Messages

1

Tournaments / Re: Spooky hat tourney: Doubles round

« on: November 13, 2024, 02:17:20 PM »

Chef Hat vs Bandana- Serge should OHKO Quina before they move and that puts a real damper on anything else the Chefs could do.
Chef Hat vs Baseball Cap- Ness equips for sleep blocking and proceeds to hand them the entire asses on a platter.  Junpei is helping.
Chef Hat vs Sombrero Orcha isn't quite one-rounded by the weakness-boosted Hydropump plus Ricardo's move, but he can only heal once.  Meanwhile it would take two rounds of concentrated attacks to take out Quina, so three with the heal.  What's Quina got with three turns?  Wellllll... if you spot them an insomniac, and I suppose I do, that.  Thanks Shadow Hearts for being the only RPG with good status blockers but no sleep status!  Put everyone else to sleep and slowly 1v1 Ludicolo to death (basically white wind to outpace Hydropump's damage until those run out of PP), after which Ricardo... he could maybe beat Quina solo but not with them having added damage from an ally.

Bandana vs Baseball Cap- Locke and Serge can't tag team Ness to kill him before his first turn, meaning that Serge's actual weaknesses as a fighter (like the fact he gives up his entire second turn to go ham on someone) actually matter.  Ness' move here is probably to drop a Flash Omega, which almost certainly takes Serge out of the fight entirely and lands sometehing on Locke that lets Junpei win a one on one.
Bandana vs Sombrero- Hey, Ricardo has an ally to buff!  Unfortunately Ludicolo is damn near only grass type in the entire franchise to not get a sleep or paralysis move, so Serge OHKOs them after they get off one Hydropump and that's that.

Baseball Cap vs Sombrero- Pokemon having no status blockers whatsoever, meaning Flash Omega does grisly nastiness no matter the RNG, inclines me to stop the analysis there because Ricardo sure ain't soloing Ness.

<Ness> Let Me Solo Them

2

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 9: Losers' Finals: No real comment to make here.

« on: September 24, 2024, 08:22:42 PM »

Godlike:

Elyon (BoF5) vs. Shania (SH:FtNW)


Heavy:

Lady Elmina Harken (WA:ACF) vs. Geno (SMRPG)


Middle:

Jude Maverick (WA4) vs. Stocke (RH)


Light:

Zhuzhen Liu (SH1) vs. Hubert von Vestra (FE3H)

3

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 8: Winners Final/Losers Semi. Zhuzhen Stands Alone.

« on: September 17, 2024, 12:57:30 AM »

Godlike:

Winners:

Mewtwo (PKMN) vs. Elyon (BoF5)- I... think?  This is sans math but overall Elyon isn't very fond of people who can bust past his AD, and like.  Gen 1 Amnesia y'all.

Losers:

Terra Branford (FF6) vs. Shania (SH:FtNW)


Heavy

Winners:

Lady Elmina Harken (WA:ACF) vs. Nel Zelpher (SO3)

Losers:

Asellus (SaGa) vs. Geno (SMRPG)


Middle:

Winners:

Jude Maverick (WA4) vs. MOMO Mizrahi (XSs)

Losers:

Machias Regnitz (ToCS2) vs. Stocke (RH)


Light

Winners:

Marianne von Edmund (FE3H) vs. Zhuzhen Liu (SH1)

Losers:

Annette Fantine Dominic (FE3H) vs. Hubert von Vestra (FE3H)

4

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 7, Losers Quarter: Tifa Hits a Guy with Glasses.

« on: September 10, 2024, 01:38:10 AM »

Godlike:

Terra Branford (FF6) vs. Melfice (G2)
Velius (FFT) vs. Shania (SH:FtNW)

Heavy:

Asellus (SaGa) vs. Hildegarde Valentine (SH:FtNW)- I... mean I guess Hilda might have some sorta Pink Bat shenanigans or somesuch but not really seeing it.
Geno (SMRPG) vs. Clarissa Arwin (WA:XF)

Middle:

Machias Regnitz (ToCS2) vs. Tifa Lockhart (FF7)- That 20% regen puts a real kink in Tifa's game, Machias shoudl be able to put in enough chip that he can either push her into limit before he's low enough for it to kill him or for his SCraft to finish her off when he does push her into Limit range.
Stocke (RH) vs. Jessica de Alkirk (L:SSSC)

Light:

Milich Oppenheimer (Suikos) vs. Annette Fantine Dominic (FE3H)
Ricardo Banderas (XG) vs. Hubert von Vestra (FE3H)

5

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 6, Winners Semi/Losers 3: Three Houses Remain Standing.

