tendencies. I should let it go because first person dungeon controls being twitch based is terrible, but it is for a Vit source which is so good. Sources are crazy good in this game since it uses a lower stat scale than most modern SMT games. You cap out at 40 in a stat and only gain 1 at level up, so +1 to a stat for free is amazing and Vitality is a gooooood stat in this game.
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But aren't you playing on easy? Do you really need that VIT? Doesn't OCD demand you to start collecting 99 of every item right now?
El Cid, um, Wasteland 2 doesn't look good at all? What do you think of the game right now?
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I'm enjoying it well enough but it really isn't Yattaf-friendly (that's what you were asking, right?)
Combat is basically old-school Fallout except you can command your whole team. Actually maybe X-Com would be a better comparison, in that case. Honestly not that far from Shadowrun Returns either (if you stripped the magic out). So deliberately simplistic down and dirty shootin' and stabbin'. It's reasonably well-balanced on normal, enemies will fuck you up if you make stupid tactical decisions, so don't do that. I run from every world map encounter, though, and reload when I fail to run. The fixed battles are fine, but I really don't want to fight every random schmoe in Arizona. Dungeons are always unexpectedly huge, so there's a genuine sense of tension early on when you don't entirely know what the game wants from you and it seems like you could realistically run yourself out of resources and permafail. I'm not sure if that's good or bad, but it does gel with the setting and there is unspoken emphasis that you need to build a diverse and balanced team. (By this point though I can afford to just leave the Uzi on burst fire and turn everything before me into a red paste.)
The writing is adequate. There's some nice flavor text but really little outstanding material (though I have to say it's a distinct step up from what I was previously playing). Oh, I wanted to mention, during chargen there's a religion and brand of cigarettes dropdown for each character? And these have reflected None for every follower I've recruited, which I can't help but think is strange. It might be suggestive of the caliber of NPCs you're working with, they'll make casual comments as you walk around new places but there's no personal Q&A after recruitment and they don't have personal quests or any of that stuff. Aside from Angela, who you get handed to you overleveled in the intro and who has genuine plot importance, none of them so far have had any plot significance at all (setting significance is there, though). And your core team's lines come entirely from interrogating NPCs with questions that basically all boil down to "'Metal Gear?'" so they're not contributing a ton either. There are persuasion options in conversation but they crop up rather less often than I'd expected.
Personality was clearly always meant to come from the world, so your mileage may vary with interest in the subgenre. The game has a very odd sense of humor. Oh, I wished earlier to submit this piece of wisdom: "Don't hurt hobos and hobos won't hurt you." That's sound advice Super.
The score is restrained to the point of nonexistence. I'm not convinced there are more than two background tracks in the game. Maybe there will be more now that I've transitioned to the second half?
So mostly it's a series of "Yeah, that's good enough" boxes checked off in something that plays well to my thematic biases. If nothing else, I continue to be amazed at the number and variety of ways in which my attempts to bring law and civilization back to the post-nuclear desert continue to trainwreck.
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Grefter: 4-1 is a fair deal shorter than the other first round areas (the other X-1s are all quite lengthy with shortcuts, 4-1 just makes you worry about even attempting the place because skellingtons). 4-2, however, more than makes up for this deficiency without even the decency to include a shortcut. I might genuinely have quit the game if I'd died in there.
EDIT: you know, I actually don't know this, why do people kill themselves deliberately in Demon's Souls anyway? (Apart from black world tendency shit, that is.)
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4 is one of the many reasons I never replayed Demon's compared to the Darks. I think I killed all of Phalanx and Tower Knight just to test the Northern Regalia before stopping with a hearty "Fuck that noise."
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You kill yourself in the nexus in order to avoid losing white tendency in the levels. (Dying in human form lowers tendency by 1, and you need max tendency to do white world events)
Also, if you have white character tendency, you deal more damage in soul form, but I think the extra hp generally trumps that unless you are using hyper mode.
The biggest frustration is that logging in online resets tendency, so you either have to play offline or never turn the game off to preserve white world.
None of this is relevant to a blind playthrough, mind.
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Oh I'm not trying to solo everything. Look at Dragonfall! I'm not soloing it yet!
This does sound pretty interesting at times, buuuuut not enough to compensatey for my complete lack of interest in the setting and my strong dislike of the aesthetics of this game. (In fact I can't even think of a worse looking game post N64 game right now, aside from games with horrible character design)
Like I should rather just replay Fallout 1/2 if I want to scratch that hitch since I've forgotten about them.
Dragonfall: Doing extremel shady work trying to raise 50 000 bucks for Alice.
I'm playing as Miss Very Nice Biowarish Main Character (called Sam) just out of respect for the plot and world of the game, but I really want to pick all these douchebag options. It's becoming incredibly harder to resist. The game even acknowledges that I'm doing some really wrong work, out of fear or desire for revenge only.
It's immensely frustrating to be a 3 charisma, 1 intelligence melee character and see all these AMAZING dialogue options I can't pick. It's like:
- Hey Delita, let's go kill some rebels
- (INTELLIGENCE REQUIRED: 6) *greyed out* Hey Delita, maybe you should hide your sister while this commner revolt goes on? I don't think she's safe here, she risks being associated with the Beoulves but doesn't benefit from the same protection.
Melee is eeeeeeeeeh in this game, it does unimpressive damage with meh accuracy, at 1 range obviously (move and attack is viable for 1 AP though), it pretty much forces you to eat a lot of bullets with no cover.
AP damage is nice.
Sam is still the MVP. I think, as she becomes a monster with Aim and Haste on, unlike every other character.
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I don't know a tooon about melee in it (since I am not huge on the source material), but my understanding is that the big appeal for melee is the AP damage yeah. It is an interesting counterpoint to your usual system where mages are about control and your melee fighters run in and do clean up. Running melee, mages and ranged in Shadowrun Returns is Mages buff you up/support, Melee ties things up and ranged guys clean up with the damage.
That said when I played the main campaign it was far more just about buffing and everyone else blasting shit with guns. I defaulted to melee guys using guns just as much as melee since I only used street samurai NPCs, so points dumped all over the shop.
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Hyrule Warriors - So I have finally obtained purty picture after a few hours of work. Objectively it wasn't really worth the time, but it was so shiny. Now I need to work on getting higher level weapons for Midna, Darunia, Zant, and Ghirahim.
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I don't know a tooon about melee in it (since I am not huge on the source material), but my understanding is that the big appeal for melee is the AP damage yeah.
It's easier to gank dudes with melee if you are good at fightans than it is to shoot dudes if you are good at shootans. But melee you can only attack one enemy per round as opposed to shooting twice, potentially at different targets, or spraying a room with bullets and making your GM hate you. Ahem. Also, if you fail at combat, your target may injure you instead. High risk, high reward. Unless you're a troll with a nodachi. In which case you should melee all day long. Or you're fighting a troll with a nodachi. In which case you should reflect on the poor life choices that led you to this juncture.
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Well I know in baseline Returns I spent a lot of time fighting multiple enemies, so locking down a single enemy wasn't a huge benefit really.
Demons's Souls's - Went to Flamelurker. Died a stupid number of times to falling down the shortcut. Died once to Lurker just with backing myself up to the stairs and getting caught on debris there. Went and fought him again and abused random shit lying around the arena and then suddenly couldn't get camera locks easy (The Real Cameras's Souls's Starts's Here) tried to blitz down the last bit of health, miscalculated thinking 1 Soul Arrow was needed when 2 were. Killed him as I got hit by explosion. Got the kill and no souls. I will take it.
Edit - I think this counted as being killed as Human once, because after killing Dragon God I can't get the Dragon Bone Smasher...
Oh well? I am pretty sure I didn't goof and forget to kill myself in Body form back before I went and died to Dragon God once like a putz.
Edit 2 - Killed Tower Knight. Since I had killed the Red Dragon with cheese I could go back and get into the execution pit. Killed Executioner Miralda, got some loot I don't care much about, but good (?) light armour. Debating whether I go to 1-3 to rescue Yuria or if I suck up my fear and do 3-1.
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Locking down single dudes is really something that doesn't come fully into use until late in the game when you start running afoul of the seriously dangerous guys that come strapped with miniguns and Fire breath.
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Super Mario 3D World - Gotta get ready for Captain Toad Treasure Tracker, so gonna play this. World 1 was pretty standard easy Mario fare, we'll see if the game picks up in challenge later~
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WL2- Newest patch added the ability to import your characters from the last game. So now that I'm done with the game I'm going to do a perfect playthrough where I fix everything with a team of four level 40 rangers.
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Grefter: Dragonbone Smasher is good but also incredibly fucking heavy. You don't care about it unless you're running a pure strength build (which you're obviously not). Miralda's armor is pretty good insofar as Demon's Souls armor goes. I ran with it (sans hood) pretty much the entire game because it looked snazzy and everything other than light armor is completely worthless.
And man, that's why people kill themselves in the Nexus? To avoid shifting world tendency to black when they die in other worlds? Dude, there is so much shit I would not have survived in my playthrough without that nice buffer of running at full HP. That's gimping yourself for insurance so much worse than perpetually running with Rings of Life/Soul Protection in DS2 (at least that only takes up one out of four ring slots instead of chopping your HP by 25% and taking up one out of two ring slots).
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I would have been after it just to see stuff with Scirvir rather than to use it, so not really a big deal since I don't need the Pure stone he gives for Str builds for the same reason I don't need the Smasher. I assume this is a significant part of tot for most people knowing that most people on the internet obsess over this shit like I do, but there will likely just be some percentage that are after loot from Perfect White NPCs or events.
I was mostly holding off on just suiciding in 2-x o get Talisman of Beasts so I stop messing around with Talisman and Catalyst juggling.
I am not finding running Soul Form all the time that big a deal now even with dedicating that ring slot to Thief's ring instead of Cling Ring. The difference in HP between survivable to get away and use grass or be able to take a second hit is pretty huge. I could probably test it out more now that I am levelled up a bit more (the resist for Soul Level seems to be significantly more important here than in Dark Souls and it was already pretty decently effective there) but I am happy playing more stealthy. I wouldn't be able stealth as well in Body form either, so wooooo. Stealth being one of the most effective ways to cheese bosses is really shaping my play.
If I was playing a melee character though my choices would be different, but fuck this game, it doesn't deserve anything more than the cheesiest tactics I can.
And wait, Dark Souls 2 has 4 ring slots? Man I would struggle to find a fourth ring better than "play Souls Game like a normal game".
Also of note, item dupe glitch is craaaaazy easy. I did it to get Ephemeral Eyes, but damn. I might use it for ores that are refusing to drop... I could also use it on souls to get ALL THE SPELLS too. Not sure I want to cheat that much though, but picking between Fireball and Firestorm is bugging me a little.
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Grefter: Dragonbone Smasher is good but also incredibly fucking heavy. You don't care about it unless you're running a pure strength build (which you're obviously not). Miralda's armor is pretty good insofar as Demon's Souls armor goes. I ran with it (sans hood) pretty much the entire game because it looked snazzy and everything other than light armor is completely worthless.
And man, that's why people kill themselves in the Nexus? To avoid shifting world tendency to black when they die in other worlds? Dude, there is so much shit I would not have survived in my playthrough without that nice buffer of running at full HP. That's gimping yourself for insurance so much worse than perpetually running with Rings of Life/Soul Protection in DS2 (at least that only takes up one out of four ring slots instead of chopping your HP by 25% and taking up one out of two ring slots).
That's why I say it's irrelevant when playing blind. I am pro at Demon's Souls and can beat the whole game in Soul form with hardly any deaths, but most players are not at that level. The loss of a ring slot if you need Cling is pretty huge.
Re: Talisman of Beasts, I hope you are prepared to cheese Scirvir or for the fight of your life. Hardest NPC phantom in the series, even worse than Old King Doran in my opinion. If you want to kill him easily, I suggest baiting him out and pushing him off the ledge somehow. You have to jump down to get the Talisman, but it saves headache if you can pull it off.
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Cheese is the only thing this game deserves. That as how it was always going to be. I am wondering if he will run off after Soul Remains like Miralda apparently will.
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My laptop has been doing extremely weird noises for a few weeks.
Whenever the fans start it does a "Hmmm?" sound then whenever they stop he goes "Hmmm."
It is weird.
I don't know a tooon about melee in it (since I am not huge on the source material), but my understanding is that the big appeal for melee is the AP damage yeah.
It's easier to gank dudes with melee if you are good at fightans than it is to shoot dudes if you are good at shootans. But melee you can only attack one enemy per round as opposed to shooting twice, potentially at different targets, or spraying a room with bullets and making your GM hate you. Ahem. Also, if you fail at combat, your target may injure you instead. High risk, high reward. Unless you're a troll with a nodachi. In which case you should melee all day long. Or you're fighting a troll with a nodachi. In which case you should reflect on the poor life choices that led you to this juncture.
Moving and attacking only costs 1 AP so I can attack twice per round! Three times with Haste!
My main character is getting really good with a 5 damage katana, +6% hitrate cyberware, strength boosting cyberware, the Cleave skill (Multitarget damage), and Deitrich's buffs.... She eats a ton of damage but that's why I've replaced Eiger with the glorious healbot.
I really should have gone with Bear worshipping (Grants a heal skill) over Racoon worshiping (Grants a +mov buff) since cyberware can boost movement. Ah well.
This game is as unspectacular as it is impressive. Somehow. It is impossible for me to be excited by it, but it's definitely one of the best WRPG I can think of. It's weird.
In any case they failed the marketing on that one. The game sounded like some DLC released as standalone (like Farcry 3 Blood Dragon) but from what I can tell the original Shadowrun Returns is like a demo and this is pretty much the real stuff.
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I believe Soul Remains work, but since Scirvir uses ranged attacks you may have to do some work to get him off the edge. The Mirdan Hammer's 2 handed R1 and the Dragon Bone Smasher are pretty good for knockback if you can wield those.
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See, I didn't even know soul form = stealthier. That (or the Sneaky McSneakerson ring) would've been a nice bonus for the one boss who's blind (kind of a neat gimmick From's never duplicated) and was kind of terrifying to fight as a slow bruiser.
Grefter, I personally would withhold all judgement if you decided to item dupe upgrade materials. Ore is stupidly rare in Demon's Souls, I didn't come close to maxing out even a single weapon.
Fenrir! If you're hauling Dietrich and Glory around with you, lemme know what deep dark secrets Apex has to share about them (the only plot character I had along for that mission was Eiger; for this purpose, the game apparently does not recognize the plot decker as a plot character).
Dragonfall is definitely a level of magnitude or two cooler than Dead Man's Switch (which wasn't bad or anything, just not hugely impressive in comparison).
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All right I'll try to remember.
You had another PC for that quest?
Was she Lucky Strike?
I already had Glory confess to me how she worshipped Satan. I asked the magic shop guy some trivia about worshipping Satan, he asked me why i asked but I didn't want to spill the beans. Hmm. Wonder where that would have gotten me.
The NPC interactions go well beyond the Bioware standard. I think I'd say this game has the best NPC interactions in a game not named Planescape Torment? There are real consequences to your choices and all, too, and the nice choice is not always the best choice. Super great.
The missions are extremely memorable too. Though maybe I'm just talking about the Director's Cut new missions here, which probably got extra polish since they're, like, DLC of DLC. I can't find a list of what the new missions are so I can't comment on that much more.
BTW, isn't Dragonfall way longer than DMS too?
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It was like Neverwinter Nights. The initial down payment was mostly for tools for user generated content with the original release.
Then after that there is a patch/expansion to update toolset and actually release a really good campaign.
Dead Man Switch shits all over NWN1 original campaign though. It actually is fun.
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Some of the weapon upgrades are pretty simple to get (Spider, Dragon, Faint) but there are some that are basically pure chance like Bladestone. Fortunately, the easier to get stones are generally more useful anyway. Fire weapons are insanely good, Blessed weapons give HP regen, Sticky bows are nuts, etc.
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How long is Dragonfall? Because you make it sound like a full-length game all on its own.
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I'm gonna estimate 15-20ish hours? Don't exactly recall. Steam says I've got 37 hours logged on SR total, so twentysomething probably about right. Dragonfall is a fair bit longer than the original campaign.
I don't remember who the fourth wheel was in that fight, Fenrir, and my saves are on the old computer so I can't check. I usually made sure to have a mage in the party because Haste is the shit, but memory says there was a rather tremendous amount of shooting on that mission. If Lucky Strike's the rifle chick with the cool hair, yeah, I think I used her a lot. It was definitely some hire, at least. They're not important enough for Apex to acknowledge!
If working for Satan is the only bad thing Glory's told you about, she's not done yet.
The nice choice is not always the best choice! In fact, if you're talking to Eiger, it's almost always the worst choice.
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How long is Dragonfall? Because you make it sound like a full-length game all on its own.
It's pretty much is, especially now that they've re-released the Director's Cut version which is an actual stand-alone.
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Director's Cut adds 5 new missions too, so you can add... 5 hours? To these estimations.
Pretty good value for 15$ before Steam sales.
Lucky Strike is the only hire with dialogue from what I've seen (and she's very confrontational), but I've just checked and this is Director's Cut expansion only.
"Cool hair" is really too much of a relative term. Does Alice have cool hair?
Anyway Lucky Strike's the blonde Demi-fiend. I haven't used hires much because $$$
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Demons's Souls's - Did 1-3 because I wanted to unlock Yuria. Ostrava is amazingly terrible. Like killing those 3 Red Eye Knights wasn't that hard since kiting one, killing the other and letting one beat him in the face worked fine. Killed the two I was handling while peeling the third off him after the fact worked wonders. He ran off into his little corner to hide. Then the third one I was dealing with dropped aggro from me and teleported to Ostrava's corner. Okay. Fine, clear that out. I died to Fat Ministers fire a bit (soul form, 10 Vit, no Cling Ring on, no Fire Resist ring on. Massive overkill) while I worked out best places to zone fireballs on the guys guarding Yuria and Biorr each. Every time having to run up and kill the 5 scrubby soldiers on Ostrava's patrol route (first time I got to it late and he was engaging them and was at like half health...). Just so bad.
Then watch Biorr nearly solo Penetrator Knight. Holy shit. It is like Iron Tarkus but better with a hot accent (but less sexy personality). I was throwing Soul arrows the whole time but I think I barely did half the HP bar in damage. He just randomly took off huge chunks of HP.
Also went to 5-1 just to get Morning Star so I could make a Dragon Morning Star +5 (I cheated for Chunks and Shards. Fuck this game) just so I could backstab Fat Minister with it to see how it goes.
Now poking at how to handle Scirvir. Him having Regen and knowing that NPCs kind of cheat with MP makes me sketchy on how I want to approach it. Apparently you can backstab him a ton with Soul Remains, but eh. I think I will either press on to 4-2 and buy Kunai or do 5-1 for Poison Cloud (and 3-1 for Freke). Kind of tempted to go Kunai just because throwing poison things at dudes seems to be a broken staple.
And man El Cid, not that I am ever ever going to recommend anyone play this game, but if you do play this shit again you should play around with Soul Form and Thief's Ring more. The amount of bullshit you can pull of is ridiculous. Every single encounter outside of bosses can be handled poking in and out of range of enemies, they will drop aggro just outside of lock on range. So you can ping people with hit and fade ranged attacks with impunity. I just recently started playing around with Cloak to see how much it drops your aggro radius, I am pretty sure you could feasibly aggro enemies and then proceed to repeatedly backstab them while they walk back to their spawn point.
I kind of figure this kind of reason accounts for two things in Dark Souls. Firstly why the Ring of Fog and Hidden Soul are nerfed as hard as the are (they are right? They have to be, otherwise I need to investigate sometime... more on this later though). I also figure this is why enemies in Dark Souls do that weird slow walk backwards to their spawn. Even prior to abusing the Thief's Ring this basic strategy was how I was handling Red Eye Knight in 1-1 when I did a quick run to bump me up to a level up or upgrade costs for weapons early on. Shoot them in face, run like a bitch, wait until they start walking back, shoot them in the back and run again.
Thinking more on Dank Souls though, you probably need the Slumbering Dragon Crest to pull it off since you don't have Soul Form to lower noise you make, so it puts it on hold until Sen's Fortress. Sen's is not built for that kind of play (maybe something with the Titanite Demons down the bottom?) with the tight corridors. After that you hit Anor Londo and it is full of Sentinels so you kind of aren't getting much Backstab play in there either.
I suppose it might be fun to play around with in the back area of the Forest? NG+ maybe? But who cares about NG+
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I dunno about poison in Demon's Souls specifically, but in Dark Souls at least it's pretty terrible. Like really specifically useful only for giant nuisances you can snipe from a mile off (if you don't mind waiting a few minutes for them to die). I don't recall being poisoned in Demon's Souls being that much of a nuisance (plague is another matter) and status tends to work identically for PCs and for enemies in these games so I'd guess it sucks. Don't think poison got really awesome until Dark Souls 2, where it works fast, nearly every boss is vulnerable, you can design entire builds around it and pretty handily dominate the game (until you get to the DLC and everything immunes or at least has extreme resistance to all status. ffffffffffff).
EDIT: I guess I will have to replay Dragonfall at some point to see new stuff because definitely none of my hires ever spoke up in the original version. Checking again, turns out Steam did keep my saves for me, you just can't use original Dragonfall saves in Director's Cut. I might see about importing my DMS samurai at some point just to smash through it and make getting to new stuff easier.
EDITEDIT: Importing doesn't presently work with director's cut. Well, I didn't say I was going to do it any time soon.
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Stealth is pretty awful in terms of actually trying to kill anything. You need both ring slots to lower both sound and visibility, and even then it's not even good for running past things because your visibility range isn't really decreased by that much. The only place I can think of it being useful is MAYBE Real-American-Hero-Blighttown (instead of backdoor why-would-I-ever-not-take-this-path-Blighttown), so you risk having to fight 3-4 aborted fetus trolls at the same time a lot less... but that path is obviously before Sen's fortress, and if you've got the Ring of Fog by then you may as well just run past the Valley of Drakes to backdoor Blighttown, even IF you don't take the thief key.
Maybe for running past all the enemies in, like, the tomb of the giants too. But yeah, agreed with cid, that combo is godawful in DS1.
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Replaying Director's Cut is probably worth it if you liked the original. I'm pretty sure Blitz 's sidequest and Trial Run are Director's Cut only missions, and both were pretty awesome. Being able to choose which skills the four companions get when levelling up is also pretty nice.
So they released the original Shadowrun Returns as this big RPG maker engine + some short linear campaign in America (Dead Man's Switch).
Then they released a proper solo campaign in Berlin with entirely different characters (Dragonfall), that was free for those who bought the game on Kickstarter, but cost the original game + the expansion for those who didn't buy the game before.
Considering that people wanted to play Dragonfall without paying for the worse original game, they released Dragonfall as a standalone + added a bunch of stuff and made the new stuff free for those who already got the original Dragonfall.
Then they add to market that without confusing everybody and it was hard!
I'll have to try the mods at one point too. Wonder if any of them are good.
Elminage Gothic: This is some archaic shit.
Wizardry 1 game systems, TAC0s, 20% hit rate on your front row fighters, etc.
Glorious PSP graphics on your giant PC screen since this is a PSP port.
Thousands of crappy options with one totally unintuitive super over powered one early on (Brawlers. I couldn't do anything without my dragon brawler)
It took me 5 hours to finish the first dungeon. I spent less time exploring than leaving the dungeon / going back to where I was.
Do not play it if you haven't already played, like, every dungeon crawler on earth.
In a regular firts person dungeon crawler in 2014, you press a button and the map screen comes up.
Here, you press a button and the map screen comes up, but this costs one map. Yes you need to buy maps, and you are utterly fucked if you run out of them. Thankfully they are dirt cheap (one random encouter in the first area =~ enough money for 30 maps) so I just buy 90 maps whenever I go back to town. People went berserk over this and a guy made a patch for unlimited maps to make the game "playable"
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The most recent time I played Dark Souls, I did a stealth run (Slumbering/Fog) except against bosses. It's actually very effective; you basically get the Thief's Ring effect from Demon's against the majority of enemies. They don't see you coming in advance, which helps out a lot against stuff like Painting Guardians and Silver Knight archers. You can also make them stop pursuing you from a far shorter distance, which is one of the biggest reasons the Thief's Ring was so good.
However, to really make the build work at its finest, you need the spell "Aural Decoy." This works like Soul Remains, and seemed to affect almost every regular enemy in the game. With that going, I had enemies jumping off cliffs and completely forgetting I existed with little effort, then I could finish them off with Homing Soulmass or whatever safely.
In short, stealth is still good in Dark Souls. It's just a different way to approach the game.
As for Poison weapons, they are not worth it in Demon's or Dark 1. The damage is just too slow to make a difference. Even plague is barely worth it in Demon's, except maybe in PvP (which I don't play). In Dark 2 they are effective, but the game is so broken you can probably just use strength weapons and get more damage out of them than the DoT adds up to.
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In Demons's and Dark Souls the "use" for poison/toxic is specifically for cheese as far as I am concerned. Demons has a bunch of strategies that are "poison this guy around a corner or through a wall then go have a nap" Dark has poop on Capra Demon and I have heard hype for Poison Arrow counter sniping the Silver Knights in Anor Londo (though I just used Slumbering Dragon Crest and Fog Ring on them actually). They are far from good, but they have boring uses if you want to play the game in shitty ways. DS2 sounds like they legit wanted to support them again, but you can't have nice things in DLC.
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Orstrava's AI seems to actually be programmed to be garbage. He will attack at the absolute worst times. And what makes it hilarious is just how much his HP starts exploding in NG+ runs. He has 12,000 HP compared to Bior's 2,500.
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FF10: Just beat Seymour's 3rd form. Ok, now I'm SURE he's dead for good because he fell off a cliff! That's instant death in jRPGs, right? Yeah, I can't think of a counter example!
Anyway, so we fight a giant robot because the Guado have those. Not much to say here other than "GIANT ROBOT KILL IT NOW!" It's basically the epitome of "we're due for a boss, so here's a boss" even though Calm Lands isn't that long...granted I spent forever on it because...well...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEUOOgNzOv4 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEUOOgNzOv4)
But that's not plot relevant! Anyway, then we go see Yojimbo. This is mostly Lulu plot summed up as "She failed, she feels bad" and it's trying to give backstory but really, it just falls short because it doesn't really tell us much new nor give us much more insight on Lulu. Wasted opportunity really; feels like they made the dungeon first for purposes of Yojimbo, and wanted some plot excuse and shoe-horned Lulu development on top of it. Meh.
One thing that stands out to me though is the discussion of the Thief who brings the Aeon in there. Notably, Tidus questions why a Thief would do that, and Wakka responds "probably thought he could stop the pilgrimages that way. Without the Aeons, Summoners won't fight sin and won't die. At least, that's probably what he was thinking." Or something along those lines. Doesn't seem like much at first, but consider who is saying it:
It's Wakka. If this was said at a point before Bevelle, you can damn well sure he'd make a crack about him being a heretic and awful and say how wrong it is, but here? He just says it like it is. It shows that Wakka is past the "YEVON IS ALWAYS RIGHT!" phase in a subtle way; he simply acknowledges the thief's ideas and doesn't inject his own opinion on it.
Tidus responds with a simple "I kind of agree with him." Nice way to acknowledge that the thief very much had the same mindset as what Tidus and Rikku have, and was thinking of some method, just one that didn't work out (the Aeon was taken but pilgrimages still happen after all.)
BUT ENOUGH OF THAT! ONTO A MOUNTAIN OF A BUNCH OF SMELLY OLD DOG PEOPLE!
So Kelk is all "You SHALL NOT PASS!" And Yuna is all "Yes, I WILL pass" and Kelk is all "No!!!!", and Yuna is like "look, you like SPira right? Well, do you want Spira to be blown up by Sin? Then let me pass because seriously, Yevon is pointless!" and Kelk is all "Ok, your logic is strong, but I will pretend you win because SHEAR WILLPOWER! which sounds more dramatic!" and they pass. Also Yenke and Biran are acting like jerks here...
...and then they act like jerks ONE SCENE LATER! Then Kimhari beats their asses and they're all "ok, Kimhari's a bad enough dude to save the president to guard the summoner, KIMHARI MAY PASS!" Then they bother you once again to SING THE HYMN OF THE FAYTH!
Funnily enough, Biran and Yenke singing it, despite how their voices really don't fit the song at all, is probably the clearest rendition of the song yet. Like I was actually able to go "huh, that's the real word there?" Then 3 OTHER RONSOS join in and they act like the entire race is singing they go from "Rough guys" to Monks singing...yeah, don't think much about it.
One thing worth noting is that this scene proves that no, Wakka did not believe that Tidus was from Zanarkand, or at least, the Zanarkand they know about. I know someone here claimed "it's clear he believed it!" but the lines when talking to Wakka on Gagazet say the complete opposite. He says "Through here is the Ruins to Zanarkand. Hey, I'm sure it's not the same Zanarkand you come from" and Tidus responds "Wait, you actually believe me?" and Wakka goes "Maybe!" Well, ok, maybe NOW Wakka believes him, but the fact that Tidus is shocked that Wakka actually believes his story suggests that Tidus assumed Wakka didn't believe him; Tidus overheard the alleged "Wakka believes him!" conversation on the way to Luca the claim made, which this line completely nullifies, so yeah, Wakka doesn't believe Tidus, at least initially. He was clearly helping Tidus out because a combination of "He looks like Chappu, maybe there's a connection!" and Wakka simply being a nice guy who wanted to lend a hand to someone in need.
BRASKA SPHERE! Mostly Braska saying "Yuna, be strong, I hope you see this!" of course he does not acknowledge that the only way Yuna is going to see it is if she goes on a Pilgrimage herself and thus condemns her life that way but SHH!
So then atop the mountain...or something, I'm not sure where, there's a save point and some pillars and it's a convenient spot for a boss fight basically, BUT REGARDLESS...
Rikku: I still can't think of anything :(
Tidus: Yeah, neither can I -_-
Rikku: WHAT CAN WE DO!?
Tidus: We don't know enough yet! But we'll find a way!
Rikku: Hey, you sound like a leader!
Tidus: Star player of the Zanarkand Abes!
Rikku: AAAAAAAH!
Seymour: About time you noticed me! I've been stalking you this entire dungeon!
Tidus: even when we were buying supplies from O'aka's brother?
Seymour: ESPECIALLY when you buying supplies from...wait who?
Tidus: ...nevermind, RIKKU! I'LL FIGHT THIS ALONE! GO GET AURON!
Rikku: Why only Auron? Wouldn't the entire group be useful?
Tidus: Because I SAID SO!
Seymour: So...you want to die for your father's sake?
Tidus: That's kind of out of nowhere.
Seymour: I'll show YOU out of nowhere! WITH YOUR FATHER'S POWER!
Tidus: Wait, how do you know my old man is Sin?
Seymour: HELLO! MAESTER OF YEVON HERE!
Kimhari: SAVE SOME FOR KIMHARI!
And now I'm turning this into a full fledged abridged moment and basically Seymour spills beans, goes on a nihistic rant, Yuna has Bahamut punch him in the face for 18k damage because my Yuna has much higher strength than she normally has here, he never pulls off total Annihilation because I hit him with Energy Burst with BDL and...wait, why am I discussing gameplay? DAMN YOU!!!
So Tidus just comes clean, and goes "look I don't get it either, but yes, I'm willing to defeat my old man for purposes of saving Spira." The others mostly shrug it off but Yuna is in distress because Tidus basically kept a secret so big from her. Oh sure blame him and not the guy who likely told him the truth.
AND NOW WE ARE INSIDE GAGAZET! And plot will take a bit of a halt because lots of caves, a giant dragon-like boss, and AWESOME MUSIC DUNGEON IN RUINS!
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Wasteland 2: Look, you guys might be God's militia, but you definitely won't be the first militia I've had to wipe off my boots at the end of the day. Oh but Deuteronomy says it's a sin to eat shellfish-- Need better rad suits so I can execute every last motherfucking one of them. They're pretty heavily armed, though (and armored, which is sorta their undoing because lasers are really coming into their own now). I had to rerun the Santa Monica fight a number of times to prevent the NPCs from getting fragged by stray shotgun blasts.
Random stuff:
-This is the only game I am aware of in which cat litter is a crucial quest item (for science reasons!)
-The Los Angeles map is weird. In the first half of the game you have to monitor your water supplies and make sure you don't wander too far off course into places where you can't reliably resupply; there are also mountain ranges that channel you down certain routes. In L.A., neither of these things are in evidence--the water gauge is totally gone (I guess because L.A.'s broadly flooded) and there are no physical obstacles to movement (they still kinda railroad you with radiation clouds, but it's less prominent). I find it a little strange as a decision decision that they condition you to move around in certain ways for the first half of the game, even adding accessories to further your water-carrying capacity (and thus movement range), and then render that completely unnecessary in the second half.
-Angel Oracle is two sides of unsympathetic jerks butting heads again. Sigh. I stuck with Mister Manners because he could at least kinda sorta be reasoned with (also the accent is frankly hilarious). So now instead of being a society that arbitrarily executes people on a regular basis and then eats them, the White Glove Society Mannerites are just a society that arbitrarily executes people on a regular basis. Progress!
-So I'm mucking around in the maintenance tunnels beneath Angel Oracle and there's jets of steam blocking some passageways. You can pass a strength check to jam these shut, but for one of them I need to pass the valve is on the other side of the hazard. I figure, Gordon's a tough guy, I'll send him over and then turn it off. The steam inflicts piddly damage--and incinerates his clothing. It's hot enough to instantly turn armor into ash yet only deals 5% of his max HP in damage? It's a special kind of steam, and soon it will melt off all your clothes!
-"As the great warlord Gandhi said, 'Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.'" Someone's been taking their history lessons from Civilization, I see.
-People shove some weird stuff into toasters. Shampoo bottles? Sanford & Son?!
-The game awarded me an achievement for contracting an STD. "Crusty clam?" That's, uh, evocative.
I'm doing a lot better at avoiding unnecessary massacres in L.A. so far! (This'll change once I find the militia HQ, though.)
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Demons's Souls's - Did 4-1 and got Kunai to do in Scirvir and died a hilarious number of times to dumb shit. Turns out NPCs will attack enough and walk through Soul Remains and keep attacking them. So trying to get in some backstabs to hurry things up got me one shot with sword to the face. Like 4 or 5 times. Then there was the times I died trying to hurry things up while I let him heal since I didn't know I needed to interrupt heals each time he was attacked (the AI is very much event driven rather than checking current status over and over). Then there was the time I got him down to nearly dead and missed that he would spam the everloving fuck out of heal. Oh I thought, lets backstab him past limit phase. I LEARNED NOTHING.
So next time I just ate dinner while reading news while his health ticked down and then spammed Kunais in his face until he died in the last parts. PRO AT VIDEOGAMES YOU GUYS.
4-1 I should have finished ages ago, Adjudicator is kind of amazing visual design, but I haven't seen much of him actually in game. I walked forward and was one shot by the tongue without seeing him once.
Next time it was baiting out the first tongue attack to clear the ledge and then poking forward every now and then and shooting the bird with fire every now and then.
Then I poked in at 3-1 and goddamn the sound design in this place is going to wreck me. It is way too good. Every prisoner is going to die just so I don't have to hear them. I am actually not certain on this given the quality of the sound design here, but I think maybe playing with no music actually helps the atmosphere here, but given how good the rest of the audio is I could be totally wrong. OH and of course the area is black and grey with blue tones everywhere ad the prisoners are grey with dark brown clothes. So even systemically trying to clear them out I still got jumped a bunch.
I cleared like just the starting area. I am going to do this not at 10pm at night.
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Wasteland 2: I killed them all. God will know his own.
Game wasn't really happy about me doing this, though. I'm pretty sure it was trying to push me into some sneaky, infiltrate the cult and turn them against each other scheme but dude, no, I tried talking to the bigwigs for a couple minutes, they're 100% as horrible as advertised, I'd like to forcibly put an end to their slave'n'rape party right now thank you very much. I open fire in the chapel and my followers are all No, you can't start a fight with innocents! Zuh? What, they're innocent because in this lone particular circumstance of us meeting them they're not immediately massacring whole towns for eating shrimp or whatever? Okay fine, so I wander around Griffith Observatory standing in places they obviously don't want me to until they get pissed off enough to attack. But this only works for the one group and no one else notices me killing them in broad daylight! Arrrgh. Okay! I talk to nananana leader, he says if I don't agree to the plan he's about to propose (of me framing and murdering his scheming subordinates) then he'll kill me; I say no and I kill him. This renders the rest of the militia formally hostile. Finally! Now I can shoot them all without complications.
I think I broke some scripting somewhere, though, because the prisoners won't leave. I talk to the one named representative of the group and he just mopes around all "You've killed us, you idiot!" Drunken dancing vulpine. Dude, they're dead! The guards are dead! You couldn't stop them, the army couldn't stop them, but I did! Everybody's dead! The game even gave me a trophy for fragging all the church leadership! Get out of your cells and go home! Sigh. There was one named officer that wandered off after I got him drunk so I could steal an eyeball and present it to the eyeball's former owner's widow to presumably kick off a quest chain of working against the cult from inside (but nothing actually happened, which was the point where I officially said fuck it, genocide mode). Maybe these guys are stuck there just because this one mook disappeared from the game?
Anyway, I don't think I care enough to reload and look for alternatives. They were sleazebags, good riddance (protip, every faction in this game except the rangers is led by sleazebags). Geez, it's going to take forever just to properly loot that place; there are guns everywhere and I'm out of inventory space.
Oh, in the process of invading the place I found a book titled Killing for Morons. Effect: boost Combat Shooting ranks by ten. So it maxes out a previously nonexistent skill which does...something? Let's find out! "Allows use of a wide range of traditional firearms." Well that's clear as mud. Hey Rob! What the heck does this do!
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Demons's Souls's - I beat 3-1. Audio solid the whole way through. Dudes in Iron Maidens 10/10.
4-2 The Real Cameras's Souls's Starts Here. Pretty close to back to anti-fun again. The cliff is terrible, but it is the second Reaper that is killing me and is not fun.
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And I hope you're not laboring under the delusion that there's a boss gate immediately after him.
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Of course not. Hare talking like I don't sit there with something telling me everything that is going to happen before hand right there in front of me.
Also I meant to say last post, Google suggests that your Wasteland 2 book is a reference to a skill in Wasteland 1 on PC (specific to that version) that did nothing. Apparently in this it boosts your crit rate significantly, like +100%, but the source is just random forum posts of some age so I can't vouch for accuracy of the statement or for current patch version of the game.
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Hyrule Warriors - Probably opened a gate to hell, or something (https://dviw3bl0enbyw.cloudfront.net/uploads/forum_attachment/file/170630/chickens.gif)
I, for one, welcome our new chicken overlords
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Protip on 4-2:
If you can't beat the Reapers, running past all three of them is way easier than fighting them. It's almost comical. Just make sure you are wearing the Thief's Ring. The third one is most likely to harm you, so you might want to throw Soul remains at him or something.
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Oh, in the process of invading the place I found a book titled Killing for Morons. Effect: boost Combat Shooting ranks by ten. So it maxes out a previously nonexistent skill which does...something? Let's find out! "Allows use of a wide range of traditional firearms." Well that's clear as mud. Hey Rob! What the heck does this do!
It's an easter egg. Combat shooting's a reference to the first game, where it was only in the PC version because (I think) they forgot to take it out. It does nothing. I think Oblivion did something like this by hiding a book that supposedly raised your polearm skill?
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Shadowrun Dragonfall:
That mission to blow up the evil lab. WITH STEALTH ELEMENTS. Oh god.
It was super hard so I restarted the mission and levelled up Charisma to get the Security Etiquette instead of Strength, to bluff my way around. It worked well.
Director's Cut introduces Luca (I think? His first mission is DC only, so I guess he is), who's basically the shadiest guy you can work for in Shadowrun, and that's saying something.
At the beginning of the aforementioned mission to blow up the lab (which was in the original Dragonfall), he made a call to say that he knows I'm going to that lab, and he asked me to say to one particular scientist who works there "We are pleased that Project Vincent is going so well" with no other details.
No idea what this is about.
So I complied and told the scientist, and this scared the hell out of him. (He promised he'd "make the call", I also don't know what this is about either)
Later I'll collect my money from Luca.
Neat!
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Hyrule Warriors - Mostly lots of Adventure Mode; I've been trying to get Level 3 weapons for the characters I use more often (Zelda, Sheik, Cia, Impa, Link, Lana) and have mostly succeeded at this point, though I still have some alternate Level 3's to track down (including the all-important Great Fairy and Summoning Gate). At some point I'll be non-lazy enough to post my thoughts on all the characters, but there are still a few I've hardly used (mainly Zant).
Lunar: Eternal Blue Complete - I decided to replay this, currently about three hours in. Hiro just got his second swing and I'm about to get Jean. The game has... actually aged reasonably well so far, which is nice to see. Mostly, the challenge balance is in a pretty great place: enemies are competent but never unfair. The voice acting of the game is somewhat less good now, certainly (definitely an area games have made lots of progress), with Lucia's being particularly bad. Too early to say much on the writing, but at least Working Design's translation is snappy.
Mario Kart 8 - DLC came out today! SNES Rainbow Road + GC Yoshi Circuit, they really want us to suffer.
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I read an LP of Eternal Blue over the summer and to me it was the humor that had aged most poorly. Not the translation per se, casual conversation between the characters comes across fine, but the actual jokes that can make no remote degree of sense to someone not already intimately familiar with mid-90's junk culture.
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I've never really had a strong opinion on the game's humour, but yeah that's pretty fair. Obviously as someone from that era I still "get" all the references, so I suppose that does help a bit. They're a bit groan-inducing at points, but that's part of the charm, or something...?
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My memory of the VA in EBC is also that it is pretty grainy recording as well? Just bad compression tech at the time obviously, but that kind of production stands out now (along with the fact that we don't have to fit the whole track on one CD).
I am not that shocked that the gameplay holds up to about the same level it used to. It didn't push any boundaries, but was competent for the time. I don't think it would wow anyone playing it fresh nowadays, but it is pretty inoffensive as well. Seems like it would just be generically acceptable as a vehicle to get through a game.
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Demons's Souls's - I got the second reaper a couple of times (with Soul Remains making him suicide) then proceeded to die multiple times to things.
The third reaper pull my first look at it involved eating lazer in the face.
k
Then die on the run because my Flame Toss wants to keep hitting the ground instead of the skeleton rolling around below the step. So walk forwards. Die to chip damage of rolls stunning me then getting chopped. This is a good 2 steps into the ledge. Because rolling skeletons damage very far in front of them.
k
Then the first reaper gets off a Soul Arrow between Flame Tosses. Somehow.
k
Then another time I rolled back off a cliff because I forgot this is Demons's Souls's and not a good game like Darks's Souls's where you are not arbitrarily locked to the four cardinal directions when rolling in a game with a 3D camera that you can control. Because of reasons.
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Died to the Female Shadowlurker because she 2 shots me and they aren't stunned by spells.
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Turn of the PS3 at this point.
Next time I play I will do 5-1 I guess so I can get Poison Cloud so I can cheese Lazer Shadowz.
I miss fun.
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Dragonfall: Shit is getting real, I raised the 50k needed for Alice's info, and did the mission afterwards. My fellow characters are maxed out so I'm sure I'm at the very end of the game.
Among the 5 DLC missions there's one for the shady doc but none for Deitrich. I really don't know why he's less important.
- There's one mission for the lodge to "test" the main character. She's teamed with a terrible team of shadowrunners (One is a civilian, one is super arrogant, and the last one doesn't even speak German) obviously things go wrong pretty fast. Fantastic mission.
- The mission for Eiger involves another super duper secret mysterious company taking over the world or something and only mentioned once. (Thinking about it, the Shadowrun world is such an Ayn rand world. Government seems completely absent) Anyway it's very hard but not amazing; it doesn't really involve her plot either.
- Glory's mission has her go back to the place where she got indoctrinated to either save the kids or kill the mastermind. (you can't do both) It's a great mission, and it has one of the most complicated speech checks.
- The doc's mission is pretty light hearted, involving a delusional scientist trapped in a house for years having watched the same few episodes of a crappy TV series over and over.
- Blitz's mission has to be the most fun, but I shouldn't talk about it too much.
I really like Blitz, by the way. He is the nice stereotype of a 20 something English white trash. I felt pretty bad for him for his Emily sidequest, even though all the dialogue choices but 1 were like "As I expected you fucked up again."
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I finished Shadowrun Dragonfall, it was the coolest game. And as far as I'm concerned, coolness almost always equals quality.
The Shadowrun setting is the most ridiculous thing (elves hacking into the matrix. Dragons running companies. Drone wielding shaman lesbians) but somehow it works.
Total game time was around 30 hours for me but I play slowly.
I kinda regret playing nice, there were so many opportunities to be a jerk. Sometimes it felt like:
Random guy: Hey I'll give you this important item in exchange for food, that way we both win!
Choices:
- Yes!
- No.
- (Lie) Yes!
- (Charisma: 5) Allright, but I want more.
- *Attack* Sorry, I really want the important item right now.
- (Strength: 5) Maybe you can just give me everything you have right now if you value your life.
- (Quickness: 5) *Shoot him in the face before anyone can react*
I wanted to try this game solo, but the APEX mission sounds impossible that way.
I'll replay it later, maybe with non-hired runners forbidden; that sounds like a fun challenge.
Cid, APEX only has something to say about Eiger.
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Weird. That seemed like such an obvious We Know Allll Your Secrets scene!
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Wasteland 2: I'm at the last battle and oh my fucking god you did not just do that, game. You DID. FUCK YOU. FUCK YOU IN THE MOTHERFUCKING ASS.
Fuck fuck fuckity fuck fuck fuck.
Sigh. I guess I should explain. Full spoilery disclosure: at the last minute the big bad gets his brain overwritten by a computer program, which is not the bad part (that's just schadenfreude). The bad part is that this also happens to any party members with cybernetic implants. There are two of these you can recruit during the game and guess what? I've got them both in my party. One of them is the dedicated reviver. So not only am I gimped on offense and healing, but I've got shotgun blasts and dragonpunches coming at my back from former allies while trying to fight literally like two dozen durable enemy snipers that all start with height and range on me.
I don't know if I'll bother finishing this. If I do I'll probably put it on easy mode just to cruise through the rest of this travesty.
EDIT: Skynet defeated, easy mode prevails. I don't have it in me to do a proper postmortem here, so in sum: mostly decent game with some argh inducing moments, can't imagine myself ever replaying it though.
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Bayonetta 2: Completed! Now for a review.
Bayonetta 2 is a game for the Wii U. IT is published by Nintendo, despite being an IP made by Sega, and created by Platinum Games. It is an action game with a female protagonist named "Bayonetta" and a sequel to a game named after this female protagonist. The protagonist in question has many powers such as summoning demons, turning her hair into giant fists, and shooting guns in flashy way.
There are graphics in this game. They make characters look like characters and not the backgrounds, which look like backgrounds. The enemies look like things that are not the character you play as, because they are enemies.
There are bosses in the game, they have more health than regular enemies. You fight them sometmies at the end of a chapter, and there are less of them to compensate. After beating a chapter, you get rewarded. Do well, you get Platinum, do poorly, you get a Stone award.
There are characters in the game. There is a demon store owner named Rodin, an italian guy named Enzo, and some man with a grappling hook who claims to be a reporter named Luka; they are all males from the first game. There is also Jeanne, another witch who wears red instead of black, who is also from the first game. There is a Masked Lumen, who the game treats as a rival; you fight him sometimes, he is of the "antagonist" classification. There is a new character named Loki; he is a little boy with cards and a golden pyramid necklace. He is a good guy who Bayonetta helps throughout.
The plot is Jeanne loses her soul to demons, so Bayonetta goes to hell to get it back. It tells a story about this, and it ends, the story is over, with the final boss having been defeated.
There is music; it has some vocals. Some of the music does not have vocals. It has a style to it that involves specific instruments playing at the right time. It plays, except for the silent sequences, where it does not play. The game also has voice acting; characters talk when they are suppose to, and they have voices by different voice actors to make it clear that Bayonetta is not a man.
If you want to play Bayonetta 2, you should buy it, and a Wii U, because you might find it hard to play Bayonetta 2 otherwise. You could also borrow or rent it as a service-able option, provided you have a Wii U. If you do not want to play Bayonetta 2, then do not acquire it or a Wii U if you so do not desire.
The game earns somewhere between 0/10 to 10/10. If you prefer a letter system, it ranges from A+ to F.
There, that's my review of Bayonetta 2!
Yes, this is just a rip off of the FF13 objective review, but for some reason I wanted to do it. I can come up with a legitimate SUBJECTIVE review if you really wish.
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Weird. That seemed like such an obvious We Know Allll Your Secrets scene!
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Wasteland 2: I'm at the last battle and oh my fucking god you did not just do that, game. You DID. FUCK YOU. FUCK YOU IN THE MOTHERFUCKING ASS.
Fuck fuck fuckity fuck fuck fuck.
Sigh. I guess I should explain. Full spoilery disclosure: at the last minute the big bad gets his brain overwritten by a computer program, which is not the bad part (that's just schadenfreude). The bad part is that this also happens to any party members with cybernetic implants. There are two of these you can recruit during the game and guess what? I've got them both in my party. One of them is the dedicated reviver. So not only am I gimped on offense and healing, but I've got shotgun blasts and dragonpunches coming at my back from former allies while trying to fight literally like two dozen durable enemy snipers that all start with height and range on me.
I don't know if I'll bother finishing this. If I do I'll probably put it on easy mode just to cruise through the rest of this travesty.
EDIT: Skynet defeated, easy mode prevails. I don't have it in me to do a proper postmortem here, so in sum: mostly decent game with some argh inducing moments, can't imagine myself ever replaying it though.
To be fair, it's not out of nowhere. There's hints that the prevalence of bionic implants is anything but accidental really early in the game. Also you can just reload the autosave at the beginning of the room and dismiss both of them from your group, if you don't want to gun them down like dogs.
(How do you only have one surgeon? It's 2 SP).
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(How do you only have one surgeon? It's 2 SP).
I have a backup surgeon at rank 3. She got gunned down pretty quick though, which was where ragequit occurred.
I actually did reload, dismiss both followers at the back of the room, and try again, but they still got converted and still followed me in once the actual fight started. (EDIT: apparently reloading again would've despawned them completely, but that didn't occur to me at the time.)
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Demons's Souls's - I sunk like all of Sunday into this. Did 5-1, 4-2 & 3, 3-2 & 3. Poked into 1-4 to kill the black phantoms. So much cheese was applied. 5-1 was done pretty legitimate (other than generic Magic cheese). Reapers in 4-2 first one is pretty easy with obvious things, second one I have the placement to make him suicide on Soul Remains, third one eats Toxic Cloud. I should have got this sooner. Then there is a cave full of explosive clouds like in 2. Okay game. Okay.
Then I died to Old Hero because I am used cheesing bosses with thief ring, but because he is made to be done with it, he reacts differently! Oh well.
Storm Beast is kind of meeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhh. The Camera Souls is strong here. Manta things target fucking stupid all over the place. Like, normal enemies will target way too close only. Manta things? Target random thing behind you outside spell range, ignore things throwing spears at face. Died a few times. Ended up just eating grass and face tanking.
3-2 is full of amazing things. It also has random stupid spikes of Cameras's Souls's that the devs fucking know is there even more so than the usual lolblindcorner! Stuff. It is "we know you know there is a guy there. You can even see him. No you can't target him. There is a slight curve to the wall/you need to go up the elevator so it can attack you before you lock on. Man Eaters got first one Sniped through Fog Gate while in Morion Blade/Clever Rat Ring mode. Second one got poisoned while I hid next to stairs and played Soul Hackers.
3-3. Amazing. Boss fight is bad against AI, but the monk possessed by The King In Yellow that site on a throne of all of the "thrones" it can find is fantastic. Strategies on the wiki are pretty disappointing though. Use Homing Soul Arrow!!!!!!! Doesn't help with the boss you get it from. That said the AI is easy to bait into walking up to you Soul Ray blasting in the face then rolling out of the way.
Tower of Latria nearly justifies playing this game, but there is so much of the garbage design that is in this game that bleeds over into the zone that it kind of harshes on it.
I sniped the 1-4 dudes. While I do accept that Royal with magic cheese is probably easy mode start, I think starting Royal and switch hitting over to Archer probably actually results in the better abuse of game exploits.
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That is the proper way to deal with Maneaters, Grefter. That is absolutely correct procedure.
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That is the proper way to deal with Maneaters, Grefter. That is absolutely correct procedure.
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Revolution 60.
5ish hour iPhone RPG-esque game.
Plot was actually quite good, and there seem to be several endings I haven't gotten, so I might replay for those.
Combat was...decent enough for 5 hours; not sure if it will hold up on replays. There isn't exactly a direct analogue, although I'd say it feels similar to a Mario & Luigi game, in that the outcome of a fight is determined mostly by the action elements, and the RPG customization is barely present, but it's not exactly an action game either.
Music is solid. Voice acting...seemed decent. I don't know that there were any moments where I thought "wow, this voice acting is so good", but it never really bothered me.
Not a huge fan of the QTEs, but they're consistent enough that they usually felt predictable.
Overall I played pretty much the entirety in one sitting, though (and played the game rather than pay attention to a Starcraft finals) so on a first playthrough my impressions are definitely positive.
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Dark Souls 2: I'm back!!
Going to try the DLC.
I restarted as Yattaf w/ Giant Club. I had to. I just can't resist it. The Giant Club is just too cool.
Pancacking enemies (Two handed R2) is still as effective as before. This time, I got the club before fighting RRV, and I had the pleasant surprise to see that pancacking works perfectly on the mohawk rat..
I tried the super-nice Moon Butterfly skirt for a while. Unintentionally poisoned and killed both Gavlan and Patches before removing it for the rest of the run :(
In 5 hours I went Giant -> CLUB GET -> RRV -> Dragon Dude -> Pikachu -> Siamese Twins -> Pursuer -> Rotten -> Skellies -> Covetous -> Medusa.
Spent a ton of time in the forest reajusting.
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Demons's Souls's - Alant got sniped from the fog door. Doesn't actually take that long though you do kind of have to arc the arrows over the stairs a little. Achievable with +5 Stick Short Compound Bow and 12 dex. Had bought a few hundred Light Arrows thinking I would be plinking for a long time. Not quite as bad as expected. Killing the Dragon took more patience. Both done with Clever Rat's Ring and Morion blade (Safe to assume everything was killed with this once I got them both). 4-2 was actually pretty breezy because I was doing it at end game and wasn't chasing any of the loot. I did get some of the shiny things. The slugs that cover the Moonlight Greatsword are fucking stupid. So many of them and they clip into the ground so you can't target them properly. Died to Dirty Colussus because I didn't know his attacks and went in with super aggressive setup at first (try out this fire storm spell!11!). Died when I killed it as well, but meh a win is a win. Garland got fire thrown in his face until he fell over.
Overall, I am glad I played this just for personal reasons, but holy shit this game is no where near as good as Dark Souls. I would say if you are interested in the series as a whole concept I would just go to Dark Souls and give this a skip. It is just completely archaic compared to Dark Souls in nearly every way. It isn't just that it is designed to be harder, the entire system that both games leverage is significantly more clunky in Demons's than it is in Dark. You can only evade in 4 cardinal directions, there is less kinds of attacks in combat. The difficulty is more punishing in some pretty shitty ways. Dark Souls has the rep of if you die it is your fault (which I still think is a bunch of wank, but whatever), you should have paid more attention (or more realistically, now that you know how something works you know how to deal with it next time). Demons's on the other hand punishes you significantly more for things you can clearly see coming, but you failed on execution.
