Games you're playing: The 2009 edition.

[Shale]

Superb.

[Smashy]

BvS: Whee kaiju drops.  Plug Suit is nice for helping out my Gen in the arena (Currently for me I want Nin>Gen>Tai in the arena), and Firebrand looks awesome for hitting villages, especially since I have Billy/Emo 3 for plenty of Strength.

Estiah: Trials unlocked, but I don't need them for another 5 levels.  These upcoming levels are the slow point of the game, from what I've heard.  Thankfully I have enough weapon skills lying around to keep my AP spent, and there's always gathering.  Should be a bit trickier with my alt, since the Mercenary path my main's on is pretty much Easy Modo thanks to high damage and destruction charms to end those that would use armor gimmicks against you.  Alt is a Sage, which has... ward projection!... I'll save you the rant and just say that projection is veeeeery situational.  Works for Guards thanks to their armor+damage moves, but Sages don't get the magic counterpart, so... yeah <_<

[NotMiki]

DDR MAX 2: AAed Healing Vision ~ Angelic Mix.  Go me.  Only took...well, a while.  Let's leave it at that.

[VySaika]

I now have a mental image of old man Will Knights kickig ass at DDR. This amuses me to no end.

[NotMiki]

Replace it with a guy in his mid-to-late 20s with a beard and a shirt and tie.  Probably looks about the same to the teens at the arcade anyway.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

So you know how the difficulty in SO4 spikes big time on Floor 1 of the first of the two post-game dungeons? Well, once you get Duplicate on floor 7, everything changes. I started duping moonstones like a bastard and now Edge and Cyberface are unstoppable. Jesus christ Edge's Moonstone Sword is good.

[Unoriginal]

Persona 4:  Blew through to November without any real effort, but that's what I get for abusing the New Game+ Compendium for a Spell Master/Cool Breeze Trumpeter right off the bat.  With any luck the game will start being able to fight back sometime soon.  Might also get 100% S Links, but I'll probably be cutting it somewhat close.

PWI: Cleric mid 40s.  Mostly just doing dalies, but I'll get a quest in now and again when I'm in the mood.

WoW: Waiting for 3.1.  Working on the Exalted title in the mean time.  Still have a few WotLK reps I've been neglecting, and I'm fairly close to maxing the Goblin reps via DM North Knot runs, but I'll likely have to get... creative for the last couple of them.  Currently at 30/40.

[Shale]

KH: Trashed the Hades cup. Lost to Cerberus on my first run, but it was smooth sailing after that. Rock Titan is a pathetic joke. After that came Phantom, which was a goddamned pain in the ass. The barrier-change gimmick wouldn't be nearly as annoying if it didn't take him forever to reset the bloody thing, and if there wasn't a real-time Condemned effect going on in the meantime that costs 2 MP to delay. Laaaaaame. Ended up going full-bore for MP and magic damage tweaking and burning through a ton of Ethers and Elixirs. But I did it! And my reward, now that I can finally get to the Clock Tower's treasures again: a Mythril Shard.

Fuck you too, game.

[Cmdr_King]

By my best guess, the Rock Titan only exists to thwart timed runs.  He sure as hell is less threatening than Hades anyway.  Or the 9 random battles between Hades and him.

Actually, one of the treasures on the clock tower is puppies, so if you don't happen to notice that before you move on to Hollow Bastion, you have to fight him to finish that quest!!
Fuck you too Phantom.
Oh, have you tried the special fights at the Colosseum?  No real prizes, but they're neat fights.  For all Ice Titan is, once you realize his real gimmick, not that much better than Rock.

[Shale]

Oh, I've got all the puppies already. Aeroga is nice.

Best part about that, though: When I killed Phantom and got control of Sora back, the clock was at 10:59:45. The 10:00 treasure is a Defense Up. But after you kill Phantom, the treasure rooms are locked until you leave the area and re-enter! Woo freaking hoo.