« on: September 03, 2024, 01:41:24 AM »

Godlike:

Winners:

Shania (SH:FtNW) vs. Mewtwo (PKMN)- ... I think?  Poke me if math says otherwise.
Melfice (G2) vs. Elyon (BoF5)- Melfice isn't undurable or undamaging but he's really more about pouring on speed and Elyon getting the jump on him, even if Melfice can double after that, makes that a real uphill climb on top of the absolute defense.

Losers:

Worker 8 (FFT) vs. Terra Branford (FF6)- So it turns out that W8's supposed ID was a documentation/coding oversight that doesn't exist and I think he needs that to muscle past Terra, albeit barely.
Nailah (FE10) vs. Velius (FFT)


Heavy:

Winners:

Clarissa Arwin (WA:XF) vs. Lady Elmina Harken (WA:ACF)- .... I think she's faster?  God maybe not, but kneejerk here.
Hildegarde Valentine (SH:FtNW) vs. Nel Zelpher (SO3)

Losers:

Asellus (SaGa) vs. Summoner (FF5)- guuuuuuuh I dunno maybe Asellus can simply get owned stoned but I feel like she can pull some bullshit first.
Geno (SMRPG) vs. Celica (FE:SoV)


Middle:

Winners:

Jude Maverick (WA4) vs. Jessica de Alkirk (L:SSSC)
Tifa Lockhart (FF7) vs. MOMO Mizrahi (XSs)- Tifa likes frail healers but does not like duellers who can neuter her damage during Limit, a thing she cannot not use once procced.

Losers:

Karsh (CC) vs. Machias Regnitz (ToCS2)
Stocke (RH) vs. Anastasia Romanov (SH2)


Light:

Winners:

Marianne (FE3H) vs. Hubert (FE3H)- oops didn't even check her res, dang
Zhuzhen Liu (SH1) vs. Annette Fantine Dominic (FE3H)- Annette lacks for good burst options and Zhuzhen isn't that frail?

Losers:

Millich Oppenheimer (Suikos) vs. Labyrinthia Wordsworth (WA:XF)
Ricardo Banderas (XG) vs. Squire (FFT)

6

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 5, Losers 2: That Squire's committing animal abuse! :(

« on: August 30, 2024, 03:36:28 AM »

Godlike:

Worker 8 (FFT) vs. Tir McDohl (S1)
Terra Branford (FF6) vs. Barbariccia (FF4)
Nailah (FE10) vs. Edelgard von Hresvelg (FE3H)- the fight ends in a draw when they make out
Velius (FFT) vs. Citan Uzuki (XG)

Heavy:

KOS-MOS (XS) vs. Asellus (SaGa)
Ernst (S5) vs. Summoner (FF5)
Tidus (FFX) vs. Geno (SMRPG)
Celica (FE:SoV) vs. Rufus (VP2)

Middle:

Karsh (CC) vs. Kesaran Pasaran (WA4)
Machias Regnitz (ToCS2) vs. Amarant Coral (FF9)
Leehalt Alceste (WA3) vs. Stocke (RH)
Shulk (XBC) vs. Anastasia Romanov (SH2)

Light:

Mustadio Bunanza (FFT) vs. Millich Oppenheimer (Suikos)
Peco (BoF3) vs. Labyrinthia Wordsworth (WA:XF)- apparently?
Ricardo Banderas (XG) vs. Queen (S3)
Boco (FFT) vs. Squire (FFT)

7

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: August 22, 2024, 05:37:46 AM »

Rhapsody 3: after poking the 6th story for a bit, I decided to take the game at its word and treat said scenario as a proper after game. By which I mean I have declined to play more if it.

I was liking the game well enough through the first three stories but the fourth is such a pure dungeon crawl with nothing much going for it, a prequel to a silly but not THAT interesting chapter plot in the second game. Worth plowing through to get to Cherie’s chapter, but I also completely stalled on it twice and played a whole fucking Xenoblade both times.

This gets at the larger problem though: Rhapsody was never ANY good at dungeon design, but the first game was piss easy and the second, while mean at times, has a decent means of buffing up your party to eventually win just about anything, so with a little grit you can just force your way through. This game you spend so much time in dungeons, and enemies are actually fairly lethal, and the inane party system gives you tons of party slots but doesn’t let you control most of them so it’s just a constant slog. Shit, in most of the chapters you don’t even level up fast, then by the time you DO the game says “lol enemies just level scale to you”. Thanks game. Thanks.