For example in 3-2 you can see most of the gargoyles from ages away and hear them from even fucking further. When one is flying nearby they are amazingly loud and actually use up so many audio channels that other audio starts to not transmit. SO you know there is a gargoyle there, but you can't target it because of reasons. Now it is going to attack you as soon as you step off an elevator WHY DIDN'T YOU KILL IT YOU BAD GET GUD FGT. Ignore the fact that you are restricted to the game's targeting system. Even if you block it as soon as it appears you are still entirely at the whims of the camera. Did you successfully target it? I hope so because otherwise you have forced focus of the camera in some random direction (this is a control thing that needs to fuck RIGHT the hell off if you are going to restrict target lock range as much as this game does, it should be on a different button completely for this game. Or you know they could not make the lock-on range pissing distance). My Camera Souls jokes were 100% serious, that is hands down the most difficult part of the game and is my biggest complaint of the game. I figure it is pretty apparent, but I will say the obvious anyway, when the camera in your third person action game is shitty it really brings down the quality of your game and it is something that third person action games have been struggling with for a very long time. It isn't Kingdom Hearts bad or Soul Reaver bad, but frustratingly it feels like something that they could fix way easier than those games could. Most of the majour issues they have with camera controls are handled well most of the time. There is still rare cases where camera will clip through things obstructing your view or the camera NOT clipping through things jamming your view up your butt hole, but they are few and far between and when they do happen they don't directly impact your ability to control your character. It is nearly always a problem with the lock-on. It is inconsistent and flaky as hell. Some enemies it will lock on to a million miles away, other enemies it won't lock on to even when they are in plane view because you are more than 3 meters away or because there is a stick between you and them. Then there is the times where it does actually impact your ability to control your camera. There is a couple of points of this in Dark Souls as well, but no where near as common. 4-2 is explicitly designed to make players walk off cliffs because the game targeted a Manta thing flying off the side of the cliff instead of the skeletons they are trying to target. This is abusive and just shitty. Yes it is From Soft being trolly devs lololol, but this is actually literally the definition of artificial difficulty that people complain about rather than challenging gameplay that people actually like from the series.
That is to say, a lot of things got tidied up in Dark Souls, the chunk of it (up to O&S for reference) hasn't had a ton of these issues, the lock on is mostly consistent in the game except for dark areas of the Catacombs, where even there it was quite reasonable most of the time (still to do Tomb of the Giants though).
My initial assessment of Dark Souls respects my time more really holds true the whole game I think. Demons's Souls's levels are just too long with no real pacing to them and the game mechanically reinforces slowing down a lot. Both in the deliberate slow pacing of the combat (Shied is your New God) and in how punitive it is along with slow degenerate tactics that it makes open to you. Did you take any damage at all? Grab that Regen ring or a Blessed Weapon and sit around for a bit. Did you spend mana? Sit around. There is actually a ton of healing items and MP restoring items around that you can use, but I hope you wanted to do that tower full of Lovecraft Horror and Mindflayers early on, otherwise you won't know about them. Everything is super super segmented, so where the game drives you to try and spread out thinly across the levels, it also asks you to make no progress while you do so. Spending resources adds risk to your run, do you want to waste those Spices to get MP now when you don't know if you will die to random hidden things? Is this level going to have a one shot mechnanic 2/3 of the way through it that you can't realistically expect to see coming as well? If you waste them it comes with the penalty of your time spent in the level, the possible penalty of your souls if you can't progress equally far again (and you just had to use an item...) and if you need to replace it, the time spent either getting the souls for or grinding the item directly. I am all for interesting choices in the game, but the choice of "doing I sit here and wait now or do I go do grinding later which has its own inherent risks" is a pretty fucking shitty binary choice.
On the topic of interesting choices, boss souls! I have heard a lot of praise for this system especially compared to Dark Souls. The reality of it is actually super underwhelming. Yes you do have a few souls that you are presented with a valid choice between two choices of spell or a weapon, but in my estimate, that is only the Arch Demon's souls that do it well, and even of those it is just Dragon God and Old Monk. Astraea has interesting and very flavourful choices, but none that are actually that compelling (2 multiplayer spells, a super niche sword and a status spell that doesn't work on many things (more things are effected by Poison Cloud which comes from the first boss of her area and it is competing with Cure, which has the same effect as a cheap consumable). The False King Alant Soul doesn't even have any uses other than the NG+ only weapon wouldn't have minded seeing Soul Sucker put there). Storm Beast's Soul only has two options, one of which is obtuse to how good it is (because it is intuitive to make a sword you can't use to take advantage of its low HP damage boost on other weapons....) and the other which is kind of questionable niche use and cuts both ways.
The rest of the souls either have only 1 real use per build or only really do one good thing, even with the multiple options. The only other one that has multiple choices I think is the Armored Spider one (a first boss soul, for reference later). You get to choose between a bow or two spells of questionable niche use. The bow is generally considered one of the best items in the game. A difficult choice.
But at the end of the day that is fine right? You just make your choice and eat the soul and move on. But you can't even fucking do that. The game doesn't TELL you what any of these fucking things do. It tells you on every soul "this might be used for weapons or spells", but it tells you dick about the weapon you might get and it even tells you this on souls that can't be used for weapons/spells as appropriate. So do you just eat them? Well you also don't know how many souls they will give. For example your choice for the Adjudicator's Souls is a Regeneration spell (which is okay I guess since it fully heals you? But slot intensive and give you the fun of sitting around for a minute and a half to regen that health on and the MP you spend as well), the Meat Cleaver which is also considered one of the best weapons in the game (which you need to know make it from a Club/mace) or 1500 souls. The choice there when you are informed is incredibly clear. 1500 souls is fucking nothing even at the start of the game. The Regen spell is niche as fuck. Without google though? Your fucked. You have no way of knowing any of these things. To identify boss weapons you need to go to the Blacksmith on 2-1 with the base weapon at the appropriate level and SPECIFICALLY at that level. If you got something nice towards the end of the game I hope you didn't buff that sword up to +9, because now you can't turn it into that boss weapon. You need to start from scratch either by wrecking this weapon (WHY WOULD ANYONE EVER DO THIS) or by buying a copy of the weapon type and grinding up shards to level it.
Fuck this game. That just wound me up when I wasn't meaning to go on a rant about it. The item upgrading in this game is FUCKING TERRIBLE. And the worst part is, the Meat Cleaver which seriously is STUPID GOOD can be made from an unupgraded club. Club +0. That you can buy for 500 souls. Shit's fucking crazy.
Okay. I stopped making sense about 20 minutes ago so I am stopping now. After mentioning the highlights of the game.
- The moment I realised Pure Hardstone is going to be my DJ name when I start making dupstep.
- The Tower of Latria end to end. The Mindflayer prison, the metal as fuck giant heart suspended at the top of a tower by chains magically held in place by tortured slaves, the centipedes made out of human heads that have their heads pop off when they take enough damage even if they die in one hit, the Old Monk possessed by an interdimensional being inside a piece of yellow cloth sitting on a throne atop of every chair in a kingdom because it is the King of Kings and best of all the sound design in all these places being amazing. The mindflayer's check in bell tones and the incredibly prolonged wet squelch of the heart and related organic matter any time something happens with them would be the real high points, but the whole zone's audio stands out as well above any of the other zones.
On the note of sound design though, where it is all aces in World 3, everywhere else it is super patchy. I hated every time I was human because I had to put up with those foot step sounds. No surface feels right and player's footsteps are mixed up way too high (it is good that enemy steps are loud! The player's shouldn't be generating the same volume though with directional audio, because you are literally on top of the noise source your player foot steps are incredibly loud and the only footstep you will hear).
Also last thing, New Game + is terrible in this. The only drive to do it is either trophies or grind for the sake of grind. No more loot is worth going for, you can't upgrade most of your gear any further. So you may as well just approach the levels going as directly as possible and that guts a huge portion of the actual "time" investment in the game. For such a staple of the series it is pretty shitty and boring thing to do really. Dark Souls 2 seems to get some of it right by mixing things up on the first play through an unlocking stuff normally tucked behind covenants on the third. It still probably has less progression, but at least it is changing things in more ways than multiplying all stats by 1.5 and calling it a day.
Soul Hackers
(http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20111001030824/megamitensei/images/5/5b/Leprechaun2.jpg)
Game of the year.
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Yeah, unfortunately the boss soul thing is only a little less obtuse in Dark Souls (flipside, almost none of them are even worth using). It's still total FAQ-bait. Much as I like Dark Souls 1 better for atmospheric stuff, I can't fail to appreciate how much easier this kind of thing is to deal with in Dark Souls 2. You bring the boss soul alone to one of two people and job done.
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The fact that they are generally not worth much (other than like that one spear from Moonlight Butterfly? Maybe Kellogs Fruity Sword?) makes the obtuseness somewhat manageable. They are just trophy and achievement bait at that point which I can deal with.
Tales of Xillia - Okay so this is another Tales game that starts off being full of references to old Tales games but does things in a new way with a weird planet ecololgy and then part way through ends up being about space aliens. I am kind of getting sick of the whole space aliens thing, buuuuut this one gave us trechcoat wearing jetpack dudes attacking on rollerblades shooting shit up with uzis. So it gets a pass for now.
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Aliens? I thought the game made it pretty clear that they are on the same planet.
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Mario Kart 8 - DLC came out, so obviously had to give Nintendo more of my money for it. DLC averages to 6 dollars for 8 tracks (I paid 12 dollars for the package, but half of them haven't come out yet). Compared to the game itself, which is 65 dollars for 32 tracks, it's pretty damn cheap.
There are three courses that are themed based on other series. The Excitebike course is pretty odd (mostly just a couple of straight lines, which sounds pretty accurate to the old game) and a homage to something I've never played or seen so I'm not too overall fond of it, the F-Zero course is deliciously evil and really captures the feel of F-Zero by turning on the anti-gravity mode all the time, and Hyrule Castle is a very beautiful Zelda callback and is also very challenging, because most of the courses in this DLC seem to be. There are also three retro courses -- SNES Rainbow Road, which is as horrifying as it was in MK7, Yoshi's Circuit, which does the best job of replicating a GCN course that the game has done (and it is still evil), and Wario's Gold Mine, which I have little opinion on. They added two other new courses in, Ice Ice Outpost and Dragon Driftpost, and they are both solid courses which both are above average for MK8 original courses.
Don't really care about the other stuff from the DLC pack, although we got a pink cat Peach, Tanooki Mario, and Link as new playable characters. But still no Captain Toad OR Captain Falcon!!! It is time to petition Nintendo because I TAKE THIS THIS MARIO KART ROSTER SHIT SERIOUSLY! There are some new themed vehicles too, mostly homages from other games.
Hyrule Warriors - Upgraded my ability to summon chickens :D and got the Level 3 of Lana's other weapons. Deku Spear is sadly not very good thanks to the atrocious limit, but the other two weapons are decent. Now I'm working on getting Zant weapons so I can later get the Great Fairy Level 3 weapon and Zelda's Wind Waker Level 3. I also need to still use Ruto and Agitha, two characters that I can't bring myself to care about.
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Evade rolls in every direction only appeared in Dark Souls 2. Dark Souls also only had left/right/up/down rolls. It's why the roll is a bit better in Dark Souls 2 even if it actually feels a lot worse.
I'm pretty sure Demon's's Soul's isn't really the game you're supposed to tackle with perfect knowledge of the game, more of a game where you just try to scrape by with whatever you have the luck to find out, that would be why it is ten thousand times easier than Dark Souls 1/2 when you know it well. The games progressively got more streamlined to remove some obscure elements.
I have the Large Club +10, 50 Vit, 42 Str. Ready to go through the DLC. Wooo
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Yeah, I briefly jumped back into DS1 a couple months aback and wow was it hard getting used to not having omnidirectional rolling anymore. (Of course, the downside of that in DS2 is that you have to be a lot more precise with rolling with regard to direction in addition to timing, whereas in DS1 it was just "which one of four directions will get my i-frames to last me safely through this attack?" at the right time.)
Also jesus you're fast Fenrir.
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Huh. I didn't realise it in Dark that it was only 4 direction role.
And Niu I just watched a cutscenes where a thing shot the sky and toe it open and flying ships came I'm through the gap. So "aliens" at this point. It is still functionally no different.
Edit - I was looking at restarting Dark Souls when I build new PC and the shift to Steam happens. After playing around with a Secret Dagger in Demons's I was thinking of going Dex build instead of Str like I had been (though I <3 log Fenrir and it will always be my first love). Wondering if you guys have any particular recommendation for which Dagger to use? I figure if it goes to shit it will be easy to transition over to a Curved Sword and will see use out of Bows either way.
Had been toying with the idea of the Bandit Knife since it seems to be the Secret Dagger analogue, but the Parrying Dagger is right there in New Londo Ruins and could be an easy grab (along with the Estoc for a fallback). I could level that and use it for most of the game up until AotA and transition to Dark Silver Tracer then. Then I could try to YOLO parry Gwyn in the face with the parrying dagger off hand (this will not actually happen).
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They are some definition of alien for sure.
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Priscilla's Dagger is fun if you don't mind waiting for it / can actually chop the tail. Otherwise, I'd probably go with the Bandit's Knife, but honestly I like Daggers more in Demon's and Dark 2. Curved swords are pretty cool.
I actually recommend the YOLO parry Gwyn strat. In my experience, it saves time trying and failing to parry (and getting better at it) instead of slugging it if you aren't good at fighting him. Usually I use the Stalagmite cheese strategy, though.
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Daggers are pretty bad as a main weapon. I got some use out of them by equipping them on mages (low reqs) and buffing them with Magic Weapon, but beyond that...
El Cid, watch me take more time to go through any DLC than what I did to get there (Beating the four lords in 7 hours. I actually felt slow, picking things up)
I went through the first area of the first DLC (Sunken King, I'm doing them in order)
The fake phantom enemies were totally awesome.
I got a pretty cool giant club... That poisons the player with each hit. What the hell is this, From??
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Rogue Legacy - Got this and Wasteland 2 to try them out. Seems neat, but very difficult. Haven't played too much, but definitely a game to go back to and play more of.
Wasteland 2 - This has been taking up most of my gaming time spent at home, which admittedly hasn't been terribly much. Tried to make a fairly balanced team, am playing on normal, etc. Never played the first, so taking this kind of slow and doing some small save-scumming but not fretting over losing out on most things.
Got to (what I presume to be) the first set of split missions, and went with the closer one. I have no idea if this was a good idea or not, but oops, too late. Managed to save almost everyone, though accidentally glitched with the boss and shot them by accident while aiming elsewhere, so when I initiated conversation it went straight to "HOW DID YOU KNOW!?" and then fight. First truly difficult fight of the game so far, possibly due to luck, who knows. Having some troubles with where to go next, since this place added 3 extra markers on the map, plus there's still 2 from previous missions. At least I picked up a super useful party member while I was there. Now if only the random encounters didn't go from 10-20HP to 80-125HP, it wouldn't be so bad, since I'm not at the point where I can take more than one of these combats. >_>
Fire Emblem: Awakening - Playing this on Lunatic, and I finally have a Chrom who isn't STR-screwed, like every other game I've ever played with him. Been trying to feed experience to a few other people, though it's mostly been Robin and Chrom getting experience, with tiny bits falling to others through dual-support or small hits before dying to the swarms. So glad I have this on casual. It really allows for a lot of strategies I otherwise wouldn't really have, and sacrificing my healers to give Chrom/Robin more time to heal up has been pretty essential on more than one map. >_>
Mostly running GreatLord!Chrom, Swordmaster!Robin, Tactician!Morgan, Lord!Lucina (though changing her class when I get a second seal), with Myrmidon!Gaius, Nowi, Sorcerer!Tharja, and WarCleric!Lissa as backup, Donnel/Libra/etc as "trying to make use of, but just not good enough yet"
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Sounds like you went to Ag Center, Mage? (This is what I also did, because it was closer.) If so, then yeah Rose is helpful, but *mega spoilers*: she'll turn on you immediately before the last battle if you keep her that long. Definitely worth having around until you get other options for a full party, but don't plan on using her for the long haul.
The prison has good loot, but also enemies that can do huge chunks of damage early on. Probably safer checking out the other split mission objective and poking around whatever other small landmarks you've got flagged first.
I almost entirely skipped randoms.
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Sounds like you went to Ag Center, Mage? (This is what I also did, because it was closer.) If so, then yeah Rose is helpful, but *mega spoilers*: she'll turn on you immediately before the last battle if you keep her that long. Definitely worth having around until you get other options for a full party, but don't plan on using her for the long haul.
The prison has good loot, but also enemies that can do huge chunks of damage early on. Probably safer checking out the other split mission objective and poking around whatever other small landmarks you've got flagged first.
I almost entirely skipped randoms.
Ag Center is, indeed, where I went. I'm not aware of any prison yet, but I'm guessing that's the other place I could have gone to. Really it's that *minor spoilers* there are now 3 infected areas on the map because Sue is a fucking dumbass, and when I went to go to the closest one just south of Ag Center, I found some seriously badass randoms in the middle of a giant radiation patch. I was about to lose one of my rangers trying to backtrack out, so I just closed the game for now. I guess it's okay to avoid randoms, then?
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In the long run I think you'll just miss out on some levels and loot. No big, really, plot gives you plenty of both.
Of course, because I skipped most of them (until endgame when my avoidance rate flatlined) I couldn't tell you whether there's any neat unique encounters like the Mad Max thing in Fallout or whatever, but the ones I did see were mostly just random goons.
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Gref, don't bother with daggers in DS1. They are all pretty much garbage. If you want a fun dex weapon, I highly recommend the Balder Side Sword. It's a random drop, but it's not super rare or anything if you blow at least one humanity while fighting Balder Knights around the parish. Quite a bit of fun. Cid, Zenny, and Laggy approved. Richard's Rapier is an OK alternative if you can wait for Sen's Fortress.
Great Sycthe is a lot of fun too, and available from the start if you rush the catacombs. I don't know how good it is as a pure dex weapon though since it's on my Cleric. I'm not a fan of curved swords in general. Katanas are supposedly OK but I don't like them.
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Great Scythe is amazingly good. Probably the best DEX weapon. Tears for how badly it got nerfed in DS2.
Also seconding other suggestions, BSS not too much trouble to get early while farming titanite. (Daggers are worthless for anything but backstab-fishing in DS1. DS2 at least you can dual-wield properly and spam the hell out of fast attacks.)
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It was the fast attacks that I was quite liking in Demons's, so that is unfortunate. Put on the back burner for now until I do some kind of Int based run then i guess. Balder Swag Sword is always an option I suppose. Great Scythe maayyyyyybe, but I have done Catacombs early and am not super keen to do that again. Though I suppose practicing suicide runs will teach me the place better.
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If you want to really test your suicide skill, going for the iato early in upper blight town is a possibility. I did that once; it's a good weapon. Of course, if you just wanted any katana you could murder the undead merchant in burg. He drops most of his important goods.
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Iaito has a neat special attack. Lots of fun to use, although I'm not sure I would want to rely on it in the long term.
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If you want to really test your suicide skill, going for the iato early in upper blight town is a possibility. I did that once; it's a good weapon. Of course, if you just wanted any katana you could murder the undead merchant in burg. He drops most of his important goods.
Undead Merchant: most murdered NPC in Souls games? I always saw a tremendous number of other players using the uchigatana in multiplayer, was never sure whether this was just because it's easy to get early (for the low price of murdering an innocent bystander) or because of Sephiroth cachet. Or both I guess. Katanas are okay I guess, for all that I think there are much cooler options out there.
Lack of a kicking option with curved swords always bugged me, which is a shame since there's some neat ones on paper.
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You can buy Uchigatanas from Shiva too, but it's considerably more trouble.
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Bayonetta 2: Replaying some missions because THERE ARE THINGS I DID NOT GET OK!? Spliced things up a bit by playing as Jeanne. No, that's not really a spoiler because they revealed pre-release she's playable and she was playable in Bayonetta 1 anyway, they just made her easier to unlock here.
Jeanne is very much a more advanced version of Bayonetta. She has all the same moves, weapons, etc. as Bayonetta, but...
-The window to activate Witch Time is way lower.
-Higher damage on Wicked Weaves.
IOWs, both aspects that reward you playing better. Witch Time doesn't sound like a big deal until you realize just how many dodges you take for granted that were Witch Time; Jeanne, you really need to time the dodges properly, or you'll be punished. Oh, her dodges work fine, and you can keep dodging of course, but if you're use to Bayo, you'll instinctively go "Ok, Witch Time, COUNTER ATTACK NOW!" which will get YOU punished. Likewise, Wicked Weaves encourage you to use more advanced combos, since now using them rewards you more than before.
Haven't played much as the other unlocked character. I played a bit with that character in Tag Climax and wow do you notice the durability loss; it feels like playing Dante Must Die mode in DMC1 because every hit does 2-3HKO damage. Allegedly this characters hits harder, but haven't had much to gauge with.
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Undead Merchant: most murdered NPC in Souls games?
Because of the nature of speed runs I would expect it is Maughlin the Armorer from Dark Souls 2. Getting 1 million souls being a route and the nature of repetition of speed runs pretty much guarantees he is killed more often than even Yurt.
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Started up Pokemon Colosseum's RPG mode in Dolphin on a whim last Sunday. I beat XD years ago, so this is the last Pokemon RPG that I haven't played, not counting alternate versions.
Just reached the point where I can finally purify Shadow Pokemon, thankfully, because the earlygame is just obnoxious in Colosseum. It would take a Meeple-sized rant to cover all the reasons why Shadow Pokemon are a pain in the ass to use in this game, and I'm not in the mood right now.
Edit: Starter Espeon deserves a special mention for an obscenely good earlygame. It has fully evolved stats vs mostly NFE enemies early on, plus it starts with Return and maxed happiness for a physical attack that's actually pretty good this early on, so it's not deadweight vs Psychic resists. Umbreon sadly can't compare despite a higher starting level; it has much worse damage, no way of drawing enemy attacks away from a frailer target, and no worthwhile support moves. It still's still significant through the first major dungeon because it's a second team member that will never randomly lose turns to Hyper Mode, but after that it's pretty mediocre.
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The Shadow Pokemon handling alone kills a lot of Pokemon Colosseum's experience. Cannot be emphasized enough how much better an experience XD was because they fixed that so much.
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Well that was a little underwhelming.
Soul Hackers - A woman who summons demons with a parasol tried to blow up the Spookies' super secret camper van which has their logo on the side.
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Dark Souls 2 Sunken Crown:
Finished. Holy shit this DLC was so good. Like everything about it. Superior level design and bosses.
There were so many memorable moments including three times where I just ran away from everything in panic, which is the coolest thing that can happen in Dark Souls.
The 1 vs 3 boss fight was pretty fun, I won that on the first try. I pancacked people with a giant club. That's just what I do.
Flower skirt is pretty great for fashion souls but I have nothing in my wardrobe that goes well with it. Horrible.
At least I have that shiny crown that goes well with everything. I'm also going to use this new Yorgh spear for a bit. There were enough materials in the DLC to upgrade it to max.
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PSP/Vita updatez on Japan, France, & Japan.
Muramasa Rebirth - Finished "Momohime"'s final chapter. Well this clearly isn't the end of everything but dunno if I can be arsed to do Kisuke's story and attempt to get a different ending or whatever. Stylish game, but eh. I appreciate that the narrative finally embraced a bit of "you are the bad guy" by the end, but the narrative / ending is *still* way the heck too soft on Jinkuro, what with Rankai / Momohime's reactions. Look this guy is a psychotic body-stealing mass murderer trying to invade heaven and become an evil god, it's not much of a sin to hate him. Shame, because I do like the idea of a villain protagonist - it certainly gives you far more excuses to fight and slay everything than usual, as everyone quite reasonably wants your head.
Jeanne d'Arc - Wait... what. Did this game just have a good plot twist? ...you're kidding me. Now I'm suddenly interested in what happens and where this goes from here. I'm 98% sure they will screw it up, but hey, props for a single moment that actually makes things ten times more interesting. Reminds me a bit of Sands of Destruction, which for the most part had terrible writing & plotting, but did manage 1 good twist.
...of course the game then promptly goes and annoys me with a *pitifully* easy mission where you just mow down everything effortlessly, but lose anyway because an enemy archer reinforcement spawns in the rear with the ability to one-shot your uncontrollable guest. Despite the fact that he was like literally the only enemy on the board as I'd already crushed everything else and was easily 2HKO'd by me and utterly harmless to my real team. And the excuse for this guest-escort mission was pretty damn specious. SIGH. Difficult, fine, but easy & boring & still lost? Meh.
Corpse Party - Kowai.
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Jeanne d'Arc - Wait... what. Did this game just have a good plot twist? ...you're kidding me. Now I'm suddenly interested in what happens and where this goes from here.
Jeanne D'Arc gets burnt at the stake at the age of 19.
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Jeanne D'Arc is surprisingly solid plotwise.
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Flower skirt is pretty great for fashion souls but I have nothing in my wardrobe that goes well with it. Horrible.
At least I have that shiny crown that goes well with everything. I'm also going to use this new Yorgh spear for a bit. There were enough materials in the DLC to upgrade it to max.
I wear the flower skirt with the singer's dress. You can't actually see the skirt under that but at least you get some nice shoes out of the equation. I really can't find anything else in the game that goes well with it, sadly.
DLC zones are shockingly generous with ore. Pretty sure there are more twinklies and dragonbones in the DLC zones than in the entirety of the base game.
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Tales of Xillia - So there is a lot of discussion right now about how there is the world of Reize Maxia and that the invaders come from the world of Elympios. So yeah, aliens.
Aaaaaaand there is jokes about Spirits "tethering" which is pretty close to belonging in an Ar Tonelico game.
Nier - picked this back up because I wanted something I could press buttons while I listen to a podcast. Finished off the side quests I'm part 1 then pushed through past the point of no return.
I think I hate this game. Circle jerking itself about hurr hurr video games so shitty you guys here I will show you by making a shitty video game. Also why is the haunted mansion Resident Evil for no fucking reason?
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Well that was a little underwhelming.
Soul Hackers - A woman who summons demons with a parasol tried to blow up the Spookies' super secret camper van which has their logo on the side.
That's it? Her umbrella is the most fashionable among all the summon devices out there. well, maybe except the saxophone.
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Crown of the Old Iron King DLC:
Well this was worse than Sunken King but still pretty cool.
Best part was the NPC invader who runs away after a while to make you fall into his cool trap.
Fume Knight took me countless tries. Bastard really didn't want to me to run away and drink my Sunny Delight. I then respecced all my dex into adaptability and won on the first try. I'll stop saying adp sucks now.
Smelter 2.0 shows just how much a bigger room makes a difference.
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I think I hate this game. Circle jerking itself about hurr hurr video games so shitty you guys here I will show you by making a shitty video game. Also why is the haunted mansion Resident Evil for no fucking reason?
Hey now, you're the crazy person who did sidequests in a Cavia game.
That said Nier is pretty... bare bones I guess is the word I want? even at the best of times so calling it bad is pretty defensible to say the least.
It is Resident Evil because the Nier they made is not the Nier they set out to make. The original game concept was like... you move in and out of different Fairy Tales or some such, and I think the idea was going to be that each story was its own genre and atmosphere and hence the weird mishmash of stuff from different games in there. Honestly I really like that about Nier even in the final product where it's downplayed, but I may also be a sucker for Nier's soundtrack.
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Fenrir: Yeah, Sunken King > Old Iron King >> Ivory King, unfortunately. OIK has the two best bosses in the game at least (did you fight Sir Alonne?) alongside the lame-o recolor. Oh, did you get the chicken leg greatclub? It drops from the giants in Brume Tower and might just be the most ridiculous weapon in the game.
There were so many memorable moments including three times where I just ran away from everything in panic, which is the coolest thing that can happen in Dark Souls.
Oh, I wanted to guess at this:
-Room fulla bloodstains
-Enemy horde ahead therefore be wary of bug
-The spike floor room
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Yeah I fought Alonne, he was pretty easy especially after Fume Knight w/ one statue left.
Nice katana. I also like the ridiculously blue Smelter 2.0 sword.
What is the bloodstain room? If it's the first one with the ghost knight, you are correct. I just saw these phantoms and ignored them like usual, then went "Uh... They are pretty huge... Why are they standing there... Why are they looking at me now... OH GOD" I ran to that small room with the mage and like three poison knights where you have to activate a switch three times to survive. I just ran around and died.
Second gues is not really correct, I got scared a little but found the stairs soon enough.
Third guess is correct, too many ghost knights, spikes everywhere, wait where was that entrance where I came from, oh shit where do I go, oh god oh god. Somehow I found a ladder and survived.
Third actual case was That Room in the Cave of the Dead. Somehow I also survived here , even though I was super close to getting petrified.
BTW I got an invader for the first time this playthrough! I stood in a narrow corridor and pancacked him.
BRB farming for chicken leg
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Bayonetta 1 (Wii U): So replaying the early game has made me realize how much crap I take for granted.
Things you don't have in the prologue of Bayo 1:
-Wicked Weaves
-Panther
-Any of Rodin's abilities (given granted)
-Air Dodge (this feels like a fundamental enough to distinguish from the previous)
-Witch Time
-Any combos worth a damn due to lack of weapons and Witch Time (you're using the Hand Guns, the joke weapons handed to you for completing the game)
-Torture Attacks
Now granted, Torture Attacks, Witch Time and Wicked Weaves are all given to you by the beginning of Chap 1, but prologue doesn't go as smoothly when you take these things for granted! Albeit, prologue also gives you infinite health near as I can tell for your initial playthrough.
Why didn't this come up in Bayo 2? Because just about all of those sans the Rodin thing are in fact initial skills, on top of which, you also get Umbran Climax.
This in turn makes Bayo 1's early game harder than Bayo 2's, not because enemies are tougher but because you're so much weaker, and when you're use to big skills, that happens. Bayo 2, you still need to learn a bunch of stuff (Form of Bat is a big deal for example) but the system doesn't feel like it's restricting itself for tutorial purposes.
This is not a complaint about how Bayo 1 didn't age well, more just what happens when you're use to one thing and it's gone. By Chapter 4 or so, you should get everything notable back, and be on the right track. I just finished Chapter 2, which by now I have bought Air Dodge, both Stinger clones, the Shurada (aka the weapon I'm most familiar with), and...yeah, I just want Panther form because lots of moments of "ok, gotta run for a bit, TIME TO GO PANT-...oh, right :("
Also used the Peach Outfit and Samus Outfit. Samus is kind of boring beacuse it seems to just replace the animation of guns with the Arm cannon. Peach has Bowser Weaves, automatically awesome!
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I finished the Ivory King Dark Souls DLC, I really liked it too. (like everything Dark Souls, to be fair)
Level design is pretty unmemorable for Souls, (except the outskirts) it feels almost like a PS2 game. (Like those 3D Castlevanias but obviously not that bad) Stone walls, questionable dead ends, etc. Almost no verticality for a Souls game.
The atmosphere is pretty amazing though. I'm not really into srs roleplay at all, but even I had to give some warmer-looking equipment to my character because this place just looked way too cold. (And it's not like she was showing much skin before. The place really just felt too cold)
The outskirts were such a dick move. Wow.
Thankfully the Great Club is probably the best anti-reindeer weapon. Reindeers die in 3 hits and get pancacked after the second hit, so the only hard part is smacking them once. Then, for the second hit, you can don't have to worry about taking damage since the reindeer will be flattened, and for the third hit you just smack him when he tries to get up. (THIS is usually the part where I say "Welcome to the CLUB")
The bosses got me once and I was all "Noooooooo" for two minutes. My great club broke mid-fight and I could barely outdamage the boss' dark regen with my crappy other weapons.
This must be amazing in NG+
Bell = Best helm
Bone Fist = Best weapon
And the DLC had the best invasions
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Ivory King is fucking unbearable on NG+ (or worse NG++, where there are even more red phantoms).
I tend to skip the outskirts even on NG. There's a nice hat. There's a ring that let's you be sexy even as a phantom. I'm not convinced they're worth it.
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Every other enemy in the DLC is pancackable with only one hit and the bosses aren't too tough.
Fume Knight + scares me a little more.
Hmmm I really want to invade people in the outskirts at one point.
I'm a jerk.
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I think I hate this game. Circle jerking itself about hurr hurr video games so shitty you guys here I will show you by making a shitty video game. Also why is the haunted mansion Resident Evil for no fucking reason?
Hey now, you're the crazy person who did sidequests in a Cavia game.
That said Nier is pretty... bare bones I guess is the word I want? even at the best of times so calling it bad is pretty defensible to say the least.
It is Resident Evil because the Nier they made is not the Nier they set out to make. The original game concept was like... you move in and out of different Fairy Tales or some such, and I think the idea was going to be that each story was its own genre and atmosphere and hence the weird mishmash of stuff from different games in there. Honestly I really like that about Nier even in the final product where it's downplayed, but I may also be a sucker for Nier's soundtrack.
Yeah, they do a lot of different genres of things. Have you gotten to the text adventure yet?
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Every other enemy in the DLC is pancackable with only one hit and the bosses aren't too tough.
Fume Knight + scares me a little more.
Hmmm I really want to invade people in the outskirts at one point.
I'm a jerk.
I did that once.
I couldn't find the host and he psychically used a seed of a tree of giants at the best/worst time.
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Pokemon Colosseum: Just confirmed that both my Espeon and Jumpluff have Hidden Power Steel. >_<
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I just have to imagine Fenrir wearing a Daft Punk helmet while listening to Eurotrash dance music, playing DS and yelling about the club every once in a while while his roommates do his best to pretend that that isn't a thing that is totally happening all over the place.
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Super Mario 3D World - Has finally decided in World 3 and 4 not to be uber-easy, so the game is starting to get quite fun. I've mostly been using Princess Peach for mad floaty powers.
Hyrule Warriors - Chain chomp get. :D I think this might be one of the few references the game makes to LA.
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Pokemon ORAS: Started this up and went with Mudkip as the starter. Pretty solid so far although it has the same problem of adding some cool new features while removing other cool ones that all the other pokemon games do (trainer customization is gone, and roller skates might be as well, but the pokenav has some cool stuff.)
One of the most notable changes is that when you're out on the field every so often a pokemon tail or head or something will pop out of the grass and you can sneak up on it to fight it. Some have generic sprites so you won't really know until you fight it, but for others you can tell which pokemon it will be. Sometimes it's against a normal pokemon, but other times it's against a much higher level pokemon with a move it wouldn't normally have. A lot of people have said they caught a level 5 Taillow that already has Brave Bird, and the tutorial example they use is a level 5 Poocheyna with one of the elemental fangs. Normally other pokemon in that route would be around level 2 or 3. I didn't find the Tailow, but when I was wandering through Petalburg woods I found a level 15 Shroomish with Focus Punch. I'm kinda curious to see how the level scaling works with these guys because right now it's looking like it's 2x the level of the other randoms. It would be kind of awesome to be able to encounter a level 80+ pokemon in victory road for example.
Anyway, Roxie got destroyed by the uber shroomish who was even able to use Focus Punch successfully because Nosepass used Harden at the wrong time. Team is currently Marshtomp, Shroomish, Ralts, Lombre and two others. I don't know how long I'm going to keep the Shroomish, but I kind of want to make a Sub/Leech Seed/Spore/Focus Punch set since the game basically handed it to me. It even has Poison Heal for toxic orb shenanigans.
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Story of my life Zenny
Story of my life.
I need to point out that what prompted me to go through the Dark Souls 2 DLC (Playing Dark Souls 2 was a problem) was El Cid telling me that there's this bell you can wear on your head and that makes you immune to headshots (which is a really useless side effect) :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCUk9V4__zE
No regrets.
Oh I've been playing FF6 Eviltype on and off, and Umaro has become this unstoppable god of destruction. Like I just sent him to the Coliseum right after getting him and got 4 sets of Marvel Shoes? Then I ditched the Marvel Shoes because I didn't really need them and got 4 Exp Eggs instead.
In battle I basically just let him do all the work because it's easier that way. The three other characters play Triple Triad and eventually heal. I always use Umaro and switch the others in anticipation for Kefka's Tower. He's like level 60 now.
Before Umaro, Edgar has been the WoB god he usually is.
ATB would be way better if you could see the enemy bars. As it is, enemy actions feel very unpredictable and random at time. (See Necron from FF9 or Chadarnook here) So I don't feel it's a system very well suited for really difficult challenges? (like say, Penny Arcade 3's insane mode) This is still a fun patch since it's really not very difficult.
In retrospect, things I learnt regarding FF6 that I didn't realize because it was one of my first RPGs:
- The Fanatic Tower boss was such a massive dick move from Squaresoft
- No one is going to get the Paladin Shield and learn Ultima from it unless they grind like hell
- Sorry Mog but the gold hairpin is cooler than your useless water dance and early availability
- I'm 2 cool 2 wait for Shadow. I'm not helping the bastard who left me before boarding the phantom train way back then.
Meanwhile, things confirmed:
- The Opera House scene is still really awkward.
- Fuck Cid and his dumb fish. Maybe he'd survive more easily if he didn't wear that giant yellow raincoat while sleeping and marinate in his sweat.
- Cool mohawk Strago. You're still my fav
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Mog > the Gold Hairpin. Mog's really darn good in the WoB beacuse Dances don't suck there, and he's average level +5, making him a tank to boot. Gold Hairpin is awful; you're wasting a relic slot to...cast Osmose one less time per 2 MP Cycles in effect?
The best use of the Gold Hairpin is being an early Dragon Horn, and honestly there are other ways to get that when you actually care about it.
SPEAKING OF FINAL FANTASY STUFF:
Curtain Call: I did a map where I missed a boss, and got 2 Turquoise Shard Bosses along the way, meaning I unlock Celes and then...get stuck with a situation where Paine is the best option left...and there's still 2 other characters! What the hell Turquoise shards?
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I dunno, I don't find him groundbreaking at all even with the level advantage. He has no magic at this point (which is terrible) and his dances aren't really awesome compared to other skillsets. The Floating continent is pretty much his only dungeon, and out of the three characters I could choose, I had a lot more useful ones than him.
Casting Osmose less is not awesome but convenient enough!
Edit: Oh wait you can get him before the Sealed Gate, nevermind then.
I still prefer the hairpin
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Neither Mog nor the Hairpin are all that useful TBH, so pick whichever. But Mog's battle intro animation is fun, so there's that.
Also Eviltype savagely nerfed Osmose, although it's barely noticeable since it still refills like 2/3 of your max MP (eventually all of it once you pump your Magic), so whatevs.
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Mog's quite useful in the WoB ET thanks to dances being buffed appreciably. The durablity's nice in eviltype as well.
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I just have to imagine Fenrir wearing a Daft Punk helmet while listening to Eurotrash dance music, playing DS and yelling about the club every once in a while while his roommates do his best to pretend that that isn't a thing that is totally happening all over the place.
So on that same note does everyone else assume Zenny play games just in his underpants and a motorcycle helmet like the Biker from the second mode in Hotline Miami? Otter obviously wears the other hotline Miami masks of Jacket, but wears a business shirt with no tie and top button undone.
Post I was going to respond about Nier got munched so here is a delayed response CK
It isn't the side quests that bother me. I still kind of like them. While they are shitty terrible grindy things they are hard work in a post apocalyptic world, especially if you are trying to do good. They are pretty consistently little stories about family and are on point. They are consistent and flavourful but have really diverse outcomes even if the activity is variations on kill or fetch quests.
On the other hand the main plot just had me revisit the starting dungeon just to pointlessly violently have one of the characters die that was just fucking resurrected so that they could be removed again. It decided to follow it up with another dungeon revisit (which is okay) that ended in being told to go away and come back later where FAQ tells me I get to run through the dungeon again. The plot here involved killing off a side character in the time skip and showing that Nier hasn't visited then in this whole time. This is Nier who has spent 5 years looking out for the nearby village he lives in, who has built deep relationships and lifelong bonds with people he barely knows, who the concept of family is so key that he will go on a five year crusade to get back hai daughter. That Nier won't check in on two Orphans who he knows have no parents. He won't visit the only place that can upgrade and maintain his weapons.
Also I can't tell which genre the underground lab was supposed to be riffing on. It felt like it was trying to be isometric action/strategy games like Syndicate or Crusader series. If it was I am thoroughly confused for two reasons. The ability to rotate the camera kind of threw me off (though some games did have that...), but even more so, those kinds of games haven't been culturally relevant for like 20 years. The only people that remember that kind if shit is weird grognards and 30+ year old PC gamers like me. Better talk about them in a PS3 Rpg? It can't be that.
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Hmmmm this means Zenny's theme music would be
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwrjNgOZo2I
Yeah ok I'm fine with it.
IIRC Nier only cares about his daughter basically (And Kaine because *link to Kaine's artwork*), he doesn't really give a shit about anyone else, but I could be wrong about that.
Really I don't know what the mansion thing was copying but it was pretty cool. My favourite part of the game. Also great music.
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Ah, more annoyed with the gratuitous grimdark than the quest. Yeah is fair. Longer post when at home, but Summary is it kinda works but I can't fault someone hating it.
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I just have to imagine Fenrir wearing a Daft Punk helmet while listening to Eurotrash dance music, playing DS and yelling about the club every once in a while while his roommates do his best to pretend that that isn't a thing that is totally happening all over the place.
So on that same note does everyone else assume Zenny play games just in his underpants and a motorcycle helmet like the Biker from the second mode in Hotline Miami? Otter obviously wears the other hotline Miami masks of Jacket, but wears a business shirt with no tie and top button undone.
Hmmmm this means Zenny's theme music would be
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwrjNgOZo2I
Yeah ok I'm fine with it.
ok guys where's the hidden camera
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Bayonetta Wii U: Shock and awe, Grace and Glory are still assholes, Jeane remains fun fights, and finally got Panther Mode so these running segments are now easier. Also, Form of Bat now available,!
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Super Smash Bros. Wii U - Stood in a stupidly long line to pick this up, but successfully acquired it! Played about 10 matches and experimented a bit with the 3DS-as-controller for it. Worked pretty well, actually. Also imported my Mii fighter into the game.
Super Mario 3D World - Did some green star collecting and finished half of World 5. ~
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Lunar 2 - I got beaten up by a bunch of kids. Still a pretty fun replay, not much to say about it.
Mario Kart 8 - Got three stars on all the DLC tracks. They were a pretty fun mix, with three being solid homages to other series, three of them being retro tracks (bonus points for Rainbow Road SNES and Yoshi Circuit GCN being two of my favourite tracks in the series, and both are done pretty well), and two new tracks which I am kinda lukewarm on but I wouldn't call them bad. Anyway will probably shelve this back into "mostly multiplayer" territory but there is always an excuse for that.
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U - Speaking of multiplayer, this came out. It seems a lot like 3DS, perhaps even more than I was expecting? But it's super-pretty, and I do prefer playing multiplayer on one big screen. Not much to say about it, I've just played one round of matches so far, but I will say that I heartilly approve of Score Display being unlocked from the start (also Bowser Jr.) and the ability to change item frequency was a big omission from 3DS so I'm glad to see it's fixed here.
Hyrule Warriors - Broke the 70 hour barrier, still enjoying it a lot. The amount of content in this game is pretty insane (128 adventure mode maps, another 128 on the DLC package we already have... wouldn't be stunned if there is more down the line) so it's obviously going to be a "play until I get bored of it" rather than "play until completion". But that shows no signs of happening so far. Anyway, I now have all L3 weapons for my mains (Zelda, Sheik, Cia, Link, Impa, Lana) except the Great Fairy and baton. The L3 Summoning Gate map was a bitch, but now I can summon chickens with maximum power~
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Heroes of the Storm - Is anyone in the DL playing this other than metroid composite? Blizzard is in some ways making this even grindier than League of Legends, but gives you a *gigantic* XP boost if you play with a friend, +50% XP. They really, really want you to play with friends to the point that solo-queuing is basically pointless. (They also love opaque huge numbers for some reason. It's not enough to get 70 XP; no you're earning 67,856 XP for some reason.) Also the money-grab scent is strong here, stronger than with League. Sure, who wouldn't want to ride into battle on a rainbow unicorn, but for *20 bucks*?! No. (Sure, Rito has 2 "Legendary" skins that cost more than that, but they're total revamps of all the animations of the character and are hugely different.) League champs tend to cost 5-7 dollars for the expensive ones, and the cheap ones are unlocked via in-game currency; HotS seems to like to charge 7-10 bucks for its expensive champs.
Opening cinematic & tutorial are amusing enough, though. Raynor vs. Diablo, yes.
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I blame not having an authenticator for not getting Heroes access. Also my fuck-stupid battletag chosen by someone else because it's a shared account. Hopefully with Beta coming in January I can get in.
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I've been meaning to install it, and plan to. So yeah, once I have some free time (around Thanksgiving - going home, in the middle of nowhere, so plenty of free time).
Speaking of games...well, there's a lot here, but most recently on my mind is the NEW AND IMPROVED SUMMONER'S RIFT IN LEAGUE OF LEGENDS.
Only 20 or so games into this, but I have an decent idea of how it plays compared to the old SR. From an aesthetic standpoint...I've heard people compare its style to Disney, and I do have to agree it does kind of look like Disney. The colours are brighter, it looks happier, the jungle monsters are cuter...having said that, it doesn't really detract from the game at all. I do kind of miss the wraiths, but now it looks more like a jungle with jungle monsters. From a gameplay standpoint, the lane that's changed the most is the jungle. Jungle was my worst lane to begin with, but I could do reasonably well with a few junglers (Amumu, Fiddlesticks, Vi, Hecarim, Sejuani). Jungle now is overall much less of the same thing, same routes, same timings, etc. It now seems varied a bit - there are more buffs that have a bit more variety, ranging from a ward, healing, bonus damage, etc. There's variety in the jungling routes now, other than blue - small camp - small camp - home - red - gank. Junglers also don't feel so damn polarizingly powerful, as in able to completely control a game by themselves. They still play a huge role, but it feels like there are more choices now. Granted, jungle is much tougher, hard to clear completely, and some junglers seem really weak if they don't have good sustain, clear, and mitigation. I have to say, though...the dragon changes are extremely dominating, and control the game. It feels like, while there are hypothetical strategic choices in going for objectives or dragon, the benefits of dragon far outweigh getting even 3 towers down. It seems like every game, whichever team controls the dragon wins the game, towers and inhibitors be damned. The buffs are crazy, and while I know the dragon is technically more difficult the more buffs you get, the downtime between dragon respawn is more than enough time to get the items and levels to kill it much more easily the subsequent times, especially considering the bonuses it gives. I like the idea, but it really feels like it needs toned down to some extent.
Anyway, still mostly filling most roles, but best in the mid or top lane.
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Pokemon Colosseum- I managed to catch Suicune on the first Net Ball I toss, and Entei/Raikou weren't too bad either. On the other hand, Murkrow took 3 resets and about 15 Ultra Ball tosses before I got it (I'm abusing the hell out of the infinite ball glitch, so the actual Ultra Ball count never decreased <_<), go figure.
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Bravely Default- Now for the C8 Boss pain. I ran with the suggestion last time of making a defense build, and I'm sure glad I did (for all that using Desperation seemed to be kind of pointless offensively. Grab Dual Shield from Knight, run Templar, Dark Knight secondary, switch between Dual Shields and weaponry depending). Onto the pain...
Ominas/Holly/Heinkel/Barras- Way easy. Went in with little thought and won. No one here was scary enough.
Ancheim Bosses- Pain in the ass. Profiteur ITD at this point is laughable, but Jackal and Khint were doing a lot of damage with a tendency to brave. I don't think I was running the defense build here yet, although it would have been good. Luckily not too much MT, but yeah, this was a nasty fight
Florem Bosses- Eh. Rampart shone here. Not of them were overly impressive.
Swordmaster Team Fight- FUCK THIS. Ugh, this took way too many tries. Praline is extremely annoying, but even rushing her first still leads to Kami entering the fight. Kikyo, is one of the easiest alone, is such a massive pain in a team. She loves to use the initiative move and kill off someone who already took damage. Really can't underline how much tries I needed. Need to rush Praline and still be in decent shape. This is where the physical build shone. Completely necessary to beat this fight.
De Rosso-Yulyana- There's only two of them, and DeRosso is easy to predict at this point.
Eternia Central
Fight 1- Not bad at all. Profiteur gained a new trick, but one that was easily gotten around. Defense build great again here..
Fight 2- Not bad either.
Fight 3- Another hideously painful fight. Defense build was very badly needed. Again, you need to rush Praline (and with ST or else face Alternis' wrath). Praline just becomes such a monster in team battles.
Fight 4- What. The. Fuck. Jesus, there is no good way to protect against Fire Bane. I was hoping the anti-status move would get, but no such luck. I haven't beat this yet; also blah to Fire Bane overriding the anti-Fire equips. This fight...my best idea is so wait, save up SP, rush Qada (which joy, leads to him getting nasty, so I'll need to run a Ninja strat despite it being completely pointless for everyone else in the fight) and...use SP right after Qada uses Fire Bane and pray. If I'm lucky, the turn order on turn 1 would be Spiritmaster->Mephilia/Ominas->Qada. Maybe slowing down Qada might do it (if it effects on the same turn order). Regardless, this fight is evil as fuck.
Even the strategy guide best advise is to equip 20% and 30% up Mdef and run 3 Spiritmasters (yeah, I have two, so 3 is not happening). Even some moves that halve damage really are not enough due to Fire Bane Mephilia doing like 9500 MT damage.
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Oh yeah, also going to try a status setup and see if that has luck. Some Withering Ripple+some MT specials (and maybe some Vampire status).
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You can neuter that fight by slowing down Qada so that he goes last each turn, and having a Spiritmaster twinked for speed, so that you can respond to each Fire Bane with an elemental immunity buff. Be warned that he can use Fire Bane as often as every other turn, so you'll want either two Spiritmasters or a Performer to ensure you always have the needed actions. But yeah, that should lock down the entire fight, outside the first turn I suppose? That's somewhat RNG reliant since they're all the same speed. Still whatever, reload save at worst.
EDIT: You can also one-round the fight with raw offence but that requires considerably more setup.
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Yeah, that's the strat I was going to try next (Or am in the middle of trying. Closed it up for the night in the middle of the fight to regain some SP for abuse). Status wasn't cutting it.
That said, as bad as some of these fights are, I can't imagine going at them without the staff special skill (which I don't think you use, IIRC).
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Dhyer: That's the fight I whined & asked about back in August, if you want to check the archives. Ephraim covers the offensive style of winning that fight. It is definitely one of the hardest fights in the game, certainly harder than the final for me, and pretty well demands some kind of specialized strategy / setup.
Personally, I won that fight the lame style: I checked my DS every night or so and input a few more commands using SP until I hit -1, then put the DS back in sleep mode. Another way to win on turn 1! (I was reading books at the time for my commute, so didn't miss the DS too much.)
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Did I mention I was playing Warframe? Been playing a lot recently. I mostly main Valkyr but use Saryn for Archwing stuff because no shields in space is a bad thing. I recently unlocked all the planets and got the Saviour of Uranus award. Because that's the joke.
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How healthy is the game now? I still kind of miss it, but probs more for the Laggy games than the game itself. I loved it in beta, but lots of progressive iteration away from design I liked.
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Pokemon Colosseum beaten. The final boss was really scary due to level creep, being ~5 levels above the penultimate boss who in turn had ~5 more than the preceeding enemies. His Slaking could OHKO Raikou with Crush Claw after an X Attack while not taking significant damage from anything I could throw it. Thankfully the AI is kinda dumb so his ally Machamp finished him off with Earthquake before the Skill Swap Slowking could come out, which would've been REALLY scary. Rest of the team (Scizor, Salamence, Dusclops) was not exactly chopped liver, either.
Colosseum story mode's short length and weird level curve make it feel more like an experiment or test run than a proper RPG. You start with an L26 Umbreon and L25 Espeon, the snagable Shadow Pokemon start at L30 with all three stage Pokemon starting at tier 2 (and even some two stage lines), while the main game ends around L48-50 (depending on how many optional battles you go for) - it all kinda feels like you skip the first half of a normal-lengthed game. The high starting levels and lack of a move relearner also mean that moves you'd normal take for granted in other games are impossible to get in Colosseum, like Leech Seed on Jumpluff.
The double battle emphasis and catching Pokemon during boss battles are novel twists on the usual Pokemon format, albeit ones that XD later refined into a much better RPG. Colosseum's most enduring novelty is that the playable roster consists about 90% of gen 2 Pokemon, with just a few gen 3 mons mixed in. This is a welcome change from Johto, where gen 2 Pokemon are often obscured and largely overshadowed by their gen 1 counterparts. Oh, and there's an infinite Pokeball glitch that's pretty hilarious in practice.
Some thoughts on the Pokemon I ended up using:
Espeon: Irreplacable earlygame MVP, as I mentioned previously. Low physical durability gradually became a problem later on, but the offense was still priceless, getting more turn 1 OHKOs than anyone else by far. The lack of an Alakazam (or any other Psychic, save Meditite) makes the late Psybeam/Psychic pickups sting less in this game.
Jumpluff: The lack of Leech Seed and Stun Spore really suck, but it's both the fastest and most accurate sleep move in the game by a significant margin, not counting Yawn users, especially in a game where every single catchable Pokemon has a non-typed recoil move to potentially suicide with. The completionist in me wanted to snag every Shadow Pokemon to make things more interesting, so Jumpluff was a must.
Quagsire: Water and Ground are priceless types for the story Mt. Battle sequence, while Shadow Pokemon lab was filled with Rain Dance+Thunder spamming Electrics that come before the Earthquake TM. Quagsire thus filled valuable type niches before ultimately being phased out after I caught Water and Ground types with significantly better stats.
Suicune+Raikou: Rain Dance+Surf+Thunder ahoy. Gen 3 Surf doesn't hit allies but only does half damage to each target, so the damage boost from Rain Dance matters more than in singles-based RPG. Raikou's speed makes it ideal for Thunderdancing, which is good because its movepool is pretty barren otherwise. Suicune's Aurora Beam is valuable in a game where Ice Beam TMs are hard to get, and the durabilities on both mattered a lot since it's harder to play type advantages perfectly in an all-doubles game.
Flygon: Starting as a L43 Vibrava means you skip almost the entire painful NFE phase for this evo line for once, plus you get the Earthquake TM almost immediatly afterwards. It's pretty clearly the best Ground type in Colosseum (alternatives: Quagsire, Gligar, Piloswine) which helps its case for that TM, in an all-doubles game where Earthquake naturally dominates. Luckily Protect is storebought, so I gave it to Espeon/Suicune/Raikou so Flygon could safely use EQ with any partner out. Crunch/Dragonbreath/storebought Fire Blast gave it some respectable options for Ground resists/immunes.
Skarmory: Last minute filler addition, mainly to get a Ground-immune with better damage/durability than Jumpluff for battles where I want Flygon to use EQ more than just every alternating turn.
My copy of Alpha Sapphire's supposed to arrive tomorrow, so I'm done with the game for the time being. Colosseum's postgame doesn't sound all that interesting on paper, so who knows if/when I go back and pick it up.
