Games you're playing: The 2009 edition.

[Excal]

Why am I not surprised you would be the Tidus expert.  Anyways, yeah, already knew about Cloud, or at least those two.  Sadly, that ground move on Cloud is scrubby enough that Finish Touch looks worse for it.

As for Squall, the air and ground moves that involve wall slamming the target into the ground leave the opponent stunned long enough for Aerial Ring to combo if you started relatively close to the ground.

[Lord Ephraim]

Particularly the reason why I use Squall as my main character is because the CPU cannot dodge Beat Fang -> Aerial Circle.  Squall already Brave rapes with Sneak Attack and Counterattack support skills on and EX Mode he can break someone with over 3000 Brave. 

I've mentioned to Meeple that Brave -> HP chains are a horrible idea but once you realize that characters like Cloud and Warrior of Light have shitty normal HP attacks, they need all they can get.  This doesn't explain Golbez's Cosmic Ray or as I call it "WHAT THE FUCK HOW DID YOU HIT ME?!?"  Just thank god there's no HP chains for Sephiroth and CoD.

Now if fucking Sony would release Ad-hoc party so I can finally stop playing against the CPU, it would be wonderful.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

So you know what I always do the first thing when I get Orlandu?

Dupe like ten Excaliburs.

[Tonfa]

Zidane has 3-4 moves that link to Meo Twister and Tidus has 5 moves that link to Quick Hit. The brave setups suffer from utter lack of range and notable setup/hilarious recovery time on whiff respectively, thankfully.

EDIT: Also WoL has 2 versions of Rune Saber (one from ground, one from air) and 2 versions of Bitter End (one hitting up in air, one hitting down). Quite brutal if you let him get in range.

[Excal]

Hmm?  Cloud's HP attacks are fine, thanks.  Braver's good for what it is, Cross-Slash is hard to capitalize on if it whiffs, and Meteorain is good at keeping people on their toes if they're not charging.  Especially compared to the short range of the trigger for Finish Touch.  Though, Omnislash v.5 is a nice addition.

[Idun]

I am at the save point right after fighting the cursed walls in Beast's Castle. I just started getting tired of Donald and Goofy fighting, so I just made it me and Donald with the Valor form. .... I dunno what happened, but it was towards the beginning of the battle and the battle ended swiftly after. Granted mine was at L4 before the fight, but uh, yeah. Sweet form. Sometimes it moves too fast for me to really see things well though.

[Scar]

Dissidia:

Can you in any way at all play this game on the PS3 with some sort of psp connection?

[SageAcrin]

What, directly *on* the PS3 with no intervening PSP anywhere around?

Not that I'm aware of.

[Meeplelard]

Cloud has a few issues with his HP Attacks actually.

Braver's good...but its his ONLY AERIAL HP ATTACK.  This makes him incredibly predictable in the air.
Cross Slash...is decidingly not good.  Easy to see coming, and short range, and leaves him wide open.  Its only really useful for stuff like reflecting Emperor's Flare.
Meteorain is hard to hit with, though it is good as a pressure move, and has some sniping potential, so if you can fire it off from a blind spot, it can be punishing; also, the meteors raising near him can deal brave damage, so it offers him some protection.

Omnislash Ver. 5 was vaguely needed mostly cause it gives Cloud another way to do Aerial HP Damage; in exchange for Braver being unblockable, Omnislash Ver 5 is somewhat easier to hit with, due to being linked from a Brave.  Actually, this is why Brave -> HP Attacks are not broken; ALL of them are blockable but Firion's Reel Axe, which isn't that hard to dodge, so it balances out there.  Being Blockable is a big deal, if you don't stagger; it leaves you wide open for a counter attack, if you're a melee character.

In the case of Terra's Holy Combo, Bartz's Holy -> Flare chain, and Onion Knight's Magic stuff, the flaw is that these moves can be reflected back at you, and are a little harder to hit with; you can't really counter them perfectly.  Granted, Holy Combo is one of the strongest attacks in the game, and absurd in EX Mode, but flipside, Ultima portion can actually miss if timing is off, and if you wait too long, it can be dodged (though, in EX Mode, its practically impossible cause of how fast the Flares come off and how many there are.)

Speaking of Dissidia...
Just beat DO6, just DO1 left!
Fantranslations fail for a number of reasons.  Also, hearing it in English make Terra's lines come off as far less Damsel in Distress like than the Japanese portrayed, and felt somewhat more in character as a result   Definitely felt stronger as a person, in any event, in the English than the Japanese.

Kefka is also handled excellently; David Wittenburg got him spot on.  Also, while its annoying that they fucked up an OBVIOUS FF6 reference by turning "Slave Crown" into "Puppeteer's Wheel"  (How do you miss that reference? HOW!?  And why the fuck would you change it?  Ultimania even stated they DID THAT ON PURPOSE for an obvious reference, if you actually bothered to check the equips!), they did put Kefka's massive HATE!!! fest line in the game, noteworthy cause FF6a decided to remove that for just a generic (if over the top) insult instead.