In conclusion your honor, it’s good that after this N1 gave up on dungeon design forevermore and just made srpgs. Best decision they ever made. Real shame they gave up on musicals in exchange.

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Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 4, Winners Quarter: Monk fight in Middle! Shootout in Heavy! :)

« on: August 21, 2024, 03:21:54 PM »

Godlike:

Shania (SH:FtNW) vs. Citan Uzuki (XG)
Edelgard von Hresvelg (FE3H) vs. Mewtwo (PKMN)
Melfice (G2) vs. Barbariccia (FF4)
Elyon (BoF5) vs. Tir McDohl (S1)

Heavy:

Clarissa Arwin (WA:XF) vs. Rufus (VP2)
Geno (SMRPG) vs. Lady Elmina Harken (WA:ACF)
Hildegarde Valentine (SH:FtNW) vs. Summoner (FF5)
Nel Zelpher (SO3) vs. Asellus (SaGa)

Middle:

Jude Maverick (WA4) vs. Anastasia Romanov (SH2)
Stocke (RH) vs. Jessica de Alkirk (L:SSSC)- Just as a gutcheck, looking at their relative resources, Stocke's free damage being 'lol' gives Jessica the edge in the long term, even setting aside any status she might land.
Tifa Lockhart (FF7) vs. Amarant Coral (FF9)
MOMO Mizrahi (XSs) vs. Kesaran Pasaran (WA4)

Light:

Marianne (FE3H) vs. Squire (FFT)
Hubert (FE3H) vs. Queen (S3)
Labyrinthia Wordsworth (WA:XF) vs. Zhuzhen Liu (SH1)
Millich Oppenheimer (Suikos) vs. Annette Fantine Dominic (FE3H)

9

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 3, Losers'1: Light and Dark, Past and Future, Meeting Again

« on: August 13, 2024, 10:05:22 PM »

Godlike:

Worker 8 (FFT) vs. Magus (CT)
Zio (PSIV) vs. Terra Branford (FF6)
Odd Eye (ShF2) vs. Nailah (FE10)- Without crunching too hard about it anyways, I think Odd Eye takes an extra swing to kill her, and that's if he hits all three, she definitely gets at least one turn to maul him.  He has the chance to land sleep but I'm calling that a wash with her chance to just dodge his first hit.
Velius (FFT) vs. Chris Lightfellow (S3)


Heavy:

KOS-MOS (XS) vs. Lyndis (FE7)- unless someone wants to math it, KOS-MOS is has a pile of overall durability while Lyn's only got her evade and fuck it, probably enough to win it.
Maya Schrodinger (WA3) vs. Ernst (S5)
Ryuji Sakamoto (P5) vs. Tidus (FFX)
Therion (OT) vs. Celica (FE:SoV)


Middle:

Mitsuru Kirijo (P3) vs. Karsh (CC)- Sadly for her MARIN KARIN doesn't work reliably enough to attempt and create an opening to do something besides heal. P3 speed don't mean much but the way I figure it CC characters are average initiative and then you're looking at basically "time until you double/get doubled" based on agility, and Mitsuru is on the wrong side of average.
Machias Regnitz (ToCS2) vs. Clive Winslett (WA3)
Leehalt Alceste (WA3) vs. Bowser (SMRPG)
Albel Nox (SO3) vs. Shulk (XBC)- uggghhh okay if I can remotely read the stat topic basically any evade buff completely nukes Albel's One Cool Trick because he needs both the HP drain to life and the MP drain to keep attacking.


Light:

Marcus (FE6) vs. Mustadio Bunanza (FFT)
Peco (BoF3) vs. Nina (S2)
Ricardo Banderas (XG) vs. Cotton (SaGa)
Benedict (TriStrat) vs. Boco (FFT)- No vote.

10

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: August 11, 2024, 07:11:12 PM »

XB2 Torna The Golden Country- Wahoo.

For the most part this is the best parts of XB2 concentrated into a smaller space.  Along the way they also did a good deal to smooth over some of the most frustrating parts of XB2 proper, although that might also have been in part a function of being a DLC campaign.  In particular the areas here are smaller and use vertical space a LOT less, but that could also just be so they could design it faster?  I dunno.