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Suikoden 2 finished. Impossible to get the good ending because I didn't trigger an obscure event early on (Thanks, Clive), but so it goes. I enjoyed the game, but didn't feel like it was a masterpiece or even much better than the first game (which I also liked). So many dull areas with tons of knights you just spam auto-fight on... Luca Blight was the best character, and the story lost a lot of steam when he died. The thing that really struck me about this game and the original was just how cheaply made it feels, in part due to the shoddy translations. It's still a neat experience in spite of this, and I do look forward to 3 whenever I get to it. I just hope the 108 stars guide I use doesn't fail to tell me about a critical thing I have to do next time.
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On the upshot, Suikoden III has very few Stars that can be permanently missed (in fact, I believe the set of 7 you can fail to get due to a poor decision are the only ones). Also Suikoden III has lots of other stuff going for it, but anyway.
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How healthy is the game now? I still kind of miss it, but probs more for the Laggy games than the game itself. I loved it in beta, but lots of progressive iteration away from design I liked.
It's pretty damn solid now. Occasional bugs but nothing serious. But it is nothing but grinding - story is all but nonexistent. But very stylish grinding indeed.
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On the upshot, Suikoden III has very few Stars that can be permanently missed (in fact, I believe the set of 7 you can fail to get due to a poor decision are the only ones). Also Suikoden III has lots of other stuff going for it, but anyway.
Specifically, only if you repeatedly answer Yes to the prompt of "Do you really want to do this obviously bad and unheroic thing" can you permanently miss anyone, to my knowledge.
Suikoden 3 > other Suikodens, anyway. The pairs system was dumb, but at least you get a lot more versatility out of your characters due to skills and such. Also no silent main!
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I like the unite system personally, but I wish it communicated movement to you better than it does. There is a whole chunk of the system there that you kind of learn by feel, but that seems like it takes a long time to do.
Also the benefit for getting all stars in Suikoden 3 is an extra chapter, which sounds really substantial but really isn't. Having beat the game multiple times, I wouldn't eveni bother with it again unless it had been a few years since I played. The plot plays out the same whether you got all 108 stars or not.
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I don't remember, does the unite system do anything aside from forcing you to have three guys autobattle?
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Healing items could only be used within a pair (but could be shared), and Kindness Drops hit both people in a pair. Otherwise, "forces three people to auto-battle" (but you choose which three, and what they do depends on what their partness does) is pretty much it.
I don't think S3 did the best possible job with it necessarily but I think entering commands for less than six people is a net positive, and I am happier with what S3 did than what S4 or what Tierkreis did: a game where you recruit dozens of PCs is better served by a large party size.
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Some of it is that restriction that breeds choice. You can just jam a caster and a melee person together blindly so you can always use your rune, but that isn't always the best idea. Pairing up a caster with a defensive character means your defensive character will likely sit in the back lines doing nothing, which is presumably not what you want your dude in heavy armour doing(Song of Madness overwrites this behaviour). Pairing them with someone aggressive puts your caster right up amongst all their enemies shit. Most of the time you will be fine, but if there is multiple enemies they will surround your front man and then end up in range of the caster. This applies even more so for Archer characters. They have skills to boost their range that if they are with someone aggressive will be wasted because they will run right up to the enemy.
So there is a trade off there, you can pair archers with casters and they will snipe while your caster casts.
Pairing people with high movement lets them both get out of range of magic more often (happens surprisingly more than you expect if you don't use Holy Dash!) and seems to give you a bit more flexibility with how your pairs behave.
At theend of the day though it never really pays off because skills like Repel or Swing are still so effective at low ranks that they are nearly always worth taking over Holy Dash, it is a Suikoden game so it is still pretty easy, even if you can work around it, Fire Runes are still pretty universally weaker than Lightning ones are (Thunderstorm is stupid) and most damning of all nothing in the game tells you how any of it fuckin get works. Movement and positioning is actually quite strictly defined, but nothing shows you how or where it is broken up (I think just from feel that the battle map is actually a bunch of hexes) to how 138 MOV translates into that. Most of the time players just see Movement as a restriction on the number of swings they can take round 1 and that is it. Which to be fair is pretty much all base line movement gives you. Increasing movement doesn't give you much more, but it does do something.
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Hahah yeah, I don't think I've ever actually known that, and I've played Suikoden 3 like three times.
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I would note that last time I talked with Elf about it I am pretty sure I came out of the discussion not sure if I was seeing patterns where there wasn't really any or not. Having just finished a play through recently I am pretty confident in them, but at the end of the day it doesn't matter at all because even if they are there they go unnoticed by huge portion of the playerbase. A system that no one uses that no one knows about functionally doesn't exist.
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(I think just from feel that the battle map is actually a bunch of hexes)
This is absolutely the case. Once you realise this and get a feel for it you will pretty much see the grid.
I basically agree with all your comments there. S3 has a kinda cool movement/positioning system which is somewhat obscured from the player and he or she doesn't need to know it anyway, so yeah it is largely irrelevant unless you want to be a stupid nerd about it. I obviously do.
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Well if you want to nerd lord over it, the thing I like most about it is that because it works on a grid, the strategy battles also work like the regular battles, both on the macro level and the micro levels, but you have less direct control of them on the micro scale and on the macro there is more restrictions on the space of the battlefield. It is that which really drives that the system is full of very intentional design decisions that are completely lost on the player because they actively avoid presenting it to them. It makes for the game in the series with the most interesting and thought out strategy battles having portions of its cool factor hidden from it, not to mention it is used so incredibly sparingly that it feels entirely under utilised.
Hands down the game that pushes the envelope hardest in the series (other games that break series norms are breaking them in very industry safe ways) and is simultaneously the game I don't think pushed the envelope enough. I assume they didn't go as far with it as they did because series fans are incredibly defensive and resistant to change, but ultimately the Suikodrn community outside the DL is still but hurt about S3, so they may as well have gone all in.
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Introducing Suikoden 3: The Golden! Bringing all the things you wanted to the game but the developers didn't have time for! New plays, new events, and brand new ending! Actually battle at night! Refined gameplay mechanics! Have actual control over your PCs! And a new character that everyone likes and is good at everything and may or may not be the cause of the whole thing!
Enjoy events like Hugo joining the band with Toppo, Nei, and Shabon and learning to play the guitar in 3 days! Go to Geddoe's yodeling recital! Spend Christmas with Chris!
Coming soon!
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Going back to the original whine, Suikoden 3's recruitment is vastly superior to most other Suikodens due to 1 thing: no time limits. Go ahead and make recruitment weird & obscure if you want (it generally isn't in S3), but don't make it so if you don't re-check every town after every event you can permanently miss a character. You can lock yourselves out of recruits in S3, but it's always by screwing up dialogue choices / war battles / duels. You never time out any recruits to my knowledge, unlike S2 / S5, both horrible offenders. So you can advance the plot guilt-free you didn't talk to the entire world again.
S3 also had a reasonably useful detective, which was nice, unlike S5, where Oboro is the world's most incompetent detective. Gee thanks for telling me I can recruit person X, I could guess that already from the fact they had a portrait...
(if I had to complain about 1 S3 perma-miss, it's Ayame. Lose the meaningless duel and she doesn't join? Whatever game, ninjas make no sense.)
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Introducing Suikoden 3: The Golden! Bringing all the things you wanted to the game but the developers didn't have time for! New plays, new events, and brand new ending! Actually battle at night! Refined gameplay mechanics! Have actual control over your PCs! And a new character that everyone likes and is good at everything and may or may not be the cause of the whole thing!
Enjoy events like Hugo joining the band with Toppo, Nei, and Shabon and learning to play the guitar in 3 days! Go to Geddoe's yodeling recital! Spend Christmas with Chris!
Coming soon!
Also he rides a skateboard.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OThgYAgng18
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Damnit. I can't believe I forgot he rides a skateboard.
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Curtain Call: I've unlocked most characters I think. Ok, I know I'm missing a handful but a majority of them are unlocked!
I will probably get the DLC characters after all that...maybe...though US not getting Krile is kind of bullshit even if I don't really care about the character, and glancing at her skillset, she's not very good.
She's a Mage, but caps at Bluff and doesn't get any unique Limits. She gets all the Aras and Agas sans Aerora (which sucks anyway), and naturally learns Meteor (massive damage when you hit a benchmark on a BMS), and gets Mana's Paean 2. She also has high agility. Doesn't sound so bad, right?
Well compare that to Vivi. Vivi lacks Krile's speed, but instead gets Dualcast over Bluff, all 3 levels of Magic Up instead of Mana's Paean 2, Fire instead of Thunder (lateral shift, depends on song, etc.) Tornado and Doomsday instead of Meteor (which can be taught via a scroll anyway.) Furthermore, if you want to talk twinking, stats aren't that meaningful since Crystarium can be used to cover that.
To say nothing of Shantotto who has everything Vivi has outside of Tornado alongside Bluff (only character who gets Bluff and Dualcast) and Ancient Magic. Both Vivi and Shantotto are characters that can be gotten for free (I think Shantotto is even a potential default pick), Krile you have to spend money on.
She's probably better than Vincent though, who gets a bunch of defensive/agility based songs, only one of the Magic types (Fire)...unless you want to count Aero spells which are AHAHAHAHAHAH, and Satan Slam, a Limit. Yep, totally worth spending money on THIS guy! At least Krile looks competent if she were a free character, Vincent's just flat out embarrassing for someone you need to spend money on.
...why yes, yes I did just go on about Krile's worth in Curtain Call (with some Vincent mockery) because we can't buy her and how she's not worthwhile, what about it?
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BD- The evil battle is down. No SP was actually even used in the fight. Just the standard "get absurdly lucky with turn order." I was especially lucky in that Qada must have hit the outside range of random variance and on turn 1 went before my faster defensive setups. I made some tactical misplays, but still insane luck. I hate that the fight can cause so many resets such on randomness of the first turn (Hey, if Qada goes right before Mephilia, you have absolutely no choice but to use SP. Even everyone Defaulting still doesn't help if Qada goes first (well, I guess maybe with the Templar passive. That may have worked too with a little grinding).
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@Meeple, you have no idea how pissed I am that we're not getting Krile. I need my FFV complete cast!
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You can also use Stillness first turn to remove most of the randomness, although that also puts you in a bit of a BP hole to start the battle.
EDIT: Actually, it's not that bad a hole?
Turn 1: Stillness. Spiritmaster at -3 BP. Performer uses 2x One More For You to bring them back to -1.
Turn 2: Enigma. Spiritmaster at -4 BP. (Someone else needs to reduce Qada's speed this turn.)
Turn 3: Performer back at 0 SP, uses One More For You x2 on Spiritmaster.
Repeat turns 2-3 forever, win.
That may have even been what I did, I dunno! I didn't have nearly as much trouble with this battle as you or Snowfire, but I was pretty fortunate in that most of the pieces of this strategy were on my default set: I already had a speed-twinked spiritmaster, as well as a performer and a pirate.
Even without Stillness though it's hardly "absurdly" luck-based, though, as there's only a 50/50 chance for Qada to outspeed Mephilia turn 1, and any turn thereafter you can fuck around with his speed. I never saw him go before Mephilia thereafter but if it's possible you could also remove all doubt by speeding up Mephilia.
(And you're probably aware of this, but this fight is pretty much into the non-canon aftergame territory, so it certainly is under no obligation to play "fair".)
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FFX Lulu solo (Expert Grid): Well when I bought FFX-2 I got this for free, soooooo...
I named Tidus "Oh fuck!" It is amazing. Thanks Zenny.
I also named Valefor "Chicken". I wonder: Is Dark Valefor going to be named Dark Chicken?
Jesus the time spent watching unskippable cutscenes is off the charts. Thankfully playing this on the vita means I can do other things at the same time. By the way, don't listen to Meeple's lies, Tidus is terrible.
This actually looks like it might be a pretty damn difficult challenge, as the way experience works penalizes the player a lot for screwing around in the sphere grid. Like, the consequence for getting out of the normal path to get some HP+200 sphere, would be the equivalent of learning Firaga at level 60 instead of 55. This is big. So -> I'm making a beeline for the Aga spells, stopping only for the occasional agility up spheres. (Because I have seen some stoners who are faster than Lulu is right now, seriously)
I don't remember if this game sells useful potions at all, let's hope it does because I'm not stopping for Cura on the way.
Supposedly when a character fails running away, it's because he's been cornered by monsters right? With Yuna's failed running animation she just looks like she goes "Hmmm... Nah. I'll keep fighting"
Maybe Squaresoft didn't want to show her falling flat on her face wearing that dress. Big missed opportunity here.
Edit: Even in HD, Seymour's lame tribal tattoo still looks like belly hair
BTW people have found out how poise works in Dark Souls 2. It's weird.
http://www.reddit.com/r/DarkSouls2/comments/2n8aqd/everything_you_ever_wanted_to_know_about_poise/
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Edit: Even in HD, Seymour's lame tribal tattoo still looks like belly hair
Wait, you mean it isn't?
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Man you tell me.
I'm not even sure anymore.
http://www.studentsoftheworld.info/sites/jeux/img/426_seymour%20presentation.jpg
The only thing I know is that no one should wear this
(And my god why did Seymour use a pencil sharpener on his fingers?)
BTW I won the Blitzball match 2-1. What the hell? I didn't even pay any attention to it, just had everything on auto and passed the ball to Wakka/Oh fuck! so they could do their super-moves.
When I played through the game years ago I reset like 6 times and still couldn't do it.
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Trivia of the day:
Guano means pigeon shit in French
I am fighting Seymour Pigeon Shit
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Trivia of the day:
Guano means "excrement of birds" in English. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guano )
Bonus trivia you already know but geeks can't resist correcting people: It's Seymour Guado. (In French, too. http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Fantasy_X ) (Which is still a little weird... like calling Rikku "Rikku al-Bhed." Sure, I can see referring to foreigners by their nationality - Bob the Greek if you're not in Greece - but do the Guados really go by "Guado" as their last name among each other?)
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Damn.
Well he'll always be Seymour Guano in my heart
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Jesus the time spent watching unskippable cutscenes is off the charts.
I really wonder if Square realizes that they probably lost out on so many damn potential sales with this. It's the only damn thing I really wanted in the game.
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Yeah I think we already had this discussion. I could have bought it at launch but just waited because of this, I effectively only really cared about FFX-2 HD (even though FFX has even more cutscenes than I remember)
Something else that I forgot about is that Lulu's end battle animation would feel tasteless in a Nippon Ichi game.
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It's pretty amazing really. Square-enix goes out of it's way to re-orchestrate the entire OST of FF10, which is completely unnecessary since the entire track is fine as is, and FF10 isn't exactly a game whose OST was held back by the instrumental quality (this is a PS2 game guys), and something no one was asking for...
...but they couldn't be bothered to implement Scene Skip, which is probably FF10's most significant flaw? I mean, sceneskip wasn't exactly a thing back when FF10 came out, so why it lacked it there is understandable (though still a flaw because the net result is the same: You are stuck sitting through lengthy cut-scenes) but FF10 HD really has no excuse other than Square-enix basically ignoring the fans and doing whatever the hell they wanted.
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I named Tidus "Oh fuck!" It is amazing. Thanks Zenny.
Duh.
I also named Valefor "Chicken". I wonder: Is Dark Valefor going to be named Dark Chicken?
Duh.
By the way, don't listen to Meeple's lies, Tidus is terrible.
Duh.
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Actually, I fought that other summoner earlygame, and she summoned "Ifrit" and not "Chimney", the name I gave to Ifrit.
So I suspect there's not going to be any Dark Chicken :( :( :(
BTW I've been laughing for five minutes after reading this:
http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Point_of_No_Return
Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII
The Point of No Return occurs when Lightning enters the distortion formed at the middle of the fifth corridor within God's Sanctum in the Luxerion cathedral, where she saw Bhunivelze disguised as Hope take her friends' souls. After arguing with Bhunivelze, Lightning enters the Cosmogenesis, and the god awaits in the Sanct of Theogenesis.
I should give names to my rooms. Like "Trifecta of Paleo-Metempsychosis" instead of just "kitchen".
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Pokemon Alpha Sapphire: Props to Gamefreak for the opening sequence, that was actually clever.
Picked Treeko for my starter since Sceptile has the most interesting Mega of the three. Mega Drain at L13 is really nice, stronger on average than gen 3 Bullet Seed plus draining. After checking its level-up moves on Serebii I'm definately holding off on evo until L21, when it gets Giga Drain (!!!). That's well worth stalling for five levels, especially since you get boosted exp in the meantime.
Second team member is an L15 Taillow with Boomburst from a shaking spot. Luckily I managed to catch it at full health, since it easily outsped and OHKO'd everything I had at the time.
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Man
Sorry to talk so much about FFX but
Auron REALLY looks like Jeff Goldblum
It's uncanny
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Man
Sorry to talk so much about games that aren't FFX
It's okay, I forgive you.
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We are merciful gods.
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Speaking of FF10...
FF10 HD: So...about that post Seymour stuff...yeah I should talk about that, shouldn't I?
So we get to the Fayth...OF THE EXTREME!!! which we learn isn't creating an Aeon, but literally an entire city...of which only Tidus learns about because he goes to sleep and learns all the truth. Oh yeah, he also says "THIS IS MY STORY!"...I think this is the first time he says that since the game begins, to be honest, and that scene technically takes place after this scene. Interestingly, Tidus words it by saying "This is our...no, this is my story." Weird he'd start with the plural and then go to the singular. Only logic I can think of is Tidus is trying to assert himself by making it clear "it'll end how I want it, I don't care how anyone else thinks." Honestly, the line here just seems out of nowhere, and like a random theme they remembered existed and suddenly forcing it back in. Weird that people also harp on the "THIS IS MY STORY!" so much when he doesn't even say it that often.
I can sum up the sequence as follows:
Tidus: Why am I home?
Bahamut: It's a dream.
Tidus: Really? I need to stop dreaming!
Bahamut: But Tidus...you are a dream!
Tidus: ...that's crazy talk.
Bahamut: No seriously. You see, war happened between Bevelle and Zanarkand. Bevelle was all >:) and Zanarkand was all ;_; so they dreamed up a Zanarkand that can never sleep.
Tidus: o...k...
Bahamut: ...yeah, and they kind of want to stop dreaming. Mnaybe you and your dad, dreams who were TOUCHED BY SIN!!!, can finally stop it!
Considering all this, Tidus takes the news pretty well. His response is more of confusion than denial, and when he finally starts to process it, he goes right into the Acceptance state. TAKE THAT DENIAL, ANGER, BARGAINING AND DEPRESSION! TIDUS JUST BEAT YOUR 5 STAGES OF GRIEF BY GOING STRAIGHT TO STAGE 5, DEAL WITH IT!!!
In all seriousness, if there's one moment that really just puts a huge dent in the "Tidus is a whiner, all he does is whine", it's this very scene. Based on everything people whine about Tidus, if it was true, he'd have done his usual complaining and probably yelled at Bahamut here. Remember, he acted kind of similarly to Auron telling him Sin was Jecht, though there Tidus was more angry for a combination of reasons, as well as kind of went ballistic at the Yuna news earlier, but that was more because he was left in the dark about everything and kept making all these empty promises that he now learned were empty promises. Nonetheless, the fact that he takes the news as pretty much a "*sigh* that's a disappointment..." kind of shows that either:
A. Tidus is not the whiner people pretend he is as an easy way to go "He is an awful hero, game better off without it!"
B. Tidus was a whiner, but has gone through this thing called "character development" and so he is now able to take news well.
If A, well, I explained it there. If B, well...isn't that a GOOD thing? They put Tidus at a low point and managed to make him grow up and become not like he was early on. Anyone sensible doesn't look at how a character is early game and goes "this is a bad character, he will forever be bad!" First impressions are strong, but not always accurate; Tidus showing growth, if you subscribe to B, means he should be assessed at the end of the game and how far he is there, and the path he took there. That's how you look at dynamic characters!
So after this, we get...probably the most pointless section in the game, that being the Mt. Gagazet Caves. It's complete filler thrown in just to break up the fight between Seymour Flux and Sanctuary Keeper...and the latter is a 100% filler boss anyway. Seriously, this is a section of the game that bugged me because it is so forgettable, yet plugged in for the sake of added gameplay and the enemies aren't even that interesting. You're going to fight these things in Zanarkand anyway, and Zanarkand is way better!
So we learn Yunalesca is the one testing us, and that she's "alive as Seymour and Mika" ...yeah, this is pretty straight forward and little else. Well, Yuna does state that she's really not surprised and afraid of nothing at this point. To be frank, this makes sense seeing as from Yuna's perspective her options are basically "Succeed and die" or "Fail and die" so this concept of "Death" sort of loses all meaning when both options lead to it, might as well just throw away your fear of it!
...ok, that and Yuna is brave, we get it. THEN WE FIGHT A GIANT DRAGON BECAUSE YUNALESCA SAID SO!
Now onto a scene of MORE CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT! Rikku wants to take a break because they're near the summit, because she's trying to stall as much as possible, and is pretty much stating this outright too. Tidus is being open about how he doesn't want the quest to end, but knows it's almost over too. Wakka is basically there to lend an ear, and not much...but then strangely, Auron of all people responds, and in an unexpected way:
"You remind me of myself on my pilgrimage with Braska"
This is really the first time we get insight on what Auron was going through internally in the pilgrimage. We see glimpses of him from the spheres, where he mostly is the Super Ego of Braska with Jecht being the Id. This scene, Auron states that he really didn't think much of it until that point on the mountain where suddenly he had second thoughts, and started considering "maybe there is another way, why does Braska have to do this?" He states he wanted to change the world, but in the end, changed nothing.
So Auron is basically admitting he wanted to do the same as Tidus but failed. Wakka comments on a Legendary Guardian having second thoughts and Auron simply responds "well, I wasn't a legend back then" in effect. Adds that little bit of extra human element to Auron.
Then we see a shot of Zanarkand, Tidus does a narrative that is bland and boring but sounds dramatic so SHUT UP IT'S AWESOME YOU LISTEN TO IT SO WE CAN JUSTIFY THIS FMV!!! Then we get a scene with Rikku and Yuna. Rikku is still trying to talk Yuna out of it, and even convinced herself that Yuna WILL get out of this alive, and they will see each other again.
Yuna gives her a passionate huge...well, they are cousins, so I guess it's a family thing! It's actually kind of touching seeing Yuna give her regards to Rikku and Cid, and Rikku saying "no, you'll tell Cid these things yourself!" and yeah, it's a nice capstone on Rikku and Yuna's relationship which they don't really go much into beyond this scene...
...AND IT FURTHER MAKES FF10-2 GOD DAMNED PAINFUL. See, here they come off as something like family members who don't see each other often, but actually still care for one another. FF10-2, they're basically sorority girls. Here, we see yet again that Rikku has this thing called a "serious emotional side" that shows up multiple times through out FF10, to remind us there's a real character beneath the bubbly, fun personality. FF10-2 sort of deletes that aspect entirely and relegates Rikku to nothing but that surface level description raised several levels up. Really, her character in that game is being the "Fun Girl", with Yuna being the "Nice Girl" and Paine being the "Mean Girl." Because screw characters, we want our trope team dynamic!
...yeah, this replay is only further cementing how FF10-2 completely spat on Rikku's character, whether it be intentional because they didn't care, and just shoved her in a bikini because Fan-service, or because the guys who made FF10-2 didn't pay attention to the character at all, just looked at a couple of FF10 scenes and went "yeah, that's the character alright!" I get it, FF10-2 is a more light-hearted game, you could still afford to give Rikku a serious scene here and there.
But tangent from FF10-2 aside, we now have THE YUNA SPHERE!
Ok, I can sum this up pretty fast:
-She likes having Auron on her team because makes her closer to her father!
-She really likes Kimhari because he's always been there for her
-Wakka and Lulu are her real siblings in her eyes
-She has developed feelings for Tidus as early as Mii'hen Highroad.
None of that is worth noting except for that last one, and it's because of the irony involved. She talks about how it "hurts" because she knows she will "never get to spend the time she wants with him" obviously because she knows succeeding in her pilgrimage = she dies (and she reminds us that "if you're watching this, I am already dead.") The ironic part is, ignoring FF10-2's special ending, she is absolutely correct here, but for the completely wrong reasons. She's going to end up surviving this, it's Tidus who will not. It makes you wonder how she would have thought of it if the situation were reversed from the outset. It's a neat little bit of foreshadowing with irony. Also worth noting that while the "YOU ARE A DREAM!!!" has been revealed, the game doesn't state what will happen to Tidus and Jecht if they stop dreaming. If anything, the game suggested that Tidus could be an exception since he was "touched by Sin" but it's left intentionally vague. So by this point, the player really has no reason to believe Tidus is going to die by the end, and you're more just wondering "ok, how are they going to find a way to keep Yuna alive?"
Rikku left out because the sphere takes place before meeting up with Rikku. I think that scene Yuna shares with Rikku is kind of meant to fill in there, as we otherwise would never hear what Yuna really thinks about Rikku. I'd say it's forced but the way it works itself fits well enough since it is in character for Rikku to try and do whatever she can to tell "YUNA DON'T DO IT!" and given where they are on the journey, it fits that Yuna would take this moment to reassure Rikku.
And then we get to Zanarkand, and we learn Tidus was pretty much telling the entire story to the team (minus the dream part of course), and that's what the narrative basically was! ANd then we go off, awesome music plays...slightly butchered because FF10 HD remastered music THAT IT DID NOT HAVE TO REMASTER SERIOUSLY WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT!?, minor cutscenes ensue along the way, then we get to the Blitz Ball Dome and one of the best songs in FF10 is replaced with one of the most generic and repetitive songs.
Look, I get why they changed the music; the song works as a build up to the dome and once you're there, the tone from "Build up" to "11th Hour!" is a thing, but...the Blitz Ball match up theme? Really? That's the song you're using for a "Fake Final Dungeon"? Especially after "A Fleeting Dream"? Yeah, screw you, I'm done playing for the night!
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While the blitzball track certainly isn't the best track in the world, it's a very appropriate choice for a dungeon which is... well, a blitzball stadium.
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I get that part, still doesn't really work for context of the game. It fits where you are, but not really what is going on and it really is just a dull after the piece before. I get why the track is the way it is; in most substantial situation you'll hear it, you won't hear it for more than a minute, so you don't need a long piece but it really just fails for anything with legitimate gameplay and plot context.
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I haven't gotten to that part yet but I'm sure the Thunder Plains music fits ways less.
It's like they wanted to compensate for the fact that you're getting your ass destroyed by a thunder strike every ten seconds by having the cheeriest theme.
Typical situation: You just finished a long battle against one of those golems, so you relax a little. BOOM Thunderstrike less than one second after the battle victory screen, Tidus gets wrecked, and the soundtrack is all ^_^ ^_^
Edit: Yeah it's pretty great.
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Hyrule Warriors - Finally got the Level 3 Great Fairy, thank god. Such a difficult map! Now I am working on the Level 3 Summoning Gate. Meanwhile, I also got the second DLC set -- Twili Midna, Dominion Rod, and new map -- and the Amiibo Spinner thing. :D Spent a small amount of time making fun of people whining about the Spinner being tied to Amiibo on GameFAQs. I'm not sure why I care, but the miserable manchilddom just rubs me the wrong way sometimes.
Super Mario 3D World - Spent most of the last couple hours collecting Green Stars, since I know I will need them for the aftergame. Before that, I played a few maps with one of my friends. Throwing someone who is kinda bad at platformers into World 6 of a Mario game was probably a bad idea, and we lost all our lives, but it was funny as hell.
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FFX Yattaf solo:
Holy shit Seymour 1
It took me like five hours of saving and reloading and grinding and setup changing to beat this guy. Dude can summon Anima, who uses unblockable instant death right away and has 16000 HPs. Just getting one turn before Anima uses instant death is an ordeal. And then you have to do 16000 damage in that one turn. Then when Anima dies, the real FFX begins, Seymour gets super angry and does so much of damage.
I only won thanks to SOS Antifire. I was desperate enough to mod freaking SOS Antifire into some armor and it allowed me to win. It's a good thing Seymour thinks he's playing Chrono Cross and has to use his spells in the exact same order all the time.
I looked at solo challenge faqs for other characters like Auron and Wakka and they basically all say "Yeah, to get past this battle... Just cheat man"
The Lulu solo faq said "Bring that Lightningproof armor to the battle" and I was all ".... Lightningproof armor?" and the faq was all "You're screwed LOL"
Thankfully, SOS Antifire to the rescue
BTW in this game, the super old guy in the team is 35.
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Arguably he's 25 plus spoilerspoilers. But whatever, he looks and acts 35 so we'll give him a pass.
This is still older than the "old guy" in lots of games, including both the previous two FFs (and tying FF7's, no Vincent does not count). Not to mention every Lunar, every Grandia (outside Mareg who is apparently similar), Mana Khemia, etc., etc.
I'd complain about this in RPGs more except it is kinda realistic to the actual age where people are running around hitting things with swords.
And yeah, Seymour 1 is a bitch on most solos. For Wakka I had to reach some reasonably high Str threshold so I could one-shot Anima with Attack Reels (she does use Boost first turn which amps damage to her by 1.5x, at least, even non-typed damage). Not that unreasonable, I only had to be kiinda overlevelled because Attack Reels is so great. Auron/Lulu/Kimahri all have a really hard time there though. Good show on the SOS Nul, yeah I've used that too.
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BD- At the final dungeon. Shit, I guess I had to actually go and pay attention to Freelancer's level ups. Doesn't even learn Late Bloomer? Not like I really care, but I was already annoyed enough with the skill. Turns out that it's just a completely worthless skill that just further hampers one of the game's more annoying classes (Not worthless, but annoying. A class that has one amazing skill- but one you'll only use once- and then a bunch of garbage off bad stats).
Final Eternia battle was fun with that damage rushing on both sides though! I feel like maybe if the Eternians had any idea what was really happening, maybe they should have been a bit more adamant or insightful instead of letting you smash their faces in 5 times.
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SOS Nul-abilities were crucial for Tidus SCC too, in particular it was the only way to immunity to...Ice I think it was? which there was no way I could get around fast enough against Omnis even with the Caladbolg. Luckily, he nukes you with Ultima right before it, and you can HP twink Tidus to barely survive that!
FF10 replays tend to always involve me investing loads of money in things I expect to be useful, but ultimately never end up using anyway. Like this playthrough, Tidus' Slowtouch weapon sounds cool because hey, Tidus won't learn Slow on Auron's grid, and Yuna's going to take forever to get it and may skip it outright! Turns out I never bother to use it anyway...
...and soon going to sell like everything (Sellable) of Tidus' besides the Sonic Steel, because Caladbolg unlock.
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Man FFX is not really a good game for solos at all compared to a lot of RPGs and you still all did it. You all love your FFX.
I got Doublecast and that was the end of my path.
Flare is waaay further on the expert sphere grid, locked behind a few level 3 and 4 spherelocks or whatever they're called.
I decided to wait until I got the appropriate keychainspheres.
Then ten seconds later I just teleported to Auron's first sphere node to get Haste instead. WOOO
Then I think I'm going for the Rikkuish path because she also has Flare, only locked behind level 2 annoyingspheres. Yep.
Seymour Nachos went "Cool, you have Stoneward... But do you have Stoneproof?" and of course I died. Jesus Christ FFX.
Fortunately he only uses it below 24000 HPs, and Doublecast Firaga + Overdrive > 24001 HPs. He actually died from his little buddy panicking and stealing his last 4000 Hps from him.
I then averted my eyes from the Tidus sex
About Auron, well he really has the role of the wise old mentor guy in the team (despite his youth), and there isn't often a guy like him in every RPG party... Especially FF8
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Is there any plot reasons why your team of heretics hunted by Yevon can play blitzball competitively? Does the Blitzball league grant asylum?
That's like Ben Laden playing in the World Cup
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I tried replaying FFX once but the International edition crashed out on me at the fight where you team up with Seymour against Sin and I can't bear the thought of wading through the first part of the game *again*.
SRWZ3: Beat, finally, on a loaner game played on a loaner PS3, because Internet friends are the best. The thing just gets steamrolled after 2/3 of the way through, as much as any game in the series that I can remember, but it was a good time. TTGL, for pete's sake. So awesome.
Theatrhythm CC: Got this for the 3DS I got for my birthday. Lots of fun as a rhythm game, but the RPG elements are completely lost on me. The way they implement the genres doesn't really mesh, unless you miss a lot of notes.
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It's definitely more of a thing in the original Theathrhythm. I think they decided to downplay the RPG elements in the sequel because, well, they aren't really all that great. I generally think it's an upgrade because you are freer to play the game with whoever you want, which is the point of a silly silly crossover game, no?
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Man FFX is not really a good game for solos at all compared to a lot of RPGs and you still all did it. You all love your FFX.
I dunno, I would certainly consider it a better game for solos than FF5-6 because of more interesting skills/equipment stuff (e.g. SOS Nuls!) and much more interesting enemy design. In the FF5 solo I felt I could only ever lose because of fatal status* (some of that is FF5 enemies being undamaging, some of it is the fact that one PC = overlevelled in those games).
It's also a better game for solos than say Grandia 3 or Shadow Hearts 3, two games I considered doing one for but realised they would just be way too hard because of the fact the games are just harder to start with + the way enemies can gang up on you (especially in Grandia). Like yeah you could probably get around this by grinding a lot but that would be stupid.
And then lots of games have solos which don't work well because they revive your other party members to full (or even just 1 HP + they can't target themselves and/or escape individually like in FFX) and so much of the "solo" strategy is hoping your allies take some hits for you, and I just find that very unappealing. WA4's high on my list of favourite RPGs ever (especially gameplaywise) but a solo has never been terribly tempting in that game for me, for that reason.
I haven't done any other solos; if you feel like recommending any good ones, feel free!
*EDIT: and Atomos of course
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It's definitely more of a thing in the original Theathrhythm. I think they decided to downplay the RPG elements in the sequel because, well, they aren't really all that great. I generally think it's an upgrade because you are freer to play the game with whoever you want, which is the point of a silly silly crossover game, no?
Yeah, pretty much this. In the first game, stats mattered more because you wanted to kill as many bosses as possible in Dark Notes to get as many shards as possible, and you wanted at least one half-decent speedster for FMS' to get that Boss unlock. This led to situations like "Any FMS based PC is useless because someone like Terra or Shantotto is good enough and actually effective in BMS." Naturally, defensive characters were not worth much unless you simply wanted to survive to the end of a song, not caring about rating.
Here, you just want to kill one Boss and you've gotten the significant rewards for a Medley; multiple gets you more bells and whistles, but is not crucial. Also recruiting characters is way easier in Curtain Call than it is the original, it cannot be stressed enough.
Generally speaking, if you don't care about the RPG Element, then just equip a bunch of defensive skills, stat ups, etc., just so you can survive to the end of the song. The RPG element is more extra fluff like how many enemies you can kill in a BMS, how far can you travel on an FMS, how many enemies can you kill with a "hands free" style, etc. It's basically there for getting trophies. You do want to factor this in to some degree when doing Medleys to insure you kill the notable bosses for Shards, but beyond that, not a big deal.
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Hyrule Warriors - Got the Level 3 Summoning Gate and grabbed Ganondorf's Level 3 weapon as well. Now I'm working on getting some Gold Skulltulas and maybe going to grab Level 3's for the characters that you get in Adventure Mode as well as Darunia. At some point I should work on the Master Quest too.
Smash 4 - Did the Smash Tour to unlock a new stage. It's more fun than Smash Run because it doesn't try to be a shitty platformer, but it's still kinda weird. I like that it intersperses Smash gameplay in the core of the game instead of the fucking bizareness of Smash Run. Ran into one map that spawned like a Galaga every few seconds. It was pretty hilarious. Also been trying to git gud at the free-for-all mode.
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The solo gameplay in FFX is very good; when I said it wasn't a great game for solos, I mostly talked about the annoyances: Long unskippable cutscenes (sometimes before bosses), needing characters to flee at the starting of every battle (this requires 4 button presses per fleeing attempt and can fail), generally slow battle pace.
I actually really liked FF5 solo? I didn't feel I could die much less to damage than in FFX. (Admittedly Lulu is pretty tanky...) I had a lot of difficult fights like Exdeath 1 and had to switch strategies a lot.
BUT I don't know about you but I also had an additional no-monk rule because monk made every other class obsolete in that context. This meant I also didn't have HP+30%.
Persona 3 Portable was my favourite solo, I think, since the game just showers you with options, has a ton of interesting battles and lets you fly through the dating sim aspect. Pretty cool Yattaf too.
You'd probably enjoy SaGa Frontier 1 solo (Just not with Emelia as her first boss requires grinding) It's also a great way to rediscover the game and one of the only ways (...outside speedruns?) to make all that SaGa Frontier knowledge actually have a real use. Random battles outside the lab become threatening, you have to balance learning techs and being good in battles, etc.
Romancing SaGa 3 was very similar and better as a solo game, but a lot more difficult so you'd really have to know the game first. I'm also totally biased towards it because it has my favourite Yattaf
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I haven't done any other solos; if you feel like recommending any good ones, feel free!
Valkyrie Profile, my good man.
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Oh yeah, absolutely agreed about the long cutscenes, they do suck. You must remember that I cut my teeth on FFT challenges so I'm used to that sort of garbage, you don't want to know how many times I've seen Barinten get thrown off a roof, or Wiegraf's whiny speech, or Gafgarion telling Ramza to haul ass back to Igros.
Exdeath 1 I recall being easy outside the chance of Doom to start the battle (which you can cast Return to get around). Golem/Carbuncle, or just Protect/Shell if you'd rather run White/Mix than Summon (but Summon provides offence). You could also get all the defensive buffs if you dropped Time Mage, but I love my Haste too much. FF5 buffs are amazing things. In fairness, FFX's are too, but the game designers are a bit more aware of this and bosses remove positive status more, and/or have other tricks to circumvent them). FFX's enemy damage scale is also a bit higher to start with, but the biggest thing is that in FF5 solos you get a big level boost which roughly doubles your HP.
I didn't find Monk very useful at all, past the earlygame, as usual with FF5. Barehanded was nice if you needed to give other jobs physical damage (although that falls off by mid world 2 even with the level boost IIRC) but that was about it. I certainly didn't get HP+30. The one thing I banned to ensure I actually had to make choices was Mix (since Mix has like every buff ever but is annoying to farm things for) but that wasn't really necessary or anything.
Saga Frontier does feel like one worth trying at some point!
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Does Barinten getting thrown off a roof actually ever get old?
I don't remember the specifics with ExDeath 1 but I had to choose between time magic and... Damage? Healing? I might have just not mastered the right jobs. I certainly didn't bother with Mix.
Captain K, are you crazy, this sounds like the worst game for solos. You have almost no options and have to rely on the RNG Gods all the time. And how do you get past Bloodbane anyway? This is B ending only?
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Guts/Angel Curio/Auto Item blahblahblah will get you past most everything with enough luck. For Bloodbane... you're thinking of Heal every 10 turns above half HP or whatever it is? Hmm, you'd need to muster 11k damage per turn to avoid that. Seems tricky for a solo but doable, probably something involving Charge and Reverie and such. (Or you could use Lawfer and a Combo Jewel and soul crush every turn or two with the Dinosaur, broke'd.) I do have to agree that I don't think VP is really in its element in solos, since so much of that game is the interplay of comboing your different PCs' attacks together.
Yeah I suppose for Exdeath 1 you'd really want to have at least one of Summon 4, Time 4 (or at least 2; 4 is just for Return), or White 5 going into the fight so you can have two useful skillsets. I was probably taking that for granted.
Does Barinten getting thrown off a roof actually ever get old?
Not really, no.
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Not really a fan of replaying most games these days, let alone doing a solo challenge (at least when things get grindy & slow - e.g. FF12 solo is surely doable, and surely super-boring), but one time I tried one was Arc the Lad 4 of all games. You get some super accessories in a NG+ which include things like "double XP" IIRC. Since the system to that game was pretty great but way too easy, I figured I'd try a Kharg / Darc solo, but... it doesn't ACTUALLY get harder, because that game has subtractive defense, so if you overlevel your solo character - which is going to happen - you basically stop taking damage. So I pretty well abandoned the run, it wasn't interesting. Alas.
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I just saw a video of a(n over enthusiastic) guy playing VP solo and he couldn't get past Bloodbane because of Heal yeah (but could have with the RNG planets aligned). That was with Valkyrie, Lawfer would have an easier time.
A big problem is that Bloodbane used heal even with nearly no HPs left, I wonder when the rumour that he doesn't use Heal at low HPs came from?
Dude had 90 000 HPs
He used Auto Item / Throw / Splash / Charge, said Reverie didn't help there.
He needed to use Combo Jewel to get a PWS with a sword and that wasted a ton of turns. He tried Might Potions.
He needed Bloodbane to never guard/dodge and to never hit successfuly with status, and he needed to have perfect timing for his attacks.
(BTW he mentioned Captain K of course)
Snowfire: Yeah it's like Fire Emblem. In FE if you only use one guy you just cruise through all the midgame because you have one overleveled dude in a game with substractive defense.
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Sounds about right re Bloodbane. As far as Heal at low HPs goes... maybe he can use it in the Gravity Blessing range but not the Death Sanction range? I know I did some challenge which required skipping Heal and it worked. Though, IIRC VP AI changes at lower HP thresholds are sometimes a bit fuzzy and enemies sometimes do things they aren't "supposed" to.
The FE thing is very true. I've never even done a solo with a Def-based character but I've done Lyn and Colm and high evade has the same effect; being overlevelled in many of these games is just brutal on the enemies. The only reason FE solos get under control is you hit the level cap and stop improving past a certain point which lets the enemies catch up. That and sometimes the enemies have win conditions that don't require killing you, these are often some of the hardest maps (Sands of Time, Last Hope, etc.).
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The guy experimented a bit later in the video.
At low HPs on the 10th turn, if he attacked (and missed) Bloodbane used Heal, if he used an item Bloodbane used Gravity Blessing. So there's a bit of randomness there.
Probably the easiest way to play through an average Fire Emblem is to just use around 5 characters, and raise a few prepromotes near the end. The first few and the last few maps are a tiny bit more difficult than usual, while the rest of the game is utterly crushed.
Pokemon is even more unbalanced; use only one Pokemon and destroy the entire game.
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Yeah, you even get the benefit of supports if you go for ~5 characters, which are often a pretty big deal.
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I did a solo run with Lucius in FE7. Only on Eliwood normal mode, though. It was laughably easy. If you were going to take on a hard mode, I imagine Marcus would be the best pick.
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Marcus Solo gets walled so hard at the final chapter. Actually many FE7 solos do, I think Meeple gave up on beating his Hector one there for instance. I'm actually pretty impressed Lucius was able to get through that, though blah blah depends on stats etc. RNG abuse can go a long way if you're willing to do that.
HM actually barely matters for the final chapter, and everything before then is largely fairly easy on a solo (aside from some rough spots getting started depending on the character, and as mentioned a few points where you can lose a battle without dying)... so yeah mode shouldn't matter too much I wouldn't think.
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Doesn't surprise me that much about Hector, as he has low mdef, pretty bad ranged weapons, and crazy as usual but not that crazy FE evasion. I think mages are at their best for this kind of challenge. Erk would have had an even easier time I think.
I tried a Seth solo on hard mode in FE8, it was very easy until that battle in the volcano.
FFX: Why did we never rank Biran? He has plot. Probably art. He's a better rank than Kimahri.
Biran vs Suikoden 5 Zahhak.
Defender X was super mean, getting turns out of nowhere with some real ultramurderdamage. I don't think I'd have gone anywhere without Haste here. Yojimbo was a real total weakling in comparison. He is lucky I am willing to spend 300k just to rename him "Fred". It's canon now, by the way. He's Fred.
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Wait, Biran scales? That's no fun. Nevermind then.
And I just noticed the FFX boss stat topic just now. Damn it.
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Yeah Biran and Yenke are fucked up in the DL sadly. Well, given the way they scale it's pretty inarguable that they're some shade of bad, but how bad eludes science.
Also Erk seems all but hopeless against the Dragon. 20/20 Erk with Excalibur does 0 damage there; even with RNG abuse and/or stat boosters to cap his stats the most he can do is 6 (12 if he doubles, which needs capped speed pretty much). So he'll need to eat 10 dragon attacks to win and that just needs too many Elixirs since you only have five inventory slots. Lucius does much better there due to Aureola hitting weakness.
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Erk + Elixir mules solo, then?!
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Well, I would question if that is still a "solo" but yeah that would work (again, assuming you RNG abuse him or get lucky). Can't call a solo where you have to bend the rules like that an easy one, though!~
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Marcus Solo gets walled so hard at the final chapter. Actually many FE7 solos do, I think Meeple gave up on beating his Hector one there for instance. I'm actually pretty impressed Lucius was able to get through that, though blah blah depends on stats etc. RNG abuse can go a long way if you're willing to do that.
HM actually barely matters for the final chapter, and everything before then is largely fairly easy on a solo (aside from some rough spots getting started depending on the character, and as mentioned a few points where you can lose a battle without dying)... so yeah mode shouldn't matter too much I wouldn't think.
Light is the only battle in the game that really punishes low speed (Oh god does it ever) and Dragon has fearsome defense. If you don't hit a weakness there you are going to have trouble against the final.
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FF10 HD: So...we just wrecked 1000 years of tradition in order to save the world!
First plot stuff we get? A bunch of scenes from prior pilgrimages! Apparently Ohaland and that other dude aren't important enough, BUT LADY YOCUN MUST BE SHOW SO WE CAN FORGET ABOUT HER 2 MINUTES LATER! Then we have kid Seymour whose all "I don't wanna say the world because you won't be in it :(" even though he's going to die too...pretty weird thing for the kid to be scared that his mother is going to die instead of he himself and...wait, how does Seymour and his mother know that the Final Aeon yield the death of the person? You don't learn about this until you get inside! I suppose because Lord Jiscal is a Maester, he might have inside knowledge or something, but that's about the best I can come up with.
Then we see Jecht being all "Don't do it" and Braska's all "too bad" and Jecht's like "Well shucks, I tried" and Auron's like "MY TURN! BEHOLD MY HEARTFELT SPEECH TO TALK YOU OUT OF IT!" and Braska's like "nope, didn't work!"
Then we do the Cloyster of Trials...which is weird because they don't play the music here but they do play it if you come back to get the Destruction Sphere! THIS IS TOTALLY IMPORTANT AND IF YOU SAY OTHERWISE YOU CLEARLY DO NOT HAVE YOUR PRIORITIES STRAIGHT!
Then we meet some old dude who is...completely useless. Like, does Yunalesca really need an old, undead butler to help her? What does a dead person who does nothing but lay around half naked on a couch need? Speaking of which, what the hell does she do all these years?
There's 8 Aeons in the game, meaning 8 people who reached Zanarkand and failed to kill Sin (or in Seymour's case, simply said "screw you, I quit!"), so they met Yunalesca, then we have the 4 high summoners. So over the course of 1000 years, only 12 pilgrimages have gotten that far...you'd think she'd be happy to see another person! You're the first person she's seen in like 10 years after all, and Braska is...the first person she's seen since Seymour's pilgrimage I guess? God knows how long a difference between Seymour and the others and *fast forward button pressed because this is looking too deep into things*
So Yunalesca appears, is all "kill one of your friends so you can kill Sin...and you will die too...KILL YOURSELF DO IT DO IT DO IT DO IT!" Yuna's like "ok" and Lulu and Wakka are like "We volunteer!" then Tidus is all "HELL NAW!"
Ok, to be serious, this is the part where Tidus really comes through. He puts his foot down and says "no, you are not going through with this, killing yourself is not the answer." We see a flashback with Auron saying the same thing to Braska, and Braska just goes "there's a chance it won't!" and it does, and Auron gets angry seeing this part of his life over. This is a rare case of seeing Auron show legitimate emotion that isn't casual happiness or anger or something. Which is fine; Auron's suppose to be kind of stoicy and unphased by much, so seeing him get emotional shows just how much this hurts him. Tidus seeing Auron doing the same thing and failing just further cements that Tidus has to try harder.
Wakka and Lulu respond with "You want everything, but you'll get nothing. Stop being a child!" Tidus says "but I want everything!" Not the best response, but Tidus is also not the brightest person despite not being an idiot. The better statement is Tidus' follow up to that:
"Ok, tell me, what would an adult do? Just send more summoners to throw away like trash?" Paraphrased, but I do like his point here, because while it is arguably "childish" he's taking the moral high ground and basically saying "This is stupid! All you're doing is enabling more death and destruction and we all know it's just a temporary solution!" Then he follows up with "Yunalesca knows, let's talk to her one last time!"
Yunalesca of course goes "nope, Final Summoning, only way, AND SIN ALWAYS COMES BACK!" and pretty much spells out that Yevon's teachings were always a lie, just to give people hope, if a false one. Then Yuna gives the "we will live without false hope!" speech, basically telling Yunalesca to shove it, Auron's "Now's the time!" speech kicks in, everyone gives their epic lines of determination, and they kick Yunalesca's ass. Yunalesca's response is "Now you've REALLY doomed Spira! Yu Yevon is immortal!" and dies.
Then we have talking about what to do next, then Auron pulls Tidus aside. One thing I left out is in an earlier scene, Jecht explains why he decides to go with Braska:
He's given up hope of ever going home, and thus his biggest dream will never be fulfilled. What is his dream? Seeing Tidus grow up and become a star player like he himself. This is the scene that finally encaptures that Jecht was thinking what he was doing is tough love, and he really did care for Tidus, and wanted him to succeed, he just was really bad at doing it. Still, it's a noble dream nonetheless, and one he will never see fulfilled, so he decides he might as make himself useful.
So piggybacking off that, Jecht basically hands the torch over to Auron, asking him to raise Tidus. He calls him a crybaby that needs protecting, but it's still a noble thing to do; he wants to make sure Tidus has some form of father figure to look up to, though the Tidus/Auron relationship came off more like Nephew/Uncle than pseudo father/son, but I digress. Still, we also learn that Auron is dead, he used this to his advantage, etc.
Not much important happens from here, just discussing of what to do next. I guess a few minor things worth noting are:
-Yuna finally meets Cid, her uncle, and they don't exchange any words. Yuna bows her head, Cid turns around, because he's about to break up crying seeing her; probably because Yuna looks a lot like his sister, and it's an emotional moment that he almost lost her, etc.
-Rikku and Wakka fighting over the "LET ME TELL THE PLAN!" Just funny little incident of how far that relationship has gone and how the two bounce off each other. On one hand, we have the energetic 15 year old girl, on the otherhand, we have the idiot who loves attention. So Lulu jumping in and being the one to say the plan was a great little punch line that made them both go "Aaaawwww..."
Then I went off and started doing gameplay things...because gameplay...and gameplay...and YOJIMBO YOU ARE AN EXPENSIVE WHORE!
EDIT: Regarding Hector solo, yeah, I gave up. Part of this was because I didn't plan properly and save Tomahawks which may have given me a chance, but ultimately, the mages were doing too much damage and them being able to attack without countering effectively (Hand Axes weren't cutting it from my recollection) led to some bad stuff. Ursula especially was threatening because of the move, and while it was a joke, Jerme's damage was meaningful because taking 7 damage can mean the difference between surviving something Ursula does or dying.
I am not sure if Tomahawk would have made a difference, but I'm sure a legitimate ranged counter would have been meaningful.
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Well. Erk would have an easier time except for that gimmicky final boss that he couldn't possibly beat!
I'm really glad I bought that Initiative weapon for Oh fuck! so he could triplecast "Failing to run away" at the start of every battle.
I also noticed that Flare actually isn't even on Lulu's tree at all. it's nearby geographically on the spheregrid but there's no link.
And oh wow Seymour Flux. I'm utterly fucked. Dunno how I'll get out of that one. Edit: Auto remedy ability maybe? I think I stole some remedies from Marlboros in the Calm Lands. I still don't have a lot of X-potions though...
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Yeah, on Expert Grid, Flare is actually on Rikku's grid. I know this because I just got Flare with Auron who has been going down Rikku's grid my game. Holy is still on Yuna's but hidden behind some locks now, with Full-life now being on her grid instead of Rikku's. Ultima is now actually on Lulu's grid as well; I'd say go for that but you probably don't have the Level 4 key Spheres to get it.
Expert Grid is built very much around the idea of flexibility with movesets in any event, less on the original mindset of the Sphere Grid of "everyone has a role and a skillset, and they're going to be stuck with that for a while!" with some leniency factors. Expert, by contrast, you'll note has a lot of branching pathes that lead into someone else's grid without any key spheres (or if a Key Sphere si involved, often a low level one). Even ignoring the "everyone has access to Kimhari!"; the way I've been building Rikku alone seeing as she's been basically jumping around the grid where I feel like, provided she's not outright following another character.
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Captain K, are you crazy, this sounds like the worst game for solos. You have almost no options and have to rely on the RNG Gods all the time. And how do you get past Bloodbane anyway? This is B ending only?
I've completed solo games with Valk, Lawfer, and Jelanda. Think I was level 37-ish with Jelanda beating Bloodbane. Be sure to check the end of my FAQ if you decide to do Valk solo though, there's some weird glitches with only her in the party.
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Man FFX is not really a good game
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keychainspheres.
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level 2 annoyingspheres. Yep.
Seymour Nachos went "Cool, you have Stoneward... But do you have Stoneproof?" and of course I died. Jesus Christ FFX.
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I then averted my eyes from the Tidus sex
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I'm really glad I bought that Initiative weapon for Oh fuck! so he could triplecast "Failing to run away" at the start of every battle.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure Fenrir that by this point you could talk about basically any video game and I'd read your commentary about it.
Breath of Death 7:
Interesting take on the NES Dragon Quest formula. Started on Hard Mode because I'm a cheeky little bugger.
It brings a couple things to the table here. First, enemies get stronger each round of battle, so you really need to finish battles quickly. Second, HP regens to full at the end of each fight, but how much MP you regenerate is based on how quickly you end the battle. Third, and perhaps most infuriatingly, each level up you must pick between one of two level up options. Sometimes, this is between making your status attack low-percentage MT, or high-percentage ST. Sometimes, it's choosing between number of hits vs. base damage, sometimes it's between which stats you want to level up. Sometimes it's between two things that are so completely different that it changes how that character acts in future fights permanently. I actually quite like the system, but going in blind it is VERY easy to lock yourself into an unwinnable situation. I've had to restart twice (fortunately the second time around is quick) to change skill choices just to be able to beat an area... only to get locked into another unwinnable situation in the next dungeon because of poor skill path choices.
Now, I was playing Hard, which I imagine you're only supposed to play once you have a build figured out, sure. The issue is that playing normal is BOOOOOOORING and none of your choices actually matter because you can just mash attack on all your characters and win, so you don't actually have an accurate feel for what skills you're going to need when the enemies can actually kick your ass.
I'll probably restart again, breeze through normal and put it up. Grinding on hard is too frustrating, and maybe the endgame will make me have to pay attention more. Lots of interesting concepts largely wasted because there's no middle option between Normal and Hard modes.
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Yeah, on Expert Grid, Flare is actually on Rikku's grid. I know this because I just got Flare with Auron who has been going down Rikku's grid my game. Holy is still on Yuna's but hidden behind some locks now, with Full-life now being on her grid instead of Rikku's. Ultima is now actually on Lulu's grid as well; I'd say go for that but you probably don't have the Level 4 key Spheres to get it.
