Mana Khemia finished - Flay path chosen.
Alright, this game is very much a mixed bag. The day/night cycle I generally referred to as a good chance to catch up on my reading, or otherwise a good reminder to stop playing the game for a bit and do something else. So, it's very well designed if you want to periodically disengage your players from the game. Somehow, I don't think that was the intention. The other really big problem is the Grow Book, which quite frankly takes the worst aspects of the Sphere Grid and the License Board and mixes them together. The fact that you can't see what you need to move forward or even really what you get further on is generally annoying. This is in addition to the fact that the progression system makes it so that lacking one item can prevent further growth for the entire party. So, yeah. Two very emphatic thumbs down. Finally, there's just the lesser mention that the character quests felt less like a reward that actually doing the classes, since the classes gave you free stuff. Really good free stuff. So that getting good grades is actually counter productive since the only thing you get is less good stuff and a few interesting rumours.
Now, on to the good stuff. Some of the things they pulled with the characters was actually good. Flay had a neat twist, and was generally mildly amusing at worst. But Vayne, Jess, Roxis, and the villain cast were also very well done. Mana of Light also gets a special nod despite being very tied in with Roxis. Specifically, the way they handled the final boss and the main plot in the second half is interesting, even if it wasn't well written (it needed much more lead up and definition, though I don't really want to say too much here). That said, the plot really only shows up for the last 25% of the game, and the gameplay for the last 50%, so the opening mainly just gets by on Flay, Tony, and Renee, and isn't anything special.
So... for the most part, the good far outweighs the bad. Just, the bad is so glaring and so very, very much didn't need to be there. Either way, it was a neat game to play and a nice break from P3. Just hope the ending there is half as good as the one here.
On the go
SRWOG1 finished, Combine Cheese is chedderlicious, and Irm once again probably manages to snag MVP, though Ryusei makes a fairly good argument later on just from having SRX. Either way, nothing special there.
Which brings me to... FE6.
Managed to get this working on my DS, so it's going on now. Just beat Chapter 8, and am halfway through 8x. Party so far is Roy, Lance, Alan, Sue, Lugh, Dieck, Thany, Rutger, Clarine, and Lilina is getting a trial berth to see if she turns out halfway decent. So far, +2 Speed in two/three level ups is saying that she will be. Everyone is around Lv10/11 except for a Lv 6 Roy and a Lvl 3/4 Lilina.