I do think the ending feels a little at odds with itself.  The trouble they have is they couldn't really TOP the showdown with Malos, and that was the only logical place to put the culling of the party that happens.  And within the context of XB2's battle system I'm not sure how you do a good Price of Freedom sequence.  But simultaneously the ending sequence is doing a lot to show in montage a finalization of the state of play that leads into XB2 proper and not having a real 'chapter' about Amalthus' campaign and Lora's last stand does kinda diminish what this game was doing with its unique plot.  It hits the most important bits and does a good job of showing Torna as a real place (albeit I think they might have forgotten some stuff) but I'm surprised how much of Jin's transition between who he was in Torna and who he became in XB2 is left to inference.

11

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: August 07, 2024, 01:25:15 AM »

Xenoblade 2- So, because I bought Torna as part of the expansion pass, I got a ton of goodies in XB2 that made it super duper easy.  So I kiiiiinda beat the main game in a bit less than 40 hours.

On the one hand this does mean I beat the danged game and don't *really* understand half the systems in it, but on the other hand the game only mildly improved on the deadliness of enemy mobs so I think I was certainly less frustrated.  I will say though that the handful of quests and such I did end up doing were definitely a move in the right direction relative to my complaints about XB1.

So honestly, on the whole, I think Xenoblade 2 is a better game than 1, even if I understand that it tends to undercut itself a times.  But honestly setting aside anything else, Xenoblade 2 just has a much better villain cast. Like yeah Egil is fine as a foil to Shulk but as a character? Eh. And sure “Deus with dialog” is interesting to me as a Xenogears veteran but again, not an amazing villain. Meanwhile there’s real pathos to Jin and Malos and I get why Rex wants to redeem them much more. Like, Shulk developing an aversion to killing makes sense as a reaction to events through the game , it’s a good part of his character, but Rex clearly understands his enemies as people and relates to them as such.

More substantively… both of these games are honestly smaller in story scope than Xenogears, but where XB1 is trying to execute some of its ideas without really embellishing them (or I guess, not doing ENOUGH to embellish them), XB2 is more an outwardly Very 2010s RPG that then eases the player into the more philosphical side of Takahashi's writing, and where it borrows directly from Xenogears it takes those ideas in a different direction.  Like, the fact that Pyra and Mythra are basically a variation on Fei (with a plot role slightly closer to Elly) is well documented, but the fact the two games were released nearly 20 years apart is very present, one feels like someone taking the clinical understanding of DID in the late 90s and building a story around them, while the other feels like a depiction of a plural person derived from knowing some plural people, so this very similar idea feels a lot fresher and influences the story in interesting and new ways.

But yeah the game's flaws are really really well documented and honestly playing the Definitive Edition of XB1 spoiled me somewhat becuase between those two games they got better at quest markers and properly pathing out your minimaps, but still I overall enjoyed this one more.  It just had more under the hood whereas XB1 just felt like a thinner game than other Xeno stuff.

12

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 2: Are Realians worms? And two demon swordsmen square off. :)

« on: August 05, 2024, 05:38:13 PM »

Godlike:

Odd Eye (ShF2) vs. Melfice (G2)
Barbariccia (FF4) vs. Nailah (FE10)
Velius (FFT) vs. Elyon (BoF5)- just a kneejerk that Elyon is a higher tier of Godlike
Tir McDohl (S1) vs. Chris Lightfellow (S3)- Yeah SL isn't *that* fast.


Heavy:

Ryuji Sakamoto (P5) vs. Hildegarde Valentine (SH:FtNW)
Summoner (FF5) vs. Tidus (FFX)- *checks* this kinda comes down to how much I let FFX customize their armor for status buuuuuut I kinda remember Stoneproof being pretty hard?
Nel Zelpher (SO3) vs. Therion (OT)
Asellus (SaGa) vs. Celica (FE:SoV)- Does Celica make Heavy?  Huh.  She ain't no Asellus though.


Middle:

Tifa Lockhart (FF7) vs. Leehalt Alceste (WA3)
Amarant Coral (FF9) vs. Bowser (SMRPG)- Bleh, I think?  Bowser's game is more geared for straight sluggers.
Albel Nox (SO3) vs. MOMO (XSs)
Shulk (XBC) vs. Kesaran Pasaran (WA4)- Shulk's crowd control and healing wouldn't necessarily be enough here even if he *could* spam it, which he can't.