Expert Grid is built very much around the idea of flexibility with movesets in any event, less on the original mindset of the Sphere Grid of "everyone has a role and a skillset, and they're going to be stuck with that for a while!" with some leniency factors. Expert, by contrast, you'll note has a lot of branching pathes that lead into someone else's grid without any key spheres (or if a Key Sphere si involved, often a low level one). Even ignoring the "everyone has access to Kimhari!"; the way I've been building Rikku alone seeing as she's been basically jumping around the grid where I feel like, provided she's not outright following another character.
Ultima would have been pretty cool but I already teleported away!
Doublecasting -gas is already pretty awesome though.
Captain K, are you crazy, this sounds like the worst game for solos. You have almost no options and have to rely on the RNG Gods all the time. And how do you get past Bloodbane anyway? This is B ending only?
I've completed solo games with Valk, Lawfer, and Jelanda. Think I was level 37-ish with Jelanda beating Bloodbane. Be sure to check the end of my FAQ if you decide to do Valk solo though, there's some weird glitches with only her in the party.
What's your secret Captain.
Zenny you don't really have to change what I wrote, I still see FFX as pretty eeeeh.
I mean I considered it as "that good game I don't like because Tidus", but now I just find the game below average (And Tidus maybe not that bad. Just repulsive / cringe worthy)
The game just wastes so much of your time. I've talked about the super long unskippable cutscenes and slow pace in battle, but man, I should also mention the super simple puzzles stretched out to eternity so they take an half hour each. That Tetris pieces puzzle before Spectral Keeper. The conveyor beltish thing below Bevelle. Why.
Man you are never interrupted by a one hour long crossword puzzle playing FF5. (A crossword puzzle where you have to move across the map to select each letter, to make it extra slow)
Amazingly on Mt Gagazet there's an actual "Fit the right peg into the right hole" puzzle. It is pretty short. But, like, really?
The story had potential for some melodrama. Zelda Link's Awakening did it better though. And bad cinematography ruins the cutscenes (The camera really likes to wobble around, there are too many extreme closeups on faces. There's SeizureCam in the pre-Yunalesca battle) There's also too much fanservice in a franchise that usually doesn't rely on it. (There's Tifa and Shiva and that's it)
Really cool battles though. CTB is such an improvement over ATB.
Seymour Flux? I stole a few remedies from Marlboros and made that awesome auto ability that automatically cures status effects whenever you get hit. Unfortunately Hi-potions weren't cutting it anymore at all. So with those super fire gems I stole from 'nades on Mt Gagazet, I also added Absorb Fire to the previously mentioned so I could heal to full by throwing giant fireballes at myself. Doublecast Giant fireballs on Yattaf + Giant fireballs on the enemy = Pretty sweet.
I also bought a staff with +15% magic damage and Magic Booster and added First Strike to it.
Flux was still a big jerk with Reflect and high damage and whatnot. Fortunately he's vulnerable to poizn and Overdrive ignores reflect. So. I just kinda waited for his demise from the sidelines, eating an healthy diet of magma, throwing one Overdrive every few turns.
Sanctuary Keeper: Lrn2dispel bro
Properly buffed Yattaf was hasted, evaded all his evadable attacks 100% of the time and could do 10000 damage with Doublecast -gas.
I still had to use an ether, because I ran out of shit.
Spectral Keeper: Spent the battle putting mines on Oh fuck!'s corpse. GG.
Fury was a noteworthy problem. But, thank god, Furyward was enough to be entirely immune to this effect in that battle. (because I have no idea how to make Furyproof)
Yunalesca: ffffffffffffff
This battle can go relatively smoothly but Curage on Zombie Yattaf is instant death.
My plan is stealing some trinkets from the zombies in Zanarkand to get zombie immunity. Then add ID immunity. Not sure if that will be enough... I have no accessory with three empty slots, so I can't have Absorb Fire on top of all that. This sucks.
Edit: Yeah it was easy. She stops using Absorb alltogether after her first phase right? She had no damage anymore and always made sure I had Regen on. Nice.
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Sounds like your experience with FFX was like mine when I replayed Parasite Eve.
Anyway, you know what's a pretty good game so far? Dragon Age 3. They took the one good thing from 2 (Varric) and basically jettisoned the rest. The tactical camera is back, bitches. Unlike other entries in the series (or recent BW games in general), the maps are also fucking huge. I'm six hours in and I've spent almost all of it on the first major map. It includes the village of Redcliffe from the first game, which is cool. It's a tiny corner of a huge fucking map that is absolutely packed with missions and fights and small dungeons and such.
They let you play as the Qunari this time, so obviously I did that because what would make a bunch of Christian analogies more uncomfortable than their chosen one being a foreigner with weird gods? Fucking nothing, bro. So I gave him the coolest horns I could find and named him Freakzilla after the [url =http://youtu.be/UqT0quOMMBU]most eloquent man I could think of[/url]. The game actually acknowledges this and gives you the chance to role-play with it some, letting you decide if your character is open to the idea of their god or if you wanna shut it down or try and deflect people away from that line of questioning all the time. Reminds me of Arcanum, though I'm sure you are actually the chosen one this time.
Looking forward to being racist against elves some more. They let me import all the shitty things I've done to every elf settlement I've come across so if there's not another opportunity to side with werewolves against them or turn them over to the Man I'm gonna be bummed.
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Bayonetta Wii U: Completed! I got the accessory that makes enemies enraged and used that not knowing what it does and the tower climb kind of went crazy...but hey, lot's of combo points at least!
Fun game still, but a number of things stand out more now that I've played the sequel, which either removed a lot of them, or adjusted them to be less annoying. Here's a quick run down!
-Losing Magic when hit. This is obnoxious as very few games have you lose super gauge when hit, and Bayonetta's is even already more limited. Bayo 2 removing that, while making the game easier, just makes it feel more conventional, in a way that benefits it.
-Quick Time Events. Pretty much all gone outside of "Mash for Bonus Points" which are fine. You won't find yourself dying for not pressing X fast enough. I actually died to Jeanne 4 because of that stupid mid-battle QTE where you have to dodge a missile for the next phase.
-Gimmick sections. I actually like the Motorcycle but it overstays it's welcome; Bayo 2 has a similar segment but you are a little more varied and the segment is way shorter. Space Harrier returns as well, but is much shorter and way better handled due to more options and NO MORE SCREEN SPINNING. Speaking of this, it is better in the Wii U version because it seems to control better but still has the "TOO LONG" problem. The new stuff like Flying sections are actually cool because it feels like an extension of main gameplay as opposed to a complete change.
So basically, Bayo 2 can be summed up as Bayo 1 with the few kinks the game had banged out. The one thing Bayo 1 seems to have an edge on Bayo 2 is it's definitely a harder game, so if you want a more challenging game on your first playthroguh, Bayo 1 is better for it! Bayo 2 is better in just about every other way. Oh, Bayo 2 also lacks Angel Attack, I FEEL EMPTY FINISHING CHAPTERS WITHOUT "Ladies and Gentlemen, it's the moment you've been waiting for: ANGEL ATTACK!!!"
Yeah, that's why I haven't really did a formal review of Bayo 2; it's basically "take the first game, make it better" and go from there. Considering how good the first game was, that should give you an idea of how high my opinion of the sequel is!
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I'm recording this mostly for Super's edification:
Was on PSN and someone on the friend list suggests a round of Harmony of Despair. After repeated failures due to non-Cid people dying in skeleton form, we call it a day. Afterwards, presumably because I'm a masochist, I decide to find out exactly how incapable Maria is of dealing with Astarte. Damages done on hard mode:
Ice dragon: 17 damage. (This, sadly, is in practice the big gun.)
Firebird: 13 damage. (Might hit twice if she's airborne?!)
Lightning kitty: 15ish I think?
La la la, la la la la la: 90 damage per note (holy or strike type after all, apparently) but you can't use this because it keeps you immobile and you'll get tornadoed for trying.
Bird tossin': 5 damage. (!!!)
All skills rank 8, for reference. Guardian Knuckle might not fail, but I couldn't remember the controls.
After ten minutes of dodging and tossing birds I finally fucked up and died.
Maria!
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BTW Zenny, in later Zeboyd games (Penny Arcade 3/4) you also have to make this kind of decision with huge consequences, but can't even grind at all ever.
FFX the Yattafing:
I finished this, so I might as well post.
I've realized that true FFX soloers restrict themselves to their character's own sphere grids, so, in not doing that, I am basically a dirty gaijin peasant casual. But since I know basically jack about FFX I think that was pretty fair; true soloers know that you HAVE to farm cactuar needles in the thunder plain to forge Citanstrike into their weapons. And I don't.
Anyway after Yunalesca, I captured a few monsters from the early areas before I got bored. The Monster Arena guy gave me a few items for it, and I could forge "All spells now cost 1MP" on that spare "Magic Boost + 15% magic damage" weapon I had around. It was wonderful.
Sin boss battle: Giant whale basically just spent all his turns waiting.
Inside Sin: At this point I had gotten a few Return spheres, so I just returned near Ultima.
And I needed 22 more levels to learn Ultima.
You know, in FFX-2, you go multiple times through the exact same areas you go through only once in FFX, plus some other areas.
I was wondering why FFX-2 didn't feel super combat-heavy compared to FFX, considering that? Well the reason is that FFX has a totally super crazy, Tales of Phantasiaesque encounter rate. I got 20 of the levels I needed out of 22 in the one screen right before Seymour Omnis.
Seymour Omnis: I came with that Fire Absorb accessory, so lol. His Ultima did like 1500 Damage? Poor guy didn't even get the time to switch elements, but I had a Ice/Lightning/Water proof accessory waiting so he wouldn't even have been able to do anything..
He had the best music though.
So anyway I got Ultima right after. Then, in every random battle, I sang along with the battle theme "Dou-ble-cast-Ul-ti-maaa, Dou-ble-cast-Ul-ti-maaaaaaaaaaaa" It was the best part of the game.
BFA, BFF:
Quite overwhelming. Real strategy talk here.
Defeats included:
- Petrification -> Instant loss. For the next battles I equipped a Stoneproof accessory, so I couldn't heal with fire anymore at this point.
- Jecht's attack inflicts a strong delay, I had low Hps and only one turn before he could act again: I decided to heal with a potion. One of the pagodas then got a turn and decided to inflict a bunch of status, I'm screwed.
- Same as before except I killed the pagoda with Ultima instead of healing. Then Jecht used another big attack with Delay, and the other padoga resurrected. I was in the same situation as before with even less HPs. Dead.
I grinded a bit in case enemies in the area dropped cool items; and I noticed that those stone monsters in the final dungeon actually have the grenades I needed to customize Stoneproof. So I added Stoneproof and Fire Absorb on the same ring. -> I could heal and kill Pagodas on the same turn. This was all I needed to win the battle, but I also slapped an extra +30% HP on top of it.
And that's it.
Three things about the rest:
- Why do all the characters become asian in FMVs?
- I named Shiva FemCielo. I really like that nickname. It fits very well while also super insulting to her.
- I googled "Yu Yevon cosplay", figuring, there are so many Yuna cosplays, there can be ONE Yu Yevon cosplay right? But nope, no results. :|
Edit: Oh wow though, Seymour cosplay. That hair.
(http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2012/015/c/7/cosplay_seymour_the_best_seymour_ever_by_ange_lady_yunashe-d4mi50i.jpg)
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Breath of Fire 3: Been doing a magic no physical attacks playthrough. Just got through the first adult dungeon. As you might expect, Nina is MVP. It was pretty rough going until I beat Stallion (who wasn't too bad Garr used items, while Nina and Ryu plinked away on offense). At that point Momo had already learned Quake and Mygas gave us Typhoon and Magic Ball to pass around.
As a whole, Momo has been kind of underwhelming. I have to run away a lot to convserve MP, and as a result Momo didn't learn quake till around the tournament arc (which she never got the chance to use). Everything in the Lighthouse is immune to Quake aside from the boss so she wasn't great there either.
As you might expect, Nina is pretty good. She was essential in the first couple non Teepo dungeons, and even after that she beat the Dodai's one on one and wrecked the lighthouse. Iceblast was about as good as you would expect in the Volcano too. It'll be interesting if she can keep up her dominance in the second half of the game.
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Nice work, Fenrir. Also I didn't think OwnSphereGrid Lulu could reasonably beat BFA (it's possible the FFX challenge community has figured out a way in the last ten years), so no shame there.
I got 20 of the levels I needed out of 22 in the one screen right before Seymour Omnis.
In fairness that "one screen" is a monster, half the final dungeon (there is only one other screen with random encounters, and it's smaller if anything). You also get pretty much one level per battle there IIRC (less if you don't overkill but more if you do, I want to say?), even at the Exp-per-sphere-level cap.
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The Lulu solo faq is OwnSphereGrid actually so yep.
It suggests doing some minigames though, for items like an Auto-Haste bangle. (And I personnally didn't want to bother with that)
In fact even the Auron only guide is OSG too.
It says "Go grind for 30 hours to beat Sinspawn Gui" hahahah
Yeah that screen is pretty huge. Not that much if you remove random battles though. I got slightly bit more than half a level from your average random there. I ran away from King Behemoth and Ahriman x 3, killed every other enemy formation.
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The FFX puzzles (at least the Fayth ones) are supposed to simulate the difficulty of fulfilling the trials. So yeah, probably annoying on later playthroughs, but I thought they were excellently done the first time around (compared to BD, and that horrible buttonmashing at the crystals which I'm betting was intended to be the same thing).
BD- Beaten. Overall, super excellent game. Hard boss fights, interesting classes, well balanced overall. This is the type of game that Square hasn't made for a decade for the most part, and it's why their brand suffered. More of this please and less of everything that went into FF 15's design strategy or endlessly rechurning the same game out.
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Hyrule Warriors - Finally kicked the shit out of Ganon and beat the entire Adventure Mode map, which is like 128 squares! It was most glorious. I still need to collect Gold Skulltulas for these maps if I decide that's worth it, and of course my foolish fool self bought the entire DLC Season Pass, so they keep giving me new maps and content. I got Twili Midna with the most recent DLC. She is utterly overpowered vs. randoms and minibosses, between her Strong attack that just wrecks a giant area around her and her YYYX / C4 that is a giant freaking laser beam of doom. (The game has four major type of enemies; randoms, minibosses, plot bosses, and giant bosses. generally characters are better or worse against the different types.) I also tried out the Dominion Rod, which is a decent weapon, certainly, but not as ridiculous as Twili Midna. Anyway, now I've started on the Master Quest, mostly working toward getting villain weapons and goth outfits for the characters. Important goals.
Super Mario 3D World - Got to World 7, also known as Castle World. Went through a hilarious blue lava map that took two continues for me to beat. Definitely a pretty challenging game compared to SM3DL as well as the newer NSMB. I've been mostly playing as Peach because she floats and wears pink.
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Settle It In SMASH!!- The unlocking dance is complete. Did up to Game and Watch just by doing Smashes, then unlocked all the stages which due to shared requirements also meant I got the last character and the last map at the same time (because Cruel Smash is still Cruel Smash). Hurray, now I can play because I feel like playing instead of being compelled to get the things first.
Largely just been playing as Lucina, since Marth has long been one of my guys and Lucina is basically Marth except awesome. Although it seems to me that giving her marth's moveset except having Aether instead of Dolphin Slash would have made more sense. Oh well. Casual experimentation suggests that I could probably do well as Greninja too. Shulk seems straightforward too. Robin I like but is definitely not a character for someone bad at the game like myself. Haven't really tried any other newcomers.
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BD- This is the type of game that Square hasn't made for a decade for the most part, and it's why their brand suffered. More of this please and less of everything that went into FF 15's design strategy or endlessly rechurning the same game out.
I feel compelled to mention that Final Fantasy Dimensions is more recent than a decade and has a lot of BD's design philosophy (though not quite up to its level, it's still pretty solid). I also hear it's getting a sequel.
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I would say I consider FFD a bit worse than BD overall, but it's still worth playing if you enjoy BD/FF5 style games. The class system in FFD is a bit less robust and the its cast is quite a bit weaker. It doesn't end with a whimper like BD does though so that's a plus.
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BD's final chapters completely sunk it for me, but at least it was a step in the right direction for Square. I don't think they've made a game that's hit on gameplay and story for me since the P2 era and BD at least hit the right notes at parts on both.
Ciddy: Notes are holy elemental, Guardian Knuckle is holy elemental as well IIRC (Good fucking luck using that against bosses though)
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Up to the Elite Four in Alpha Sapphire. Thoughts on some minor stuff:
-The surfing Ace Trainers are a nice touch, they made the Water routes something like 60-70% Water types instead of 99% like usual. I still would've liked even more variety, considering how many Water routes there are in this game.
-The encounter rate in water is actually pretty low in this game, so repels aren't necessary to make the last third of the game bearable for once.
-Being able to Fly/Soar to anywhere instead of just towns+Pokemon League+Victory Road entrance sometimes is a really nice change, one that hopefully carries over to future games.
-Mega evolutions cancelling Pokemon-Amie benefits is kinda interesting as a gameplay mechanic (lose out on the 1.2x exp boost, mainly) but continues to be nonsensical plotwise, where mega evolving is supposed to require a strong bond between trainer and Pokemon. In a related note the number of Megas is starting to get kinda silly.
-The facial expressions and body language on your rival and gym leaders is pretty good this time around.
-Using the Ruby/Sapphire gym lineups instead of the Emerald ones was a big mistake, IMO. Tate & Liza only having two Pokemon for the seventh gym is inexcusible.
-IGN has unintentionally made Team Magma way funnier as an enemy team than Team Aqua; sadly, I preordered AS before their review became public.
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Oh yeah, FFD existed, but then it basically completely invalidated because iOS only games might as well be a poke in the eye for most consumers (Hopefully they were smart enough to fix this, but knowing Square probably not).
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If memory serves FFD is available on android devices as well as iOS? Buuuut yeah, it's never gotten, say, an eShop or Steam release. For... some reason.
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I don't think Square signed any kind of exclusivity deal, they're just... either lazy or not good at business, hence why so many of their games are iOS only. Either would not surprise me.
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I played FFD on my Nexus 7, so yeah, they fixed that.
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I tried out the FFD demo on my iPhone and quickly determined that I would never spend money on any game that relies on a virtual d-pad/buttons for controls.
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I don't see how being available on the two widest-adopted mobile devices is Square invalidating the game for most consumers? If anything, it's being much more inclusive for being a major developer actually releasing a game on the mobile market AND localizing it. (And it's probably the best JRPG available on mobile, which says more about the trash that gets shoveled out on mobile and then poorly organized so no one can separate the crap from the decent stuff, honestly.)
In regards to the controls, I personally feel it takes a little getting used to, but the control scheme itself isn't inherently bad. FFD could possibly have done it more intuitively, but it doesn't take that long to adjust, like any new control scheme.
Disclaimer: I'm not saying "FFD is perfect, you must all worship it," but it gets a strange amount of backlash every time it gets brought up.
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Having not played FFD I'm... inclined to mostly agree with Djinn here? It's not as if iOS+Android is equivalent to the N-Gage (or even, dare I say it, the Vita); lots of gamers have one. Not everyone, of course (I don't, myself!), but that's kinda the way it goes with games and systems: unless you religiously buy every system there's always going to be some games for systems you don't own.
The control concerns I'll leave to people who have actually tried them, but at base I don't see a reason why one a touchscreen D-pad would be innately bad.
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Three things:
- The lack of tactile feedback is pretty terrible when you're used to gaming with a controller.
- The lines between, say, "Down" and "right" blur when there's no tactile feedback + Your hand is in the corner of the screen, blocking the d-pad from view. This could work if the game had omnidirectional controls but IIRC you can just go up down left right.
- Keeping a finger on a touchscreen for extended periods (which happens when you're walking) is pretty uncomfortable too. Mobile games usually get around that by just having you "click" or drag for short periods instead of relying on D-pads.
It just feels bad.
Games can do touch control well even in an action game(Super Hexagon) but I think a touch d-pad just doesn't work at all as a concept.
FFD isn't anything special anyway
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I found it more comfortable than the keyboard controls of games when I have to play on PC, and as someone with some pretty bad hand/lower arm muscle inflammation issues, I notice such things. Anyway...
Super Mario 3D World - Threw the mighty Bowser into lava, but he got better. Lava must be really wussy in this world. And then he kidnapped the fairies, revealing his ultimate plan to... build a magical amusement park with his face in the center? Okay, Bowser. So did his absurdly difficult levels, particularly one where you ride a block into lava, and then kicked the shit out of him again. Yay, game over. But now I have aftergame... in space! Just got Rosalina for that.
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FFD put the virtual A-button equivalent in-between the d-pad, which significantly increases the odds of misclicking when you're trying to do something basic like, say, talk to an npc wandering around a town. Maybe it works out better with a larger screen, but on a 3.5 inch iphone it was just needlessly frustrating. I suppose it makes one-handed play easier except that the menu button is on the top-right so you need a second hand for that anyways.
I've played other android/ios games with larger, easier to use virtual buttons and while they're significantly better than FFD I still find myself making misclicks at a much higher rate than I would on anything with a d-pad or keyboard; the lack of tactile feedback really hurts. I can live when messing around with free games but paid ones are another matter.
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The control scheme was not especially friendly but it never screwed me over in a fight. I can't complain much given that tap-to-move in a 16-bit RPG would be equally unpleasant if not more so.
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It isn't anything special, but it is also not that bad either. Noting that the entry point for this conversation was "They haven't made games like this in years" so the pickings are pretty thin. In that stock "Not special" is still of note.
The touch screen controls honestly are just a thing to get used to and screen size really matters. Playing these on a tablet vs a phone is a pretty massive difference from my experience. Having 8 way movement even over just the 4 cardinal directions also helps them immensely yes (compare FFD to FF5 which did more free movement or FF6 which I think is just 8 way back on a more restricted grid). A lot of it is teething problems to moving the genre to a new interface.
When the interface works though? Man JRPGs work really well on tablets and I am confident you could scale down to phones easily with some shifts in interfacing (which never is done, one version is king). I hear really good things about the Dragon Quest ports on iOS just for controls and GUI, but am tentative to try them out because well, DQ games and I have an unhealthy relationship.
For perspective, we are only really looking at a few years of working on interfacing with touch screens in this market. There is a ton of theory behind it, but not a bunch of practice in implementation. Remember how great things interfaced back in the day on NES? How many games used Select and made you want to break things. PC games were even worse (from the other end of the spectrum, too many inputs instead of too few).
Touch screens still need some time and experimentation to check out, so I understand not being an early adopter, but I would really recommend not being dismissive of them as a platform. There is actually a pretty healthy looking cottage industry for (cheap) JRPGs that you can clearly see on the iTunes app store that I am confident mirrors at least to Google Play store.
All this talk of lack of tactile feedback, it is something you really get used to honestly. At this point I can touch type on my tablet at relatively accurately without the annoying as fuck key press sounds (it isn't as good as a real keypad, but it is pretty okay). Phones are a bit harder though.
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Yeah, I did play the game on the iPad, not a phone, so that probably helps.
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And I played on a tiny phone so this didn't.
I haven't seen any good RPG on mobile (yet) but I think they could work with a point and click interface. Touch where you want your character to move. Touch the NPC you want to talk to.
Battles are menu driven so obviously very touch friendly too.
Just straight up putting Final Fantasy on a phone and having a touch D-pad is like putting Farmville on the Xbox One with the joystick acting like a mouse, it ignores the system's strengths. I guess the game was originally made for phones with 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 buttons where 4 = left?
BTW I've heard that the DQ8 IOs port is like the worst thing ever.
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RPGs are one of the few major console genres that aren't fatally compromised by touchscreen controls, but a virtual d-pad is really the laziest UI possible for them. I'll accept them for free games because they're free and emulators because they don't really have any better options but that's it.
Note that the battle UI in FFD is infinitely better than the map because it has a real touchscreen interface, even if not a fully optimized one for small screens. Imagine how bad fights would be if you had to use a virtual d-pad + buttons for those as well.
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What do you think would be a better way of doing a map, then?
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A rhythm minigame would be pretty good start.
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I imagine the gripe is that it's not point and click movement. Except point and click movement is also fail on a touchscreen I find. Without being able to mouseover stuff and have highlighting to see where shit is you just trade of slightly finicky touchpad for flailing around hoping you click where you need to be.
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Solution seems pretty simple to me. Make it kinda like Diablo handles movement: your character heads in the direction you're clicking/pressing. Hell they did it for the DS remakes of FF3 and FF4 and it worked well. It would be less bad than both finnicky click-on-location-to-move-there and having a Dpad you can't see or feel because your fingers are blocking it.
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It's notable that FFD at least gave a few different control schemes options that somewhat address the lack of intuitive feel and the 'UI covering the screen' issues. I switched between two of them from towns full of NPCs I had to talk to and dungeons where I just wanted to run through quickly. It worked out fairly well for me. But maybe FFD's control scheme just suits my preferences more than others here?
FFD in general just does a lot of things I like with a Job-based RPG, though. It has blank characters, but they all have at least a -little- personality and starting skills to differentiate them. It has not one, but two, separate 5-member parties that go through their own stories, so it mixes up the dynamics and perspectives often enough that it doesn't get stale too quickly. Also, large parties are a favorite of mine. Four of each party are permanent members and the fifth slot is a rotating set of temps with fixed Jobs to give players an idea of the new Jobs they'll be getting soon with no risk of wasting precious JP on them. The best part is that by the end you have a merged party where you can pick your five favorites and the two separate parties have some unique options only available to one party or another so it actually encourages mixing and matching builds.
tl;dr: FFD is flawed, but it has a decent unique setup in how it approaches Job system balance between two eventually-merging parties, which is a damn good selling point to me.
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Diablo III because Andrew bought us the expansion during Blizzard's Black Friday sale.
We are playing seasonal heroes (because why not) on a laughably easy "Hard" mode wherein we can't even take damage from epic enemies or bosses. We did hit Whimsydale, though, which was nice. Slightly off-tone kids' music, delightful chubby purple unicorns exploding in gore, happy dancing clouds and rainbows...
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LadyDoor: You hit on what killed D3 for me, at least. Early D3 was actually *too* punishing about this, especially on Inferno, but in general enemies did tons of damage to you if you didn't use the various defensive tricks each class had (invincibility frames, abilities, etc.), but they also died reasonably quickly. Over various patches, they've nerfed enemy damage, but not enemy durability. So take your choice between easy stomps, or crank up the difficulty so that you can die... but enemies now take eons to dispatch. I'd really love it if the higher difficulty levels buffed only enemy offense yet enemy health stayed somewhat constant between difficulties. Oh, well.
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I played D3 at the very beginning and the difficulty was pretty tight.
Disappointing to hear that they did this.
FFX Solo: Raised some numbers up for way longer than I am willing to admit. I knew it was pointless all the way through at least. don't care, filling the entire grid was cool.
Then I got brutally murdered by Dark Aeons anyway.
Well.
Omega Ruins was a pretty decent shortish aftergame dungeon. Lots of death but after a while it became formulaic: ID protection against Coeurls and Satan, Stone protection against the cool skeleton dinosaur things, Reraise against Tonberries, Confuse protection against a few enemies, First strike weapon equipped at all times just to survive a Marlboro + encounter.
Monster Arena was incredibly lazy design. They took normal enemies and gave them super stats. They didn't even gave them new colors. Yes this is actually lazier than palette swapping. Go grind spheres for 20 hours to beat regular not even palette swapped enemies with super stats. There's not even a new "Arena" battle background, you fight them on the regular Calm Land background. Jesus.
Here are the colors of each character on the sphere grid, they are used to differenciate each character from each other:
Rikku: Green
Auron: Red
Wakka: Yellow-Orange
Lulu: Purple
Tidus: Slightly light blue
Kimahri: Slightly dark blue
Yuna: Blue-ish blue
I think they ran out of colors after finding 5 of them guys
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LadyDoor: You hit on what killed D3 for me, at least. Early D3 was actually *too* punishing about this, especially on Inferno, but in general enemies did tons of damage to you if you didn't use the various defensive tricks each class had (invincibility frames, abilities, etc.), but they also died reasonably quickly. Over various patches, they've nerfed enemy damage, but not enemy durability. So take your choice between easy stomps, or crank up the difficulty so that you can die... but enemies now take eons to dispatch. I'd really love it if the higher difficulty levels buffed only enemy offense yet enemy health stayed somewhat constant between difficulties. Oh, well.
Playing high-level D3 these days, the balance between damage and durability is about right, in my opinion. Keep in mind that it is more difficult to build gear for damage than for durability, so a newcomer to lvl 70 is going to think everything is a meat tank. Greater Rifts are timed, so if you want to progress to higher-ranked rifts, you need the damage, end of story. Choice between living and always losing and dying and sometimes winning. So I pretty much completely disagree with your assessment.
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Yeah, we chatted on that before. It's nice that Greater Rifts are closer to the right balance, but I stand by the "too much durability, not enough damage" for below-L70 play post RoS (which is what LD is doing now). I'd love to be wrong though! Blizzard does keep the patches rolling, so maybe it's changed since...
...more generally, though, I'd be shocked if Greater Rifts were anything like D3 1.00 - 1.03 Inferno, which was brutal and unforgiving.
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Greater Rifts are brutal and unforgiving. Really! Let's just say I'm happy repairs don't cost much anymore because I've lost all the durability in my gear in a GR a number of times now. And I play monk ferchrissakes. As for lvl 1-70, as far as I can tell Blizzard just kinda ignores it, not unlike WoW. My advice is play til the end of the story once, then solicit someone to powerlevel you the rest of the way.
EDIT: I legit beat a GR (which are timed for 15 minutes) with 0 seconds to spare once. They're pretty great.
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Yuna: Blue-ish blue
Yuna's colour is actually White. Doesn't excuse that they didn't use separate colours for Tidus and Kimahri though.
Also, Jim, when will you start Marvel 2015? You can beat up d00ps. Random boss affixes are the best. Nothing like playing Hawkeye and then getting a boss with Missile Protection.
Speedrunning FFT has taught me that Sluice Gate is impossible. That is all.
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Earthbound: So I replayed this due to Smash 4 influence. I hadn't played the game since it was new, so I think that's like 15 years. It's a much different experience as an adult than it was as a kid in the nineties. Shit seems a lot more fucked up than I remembered. Also, Dr. Andonuts is a terrible father... like, he seriously says to his 13-year-old kid "Well, let's see eachother again in another 10 years!" I'm not sure how I reacted to that as a kid, but it seriously stood out to me as horrible as an adult. Flipside, all of the saccharine ending sequence stuff hits a lot more powerfully as an adult than as a kid, so it's not a bad trade.
Gameplay is of course a lot more antiquated now, but not horrible considering that Dragon Quest still uses the same damn battle system. *shrugs*
I got all the 1/128 chance drops because fast forward button and GameFAQs exists now, so that was pretty cool to finally know what all that hype was about. Gutsy Bat is a pretty satisfying weapon.
I counted no less than 3 drug trips on our adventure, so now I know what to do if I ever want to go on a real JRPG adventure in real life.
Tales of Graces f:
Speaking of drug trips! Damn, this game's battle system is just awesome. After playing some Xillia, I thought going back to Graces would be difficult, but it actually plays to my biases better than Xillia. Infinite resourceless cooldowns are just fun.
The plot was better than I expected after reading all of the comments people had here. So... thanks for the lowered expectations, guys? I got more enjoyment out of the game as a result. Malik is awesome. The cast is humorous when they want to be. Sophie makes a good catalyst for a lot of jokes, and also makes for a great emotional center for the character dynamics to evolve around. Asbel is really disappointing as a main, but I ended up liking him by the end of the game and the F arc, at least.
The big optional dungeon was the stand-out drug trip for the game. It really felt like a worthy successor to VP's Seraphic Gate. I wish it had more skits, though. Overall, game is probably a 8.5 to 9 for my personal rating. More objectively, it's probably still a solid 7.5-8. Its battle system and balance/pacing are good enough to outweigh any issues that people might have with the story/characters/anime-ness.
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Tide, Yuna's color is so blue that Yuna still sings Eiffel 65.
Here's a screen: http://i.ytimg.com/vi/bFzwSW3_7mw/maxresdefault.jpg
It looks like they might have changed it for the HD version because there clearly wasn't enough blue.
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Um, that's ivory white, Fenny.
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Fenrir's referring to the path that Yuna's path traces, which is indeed blue in that screenshot. It was clearly redone, though; in FFX PS2, the path traced was thinner and the same colour as the circle which indicates Yuna's current location, which is indeed white.
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I actually thought the paths were all the same color, hence my confusion.
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Gameplay is of course a lot more antiquated now, but not horrible considering that Dragon Quest still uses the same damn battle system. *shrugs*
Remind me to never play this game
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NSMB2: Picked this up on a Black Friday sale, 100% cleared three worlds so far (1, 2, and Mushroom). I'm not sure how to feel about the game's “fuck it, here's ALL THE LIVES” philosophy of challenge, but it's still fun to explore.
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NSMB2's not a terrible game, but it feels like the weak link of the NSMB series. I had mostly forgotten the game a couple months later. >_>
Super Mario 3D World - Now this game is quite excellent. I obtained 1x Rosalina for starting the aftergame, and I just finished the first aftergame world, which is as douchey as expected. I really like that this game brings back the SMB2 mechanics of characters that vary in things besides outfits, but I'm still not sure what Toad's point is. Oh well. I've been using mostly Rosalina lately, she is pretty much Luigi but better. She has Luigi's hops, but in her tiny or Mushroom form she can spin attack, which can be used as both a double jump and an attack.
Super Smash Bros. Wii U - Trained the amiibos to fight in Smash, now I fear that Nintendo is letting us train a robot army that will kill us all. More seriously, it was fun to train them and the amiibos are cute. Thanks for the Christmas present Magey <3. I am mostly still training myself to get good at Smash. Actually won a couple of matches yesterday against Magey and Elfboy, which made me happy.
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Chaos Ring 3 - I am really spending too much time on this game, yet I don't want to stop. I guess this happens when the game not only have bishies, but beautiful obasan as well.
But what is with this game and hiding important plot information in conversations with completely unrelated townsfolk NPC?
I mean, why is a cow hanging at the peripheral of the town telling me the relationship between the last bosses of Chaos Ring 1 and Chaos Ring 3!?
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Gameplay is of course a lot more antiquated now, but not horrible considering that Dragon Quest still uses the same damn battle system. *shrugs*
Citing Dragon Quest as a "defense" for something like this is often a bad idea. It's kind of the most obvious example of a long standing jRPG franchise that refuses to really do much in the way of moving forward, so if anything, being comparable to Dragon quest is an example of a negative, in this regard.
Now yes, you can have a "if not broke don't fix it" mindset, but you need a strong base to work with, as well as be willing to find interesting things to add to it. Both Pokemon and Fire Emblem illustrate this pretty well. Dragon Quest kind of just clicks a few different tags and then calls it a day. Earthbound being like that doesn't do it any favors.
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It's not a good thing, no. But it is functional, and in a game like Earthbound functional is tolerable because gameplay is not the focus of the game. That it is still in circulation in various corners, most notably but not limited to the DQ series, just serves to remind us just how functional that system still can be.
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It wasn't meant as a positive. It just kind of adequately described what it was. I should have mentioned that the battle system aspect was basically a non factor in determining the enjoyment I got out of the game. It was just kinda there to display silly text and give context to the crazy enemy designs. Not unlike the JRPG spoof boss fight in the SNES Kirby game...
"The Earthbound battle system exists. You earned 2 Happy Smile points. Congratulations."
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Pokémon EXPAND THE LANDMASS IN GLORIOUS THREE DEE- Finished Episode Delta, so time for the wrapup. Haven't explored the aftergame at all, but if I remember my Gen 3 properly it's mostly the Battle Frontier (especially since the Gen 3 legends are handed out outright for once) so probably won't be doing TOO much with it.
So I decided early on to basically run with the first six pokemon I caught, and as such had Team Scrubs by and large. Team, in reverse catch order:
Rayquaza (L70, Relaxed, Extreme Speed/Dragon Pulse/Dragon Dance/Dragon Ascent)- So they force you to add it to the party at the end there because, y'know, space. MORE STATS THAN GOD is more stats than god. Of course once you get it you proceed to solo the dragonborn then OHKO Deoxys so oops. Not actually relevant as such, but god damn.
Groudon- Didn't actually use, next.
Latios- Forced into the party, but never deployed.
Swellow (L47, Jolly, Guts, Aerial Ace/Double Team/Fly/Quick Attack)- Not really bad, but the limited move pool and peaking damned early on move power means it's not a serious contender after a point. Situationally useful of course (my only reliable tool against fighting more or less) but not really great by any stretch.
Linoone (L32, Lax, Gluttony, Rock Smash/Slash/Strength/Surf)- I kept it's levels up just enough to take a hit or two in the middle gyms (Gym 6 in particular was nasty for my team) but after a point it just became the HM slave it was born to be, and was never a serious contributor to the team.
Beautifly (L45, Impish, Swarm, Air Cutter/Bug Buzz/Giga Drain/Quiver Dance)- Very yo-yo-y for usefulness. Obvious Jeigan applications of course, but... even after that it would fall behind then surge back into usefulness. Giga Drain made it reasonably good against various Water types which has obvious applications in Hoenn, and Air Cutter gave it a clear niche in 2v2. It never really fell truly behind, and a couple tough fights were subjected to swap whoring followed by Quiver Dancing until everything died. And of course those Wailmers/Wailords that insisted on coming out and being perfect setup pawns.
Mightyena (L44, Quiet, Intimidate, Crunch/Howl/Snarl/Fire Fang)- Basically the hero of many a gym battle. Intimidate shenanigans, snarl to nuke SAtk? Yup. Cheap as fuck but fuck you. It developed a bad habit of not getting any exp on good matchups due to opponents having offtype moves around gym 7, so its levels don't reflect how much Eph's Hero carried the team.
Metagross (L58, Quiet, Clear Body, Meteor Mash/Psychic/Earthquake/Hammer Arm)- Broken. This thing is currently being handed out as a level 5 Beldum with a non-you OT. Solos multiple gyms on typing, comes with its Mega Evo stone, and is still a 600 BST monster with a solid move pool. It's why I did the Team Scrubs thing: I knew this thing would smash all comers if I decided I was getting pissed off with the other scrubs.
Swampert (L51, Sassy, Torrent, Mud Shot/Rock Slide/Earthquake/Waterfall)- Just as good as I remember it from Sapphire, except now I can teach it AND other stuff Earthquake basically as soon as it evolves. Always good, even during that slight move drought early on.
So it's, y'know, good and all? 7/10 stuff really. It lacks the spark X/Y had, but there's no particular fault with it except it's a touch too faithful to Ruby and Sapphire, although more particularly if it'd incorporated more stuff from Emerald it'd be a definite step up as well.
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Also, Jim, when will you start Marvel 2015? You can beat up d00ps. Random boss affixes are the best. Nothing like playing Hawkeye and then getting a boss with Missile Protection.
If anyone is interested in starting this I'm giving my account away. I just don't have time to keep up with it anymore. Got high level Fantastic Four and Luke Fucking Cage so you can do the high level stuff, as well as several low level characters so you can experience the earlygame. And a very well-geared Mr. Fantastic. Pm me if interested.
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Finished Portal 1 for the first time and played the first two chapters of Portal 2.
Portal 1 is pretty great and holds up extremely well. Portals themselves are still amazing to just watch and interact with, on a basic level. I also love how it tells a story through level design, Glados is one hell of an antagonist.
Portal 2 is surprisingly pretty bad so far. I can't stand Wheatley's Family Guy-ish overexaggerated eyelid related expressions. There's a focus on setpieces like a regular AAA game. Puzzles are nothing special so far. Even Glados is tired out now that she's not subtly passive aggressive and just plain aggressive. And she recycles some of her old jokes. Yeaaaah.
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Keep going. It doesn't get amazing, but there is still some good Glados in there.
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Ok I will!
Wheatley actually reminds me a lot of Pixar characters. He'd fit perfectly in Toy Story.
Pixar really bores me. I am too old for this shit. The only thing I dread when I go see my nephews/niece is drowning in Pixar merchandise again or having to like watch Pixar shorts again.
Man I really hope I never see Wheatley again (Yes I know it's not happening)
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Fenrir has no taste I see. It's okay, I forgive you for the unjustified Wheatley hate. Some day, you'll realize the error of your ways.
GlaDOS isn't happy with Chelle, but I think there's a pretty darn good reason! There's a developer comment that they actually had to intentionally play *down* her interactions with Chelle a tad, make it more of a slow burn with a "back to business while I 'subtly' insult you" deal. I thought it worked well enough.
GLaDOS: Do you know the biggest lesson I learned from what you did? I discovered I have a sort of black-box quick-save feature. In the event of a catastrophic failure, the last two minutes of my life are preserved for analysis.
GLaDOS: I was able - well, forced really - to relive you killing me. Again and again. Forever.
GLaDOS: Fifty thousand years is a lot of time to think. About me. About you. We were doing so well together.
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Dynasty Warriors 8/XL - Saw a demo from the series years ago, thought it looked interesting and also know peeps I'd seen talking about it before. Went for DW8 vanilla to see how much I enjoyed it, which was a lot and decided to upgrade to XL. Beat all the story modes/paths, historical and hypothetical including Lu Bu's and the stuff added to XL. Just have DLC stuffs to do if I want. Also did Ambition mode, fully upgraded my camp, all facilities, etc, got Cai Wenji to max level, working on clearing Ambition mode part 2, maining Zhou Tai now. Really enjoy it, Cai Wenji hype, Diaochan hype, Zhou Tai hype, Sun Quan (and Sun Ce, Sun Jian, Sun Shang Xiang, ok pretty much the entire Sun family more or less) , Xiahou Ba hype, Liu Shan hype, Xing Cai hype, Li Dian hype, Wang Yuanji hype yaay~
Edit - Oh and Xu Shu hype, Guo Jia hype, Guo Hai hype, Xiahou Yuan hype, Sima Yi hype, Zhang Chunhua hype, Zhang Liao hype, Xiahou Dun hype, Lu Bu hype, Chen Gong hype, Lu Su hype ... okay more or less the entire cast hype since I'm a CT and usually am more inclined to like than dislike, except probably Dong Zhao, Cao Pi, and Yuan Shu although Dong Zhao does get some incredibly cute costumes like the Tin Man, and Cao Pi got all sappy in Ambition mode~
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Fenrir has no taste I see. It's okay, I forgive you for the unjustified Wheatley hate. Some day, you'll realize the error of your ways.
You sound like GladOS.
I don't really mind this kind of character (I still read Dinosaur Comics regiliously. Wheatley's a T-rex), he's just plain not funny so far. Like at all.
GlaDOS isn't happy with Chelle, but I think there's a pretty darn good reason! There's a developer comment that they actually had to intentionally play *down* her interactions with Chelle a tad, make it more of a slow burn with a "back to business while I 'subtly' insult you" deal. I thought it worked well enough.
GLaDOS: Do you know the biggest lesson I learned from what you did? I discovered I have a sort of black-box quick-save feature. In the event of a catastrophic failure, the last two minutes of my life are preserved for analysis.
GLaDOS: I was able - well, forced really - to relive you killing me. Again and again. Forever.
GLaDOS: Fifty thousand years is a lot of time to think. About me. About you. We were doing so well together.
Well yes it makes sense but that doesn't make it good? They could always have changed the story?
Portal's writing was pretty masterful; At the beginning of the game you see this AI as extremely insensitive because it's just an AI (and the dialogue was really funny in this regard) but then you slowly realize over the course of the game that she's actually a malevolent HAL type, and at the very end she turns (very binary) evil in a comical way. The end was just right because the game didn't dwell on that; as you got like about 20 amazing minutes of psycho GladOS.
In contrats to Portal 2 which is totally super-dwelling. It's spread thin. It is Portal 1 fanservice.
This could all change and become amazing, I'm just surprised by how weak it is compared to Portal 1 ATM.
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I am inclined to agree with Fenrir on this (though kudos to Wheatley's VA if nothing else). That said, I enjoyed the gel-based puzzles in Portal 2 a lot. They were probably my favorite puzzles in both games. The Cave Johnson section was fairly entertaining, but I felt the gameplay suffered. I'm not a fan of the 'find the one tiny spot where you have to shoot a Portal' areas in either game, and that part had a lot of it. I would give both games a 7/10 generally, but I feel one could just play Portal and get a complete experience.
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I'd hate Portal 2 almost as much as Fenrir if the first act was the whole game, thankfully it's not. It's a very dedicated head-fake, though.
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I'm not a fan of the 'find the one tiny spot where you have to shoot a Portal' areas in either game, and that part had a lot of it.
Yeah, I hated when the game resorted to this. That said, Old Aperture was still the best part of the game for me because exploring forgotten rusting superstructures = doubleplus Cid points. Also I can forgive almost anything for Cave Johnson.
Wheatley had a lot of excellent lines and the VA was spot-on. I dunno, Fenrir.
I enjoyed Portal 2 a lot more on a replay because I was no longer laboring under the unrealistic expectation that it could be compressed awesome like its predecessor.
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Alpha Sapphire: Got the Aggronite. Does anything else I did in this game really matter? I CAN GET MEGA AGGRON IN LIKE 22 LEVELS!!
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Alpha Sapphire: Beat Delta Episode a few days back, then took a look at the E4 rematch levels. L70+ teams vs my L54 group? Yeah, not happening. Might as well just toss all my stored-up rare candies on Kyogre then let it, Mega-Raybroken, and Deoxys handle them.
Team thoughts, since most of them are largey done now.
Sceptile (Giga Drain, Dragon Claw, Earthquake, Leaf Storm)- Most interesting starter Mega since there's times where the added Dragon type is a liability so you're better off staying in base form instead of being a strict upgrade. Giga Drain and Leaf Storm are both really nice upgrades over gen 3 Leaf Blade and had distinct uses. Dragon STAB is helpful considering how many things resist Grass, though being stuck with physical Dual Chop/Dragon Claw isn't ideal. EQ I used over Focus Blast because 70% accuracy sucks and the higher power isn't really needed in-game.
Swellow (Boomburst, Brave Bird, Fly, U-Turn)- Faded from earlygame godhood since Boomburst only 2HKOs most things instead of OHKOs, plus the low durability is increasingly noticable. Still held its own weight in the team, strong moves off middling attack stats plus great speed is workable enough in-game.
Manectric (Thunderbolt, Flamethrower, T-wave, rotating filler move)- Take bog standard Electric type, add fire moves for coverage and a Mega for better stats+Intimidate. Really good but not particularly interesting.
Aggron (Rock Slide, Iron Head, Earthquake, rotating filler move)- Same Aggron tanking, now with significantly better STAB options. Rock Slide at L25 and Iron Head at L22 do wonders for Aron's offense. Defensive typing walled a bunch of stuff, including allied Boombursts in double battles. I tended to stick to the base form for Rock STAB, but the Mega was still a good option for water-logged routes.
Heracross (Close Combat, Megahorn, pick two of EQ/Rock Slide/Shadow Claw/Swords Dance/False Swipe)- Getting Megahorn at L37 instead of the 50s for once is really awesome, and Close Combat was only pushed back to L43 to compensate. The last two slots were constantly mixed and matched based on the situation. I never used the Mega form since I didn't like the -10 speed drop, it got outsped ocasionally as it is and isn't bulky enough to not care about going first. Got the second most use vs the Elite Four due to some favorable type matchups, even though Sceptile and Manectric are probably better overall.
Kyogre (Surf, Ice Beam, Thunder, Water HM move/Calm Mind)- Same old Kyogre, now with even higher stats thanks to primal reversion. Probably still better than Groudon in-game due to more immediate firepower, so at least it has something to commiserate about now that's been so badly dethroned in ubers.
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My problem with touch d-pads can be seen here
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-12-05-video-touch-control-rage-with-tomb-raider-2-for-ios
Obviously this is a waaay bigger problem with Tomb Raider 2 than Final Fantasy Dimensions. (Tomb Raider 2 also already having difficult controls to begin with so a port to iOS was just a recipe for disaster)
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Some more quick notes from BoF3 magic challenge.
I'll probably go into more detail once I'm done, but Gaist was by far the hardest fight in this challenge so far. Big defense and magic resist made him incredibly difficult to damage, especially since I didn't find the Icicle shop until after the fight.
Angler was tedious, but not too difficult. He has no weaknesses and decent enough defenses especially since Garr is pratcically a non factor on offense, but he's still not bad. Just tedious. The team really wants the third level spells soon.
Also, I don't know if this is mentioned in the stat topic, but I'm pretty sure BoF3 healing spells get some kind of agility boost. It's not huge enough for Ryu to outpace someone with a significant agility advantage, but it's enough for Ryu to do something like going after an enemy who is consistently faster than him normally but slower than Nina to being consistently faster than the aforementioned enemy while still being slower than Nina. Seems like it could be a nice boost to Momo especially.
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Tales of Vesperia- Picked this back up on the 360 while waiting for PS3 JP version to arrive. I must have been terrible at Tales games back then as I barely had over 1000 Grade on the old clear file and only one costume (Judith's Sultry Temptress), either that or I must have just blitzed through it for the story. Caught up on a lot of endgame stuff, getting the costumes, titles, etc that I could, also collected more artes, skills, altered artes, materials, equipment, etc. Wrapped it up with grinding for Grade for NG+, did some with the blah blah blah Rita method, some with Estelle with variety. and some with setting the AI to auto grind with Tidal Wave/Holy Rain/Tempest spam~ Finished off with 17'000~ Grade, now I'm just winding up with material farming and equipment synthesis. Things I apparently missed out on permanently on this file costumes of Yuri's except the theatre/play and spa ones, Raven's spoiler costume (:() , at least I finally got his Shining Star one though, but then I also missed out on Vanji Lost/Stop Flow, Karol's Giganto quest costume, the post game dungeon, 200 man melees, probably other things I'm not thinking of or don't remember, or know. Things I'm saving for next time probably, Judith's title for clearing all five dragon races, and Into the Sky costume, and cooking things~
Finally managed to clear L3!, of that darn dragon race at least, which also meant I was able to clear the dog map too. Though no resolution with Little Wolf bugs me~
Been reading up on the PS3 version, seems kind of pointless to arbitrarily nerf things like Estelle's Eternal Support and Force Field permanent invincibility all battle hax and Raven's Stop Flow, when it adds skills like "Cannot die while in Overlimit!" , but I don't know, unless PS3 version also nerfs things like how fast characters like Rita fill Overlimit or something~
Also yaay Djinns~, glad you enjoyed Graces, and got something from the characters :)
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On that thread of games I suppose I should say
Tales of Xillia - finished this and did Magnus Zero once, didn't bother going through a second time.
I am hesitant to call this the best Tales game in years since I have been saying that for most of them I have played since Abyss really. Graces was good even with all the ffffffffffffffff involved. Vesperia is also still really really high in my esteem, I kind of want to replay it to see how it holds up, but that hate binge replay of ToS on PS3 isn't going to do itself and I have like 2 other Tales games sitting around unplayed as well.
For years Tales games mostly felt like they were a linear progression of improvement and I have been on board since ToP. I still like SNES ToP is how much I am on board for this series. So when I feel like they have slowed down a lot since Vesperia I don't mean that as a bad thing, but they do seem to not be making as much headway as they used to. They don't push the envelope much, but they never have. The series definitely is stagnant in some spots, but it is ones they always have. It is mostly the plot, they refuse the same points in the same way over and over and reuse similar settings a lot, it loops back on itself in similar ways to Final Fantasy does without reinventing itself every time the way FF does.
That said they tune the combat system a little bit each time to keep the similar gameplay different for fans each time, so that is good if you like the series. Unfortunately it means they aren't really going to chase a broader audience than what they already have (for good or ill).
So that is a lot of meta and not a lot about the game I guess' but that does say a lot of what I want to say about Xillia, it is really good Tales game, if you like them you have probably already played it and I am the last one that needs to tell you. The character work is pretty good for the series, the only really bad character is a villain so you don't interact much. The game is full of old random throwbacks that are just kind of there. The game tracks side quests for you really well which is a nice change, but for the first time as well side quests honestly aren't that huge of a deal, your biggest rewards are from levelling up shops.
The shop system I at first wanted to praise and now that I am done want to praise significantly less. It isn't so much a well designed system as it is a really highly functional one. It is incredibly simple way of pacing shops by essentially tying them to your progress through the game with an experience meter, but still having shops universal and independent of the town you are in (which is great after having to fly to the fucking moon to go shopping in Graces). So it is simple but it is really an inelegant way to solve that problem. Kudos to them both identifying and addressing the problem, it is a good simple solution to it, but it doesn't feel particularly inspired. I am not sure what I would do different, but hey, I can dream.
ToX, if you were going to play it you probably already have,so this is me telling you that you should have played it when you did.
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I would take uninspired connivance over Graces and Xillia 2's absolute hell any time.
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I enjoyed Wheatly and found the shift in Glados a reasonably successful one (retreading the same territory would also have been dull). Old Ap. was fun narratively, but agonizing gameplay wise.
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Oh it certainly is good. Functional is my second favourite kind of solution. It just isn't flashy or interesting way to resolve a new problem. They identified an old problem and fixed it with old solutions. It definitely works and the game is significantly better for it. They could have just gone "eh you can teleport most of the time, what the fuck ever" like they have in the past.
I do remember your rage against ToX2. that may be a contributing factor to me wanting to hate play ToS instead of jumping to ToX2 next for my Tales binge.
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Portal 2: Got up to Chapter 6? Writing has gotten a bit better.
I think the fact that the game is way goofier than Portal 1 was weird and I didn't anticipate it. I'm not a fan but it works.
Wheatley betrayal sounded dumb until I read some interesting things on the Internet about it because I just couldn't believe how dumb it was. Ok.
Freedom Wars:
Is some MH clone with pretty boring battles so far.
But:
It's a post apocalyptic world where resurces are scarce and countries fight each other for scraps.
You get amnesia at the beginning of the game and get sentenced to 1 000 000 years in prison (yes) for contributing nothing to society.
You can do missions for the Greater Good to lower your jail time. The goal of the game is reaching 0 and getting free. (Though it seems that there is an overarching plot where you get to destroy the system. Presumably by becoming an engineer and starting a new agricultural revolution? If it's possible, I'll try to be selfish, reach 0 jail time, and leave without saving the world)
Ok what's cool is that you have absolutely no freedom at the beginning of the game, and if you try to transgress any law you get additional jail time.
At the beginning of the game you can only move around in a super small cell. I did that, and immediately got a +10 additional jail time for walking 5 unproductive steps in my cell. Then I tried to sleep and got +20 jail time for lying down. (I was only allowed to sit if I wanted to sleep )
After a mission I eventually could buy these rights, and also could get out of my cell and explore the prison. One guy immediately talked to me, and I got +30 jail time for talking to a stranger and +50 jail time for getting near a prisoner of the opposite sex. ffffffffffffff
Total jail time is shown above the head of every prisoner. People with fewer years left see my score and treat me like trash. There are some people with like 3 million jail times who very obviously went totally crazy and just kept adding up jail time. And they're never getting out of there.