Also, HOLY SHIT, Terra can actually do Brave Damage before Holy Combo now.  What the hell did they do to Blizzara?  It was definitely not this strong in the Japanese.  Seriously, they turned one of the most bland, mediocre Brave attacks in the game to a damn good one.

[Luther Lansfeld]

FFT Summoner SCC- I had a fun battle with Altima. Basically, she picked up two crystals and I still almost won. It was hilarious fun times and I forced her to use All-Ultima on herself. Twice. And a third time if Alma wasn't brain-damaged and moved close to me. >_> Barely lost, alas, but I think I discovered that despite Altima saying she got 999 back from the crystal she actually gets full HP. Bitch.

Pretty damn easy file overall. I love Summoners!

[Sierra]

MK2: Why is Flay not being fired for this.

[Fudozukushi]

MK2: Why is Flay not being fired for this.

[Pyro]

Muramasa:

Momohime's path beaten. The game is an oddball.

It is as pretty as Odin Sphere, although far more oriental in style so it comes off differently. The lack of Hi-definition kind of depresses me, since I think there could be some truly awe-inspiring visuals if it was on the 360/PS3. As is, it's just a downright gorgeous game!

The gameplay is wild and crazy fun, unlike Odin Sphere. Momohime will dash, combo, and generally be everywhere on the screen at once pretty much constantly. At times I found myself shocked that I was actually controlling that wild ball of blade-wielding death. You can essentially ALWAYS be attacking, and quite frankly that is exactly what you should do. For almost every single battle, the game favors offense over defense as a strategy. This means less waiting for openings and more flashy action. Attacking serves as a kind of blocking against attacks, even form behind. Instead of Momohime taking damage, whatever sword she has equipped will. Once it has taken enough damage, it will break and deal half damage while no longer offering protection. At this point you can switch to one of your other two standby weapons with a single buttonpush which a) unleashes a fullscreen attack and b) gives you a shiny new weapon to use while the other one 'recharges' and fixes itself in a set amount of time. Each weapon has a unique special attack that will make it wear out faster but will make the user invincible while being executed and is generally superior to a basic combo. There are a LOT of weapons in this game, as you can make ~3 everytime you beat a boss.

The game's plot has a problem... it's full of holes. Not in the sense that "hey wait, that couldn't have happened!" or "that makes no sense!" but literally full of holes in the story that needed cutscenes. The game relies on the player to infer certain situations and the background of the game (there is no intro, you are thrust into action immediately). While this would work if there was more exposition, the limited amount of it means you will be left wondering. Even after finishing the game, I'm still not certain about the details surrounding Momohime's posession, for example. Not to say there aren't some pretty cool scenes in the game (Momohime convincing a giant demon to swallow her whole without chomping down so she can get in it's gut and reunite with her sword to cause massive indigestion, for example). In general though I found myself not much caring for the characters and wondering exactly how it all fit together. When compared to OS' and GG's rather phenomenal handling of storytelling, this left me depressed.

Guess I'm onto the amnesiac Ninja's story now.

[DjinnAndTonic]

RPG Buffet platter!

Got some free time and tried out a bunch of the games I picked up while I was in America (finally...).

Breath of Fire 5: ...Why do you hate me, Capcom? There's a lot of fairly interesting ideas going on here, but none of them are fun. I hate dying. Even with the reward mechanic, this is teh suck. Almost no access to save points, healing, item storage/identification... and worst of all... losing your whole inventory when you restart. That just sucks. There's no discernable way to really improve yourself much by constantly restarting... and the game is determined to make the beginning really easy to get killed in by an unlucky surprise attack. It's just frustrating. Once I got Nina and Lin, things became more managable and I was able to get pretty far before I got surprise-attacked by a giant boss that slung fire spells. Maybe it becomes more playable when you have more D- options to fall back on should you get surprise-attacked... Maybe. Also, the art sucks.

Megaman X Command Mission: ...Oh, well maybe Capcom doesn't hate me quite so much after all. Pretty much the polar opposite of BoF5 for expected/actual enjoyment factor. Despite not being a big Megaman fan (blasphemy, I know...), I found this to be pretty likeable and the over-the-top plot melodrama is just cheesy enough to keep me from button-mashing through plot sequences. Battle system is fun. Characters feel really distinct from eachother and I like the E-tank system. It's a really effective way of 'limiting' healing ability without completely screwing you over (coughBoF5cough). <3 Hippopressor and Wild Jango <3 Art style is nice, graphics are crisp cell-shaded affairs, Cinematography is bad, but oh well, can't have everything.

Mana Khemia: It's everything I could hope for and more. I like Gust games in general, and this one is really well polished and the characters are more fleshed out than previous offerings. Nice. The alchemy-recipe-IC-skill-building-sphere-grid interplay is overly complicated, but that's what makes it awesome. The end result is something you find in every RPG ever - grind random battles->get money/items/stronger. But the way it is woven together here is really fun. The school setting is appropriate, though I don't really care about it. Flay is awesome, Nikki/Jess are tolerable enough, Vayne looks promising despite his mass of cliches he's already accumulating. Gratuitous foulmouthed cat is gratuitous. Probably the game I'll stick with the longest before giving in and playing ToV again. Art is pretty, though Nikki/Jess's designs are kind of... scary. I like sprite work > 3D anyway, so I'm probably biased towards liking this game's really colorful settings/sprites over most of the other offerings.