Light:

Ricardo Banderas (XG) vs. Labyrinthia Wordsworth (WA:XF)- kneejerk
Cotton (SaGa) vs. Zhuzhen Liu (SH1)
Benedict (TriStrat) vs. Millich Oppenheimer (Suikos)- No vote.
Boco (FFT) vs. Annette (FE3H)- math could prove me wrong here, but at a glance, Annette doesn't really have much in the way of spike damage (Dust is only an extra 10 over Lightning Axe), and her steady damage is just barely average and has a chance to miss, so I think Boco can actually hold her off long enough.  If Dust got effective bonus against any monster class that'd change things but I think it's specifically against Dragons.

13

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Round 1: Axes to the Face, and Hubert on Kitchen Duty

« on: July 30, 2024, 02:39:09 AM »

Godlike:

Shania(SH:FtNW) vs. Worker 8 (FFT)
Magus (CT) vs. Citan Uzuki (XG)
Edelgard von Hresvelg (FE3H) vs. Zio (PSIV)
Terra Branford (FF6) vs. Mewtwo (PKMN)


Heavy:

KOS-MOS (XS) vs. Clarissa Arwin (WA:XF)
Lyndis (FE7) vs. Rufus (VP2)
Maya Schrodinger (WA3) vs. Geno (SMRPG)
Lady Elmina Harken (WA:ACF) vs. Ernst (S5)


Middle:

Mitsuru Kirijo (P3) vs. Jude Maverick (WA4)
Anastasia Romanov (SH2) vs. Karsh (CC)
Machias Regnitz (ToCS2) vs. Stocke (RH)
Jessica de Alkirk (L:SSSC) vs. Clive Winslett (WA3)


Light:

Marianne (FE3H) vs. Marcus (FE6)
Squire (FFT) vs. Mustadio (FFT)
Hubert (FE3H) vs. Peco (BoF3)
Queen (S3) vs. Nina (S2)

14

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: July 27, 2024, 02:17:26 AM »

Eiyuden Chronicles Rising- went on through this on a whim, it's pretty alright.

So, this game ended up being clearly a retro PSP game?  Like, it just has that structure of main and side quests that are deliberately designed to be digestible in chunks one could play during a commute, y'know?

In terms of introducing the larger conflict that I assume is going on in the proper Eiyuden it's kinda so-so, but as a Suikoden veteran it *does* do a good job of establishing how Eiyuden as a setting will be compatible but slightly different from that series.  Like, okay, yeah, Runes are pretty comparable in terms of how you use them and their appearance, but by breaking them up into the raw runes and the lenses you create a good way to differentiate between characters and explain how Runes can be "common enough for an army" but shy of "magitek singularity" (although unlike Suikoden there IS a suggestion, at least in this game, that things are on the cusp of such a thing).  It does make the sometimes too-modern dialog feel just a teensy bit less out of place at any rate.

So yeah this was a bit better than it'd been described to me, but I do get why it underwhelmed people a bit on release.

15

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: July 22, 2024, 04:27:53 AM »

Xenoblade Chronicles- it is done.

This is a game that must speak so much to the 14 year old who was just there for it in its day.  It's got a lot going on, you can play it practically forever, there's enough there for the cast to extrapolate on, that's all good stuff.  But coming into it as a Xeno veteran I can only miss many things and find disappointment in some of the stuff that replaced it.  The game is scaled back so much in terms of the craft, depth, and texture of the plot and scenes, it has the unmistakable air of "okay we can't do what *we* want, so what'll sell". 

It kinda reminds me of Don Bluth's Anastasia in that way when I say it out loud.

Which isn't to say the game is shallow or lacking in good aspects or anything like that.  It's just.  So often I'd feel like I was making progress and then thought "hey I should look up how to <x>" and then get stuck in a quagmire of quests filled with generic dialog to even access <x>.  And you can see what they wanted to do with how all those systems interact and for the right person of the right age, I'm sure it's magical but.  Man I'd rather have some other way to see how Melia feels about Fiora or how Dunban feels about anything than either fighting a million things for proccing affinity points in battle or doing every major sidequest in a region hoping the generic quest barks go to the character I'm more interested in at the time.

On the plus side this version of the game has Casual Mode, which undoes some of the mechanical rough edges of the game like the insanely harsh level checks.  I played about half of it legit, I'd say up until Sword Valley, but at that point I kinda forgot to swap from casual for mobs to normal for bosses.  It's a shame in some ways because bosses crumple that way while mobs remain potentially tricky if they're even in your ballpark level wise.
It IS really fun to get a bit overlevelled and just walk straight into monsters that're terrified to attack you though.