Some guy is planning an escape and I'm sure he's going to be crushed. Cameras are everywhere and everybody has a customizable personal android watching their every move and being jerks in general. (I made mine an UOM with a pompadour)
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Oh it certainly is good. Functional is my second favourite kind of solution. It just isn't flashy or interesting way to resolve a new problem. They identified an old problem and fixed it with old solutions. It definitely works and the game is significantly better for it. They could have just gone "eh you can teleport most of the time, what the fuck ever" like they have in the past.
I do remember your rage against ToX2. that may be a contributing factor to me wanting to hate play ToS instead of jumping to ToX2 next for my Tales binge.
And I didn't even get into any of the worst rants I could have gone with either. I was just so sick of the game's shit I didn't want to think about it anymore.
Like, by some coincidence I was playing again recently and remembering why I hated it. I fought one of the bonus bosses - Snow Cougar EX - and it has an affect where it curls up and summons a bigass blizzard across the field to damage you. To stop it you have to kill three adds, but literally—LITERALLY every time I tired to attack the adds, the damage affect would go off and stone my whole party. And it's not like any dispel would have helped either, my whole party was hit each time and any status protection status lasts about half a second. Accessories? Complete pain in the ass to make. If I wanted full stone protection I'd have needed to wait at least an hour to get enough materials to Custom Order the stone protection. Relying on a 15 minute wait for a RANDOM CHANCE to get what you need is absurd. And you need hundreds of the "rare" drops to start equipping yourself for the post-game hell.
I mean, hell, did I ever talk about the bonus boss who went into Overlimit and healed herself to full (she was at low thousands and healed herself back into the hundred thousands) without me being able to do a damn thing? If I don't have Chromatus or a Mystic Arte of my own there was nothing to stop it. Every extra boss is an outrageously fat stack of numbers that turns every fight into a complete asinine bore. That Snow Cougar had an ATK score of 40,000! It'd take me two PCs combining every stat they HAD to reach that!
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Fudo, SPAM IFRIT II.
It a very effective way to kill a lot of the optional bosses.
Hell, Ifirit II is almost like the only thing I use in late game when controlling Milla, as it is simply so OP.
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Dragon Age: Inquisition continues to be very good. Besides two adventure zones that are close to each other on the map and I assume were originally going to be one place but for technical issues of some sort, each area is both large and open enough for truly satisfying exploration, and all of them are pretty distinct from each other visually and thematically. The writing tends to be quite enjoyable, particularly in regards to my character being a Qunari and how people in Orlais and Ferelden react to that.
My character is also very eloquent and always knows the right thing to say. When someone dies that thing tends to be "Well... shit."
Combat is still enjoyable, but I wish the AI was more customizable. The replacement of healing spells with a limited number of potions, forcing you to rely on guard abilities and shield spells and such, makes going into dungeons an actual challenge where you may not have enough supplies to get to the end if you play poorly, necessitating you go back to base and start over. Puts a lot of the onus on you to avoid large attacks and control the enemy rather than just face-tanking every single thing while you have everyone blow their best moves.
Still can't fuck the ghost, though.
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Still can't fuck the ghost, though.
I am tired of Bioware's pro SJW bullshit. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me thrice with no ghostboning? I'm done. They've clearly forgotten about the fans that built them up, the fans that truly mattered. Now they are slaves to social media and political correctness. I can't handle it anymore, the constant betrayal is just too much. I'm not going to take it anymore and neither should you.
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If you put a ghost into a game where you can fuck most of your companions, the audience is going to expect you to reenact the ghost blowjob scene from Ghostbusters. That's a fucking fact of life.
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If there's something strange
in your neighborhood
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
If there's something weird
and it don't look good
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
I ain't afraid of no ghosts
I ain't afraid of no ghosts
If you're seeing things
running through your head
Who can ya call?
GHOSTBONERS
An invisible man
sleeping in your bed
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
I ain't afraid of no ghosts
I ain't afraid of no ghosts
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
If ya all alone
pick up the phone
and call
GHOSTBONERS
I ain't afraid of no ghosts
I here it likes the girls
I ain't afraid of no ghost
Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
If you've had a dose of a
freaky ghost baby
Ya better call
GHOSTBONERS
Lemme tell ya something
Bustin' makes me feel good!
I ain't afraid of no ghosts
I ain't afraid of no ghosts
Don't get caught alone no no
GHOSTBONERS
When it comes through your door
Unless you just want some more
I think you better call
GHOSTBONERS
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
I think you better call
GHOSTBONERS
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
I can't hear you
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
Louder
GHOSTBONERS
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
Who can ya call?
GHOSTBONERS
Who ya gonna call?
GHOSTBONERS
I started this as a joke with a find and replace, then parsing the text I felt the need to draw attention to specific verses.
It works you guys. It totally works.
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Grefter, the new Ghostbusters movie supposedly has an all-female cast, so obviously Hollywood is pushing its pro-SJW agenda on us. Why do they have to be women? They're caving to the misguided SJW idea that women should have representation in film (they probably also think they should vote lol) and they're shoehorning them into a classic franchise that has no logical place for them. Also, everyone knows women can't be funny. They've clearly forgotten the fans that have gotten them there, so we should do our do diligence and boycott the movie and then die in abject solitude.
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Fudo, SPAM IFRIT II.
It a very effective way to kill a lot of the optional bosses.
Hell, Ifirit II is almost like the only thing I use in late game when controlling Milla, as it is simply so OP.
Sure, why not. This game doesn't deserve respect like Xillia 1 does.
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Noting that I am well aware of the irony of this after me just saying I want to hate replay ToS on PS3.
You could just like, not play it maybe? You finished the game, it is post game bullshit. Maybe it just isn't worth your time. If it is because you literally have nothing else to play, hit me up in PM. I can buy you a random fucking Steam game. I have a few things in my inventory that I can give away even. Nothing new, but shit that is a damn sight better than doing the optional end game garbage for a game that you think is a giant pile of shit.
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Noting that I am well aware of the irony of this after me just saying I want to hate replay ToS on PS3.
You could just like, not play it maybe? You finished the game, it is post game bullshit. Maybe it just isn't worth your time. If it is because you literally have nothing else to play, hit me up in PM. I can buy you a random fucking Steam game. I have a few things in my inventory that I can give away even. Nothing new, but shit that is a damn sight better than doing the optional end game garbage for a game that you think is a giant pile of shit.
My time is fairly worthless and when I want to hate a game I want to do it from as complete a position as possible so I can laugh at people who try and call me out as never playing it. I may hate the game but damn is it fun laughing at its shittiness, and I laugh at it far more than I play it.
Thanks for the offer, but I have plenty of games of mine own to go through. Shadows of Mordor had a extra mode thrown in recently, I also grabbed Heart of the Swarm and can go get the Hard Mode Achievements for that. Heck, I could even go finish getting Stat Topic Data for the original Xillia.
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Well at least petrify doesn't cause an instant game over anymore, I remember the entire party getting petrified by those plant things while going through Magnus Zero in the original Xillia ... yeeah~
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Well at least petrify doesn't cause an instant game over anymore, I remember the entire party getting petrified by those plant things while going through Magnus Zero in the original Xillia ... yeeah~
I'm glad I heard about that in advance and always had a protector on Elize.
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Noting that I am well aware of the irony of this after me just saying I want to hate replay ToS on PS3.
You could just like, not play it maybe? You finished the game, it is post game bullshit. Maybe it just isn't worth your time. If it is because you literally have nothing else to play, hit me up in PM. I can buy you a random fucking Steam game. I have a few things in my inventory that I can give away even. Nothing new, but shit that is a damn sight better than doing the optional end game garbage for a game that you think is a giant pile of shit.
My time is fairly worthless and when I want to hate a game I want to do it from as complete a position as possible so I can laugh at people who try and call me out as never playing it. I may hate the game but damn is it fun laughing at its shittiness, and I laugh at it far more than I play it.
I can relate to that. I remember doing the same to the despicabelly bad ToD2.
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NSMB2: 100% on worlds 1-5 and mushroom/flower, just need to clear out 6 and star. The game is very much a Lost Levels sort of paint-by-numbers sequel, but they've managed to wring enough new wrinkles out of the NSMB mold that it's fun to play. It's just not enough to get any real enthusiasm going. The coin-collecting gimmick also falls pretty much flat, which is a shame.
Infamous 2: I've got a PS3 again! As opposed to bumming one off Super, I mean. Picked up where I left off in this - namely, really early on. Currently tooling around after unlocking the first round of buyable powers. Running around the city lightning-ing fools is just as fun as it was in the first one, and I really like the new system of hot-swappable sidegrades for the main power types. Also, it's pretty as all get-out.
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The problem is that the coin gimmick devalues coins! You get really excited about getting 100 coins in Mario 1 because holy shit an extra life but in this game you have so many extra lives they are running out of your ears.
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I was expecting some kind of tangible reward for getting a whole bunch of coins beyond the usual extra life per 100, but all you get is a new title screen at a threshold that's so high the only way to get it is to grind the rainbow levels into dust - nobody's idea of fun. Unlockable Luigi/Toad/Peach, more toad houses, a Gold Flower every 5K coins or something would have given the whole exercise some purpose.
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So you are proposing a return to Gold Flower standard to keep the value of the Mushroom Kingdom dollar up?
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GOOGLE RON SHROOM
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Just picked up a PS4 and Shadows of Mordor, which has been shockingly good. Since this is a game all about emergent systems, trying to convey individual stories I have had may be similar to telling someone your dreams, but I have felt like a much stronger sense of bloodlust against some of these stupid Orc captains than I have felt for like 90% of villains in storybased RPGs (. The higher level orcs have weird perks, like being immune to fire, being shot, or immune to being stealth killed (which is fine for balance but it's like being immune to stab wounds) and they also have fun weaknesses like shitting themselves when they see doggies and bees. I feel like if you got some of these dudes high enough level that they'd have a combination of traits that would make them virtually impossible to kill, but I'm not close to being there yet.
The game looks like it has a lot of things to do (mostly variants of murdering all orcs), and the open world actually doesn't look to be that big, so traversal from murder to murder never feels labored.
I let a dude level up by murdering me several times ("let") and now Tuka Hot Tongs thinks he's the shit until I crash his feast and rain bees on his parade.
Also the Warchiefs are introduced by a choir chanting their silly names like a terrible WWE entrance song. It's goofy.
Also this game probably craps all over the LotR lore but I don't care. This thing may as well not have a story as far as I'm concerned.
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Enjoy the orc murder. ENJOY IT! Bwhahahahaha. Yes, you can eventually get nigh-invulnerable orcs that constantly regen health and kill you in one hit. It's GLORIOUS.
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Still can't fuck the ghost, though.
I am tired of Bioware's pro SJW bullshit. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me thrice with no ghostboning? I'm done. They've clearly forgotten about the fans that built them up, the fans that truly mattered. Now they are slaves to social media and political correctness. I can't handle it anymore, the constant betrayal is just too much. I'm not going to take it anymore and neither should you.
:golfclap: I enjoyed this bit of satire. Thank you.
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Nier - I am finished this game. This game isn't finished with itself though. it won't fucking stop.
So bored. The game is so far up its own arsehole. You know what would be cool? If you didn't kill off the support cast more than once each during the game.
The gameplay sucks, the plot during all the main missions is terrible and stupid. It has all the depths of my kitchen sink.
The side quests are the best writing in the game and are consistent and on the central theme of the game, which is more than you can say for all the fucking main areas. It is a shame the best parts of the game has deliberate aggressively bad gameplay because SIDE QUESTS ARE BAD.
This game is bad and I regret not waiting for longer to play it. Putting it aside for a rainy day for when I wanted a really good game ended up being the exact opposite of what it was.
Now I actually need to go kill the final boss (again). Maybe there is another two forms. Kaine hasn't committed suicide or been killed out of hand just yet, so maybe there is only 6 more fights to get through in this rubbish.
I don't care if New Game+ starts me half way through the game, I am not touching this crap again for 20 minutes of cutscenes I can youtube IF I feel like giving it the time of day again.
Edit - Oh and Kaine's butt corset is embarrassing and you should all feel bad.
Edit 2 - Okay there wasn't a suicide pointlessly cutscene for her, what a twist. Now I can't skip the credit sequence. Hooray.
So like the setting does leave a lot of questions open that I assume it answers in the other endings? But you have to earn that kind of commitment from me as a player. I am not going to sink more time into this snoozefest of a game to find out why human spirits and bodies being separated was the answer to avoiding extinction. Why spirits trying to inhabit bodies again kills the body (presumably the disease kills them). Why Shadows are human souls and they fight humans. How the shadows can pretend to be Bodies. Why they are fighitng. Why the fuck Kaine has a butt corset. Why Nier's shadow form is the centre of the universe for reasons OTHER than narrative convenience. Why Emil even exists in this story.
The game is a bare minimum set of systems and resources put together tied together with shoestrings to tell a story that has no focus and is too busy going HURHURR VIDEO GAEMS ARE DUMB HURRR HURR to deliver on a single fucking concept. You don't get to talk that kind of shit about video games when you can't deliver.
For a game who has a central them of fatherhood (or family) it sure does sweet fuck all to build the relationship between Nier and Yonah.
I will give it one thing on that front though. It does do the story of a sociopath trying to save a young girl plot years before The Last of Us did it and it does it significantly worse than The Last of Us does.
For a game that wants to talk about video games, it doesn't talk about much of any relevance, doesn't examine any of them with any particular depth.
OH hey, a fun thought did occur to me though. Since it is a video game about video games, maybe Nier is Frog Fractions 2 and the real joke is that it sucks.
Edit 3 - Okay now that the credits are done the clear save data tells me what I am replaying for. To see Kaine's story? Oh cool I don't need to bother playing again. Good to know.
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Kaine's insane fanservice is actualy pretty cool because she's a hermaphrodite
I agree that "LOL videogame fetchquests! Here's a fetchquest" is dumb but I don't remember Nier going "LOL videogames!" like at all. When did that happen? It can't possibly be a major part of the game...
I've seen a lot of games do that in smal doses recently (Far Cry Blood Dragon comes to mind) probably as a push back against the endless Zelda-ish tutorials and endless MMO fetchquests. I barely notice it anymore.
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I could be attributing intent to places that I just see incompetence I suppose because the game is busy slow jerking itself off in so many other ways.
The core combat system is pretty bad, it plays like an action RPG but the controls aren't that tight or responsive. If you get hit it is super easy to be chain at the end of your crazy long stun animation, you better be mashing the shit out of Evade or something to get yourself moving out of the way. There is a combo system that doesn't do a damn thing, it is just there because that is what video games do (both of these are a series staple).
The core plot is over the top and fucking stupid at so many points, everyone instantly forms deep meaningful relationships with the random social detritus they meet and they all constantly self sacrifice over and over again, because that is what JRPGs do.
During every sequence where the game is all "check me out I am just like that other genre" it does it badly.
- All the Danmaku components you work around by just attacking bullets and the controls aren't tight enough to actually do proper bullet hell stuff and enemy placement she trash do it is way too random for it to be even any good.
- The Text Adventure sequence at the Forest of Myth boils down to like 5 or 6 player interactions and is probably the best part of the regular game. 15 minutes pretty okay joke ain't worth shit when you are going to repeat it later badly and the rest of your game is terrible, especially when the good part is in the half of the game you don't get to redo.
- The Haunted Mansion is all Resident Evil at the start and does literally nothing with it. Here is 6 rooms where you have terrible controls because of a fixed camera kill some shades then we will move on. Otherwise run around finding different shaped keys. Take that Resident Evil! You know, that style of puzzle that the series hasn't done since the PS1? Yeah that was so bad you guyzzzzzzz.
- After that the haunted mansion turns into either a genre I can't place or one I placed incorrectly is isometric real time combat games. This is actually okay. The action is only occasionally obscured by stuff in the way of th camera and the camera being zoomed out hella far.
- Junk Yard randomly features top down shooter sequences. The single thing they have in common is that the controls go to shit.
- Abandoned Temple has seriously hard puzzles like "don't run" "don't jump".
Now I could be incorrectly thinking that these things were done badly deliberately based on the fact that the side quests are done poorly deliberately, but it is done so well in the side quests. You do slow boring unrewarding tasks and your reward is helping people that are struggling during after the apocalypses has happened. Through that you are shown a massive range in different families and how they work. They are all different than Nier and Yonah's relationship but most of them are pretty healthy at best or at worst the outcome between Weiss and Nier is that regardless of the situation they don't really have much room to judge.
That stuff is so good that I just don't want to see that Kaine became petrified door Jesus for 5 years for no narrative pay off other than that is what we do in these games rather than it being a commentary on these games.
That said I don't know why I want this, because even if it is a commentary I interpret it as terrible so fuck me. I am just grumpy and unpleasable I guess.
Oh and the load times on this thing are fucking monstrous. That really pushes your buttons when you aren't having fun and the best parts of the game are in the grindy part that insists you move between maps a lot. That said, that is my fault for doing the part of the game that is deliberately bad though.
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Wait a sec, so Grefter walk into NieR unknowing this is a Yokotaro production, that is designed to appall the players in one way or another.
And he even endured all this for two cycles with no prior knowledge?
Oh my god.
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Grefter, I think your assessment is way off base and I'm not sure what mindset you went into the game with that caused this kind of vitriolic reaction. I could make an impassioned rebuttal of your points but I don't have that kind of time. Instead, here's a post voicing disagreement that exists just to counter any illusion of consensus that silence might indicate.
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It seems that Grefter's hate cup has runneth over.
Super Mario 3D World - After a lot of deaths and tears, I finally beat the third world of the aftergame, which is primarily remixed (and douchier) versions of old stages, often adding in more enemies, faster platforming, and 100 seconds time limits. In practice, most of the stages don't feel that similar at all despite using the same map. The final stage in the aftergame was a mammoth of a stage, featuring pretty much all of the bosses in the game that weren't Bowser. I timed out a couple times, beat the first five bosses, and then realized there was a sixth. So I spent the next 10 or 20 tries trying to git gud enough to beat the stage in the requisite amount of time. I beat the aftergame primarily with Rosalina because she is only playable in the aftergame.
There are like three stages left in the game, but you have to collect every star, every stamp, and get to the top of every goal post to get to it. I'm not 100% sure I am up for that job, but I have started it already so maybe I am. Got all the stuff in the first four worlds.
This game is utterly fantastic. Like many longtime Mario fans, I generally consider SMB2 and SMB3 to be the duo of awesomeness for the Mario series, the gold standard. This game is the closest thing to that gold standard that I have played in the series. I will have to ponder how I feel about it vs. SMB3, which is pretty high honors in my book!
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Grefter, I think your assessment is way off base and I'm not sure what mindset you went into the game with that caused this kind of vitriolic reaction. I could make an impassioned rebuttal of your points but I don't have that kind of time. Instead, here's a post voicing disagreement that exists just to counter any illusion of consensus that silence might indicate.
also you smell
Some people don't like some things, it is okay. There's been enough Nier love on this board that we know it's not a consensus!
Anyway I think things like the mansion were more of a throwback more than a commentary? I like the closed rooms and the tons of keys in Resident Evil and Silent Hill. I don't think including them immediately means it's trying to say it's terrible.
Gameplay has a lot of variety, with individual segments not as good as they could be if fully fledged out but whatever? Kinda like 2D platforming in WA4, it's obviously not amazing but the variety is nice compared to a regular game. I really don't think it's trying to be Barkley Shut up and Jam: Gaiden at all. As shown by the way it's taking itself seriously.
I found the gameplay tight enough overall in specific parts. On hard. I got murdered by the boar for 20 hours before getting to the first dungeon though. I loved the feel of controling of the super fast main character + environmental design + music more than anything. Overall I liked the game a lot until the dumb last arc.
Portal 2: I finished it, Wheatley got pretty fun. Gameplay was as atrocious as told during the midgame. I like the idea of using portals outside of test chambers but I'm sure they could have found something better than "find the tiny white spot".
There were some super clever puzzles at the end though.
Um.
It's pretty weird to have a sequel where the main villain is much less threatening (gameplaywise he's actually more dangerous I believe)
As I understood it, Wheatley started to hate Chell because when he switched places with Glados he could control the whole facility but also kinda installed files like IAmSuperEvil.exe to do it.
I understood this was also the reason GladOS hated Chell so much and why she really became softer when detached from the mainframe. So why does she let Chell go when she gets control back at the end?
I mean sure she got on a fun adventure with Chell before being reinstalled, but Wheatley did the same thing and still turned super evil.
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Fenrir, I think the suggestion is that
-GladOS is an A.I. composite of Caroline (Cave Johnson's assistant).
-Caroline was Chell's mom.
-I forget exact wording, but turret opera's lyrics are basically butchered Italian to the extent of "Stay away from science, my daughter Chell."
-Not to drag up an overused line, but I'm pretty sure Caroline Deleted was a lie.
I adore the ending sequence of Portal 2 and that's even completely independent of the above.
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Aah ok! Makes sense.
But, a mother's love trumping code?
Too unrealistic!
Oh, I forgot:
Some people don't like some things, it is okay.*
*Except when it's Dark Souls
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It is an honor to be 'not okay' then.
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Shadow of Mordor: I've made no story progress but one of the orcbrahs I was fighting was weak to arrows so I set him on fire using a Fire Arrow. He got charred and got a small scene where he just said, "Life ... ends," which was shockingly existential and ruminative for this fairly dumb game.
PS - one second later his brain was full of sword.
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Pokemon Alpha Sapphire: Beat the rematch with basically just Rayquaza and Kyogre. Imported a L100 Scizor with Technican Swords Dance+False Swipe to catch all the legendaries now, plus mess around with Secret Base options.
After a week or two, I'll bank everything and restart the game with a way more interesting team:
Mightyena
Beautifly
Dustox
Masquerain
Delcatty
Plusle/Minun (whichever is more common in AS)
Volbeat
Spinda
Castform
Kecleon
Chimecho
Luvdisc
Trainer name: Niuko
To keep things interesting, I'll disable the exp share until after Delta Episode is finished, because the E4 rematch levels are too dumb otherwise; even there I'll only start off with a L60 team and grind up further if it proves completely impossible. Also I won't use healing items in-battle vs Gym Leaders and the Elite Four (and Aqua admins I guess, not that I should need any healing there). I will max out everyone's affection in Pokemon Amie though, the exp boost will be helpful and a lot fairer than exp share while the hax working in favor of these guys should feel amusing rather than cheap.
Also I could use some nickname suggestions. Ephraim is an obvious pick for Mightyena but otherwise I'm dry on ideas right now. Maybe super for Luvdisc just because that makes for a funny visual image. Also the nicknames don't have to be DL member names, though I'm obviously fine with those.
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Delcatty sounds good for me :)
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Pokeniu is back, bitches.
yessssss
Hyrule Warriors - I fully cleared the Adventure Map at long last, and also passed 100 hours played. The very last map I finished was a "defeat 1000 enemies in 10 minutes" one where you have to deal with half a dozen human bosses and three(!) Imprisoned. After several tries I cleared it in 9:58; only map I got a C ranking on.
No I'm not done with the game.
Lunar: Eternal Blue Complete - Nearing the end of disc 2, just beat the Red Fiend. I do like this game overall but there are some very clear flaws with its writing sometimes. The Mauri arc was pretty terribly bungled. Oh well! Beyond that the writing is reasonably sharp overall and the gameplay remains one of the best-executed traditional turn-based gameplay systems.
Super Smash Bros. 4 Wii U - Outside of plenty of multiplayer smashing action I'm doing the event matches, which are certainly a lot more fun than any one-player mode in the 3DS version. I generally try to do them on Hard but some are too evil so I settle for beating them in Normal instead.
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Grefter, I think your assessment is way off base and I'm not sure what mindset you went into the game with that caused this kind of vitriolic reaction. I could make an impassioned rebuttal of your points but I don't have that kind of time. Instead, here's a post voicing disagreement that exists just to counter any illusion of consensus that silence might indicate.
NOTE: I AM NOT BEING AGGRESSIVE WITH THE BELOW. TONE IS MEANT TO BE DIRECT INFORMATIVE. Edit - Also of course as soon as I post I want to edit in a bunch of NONONO I MEAN THIS to stuff.
You want to know what mindset I went into? One that had been set exactly by the kind of dissenting voice you aren't really going through there. You, Fenrir, CK and others really dug this game. You all liked the music and seemed to think the game itself wasreally good. I had it packed away for a rainy day. Edit - This is to say, I appreciated your opinions and took them on board! You got my interest in the game up.
My personal experience was okay music that didn't push any boundaries and a messy game that is full of gameplay that is average at best.
I am not accusing you guys of setting my expectations so high that I couldn't have them met or anything, I was just expecting a good game or interesting concepts and I didn't get that out of this. Edit - So I wanted to post about what I got out of it to share that. Not to start a fight. My personal weather vane on the DL opinion of the game is that it is quite well thought of. If I didn't have something different to say (and wasn't frustrated with it) I would have just posted like Nier - Its good and you already know why.
I know of the designer's oeuvre (but no first hand experience prior to this), I just don't think he has done the work to earn that here. See Spec Ops: The Line for a game that earned that exact kind of thing.
Fen, the difference between WA4 platforming bits and Nier is that platforming isn't 80% of the game and it doesn't use turn based combat controls to do it. That said, turn based platformer, get on that indie devs.
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I meant that platforming in WA4 is bigger or as big as Text only thing / RE mansion / Isometric top down action / shooter / bullet hell in Nier.
Regular fighting that's a big part of the game is still like better than, say, Skyrim.
Anyway, aren't that greek town and the aerie at least super great to see?
I dunno. I'd think you'd have found enough cool shit in here. Dude at least Kaine's gender is super great. You get guys frothing over her then getting to the reveal and then being all confused about their sexuality.
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Started up Dragon Age: Origins cause of the hubbub the other day. Cause my 3 bucks I paid from the bargain bin is what put them where they are today.
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FF10 HD: So...I finally finished this, took me long enough! Blame...I'm not sure, I really should have played this faster. Screw it, whoever posts directly after me is to blame for this!
So yeah, I need to finish my plot rant? Well, let's get started!
So first we go to Bevelle! Shelinda is all "I'm a captain and OH GOD I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO!" It's not a meaningful scene per se other than further establishing Yevon really is falling apart. Not only are the priests arguing, but someone like Shelinda being made Captain of the Guards? Uh, yeah, that proves your options are slim.
Then they meet with Mika, because that was Kimhari's idea. Mika is all "You met Yunalesca? GOOD! KILL SIN NOW!" and Yuna is like "uh, yeah, about that...we sort of killed her...I mean, she was already dead, but well...you know how it works...you're unsent yourself" Ok, so she didn't say THAT, but basically Mika spills the beans on Yu Yevon's existence (That Yunalesca name-dropped), and pretty much spells out that Sin is just an armor protecting the real deal. One thing I have to say is that this "Man behind the Giant Evil Whale Monster" reveal doesn't do that I want to say happens often is exonerate Sin of his wrong doings, as it doesn't say "It's not Sin's fault!" but rather merely establishes Sin is just a weapon (or an Armor as Mika puts it), and so long as Yu Yevon exists, Sin can always come back. With this bit of news finally established, Mika loses his will to live, and dies fully without a sending.
Shelinda obliviously appears and goes "where's Mika" and Auron gracefully fibs about how Mika hasn't arrived yet just to remove suspicion. Shelinda falls for it; she's such a cute little tool. I will make one comment about FF10-2 here:
I do find it funny how Shelinda actually ended up as a news reporter 2 years later. I'm not sure I'd call it "in-character" but she wasn't exactly a major character so giving her a funny little role just to cover what she did was nice. For all it's faults, FF10-2 did at least remember the existence of a lot of secondary and tertiary characters, and tried to cover their bases there. Yes, Isaaru's role is completely out of left field, but at least they REMEMBERED Isaaru exists! Gotta give credit where credit is due. I think only Luzu and Gatta are absent, and that's understandable since it avoids having to establish a canon fate for them, and you can't show both for obvious reasons.
...well, ok, it also lacked Wakka/Lulu's previous summoner, but he has literally one scene and just existed as a guy who would logically trust Wakka/Lulu over Yevon while still being part of the order to help some exposition, so whatever there. We can assume he got eaten by a Shoopuff and move on!
Anyway, into the Chamber of the Fayth, Bahamut explains further that Yu Yevon was once a summoner, and is now trying to call THE ULTIMATE SUMMONING! He is neither good nor evil! Dead nor alive! Etc. etc.
...yeah, Bahamut, bullshit on that "Good nor evil" thing. Yu Yevon is clearly the bad guy; there's no excuse to torture a civilization for 1000 years just because you're trying to summon your village back. You killed millions to save thousands. That's not how it works! See, in Doctor Who, it at least establishes the Doctor killed billions of Timelords to save trillions of lives across the galaxy! Legitimate moral dilemna, it comes up several times throughout the "kill mass amounts to save even more!" Yu Yevon is doing the opposite; he's restoring mass amounts by killing way more than he's saving.
The only defense you can play is "Yu Yevon has lost all semblance of sentience is and acting entirely on instinct" which I guess is what Bahamut is trying to say; he doesn't really have a will of his own, more just acting entirely on auto-pilot, and as a result, can't really be considered good or evil, just kind of existing. Anyway, Bahamut explains that Yevon needs Aeons to create Sin, and if all Aeons are dead, Yu Yevon will be exposed...well, no, he doesn't say this, he just urges you to summon him, and later Yuna comes to this conclusion but jumping the gun!
The final thing Bahamut says is the whole "The dream will disappear" nonsense to make sure Tidus understands and Tidus is cool with it, but Yuna is puzzled. Yuna questions Tidus, Tidus goes "oh, it's nothing, let's go kill Sin!" and Yuna pulls Auron's "You're a poor liar!" card.
Ok, so major fight with Sin! Screw plot, WE WANT ACTION!
I'd explain this but really, I think this imagery (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdkKB0-gQq8#t=1m39s) works better for how the fight ultimately goes.
Well, ok, there are gravity bolts involved but ultimately, you get the idea. The dialog here is mostly action scene stuff, until Yuna speculates how to beat SIn once and for all. Summon Aeons -> kill them on the spot as they're possessed when they're still Aeons and not Sin. Yuna notes what disturbs her here is that this is the first time the Aeons personally requested to be used; they've been allies for a while, but never said "USE US NOW!" Yuna shows discomfort in the idea, but pretty much understands it's the only way.
So after being eaten by Sin and Seymour's giant incorporeal chest, we run through some water and fight...Seymour!
I love this scene. No, it's not important or reveals anything, it's just a nice stylish exchange of lines between Hero and villain. It's utterly stock Hero vs. Villain dialog too, in that you could replace Tidus and Seymour here with just about any Good Guy vs. Bad Guy, arrange the wording to fit the characters in question, and it'd still work. Observe!
Sanctus: Ahahaah!
Nero: Don't you ever give up?
Sanctus: The Savior has chosen me! I am part of the Savior, one with the Savior, FOREVER! IMMORTAL!
Nero: The Savior just absorbed you!
Sanctus: I will learn to control it...from within! I have all the time in the world! Since you were so gracious enough to dispose of Dante...the only means of defeating the Savior and myself...is forever gone...NOW NOTHING CAN STOP US!
Nero; Well I can.
Sanctus: By all means TRY! You should thank me, your death means Kyrie's life!!!
SEE WHAT I MEAN!? And of course, doing this properly means you let Seymour long enough to his Ultmia phase so he can be all "There is no salvation for the damned! Rest in peace in eternal darkness!" and "Let Darkness take you!" Something about that exchange of lines just works for an Ultima quote...shut up Ramza and your "Brush off vanity, Show reality!" nonsense! YOUR ULTIMA SUCKS AND YOU SHOULD FEEL BAD ABOUT CALLING IT ULTIMA AND...
...wait, getting side tracked. Anyway, Seymour beaten, Yuna sends him, even as he's dying he's basically refuses to admit he was wrong, and is only admitting defeat because you have him against the corner and he pretty much acknowledges there's no hope for him left.
MORE DUNGEON CRAWLING! Then we get to the stupid crystal room WHY DO YOU EXIST GO BURN IN A DITCH OF PAIN AND TORMENT AND...
...oh hi Jecht. Nice to meet you finally!
So yeah, we finally meet Jecht face to face; all we've seen of him thus far is flashbacks from Tidus' perspective, and the Jecht Spheres, and that one scene in Zanarkand. Jecht's first thing he says?
"You're late, Auron."
This is just quickly establishing that Jecht still has some of him left; he's not completely taken by Sin and that this is in fact Jecht speaking. It establishes he still has that bad sense of humor left in him that we've seen plenty of. After that, he follows up by referring to Tidus' growth, and how he looks scrawny, which you can't tell if he's bullying Tidus or just teasing him. Then he goes "You've really grown up, haven't you" in a sincere voice, which establishes the first line was Jecht just being himself, and the 2nd line was him getting his act together and showing both recognition that his son is now indeed a man, and there's a sense of remorse in his voice, almost like "and I missed all this happen", understandable situation for a father.
Tidus' response is "You're still bigger", which can be interpreted to mean multiple things. Could be that Tidus is acknowledging that he's still not as big and tough as Jecht literally, could also mean Tidus' way of saying Jecht is more of an adult than he is, and showing some respect, etc. Then Jecht goes "well I am Sin" and Tidus calls him out on it not being funny; Jecht's trying to lighten the mood, and said the wrong thing. Jecht then goes on about how Tidus came here and knows what he's got to do, etc.
Then we get the moment Tidus has been waiting his entire life for. The one thing he was never able to do to Jecht when they were together because he was intimidated, and never afterwards since Jecht was gone:
"Dad." "Yeah?" "I hate you!"
Now for all the irony things to kick in! First off, Tidus said "Dad" for like the first time in the entire game. He never referred to Jecht by "Dad" or "Father" any such I believe; it's always "My old man" and what not. The fact that he calls him "Dad" shows that this is the first time Tidus thinks of Jecht as family, so that's important. The "I hate you" is also said in a way that's holding back from crying, almost like he's forcing it out, and he doesn't actually believe it himself, but he needs to let it out.
Jecht's response? "I know, I know, and that's why you need to do it." He goes onto explain how there's very little left of him. He then explains that once it starts, he can't hold back Sin. Why does he say this? Well mostly works around that annoying plothole of "if Jecht wanted to die, why not just let them kill him?" The Answer is sort of given here. We assume Jecht can only be killed in Aeon form, and that the form he's taking now is just an avatar of himself. Once he's in Aeon form, he's no longer himself, but Yu Yevon is in control of him, so yeah, that's why he's fighting back! It's a cheap explanation but gets the point across for why there is a final boss fight at all!
As Jecht transforms, Tidus tries to stop him, fails, then goes "I'll show you, GIVE IT ALL YOU GOT DAD!"
Personally, I like to think the next part goes a little something likethis. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6j6wmrZ2Co)
Jecht falls, and Tidus does the dramatic "run over to grab his body from falling." Jecht starts calling him a crybaby, and sure enough, Tidus is completely bawling here. For a game that keeps saying how much Tidus cries...this is the first time we see him cry. Granted, Jecht last saw him when he was like 7, so things have changed, but I digress. Tidus is crying "I hate you!" and Jecht pretty much spells out that he's proud of Tidus and that he's his son and he hasn't disappointed him, and Tidus says "For the first time, I'm glad that you're my father." Quite a contrast from how the first we saw of Tidus and Jecht was Tidus looking at a billboard of his father and giving him an angry "HMPH!" and well, yeah, it's almost like Tidus and Jecht have grown a lot over their journeys and it only took saving the world for them to finally be a family...and now Jecht is dying...
OH CRAP YU YEVON! QUICK YUNA SUMMON AEONS AND KILL THEM! You do that, Yuna gets upset after each.
Then Tidus drops the Bombshell of "yeah, so I'm going to die after this fight." Why now? Because they literally cannot turn back, so it makes sense. Again, the irony thing kicks in; the whole purpose of the mission was to kill Sin without losing Yuna, and ideally kill Sin FOREVER. The only way to do that is to lose Tidus instead, and the reason they go through with ti is because only Tidus knows about it (and possibly Auron, who Tidus is the only one who knows HIS secret), and they didn't, and well, now they don't have a choice!
...it's also why Yuna's "WE DIDN'T HAVE A CHOICE!" rant at X-2 is bullshit because, well, she really didn't have a choice because she didn't even know there was a choice to be made! She went in thinking "ok, we're killing Sin; we need to lose Aeons, but there's literally no other way!" Yuna's rant somehow glosses over this and misses like the entire point of FF10 and people who defend his "It sucks" rant is because "HER CHARACTER COMES FULL CIRCLE" when uh, it already came full circle in FF10? She was clearly NOT ok with this decision, but it's not like she could do a damned thing about it.
Yu Yevon goes splat, victory! MASSIVE SENDING! Auron dies. One thing I do wish is Tidus and Auron actually exchanged some last words because Auron has been Tidus' second father of sorts, you'd think he'd have a stronger emotional reaction. I do appreciate the pat on the chest he gets Kimhari, because Kimhari is the one who fulfilled Auron's dying wish, after all.
Then we see Spira recovering leading to Tidus' death. Strong emotional scene between him and Yuna, between Tidus saying "I have to go, sorry I couldn't show you Zanarkand" since that was like the one thing he promised her and he failed. I'm not going into details here because you all know what happens, but I will again hype the decision to translate Yuna's line as "I love you" being the right thing to do here, instead of the awfully cliched "Thank you." Considering how emotional this scene is, and how clear her feelings are, the "Thank you" thing just falls short, and it's just a corny way of going "She loves him but doesn't!" Explicitly saying "love" instead gets the emotional context across way better, and a nice change of pace. I get that sometimes using "Thank you" works to keep the relationship ambiguous while still suggest they are a thing, but with Tidus and Yuna, we already KNOW they're a thing, we KNOW they have strong emotional feelings for one another, just have her come out and say it, and it gives Tidus nice final words to go off as he dies.
Then he high fives his dad, ending the relationship on a strong positive note! Yay character development!
From here, Yuna has a speech, blah blah, game ends.
So that's FF10! Overall, plot still holds up and character work is still strong. I am convinced that anyone who calls Tidus a whiner really doesn't pay attention to the game, instead hears his voice, listens to some early game dialog (which isn't whining, I should note), and just assumes everything he says is grating nonsense. Yes, he has some moments where he whines (the "What do you want to do?" "Scream really loud...AAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" scene comes to mind), but most of his complaining is justified.
Whining is defined as unjustified and grating complaining. Getting emotional after being told "Your father is Sin" is totally understandable. I was discussing this with someone and we both agreed that the problem with Tidus hatred is people expect him to act perfect and take everything with strides, but instead he takes things...like a person would. He has a realistic reaction to a lot of it, instead of a fictional super human mentality, nor does he have an overly depressed but quiet self angst that you see him slowly overcome. He's a normal dude (...plot twist aside), and gets thrown in an extremely exceptional situation and does what he can to adjust. The culture shock makes sense why he'll suddenly be all over with these mood swings, and worth noting he has plenty of positive emotions mixed in with the negative ones early on, and by Kilika his mindset is "guess I'm not going home anytime soon, might as well make the most of it." At Macalania, he's pretty much convinced himself he's never going home, ever, and takes it pretty well...because he's slowly growing use to Spira and gotten use to this notion of "getting home won't be easy" so when he's convinced "it won't be possible" he already was considering that option.
Tidus is not a whiner. He's normal person put in a really bizarre situation. Likewise, Jecht is not a good father either, and Tidus had every right to complain about him. Now yes, Tidus did always assume the worst when there was more to it, and Jecht is a better person than Tidus gave him credit for, but you have to remember that from Tidus' perspective, Jecht was being an emotionally abusive father. Jecht didn't see it that way but that's because Jecht's inflated ego and "it's tough love!" mindset blinded him to the reality. While JEcht may have meant well, the end result was he is still abusive to Tidus, and he really only recognizes this once he's in Spira and it's too late. That's why he's so accepting of Tidus telling him outright he hates him. If Tidus told him earlier, when they were in Zanarkand? Jecht would have laughed it off, just going "Yeah, you keep telling yourself that kid! I'm the best!" or something. The fact that his reaction is "I know" shows how much Jecht has grown.
Rikku is ruined more by FF10-2 than I remember, because I was reminded of how FF10 establishes pretty early how she's intelligent and competent. She's not "stupid" just young and immature and energetic. She's clearly capable of holding her own in an intellectual conversation and thinking outside the box, and even calls her father out on the "LET'S JUST BLOW OURSELVES UP AND TAKE EVERYONE OUT!" on why that is dumb. The fact that they degraded her to the "Energetic idiot comic relief" is insulting to what was being established in FF10. It really shows they didn't care for her character, and instead went "We need the Sweet Girl, the Fun Girl, and the Tough Girl!" and Rikku fit the bill for the middle one. She has some great interactions with Tidus and Wakka, and even some minor scenes like the scene with Kimhari where he's all "Rikku should stay Rikku!" She really needs that interactions to work, and she doesn't really bounce off Yuna much in FF10, so it's only natural she wouldn't bounce off her much in FF10-2...which is really bad because that's one of the two primary characters she works with. Likewise, Rikku didn't interact with Auron much, who is probably the closest thing to Paine...uh-oh...
Really don't have much else to say about the game other than a lot of my suspicions were confirmed on this playthrough, and I noticed a lot of little things I didn't pick up the first time in terms how the plot actually goes together. I know these rants won't change anyone's opinions, but I do feel more confident in countering points people make about this game specifically. Tidus is not a whiner, Rikku is not an idiot, and Jecht is indeed an awful father, and it's not just Tidus.
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Hey Rob, console or PC for DA:I?
I've heard various complaints about the PC version and have no idea how much is stupid bitching and how much is legit.
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Hey Rob, console or PC for DA:I?
I've heard various complaints about the PC version and have no idea how much is stupid bitching and how much is legit.
Depends on the quality of your rig. Even the minimum requirements are nothing to sneeze at but on a good machine it looks AMAZING. And naturally for a game whose UI borrows so much from WoW, mouse and keyboard controls are much more responsive than a controller. also I think the console version has you swap discs like it's 1997 or something.
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Pokéniu Reloaded FUCK YEAH
SHIT JUST GOT REAL
Also, for nicknames, I demand Mega Ciatos for Beautifly and Sir Alex for Castform.
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Obviously then Snow has to be the Dustox and NEB the Masquerain to match Ciatos.
Can I be a Spinda named Djinnda? :-[
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Oh, regarding, Pokeniu, Ephraim kind of has to be Luvdisc, if you're going to use any DLer.
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NSMB2: 100% cleared every stage. I could go for max coins/lives, but hell no. Bowser fight was boring, Dry Bowser tipped it over into tedium. Still enjoyed the aftergame on the whole, of course, because Luigi. And the star world stages other than the castle were pretty well done.
Layton Brothers Mysteries: I didn't realize this was out for Android! Five bucks for nine cases of Slightly Bargain Bin Phoenix Wright? Sign me the hell up. Finished three cases so far and it's exactly what I expected. Which is a good thing. (The first case is basically PW case 2-1, which is surely not a coincidence.)
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Oh, regarding, Pokeniu, Ephraim kind of has to be Luvdisc, if you're going to use any DLer.
Literally didn't see Mightyena on the list.
Also, have you played Dual Destinies yet, Shale? You should.
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I played the demo and will be grabbing the full version soon. It's going to be the first thing I buy on the eShop, in fact; but I'm waiting to register my Wii U (which is technically a Christmas present so we haven't opened it yet) so I can get the extra 10% bonus on store credit.
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So, Captain Toad looks ridiculously adorable and tons of fun, but it may be a bit short on actual content for the asking price. Can anyone here weigh in on it? It looks like it would be a nice feelgood holiday game.
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I think that's why it's only $40 instead of $60, yeah. I'd say it looks maybe 10 hours long? GameFAQs says it is 35 hours. GameFAQs is probably full of horse turds. A review says 10-20 minutes per stage and there is 70 stages.
I can't say, because I haven't gotten it yet. It's clearly not in my apartment hiding somewhere, that is one thing I am certain of... *explodes*
Play Hyrule Warriors Gourry
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I can say that it is, without a doubt, worth the asking price. It's about as long as most 3DS games, which is what it's priced as. If you want to get all the bonus stuff, you're probably looking at that 30-35 hour mark, otherwise maybe 10-20 depending on how well you can manage to navigate 3D mazes. It is gloriously fun and actually quite engaging though.
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Oh, speaking of Nintendo systems. It's been a long time since I've had the current models, and now I own both. I've got Mario 3D World, Mario Kart 8, Smash, DK Tropical Freeze and Bayonetta 2 (soon) for Wii U, and NSMB2, Theatrhythm CC, BD, and FE: Awakening for 3DS. Dual Destinies and Layton vs. Wright are obviously on the list, and I'll grab 3D Land at some point when I feel the need for more Mario, but what else should I look for?
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If you want to be cool and wear pink wrap around shades and a yellow raincoat (like you should) then Soul Hackers is pretty fun if you want more JRPG on that list.
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If you're really into Mario & Luigi then Dream Team is worth checking out. If not is pretty skippable though. Otherwise the only things I have that aren't covered there are pokemon so.
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I give 97 Ciato thumbs ups to Hyrule Warriors~ I'm bad at describing things but it's kind of like DW mixed with a 3D action game (with like 20 playable characters!) mixed with utter beautifulness. It has a faster-paced Adventure Mode or a slower-paced Story/Legend Mode depending on what you like (and you unlock characters by doing each of them). The Zelda references are cool but I am not really a Zelda fan and the game is fine to play without having that series fangirlism.
NSMBU is another solid Mario game, and I had great fun and shenanigans playing it three player, even moreso than NSMBWii. The game feels like it was more designed around having multiple people than the first game? But I'd guess it's still a good 1P experience once you are in the mood for yet another Mario.
DKCR is a quite solid game if you haven't already played that for the Wii. Since I haven't played TF yet, I'm not sure how much the game is overshadowed by its successor. Mario Kart 7 is a fabulous game but unless you really dig 1P Mario Kart I think the time for it has passed (but I feel bad not mentioning one of my favorite 3DS games in this, so I did :p).
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Oh, regarding, Pokeniu, Ephraim kind of has to be Luvdisc, if you're going to use any DLer.
Literally didn't see Mightyena on the list.
Why can't he be both?!?!?
Regarding Wii U games for Shale...
Captain Toad, from my understanding, is worth the price based on reviews and what (non-trolls) have to say about it. It's apparently like 70 stages long, and apparently it'll have Amiibo Support, though who knows what that is. Based on how long the stages were in SM3W, I'd say 10 hours sounds about right, though apparently there's a lot of optional collectibles you're unlikely to get on a first time playthrough, so you can go back and probably get your money's worth that way. It is priced at $40 for a reason, after all.
Wonderful 101 is a fun and quirky game, also made by Platinum Games. It's what happens when you combine Okami, Bayonetta, and Pikmin into one game. If that sounds like a mixture for a train wreck, you are absolutely right, the game is exactly that, and it makes full use of it's train-wreck status to be entertaining!
Sonic Lost World is decent; it's not as good as the "Rush to Win" games (particularly Colors and Generations) but it's solid in it's own right, especially after the patch fixed some of it's issues. Worth at least checking out.
Regarding DKCTF vs. DKCR?
DKCTF is indeed a step up from it's predecessor, but said predecessor has the advantage of a portable variant, so may be worth grabbing for that reason alone. They're pretty much the same on core gameplay, just DKCTF has multiple partner characters, a new "KONG POW" ability that you will never use because you often forget it exists, and more importantly, tighter and more unique stage design. DKCR's a fine game of course, and worth playing, especially since it's portable and DKCTF is not. I wouldn't say DKCTF makes DKCR meaningless, but the two are similar enough that if you like one, there's a good chance you'll like the other. It's a lot like classic Mega Man in that regard.
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I totally forgot my 3DS came with Dream Team preloaded. I should play that!
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Shale: That sounds like 3 years+ worth of gaming! Why do you need more? Anyway, kinda obvious, but Legend of Zelda: Link Between Worlds is good and reasonably short if you enjoyed Link to the Past.
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In terms of sheer quantity I sure don't need more, and yet I also don't need Bayonetta 2 or Dual Destinies in terms of sheer quantity but I don't want to miss out on them because I know I'm going to love them. I haven't really paid attention to what's out there on Nintendo systems for the past couple of years and I'm perfectly willing to extend my (already insane) queue to get other must-plays into the mix.
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The only other ones that you may be interested in are M&L: Dream Team and maybe SMT4, which is like, okay.
EDIT: oops you said you have Dream Team.
The 3DS is weird for me because there are good games for it but the killer apps for me were both Phoenix Wright games.
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Banner Saga: Hum.
The battle system doesn't seem very interesting at all... Basically:
- There's no healing, and the less HP people have the less damage they do. They become worthless pretty soon. So you really want to have initiative. Which is easy since enemies just run like morons.
- You can choose to attack either attack or defense and there's minor strategy involved in this.
- Speed is weird: One enemy gets a turn, then one ally gets a turn, no matter how many allies or enemies there are. So battles against a ton of enemies are actually pretty easy. This is pretty dumb. When you're down to 1 ally or 1 enemy though, poor guy gets destroyed.
- It's a strategy RPG with basically no terrain quirks, just flat floor. It's pretty boring.
What I'm most excited about is that there are a lot of choices that seem to affect the game, and the game uses a Souls like save system with which you can't save and reload. So yeah big thumbs up for that. I assume you can reset if you lose a battle though.
The setting is nice too. Ice, snow, vikings, politics, famine. The art style looks impressive but animations are minimal; so the game is not breaking any boundary compared to anime games with anime talking heads. Its only difference is that it's not anime.
Dragon's Crown: Got it when it was on sale.
*tries to ignore the amazon, sorceress, and any female NPC*
I chose the dwarf and he's basically the best brawler character ever. His main thing is picking up enemies and hurling them at other enemies in various deadly ways. He can also summon flame barrels and throw them at bosses. He can throw his Thor's Hammer for massive damage then punches enemies for a while.
It's all very cool but I don't know how long his appeal will last. I'm already a little bit bored. I just don't think brawlers are supposed to be super long, no matter how cool the core gameplay is.
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A good chunk of losing battles will be "SHIT HAPPENS" then the story continues.
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Banner Saga doesn't have the best battle system ever, but I love it for being Vikings plus Oregon Trail plus FFT even though it doesn't completely nail that equation. It does help that part of the Oregon Trail DNA is that you can screw something up royally without a full-on game over.
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Hey Rob, console or PC for DA:I?
I've heard various complaints about the PC version and have no idea how much is stupid bitching and how much is legit.
Depends on the quality of your rig. Even the minimum requirements are nothing to sneeze at but on a good machine it looks AMAZING. And naturally for a game whose UI borrows so much from WoW, mouse and keyboard controls are much more responsive than a controller. also I think the console version has you swap discs like it's 1997 or something.
Huh. I've actually seen a lot of complaints about the UI, saying it is absolute shit for a PC title.
One last question. How's the tactical camera? I sorta assume the zoom is DA2-ish.
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Kid Icarus Uprising is absolutely worth checking out as well; it's half 3D action game and half rail shooter, and all well-written fourth-wall-breaking hilarity. It's almost certainly my favourite 3DS game.
Most of my other recommendations have either already been covered and/or you already own.
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Fenrir: Well, TBS's system is interestingly *different* although I'm not in a hurry to endorse it being used again. There's not many systems that reward leaving enemies alive but hamstrung and dying... it's a change of pace at least?!
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If you like over-the-top action games, I'd look for The Wonderful 101. It's a mishmash of various other Clover/Platinum games like Okami, Bayonetta, God Hand, and Revengance. There's genre-shifting segments that borrow from other Nintendo franchises. It should be half off other Nintendo games at least until retail copies are not sold out. There's no tutorial, and the game is dumb enough to not give you the block and dodge move (you can buy it after the prologue) so expect to die a lot early. There's a lot of drawing to make your weapons but I found it easy to use the right stick rather than the gamepad.
So excited for more Pokeniu.
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Hey Rob, console or PC for DA:I?
I've heard various complaints about the PC version and have no idea how much is stupid bitching and how much is legit.
Depends on the quality of your rig. Even the minimum requirements are nothing to sneeze at but on a good machine it looks AMAZING. And naturally for a game whose UI borrows so much from WoW, mouse and keyboard controls are much more responsive than a controller. also I think the console version has you swap discs like it's 1997 or something.
Huh. I've actually seen a lot of complaints about the UI, saying it is absolute shit for a PC title.
One last question. How's the tactical camera? I sorta assume the zoom is DA2-ish.
The UI is WoW without mods. For some people that is the definition of a nightmare. But if you don't like the mouse-keyboard interface on PC you can plug a 360 controller in to your computer and use that. You don't get that option with any other version.
The tactical camera is actually really great. It's kind of hard to say because of how much bigger the areas are in Inquisition versus Origins, but I feel like it zooms out maybe a little bit further, even? You can also slide it around the map to look ahead, which is again, important because of how big some of the areas are. When enemy reinforcements show up they're not spawning out of nowhere like in 2, they're coming from somewhere else (doesn't happen often but I've had it occur). Also, when you zoom out into tactical mode from normal view, it pauses the game automatically so you can assign orders to all your characters, which is a nice feature since I always ended up doing that anyway.
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DOS: I'm still kinda picking away at this, but interest isn't really there at the moment. The mines are predictably pretty bad, if not necessarily in a way I predicted. There are invincible enemies that you have to stealth around in a game not really built for stealth*; detection basically mandates a reload because there's no escaping them and did I mention they're invincible? This segment is short but still pretty annoying. Then for the area's climactic battle it's just three of these dudes and you have to run away until you find a teleporter; I dropped a summon in front of them and escaped without attracting any attacks at all. Then, in the next room, where I didn't bother to save for some damn reason, I dig up a random loot pile and the entire party explodes for like 5x PCHP for no obvious reason. Think I'm done here for a while.
(*The stealth animation is hilarious though, it's about as subtle as Snake in the Box.)
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Wings of Vi: Random indie platformer that turned up on a Steam search under the Female Protagonist tag (dudes don't tell me this is any kind of surprise). Turns out to be less in the vein of Cave Story and much more like VVVVVV (minus the exploration and the retro charm of the C64 color palette) in that way of yes you will die over and over again an obscene amount of times trying to clear each individual room, which is an approach that I don't think works so well in a completely linear game. Almost immediately restarted on easy mode and still not sure whether I'll bother picking it up again.
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FFX: Got the HD collection for my birthday a couple months back, might as well make use of it (don't know whether I can bring myself to try X-2, though). Random notes after playing up through the Thunder Plains (and failing every single lightning dodge, no I'm probably not ever making a serious attempt at that):
-I don't actually mind lack of sceneskip because hey, I haven't played this game in a decade, but that might change when/if I reach a boss that can actually kill me (I don't recall this happening until Seymour Flux when I played the game previously). Jesus is there ever a lot of cutscene, though; it's two solid hours into the game before you even have enough PCs for a full active party!
-Early on, a small child loudly tells Tidus that he is a bad man. You know, I don't actually mind Tidus? He's a clueless dweeb, but I can pretty easily overlook the first part since he's literally a thousand years out of his comfort zone. And at least Voiceover Narration Tidus is less of a spaz.
-I'd forgotten the Fake Zanarkand segment immediately at the start of the game began with voiceover narration by someone who wasn't Tidus. What was that even about? I wandered offscreen and cut it off by mistake before the dude finished talking.