Persona 4: Lots of polish. Impressively polished. Shaping up well, I haven't played enough yet to really form a complete opinion, but I'm enjoying the story so far. The characters are very realistic... to the point it borders a bit on the eerie side. Could be the setting too... I don't like my RPGs to be so close to reality, and I can look out my window and see practically the same buildings and people as depicted in P4. It's just... too close to what Japanese life is like. I applaud them for that... but it's not something I seek out for my RPGs. Battle system is good ol' SMT, so of course -I'm- enjoying that. Art style is decent, art direction is awesome. I definitely like the game, though I'm probably going to shelve this one pretty quickly and come back later.

Dragon Quest 4 DS: Hey look, !PS2. DQ4 is DQ. More polish than NES version, of course. It's... just pretty standard JRPG, but I never beat the original DW4, so maybe I'll have more luck this time around now that it's mobile. Sprites aren't nice enough to really comment on them for an art style. I guess enemy sprites are pretty nicely animated. Toriyama art is ARGH!!, but I'm getting used to it again. Halfway through Ch2, the townspeople have more development than my party! >.>;;

Prinny: Can I Really Be The Hero?! - Frustrating platformer is frustrating, though I can't bring myself to hate it. You know you've made a good platformer when I throw the PSP across the room in a fit of rage and still can't bring myself to stop playing... (though if I break my PSP, I suppose that's -one way- to do it...)

Magna Carta: ;_; - Put this into the PS2, watched opening. Took this out of the PS2.

[NotMiki]

Maybe it becomes more playable when you have more D- options to fall back on should you get surprise-attacked... Maybe.

Surprise attacks are a big killer in the game, but what really mitigates them is Nina getting some AoE spells.  Nina goes before nearly everything in the game if her levels aren't too deficient, so getting instant MT damage the turn after whoever got initiative makes things a lot smoother.  Hang in there.

Also, the rewards for dying are not worth it on balance.  Keeping your levels and loot, and dealing with the occasional game over is by far the less frustrating way to complete the game.  If you want to see the extra scenes, replay the game.  It's short (especially when Nina starts with a Wizard Wand +9).

Magna Carta: ;_;

An emote for "Made my eyes bleed."  Now I've seen everything.

[Shale]

And it pulls double duty as the game's official title!

[NotMiki]

I should know better by now, but the new Magna Carta game that'll be coming out?  Looks pretty good.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

You're supposed to bork up and restart a few times at the beginning. First time, I could barely D-Dive on the last boss because I'd had to lean on it so hard for several fights. Remember that it is your trump card and can be used as such. Do not for any reason spend more than one turn in Dragon form; once you hit it, you should be positioned such that you can end your enemy in one turn. Easy to do, since you can D-Charge enough to one-shot any enemy in the game, and your dragon form has unlimited free movement.

BoF5 is the only BoF that's worth a damn. Everything else is generic as all fuck; BoF5 somehow managed to make Ryu INTERESTING.

[Dhyerwolf]

Breath of Fire 5: ...Why do you hate me, Capcom? There's a lot of fairly interesting ideas going on here, but none of them are fun. I hate dying. Even with the reward mechanic, this is teh suck. Almost no access to save points, healing

You want BoF 5 healing to be better?! Using no AP=items are broken since you can use as many as you want.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Limited access. I have all the Zenny in the world, but I can't use it for anything that would help me. Shop access is seriously restricted + inventory space is practically non-existant when I'm trying to drag around unidentified weapons in the hope that I'll find an appraiser so that THIS TIME before I die, I will have gotten a new weapon, which actually carries over to the new game... aka, progress.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

I haven't played BoF5 in like a year, but last I recall there's usually an item shop right before every. Single. Boss. Immediately before.

The other possibility is that you need to learn to pick your battles better.

[Fudozukushi]

Art is pretty, though Nikki/Jess's designs are kind of... scary. I like sprite work > 3D anyway, so I'm probably biased towards liking this game's really colorful settings/sprites over most of the other offerings.

Oh hey, something I forgot to talk about in that rant that I never made.  ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Also I'm glad MK2's art is so much better.

[Twilkitri]

I have all the Zenny in the world

Can you enlighten me as to how you pulled that off. Constant low funds was pretty much the bane of my life.

[Yoshiken]

I haven't played BoF5 in like a year, but last I recall there's usually an item shop right before every. Single. Boss. Immediately before.

Ehh, not all of them. I majorly suffered against one of the late-game ones because of no shop/save point. :/
(Right after Cupid/Hortensia... It was Vexacion, I think?)

[Sierra]

MK2: Why is Flay not being fired for this.

Hey, there's a limit to what even the coolest person can get away with. The amount of lawsuits the school would get hit with for that stunt would bankrupt the place.

Also, kind of surprised to see Djinn hating on BoFV's art of all things. I thought they did a good job of bringing their bleak dystopia to life through visuals.

(Fun fact: Firefox's automatic spellchecker thinks dystopia isn't a word. Fail.)