But yeah, this does feel nice to just have done and dusted after so many years, even if it's a different version and couldn't possibly live up to my original hype for it back in 2011 or whatever it was.

16

Tournaments / Re: RPGVO 2024 Nomination Thread

« on: July 15, 2024, 04:23:23 AM »

Godlike

Chris Lightfellow (Suikoden III)
Melfice (Grandia II)
Kyogre (Pkmn)
Magus (CT)

Heavy

Valentina (SMRPG)
Kevin (Trial of Mana)
Sharon (Legaia 2)
KOS-MOS (XS)

Middle

Tifa Lockheart (FFVII)
Makoto Niijima (P5)
Elhyam van Houten (XG)
Jessica Philomele (MK1)

Light

Labrynthia Wordsworth (WAXF)
Fina (SoA)
Lucia (SH2)
Flayn (FE3H)

17

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: July 02, 2024, 03:50:51 PM »

Trails into Reverie- Properly finished this, clearing up the Corridor. 

I think this helps nail home something that was always true in the Cold Steel games but became a bigger problem as they went, the writing team isn't really great at making more than a small core cast of characters all feel equal and interesting.  So instead, the format of Reverie lets them do parts of the story much more closely to their strengths, with one of the routes having a core fixed cast of 4 characters that only katamaris up an additional three, all of whom understand they're supporting characters there to set the others up for success, while the daydreams, most especially the ones you unlock in the Coda, are able to zoom in on just one or two characters are a time.  The after-after game set, while not really doing THAT (well, the third one does but) do a wonderful job of communicating how excited the writers are for what's coming.

I have to admit I'm a little disappointed that the game makes a point of having you tell it who Rean's love interest was then only has her obliquely mentioned in a few scenes where they can just splash an image, rather than like.  Having even ONE scene for each of them when they reunite throughout the story.  Doubly so because like... if you picked Towa like I did (or Alisa, they're in the same boat storywise), she was trapped behind enemy lines when shit went down!  Rean should have things to say there!
Probably an unintended bone for the Rean/Crow shippers all told.

I honestly really liked the Coda and the questions it decides to tackle.  The Black Records became something of a plot tumor thanks to being tied into the fucking Curse and the resignation several characters develop around that, but revealing this as the source of them makes it all feel more natural and the misunderstanding of what they were have a bit of a tragic air. 

So this game axes Divine Song as an order, which makes the mid-game a lot harder than CS3 or 4, BUT instead the True <x> Bell items are so completely cracked that you get the same effect at the rough endgame as zero casting time WHILE ALSO being free to do more generic delay-reduction Orders that let your physical characters be useful for more than item tossing (S-Break machine being the easiest setup).  It's delightfully broken.  For the record my core team eventually became Rean, Rixia, Nadia, and Musse, and boy howdy Nadia is good with minimal investment and off the charts if you actually build her like a CSIV mage.

Hooooonestly if we consider this as a CS game, it's probably my favorite.  It's middle of the pack overall, a bit behind Sky 3rd, but it really feels like they were able to cut away some of the fat from Cold Steel and refocus themselves on their best strengths as writers.

18

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: June 21, 2024, 10:43:16 PM »

Tales of Hearts R- Finished this.

It's.  An odd experience to play this now and actually be able to read it?  I mean, it's a fairly different game even without that, they changed how a bunch of stuff works, but it's recognizably the same basic game but also it's kinda specifically the same basic game which is a choice when they ramped up the dungeons so much.  Not that they're too bad, especially by Tales standards, but it's certainly a choice.

Funnily they end up really making Lithia the central character for the bulk of the story, despite her being strictly an NPC and staying that way, but it's very much her story once the second half actually gets going.  It's a shame in some ways because Kohaku's great, but eh, I also get it.  She was sorta the one that had to reach the furthest to bond with the rest of the cast and that IS just kinda what the game is doing.

Neat to have this done at least.  Nothing special, pretty average Tales game, but glad to have finally gotten to it.

19

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: June 17, 2024, 03:09:53 PM »

Trails of Cold Steel IV- Donezo.

The sins of CSIII's ending really means that a lot of this lands with a thud.  There's plenty of good scenes throughout but it peaks in the early chapters where Rean is absent and the emotional stakes are clear.  Once he's back a lot of the best stuff, including his best stuff, is buried among plot beats of former friends and allies who are either "doing their duty" to engage in Anime WWII or are 'cursed' with unquenchable bloodlust.  While some of the problem IS just the fact that all of the character beats that don't feature Rean himself all involve those terrible plotlines, which makes the contrasts rarer, the larger problem is that too many story beats need me to be invested in bringing people back from the brink when I think they're pieces of shit for being on the brink (eliciting a "okay, cool, glad Rean is happy i guess" reaction more than anything else) or that the thing that pushed them to the brink is the worst plot concept Falcom has ever written.