-Is there ever a time in this game when Lulu isn't MVP? She outdamages everybody, and even when magic isn't ideal there's Fatal Cait Sith. She basically never leaves the active party.
-The cloisters are so bad.
If I recall correctly, up next are Sperhimorph, killing Seymour mk. 1, and Tidus going all What the Hell Are We Fighting Forrrr?
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Then, in the next room, where I didn't bother to save for some damn reason, I dig up a random loot pile and the entire party explodes for like 5x PCHP for no obvious reason.
LOL, this sounds like my brother's experience with FF12:
"What's this random chest here?"
*chest explodes*
...
*never plays game again*
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-I'd forgotten the Fake Zanarkand segment immediately at the start of the game began with voiceover narration by someone who wasn't Tidus. What was that even about? I wandered offscreen and cut it off by mistake before the dude finished talking.
It was a sports announcer. If you listen long enough, he goes "Sorry to reminisce folks, let's talk about the big game going on!" and basically explains the game, complete with labelling Tidus as the Star Player of the Abes, which just supports his constant "STAR PLAYER OF THE ZANARKAND ABES!" declarations. It's more just giving a sense of the setting of Zanarkand and little else beyond that, like "yes, Jecht really was that big a deal."
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Sounds like a great way to open your game, with something that doesn't mean very much.
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@Shale: I'm enjoying the hell out of Fantasy Life right now. It's not deep or anything, it's just fun and you can play it for any length of time that you have available. Already logged 70 hours on it. I also recommend getting the 4 extra games for Streetpass Mii Plaza. Three of them are actually good once they get going. Warrior's Way sucks but you get it free with the other three so why not.
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Thanks for the recommendations, everybody! This is helpful. And possibly expensive. But mainly helpful.
Super Layton Bros.: Case 4 done. It was already Phoenix Lite, but when the hotel owner named Micah Sasucasa showed up, that removed any doubt that Level 5 knew exactly what they were doing.
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Guilty Gear Xrd - Finished reading the story mode today... and wow, did Daisuke planned all these out from the very beginning? He managed to answer almost all the questions that the fans had been asking for the past 10 years with the simple answer "it is all enlightenment's fault" and it is making total sense. No, this is not a sarcasm.
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Breath of Fire 3 Magic Only Challenge: Success! Honestly this was not very difficult. The hardest fight was Gaist and I think that the primary because I couldn't use Defense Formation. I didn't have a whole lot of offensive options for Gaist so my strategy for him was spamming items while hoping he didn't use Howling and Sanctuary back to back.
Most of the other bosses where really shut down by defensive buffs. The most memorable moment was doing 1500+ to Chimaera with a 2x Meditate +3x Enlighten Myollnir from Nina.
Myria was frustrating at first with Sanctuary, but I was able to wear her down to the non sanctuary phase and easily beat her from there. It's kind of neat to have Nina spamming spells for 400-500 damage while Myria can't break 100 damage over the whole team.
As a whole, it was a pretty interesting challenge, and damage potential of magic really surprised me (I was able to deal over 3000+ to one of the enemies in Station Maria). That being said it did expose some of the big restrictions to damage being competitive to physical attacks.
-The primary one is that Nina learns her spells really late. If she learned all her 3rd level spells about 5 levels earlier she would remain competitive with all the other party members. As it is now, there's about a 10 level gap between Lightning and Blizzard which is just ridiculous.Especially, since a lot of characters can just level up with Deis to get the 3rd level spells before Nina gets them naturally.
Slightly less significant, but it's really stupid that Enlighten is self target only when Might can target whomever.
Of course the biggest advantage physical attacks have over spells is their transformation bonuses. There's no way spells can compete with the ridiculous bonuses WereTiger, or Myrmidon and other Dragon transformations provide. Which is kind of a shame because aside from that, physical and magical attacks seem decently balanced in Bof3.
Also, one minor DL relevant note: healing spells seem to get a speed buff. Could be helpful for Ryu and Momo in a long winded battle.
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Then, in the next room, where I didn't bother to save for some damn reason, I dig up a random loot pile and the entire party explodes for like 5x PCHP for no obvious reason.
LOL, this sounds like my brother's experience with FF12:
"What's this random chest here?"
*chest explodes*
...
*never plays game again*
FFXII deserves that kind of treatment. It's really odd here, though--Divinity drops floor traps all the time, but they usually don't explode the entire world.
FFX: Seymour's bodyguards both bought it at the paws of a toy cat. And Ixion actually lived through Oblivion! The aeon defend command is pretty boss. Anyway after beating up Seymour I stopped for a while in disgust because more cloisters.
You know what took a surprisingly long time to get used to again? Fixed perspective camera. Maybe it's just playing too much Souls games for too long (I definitely have), but it felt really odd going back to that at first. Like I was back in Shadow Hearts 2 and I had to mash X like mad everywhere I went because floor pie, it can be anywhere (apparently this is also true of FFX).
So the first time I played this game I didn't get anyone's ultimate anything. The only thing I had breaking the damage limit was Bahamut's overdrive, and consequently the only way I could beat BFA was summon maxed overdrive Bahamut -> grand summon Bahamut to blast through the boss's second form before I could get hit with an overdrive myself. So out of idle curiosity I just decided to look up how to actually get people's ultimate weapons.
...Holy hell why does everything good have to be hidden behind half a dozen layers of obscura in this game, Square?
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(I definitely have)
No
Right stick for camera in third person games really only started becoming standard near the end of the PS2.
It's at least less weird that pre Halo console FPSs like Goldeneye, which are utterly unplayable now. The camera rarely gets in the way in FFX.
If you want to do the FFX aftergame, try to forget that any character besides Yuna/Rikku/Auron exists. (+ Wakka if you really like blitzball)
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Tidus/Kimahri/Lulu aren't -that- bad but depend on your patience/skill with the mini-games in question. (I don't find Lulu's bad at all, but this depends on the person and also needs a TV that doesn't lag.) That said you certainly don't need 'em if your goal is just to beat down the final boss.
Getting Wakka's is just crazy though, and I did like blitzball! You need to play 26 games of it to get the celestial, though, and that's if you know all the corner-cutting tricks; if you do it just blindly it's closer to 100 on average IIRC.
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Getting Wakka's weapon is pretty long but can be fun in a "football manager" kind of way? It's not really for me but I see the value in it. Thunder dodging 200 times is just anti-fun though. I don't think there's a real reason to use more than 3 characters in the postgame anyway (unless one of those three characters is not Yuna)
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I dunno, I like football manager-like games well enough but blitzball's really breaks down eventually (the game is not balanced for high levels, the AI doesn't level fast enough, etc.). The game itself is fun enough but for me at least it just couldn't hold up -that- long. I actually quite like lightning dodging, it's different and a test of focus which is fun in its own way. And is really short by comparison (a successful run is like 15 minutes).
For the Omega Ruins it helps to play roles same as the rest of the game, but you still don't reaaally need celestials there. Past that yeah you can roughly get away with three, although Shinryu does require a specific team. And I did that fine without Wakka's Celestial (he's mostly about Attack Reels in the aftergame anyway, just customised him a Triple Overdrive weapon... as a bonus you can actually put Piercing on good non-celestial weapons, which is helpful against quite a few of the bosses).
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Jeanne d'Arc: Run ended. Probably. Technically not complete, but I got to the final boss & second-to-last stage, so close enough. Don't think I'll take a 3rd go at the boss so.
Gameplay spoilers for the final boss ahoy, but this was lame-o. So first, a minor rant about variable difficulty. JDA is swingy here. JDA has a turn limit every battle, which is an okay idea in theory, especially since it makes more 'passive' enemy AI acceptable, you gotta move forward & engage or time out, so it nerfs slow snipey strats some. But it's quite random; some battles in close succession I switched between "crush on turn 5/20" to "barely win on turn 20/20." Notably, the 20/20 one earlier was interestingly designed, but a little too brutal to standard strats. You have Jeanne corner by a Zodiac Demon who has HP regen, so the party has to catch up with her, and there are two corridors. In retrospect, I guess the game wants you to rush just one corridor and leave the goodies & drops from the other, but I did two out of completionism, and just barely finished off the demon in time - he regens a good amount every turn, so you really need the beatdown of a lot of people on him. But fine, whatever, a little scary but I get the idea, and if I'd timed out I'm pretty sure I could have handled the fight no problem.
For the final battles, they are for the most part curbstomps against easy enemies, especially if you FAQ'd and found out that running a free stage a 2nd time inexplicably opens up better items in its shop (there is 0 hint in-game to this effect). Also gives you lots of free levels for your archer (enemies there are level 60 but trapped on roofs and basically free kills at range, so Marcel went from L51->57 in a single battle or the like). So... why am I whining? The final boss is like a Fire Emblem tank in that he's got tons of subtractive defense and tons of subtractive magic defense. And tons of HP. And 20% HP regen. Yeah, he can't really threaten me at all, but I can't threaten HIM, similar to the !Zodiac earlier, so I'll just time out and lose despite being in good health. Regen is tricky on bosses - even FFX Jecht's fairly scrubby healing is reasonably notable for keeping you honest. Too much regen just risks locking you out of ever winning. FE Radiant Dawn Dheginsea might have crazy healing, but he also has comparatively bad HP and elemental/weapon weaknesses. Now, yes, JDA has defense & MDef debuffing as well as attack buffing, but you also only have 6 skill slots, and these abilities aren't normally a winning play the rest of the game. If I ran axe dudes then I'd have Helm Splitter, but I don't, and I shouldn't be forced to run the inaccurate plotless wonders who can break defense, so I get to just marvel at the 0-30 damage I can do per character untransformed against 338 HP healed per round. Transforming & using Burning Auras allows me to keep up with the regen, but not really beat it, and then it runs out. And invoking GRIND2WIN would mean having to replay the earlier fight in the final battle sequence, something I have increasingly less patience for, especially since JDA fights don't particularly speed up when you're OP (still get to order your merry troupe to walk around the map and wait on enemy turns). Screw this.
Plot commentary: I held off chatting more about this since after my previous post on the topic, I was rewarded by CK unintentionally spoiling the game for me despite him not even playing it. ("Oh, is the plot twist this element in the midgame that you haven't got to yet that you wouldn't expect to be in the midgame? I read the spoilers!" Okay, done whining, it's JDA plot, whatevs. ;-) ) Anyway... I guess I'm somewhat unique in that I'm not someone who thinks the plot ended up a total disaster, but don't think it was nearly as good as Dhyerwolf does, and don't agree with Pyro that it gets worse toward the end. For me, the second half plot is way better. The first half of the game fundamentally fails at everything not related to the Liane / Roger / Jeanne / France love square. The midgame (Chapter 4) is the best by a mile (kilometer?), and the last half of the game is at least acceptable generic JRPG fantasy (rather than uninspired political historical fiction). Gilvaroth gets to ham it up, you go fight demon lords, etc. Nothing special, but tolerable. Spoilers: Of course, IMHO, the obvious historical plot point would have best come at the END of the game rather than in the middle... I guess it sorta works where it is, but come on, this is a rare excuse for a good tragic ending.
Anyway, character worth is something like Liane > Roger >>> everyone else. The side PC characters are almost all lame, uninteresting, and plotless; I guess La Hire & Beatrix gets little backstory arcs at least, but it's some sad work here. Early villains are all lame despite getting tons of screentime. e.g. Talbot - come on, for someone who fights you so much, he should have more presence than freakin' FF13 Rosch. I guess the 3 Therions are mildly better. The biggest problem is Jeanne; she's the main character, she needs to carry here, but she doesn't. She's a Mary Sue, which is fine, but she's a really bland and uninteresting one, which is hugely disappointing. She doesn't have to have weird quirks or craziness or flaws to be interesting, just give her *something*. She's also decreed to be charismatic kind of by fiat; she never really sold *actual charisma* to me. The fact that most of the "play Jeanne up" comments come from Gilles, who is correctly portrayed as a bit of a creeper, doesn't help; he's a biased source as to just how awesome we should believe Jeanne is. After Jeanne (for reasons I won't go into) loses the ability to hear "the Voice" (aka her historical alleged divine visions), Gilles has a snappy cheer-Jeanne-up rhetorical question: "Do you really think people followed you just because you heard The Voice?" A nice line if I could figure out a reason in-game, but nope! She's the leader precisely because she's claiming to be God's prophet and a super transforming magic knight girl, not anything of her own. Sigh.
To end on a positive note, Jeanne does work very nicely to set up a foil for Liane, at least. Jeanne gets all the generic heroic / idealistic lines, while Liane is allowed to make mistakes, be pragmatic, scared, vary between berserk courage and cowardice, etc. It makes for a nice contrast! So yeah, there are some good things in JDA's writing, which was a pleasant surprise after the slog that was the early writing. And despite the whining above, JDA's a reasonable enough strat RPG most of the time, so it was enjoyable enough if you're the type who likes strat RPGs.
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I thought all Mary Sues were bland and uninteresting ?
I read about the plot twist and it's pretty nice. I then watched the ending on Youtube and laughed for 5 minutes.
Freedom Wars: Oooh the game is trying to be difficult now!
Now I have a lot of basic rights and rarely get punished (Unless I grab forbidden loot after battle like Lenneth in VP1, which I always do). Last time was for standing still for a few minutes. Weak.
The plot is kinda getting in the way now, every prisoner is super nice with each other despite the prison being the worst shithole ever. Too bad. I would have liked Oz: the RPG very much. An atmosphere of constant mistrust maybe just doesn't fit JRPGs well I guess?
Banner Saga: I restarted to give ALL the kills to Ganulf which got him 3 levels.
I'm sure I'll screw up and he'll die later on.
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ToS - started this up, am currently headed to Hima to get to Palmacosta the long wat. Going for Eternal Apprentice as well. Cokcatrice keep wrecking my shit though. I was going for I hate Gels as well until I actually looked up how far that is you have to go without using Orange Gels, lol I. I remember beating Sword a Dancer first time I ran into him on my first play through, but I think I was a higher level than I am now. I think it would be doable knock down drag out style with an All Divide, but meh' will come back later.
Things I had forgot about ToS
- Lloyd is a better character than I remembered. He generally knows his limits and takes ownership of his problems. Would be 10/10 Tales Main of the year every year if he was an actual Dwarf instead of secret angel baby raised by Dirk.
- Collette's plot with the twist is actually pretty fun and they go all in with it from the start. They fuck it up with the set up for it with "what if Jesus went to regular school in a small village with the main charcter". I get that the whole point is that she isn't actually that special, but you do that by making the character humanised, not by making the world treat her that way in the face of all logic of the setting.
- the combat system is crazy slow. Early Tales games are always slower than the modern ones, but I swear this one is slower than Eternia is. It might be around the same speed as Destiny which is pretty rough. I think even ToP PSX remake might be quicker than this.
- the 3D component to the combat system is a total mess. It isn't just the lack of free run, later games in the series do a lot more to let you manage enemies to keep them away from your back line. I'm this, holy shit you have no control over anything, dudes will just run all over the shop and fuck shit up. I should really stop using Genis I guess. Also the battle fields are tiny and your lack of control can put you in really shitty situations. In the first Sheena fight while I was killing the Wind Guardian she and Raine had decided to go into the bottom right hand corner of the square. There is literally no way I could get Sheena out of that corner and the angle we were on was a diagonal right up close into the corner, so I couldn't even really back up to force the angle to change. This is less forgot that it happened and more I had forgot just how much it happened.
- dungeons in this are crazy short at first at least. I remembered the game being really really long. This could have been a mix of fighting everything I saw and remembering how much ground the game covers, but not how much content there is to individual components. So far most dungeons are like 3 screens, I think the Ifrit dungeon was the biggest at 4 and they aren't even very big screens. It makes for a surprisingly breezy Tales game really. You cover a lot of ground really quickly and the scenery moves at a blur honestly.
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I remember Symphonia being the first Tales game in which dungeon exploration takes a backseat compared to world map + town exploration (also seen in Abyss, maybe Legendia)
It's what turned me away from the series, because Dragon Quest 8 this isn't.
(also, the animeness got out of hand)
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FFX: I fell through the ice of a frozen lake and woke up in a desert.
Look, Square, just because you showed us an Indiana Jones travel map doesn't mean it makes any more sense.
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Lloyd Irving gets 10/10 character of the year, but NieR gets a huge hate rant? Grefter, why do you hurt me so?
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FFX: I fell through the ice of a frozen lake and woke up in a desert.
Look, Square, just because you showed us an Indiana Jones travel map doesn't mean it makes any more sense.
Sin did it.
Which admittedly is only a quarter-step better than a wizard doing it.
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W A R N I N G
IMPORTANT MESSAGE FOR MR. EPH
I caved and bought a Wii U. Please let me know when you are ready to get Falcon PAUNCH'd. kthx.
END OF MESSAGE
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JShe's a Mary Sue, which is fine, but she's a really bland and uninteresting one, which is hugely disappointing. She doesn't have to have weird quirks or craziness or flaws to be interesting, just give her *something*.
I would definitely say that Jeanne was at least slightly unbalanced. She got herself hyped up, believed in her own infallibility and she fell down hard and lost big because of it. If she was smarter or more level headed things probably would have turned off differently. Not to say that she was super interesting, but she definitely had a notable flaw that the plot capitalized on.
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I remember how much of a pain in the rear the JDA final boss was!
I also remember how satisfying it was to beat his head in (on try #2) with the power of DOG (Dog was awesome, don't know why, but he was).
Then the game froze and I got no ending. At least I got a laugh out of the situation.
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FFX: I fell through the ice of a frozen lake and woke up in a desert.
Look, Square, just because you showed us an Indiana Jones travel map doesn't mean it makes any more sense.
See also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t23YSJzMEpg
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Also in fairness, Axeman accuracy is bad...but they get a super cheap skill that boosts their accuracy (And is the best skill in the game because of this). That one dog is game MVP because that damage/durability combo is insane.
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See also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t23YSJzMEpg
If I ever have kids, I will do everything in my power to ensure that The Emperor's New Groove is the Disney movie they want to watch 100 billion times.
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Lloyd being good is entirely an early thing DJ. When the story is about Collette becoming an Angel and saving the world your point of view character is a young guy who is generally quite practical, isn't particularly book smart but knows it. He goes out of his way to help people which gets him in trouble, but he is always doing it for good reasons. Even at the start of the game when the plan at the ranch is designed to take responsibility on to himself. "it is okay they won't see my face and I will run away from the village" is a bad plan for a bad situation, he is actively trying to deflect trouble away from Genis and the town. It doesn't work for two parts, Genis is an uncoordinated fuck and mostly because it was a shitty plan for a shitty situation.
Any time they are talking about learning and stuff he makes reference to being good at PE and starts to mention Art. He is good at at least two things and one of them is actually incredibly practical and clearly comes from the fact that Dirk trains him in his craft. Lloyd is the one that repairs the Ex Sphere Raine uses for the entire game.
Then all of this goes the fuck away and Lloyd is a secret angel baby and drives everyone to save the world by sheer gumption and force of will and let's do this thing that is stupid and doesn't make any sense you guys because reasons!
Also the key part was IF HE WAS A DWARF he would be cool. Instead he is a kid who dual wieldz and wears steampunk cosplayers rejected outfit.
ToS - I can't tell if I am bad at this game or if ToS is hard in ways I had completely forgot about. I don't remember this game being much different than your normal Tales roflstomp on Normal, but holy shit, the back to back fight with the thing in the Wind temple and then Sheena wrecked me and took a lot of tries, some actual time investment to grind up gear locally to get everything up to date. Finally beat the back to back boss fight there and now suffering the same problem with the boss of Tower of Mana. I am now level 20ish so I don't think Ii am under levelled any more, just getting my face kicked in by a giant horse.
Wow, I am bad at video games.
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Lloyd Irving gets 10/10 character of the year, but NieR gets a huge hate rant? Grefter, why do you hurt me so?
What is love? Baby don't hurt me no more
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Castlevania Lords of Shadows: I was tempted to do an abridged version of this but really, there's not enough plot in my playtime segments to bother. In any event, mid chapter 2. INITIAL THOUGHTS!
-Core Battle system is actually pretty good, way better than expected. It's not as button mashy as I was expecting and you can do legitimate things besides Dial Up combos, instant death kills, and throw an occasional special attack. Basically, there's variety and it's responsive with one exception.
-Platforming stuff isn't too bad either, and they help by making Instant Death not a thing; instead you just take substantial damage when falling off a cliff.
-Enemy design is kind of bland so far, and some enemies are idiotically designed...
-...which leads to the exception. There are segments where you need to pick up Grenades from goblins, which ok, fair, but the "Pick Up" button is the same as "Grab enemy" button, and for some reason the game will decide the latter is more important than the former. Yes, the GENERIC Action overrides the circumstantial one, one that is necessary to advance the game. Really should have just made them two buttons.
-Light Magic idea is cool, and yay healing! What isn't cool is having to absorb Magic via Onimusha logic, which is a real pain when surrounded by enemies and you want to restore magic with all those power ups around. Look, it worked in Onimusha because enemies came in small waves; here enemies can just keep on coming. Just do what DMC did where running over the power up heals you, if not what God of War did where it just gives you regardless of where you are. If you want an "absorption" mechanic, do it the way Ninja Gaiden did where it's a way to get out of reach items!
-Probably the single worst thing so far though? Health. The game never restores your health automatically between stages. The game has a DMC-style Mission Based structure, but doesn't heal you between missions. Like what's the point of a mission based structure if you're not going to do that? Is it because they just want you to backtrack to earlier areas so you can get power ups you couldn't get before? I'd be willing to accept this if this was a Castlevania Tradition, but this is so unlike the rest of the franchise. The Classic 2D games fully healed you when you beat a stage, even as far back as Castlevania 1, the Metroidvanias healed you at every save point, etc. Lords of Shadow basically means if you win a fight at the skin of your teeth, you're boned.
-To add to this, dying doesn't fully heal you; it follows God of War rules where you revive at last checkpoint with the same amount of health you had when you got there. Granted, Ninja Gaiden 3 Razor's Edge did this too, and it was annoying for bosses, but that doesn't make it good design, and it also had that limited restoration mechanic NG2 had. I guess the idea is that because this game doesn't rate you at the end of fights like all the other spectacle fighters, thus no penalty for dying, they had to compensate somehow, but again, this game is so stingy on health...
...basically, yeah, so far it's got a good combat system ruined by how it handles health. Dunno how my final thoughts will be by the end. Plotwise? Gabriel is more like-able than I expected! He's not a good or compelling character, but at least the whole "he's not a happy dude" thing is sensible since his wife's death was 2 days before the game begins, as well as he seems to have honorable intentions. No, this isn't a very done character, but at least I can support this guy's mission and say I want him to succeed.
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Banner Saga: Hum.
The battle system doesn't seem very interesting at all... Basically:
- There's no healing, and the less HP people have the less damage they do. They become worthless pretty soon. So you really want to have initiative. Which is easy since enemies just run like morons.
- You can choose to attack either attack or defense and there's minor strategy involved in this.
- Speed is weird: One enemy gets a turn, then one ally gets a turn, no matter how many allies or enemies there are. So battles against a ton of enemies are actually pretty easy. This is pretty dumb. When you're down to 1 ally or 1 enemy though, poor guy gets destroyed.
- It's a strategy RPG with basically no terrain quirks, just flat floor. It's pretty boring.
What I'm most excited about is that there are a lot of choices that seem to affect the game, and the game uses a Souls like save system with which you can't save and reload. So yeah big thumbs up for that. I assume you can reset if you lose a battle though.
The setting is nice too. Ice, snow, vikings, politics, famine. The art style looks impressive but animations are minimal; so the game is not breaking any boundary compared to anime games with anime talking heads. Its only difference is that it's not anime.
You can reload in the banner saga but it's tied to checkpoints which are spaced far apart.
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Borderlands: The Presequel - I was gifted this and booted it up and quickly realized that my Borderlands fatigue is still alive and kicking. I didn't seem to hate 2 while playing it (although the meme humor is terrible and Handsome Jack is horribly obnoxious), but afterwards, I didn't feel the need to ever pick it up again. They hardly change anything here, adding some new characters/classes and an oxygen mechanic and making everyone Australian. I don't think I'm going to bother.
Shadow of Mordor - I beat this and really had a good time with it. It ends with a QTE boss fight which has no weight or import, but the core game does what it sets out to do as well or better than anything that has come before it and the Nemesis system is kind of brilliant and I wouldn't be unhappy if a variant of it were implemented in other games. There are a ton of ways to approach each situation and you are encouraged to use all of them due to the Captains' weaknesses and strengths (whereas I felt some of the gadgets in the Arkham games were a bit superfluous or clumsy to use in combat). The camera can be a bit wonky and the things you can and can't do parkour shit on seem a bit arbitrary sometimes. Still, the combat is really good and satisfying, and fighting several high level captains at a time is incredibly fun.
The story pretends to have the import that is associated with the hushed tones of Elves whispering to each other about powerful rings and shit, but as seriously as it takes itself, this is a game where you eventually get the power to explode Orc heads for no good reason and all the orcs yell about alcohol in Cockney accents (speaking of, it seems every orc with a unique epithet, and there are a lot of them, has unique flavor text, which was cool of them to implement). The game itself didn't even need to be part of a licensed movie property, but I guess the Lord of the Rings still sells.
I also picked up Bayonetta 2 and will probably play through Bayonetta 1 first, which I'm balancing between starting up Dragon Age Inquisition. I'll probably have to check out the Dragon Keep thing because I have completely forgotten the plot beats of both games.
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Lords of Shadow: So...you can mount spiders, trolls, boars, and wargs, have them break stuff, then strangle them to death...
...still classier than anything Kratos does.
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Dragon Age Origins: Picked this up as a freebie from the EA store, playing it because why not. It's more tolerable than Bioware's earlier RPGs, for whatever that's worth -- meaning the battle system is remotely playable, but I still want to strangle the AI at least once every other fight. Playing a Dwarf Noble rogue, just left the first town.
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ToS - I levelled up a couple more times and swapped Collette over from the T path to the S path to get Paraball because fuck it lets get the broken scaling attack. Like 2 more levels was worth over 100HP on each character easily. That makes it both easier to survive hits and boosts healing. About to do Asgard Human Ranch.
Still took many tries. I literally have no idea how you are meant to handle a giant horse that can 3HKO your team that can just decide to jump over everyone whenever it wants. Free Run was really really important introduction to the Tales combat system. It was broken in the opposite direction at first but hooooooly shit does it make these fights feel like you are completely at the whims of the AI.
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Did you like go to temple of wind/Asgard/Tower of Mana first or something? That's the hard path while Palmacosta/Thoda is supposed to be the easy path or something (though the Thoda boss can still screw you up if not careful - don't think I had Paraball yet) Yaay Paraball~ Anyway I was really mean to ToS on my first run and just jacked up Colette's luck with everything I could (starting with getting two Rabbit's Foot at Luin) for Toss Hammer poison hax and Paraball spam. This is really cheap but I just wanted to get through the game as soon as possible to see the story and was like god mode Colette why not because god mode cute angel girl is funny (I also picked up her Little Pickpocket title early as well)~
(well I beat the arena with Colette without using poison hax but probably will do that with poison sometime as well because broooke, and the Devil Arm's boss one time with poison and one time without, and the stuffs Colette wasn't around for - also Toss/Ice Hammers, poison/ice elemental shenanigans is fun too~)
You probably already know but remember to beat the first Sword Dancer before Tower of Salvation (think that is the cut off point anyway hopefully not earlier - think you can handle him with your levels now) :)
(oh if you have the patience you can use the fight and flee method vs Sword Dancer to swipe some EX Gems with Colette's steal if you want~)
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Bayonetta 1 - This game is fucking bonkers.
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Banner Saga: Hum.
The battle system doesn't seem very interesting at all... Basically:
- There's no healing, and the less HP people have the less damage they do. They become worthless pretty soon. So you really want to have initiative. Which is easy since enemies just run like morons.
- You can choose to attack either attack or defense and there's minor strategy involved in this.
- Speed is weird: One enemy gets a turn, then one ally gets a turn, no matter how many allies or enemies there are. So battles against a ton of enemies are actually pretty easy. This is pretty dumb. When you're down to 1 ally or 1 enemy though, poor guy gets destroyed.
- It's a strategy RPG with basically no terrain quirks, just flat floor. It's pretty boring.
What I'm most excited about is that there are a lot of choices that seem to affect the game, and the game uses a Souls like save system with which you can't save and reload. So yeah big thumbs up for that. I assume you can reset if you lose a battle though.
The setting is nice too. Ice, snow, vikings, politics, famine. The art style looks impressive but animations are minimal; so the game is not breaking any boundary compared to anime games with anime talking heads. Its only difference is that it's not anime.
You can reload in the banner saga but it's tied to checkpoints which are spaced far apart.
Is there like one checkpoint per chapter? Because there are about 3-4 battles/chapter. That would sound right.
I went through Chapter 2, and holy hell that was exhausting just to play. Morale was super poor all the way through and food supplies were low. I sided with the brothers in the village crisis and lost, the brothers got killed afterwards. I like the contrast between Rook & Annette :( and the giants :), I expect that the giants are going to suffer pretty soon. In Chapter 3.
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Yeah I deliberately did the hard route first (it is harder just on raw numbers), but like I have noted, I have had to do some grinding because I am bad, so my levels are pretty much around normal for that area based on some googling. Luck hacks on Collette might be a fun thing to pursue, but they would definitely be more viable in a game where you have more control over the battle field.
On the other hand, the Item use timer is hella tiny here and you can stock 20 of items instead of 15, so there is weird spikes of where the game is easier compared to other Tales games. Most of it isn't complaining, I know I took the hard route. It is just jarring compared to my memory of my first play through and general Tales difficulty levels these days. The point for "Normal" has drifted down over the years it seems.
Also I forgot to note for DJ that this short session featured the zenith for Lloyd as a character. After the Tower of Mana he determines that Collette can't feel any more because she s bleeding and then tricks her by trolling her with hot coffee that he is all like "it is super hot right? Lol jk it's cold yeah? Loll lol I troll you it is actually hot". That is literally the best he gets. He is socially adept, practical and genuinely caring about a friend while not going "noooo we can't do this its not fair there has to be a way to save the world AND not have you die for our sins". Literally the opposite of Tidus. Then the scene after you infiltrate the Asgard Ranch he goes to throw away the Ex Sphere that he has just been told functionally contains his Mother's life (whatever that is) in a hissy fit and needs to be talked down. It is all down hill from here guys.
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Bayonetta 1 - This game is fucking bonkers.
You have no idea.
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Bayonetta 1 - This game is fucking bonkers.
You have no idea.
I object to this. Other than Fenrir I think you will find Gourry is the most qualified person in the DL to determine just how bonkers video games can be.
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Okay yes true, but it's more about how you get up to level 20 and then look back on the first few stages as nice, sedate, normal times.
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DA:O- Uhhh. That was a bizarre glitch...
Sided with the elves, fought Witherfang. After the fight, the intro cutscene with the discussion between Witherfang and Zarathias starts playing again, only this time Witherfang and Swiftrunner are replaced by corpse/blood spot, with audio. Cutscene ends and I lose the affection points with party members AGAIN, cuts straight to post-fight scene, only Zarathias' model was completely darkened out and there was no audio. Weird.
EDIT: Oh, and I totally cockblocked that elf kid. Still a douche.
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Also in fairness, Axeman accuracy is bad...but they get a super cheap skill that boosts their accuracy (And is the best skill in the game because of this). That one dog is game MVP because that damage/durability combo is insane.
Yeah, the thing is the axemen are all totally lame as characters even by JDA standards, so I don't *want* to use 'em. Also, they definitely blossom later. Until Chapter 6 or so - a good chunk of the game - basic magic is just awesome, often doing better damage at 100% accuracy and range even for non-mages with the only downside being not generating a Burning Aura. Unfortunately JDA clearly expects you to be using the higher level magic for C7 & C8 to break defense, not realizing that the crippling MP costs on the more powerful magic makes it not real enticing to set. It's not a big deal, it means that mages can be mages and if I want big damage I just use transform abilities, but it IS a big deal vs. the final, where transform abilities don't last long enough to smash through the regen.
Then the game froze and I got no ending. At least I got a laugh out of the situation.
Yeah, I should clarify that one of my 'resets' to the final boss fight was involuntary - my Vita randomly flipped out and claimed the memory card had been removed. (This was after I cleared the mooks but before I found out the final boss had insane defenses, thus I didn't know I would want to change my skill loadouts.) The second reset I just got walled in the lame way regen does. Oh boy slap fight where you can't kill me but I can't kill you, sigh.
My Vita seems to be being bad about this - I fought the Nightmare final boss in Oath in Felghana off an old save again for giggles today, and got the same "lol your memory card was removed" on the third & final phase. Figures.
I thought all Mary Sues were bland and uninteresting ?
I read about the plot twist and it's pretty nice. I then watched the ending on Youtube and laughed for 5 minutes.
Hey now, Mary Sues *can* be fine. Nothing inherently wrong with the amazing super-talented character beloved by his or her friends and feared by their enemies. It's just grating if the character isn't 'sold'. XG Citan is super-duper awesome and knows the plot and is friends with everyone and is secretly a master swordsman blah blah blah, but you get to see him actually doing awesome things. JDA Jeanne is just bland.
JShe's a Mary Sue, which is fine, but she's a really bland and uninteresting one, which is hugely disappointing. She doesn't have to have weird quirks or craziness or flaws to be interesting, just give her *something*.
I would definitely say that Jeanne was at least slightly unbalanced. She got herself hyped up, believed in her own infallibility and she fell down hard and lost big because of it. If she was smarter or more level headed things probably would have turned off differently. Not to say that she was super interesting, but she definitely had a notable flaw that the plot capitalized on.
If the game had stopped in C4, I'd have agreed with your point. But PLOT TWIST actually the armlet was calling Jeanne to secret forest training with Luther by way of canyon-to-forest teleport or something??? And the armlets are psychic or something and know what's best. So really Jeanne's mistake was just fate, or sped up fate? Yeah I dunno. If I'd been told "look Jeanne is coming back in C5, write around it," I'd have had her *punished* for her mistake and have her come back all haggard and scarred from her near-death experience, and have had a peasant village nurse her back to health from the brink of death. Make it so she suffered & paid a price, and had to learn a hard lesson. Instead she gets free legendary hero training after falling into a canyon while wearing armor and is positively rewarded for it as she gets the best armlet. The game tries to hype the events at Rouen as vaguely her fault, maybe, but not really since it's possessed Roger blaming her... and it doesn't really make sense anyway, this is too disconnected to really be Jeanne's fault except in the sense it's anyone's fault when bad things happen after their defeat.
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So hey, maybe this one will make up for things to Djinn.
ToS - Just killed Kvar, suprisingly easy boss fight for one you are outnumbered for, but that is pretty much 100% foreknowledge. Paralysis Charms on 2/3 people to halve all the damage they take is kind of a huge deal, but the hard part of the fight being trash mobs that don't have massive Defense like bosses do helped a lot. Lloyd was capable of doing damage to them rather than just being only useful for tying up the boss and defending like he is (again, going for Eternal Apprentice on the hard path is Pretty Stupid tm).
That said I want to talk a little bit about Kvar. There is some plot around him that is blah blah blah, Kratos avenging his wife Lloyd avenging his mother blah blah blah. None of that shit fucking matters.
(http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/aselia/images/2/2b/Kvar_Model.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width/200?cb=20141022024249)
What I really want to talk about is how Tales of Symphonia has a Dragon Quest character for a boss battle. He is a coded gay half elf that is rocking Saiyan armour and pansy booties. Toriyama should sue.
Every time he is on screen he is at LEAST the second worst dressed character on screen, it is fucking amazing.
Edit - Just to actually rile Djinn up, the reason he is always the second worst dressed character on screen at any time is because he shares all his scenes with Kratos. The thing to rile you up is that I know you would fuck the shit out of a Kratos cosplayer if you met them in spite of the shittiness of the outfit.
Edit 2 - OKAY FIND DJINN I WILL FUCKING HATE ON LLOYD NOW OKAY BECAUSE I JUST AM WATCHING THE SCENE RIGHT AFTER THE GAY ELF DIED FOR MY SINS.
Fucking hell Lloyd you found out the effects of Collette turning into an angel for what 2 fucking nights at most before you told everyone? She expressed her desire for you to shut your stupid fucking face about it so that she can enjoy what as far as she expects is the last parts of her humanity without worrying everyone. She has grown up her whole life expecting to be a sacrifice and she has come to terms with this fact and you fucking have to piss all over that in spite of her adamant protests all because... what? You feel bad for like half a fucking hour? Fuck you and your selfish fucking righteous wank.
Also I love that you kill one gay Toriyama half elf mad scientist for him to be replaced immediately by another gay Toritama half elf mad scientist
(http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/aselia/images/a/a8/Rodyle_Model.png/revision/latest?cb=20141023002302)
It is weird, this isn't a consistent design choice in the game, like there is plenty of Anime As Hell characters here, but just these two make me think of DBZ rejects.
Also mad props to http://aselia.wikia.com/wiki/Kvar (http://aselia.wikia.com/wiki/Kvar) this wiki article which is the source of these pics. There sections for Kvar are amazing. The category titles are Angelus Project, Luin Razed and Burning In Hell. Naming your headings after vague events that happen half way through or at the end of the paragraph are great ways to categorise sections rather than like actual descriptive parts on a timeline or explicit descriptions of events 10/10 would Web 2.0 again.
Edit 1 billion - Also I love that the party apparently had enough explosives to blow up the Asgard Human Ranch somewhere? (I am not shocked between them that they know how to use them to be fair) They do it all without comment. Also that it is clearly called the Asgard Human Ranch even though it is most closely situated to Luin, but you see at some point in the plot Luin is going to be destroyed soooo... Better call it the Asgard one.
Edit 98989879879 - Goddammit DJ, why do either of us even like these games again? Lloyd literally shits the bed on his character instantly in this sequence. He goes from competent but boring pragmatic to having Full Blown Tidus with NONE of the justifying elements to the character Tidus has. When the 12 year old of the party is more respectful of Colette's sacrifice that she is actively choosing to pursue than you do then you have some fuckign problems
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I liked Tales of Symphonia for being one of the first ARPGs that hammed up all the ARPG tropes AND the anime tropes when I was an even huger weeaboo than I am now (middle school, I think?). Also, Zelos is still pretty awesome.
Re: Kratos - I actually don't really like Kratos' design either. I do like Lloyd's design, and I actually like most of the tropes that inform Lloyd - I like the dumb energetic hero-types (see: FF13 Snow, Justin, Tidus). But Lloyd was just boring and irredeemable (apart from yes, that one scene with the coffee mug).
Never noticed all the gay-coded half-elf scientists in ToS before. Another reason to hate it. Yay.
Honestly, ToS is so low on my list of Tales games now. I liked it a lot before, but the new games are so much better, and it's aged REALLY poorly.
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Legit really specific there, I don't ever think you like Kratos or his outfit. Just that you would totally fuck a dude in that outfit (it is really really tight).
On the other hand it also is full body other than his armpits. I have no idea who thought arm pit windows as a cool thing to have. It positively makes Zelos' belly shirt wayyyyyyyyyyyyy better.
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Snowfire: Good point about Citan.
This feels wrong though!
I now hesitate between totally agreeing with you, and re-evaluating whether Citan is awesome or not because I was about 14 years old when I saw him
I object to this. Other than Fenrir I think you will find Gourry is the most qualified person in the DL to determine just how bonkers video games can be.
Yo BTW this came out yesterday
http://store.steampowered.com/app/335670/
Freedom Wars: Rank 8 or 7 I can't remember.
I'm close to the end of the game and have only lowered my death sentence from 1 000 000 years to 930 000 000 years
I hope these endgame missions give a ton of exp.
Yeah I'm not really feeling the game anymore. I think I've been waiting for something more interesting to happen the whole time through. The beginning is by far the best part, then the game becomes monotonous. There are no new environments and very few new enemies. Even the best outfits are given at the beginning of the game. (aside from that sweet headset I just got. I should post one picture of Yattaf and her android)
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Yo BTW this came out yesterday
http://store.steampowered.com/app/335670/
Oh wow, Mother 4 is looking really good.
..seriously wtf did I just see
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inFamous 2: Almost done the first island, two more sidequests and one more story quest. Getting the improved glide has been the best upgrade in the game thus far because flying is awesome, second best is Bolt Stream -- Jesus Christ that murders everything. I went with ice powers at the power transfer event because Nix sucks and is dumb, and also because ice grenades are fun.
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inFamous 2: Almost done the first island, two more sidequests and one more story quest. Getting the improved glide has been the best upgrade in the game thus far because flying is awesome, second best is Bolt Stream -- Jesus Christ that murders everything. I went with ice powers at the power transfer event because Nix sucks and is dumb, and also because ice grenades are fun.
Ice rockets are far, far more broken. OHKO on any human-sized enemy, pretty much.
In general, Fire-powers are better on large enemies (Napalm grenades so broken on those), Ice is better on human sized ones.
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Little Inferno - Just picked this up on a weird bundle and finished it. I don't know if this was discussed here before, but this is a Grefter game if there ever was one.
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Game where you set things on fire in order to trigger oddly nuanced emotional responses from an ultimately artificial skinner box construct? Yeah, that game was made from a piece of Grefter's ribs while he was asleep.
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One thing about Citan I would say is that I always felt like his many good qualities were there to get the player to trust and depend on him so that when it comes out that basically everything he tells you in the first 2/3 of the game is a lie, it feels like a more significant thing in a game where everyone is lying to you constantly.
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I covered how much it was made for me pretty thoroughly when it came out and 12 months later when I replayed it and it still ripped me apart emotionally. Even when I knew what was happening and was enjoying the simple math/mechanics and how to do things well I was still affected by it to an amazing degree.
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Snowfire, yeah, I view it more as that Jeanne naturally sped up what they wanted and not that her mistake was somehow their effect. She blunders and they used the opportunity (IMO at least).
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Freedom Wars:
Total weak ass non-ending there, it was hilarious.
My god.
The main villain (Abel) had the lamest motivation: "What do humans need? Friends? Love?? NO. CONFLICT" and that's why he opens the gates to hell.
Then Yattaf beats his ass (let's be fair. This might be a 8 men team but Yattaf does all the work). Then she beats whatever terrible thing comes out of hell.
Then surprise betrayal from a party member, he stabs Yattaf in the back. He then puts some glasses on for some reason then leaves while going "HAHAHAH" and letting The Damsel's Angry Evil Sister enter the fray. She slaps all the weak party members left, because they can't do anything without Yattaf. (who can't do much with a dagger in the back)
Then time stops and Yattaf can magically go to hell where she meets Cain who gives her some super weapon before going all "We'll meet again".
So she comes back, and in a cutscene she kicks the crap out of Damsel's angry sister with the super weapon. Damsel's angry sister becomes super nice because Damsel gives her a hug. Everything blows up but every party member survives by riding Sister's Dragon.
They are overall pretty happy but the sister goes all "Now I have something mysterious to do..." *brood*
The End
JRPGs guys.
This wasn't a good game. I think the devs just put any idea they had in the game, so things don't quite gel at all.
My biggest issue is that healing is extremely impractical/bad. Reviving however, fully heals, costs nothing, and is super fast. I had to rely on reviving; this means that all my losses essentially came from friendly AI placement and behavior instead of say, my own effectiveness in battle.
Great fashion options though.
Here is endgame Yattaf with her android on the left.
http://image.noelshack.com/fichiers/2014/51/1418770126-2014-12-14-191151.jpg
Dang I just got super cool clothes for beating the game too.
Anyway right now I just did some online mission, and a citizen I was supposed to save went flying in a fetal position.
WTF?
Fission mailed.
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Fenrir: So who's the damsel? The person captured all game or something? And what do Cain & Abel think about imprisoning all people for the "Crime of Living"?
My biggest issue is that healing is extremely impractical/bad. Reviving however, fully heals, costs nothing, and is super fast. I had to rely on reviving; this means that all my losses essentially came from friendly AI placement and behavior instead of say, my own effectiveness in battle.
Randomly: Muramasa Rebirth has a less-annoying similar issue. Healing items are expensive and money is hard to get and healing is semi-limited, but death just slaps you back to the start of the same screen with full health. Well, this is certainly less annoying than being encouraged to run away from all encounters to save health at least, but weird that death is the best healing.
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Warning: The plot of the game makes no sense
The damsel is Beatrice, a girl with mystical special power who's kidnapped by the panopticon you're in at the beginning of the game.
You go on a clandestine mission early on, notice her, get captured/interrogated.
Then you go on a rescue mission, and thanks to help from the higher up you manage to have her become a prisoner like you. (Until she gets kindapped by Abel)
Nobody freaks the fuck out when they notice that the girl isn't there anymore somehow. They kind of explain it by saying that they got all the use they wanted out of her or something? They know that her super mystical power = being the key to open the gates to "hell". (they don't call it that)
Abel doesn't give a fuck at all, he's just there for CONFLICT. (Has he not noticed that basically the entire world is in a perpetual war?)
Cain literally only appears in one scene to act mysterious, give you a weapon and tell you you'll meet again.
In the end you solve basically nothing.
I think in the postgame you can actualy go see Cain again, probably to go on a war with Heaven SMT Nocturne style, but the credits have already rolled so I'm not expecting something life shattering.
The heaven/hell stuff is the most basic metaphor, there is no connection to the bible aside from the names of the characters, and the fact that Cain is in a hellish looking place.
My biggest issue is that healing is extremely impractical/bad. Reviving however, fully heals, costs nothing, and is super fast. I had to rely on reviving; this means that all my losses essentially came from friendly AI placement and behavior instead of say, my own effectiveness in battle.
Randomly: Muramasa Rebirth has a less-annoying similar issue. Healing items are expensive and money is hard to get and healing is semi-limited, but death just slaps you back to the start of the same screen with full health. Well, this is certainly less annoying than being encouraged to run away from all encounters to save health at least, but weird that death is the best healing.
Wow this sounds pretty terrible. So only bosses matter I guess?
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I covered how much it was made for me pretty thoroughly when it came out and 12 months later when I replayed it and it still ripped me apart emotionally. Even when I knew what was happening and was enjoying the simple math/mechanics and how to do things well I was still affected by it to an amazing degree.
generally scenes rooted strongly in XG's bonkers cosmology with contacts and Cain and all that shit don't play well with me. The "Citan betrays you/Fei is Id" scene is kind of the exception to that because the sense of betrayal is very straightforward.
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I was talking about Little Inferno. Games about setting things on fire are infinitely more emotionally impacting than Evangelion remakes.
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Yo BTW this came out yesterday
http://store.steampowered.com/app/335670/
Welp. *Install.*
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Yo BTW this came out yesterday
http://store.steampowered.com/app/335670/
Welp. *Install.*
LISA's subheading is called "the miserable adventure of a broken man" so this is to you what Little Inferno is to Grefter.
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Gref, DJ, stop making me wanting to have you two play ToD2. Just that I can examine how high your hate value will rise.
(in other words, this means the hate rant is good, give me more)
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Super Mario 3D World - Collected every single stamp, got to the top of every single goalpost, got all of thegreen stars in the game on every stage and opened up the final world. There was an ultimate marathon stage, an ultimate CAPTAIN TOAD stage, and an ultimate regular stage. Tackled the Captain Toad stage first, had maybe seven resets on it, pretty legit. Did the marathon stage, which is basically a stage where you have to solve a puzzle / defeat all enemies in the room and collect a green star in ten seconds, but in this stage you have to do thirty of them in a row without screwing up (ones in the maingame would be 5-10 in a row). So that was interesting. Took me some time to beat, maybe an hour or two, but no big.
And then there was the final stage. Filled with cheerful music and pink and blue platforms, the Ciato did not know what she was up against. The tirelessly friendly stage music and aesthetics began to fill me with hate as the course was just a marathon of the trickiest, most challenging bullshit that the game had to offer compressed into one stage. At first I was disappointed that there was only one regular stage, but that feeling went away after the 70th reset. Eventually, after over 100 resets (!) and like four days of plugging away at the damn game, I finally beat that godforsaken stage. As I went through the pipes that were arranged into a cursive "Thank you", it was like a victory lap of fuck yesness. HAHAHAHA!!!
Now I am sad it is over. I think I have Stockholm syndrome.
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Man I knew that Zenny was going to love it.
There's the Earthbound styled music/graphics too. (the music is great)
LISA is pretty good, it's about as disturbing and crude as it looks but there's heart there too. I'm not too fan of the gross humor sometimes.
The gameplay is nearly Earthbound-simple (there are some pretty basic legaia combos too) but it serves the setting well. It's all about getting you out of your comfort zone. The game is very difficult so far, so the choices do matter.
It's probably a way less interesting game when you know the mechanics perfectly, but right now: oh boy.
The best part is that :
Resting is absolutely not safe, so I try to avoid it and not just auto heal whenever I can but whenever i should. Savepoints aren't necessarily near rest points, so it's not like Baldur's Gate where you just quickload if resting got you in trouble.
Things that happened because we rested so far: Entire party poisoned, one party member fled, one party member got abducted, I got ambushed and suffered a permanent stat loss.
I don't think they're ever going to explain why exactly there are no women anymore.
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ciatos ur ready
the reel dark souls starts hear
ToS - I worked out who Rodyle reminded me of. He might still be a DBZ dude somewhere, but it is actually Lezard.
So I blew up Palmacosta ranch and that way more cleanly outlined that the bases had self destruct mechanisms. So the party isn't packing demo kits we don't know about or anything. That said Raine is the one that blows them both up and the party is is all like ":o u gonna blew it all up again. u so gnagsta raine u da real mvp" and they would be so very fucking right. Highly educated, pragmatic, competent, the game's healer, a Tales healer who has damn decent offensive spells of a good element and she slaps the shit out of Genis repeatedly. Could Raine be the best Tales character ever? Her level of pragmatism is like she is a proto-Yuri.
The Palmacosta Ranch arc gives us another amazing character that I can't tell if is original DBZ related OR it is just the Team Four Star version but this guy
(http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/aselia/images/4/42/Magnius_Model.png/revision/latest?cb=20141022024251)
Reminds me the shit out of the Ginyu Force. He is melodramatic and is always crazy over the top angry when "inferior beings" ruin shit he is doing and then chuck a giant tantrum while being completely ineffectual. He sits on a floating lounge above a dais that to get off of he needed the chair to float sideways (like a Wonkervator) half way across the room and have it unfold so he could dismount. It serves literally no functional purpose. Otherwise, he is another half elf who dresses in purple, speaks with a lisp and rocks pointed elf booties (I swear those are not standard issue). ToS may be a little problematic with most of its large villain cast at this rate.
I also want to talk about the plot during this part, because it wants to be really poignant and it kind of fails completely. They bring back up Marble, the old lady that died at the ranch at Iselia when her Ex Sphere was removed and she turned into a monster and attacked the party, so Lloyd killed her. Lloyd takes this on as his fault, but the whole time he has been talking about when his mother died how it wasn't his father's fault, it was the people that setup this situation. Which is literally the same one for reference. He has this conversation with his Secret Angel Dad Kratos who is always shady in these sequences and once even talks about how you need strength and power to stop these kinds of situations, so you know, foreshadowing the fact that he is A Betrayal Waiting To Happen. Part of the problem is that this is all trying to reach forward to well past the point where the plot really shits itself. The other part is that they drag in a fresh NPC to actively ignore any of the party dialogue in favour of listening to Magnius who is all "lolno lloyd is murder" anytime someone tries to ppointed out that um no actually it is the fault of the aliens who abducted her and put her in a concentration camp then turned her into a Bodysnatcher. It is both contrived and fucks up with the clarity of the foreshadowing. There is way too much noise for it to be effectively. Not to mention it is a tension that Lloyd already helped Genis through when they hooked him up with an Ex Sphere.
But hey at least the arc also has a little girl having been killed and replaced by some weird kind of half elf that look like Freeza mixed with a Demon who then goes on to back stab a middle aged man they tricked into thinking they could heal his body snatchered wife. That part is nearly cool.
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Super Mario 3D World - Went and beat all of the stages with Peach to get her stamp in my stamp book. I can quit anytime I want.
Oh yeah forgot about this
Super Mario Kart - Old school. 100cc was too stronk for me so I had to turn it on wuss mode. Rude.
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Super Smash 3U, been playing both versions of this. I think I'm going to be regularly using about a dozen characters for the near future, but that's fine. It'll get smaller with time, and experimenting with a new roster is half the fun. Sadly, as much as I like the character, I suspect Little Mac is not going to be for me. That said, I am having a ton o fun as Robin, even if the damned Elf is learning how to dodge Thoron. But, his attempts to interrupt me are leaving him eating Elthunders more often than I was expecting with my current level of skill, so bonus! Just means I'll have to learn to be sneakier. ;D
Aside from that, it feels so nice to have a usable Link back, and I'm really impressed with how Charizard plays. Shulk, well, he's kinda weird, but my mains for Melee/Brawl were Marth/Ike, so he feels pretty natural to me and I'm adding him in. I'm actually tempted to add Pikachu back into the roster as well because no one's using him, but, eh, we'll see. It does explain why I have little desire to add Peach back in despite liking how she plays, since I think Ciato's using her. Same with not feeling a need for trying out the new and improved Bowser. He gets a great deal of love already. Theoretically, I should probably not use Lucina, since we are all using Lucina. But screw that, Marth's been one of my mains since Melee, him and his less bloodthirsty clone are on my team. Feels like Ike is still my best character, since all of the tricks I used with him in Brawl feel same or better, but some of his other moves, like Eruption, just feel straight up improved. Does mean I'll be hosed if I ever play him in Brawl again, but I doubt that'll be an issue.
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Ike definitely seems stronger in this game. Clearly he went from FE9 Ike to FE10 Ike. Elf is actually the primary Peach user, but I have tried my hand at her a couple of times. I've been using a roster of Palutena/Zelda/Dedede/Lucian/Samus, with Megaman and Bowser and Bowser Jr. being used a bit less often.
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Bravely Default: Picked this up again on the train yesterday. Spent almost the whole commute bashing my head against the Praline fight, and finally won with just Ringabel standing after the last axeman standing OHKOed two people on consecutive turns, leading to his death by Megiddo Flame. Ran through the subsequent rescue mission in a hurry and now I'm grinding for specials before I head into the next dungeon, since it'll probably have a boss fight. Party is Ranger/Spell Fencer/Time Mage/Valkyrie.
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I pretty much binge played through all of LISA.
What the fuck guys. I liked the game but it remains as wrong as it looks in the end, so most of you shouldn't bother ever. It wasn't Drakengard level fucked up, but pretty fucked up nonetheless.
The story is Last of Us except the main guy doesn't get away with what he did at all, and pretty much everyone dies. He goes all Tony Montana at the end and you can decide if he deserves redemption or not. I went with No.
He also ended the game with no arms because I had sacrificed them earlier. He seemed to have a lot of trouble riding a bike and climbing ropes without hands.
I liked the game well enough and now want to retry it to see different things and carefully watch everything again.
Maybe do a freaking STAT TOPIC.
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How does it actually play? As much as I love Concept there is still mechanics porn I need to know about.
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Alpha Sapphire: Completed! Final Team was Swampert, Aggron, Latias, Breloom, Manectric and Gardevoir...yes, that's 5 potential Megas and I was juggling them for a while, which led to the situation of "do I really want to go Mega or will I want to save this for someone else?" When recognizing that flaw, for the last few E4 members, I actually planned ahead of time and shifted items around!
I'll hold off most thoughts until I finish Delta Episode because...reasons. I guess what I can say is it's about what you expect: a Hoenn game with a Gen 6 coat of paint, just like FRLG were Kanto games with a Gen 3 Coat and HGSS were Johto games with Gen 4. If you like Hoenn, you'll kike this game! If you don't like Hoenn...uh...depends if you think the XY improvements are enough to make up <_<? Otherwise, you pretty much know what you're getting before you play the game given the history of the franchise, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.
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Err the battles aren't really the most interesting part of the game at all. There are a lot of interesting things mechanically outside of battles that do affect battles though. The first big choice is whether you want to sacrifice your only teammate or your arm for example. Also, when you start getting a ton of teammates, you can have some of them play Russian Roulette to get a fuckton of cash + one new party member to compesate for all the dead ones. I highly recommend it.
The battles are generic unimpressive DQ/Earthbound style.
There are three kinds of characters, those who use SP and do s1ck combos, those who use SP and do not do s1ck combos, and those who use TP.
- SP works like MP.
- TP works like Lufia 2 IP, except it's reset after every battle.
- Combo characters work like Legaia characters, but they can also select skills from a menu. Say if you throw a fireball by typing DAD, you'll do one hit for D, one hit for A, then throw one fireball. You can just select it from the menu but you'll just do the fireball. If you have more than one combo character it can be difficult to remember the combos you want to do, that's why selecting from the menu is an option.
There are a lot of PCs with unique playstyles so that's pretty cool. I mostly used a geese that does a lot of superfast damage and could POIZN (10% mHP damage after every round, works on everything), a fast guy who could restore HP/SP/TP, and a drunk guy who could fully heal the entire party or throw oil at enemies, so the main character could do a ton of damage with his hadoken fireballs.
There are very few areas with random enemies, most encounters are scripted. Most of the fights are against unique humans (which is pretty cool!), sometimes there are some avoidable fights on the world map against generic copy pasted time wasters who give very little exp.
If you hoard items and go back to heal after most battles the game quickly becomes a chore. You really have to learn to not hoard with this one.
The main character is a drug addict:
- Randomly (and often) he'll have stats dramatically reduced because of withdrawal.
- if you feed him drugs he'll do a ton of damage for a short while.
Also at the beginning of the game he can use WASD for his combos. Then he loses W if he loses one arm (that was one of the punches, which he obviously can't do anymore), and then if he loses both he can pretty much only bite enemies and not do combos anymore. (He still retains the useful skills that involve throwing himself at enemies though)
Some enemies can instapermakill allies. Usually you can just reload an earlier save if you don't want to bother. It's pretty hard to get out of the first real boss battle without one death though, and the savepoint is far apart.
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"Earthbound's gameplay/graphics/music but made in 2014. Also there are no women." I have rarely heard a game described which I have less desire to play.
Super Smash Bros. - Been playing this a fair bit. I'm definitely settling in to using certain favourites a bit more, so I'm not quite juggling ~10 different characters roughly equally. Palutena I probably use the most, initially for character hype reasons but she is a lot of fun, especially with customs enabled because Angelic Missile just adds so much to her game. She's very mobile with good smash attacks, I like. Second-most-used is glorious Bowser. I enjoy him a lot, he has great damage/knockback on most of his moves and buttstomping one's enemies never gets old. I tend to receive loads of damage/die a lot while playing him but also rack up lots of kills, so it's all good in the Bowser way. Rosalina's the other somewhat unexpected favourite; Luma makes her very tactical to play as and it's fun to try to control to areas of the battlefield at once. It's also fun to sometimes just say "fuck that" and enjoy how powerful some of her attacks become when both Rosalina and Luma hit something at the same time.
I also play Peach, Lucina (because literally our entire group plays Lucina apparently), Mega Man, Bowser Jr., Sheik, Dedede, and both Samuses. Occasionally Mr. Game and Watch, since he was one of my Brawl mains and I'm still pretty good with him, but I just like so many other characters more now. Pikachu, my true Brawl main, I just can't get into; I know the changes to him are lateral but for the things I use most it feels like a big nerf and I just can't enjoy playing him as such, even though I don't think he's bad. (Actually, I don't think anyone in this game is bad?)
Lunar: Eternal Blue Complete - Beat the maingame. I had one reset on Zophar who despite the fact that I'm notably better at RPGs is still a big jerk. Anyway, the game was pretty fun to replay. The gameplay remains some of the best in any DQ-style traditional turn-based game, and the writing is still pretty sharp even if the plot has some problematic elements (and some good elements! The "Lucia is planning to destroy the world to get rid of Zophar" plot twist is pretty great). Man this game would have been so great if Lucia herself were actually a good character. Or even a decent character. The rest of the main cast is good - Hiro's a cut above the average main, Ruby and Ronfar are both excellent comic relief who manage to occasionally be something more, Jean's not too deep but quite compelling, and Leo is just great fun. Hell, the relative weak link of the controllable PCs is Lemina, who's certainly an acceptable comic character. But Lucia being weak casts a bit of a pall on the rest of the game. (Mauri is also awful but fortunately doesn't matter much outside her one arc.)
Hyrule Warriors - Completed my first skulltula image at last, hooray. I'll probably put the game down in a bit, at least for a time, but I do want to get all the L3 weapons first since it's a big goal that I'm relatively close to.
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This was actually the most feminist game I've ever played.
But yes it is clearly in a no-NEB-zone.
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"Earthbound's gameplay/graphics/music but made in 2014. Also there are no women." I have rarely heard a game described which I have less desire to play.
Then do I have a game recommendation for you! You can play as a bisexual female elf and have choice from 6 different characters,
*Cue Snow boycotting Dragon Age: Inquisition for rigidly adhering to monogamous relationships*
Game of the year every year!
Little Big Planet 3 - Since I am back home this got played a bit last night since that is what my family do.
I have to be honest, it is pretty rough. I was introduced at a boss who needs some work in a patch. I personally think the boss fight is far too tightly tuned. This game introduced wall jumping, but makes you bounce off immediately instead of being able to hug the wall like a MMX game, so timing jumps over pillars of fire with very little margin for error is pretty unforgiving. It is at lest a 3 phase boss fight so far with some plat forming between each phase and the platforming is just as unforgiving as the boss fight segment. Lots of on hit kill sections with very little recovery chance (which to be fair LBP always is one hit kill and you have limited lives at checkpoints). It is pretty brutal. I think it might be further along in the game the I initially expected (it looks like the game uses less linear level select that in the past?).
Anyway, to many of the jumps are unforgiving and require you to be moving at full speed (LBP has a little lag while you start running and momentum carries to your jumps, momentum is very very important to the gameplay of the series classically). Pair that with some of the jump requiring you to swap distance makes it pretty unforgiving. The windows for timing are more generous than they first appear (you can jump earlier than you expect), but ultimately what I assume is late in the boss fight the times are tight.
That isn't the worst part though, the camera zooms out really really far in the plat forming sequences and then the game plays with moving in and out of the foreground much more. This leads you to having to follow what is spawning into the screen incredibly quickly during the platforming sequences. Sometimes having to do that while your character is catapulting off an uncontrollable bounce pad. While all the scenery is a sea of green. A key anger point being one where the game summons up a big jumpe sequence between phase 2 and 3 and the actual way to get TO it is the last thing to spawn, so they draw your attention away from where you need go.
That and multiple times we had runs cut short by the spawn point not popping up to dump people into the field and spawning into limbo in the middle of nowhere. Everyone dies, everyone is on an infinite plane of nothingness, reset. Straight up has a bug in the level.
This is significantly less polished than the second game which was also a bit rougher than the first one(but introduced more fun new mechanics than this one has IMO).
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This was actually the most feminist game I've ever played.
??
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Uh in Lollipop Chainsaw an enemy uses gendered slurs as physical weapons.
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This was actually the most feminist game I've ever played.
??
Two reasons:
- With no women around, a lot of men are shown as fucking worthless.
Like, the first day I downloaded the game, I went to the steam forum, and there already was a topic about "But but but what about men? Men are GREAT, they have invented EVERYTHING throughout history while women have invented nothing" from a guy obviously offended by the game.
- There is actually one girl in the game. (Called Buddy) Brad the main character takes care of her, protects her by keeping her sheltered against her will, and eventually tries to rescue her. (which is the whole game) But the damsel in distress trope is deconstructed, as the main character is shown doing way more harm than good, for a ton of reasons.
It goes pretty far; she says to him how she's the one who's hurt her the most out of everyone in the world, the entire PC team turns against him, there are parallels showing that he has become similar to his own abusive father, etc.
Like Mother 2/3 there are a lot of tonal shifts, so the game can get super serious super fast, even right after a super dumb tasteless joke.
Edit: Oh yeah "feminist" might not have been the right word, but you guess what I meant.
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- With no women around, a lot of men are shown as fucking worthless.
I know you corrected yourself on this, but that's really not very feminist at all, yeah. It sends the message that men are only decent either due to trying to impress women, or perhaps due to being pacified/humanised by women? That's quite problematic.
In general a game trying to be "edgy" by not having female characters is pretty ridiculous, as this is hardly a thing which is rare. (And I don't praise games for doing the reverse, like Touhou or whatever, but at least that is kind of novel.)
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In general a game trying to be "edgy" by not having female characters is pretty ridiculous, as this is hardly a thing which is rare.
A game that disregards women and a game where the absence of women is keenly felt are worlds apart.
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Yeah, you're being really reductive there! LISA is not DmC.
First there's one good female character, so this is already a lot better than a lot of games.
Second this is a post-women world, not a world that has never had women. So whatever is attacked here is not necessarily the very nature of men (which would be, as you said, problematic) but the social constructs.
I'm not finding the story of the game perfect by any means (Tonal shifts still bother me, this is a problem in a lot of RPGs), I still find these elements I talked about pretty nice.
Anyway I'm replaying now and am trying to use the terrible first character you get for the whole game. He keeps getting skills every other level but he's still godawful.
I really don't know why this 8-10 hours game has 30 PCs but I'm liking the variety.
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Feminism generally rejects the idea that the moral fabric of society would be unwoven without women (this idea leads to shame for women who don't uphold a moral standard of what a women "should" be). That plot point in spoilers definitely speaks to me more as a part of the general downer tone that the game is going for than anything specifically feminist.
Hyrule Warriors - Mostly getting tread upon by villains in the Adventure Mode maps I have left. Using Zant and Agitha is oh-so-painful. Just lazily piddling around until I leave for vacation in a couple of days, collecting Gold Skulltulas and trying to finish Adventure Mode. Did you really need three Imprisoned on one map, game? Fuck you.
Super Smash Bros. Wii U - Not too much to say, just collecting Trophies and looking at all of the cute and sweet things that I collect~ Also training more Amiibos to do my bidding. Yes, yes. *rubs hands together* This computer is already better at playing Zelda than me...
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DmC has two women and isn't even the worst game in its series (let alone gaming/media at large) for either quantity or quality of female characters so I have no idea what you're trying to pull with that statement. If you want to go after NEB-friendly series on this front feel free to trot out Mega Man.
Anyway the world could be somewhat interesting (I have my doubts) but whatever it is isn't feminist, since ultimately it's just another work on the bandwagon philosophy rampant in too much of media that the only stories worth telling are about men. You say it's not played as problematically as I assumed it would be, and I'll take your word for it since I'm not going to play it to find out differently.
It still gets no credit for this design decision though.
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It is kind of novel for being the only RPG I can think of that has only male PCs. I can't even think of a single one outside of solo RPGs.
Like seriously, for all that JRPG females aren't always great for feminism(Rosa!!), JRPGs do tend to portray the female cast as competent, even if they fall victim to a lot of other troublesome tropes. Especially compared to a lot of other game genres.
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It is kind of novel for being the only RPG I can think of that has only male PCs. I can't even think of a single one outside of solo RPGs.
Until FF 15 it seems like. Hey, at least whatever game you guys are talking about apparentally has a plot reason!
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DmC has two women and isn't even the worst game in its series (let alone gaming/media at large) for either quantity or quality of female characters so I have no idea what you're trying to pull with that statement. If you want to go after NEB-friendly series on this front feel free to trot out Mega Man.
Anyway the world could be somewhat interesting (I have my doubts) but whatever it is isn't feminist, since ultimately it's just another work on the bandwagon philosophy rampant in too much of media that the only stories worth telling are about men. You say it's not played as problematically as I assumed it would be, and I'll take your word for it since I'm not going to play it to find out differently.
It still gets no credit for this design decision though.
I went for the game trying the hardest to be edgy, because this seemed like a particularly wrong choice of word for LISA.
It seems like you're just letting your kneejerk distaste reaction affect your judgement because this is all wrong.
This is similar to how using the Bechdel Test to judge a single film is a terrible idea, and can only be used to look at the industry as a whole.
You cannot judge the game purely because it has low women presence just because it's in an industry in which it has low women presence, just like you can't judge a single movie as being morally bankrupt for failing the Bechdel Test.
Feminism generally rejects the idea that the moral fabric of society would be unwoven without women (this idea leads to shame for women who don't uphold a moral standard of what a women "should" be).
I don't think that's true at all!
Feminism doesn't actually talk about doomsday no-women scenarios right?
It does talk about the masculine personality as a social construct (-> Ruthless competition, violence, dudes not being able to cry, etc) creating unbalanced individuals. Considering this, a game portraying society as totally reasonable / sensible / normal with women suddendly wiped out, would actually negate the feminist argument of gender as a social construct alltogether.
Think about a reverse apocalypse scenario where every man is wiped out and only women are left: a lot of women would be shown as helpless without men, because pre apocalypse society has made them less independant. Would that portrayal be misogynist? Precisely nope.
So I believe this is might actually be in tune you more than you think.
That plot point in spoilers definitely speaks to me more as a part of the general downer tone that the game is going for than anything specifically feminist.
I disagree because the terrible stuff happening is a direct consequence of the partiarchal behavior of the MC, instead of just "Gods Hate You" like in grimdark stuff like Drakengard. He saw the girl as a chance for redemption and not a person with a desire for independance and things go wrong because of this. The game even shows he could have done a right choice (by going to Rando) but refused earlier because he got selfish without realizing it.
Thinking about it, this is very similar to Braid's plot if you have played it, where the main character is a deluded guy thinking he has to Save The Girl, who as it turns out actually doesn't want this creep into her life at all but no one asked her. (Let's not talk about the dumb nuclear bomb here)
Anyway this is all too much serious talk for a silly game in which I have two fish-people in my team right now.
Point is, you went against me saying it might be the MOST FEMINIST OMG game i've played, but I haven't played any other game that explores feminist themes anyway. The most other games I've played do is try to have strong female characters (which is good, just not really going to impress me more)
Note: I haven't played Analogue and Hate +.
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It is kind of novel for being the only RPG I can think of that has only male PCs. I can't even think of a single one outside of solo RPGs.
Like seriously, for all that JRPG females aren't always great for feminism(Rosa!!), JRPGs do tend to portray the female cast as competent, even if they fall victim to a lot of other troublesome tropes. Especially compared to a lot of other game genres.
FF1 and 3j!
Lord of the Rings games! (Duh)
Barkley Gaiden!
Drakkhen!!!
I think that's it.
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It does talk about the masculine personality as a social construct (-> Ruthless competition, violence, dudes not being able to cry, etc) creating unbalanced individuals. Considering this, a game portraying society as totally reasonable / sensible / normal with women suddendly wiped out, would actually negate the feminist argument of gender as a social construct alltogether.
Think about a reverse apocalypse scenario where every man is wiped out and only women are left: a lot of women would be shown as helpless without men, because pre apocalypse society has made them less independant. Would that portrayal be misogynist? Precisely nope.
I completely disagree, I would find the latter story extremely misogynist! In a no-men society, women would obviously figure out how to deal with life without men. Maybe the more dependent personalities would find other women to depend on, but society as a whole would absoultely make do (setting aside any problems related to reproduction for a moment, which would obviously have far greater impact, dunno how LISA handles this). If a work of fiction decided to portray women as a whole (or even just a large portion of them) as somehow incompetent or unable to cope without men, that sends the rather horrifiying message that women being dependent on men is a natural, unchangeable state and that the "men and women are fundamentally different and therefore treating them differently is justified" camp is right.
So yeah I don't think the no-women version is much better.
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Space Run- Just started this. Buck is my spirit animal.
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Haven't really had time for games due to working, but I have been playing some on my breaks and trips to/from work.
Pokemon Alpha Sapphire - Playing this on my trips to and from work. It's great! It's Gen 3 with more touches, and Gen 3 was my favourite to begin with, so it's probably the perfect pokemon game for me (so far). Just got my Kyogre and am about to challenge the 8th gym leader. Getting Kyogre went poorly, however, as I didn't know it now knows Ice Beam from the start! I had my Mega Sceptile ready to slowly wittle it down to 1hp so I could catch it normally, but it used Aqua Ring then Ice Beam for 4x damage and the ability to heal itself. Not worth it after that so I just used my Masterball.
Smash 4 - Playing this at work during breaks or when people challenge me. We have a little competition at work that if you can beat me or another guy who's equally skilled, you get a prize. Virtually nobody has managed this. But it did drum up enough people to get LOTS of repeat consumers! And some really good matches have come out of it! So lots of fun. I'm down to Marth and Mac as my mains, for sure, while I'm learning Ganon/Jiggly. Other characters I enjoy using are Lucina (see previous Vancouverite comments on her, though I'm trying to avoid her if possible for that very reason) and Robin, mainly, though I'll play most characters.
Also we have amiibo, and we've been training some of them. A coworker of mine has a Link named Lonk, and it trained alongside me, my coworker, and our amiibo. It has become a monster that took me 5 tries to beat once, and even then it was just barely. The worst part is that I taught it its air game, and the air game keeps me from being able to do anything to it in the air. I can only fight on the ground, because it destroys me with the very things I taught it. :(
Mario Kart 8 - Time trials for Twisted Mansion, Royal Raceway, and N64 Rainbow Road. One coworker decided to set down a time, and it ended up being really good (within 10s of world record) and this prompted me and another coworker to get back into the Time Trial Fever from when we did Mario Kart over the summer. I managed to get 2:01.x on Twisted Mansion (vs 1:55.x world record), 2:00.4 on Royal Raceway (vs 1:52.x world record) and less time was spent on Rainbow Road, but got 1:23.x (vs 1:17.x world record). I have spent an embarrassing amount of time trying to get under 2 minutes on TM and R. Raceway.
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It is kind of novel for being the only RPG I can think of that has only male PCs. I can't even think of a single one outside of solo RPGs.
Like seriously, for all that JRPG females aren't always great for feminism(Rosa!!), JRPGs do tend to portray the female cast as competent, even if they fall victim to a lot of other troublesome tropes. Especially compared to a lot of other game genres.
FF1 and 3j!
Lord of the Rings games! (Duh)
Barkley Gaiden!
Drakkhen!!!
I think that's it.
White Mage in FF1 is regarded as female. Heck, I think Dawn of Souls even has the default names being pretty much all females. You can choose to have a party of all males, but there's still a female playable.
Drakkhen, all characters can be either gendered. I think they even changed some of the job names (instead of "Warrior" it's "Amazon")
That said, Dragon Ball Z RPGs if you want to count Lord of the Rings >_>
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White Mage starts as female and evolves into male. First transgendered RPG character!
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Also we have amiibo, and we've been training some of them. A coworker of mine has a Link named Lonk, and it trained alongside me, my coworker, and our amiibo. It has become a monster that took me 5 tries to beat once, and even then it was just barely. The worst part is that I taught it its air game, and the air game keeps me from being able to do anything to it in the air. I can only fight on the ground, because it destroys me with the very things I taught it. :(
What if you were good enough at a game you couldn't beat yourself??!??!
Dark Souls - Computer is built so this is restarted (just as an excuse essentially). It is easier knowing stuff, but I still get my shit destroyed stupidly. Died twice to Taurus Demon and wasted all my Resin (One on a bad run, one accidentally not changing back to Estus on the run up and a third by using it too early and it wearing out before even fighting him because I ran up the ladder and killed archers before he spawned. That was dumb). Killed him with 3 leaping attacks and a poke.
I nearly made the run to the gate in the Parish but got swarmed by an extra Hollow that made it under the gate before it closed. Next run should be good!
I am actively trying to force myself to go down a Dex build instead of Strength, but I needed Str to equip stuff, so I am pretty much in a Quality build for now. Hard to break old habits with how to do things. Club was so appealing and good times.
That said I got a Balder Side Sword while fucking around a bit in Parish, so definitely want to stick with the Dex build.
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It does talk about the masculine personality as a social construct (-> Ruthless competition, violence, dudes not being able to cry, etc) creating unbalanced individuals. Considering this, a game portraying society as totally reasonable / sensible / normal with women suddendly wiped out, would actually negate the feminist argument of gender as a social construct alltogether.
Think about a reverse apocalypse scenario where every man is wiped out and only women are left: a lot of women would be shown as helpless without men, because pre apocalypse society has made them less independant. Would that portrayal be misogynist? Precisely nope.
I completely disagree, I would find the latter story extremely misogynist! In a no-men society, women would obviously figure out how to deal with life without men. Maybe the more dependent personalities would find other women to depend on, but society as a whole would absoultely make do (setting aside any problems related to reproduction for a moment, which would obviously have far greater impact, dunno how LISA handles this). If a work of fiction decided to portray women as a whole (or even just a large portion of them) as somehow incompetent or unable to cope without men, that sends the rather horrifiying message that women being dependent on men is a natural, unchangeable state and that the "men and women are fundamentally different and therefore treating them differently is justified" camp is right.
So yeah I don't think the no-women version is much better.
This is a strawman argument; as I haven't talked about "society as a whole" but about "a lot of women". You dumbed down my message and are talking about something else entirely.
I think I've already answered to your argument; I see your viewpoint as shallow minded and negating gender difference as a social construct, which is one of the bases of feminisms.
In the end we're both feminists arguing about whether a game I've played and you haven't is kosher, and I believe this is getting pretty silly.
In LISA basically men are hopeless because humanity has no future.
It is kind of novel for being the only RPG I can think of that has only male PCs. I can't even think of a single one outside of solo RPGs.
Like seriously, for all that JRPG females aren't always great for feminism(Rosa!!), JRPGs do tend to portray the female cast as competent, even if they fall victim to a lot of other troublesome tropes. Especially compared to a lot of other game genres.
FF1 and 3j!
Lord of the Rings games! (Duh)
Barkley Gaiden!
Drakkhen!!!
I think that's it.
White Mage in FF1 is regarded as female. Heck, I think Dawn of Souls even has the default names being pretty much all females. You can choose to have a party of all males, but there's still a female playable.
Drakkhen, all characters can be either gendered. I think they even changed some of the job names (instead of "Warrior" it's "Amazon")
That said, Dragon Ball Z RPGs if you want to count Lord of the Rings >_>
I was thinking about the original NES FF1 there, which has an androginous White Mage which turns into a male looking White Wizard. (so it was male all along)
(http://ff.gamesmemories.com/images/ff1/characters/wwiz.gif)
I guess it's arguable.
You're definitely right about Drakkhen though!
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This is a strawman argument; as I haven't talked about "society as a whole" but about "a lot of women". You dumbed down my message and are talking about something else entirely.
You're really grasping at straws if you're complaining that I'm interpreting the highly ambiguous "a lot of women" differently from the way you intended. Maybe try clarifying what you mean instead of insinuating that I'm arguing in bad faith, which I can assure you I'm not. While I'm asking you to show some respect for your fellow posters, I'll also ask that you kindly don't dismiss my views as "shallow-minded". If this is really just a "silly" argument then that's all the more reason you shouldn't be resorting to insults.
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I am actively trying to force myself to go down a Dex build instead of Strength, but I needed Str to equip stuff, so I am pretty much in a Quality build for now. Hard to break old habits with how to do things. Club was so appealing and good times.
I usually cap STR at 16 if I'm not going for an actual strength build. At least, you can safely leave it pegged at that while you work up other stats because it's the requirement for the best middle shields (silver/black knight, former reliable in almost all circumstances and latter almost negates fire).
Abyss Odyssey: picked this up in Steam Halloween sale or something a while back, giving it a whirl now because I actually have a gamepad for the computer this time (it was basically unplayable when attempting on keyboard). Odd little thing, Chilean dungeon crawl/platformer localized by Atlus. Looks like a relatively short game--I played a couple hours (dying several times in the process) and got to what is purportedly the final boss (plotwise, but questionable in practice, trophy list suggests the existence of other bosses I haven't met)--but dying can set you back potentially to the beginning of the game. You retain EXP/levels/skills/money on death, but lose gear and dungeon progress. You can set respawn points further into the dungeon, but doing so is expensive. Decent weapons are also really expensive and random drops are unreliable, so it's kind of a gamble whether you want to twink out with items you might lose on death or buy insurance to try and scout things out first instead (the dungeon's semi-randomized, but you get a basic map that at least shows projected difficulty level of rooms so you can kinda plan a route). Kind of an odd collection of gameplay ideas that I sometimes dislike on paper and I'm not sure work exceptionally well together, but it's pretty and you get to play an art nouveau swordgirl who sounds like Major Kusanagi, so that makes it good enough a time killer for me. Hundred rapier poke!
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Well, speaking of games that are explicitly NOT Feminist!
Castlevania Lords of Shadows: In the middle of Chapter 5. Game definitely got better once you got to the end of Chapter 2, where it has the first REAL boss fight (aka one that isn't a Shadow of the Colossus Bullshit), and has handed you most of the new mechanics. Game decided that giving you health refills are regular intervals mid-level is not a bad thing and using Light Magic to restore health is a lot easier now that they aren't throwing 3 Werewolves at you at once. Still has some major issues, namely that camera has killed me on multiple occasions due to placing my character in a spot I literally cannot see him and I get blind-sided by an enemy who is also off camera. For those who played DMC1, take that style of camera and compound the issues that much more.
As far as the feminist angle of this game goes...
Here's the cast of characters so far!
Gabriel Belmont: Middle Aged Browned Haired White Guy with a 5 o'clock shadow. The only thing keeping him from being a generic Western Protagonist is he has long hair instead of a typical ball cut or whatever, and he does have an original design due to unique looking armor, which hey, that's something!
Gabriel's Wife Marie: Is Dead, randomly appears to remind Gabriel he's trying to bring her back. Is still dead, is kind of the thrust of the story...did I mention she's dead?
Pan: Spirit of the Lake, is a goat man.
Zovek: Ugly Old Man Knight who is the badass partner of Gabriel. Exists for narrative exposition and to show "yes, there are other badasses in this world, not just Gabriel!"
Cornell: LORD OF THE WEREWOLVES, wields a giant hammer.
Some Mute Girl Whose Name Eludes me: Appears at first and seems cool and hey, she's taunting a titan just so it's distracted from Gabriel whose stabbing the shiny weak points! This might be a female character I can get behi- ...wait, no, she just got killed by Gabriel sleep walking. Nevermind.
Abbot: Is a cowardly man living in a tower.
...that's about where I am so far. Needless to say, this game hasn't exactly been pro-female.
On the non-feminist discussion side of things, I am for some reason slightly surprised Gabriel remains clearly a good guy. One such example is that Abbot is in the tower, I expected Gabriel to go "Damn him for being a cowardly weakling!" His actual statement is "damn him for not protecting his people!" I know it's not a major difference but putting the focus on "protecting his people" just makes him sound less obsessed with strength and vengeance and more what you'd expect out of a guy who is a holy knight. I guess I'm mostly surprised because the game still has very God of War vibes, and I keep thinking of Gabriel, especially with his battle grunts and such, that he's this "DEATH TO ALL MONSTERS AND ANYTHING THAT STANDS IN MY WAY!" but plot very much paints him as a Heroic Dude on a mission.
No, he's not a deep or well written character; this game's plot is very much just there to give an excuse for why you're doing stuff, but at least I can say I WANT Gabriel to succeed in his mission, because he's a good guy. Can't stress how much that makes a story, even a generic one like this, more bearable when the game doesn't play the "character is deep because morally ambiguous!" card as an excuse to prove he's deep. No, he's not morally ambiguous; he's clearly a good guy, and I'm fine with that. Now if only he had something resembling a personality beyond "I'm the good paladin dude guy"
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Dark Souls - I went 16 Str because I got Black Knight Shield off the Burg guy. One of the ones in Prison dropped the sword which was tempting to build towards, but no, Balder Side Sword is still a go.
Threw poop at Capra again. Poked into the Depths and died to giant Rat (approached it from the other side this time. Didn't know how to deal with him.) Lost all my souls because I don't 1 shot Rats with a weak R1 and swung twice then got stuck in a corner between rats gang banging me. There goes my 6k Capra souls. Oh well, not earned anyway. With Laurentius freed I wanted to go upgrade my flame and get Combustion to clear out that annoying Ooze hallway that is easy Titanite Shards. BSS at +7 now. Seriously thinking of heading back to Prison and getting the Rusted Iron Ring because moving in water is more annoying than I expected (had got it last time). Also considering going and clearing out Moonlight Butterfly since I am at Andre of Astora's place now. It is just there and I just killed the Titanite Demon, so it is easy runs. Reinforced Club was +5, so I do have something to handle Stone Giant's with, but I don't think I will be 2 shotting them this time.
Also I am still bad at Gargoyles, took a few tries. Swapped to Drake Sword. Wasn't doing HEAPS more than the club, but it was enough to make a difference. Had one good run where I got them both down in range of a heavy hit to kill them both (had to target swap mid way due to opportunity etc), but they got a good synchronisation of covering attacks so I couldn't capitalise before I screwed up and died. Run after that got them and it was like clockwork though. Zoned fire perfectly and cut off the tail (first time I have done it!) which made them more manageable just by sheer factor of reducing their move pool making them easier to predict. Had a moment of thinking of levelling the Axe because it is funny and is technically a Dex weapon, but will wait and see. Might make it Lightning. It seems pretty neat.
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So, a few games I've been playing.
First up, Crusader Kings. Been tooling around with a few different tries, been finding I enjoy playing a Duke, haven't played a King position yet, but am debating between just cheating my way there, or working my way there legit. However, my current goal is to start as a Count, work my way up to a Dukedom, and then see what happens.
So, I started a game as the Duke of Krain, which is just east of Venice. Seems nice enough, I have two counties, and I get to usurp the title of my Ducal lord whenever I want to. Of course, getting a claim on his title, and actually making good on it are two completely different things. I was considering trying to use nearby Croatia as a way to force grab a few more Counties to bulk up for my eventual backing up of my claim. And as part of this, I was planning to keep one of my daughters from marrying until I could offer her to a Croatian Duke I was on good terms with. Instead, she eloped with a freaking second son. Who already had nephews.
Welp... so much for that. As for what happened to that Duke I was friendly with? He picked a fight with the King of Croatia. And won. So now he's king. And since then he's been sweeping up everything so the whole country is in his pocket and there aren't any loose bits to nab. Dang. And, trying to claim vassalage under him for some extra muscle will be super risky since he somehow got a claim to the same Dukedom I want. So... yeah. He coulda been family.
In other assorted bad news, turns out my starting duke was the second son of the Duke of Weimar. So there was a whole branch of the family holding some pretty nice turf up in Germany. Except, some time around 1100, they decided to rebel against the Emperor. So, I picked up the whole extended family since I'm the only one who hasn't lost the family lands. The one bright side is that that branch managed to get a wonderful military commander for the eventual war I'm going to fight. And, I lucked into finding a nearby county where they had a daughter, and that's it, shortly after his wife died in childbirth. So, his kid is now the heir to the County of Verona. Sweet.
But, for now, it's still just a waiting game until a chance to grab a Ducal title comes up.
Pokemon OR - Feels a bit strange since my first go through was with Sapphire. But it is nice to face mooks that don't like Rough Skin as a talent. Just hit Mossdeep, and am steadily rolling along. Gen 3 still my favourite Gen, and I am happy with my Skarmory and Slaking.
Persona Q - Given that the SMT games started with first person dungeons, it should be no surprise that Persona and Etrian mix very well. The gameplay also deals with a lot of the issues I have with Etrian gameplay. Namely, that there's a lot of abilities you have to work towards, without any real idea of how useful any of them are going to be. And a general impression that everything is expensive but that you don't really get a lot for that expense. Whereas here, you do still pay for using abilities, but you have the SMT weakness system going on. Sadly, it's more like Devil Survivor in terms of benefits than P3/4, in that it's random if you knock them over or get a followup/all out attack. But, hitting weaknesses does give you a boost, which means all moves are free and you go first next round. Boost can be lost if you're hit though, so going first isn't always an advantage. As well, everyone has the wildcard now. What this really means is, everyone has a fixed primary persona, and everyone can also equip a subpersona which is effectively a watered down wildcard from before. You can also only switch them outside of battle. They give access to skills as well as an HP/MP buffer at the start of each fight. Of course, I'm hoping that the main personas evolve over the course of the game, because Orpheus is crap. It also means that Junpei suffers, because before he had a lot of overlap with Minato (fire/slash) but that was okay because Minato quickly moved away from that to being a wildcard. Now? He's stuck as Fire/Slash as well, and he's still forced into the party. They do have Junpei as physical and Minato as magical, but it doesn't seem like enough. Especially since Koromaru also jumps on that fire train.
Aside from all that, this game is very clearly written by the Persona team, which is good because it resolves the other major issue I've had with the Etrian games, and 7th Dragon as well. Namely, all generics, all the time. You can run into other characters in those games, but none of your characters have any sort of personality. Here? The writers seem to love Junpei being an idiot as much as I do, I've gotten a dungeon break where Akihito does missionary work for protein powder, and at one point I had to shrink part of my party to super chibi size, and Koromaru's predatory instincts kick in and he hunts those party members. And It. Is. Adorable. Seriously, whoever was in charge of animating Koromaru had way too much fun.
Xenoblade - Been having some fun tooling around in this. Gameplay doesn't seem super great, but it's serviceable enough for me at the moment. Just hit the end of the prologue. Somethings weren't surprises (wait, Shulk get the Monado?), somethings totally were (though, the gameplay end of things dropped more than enough hints I didn't pick up on), and all in all it did a good job of setting up why Shulk is travelling and why I should care about his quest. And while he reasons are super selfish and personal, I can also dig that they also align with a pretty reasonable and laudable goal as well. Just, because he just went through some rough shit, and he's at the start of his journey it makes sense that he's picking the selfish reasons. So, yeah. Guess it's fair to say I'm enjoying this a lot more than I was expecting to.
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I finished DA3 today. I guess I would just say that much of the game is like if Skyrim had characters with discernible personalities and they had enjoyable conversations which revealed details about them as you explored shit to murder a shitload of things and steal everything that you're allowed to click on. The areas are usually quite large and well-designed. They manage to, for the most part, avoid the problem of "how the fuck do I get there? These cliffs are one degree too steep for me to walk up, apparently" by laying out paths to follow. Sometimes they're roads, sometimes they're more like goat paths, but most of the time if you can't figure out how to get to a destination, searching for a path and then following it will take you SOMEWHERE of note.
Other things that set it apart from an open world "run around and do shit" RPG like Skyrim is the combat is party-based and ability-based. Thanks to the big changes to healing (namely that you can only do it with a finite amount of potions) most of your healing relies on mitigation. Warriors have abilities that build armor, with the sword and shield tanks being able to gain a lot and 2h warriors only having a little. Mages can cast a barrier spell that gradually runs down as time goes on. Rogues rely almost entirely on not being wherever the enemy is attacking, either because they are invisible or they are shooting around on a grappling hook like Batman (as opposed to Warriors, who pull enemies to THEM like Scorpion). What this means is that your dream team of four rogues is probably not a very good idea. So your options for a party are basically:
1. Play as the tank. I used Blackwall as mine because he has a rockin beard. If you are playing as whoever your tank is, you can manage mitigation and positioning to make sure that, for the most part, you stay alive and your other party members don't get hit. This means you can fill out the rest of your party however you want.
2. Use the standard party composition: a warrior, a mage, a rogue and a wildcard spot. This has the added bonus of letting you deal with all of the class-specific interactables.
3. Just use ranged classes and have all of you run in a circle constantly around an enemy trying not to get hit. Requires way more micromanagement than I'm willing to do but I know a dude who had two four archer rogues kiting an enemy and whenever he got too close to one they would vanish. If you fuck this up you usually die.
My go-to party was Blackwall the Grey Warden, Dorian the Telvanni Mage with a fucking awesome mustache and Varric because he was the only good thing in DA2. Used Vivienne because I like her character, but her specialization class is basically Magic Knight, which is fucking OP as hell but involves the AI running to point blank to swing a lightsaber at shit. She died a lot and I got tired of it.
Character work is generally very good. I was very disappointed I couldn't get the racist elf mage to leave after he did a "YOU PEOPLE" speech about Qunari and I punched him in his dumb face with my enormous fist, but the ending explained why he was willing to put up with me actively shitting all over him at every opportunity, I guess. Still, he can fuck himself. Also Sera's pretty annoying, but I guess she's supposed to be like 16 and, unlike Solas, if you tell her "you fucking bother me, get out of my castle" she will leave and you won't have to put up with her, so I'm giving that the Fallout Exemption here. Really enjoyed how Cassandra and Leiliana react to your conduct with them and how that can change their endings; also was an interesting counterpoint to Vivienne getting that particular ending instead and how she's basically immutable. While she likes you, she's far less receptive to your suggestions than either of them. Dorian and Iron Bull were both an interesting opportunity to learn more about societies we haven't gotten to know much about except from outsiders, so that was fun. And of course we got to hear about Varric's new books and he's fucking awesome.
The major chunks of the story are wrapped up with large set pieces that are generally more like Dragon Age 1, with some fairly involved dungeoneering. One exception to this that I really enjoyed was the Imperial Ball in Orlais you get to go to, where you have to manipulate public opinion (and in my case, make people realize that they are wrong for underestimating a Qunari) and win people over to have more time to ransack a fairly small but incredibly treasure-dense dungeon at the end. It was an interesting change of pace. Also your party interactions there were fun.
Overall, the major callbacks from the first two games work, but I think BioWare has established they mostly know how to handle those based on ME2 and 3. One place where it kind of falls flat is, if you got the ending I did in DA1 where Alistair is King and Loghain is dead, you can really see the seam where a decision was supposed to be more important but for the character in it. I realized eventually that he WAS in a previous game, but his part was so minor that I had forgotten about it. Would have made a lot more sense to rope in one of the many Grey Wardens from Awakening instead.
Overall, great game. I hear it looks kind of shitty on 360, and considering the minimum requirements for the PC version I would believe it, but that's not my problem.
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To Excal - Regarding Persona Q, I'll just say this: spam status and ID, then things die. Naoto is MVP, and your opinion on Elizabeth and Margaret will be forever changed when you see them unable to move a finger because of silence or dies out of poison.
Persona Q truly is one of the unbalance and broken game ever.
And this is not considering things are already dying left and right with May Rain spamming combined with agility down spells.
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Makers of a P4 remake/sequel making Naoto more broken? Surely you jest!
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LISA - So Djinn dropped by my neck of Japan and we marathoned this. Got the "selfish" ending according the achievements. Failed the bike race in the last area and could not get past the bikers standing around in an adjacent cave, nor could I figure out what was going on with the Resort (though I flipped 3 switches of some kind?), so those two are gaps in my playthrough. Definitely missed one PC, maybe more, hard to tell. (If Fenrir knows how to solve these things it is ok to tell)
I don't really know how I feel about the game. On the one hand, the good. Atmospherically it was great, and at times so dark and depressing that it made me squirm, so good on it for that then. It left enough to the imagination that DJ and I were still talking about it when it finished, and I would like to see the alternate endings. Additionally, for a JRPG combat system most of the important fights were challenging enough that it required some thought and was pretty inoffensive even with the weird hybrid of Lufia 2/EB/DQ and LoL/FF6 Blitzes. One of the best parts, almost all of your choices matter, and are felt almost immediately (though less so in the long term if we're being perfectly honest). The game itself is often an asshole to the player, which was frequently way more hilarious than when it was just talking about gross stuff and asking us to laugh about it.
Downsides... almost everything about the gameplay. This is a game that is an exercise in patience. This is a game that absolutely does not respect your time. This is a game that you can't even smoothly switch between characters on the Equip screen. This is a game that doesn't have a run button, which is still better than some (http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3681706)...alternatives (http://lpix.org/1848271/fuckyou.png)... but the fact that it only barely compares favorably to Lunar DS in that realm says a lot about how frustrating this game was to play. Yes, you get the bicycle toward the end of the first area. No, it did not make everything before that less tedious. Menu navigation is atrocious, movement inelegant, and platforming frustrating. Combat is probably the best part of the gameplay, and that's sad. It is a goddamn chore to play this game. To the point that while I think I like the story and I am interested in seeing the other endings, I will Absolutely. Fucking. Not. replay this game. Not right now anyway. It is just simply too much of a chore. And while it is clearly an RPG maker game, for something being sold on a major distribution platform this level of polish is... well, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth. For whatever it's worth I feel like I still got my money's worth for that 10 bucks, but goddamn was it obnoxious to play.
But damn, did it get dark at the end. But damn did it take a lot of risks at the end. But damn did it make me blow 30 turns just to not beat up the girl I was ostensibly trying to save, just to have to give in else be stuck in the battle forever. But damn did that make my stomach churn to do that.
All story, gameplay is mostly tedious and only fun in short bursts. Gross out humor one second, dark as hell the next goddamn breath. Perhaps too dark. The entire world being out to rape this one child REALLY made me uncomfortable and often just pissed me off and I didn't think it was particularly clever nor narratively rewarding. Sure, it helps you align more with your main character, who becomes more and more of an irredeemable, abusive cockgoblin as the game goes on (but at least he's not a child rapist!), but.... ugggggh. No. Just goddamn no. No no no no no no no no no. There is something to be said that the story was able to evoke that sort of visceral reaction from me, however... but that reaction had to be evoked by dipping into the most despicable thing that could happen to a child. Fuck no.)
Really don't know how I feel about the game. People who want to play a game should not play this. People with a proper moral compass should not play this. It is despicable and horrifying and wastes your time and frequently gives the player the middle finger and I think I may have really enjoyed it.
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Dude, Zenny, have you tried remapping the controls, it took me like 20 minutes. This was the absolute worst thing.
In the resort island you can go up in one of the rooms to the floor above.
The biker gang is just a kidnapper group, like the blue rockets in the first area and the pretty boyz in the second, so they only become relevent if one of your PCs get kidnapped. They're also a little different than the two other groups, in a really cool way.
"Selfish" or "Selfless" isn't an ending thing, it's just related to how many arms you have left at the end. Which is kind of stupid to me because the arm-related choices are not about selfishness at all. (They'd be if the choice was Your arm or a PC dies, but it's Your Arm or I take all your items)
There are only two different endings, Joyless and Joyful, you get Joyful if you used joy at any point during the game. Joyless doesn't actually change the ending, you just get another little scene compared to Joyful that raises more questions than it answers. I didn't find it well written but I liked picking up a few new other things from the game in the second playthrough
- The extra scene shows that one mad scientist caused joy, and he's the trumpet dude you can see sometimes in the game like WA3 Beatrice. His fellow scientist assistant was Buzzo. We still don't know why Buzzo is pissed at Brad.
- The random janitor dude who scratches Lisa at the end was Sticky's abusive father.
- Rando, the nicest final boss in the world, was one of Brad's student, the poor one Brad lets enter his karate group for free. In one of the flashbacks you can see Brad lashed out on him in the past for whatever reason but he still felt no resentment. At the beginning of the game the 4 friends discuss going to Rando with the kid, which would have been the best decision, but Brad refuses.
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Bravely Default: Fire crystal revived. Had a few resets on the giant floating spike-brain (cool boss design after a bunch of generic demon types) , but once I figured out the timing on its shield, and managed to avoid getting OHKOed by the HP drain, it got nuked.
Also picked up the other two optional jobs in that segment. Salve-Maker was straightforward but I like the decision to make the potions expert the psychopath serial killer. He was fun and the after-fight scene was great. The Ninja sidequest was friggin' awesome, though. Locked-room mystery out of nowhere! Gradually twigging to exactly what was going on was fun, and the fight was challenging enough without having any room for quick and luck-based wipes, which is good since replaying the whole lead-in would have been a complete pain.
Ranger/Spell Fencer/Salve-Maker/Valkyrie now, considering swapping Ringabel into Pirate or Ninja.
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Castlevania Lords of Shadow: Sword Wielding Wraiths can bite me. I also must confess that considering the game's setting, I was not expecting to fight a GIANT MECHANICAL SPIDER in the middle of nowhere. I know this is Frankenstein's Castle (we will ignore how the book takes place in the 18th century, and this game is sometime in the somewhere between 1000 to 1300), but I'm pretty sure all iterations of the mad doctor and his machinery led to creating large artificial zombie men, and not giant robot archanids that shoot lightning at you and are charged by Tesla Coils.
...not that I'm complaining because hey, boss fight and not a total crap one, but still, MAKE SOME SENSE DAMN IT!
Alpha Sapphire: Terakkion refuses to give me a decent nature! After him, all I have left are 2 of the Gerbils, Cresselia and Heatran for Soaring Legendaries. I still haven't done Episode Delta but damn it I'm saving that for last because the final boss of that is level 80 so CLEARLY IT SHOULD BE LAST!
Smash Wii U: Finally got to playing this. Unlocked all but Doctor Mario, Duck Hunt Dog, and ROB as far as characters go. Something about it is just more fun than the 3DS version despite being fundamentally the same game. Not sure what it is...maybe it really is just playing Smash on a bigger screen allows for more enjoyment. Heck, even just playing on the gamepad tends to be more positive than the 3DS.
...and the 3DS version is a pretty exceptional game as is overall.
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FFX: It's a nice day for a white wedding. It's a nice day to...start agaiiiiiin!
How is Bevelle simultaneously the best and worst part of the game? Fookin' conveyor belts. Also I'd forgotten how much a giant douche Evrae is. Naturally X-potiony revenge was had at soonest opportunity.
I think at one point there was a conversation about Rikku's boobs but I've done my best to delete this from my memory.
~
Abyss Odyssey: So I beat this, for a given value of beaten. It turns out the answer to your problems is cow power. When I grow up, I'm going to Bovine University! Big bad is just sleeping not dead, though. I'm not sure if this is because default protag is trapped and not able to kill or if it's just the game's way of saying yeah you can replay indefinitely on same file, no big. It's still adding new bosses when I run another cycle, so I dunno. Will try beating it with someone else. I can now play as a naked sea sprite that throws jellyfish at people, so this was definitely worth my time. EDIT: next attempt a boss immediately jumped me at the front door. It got stuck in the floor, which was probably a good thing because the gamepad suddenly decided that up is down, X is Y, and A is B. What the hell, Logitech.
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Bravely Default: At the bottom of the Grandship engine room. Hmm, what's that bos---OH GOD MY SPLEEN AAAAAAGH BLOOD EVERYWHERE
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Final Fantasy 6 mobile version.
Bought this to keep me sane onmy eleven hour flight. Needed an internet connection to play. Could not play. 0/10 fuck off square
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Final Fantasy 6 mobile version.
Bought this to keep me sane onmy eleven hour flight. Needed an internet connection to play. Could not play. 0/10 fuck off square
It also looks like complete fucking garbage, fwiw
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So does your moms box but I still ate that
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No people ever came out of a mobile game, so what's its excuse?
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No people ever came out of a mobile game, so what's its excuse?
At least it's getting service?
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No people ever came out of a mobile game, so what's its excuse?
At least it's getting service?
He was unable to get service, note the statement about being unable to play it.
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So I got a bunch of shit from the Steam sale and picked up Dark Souls 2 and I kind of feel like the dude who saw the Wire or Breaking Bad for the first time wanting to talk about it and everyone just laughs at you and then sets your car on fire. I wanted to be funny and do double Cestuses but then I found that Fen already did it.
GOD DAMN IT FEN YOU ARE THE SIMPSONS OF DARK SOULS.
whatever dude I still love you and punching things is awesome
I really wanted to do something else dumb with dual wielding but they don't let you mix and match in an interesting way. From Software, you are dead to me.
I'm up to the Gutter which is not bad but I have a godawful sense of direction so I kind of hate it. Not having a ton of trouble so far (I think the hardest thing so far has been me being very prideful about beating up some stupid piggies early on) but I am having to overcome some Dark Souls 1 muscle memory as well as the usual shameful Souls deaths. All in all, the controls feel so much better than DS1. The game on PC is fucking gorgeous and it is super smooth like butter so this is probably the only thing I will play for the next few months. This has made me look forward to Bloodborne but I will have absolutely no time to play that when it comes out.
Has anyone looked at Lords of the Fallen? It looks like a grimdarkdudebrowhatevertheequivalentoffantasyspacemarineasshole version of Dark Souls which could be okay or bad. I hear some people actually like its combat more than the Souls game in some ways but everything else seems to fall short. It's $20 right now for PC.
Metal Gear Rising Revengeance - I grabbed this for cheap too and basically beat it in one sitting and the last fight remains the greatest thing I've seen in the past two years. Only Kojima depict a clash of ideologies so unsubtly.
I was also gifted Far Cry 4 which is apparently Far Cry 3 without the repulsive storyline so I'll be busy for a while. Also I have Dragon Age Inquisition aw fuck.
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aw fuck.
games'd
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No people ever came out of a mobile game, so what's its excuse?
At least it's getting service?
He was unable to get service, note the statement about being unable to play it.
Ah. Sorry. I thought we were still talking about your Mom's box.
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You might want to try to get to the Throne of the Ivory King DLC and farm up Bone Fist (http://darksouls.wikia.com/wiki/Bone_Fist) sometime Gourry. That way you can become kung fu and shoot fireballs.
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Ivory King DLC is not fucking around. It is post game content.
You can't really have a kung fu first playthrough honestly.
BTW Gourry I also already did dual whips my first time through
I'm sorry but I already did all the cool shit
You can be amazed at the pit in Majula and the pirate level and everything. We won't hurt you.
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I found only one whips sorry
I super wanted to do a dual whip thing too but you are some kind of Dark Souls hipster
Anyway yeah I am not sticking strictly to fistiSouls since I am now in the Shrine of Amana and I really needed to use bows.
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Dude there's nothing funny about dual-wielding the caestus, pugilism is legitimately outstanding in Dark Souls 2. You strike fast with light weapons that can benefit excellently from multiple damage+ rings and hit a weakness on like every annoying enemy type. It's great and hands down my favorite way to play the game.
Powerstancing in general I think is the best addition of DS2, but it kinda depends on what weapons you're using. Generally it works as long you stick to two of the same basic weapon type, but some types work out cooler than others. Spears and rapiers I think are pretty boring because you're just poking with two weapons instead of one, but stuff like fist weapons/daggers/curved swords get some genuinely neat combos. There's also a small handful of weapons that get specific movesets only when powerstanced (see hadokens). I highly recommend powerstancing the Warped Sword for spinspinspin.
And jesus christ don't go anywhere near the DLC zones until you've comfortably stomped the maingame. They're so much meaner.
Hunter's Blackbow >>> Shrine of Amana.
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So, Xenoblade
Gonna be starting this back up today, but last time I ventured forth on my quest. After, that is, going back into Colony 9 for a few more quests and trying out Gem Creation. Kinda cool, but I already have more useful Gems than I can slot from collectapedia and I have plenty of room for more ethers, so I only made one and moved on. Finished the cave, and got my first Monado Art, kinda nice overall though it is making the Monado even more of a plot dispenser than before. Also, Shulk as Chosen One, guess I shouldn't be surprised it happened but I had hope. Oh so much hope. Hopefully they handle it well, like it was for Fei and wasn't for Justin.
Persona Q
Finished the first dungeon. Was right in that there was a boss there. Turns out the boss can summon more mooks than SEES can handle. Fortunately, the Investigation Squad shows up and brings their combat music with them. I get an introductory battle with Minato and their core party (face it, who didn't use Chie, Yosuke, and Yukiko as the main party?) then boss time.
Once that's done, requests show up, Margaret displays why she's better at fusions than Elizabeth, and I get a lot of interaction between the two groups. These guys clearly understand their market. The other neat thing in all of this is that Yu is talking, he is a character here. Pretty laid back, well spoken, and his place in the group dynamic fits with how P4 works. He's clearly the leader, the group does seem to revolve around him not because he takes charge, but because he's insightful and says generally useful things. Yosuke still gets the most lines, but Yu's the guy they all fall in behind. Heck, there's even a S Link style scene where Yosuke's got something on his mind and Yu notices, gets him to talk about it, and talks him through it.
So, I think that confirms I'm gonna eventually play this game a second time just to see things from the other perspective and how they handle Minato. Also, see if the music is handled differently since a lot of the soundtrack is P3 thus far.
As for actual plot, there still isn't much. There's been hints that something sentient is behind all this. Margaret has dropped some hints that she knows what happens at the end of P3, but it's not her place to change any of that so she's not telling any of the characters, or Elizabeth for that matter who she knows will take action even though she's not supposed to. And now we seem to be going through a Shadowified version of what the P4 cast did for their cultural festival, because the writers enjoy making that cast suffer. I may need to replay P4 because I can't remember that part of the cultural festival at all. Regardless, all that anyone is willing to say about it is that they don't talk about it, and don't want to remember it.
Difficulty has stepped up, and now there's a nice balance between the ID skills and the elemental magics. Heck, even the physical skills. ID kills if it hits, but it can miss, even if it hits weakness. And if it misses, no boost for you. Elemental magic is basically guaranteed to hit, and will give you the boost. Also, at this point it's getting widely available in the all hitting Ma- variants. Finally, the physical skills are really shining against Bosses and FOEs where there aren't really weaknesses to hit, and a big ol sack of HP to hack through, so you want something that'll step up damage, but won't run out or get rid of healing reserves. And Fuuka comes with this great party wide regen skill that makes recovering from the HP cost for physical skills a breeze. So everything seems to have a place. Still, Mahama is pretty awesome.
Finally, I saved the best for last. Somehow, Koromaru has gotten even more adorable. But, the scene you get when it's time for him to call an all-out attack? Just this dog, sitting there, with knives in his mouth, and his tail wagging eagerly. It's just, d'awwwwww.
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Alpha Sapphire: Terrakion caught! He has a +Speed -SpA nature I believe, with maxed IVs in Def, SDef, and SpA. So why would I take it? Because he's got "Practically maxed" IVs in Attack and Speed (as in, he has 148 Attack when 149 is maximum at level 50), which after all these crappy natures or "Good nature but awful stats", I'll take what I can live with a Terrakion that is like 1 less Attack and speed than ideal.
...really crap HP IVs though, but whatever, he's a physical sweeper, not a tank.
Smash Wii U: Unlocked all characters, and played 6 player Smash with my sister, brother, brother-in-law and 2 of my cousins. We also discovered one of our gamecube controllers may have a busted A Button and see if repairing it might be doable...
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Pokémon Alpha Sapphire - OH MY GOD I'M SPENDING ALL MY TIME RAISING EVS
That aside, the usual gen 6 Pokémon goodness applies. Getting Giga Drain at L21 for Treecko rules all.
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FFX: I'd forgotten that Kimahri was on chaperone duty throughout that whole underwater makeout session. I'd also forgotten that some of the victory poses are frankly a little terrifying with hasted characters, especially Wakka's. The man's got jackhammer hips!