I'm glad the proper final boss is handled the way he is mechanically though.  Like they really gave Osborne a lot of variety for a boss with like 4 or 5 skills, you need a lot of stuff to go toe to toe with him, and it makes the earlier phases of the fight really hard because you don't really have a good way of knowing some of it before you go in.  But fortunately even if you take the "ugh just get me past this" options, it last for that phase and he's back to full strength for the next. 

But no, there's still a lot of good game here.  Just, it's mostly stuff that was already good in CSIII, and the parts that should be unique due to this being the climax of the story arc instead is hampered by how badly they balanced "we want WWII" and "Osborne should be redeemed" as writing goals.
And we really should have tossed Rufus off Orchis tower when we had a chance in the last game.  We'll see if Reverie does anything worthwhile with him but I'm not holding my breath.

20

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: June 04, 2024, 02:52:57 AM »

NEO The World Ends with You- Finished this.  Might tool around a bit with Another Day but we'll see, seems a lot more combat-focused than TWEWY's version.

So in several ways this is really a better game than TWEWY.  Like, the way it handles fashion is smoother and easier to work with, the game feels more forthcoming with how food works, and the larger stable main cast is nice.  It has a bit of a VP vibe in terms of controls and combat flow, although that can make the handful of fights that really demand you employ the movement afforded by this being an action RPG kinda awkward.  So like, if you had any affection at all for the original, I do definitely recommend it.

But it should also be said that yeah, this game extremely assumes you played TWEWY, and honestly some late-game aspects seem to be entirely pulled from the Final Remix version that was released on Switch, although you can get the gist with just the original.  And more than that while it improves on the original in several key ways, it just doesn't have quite the same focus, uniqueness, and spark of the original.  And like, let's be real, you never could, but... think about the relationship between Undertale and Deltarune.  It's a bit like that.

Sometime I should probably like.  Actually talk about this game, but these post are really more about summaries and reminders for myself and I think the overall meat of the plot will stick with me a while longer.  Mostly you will be unsurprised to learn I love Shoka.

21

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: May 28, 2024, 06:02:40 PM »

Trails of Cold Steel III- beat this. 

It's weird because like.  80% of the game is a very strong 8/10, just very good RPGing to be found here and while there's some pandering they mostly do a good job of keeping it on the right side of the line.  It does however have a kinda rough start with a lot of choices in the story that were at odds, and more weirdly an ending which I just don't see how they thought it was a good idea.  The Curse of Erebonia is a bad idea to start with, but you could make something like that sorta palatable by suggesting that there's a miasma which makes people more aggressive that resulted from some ancient collective sin.  Like, the seeds of that idea are there, but they assign so much agency to it and take it so far beyond people making bad decisions in the heat of a moment that instead it's just this case of mass demonic possession which arises from... nothing, just some ancient conflict in the past whose present manifestation has no real thematic link to how it arose in the first place.  It also kinda completely dumpsters every major antagonist of this arc along the way, and the whole thing arises from them desperately wanting to somehow make Osborne redeemable later rather than just letting this dude be beyond the pale from his own traumas and letting Rean have conflicted feelings about him or even hate him in the end.  Just a very dumb writing decision arising from Falcom not being willing to let go of their darlings.

Despite all that basically everything from late chapter 1 to the final dungeon is really good, and the final dungeon's issues are mostly related to "you all signed up for child sacrifices and at least half of you should have fucked off and stayed home after that" outside the actual ending being bad.  It's just so weird that this series which made a point of integrating massive leaps of technology and artifacts of god into the political elements of the story falling back to "devils made them do it" in order to get its world war.

22

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: May 01, 2024, 05:21:23 AM »

Princess Peach Showtime!- Finished this.  It's not a very substantial game, and the A+ costume design is sadly the only truly excellent part of it, but it's... Fine, y'know?  Good enough game.  Probably wouldn't recommend dropping $60 on it for most people?  I don't think it really lends itself to replays or challenges in particular; as far as I can tell, there's 30 stages plus 5 bosses and you have to do all of them to finish.  There might be some extras but it's not many.  So it's not really like a proper Mario game in that way.