Note to self: don't try stealing from magic urns again. They don't appreciate it.
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Banner Saga: Chapter 3, I think I'm going to stop.
The game is cool and all, but I think this is one of the most intolerable battle systems in the long run. I'm playing on Hard and still doing pretty well, but I can't stand these battles anymore. They're a clusterfuck and I feel I have to completely exploit the battle system's flaws. Nothing makes sense.
I believe they had one enemy turn always follow one ally turn (and vice versa) to solve the pacing issue of pretty much the entire SRPG genre, but this made the battle system worthless at the same time. Not a good tradeoff.
I guess I could lower difficulty to easy then just play through normally, but 1) I don't even know what "normally" would be with this battle system 2) The game wouldn't have much of a point anymore 3) That's just not how I roll really.
LISA:
Third time through because I need to. I'm also trying to get the 1ARM chievos thing and play with a Rage/Queen/Sonny team, going for efficiency, not doing any kind of sidequesty thing.
Selling cigs and finding secret stashes surprisingly gives enough money to buy the two dudes in the bar right away (not items though)
Joy also works really well to give you an advantage during boss battles in "speedruns". I actually do believe it is wasted on Brad; you should just give it instead to people with strong inaccurate attacks, like Queen or Fardy, because it gives the usual damage boost while also making these attacks hit 100% of the time. Of course, you're an asshole if you give Joy to a non-addict like Fardy, but w/e, 3000 damage truck at the beginning of the game.
If you give Terry away during the first choice of the game, you get to fight him later on. He can do some damage (OHKO to my weak ass team actually) or cry deeply. Also his PC form stays super weak the whole game but gets an uber attack at level 25. And he has one very sad speech at the end of the game if you've used him. The Hint Lord is surprisingly fleshed out, for being the first PC you usually ditch.
I don't really understand what's going on then, but I really like all the guys who spend one turn being astounded by my stupidity in battle.
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Fenrir: I played through on Normal, but Banner Saga combat strategy is all about abusing the seemingly "equal" turnsplit. I'm not sure I'd like to see it more, but there IS strategy to them, and I'm not sure I'd call it the systems 'flaws'. Basically you want as many enemy units to waste turns on movement with no attack as possible, so concentrate your force on a small sliver of the enemy and try not to let them form up. When enemy units DO get turns, you want them to be worthless, so shanking enemies down to low health but leaving them alive does wonders for screwing up enemy turn efficiency. Abilities that force enemies to waste a turn while also doing damage are also gold, especially if done on enemies who are dangerous - Oddleif & the like.
I thought it was interestingly different, at least. Try it on Normal? Maybe the upped stats are just too hardc0re for a first-time runthrough. I'm not sure the extent of the Hard changes, but it's definitely one of the systems where just a small increase in enemy stats / numbers can be totally punishing, and a small decrease lets you just #YOLO smash through everything.
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Pokémon Alpha Sapphire - OH MY GOD I'M SPENDING ALL MY TIME RAISING EVS
That aside, the usual gen 6 Pokémon goodness applies. Getting Giga Drain at L21 for Treecko rules all.
Oh please! Don't act like you're not upset you can't play Dress Up with May and not have her wearing a sunbonnet like you could with Serena!
Lords of Shadow: Completed on Knight, which seems to be 2nd highest difficulty, and highest on default. No, I will not do Paladin, as I think I had enough of this game. My general stance has remain unchanged; all the core ideas and fundamentals are there, but the game is extremely rough around the edges and that really hurts it. You'd think the 2nd game would be fantastic as a result since they'd take the first game and just fine-tune the edges, but no, sounds like they managed to screw it up way more than before.
So other things to comment on?
Well, for starters, QTEs weren't as bad as I expecting. Forgiving and you can press any button to activate them (well, at least any of the main 4), so it's just a case of paying attention to the screen. Still usual complaints about QTEs being bad to implement in general because you're busy watching a cool looking cinematic cutscene with the enemy then suddenly a circle appears on the screen and you don't press it fast enough and SPLAT, instant death, fight boss over! To be fair, most bosses have mid-fight checkpoints, so failing the QTEs just means redo half the fight, not the entire thing, but still poor design.
The plot is pretty straight forward...until the very last chapter. For the first 11 chapters, it's very simple. Gabriel's wife is dead, so he went on a quest to find a way to get her back. He learns killing the 3 Lords of Shadow and restoring balance of Light and Darkness is the way to do so. So Save the World, he gets his wife back, simple enough! He goes to do exactly that, and the rest of the game is mostly him going from point to point until he reaches one of them, kills the boss, rinse and repeat.
Then the final chapter kicks in and well...see, when you turn on the game, you get a big "Kojima Productions" symbol that appears, and you really don't see how it enters into this. The final chapter answers that as the main villain who is actually Zobek, the guy who has been your ally and the game's narrator this entire time goes on a big 10 minute rant about his MASTER PLAN and how everything is going, well, like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLnpA_bxMy8). Oh yeah, we also learn that Gabriel killed his wife when being controlled, and just when everything seems like it can't get worse, Satan pops up and goes "yo, I was behind everything, thank you for doing all the hard work for me. You literally were my pawn this entire time and thought you doing things for your own good. NOW I CAN KILL GOD!!!!" That of course takes another rant. So...yeah, Kojima sort of forgot he wasn't writing Metal Gear and started writing...Metal Gear.
Characters...well as I said, Gabriel is at least a guy you can root for because he's a good guy who wants what's good in the world and just wants to resurrect his wife, and the things he kills are either demons, undead, lycanthropes (who I should note the game makes very clear exist to just kill everything around them, so they're clearly bad guys), witches who have sold their soul to hell, etc. Basically, the usual stuff you fight in Castlevania Games. Oh, they won't resemble the traditional Castlevania enemies, but you know what I mean; things you have no moral objection to killing because they are clearly inherently bad!
...funny how the game's Narrative tries to tell you otherwise. No, I don't mean it tries to claim these evil bad guys are possibly good, I mean it claims Gabriel is "Losing his humanity, getting bloodthirsty, driven by madness and rage!" yet every single cutscene he's clearly calm, collected, and not acting that way at all. He doesn't just rush into the boss and go all "DIE MONSTER! YOU DON'T BELONG IN THIS WORLD!" and the Boss is all " I'm not the monster, YOU ARE! I'M JUST DEFENDING MYSELF!" and Gabriel is all "YOU RUINED THE CLASSIC SCENE AND THUS MY MOMENT! DIE!" More like after fighting off every enemy that has stood in his way...should note that every one of these enemies has killed unfathomable amounts of innocent lives, and usually throws the first punch, he reaches the Lord of Shadow, and the Lord is all "Darkness is great, JOIN ME GABRIEL AND WE CAN HAVE SUPREME POWER TOGETHER! YOU AND I ARE THE SAME!" and he just kind of goes "you're a bad guy, no."
Look game, you can't play the "morally ambiguous hero!" card when the good guys and bad guys are very clearly spelled out as black and white in this game. Gabriel is a good guy through and through. He kills demons who kill innocents, he's on a quest to save the world and his wife, and gaining the super powers he has is just kind of a side effect of his journey that helps him out. He kills two innocent people but neither were under his own free will, so it doesn't count. In fact, despite that, Gabriel is still all "I wish to repent for my actions" so he's nobly taking the blame for something that he has a legitimate excuse out for.
On the other hand, the game spells out that the Lords of Shadow are CLEARLY BAD GUYS. They are the evil dark halves of the 3 sacred heroes who ascended to the heavens and thus their bodies were left behind, corrupted by the darkness that left because there's two sides to every coin, yada yada yada. Point is, their good sides all went to heaven, their evil sides stayed behind and basically built up army of evil things, split into Lycanthropes, Vampires, and Spirits (They call them "Dead" but Vampires are undead so that distinction doesn't really work here.) IOWs, anything that falls into one of those three categories is clearly explicitly evil. The game never once tries to show that there are noble werewolves, or that there are good vampires. The closest is Laura, and she's less "good guy" and more "showed a sign of a conscience that let Gabriel go due to appealing to her emotionally." They make it very clear though that Laura had more than her fair share of innocent blood on her hands...that she took by her own free will...and enjoyed.
So really, the whole angle of "Gabriel is slowly transforming into that which he wishes to kill" or whatever point they're making DOES NOT WORK. The narrative and cutscenes do not match up at all. Basically, the best way to describe it would be if something like this happened:
Narrative: "And So Gabriel continues onward, slaughtering all those who stand before him innocent or guilty. His hands are stained in the blood but he cannot feel for those he killed. Even civilians are a sacrifice for his greater cause!"
Cutscene: Shows Gabriel defending orphans from a firebreathing demon that just torched their orphanage.
No, really, that's the kind of disconnect we get!
Also, again, Gabriel is not really "well written"; he's a generic good guy paladin dude...that the game tries to pretend is losing himself...yeah, I'm not going to rant about that last part again. Just know he's basically the same guy from start to finish...this does not include the completely out of nowhere epilogue that exists purely for sequel baiting and really has no basis in the main game. I guess that's why Mirror of Fate exists, to make sense of the interim, but doubt I'll play that...and I really doubt I'll play LoS2 because by all accounts it's awful.
The real question is...how does this game tie-in with Castlevania? Yes, it's a reboot so not continuity wise, but what makes it "Castlevania"? Well...the same things that made DmC a Devil May Cry...kind of. It has a lot of allusions to original franchise, but tries to do it's own thing. Clear elements it took from the original series:
-Bemont whose primary weapon is a whip (Duh?)
-said whip is nicknamed "Vampire Killer"
-Leader of the Lycans is Cornell (IIRC, there was a werewolf of this name in the other games)
-Leader of the Vampires is Carmilla (yes, I know the origin of the name, but it's still a character who appeared in several Castlevanias)
-Death being one of the last bosses
-Holy Water and Daggers being sub weapons
-Enemies are Castlevania Themed for the most part, in that you fight Vampires, Zombies, Lycans, Trolls, Bats, etc.
-There is a stage involving jumping on gears and machinery to progress. THis is totally the stand-in for the Clock-tower stage...except there are no Medusa Heads...I WILL NOT COMPLAIN AT THAT IN THE SLIGHTEST!
-The Song "Vampire Killer" plays in the Music Box. I admit I did not see this coming, but hey, nice to hear! Sadly also reminds me of how all the music in older Castlevania Games is better than his Epic Orchestrated crap. I WANT MY BLOODY TEARS DAMN IT :(
So...yeah, I guess they tried making it sort of Castlevania like rather than just slapping the name on it.
As far as how good the game is...it definitely will appeal to God of War fans a lot more than DMC fans. I do think the core combat is way better than God of War because the game doesn't feel like a mindless button masher but actually makes you care about dodging attacks and learning timing and techniques, but the similarities to God of War are more prominent than Devil May Cry. No wonder there a bunch of people who call this game "amazing" <_<
Overall? 5/10. Shame because it has so much potential but it's a prime example of how poor polish can completely ruin an experience.
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Persona Q
So, out of curiosity based on this, I started looking up some random information on Persona Q, and I found this.
"Hashino stated that 2014 being the 25th anniversary of the Persona series was the inspiration for branching into new territory, namely similar elements of the Etrian Odyssey series."
WTF. Persona was released in 1996. Either they really can't count, or there are games that pre-date Persona? I wonder if they just mean SMT (just even that just goes back to...92? it looks like).
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The first Megami Tensei was released in 87 so who knows what's happening.
Snowfire: I did realize that was the way to win; I tried to: pick few allies per battle (3), wait until the front enemies move, attack them until they reach 1-2 health and move on to the next one. It's not elegant to me. (And it doesn't make any sense whatsoever either, but I'm willing to sacrify verisimilitude)
Success or failure depends largely on whether enemies can get their shit together and not block themselves on their way to attack you, and on which skills they'll use. This randomness would be acceptable in another game, but in this every attack counts because you can't heal anything and finish nearly every battle on the brink of death.
This is all pretty bad compared to say, a good old Fire Emblem.
Hoshigami is another SRPG that does require strategy but isn't interesting to me.
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Well deploying only 3 allies sounds wrong. You don't get THAT much from levels so it's not like you get hugely better turn efficiency from only deploying your good troops, and you want more meatshields to take a hit for when you can't stop a relevant enemy unit from doing something. I *guess* a small deploy allows theoretically better hit & run archer tactics, but the maps are usually claustrophobic enough I'd question this strat, and even if you do want to do it, well, just get 3 dudes killed first and have 'em be a distraction on their way down. The only way I see this being worth it is if you have a very archer-centric strategy and don't want powerful enemies double-turning your archers to get in on 'em. (And hell, I ran an extremely archer centric strat myself, but did fine with basically 4 archers + mage + giant as my final party.)
Anyway, give it a shot on Normal is my suggestion, but the battle system isn't for everyone, I suppose.
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LISA:
Third time through because I need to. I'm also trying to get the 1ARM chievos thing and play with a Rage/Queen/Sonny team, going for efficiency, not doing any kind of sidequesty thing.
Selling cigs and finding secret stashes surprisingly gives enough money to buy the two dudes in the bar right away (not items though)
Joy also works really well to give you an advantage during boss battles in "speedruns". I actually do believe it is wasted on Brad; you should just give it instead to people with strong inaccurate attacks, like Queen or Fardy, because it gives the usual damage boost while also making these attacks hit 100% of the time. Of course, you're an asshole if you give Joy to a non-addict like Fardy, but w/e, 3000 damage truck at the beginning of the game.
If you give Terry away during the first choice of the game, you get to fight him later on. He can do some damage (OHKO to my weak ass team actually) or cry deeply. Also his PC form stays super weak the whole game but gets an uber attack at level 25. And he has one very sad speech at the end of the game if you've used him. The Hint Lord is surprisingly fleshed out, for being the first PC you usually ditch.
I don't really understand what's going on then, but I really like all the guys who spend one turn being astounded by my stupidity in battle.
Huh, never tried giving Joy to any non-Brad PCs. Just seemed like a waste of a limited resource and since we were already forced to use one addict who would potentially be useless in key battles due to the withdrawal status...
Also, there's almost no documentation for this game... who are Queen and Sonny?
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Dragon Quest III- fin. Wish the game listed playtime, I feel like I was "half way" about 10 hours in then the game lasted another 25 but maybe something is off in my perception there. I think I like DQIV more but I can see where III would have its fans definitely. Did a basic Warrior/Mage/Cleric party, made both spell casters Sages by the end.
Um . 5/10 I think.
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Well deploying only 3 allies sounds wrong. You don't get THAT much from levels so it's not like you get hugely better turn efficiency from only deploying your good troops, and you want more meatshields to take a hit for when you can't stop a relevant enemy unit from doing something. I *guess* a small deploy allows theoretically better hit & run archer tactics, but the maps are usually claustrophobic enough I'd question this strat, and even if you do want to do it, well, just get 3 dudes killed first and have 'em be a distraction on their way down. The only way I see this being worth it is if you have a very archer-centric strategy and don't want powerful enemies double-turning your archers to get in on 'em. (And hell, I ran an extremely archer centric strat myself, but did fine with basically 4 archers + mage + giant as my final party.)
Anyway, give it a shot on Normal is my suggestion, but the battle system isn't for everyone, I suppose.
Having three PCs is a risky tactic but worked much better for me than a full team (I got destroyed whenever I used a full team) Whenever I used someone like Ludin I was just waiting for him to die so the other PCs could get more urns.
1) Allies get in the way of each other all the time, so you kinda have to divide your troops anyway or be inefficient if you use a full team.
2) You don't have to divide your very limited resources.
3) You never get attacked by full HP enemies unless they play smart (they don't) or there are way too many of them.
So this is almost like having three Orlandus in FFT (w/ Auto Haste) instead of 6 regular PCs, which is a fine tradeoff.
Huh, never tried giving Joy to any non-Brad PCs. Just seemed like a waste of a limited resource and since we were already forced to use one addict who would potentially be useless in key battles due to the withdrawal status...
Also, there's almost no documentation for this game... who are Queen and Sonny?
Queen runs the brothel, and Sonny is the wrestler with a wolf on his head who joins if you beat the whole league.
If you give some Joy to Queen you really don't care that Brad is doing less damage. I beat Satan/Mike in like 4 turns. Queen gets a 2000/3000 damage x6 (under joy) brutal beatdown attack at level 25, everybody else turns into item boys to make Queen's life easier at this point.
Also, some other PCs are also addicts, which is why I first tried giving Joy to other people. This includes Queen, + Dick (pink ranger) + Buckets (Dual pistol guy who joins if you finish the russian roulette thing), Carp (Fish Head), Clint (500 mags pretty boy), Tiger Man. I think that's it.
BTW, did you find the hidden fish village? And the garbage island? These two I completely missed on my first playthrough.
Dragon Quest III- fin. Wish the game listed playtime, I feel like I was "half way" about 10 hours in then the game lasted another 25 but maybe something is off in my perception there. I think I like DQIV more but I can see where III would have its fans definitely. Did a basic Warrior/Mage/Cleric party, made both spell casters Sages by the end.
Um . 5/10 I think.
I like DQ3 but I found a big part of the appear was having one useless goof off wasting his turns in battle
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So, out of curiosity based on this, I started looking up some random information on Persona Q, and I found this.
"Hashino stated that 2014 being the 25th anniversary of the Persona series was the inspiration for branching into new territory, namely similar elements of the Etrian Odyssey series."
WTF. Persona was released in 1996. Either they really can't count, or there are games that pre-date Persona? I wonder if they just mean SMT (just even that just goes back to...92? it looks like).
I guess they are taking it from when development started? That would be weird but make some sense on a personal level for the company I guess.
Oh please! Don't act like you're not upset you can't play Dress Up with May and not have her wearing a sunbonnet like you could with Serena!
This is legit the most disappointing part of the game.
Dragon Age: Origins - rolled a City Elf thief when I found out you could just make your own story on the Tapestry of Inquisition, but really wanted to replay Origins. Going for missed achievements, so sexy time with Alistair was achieved. Done the mages tower, Shale DLC, killed Flemeth for Morrigwn and the Return to Ostagar DLC. Headed to Soldiers Peak next.
Dark Souls - got up to Anor Londo. The archers were easier this time than my first run through, I don't really know what I was doing different, but meh whatever. Cleared out chests and stuff up to Seigmeyer. Not looking forward to O&S since I don't have much humanity to burn (gave a ton to the Fair Lady).
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Internet search shows that this is actually the 25th anniversary of Atlus.
It's actually the 20th anniversary of Persona if you consider that Shin Megami Tensei If... is Persona 0
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Shadowrun Dragonfall Director's Cut got a massive price cut on Steam right now, you should get it.
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Triple poooost
South Park Stick of Truth: Fun so far, reminds me of Costume Quest. Obsidian is cool.
Are these the worst controls in a recent game, with a keyboard?
WASD To move. Hold shift to run. Space to interact. Mouse clicks to do shit in battle and take items. No key remapping. Let's see:
Right hand is on the mouse, left hand on the keyboard.
Thumb on the space bar, pinkie on the shift button, middle fingers on WASD. My left hand is in a horrible claw like position and playing for 10 minutes hurts my carpals. Pinkie and Thumb also really dont feel comfortable at all.
I'm thinking about stopping and waiting until I get a proper controller.
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FFX: So I'm running through the ruins of Zanarkand and there's cool music and some dramatic echoes of days gone past and I know one of the neatest boss fights in the game is coming up so I'm starting to be all oh right maybe this here is the best part of the game, but then SCREEEECH hold up son, we've got to put that story on hold for some TETRIS BLOCK FLOOR PUZZLES. Gawd. Way to murder the tension, Square. Anyway I stopped for the night after getting wasted by Yunalesca. I was feeling all smug after cruising through the first two forms because you better believe I stocked up on holy waters this time, no struggling to keep people alive in zombie form like I had to do when first playing the game! Then Megadeath wiped out the whole party. Wurp, forgot about that move. Pretty much all of my deaths have been that caliber of stupidity:
#1: Magic urns know exactly how to deal with thieves.
#2: Yojimbo's normal attacks are totally feeble so his overdrive can't be too brutal, can it?
#3: I'm sure this super move the game tells me Seymour Flux is about to use totally won't be able to massacre the party at full HP, because that didn't happen just a few minutes ago right?
#4: Must live as a zombie!
Other stuff: Rikku mugging dudes with status weapons is a vastly more effective random-smashing tactic than I would've expected. Also, do Focus/Aim/etcetera stack with multiple uses?
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Triple poooost
South Park Stick of Truth: Fun so far, reminds me of Costume Quest. Obsidian is cool.
Are these the worst controls in a recent game, with a keyboard?
WASD To move. Hold shift to run. Space to interact. Mouse clicks to do shit in battle and take items. No key remapping. Let's see:
Right hand is on the mouse, left hand on the keyboard.
Thumb on the space bar, pinkie on the shift button, middle fingers on WASD. My left hand is in a horrible claw like position and playing for 10 minutes hurts my carpals. Pinkie and Thumb also really dont feel comfortable at all.
I'm thinking about stopping and waiting until I get a proper controller.
It controlled well for me with a PS3 controller, though the on-screen inputs being all for X360 was a pain. Farts are also a little tricky since they involve two different sticks being used in two directions, but I never used farts anyway.
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Focus/Aim and the rest can stack up to five times.
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Shadowrun Dragonfall Director's Cut got a massive price cut on Steam right now, you should get it.
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Dark Souls - Invaded Lautrec a few times, was meh on the fight. Went back and got Black Bow of Pharis, cheesed it.
Walked in to Ornstein and Smough for my first pull on this run after only having poked my head in twice before on my Strength run that halted here because of work/life/Steam migration. Got Ornstein down. Very :O Then pillar hump harder than WoW Arena against Smough. Got him down to less than 2 big chunks of health bar left. Out of Pyro (Great Chaos Fireball used most casts on Ornstein), Great Combustion got in a lot of work. Fuck up because I figure, hey lets see how much damage Bow does plinking over pillars. Turns out it is pretty good! Not amazing damage, but amazingly safe and nearly free. Then I get a ton of Shovel Spam in a row and need to move to another pillar. Instinctively go to claw at that Block button. First person view.
Fuck.
Nearly one shot O&S. You Died.
Edit - Played some Dragon Age: Origins for a bit, had some dinner and then went back. Got them this time. All about learning the openings in Smough's hammer swings really and exploiting them more, but probably could have plinked him down with arrows if I really wanted. Black Bow of Pharis +9 with standard arrows and 30 dex doing 100+ damage did the last bit of work for me after Great Combustion and Great Chaos Fireball charges emptied out. Could have gone for Balder Side Sword thrusts, but had also got better at managing his movement around pillar and wasn't prepared to risk the slower attack than Combustion. Sometimes he follows up the over head slam or the 2 swing combo with butt stomp which timing on Combustion to dodge was tight as shit.
Not really sure on a good way to go for Smough dead first though, just ignore Ornstein at first and try to rush down Smough?
Also not sure where I want to head next. Catacombs maybe for Right of Kindling? Tomb of Giants doesn't give me much in the way of progression, but then neither does Izalith or Forest. I could go for a dive down into New Londo Ruins for the Ember I guess.
For now I think I will craft up that Quelag's Fury Sword I have been waiting for a Curved Sword to make and then go back to Dragon Age.
Edit 2 - Fashion Souls for El Cid I guess (http://cloud-4.steampowered.com/ugc/41988756620880842/4B616F2E501030D44BEC58234EEC06A3D02E94A7/). Not my usual kit, but I wanted something different to look at while running through Anor Londo killing stuff for souls for Quelag's Fury Sword (which is +5 now because there is so much fucking Demon Titanite in this game if you kill Titanite Demons when you see them).
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Honestly, a weapon with Capture + Deathstrike is a godsend if you plan on doing anything with that side quest.
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And jesus christ don't go anywhere near the DLC zones until you've comfortably stomped the maingame. They're so much meaner.
Well, I just beat the maingame! It took just three days of play which probably wasn't the best idea, but there weren't the big annoying roadblocks for me in this game that there were in DS1.
I don't have much to add about this game. It is streamlined, which I guess some DS players really hate? I really liked the changes but I get the feeling that some people found it disappointing. I kind of feel the opposite, like this is a fairly perfect product. As I mentioned before, the game is gorgeous and runs very smoothly, and options like dualwielding are really good additions to me which encourage something other than my standard shield setup. Fisting did work well for me other than some people at the end with some exceptions. I barely touched magic at all this playthrough so I'm not sure whether to go to NG+ or start over as a sorc or pyro.
Shovel Knight - I am late to the party to this as well, but this is also basically a perfect game and I think the highlight is its soundtrack, which is definitely not an insult to the rest of the game. Also since I have played Dark Souls I am becoming that unbearable person that describes mechanics in other games as being like Dark Souls, which applies to the checkpoints here.
I think my next venture may be to replay the Dragon Ages and then move onto Inquisition. It's totally unnecessary with that Keep thing but I don't remember shit from those games.
South Park Stick of Truth: Fun so far, reminds me of Costume Quest. Obsidian is cool.
Are these the worst controls in a recent game, with a keyboard?
I'm thinking about stopping and waiting until I get a proper controller.
Yeah, use a PS3 or XBox controller if it supports it (I think it should). You can use Motionjoy to emulate an XBox controller using a PS3 one, although I don't know I'm not sure what the button prompts for PC South Park's timed events defaults to. I think XBox controllers are basically plug and play but you can use Motionjoy for that too.
South Park is good but aspects of its design are a little annoying sometimes. Level ups matter for skills, which are significant, but your offensive and defensive stats are almost entirely dependent on equipment strength, which can be a deterrent since enemies level up with you. Basically this means you should find the next level of equipment to catch up with enemies. Also, your partner doesn't really level up very well in a way commensurate to your equipment upgrades and they become more useful for their status effects than anything else. This isn't always a big deal since the scaling isn't severe (except for some bosses) and some skills aren't tied to equipment. However, I found myself beating up all the kids I ran into and got to a point where I couldn't find the next level of equipment and was basically tinking people until I did. It kind of felt they were designing an RPG for the first time but I know they know better since it is Obsidian.
My only other problem is that the classes don't seem differentiated enough to justify a replay, although I probably would revisit the game down the line just for the jokes.
The game has one section that even I'm a tad squeamish about but I guess you'll get there.
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Yeah, use a PS3 or XBox controller if it supports it (I think it should). You can use Motionjoy to emulate an XBox controller using a PS3 one, although I don't know I'm not sure what the button prompts for PC South Park's timed events defaults to. I think XBox controllers are basically plug and play but you can use Motionjoy for that too.
I checked the PS3 controller and went all "Oh wow this is actually USB? I don't have to buy something else, I just have to download one program? PC gaming can be easy??"
The next 3 hours were dreadful.
But I finally got it working!! Thanks for the tip.
The problem was that Windows 8 was automatically refusing to install drivers without asking me. Thanks Windows 8.
Edit: Crap I hate level scaling
Obsidian removed it from Fallout 3 to New Vegas, why have they done this for South Park
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Crisis Core Expert Mode: I have been playing more of this. Made some progress and finally got to the part after Bahamut Fury. Also beat the Bahamut Rematch so yay, second summon! Game also finally decided to actually start giving me Modulating Phases with actual occasional level ups after I went through a ridiculous dry-spell of them.
Game should pick up because I got a 3rd accessory slot, interesting materia I can use for fusing is starting to show up, got some accessories that increase my damage notably so fights aren't taking as long, etc.
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Also not sure where I want to head next. Catacombs maybe for Right of Kindling? Tomb of Giants doesn't give me much in the way of progression, but then neither does Izalith or Forest. I could go for a dive down into New Londo Ruins for the Ember I guess.
For now I think I will craft up that Quelag's Fury Sword I have been waiting for a Curved Sword to make and then go back to Dragon Age.
Edit 2 - Fashion Souls for El Cid I guess (http://cloud-4.steampowered.com/ugc/41988756620880842/4B616F2E501030D44BEC58234EEC06A3D02E94A7/). Not my usual kit, but I wanted something different to look at while running through Anor Londo killing stuff for souls for Quelag's Fury Sword (which is +5 now because there is so much fucking Demon Titanite in this game if you kill Titanite Demons when you see them).
New Londo or Catacombs. +15 weapons or more heals. Everything else can wait!
Black sorcerer set's pretty swank! I used that + Velka's tights for Utena cosplay (it's a reasonably close match to the movie).
~
Left-click across the throat means deathoh right this game's called Torchlight 2. I guess I was in a dungeon-crawly mood. Started an outlander for guns guns guns, focused on dual-wielding and firing minionising bullets. It's not the sheer awesome that dropping ricochet traps and watching them massacre everything was in Torchlight 1 but it's still pretty neat. Resisted the urge to take a headcrab pet and name it Lamar. Picked a cat instead, used the default name--I might not care much for Heinlein, but I have to admit that Pixel is an excellent cat name.
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You offend my fashion cred. That is Black Sorcerer Robes with Eastern Gloves because it covers my undead forearms, but doesn't cover the cuffs of the robes and Black Leather boots for a practical shoe that isn't covered in armour.
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Cool now don't die and stay in human form 24/7.
Because zombies can't fashion souls
To target Smough I try to get a pillar between Ornstein and me. Or lure fast Ornstein away from slow Smough then rush at Smough, poke a few times, and repeat.
Obviously not foolproof or anything though. I have an easier time with Ornstein -> Smough even though Giant Smough is harder than Giant Ornstein
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I'd have appreciated South Park to not bring back the Manbearpig, oh well. I accept that SP is going to offend me at one point considering the amount of people it offends.
Little reminder before watching some South Park:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TttI60-mjQ
The game is full of references I don't get since I've basically never watched SP episodes more than once, but I'm having fun. Jimmy's bard song, the impossible Simon says minigame in the UFO, and looting Cartman's mother's room were highlights so far.
Allies already do no damage at this point so Stan is terrible as a pure warrior. And Butters is the best. Huh. I play the game on Expert and there are too many items for the game to ever be difficult. (and it'd be impossible without item use)
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Cool now don't die and stay in human form 24/7.
Because zombies can't fashion souls
This was good advice, I don't know why no one told me sooner. Ravelord Nito dead. Sif dead. This really works.
Edit - And Four Kings as well! Not dying really is the best way to play (Also face tanking 2 or 3 with full Havels is INTERESTING AND NEW TECHNIQUES I have found)
Edit - With just Bed of Chaos and Seath left I was inevitably going to die. Died to some trash rather than the bed though. Ever since I went hollow I have been playing terrible. Fenrir strats are truefacts proven by science here.
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Dragon Age: Origins- Game just freaking killbox'd me.
Doing the quest in the Orphanage. Killed the first demon. For some reason it restarts the cutscene from the beginning, then goes immediately to after battle scene. When it comes out, both doors are locked, impossible to pick. Nothing in the room can be interacted with. No way out of the room. I checked and it said there's a body and a chest in the room you're supposed to be able to interact with, but no such luck. Saved in new slot, reloaded, still doesn't work.
Stuck in a room with no way out (for all eternity). Grand.
Either the problem is there's a key in the interactables that I'm missing, or when it reloaded the cutscene from the beginning it shut the doors for the fight, but since the fight didn't trigger it couldn't open them upon completion afterwards. When I looked it up it also had big warning signs to save before the orphanage because it is a glitchy mess, but since I'm playing FAQless didn't quite get the memo.
Still, lost a few hours of progress and a lot of goodwill towards the game.
Though it would've been a lot funnier if I'd been going on a Hunter playthrough and not a Keith playthrough. Much more appropriate
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Cool now don't die and stay in human form 24/7.
Because zombies can't fashion souls
This was good advice, I don't know why no one told me sooner. Ravelord Nito dead. Sif dead. This really works.
Edit - And Four Kings as well! Not dying really is the best way to play (Also face tanking 2 or 3 with full Havels is INTERESTING AND NEW TECHNIQUES I have found)
Edit - With just Bed of Chaos and Seath left I was inevitably going to die. Died to some trash rather than the bed though. Ever since I went hollow I have been playing terrible. Fenrir strats are truefacts proven by science here.
It's true! I went the first couple days' sessions of DS2 without being hollow at all, but after actually dying once (in the stupidest way possible of course) it happened a lot more in rapid succession.
You just can't play confident if you don't look your best.
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Are you on PC or console Sopko? There might be a console command you can use. I vaguely recall that quest being buggy.
Dark Souls - Bed of Chaos took stupid number of zergs. I was going in through the Chaos Servant entrance and never fought Centipede Demon, so had to run past Titanite Demon a lot. Before I gave up and just ran past it I got a lot of Demon Titanite. The number of ways you can just flat out die in that fight is stupid, but none of the lolololol die with no chance to respond scenarios is as bad as the tree branch you have to run up in the last bit having a slight curve at the start below where you can see while running up to it, so when you think you have won you run off a cliff and die. Fuck that boss.
But not as much as fuck Seath's run up. That shit is terrible. The invisible platforms are obnoxious and stupid, fine you will learn them but still, dumb. The section being "Learn where we randomly put the way forward" mixed between invisible paths and trying to work out which 30-60 degree incline you can and can't walk up can fuck off and die in a fire forever. The golems being incredibly relentless can also piss off. There is literally no reason the bonfire needs to be back in Duke's Archives here either. That whole sequence is pretty bad for what thematically should be the coolest part of the game. I also have no idea how to fight Seath. First pull I died to curse from crystals. Second pull I died to damage from crystals. Third pull I stopped trying to stand in front of him and died to him chucking a tantrum and ripping off tons of health through full Havels. Fourth try he died because I spammed Estus and R1 a bunch while giving him Havel Hugs.
I have no idea what is going on.
Between those I went and did Painted World of Ariamis. This level wants to be Boletaria so much. I have been hearing people say it is the best level because it is the most like Demons's Souls's for a year now. Having done it. It is pretty bad because it is like Demons's Souls's in Dark Souls. It loops back on itself incestuously like a Dark Souls map does in ways that Demons's doesn't actually do but is fucking ugly and has a ton of trash like Demons's Souls's does. It is a shame it is ugly because the cutscene getting sucked into the painting makes the world look really pretty.
Was debating if I go shank Gwyn or do DLC. Decided to head off to DLC land and give it a look. Only really interested in Artorias, but guess I will do Kalameet and then cheese the fuck out of Manus.
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I'd have appreciated South Park to not bring back the Manbearpig, oh well. I accept that SP is going to offend me at one point considering the amount of people it offends.
Yeah that was just a reminder of some of Matt and Trey's shittier opinions but that's not even what bothered me. It's toward the end of the game and it reeks of tryhard offensiveness and I think you'll know what I'm talking about when you get there.
Jazzpunk - This has the frenetic pace of something like Airplane with joke after joke after joke. A few things fall flat but this has a really good hit rate. Some of the gags here are so stupid but I laughed at most of it anyway. It really rewards exploration and when you get a different way to interact with the world, all I tended to do was explore the entire area using that object to see what would happen. It lags badly around the spa area but this was definitely a good way to spend a few hours.
I don't want to talk too much more about it since it's best experienced fresh, but I do recommend this for people with offkilter senses of humor. Also Wedding Qake.
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Are you on PC or console Sopko? There might be a console command you can use. I vaguely recall that quest being buggy.
Console
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Tales of Vesperia PS3 - Really enjoying this. Just cleared the ghost ship and finally had Patty in the team. She's kind of fun but random. Fun for now though not sure how I'd feel about the randomness on higher difficulties. Sometime earlier I had Flynn in the team and I really enjoyed playing as him. The ghost shop came with an actual boss this time too, guess who~ I like the way they've done things with original dungeons being different, longer and added dungeons, the one I've done so far is obligatory sewer dungeon since apparently the original in the beginning with Yuri and Estelle is a sorry excuse of a sewer dungeon and doesn't count or something, this one is in Dahngrest, and you have to sneak around under there during the Union and Empire face off part. You actively infiltrate and gate crash the meeting of Ragou and the Blood Alliance instead of your party just appearing where Barbatos is just because Also the added scenes, treasures, equipment, etc. I like the added elements, little touches like I don't remember seeing Nan at Deidon Hold before, or a carriage coming to take Estelle back to the capital or there being an event in the capital where an old lady has a cat that is up on a roof and then Rita and Estelle go rushing and chasing about trying to catch it, and bond more as friends. Rita is such a cat lady, more than I realized~
Enjoying the new accessory system as well. I like how Yuri can equip the veil, and how Rita got her own veil of black and gold while it is white for everyone else who can equip a veil (Yuri, Estelle, Rita, Judith) I like the customized visors as well, like the purply one for Raven.
Oh I also finally managed to get the item that allows you to use Repede on screen. Win~
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Pokémon Alpha Sapphire - Welp, just did Mt. Chimney. Also, for something as frail and slow as it is, Numel's really coming into its own in my party. I badly, -badly- needed some Fire/Ground coverage in my party, and now that it can also do it from its superior offensive stat, I've been managing a lot of previously troublesome matchups far more easily (pretty much any Steel ever, most Fires, and even the odd Grass, although Crobat also covers grass types pretty decently. Defensively, the Electric immunity comes in handy against stuff Crobat cries against, but that would've been a lot more welcome back on Wattson). Current team besides those two is Grovyle (L26), Electrike (L27, holding out for Discharge), Metang (L27) and Kirlia (L26). Current thoughts:
Grovyle (Giga Drain/Rock Tomb/Leaf Blade/Cut) - Guys, remember how Treecko had this long lull between worthwhile attacks learned by level and how it often depended on off-type TMs to remain relevant until the 30s? Yeah, those days are long past. Between learning Giga Drain as a L21 Treecko, Mega Drain well before L16 and Leaf Blade at L24 as Grovyle, this guy really covers its bases early. Good thing, too, since it lost the Bullet Seed TM pre-gym 1. Besides that, you know what to expect with it: high-speed grass offense, now hitting both defenses. I also had it cover fliers with Rock Tomb, which was surprisingly serviceable until Electrike came along.
Electrike (Spark/Charge/Thunder Wave/Strength) - Well, speed is nice, S. Atk is decent, but Electric moves just aren't great at this point, though Charge Beam TM's actually oddly useful for gambling 2HKOs it otherwise wouldn't due to S. Atk buffing procs. Durability also ain't its strong suit, but that's an issue with most teams I run. Hopefully, it'll truly come into its own once it hits Manectric evo, but I need Discharge first. And I have to admit it's never really about variety, though Thunder Wave is always decent to have. Strength gives it minimal use if Electric's walled, but mostly there for HM slaving.
Crobat (L27, Aerial Ace/Confuse Ray/Air Cutter/Swift) - Well, the Zubat phase openly sucked, though Wing Attack and Air Cutter made it considerably less painful. Once it hit Golbat and learned Confuse Ray, it became pretty useful... then the Crobat evo kicked in crazy fast and holy -shit- final evo stats against midgame are just MEAN. Terrorizes Grass and Fighting types like a boss and works pretty well against most other things off -those- stats right now. Aerial Ace currently is pretty golden, Air Cutter mostly there for hitting another stat and Swift is pure filler until I get something better.
Numel (L27, Lava Plume/Flame Burst/Amnesia/Earth Power) - Well, I've said it before. Durability sucks, speed is awful, but holy crap does it hit hard with two of the best offensive typings in the game. Overkills Steel and Fire losers like it ain't a thang, OHKOs a lot of other stuff just because it can. Flees in terror from Water types, but that's what I have Grovyle and Electrike for. Amnesia, once again, is filler. Magnitude was useful until Earth Power kicked in, since it randomly also happens to have pretty good Atk, but Earth Power works more on my favor.
Metang (L27, Rock Smash/Iron Head/Zen Headbutt/Iron Defense) - Man, that gift Beldum Steven hands you for free is so fucking nuts. Boosted level-up rate, starting skillset with two 80+ power moves running off STAB and the favored attack stat and Steel typing AT THE VERY BEGINNING OF THE GAME. Pretty much covers my ass as the party tank who mows down things with physicals. Coverage could be better (Steel typing sucks offensively), but I struggle to think of what I could hand it currently.
Kirlia (L26, Calm Mind/Double Team/Confusion/Draining Kiss) - The long lull of Confuse being your best offense still kinda sucks, but Psychic/Fairy is such a -good- typing to have. When I have the time, Double Team is pretty useful (Ralts solo puny Brawly, Roxanne didn't fare much better) and Draining Kiss gives it a nice durability push that also doubles as offense. Now that it learned Calm Mind, hopefully I can begin setting up some of those classic brooming strings I was so fond of in RSE original. Durability was absolutely miserable until it evolved, now being only pretty miserable. But Fairy damage and the manhandling of Dark types works very much in my favor and plugs a few holes in my general composition.
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Super Smash Bros. for Wii U - Being home alone for the week gives me an excuse to actually work on the one-player mode. I like it better than 3DS'. Some of that is that Master/Crazy Orders are actually pretty fun (I'm less sold on Smash Tour, but whatever it's no worse than what it replaces), some of that is that the challenges are more enjoyable (there's less "Do ____ X times" or "Do ____ with Y number of characters").
Super Mario 3D Land - Finished the maingame. That was pretty short. Anyway, it's a decent game, and the better of the two mainline Mario games for the 3DS. But... having watched 3D World as well, this game just felt like a beta version of that. Only one character, stage design is just nowhere near as good. Apparently there are eight more worlds but I'm not terribly enthusiastic about that. Pretty cool final Bowser fight, and thank goodness there was a checkpoint before it because if I had to get the third star coin in that stage each time I would have ripped my hair out.
Rayman Origins - More random platformers. The game remains me a fair bit of Donkey Kong Country Returns in terms of its stage design and core mechanics. The mechanics are a bit stronger, though: better physics and things like wall-jumping, floating, and ground-stomping really help. There haven't been any stages quite as inspired as some of the chase/rocket barrel stages in DKCR but overall it's solid enough and the mechanics mean I enjoy it more the majority of the time. Not sure how I feel about it vs., say, New Super Mario Bros. U yet.
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Pokemon Omega Ruby - Traded in Piplup and Fennekin as soon as I could, selected Treeko as the starter, and now I am happy. Poke Amie + Piplup = life is complete. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and I evolved him. I just beat my daddy in the fifth? gym, although he killed me once. Retaliate is rude. Using the three starters, Kirika, Sandslash, and Swellow.
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Grefter:
-Bed of Chaos is so the worst thing in the game. What's most unbearable is when you make it across the pit but die anyway running through the tunnel because what up Chaos Storm in tight corridor.
-Seath? Hug the middle of the right tentacle, he'll circle a lot trying to get you into laser range. When he stops for lasers it's pretty easy to avoid, it's less accurate when you're up close so that's when you hit him a lot. Just watch out for chargin explosions. Don't run behind him unless you want to get the sword and/or get bitchslapped.
-Definitely at least try Manus, it's an excellent fight. Summon doggie, watch him facetank thousands and thousand of damage from doomcombo and dark magic spam. (He contributes almost no damage but c'mon, it's Sif. I've seen him casually land the killing blow of all of once but it was one of the greatest moments of the game.)
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Bed of Chaos has made me quit three different runs just because I felt like it wasn't worth bothering. I've found that going LEFT first makes a big difference, but it's still a huge crapshoot.
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Snow: you can buy a Bulldoze TM at Mauville for Metang's coverage options. You can also buy Low Sweep or Power up punch for Grovyle there.
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Snow: you can buy a Bulldoze TM at Mauville for Metang's coverage options. You can also buy Low Sweep or Power up punch for Grovyle there.
I bought Low Sweep, but I'll probably be unable to make -use- of it until I get to the Move Deleter to get rid of Cut (since I picked up Swords Dance for Grovyle). I'll pick up Bulldoze for Metang, though.
Pokémon Alpha Sapphire - After how excitingly well-designed the Wattson battle was, Flannery felt somewhat disappointing. Overheat on Slugma and Torkoal are scary as fuck on paper against a party as frail as mine (especially with -two- Fire-weak frontliners), but Calm Mind x 2 Kirlia managed to rip over half of Torkoal's health before being OHKOed by a Body Slam (I lucked out and Slugma's Light Screen ran out -just- in time for the attack - and I'll admit Light Screen baiting into Torkoal is a pretty neat trick, especially on a party with precisely zero water damage like mine). From there, Crobat Confuse Ray -and- Poison Fang (which it learned along the way to the leader) hax won the day against Torkoal. After that, her Numel's honestly kind of a poorly placed sacrificial lamb in comparison. I'll go straight for Norman now, where I expect Metang to shine.
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Dark Souls - I beat Artorias. I have found something worse than Bed of Chaos. Bed of Chaos sucks hard and is the worst thing ever. The run up is repetative, overly long and boring. The run up to Artorias is time spent working on Artorias that is not in the Artorias fight. I don't care that I only need to really kill 2 dudes on the ramp to the right (because they are annoying to juke) and just bail on the rest of dudes as a fade out on the elevator down. It is a good 20/30 second at least of time spent not in the Artorias fight. I don't know if Artorias is a good fight or my favourite boss. I have no actual understanding of the emotions involved here (it isn't joy), but the endorphins running during the fight feel fucking amazing and that time spent without them is the worst. Literally WeedLord BonerHitler.
Also got invaded for the second time today (first time was in Forest after I kindled bonfire expecting to not one shot Sif after wrecking Nito's face, didn't care if I lived or died). I was in Oolacile Township in arse fuck nowhere on the roof of the last building in the area before the bridge gauntlet of "Please snipe me" dudes, where you get Twin Humanities. I dropped the "Sorry" noise thing for about 5 minutes while the dude looked for me. Dropped down to bridge, dropped it for another 30 seconds and black crystaled the fuck out.
Edit - I am starting to not care. I don't know where the fuck Kalameet is. I ran to where I saw him fly by and roar before and that led me to an area where I got the other pieces to the Guardian Set and oh my god i dont care
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Edit - I am starting to not care. I don't know where the fuck Kalameet is. I ran to where I saw him fly by and roar before and that led me to an area where I got the other pieces to the Guardian Set and oh my god i dont care
There's a path near Marvelous Chester that leads down to a ravine with DOGS that eventually leads to Kalameet.
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Found it. Pulled him a few times. Meh, not feeling any good will towards this. fuck it. Time to go cheese Manus because good will = 0. Cheese factor approaching infinite.
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Pokémon Alpha Sapphire - After how excitingly well-designed the Wattson battle was, Roxanne felt somewhat disappointing.
You mean Flannery I hope <_<
Shovel Knight: Finally started my own version of the game, the file is named 42, so he thus the 42 Knight. His Shovel is the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything! Also took down 4 Knights so far.
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Found it. Pulled him a few times. Meh, not feeling any good will towards this. fuck it. Time to go cheese Manus because good will = 0. Cheese factor approaching infinite.
You cannot beat Kalameet yet anyway (Plot event ahead), so don't worry about it. Actually, maybe you can, but I"m sure not pro enough for it.
Artorias is one of my favorite fights in the game. It's really tough, but tremendously satisfying. All of his moves are predictable; you just have to adjust to them. Manus can die in a fire.
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Pokémon Alpha Sapphire - After how excitingly well-designed the Wattson battle was, Roxanne felt somewhat disappointing.
You mean Flannery I hope <_<
Yeah, that's it. sry
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Bayonetta 2: It's additional Bayonetta, and slightly more user-friendly! (Mainly because you don't lose magic when you get hit, although the wonky length of Witch Time balances that out some) Great fun to play, looks gorgeous, still hilariously over the top. At Chapter 3 currently.
Smash Bros. U: It is Smash. Fun fun times, especially with family visiting to play with. Unlocked Falco, Wario and Lucinia so far.
Mario 3D World: Not blown away by this, but it's fun to pick up and play. We're in world 6, but much of that progress has been my nephew playing alone so I may go back and start a new file after he goes home.
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Found it. Pulled him a few times. Meh, not feeling any good will towards this. fuck it. Time to go cheese Manus because good will = 0. Cheese factor approaching infinite.
You cannot beat Kalameet yet anyway (Plot event ahead), so don't worry about it. Actually, maybe you can, but I"m sure not pro enough for it.
Artorias is one of my favorite fights in the game. It's really tough, but tremendously satisfying. All of his moves are predictable; you just have to adjust to them. Manus can die in a fire.
You can actually kill Kalameet early. There's even dialogue for it.
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I was fighting Kalameet grounded. Still no love for the fight. He is crazy up close and I didn't feel like plinking him down with arrows.
Up to Gwyn now. Got a Target Shield up to +7 Fire and maxed out Dark Silver Tracer Tong, I am not good at parrying him and he tears through Stamina and HP both. Its 3 in the morning, I will sleep and come back and just try killing him with Combustion juggles instead.
Edit - Changed my mind. Did it now. ok that was really stupid
So I put my Mimic Face on and set myself on fire. Game over!
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YOU DIED?
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YOU DEFEATED?
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Pokemon Alpha Sapphire: Finished Delta Episode!
My thoughts are pretty much the same as I said before. It's Hoenn with a Gen 6 paint job, so it's good stuff. Delta Episode was neat in that it was an actual extension of the Hoenn story rather than it's own self contained thing. Makes sense, since without his own game, Rayquaza being sort of deleted from the whole "Kyogre and Groudon don't like each other >:(" plot is wrong, so they found a way to keep his integration he has in Emerald, but do something unique with it. On top of that, the story is DIFFERENT for Pokemon standards. Rather than "Evil Organization, stop them! Then Collect badges!", there's now a completely different kind of threat, and some mysterious chick running around who seems to know something related to it. Add in some cool original themes and a Final Boss fight with an unexpected opponent (Deoxys, for those wondering. Also the first time they took a promotional and put it into the main game without any sort of external requirements is something unprecedented. I'm hoping they do this more, at very least for Darkrai, Genesect and Keldeo, 3 Pokemon I feel shouldn't be promotionals, but instead just have special side quests dedicated to them)...well, ok, he was expected since Gamefreak kind of SPILLED THE BEANS before the game came out, but shh!
The only other time Pokemon really extended it's plot was in Black/White 2, which is where the end of N's character arc doesn't happen until the after game, but even that's more just one character rather than the plot coming to a close. Delta Episode wasn't WOMG AMAZING writing, but it was something actually DIFFERENT for Pokemon, a franchise people say is stagnant. It's kind of like why the BW1 plot was such a big deal; no it wasn't shakespearian writing, but it definitely had different theme and tone than other games. XY did go back to basics, but then a large part of XY did feel like it was attempting to marriage the classic stuff with the new things hence all the Gen 1 Fanservice and such.
Here in lies the question: WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY GOING TO DO WITH Z VERSION TO KEEP THINGS FRESH!?
Personally, I think they should do a prequel because Pokemon hasn't done that yet! It's not like Pokemon has such tight continuity and detailed backstory that it'd be hard to avoid retconning after all <_<
EDIT: Just remembered that technically, RSE were prequels to the Gen 2 games, but really this feels more like a Gaiden to the Kanto games than anything else, as the events in Hoenn have nothing to do with Kanto/Johto. The only thing keeping them prequels was the whole "we have contacted another region!" thing Emerald and FRLG did...and honestly, ORAS sort of retconned THAT so I should shut up about this before I hurt myself.
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I was fighting Kalameet grounded. Still no love for the fight. He is crazy up close and I didn't feel like plinking him down with arrows.
Up to Gwyn now. Got a Target Shield up to +7 Fire and maxed out Dark Silver Tracer Tong, I am not good at parrying him and he tears through Stamina and HP both. Its 3 in the morning, I will sleep and come back and just try killing him with Combustion juggles instead.
Edit - Changed my mind. Did it now. ok that was really stupid
So I put my Mimic Face on and set myself on fire. Game over!
Kalameet is honestly just tedious. Definitely least favorite of the DLC bosses. The tail weapon is pretty cool, though.
Even after all the time I've spent on the game I'm still too terrified of Gwyn to make a concerted effort at parrying him to death. Black knight shield +5 should pretty much solve all problems there anyway.
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Torchlight 2: Sand r-a-a-a-ts?
Walked through a desert, and then a slightly different desert, did not have foresight to bring nameless horse. Presently gibbing mushroom dudes. I'm just now noticing that my cat has three times as much HP as I do and I'm not sure what to make of this. Well, it doesn't seem to matter how much HP I have so long as it's not so little that I can get oneshotted (and the in-game statistics say the most anything's done to me in one hit was probably flat 2HKO territory anyway). I'm rocking dual vampire pistols and there's relatively little that can actually outpace my parasitic healing. The skillset I've picked is actually stupidly limited, I've chosen to ramp up a select few through the roof rather than diversify, but it gets RESULTS, you stupid chief! Max dual-wield execution rate, max critrate, slap on draining weapons and heal up as everything explodes into batminions around me. It's stupid but it works. (That is pretty much the game.)
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I think Kalameet is my least favourite boss after Centipede Demon and Ceaseless Discharge
I'd have appreciated South Park to not bring back the Manbearpig, oh well. I accept that SP is going to offend me at one point considering the amount of people it offends.
Yeah that was just a reminder of some of Matt and Trey's shittier opinions but that's not even what bothered me. It's toward the end of the game and it reeks of tryhard offensiveness and I think you'll know what I'm talking about when you get there.
I guess I waited all the game for something truly terrible for SP standards, but I haven't seen it happen and I don't know what it is. Was it the abortion part or the mr slave part? I think in general, I'm more bothered by SP's questionable politics + lashing out on one real person more than when it's gross as hell.
I was a bit annoyed by Canada being 8 bit Dragon Quest, in 2014. You are way past the expiration date for including this kind of thing guys. And wait, this comes from fucking Obsidian? This is like Dark Souls 3 having a THE CAKE IS A LIE LOL easter egg.
In general, this didn't feel like an Obsidian game at all: Level scaling, Simple QTE oriented combat, not a lot of ambition but tightly focused, not too many bugs, only two whole choices during the game that barely matter.
This is actually pretty much as un-Obsidian as it gets. It's an RPG. That's about it.
The game's difficulty was a joke on expert. There are few fights overall, the game lets you bypass a lot of them (not like it's needed), you can use one item per round for free in battle, and the game showers you with items. Tweaking with numbers to include an uber Xtra hard mode wouldn't work, it's just not made to be a challenge at any point really.
Plagues of Egypt from the Jew class was way too good, just a major step up from anything in my arsenal at that point.
Also
- The finale was entirely awesome. I loved all of it.
- I only caught like 22 chimpokomons and had about 100 facebook friends
- Too many farts
- I still don't know why nazis?
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This is the part where I talk about how tedious and telegraphed Kalameet is and how much a pain in the ass it is to get his tail. This is where I recount my numerous deliberate failures because I'd nearly killed him multiple times without cutting his tail off. Boast about constant no-hit runs and how I probably could have beaten him blindfolded by the time I finally got the tail weapon.
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Dark Souls 2 - Started this up because hey new years or something? Started as Sorcerer. This is regret. I don't even want a 100% block shield, I just want any shield.
Go to Forest of Fallen Giants. This place is like a billion miles long before a bonfire. plz i just want to level up why you do this
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I guess I waited all the game for something truly terrible for SP standards, but I haven't seen it happen and I don't know what it is. Was it the abortion part or the mr slave part? I think in general, I'm more bothered by SP's questionable politics + lashing out on one real person more than when it's gross as hell.
Yeah, it is to do with abortions and nazis and now you should know what I'm talking about. It just strikes me as the equivalent of the dumb lol ninja pirate viking shit that is less about being creative and more about dumb shock value (there's even an achievement associated with it). I was more offended by their effort to be edgy and offensive than what they actually did, if that makes any sense.