Now aesthetically it does pretty well at staying engaging across the entire run.  There's 3 stages for each costume, the stage play aesthetic is strong, it helps bind the whole thing together.  But I'm going to forget everything about this game by next week, and honestly only three or so of the stage types are actually engaging in their own right.  At the same time though, as you might expect from having 10 distinct stage types determined by your current job class in a platformer, none of the gameplay really has the depth to sustain many more stages than that.  The game just really never rises above the issues generated by its premise even if it's pleasant enough within that.

So yeah, not a bad game, but not one I can strongly recommend given the many other games out there and nintendo's pricing tendencies.

23

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: April 16, 2024, 11:17:26 PM »

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth- Fin

Okay so.  There's some parts of this game that smack of lacking confidence in itself and in the player to be willing to roll with what flows naturally in the game.  This is most pronounced in the beginning and parts of the endgame, where it feels like the game is afraid to just not have a driving force moving the plot along beyond "hey Sephiroth is out there, we should figure out what to do about that" and insert action sequences that just don't really jive with the overall mood meant to be set in this portion of the story.  Like yeah, Shinra is a problem and they do rule the planet, but there's a big gap between their city and the rest of the world in how they exert control.  And there are some changes to the big plot modules that don't always work, like I'd say Cosmo Canyon is just overall weaker as a sequence, despite Nanaki's arc being drawn a lot more sharply. 

On the flip side the game's propensity for bombast sells the hell out of other sequences in a way that's amazing.  FFVIIR-2 basically pauses every hour or so to rip your heart out, and at least one time does it so much harder than the original game I was floored by it.  Just a fantastically well-composed scene.

As a game unto itself it feels a lot more able to stand alone than Remake.  Like, when Remake was being a remake it was good, and when it inserted gameplay to fluff out Midgar to a complete game it was kinda the weakest parts of the game.  Now, the stuff with Avalanche being real characters, that was good, but making Hojo's lab an entire Resident Evil Mansion of new dungeon is... a lot.  Making the Shiny Golden Wire of Hope a whole dungeon?  A lot.  Remake has its share of "this did not need to take 2 hours" dungeons but it a lot better about adding gameplay to sequences that were really short in the original, and as you might expect when it has 'permission' to make a dungeon of doom it does it with gusto.  I think I spent more time in chapter 13, which is "Literally just Temple of the Ancients", than any other chapter but it always felt properly paced and appropriate.

So yeah no like.  Go ahead and play this game (once you can, since I'm 100% several of you are just waiting for a PC version).  Even if you felt like Remake kinda fell apart at the end, Rebirth is a lot more thoughtful about its new stuff and is a lot more satisfying about going off the rails for being more reserved with it.

24

Tournaments / Re: Futurama 2023 Week 5 + Rankings!

« on: February 26, 2024, 12:15:04 AM »

Godlike

Yuna (Final Fantasy X)- i vs Belial (Wild ARMs 4)- iiiiii

Heavy

Mei-ling (SaGa Frontier)- i vs Cthulhu (Cthulhu Saves Christmas)- ii (changed my vote in the tally, misremembered Cthluhu's big damage as physical rather than dark)

Middle

Minorio Aki (Labyrinth of Touhou: Gensokyo and the Heaven-Piercing Tree) vs Dedue Molinaro (Fire Emblem Three Houses)- iii

Light

Ivy (Fire Emblem Engage)- i vs Mediator (Final Fantasy Tactics)- iii

Rankings

For each of these games, please indicate if you would like to add it to the pool of Ranked games

denominator- iiiiiii
Persona y- i n- ii (1/7 or 2/7, to Backburner!)
Persona 5 y- iiiii n- (5/7 in favor, Ranked!)
Triangle Strategy  y- iiiiii n- 6/7 in favor, Ranked!)

25

General Chat / Re: What games are you playing 2024? Battle strength determined by frilly outfits

« on: February 22, 2024, 02:54:10 AM »

Super Mario RPG (2023)- It's astonishing how this is both a stunningly faithful remake and also just has a really distinct gamefeel.  Just a bunch of teeny changes that really speed the whole game up (my final play clock didn't even crack 10 hours).  It's also wild just how badly bosses EXPLODE, like in the back of my head I knew they weren't much but I think I like 3HKOed a bunch of them, it's absurd.

But yeah there's not a whole lot to say, game holds up with so few actual changes it's really funny.  Heck, they didn't even add voices like Live a Live did!  Mid-90s Square was something else y'all.