Didn't try the Ice Titan, but I did fight Sephiroth just to see how brutal he really is. Answer: Very.

[Excal]

And it is official, Odin > Nyx.

Did a bit of revamping of Personae, which also netted me a Michael with Mediarahan and Spell Mastery which was my general get out of shit free card, had the Infinity Combo Magic so that I could shrug off whatever Nyx did while using Moonlight Gown after Night Queen came into play, and changed the party from Yukari, Koromaru, Ken to Yukari, Akihiko, Aigis, and was much happier with the fact that I could do buffing and debuffing instead of healing during the wasted turns.  Far better than just having an extra healer and dead weight, since Shinji had all the extra healing I needed.

Aside from that, most of my damage was handled with Thunder Reign, which was about twice as good as my next best attack, and four times as good as anything my party members could pull out.

Still digesting final thoughts on the game, but generally positive impression, and will likely end up either an 8 or a 9.  Will probably post a more in depth review some time when I am less tired.

Also, started up The Answer to see how it was different.  It makes me wonder if the ending of the Journey was affected by the creation of FES or not.  But, definatly seems like it would have been a fair bit more jarring if that bit of plot hadn't been the one thing about the Answer that I actually remembered.  Just, was expecting that to happen at the Climax of The Journey since it would have been easy to fit in there, though, yeah.  Ending would have been completely different given the structure of the game.  Might have been more effective than what they went with, but yeah.

Anyways, sleep now, rant later.

[Meeplelard]

DMC4 Hard Mode: Just Beat Mission 3!

I was thinking "you know, this isn't any real harder than Normal mode.  Yeah, some enemy formation changes (for the better) but that's about it."  Then I look at my health after being hit only a few times and I have like half the health I expect...yeah, I guess since the nature of the game isn't too hard, they just went the simple "You take more damage, DODGE THINGS MORE!" route.  I mean, dodging isn't too hard, but I always felt in DMC4, it was more lenient about taking hits in general, since enemies were less damaging; I guess Hard mode removes that safety net of sorts.

Then again, it kind of needed to if it wanted to make the transition to DMD mode (if its like what I hear about DMC1/3's) not retarded, yet require you to take DMD seriously!

...though, I think it says everything that DMC4 Hard Mode makes you take double the damage you take in DMC2's DMD mode...by which I mean early game randoms in DMC4 vs. mid Game bosses in DMC2 <_<

Mana Khemia: PSP VERSION!  Just finished the second class.  As usual, I'm refraining from opinions on this game much like XF, though won't be quite as...brief about it?  And no, I am *NOT* promising a rant when I'm done, so you'll just have to wait and see if one comes!

That said, I do have a question actually:

Load times and slow downs.  This game has a lot of them.  Is this a PSP exclusive thing or was it prominent in the PS2 version?  Cause there's an annoying load time with a load screen and everything every time I initiate a battle, and the game randomly lags when I do simple map actions.  I can live with it, but it is still annoying.  So wondering if this is a "PSP Port sucks ass" thing or if they were present in the PS2 version too?  I don't expect people to know just how different the PSP and PS2 version is, but I figure people would at least be able to say how big load times and such were <_<

[Clear Tranquil]

Hurnhh I found Nyx relatively easy with Koro, Aegis and Yukari myself. No uber equipments or personas either. Didn't start the optional dungeon until my replay. Decent challenge of a fight but definitely defeatable.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

There were some lag times in MK in the PS2 version, but I think the load problems raised some in the port. Take that as you will.

[Excal]

Well, I noticed that on my second fight Nyx decided to wait a lot longer before pulling out Moonless Gown and Night Queen (down to a fraction of HP as opposed to about 10% of HP remaining) which does effect the difficulty a great deal.  Aside from that, Aigis and her buffs seemed to be of more use than anything else in the changes I made.

Anyways, thoughts on Persona 3.

Let's start with the bad.  The biggest strikes against the game both come in the combat system.  Namely, the instant game over if the main dies, and the AI controlled allies.  The main character gets to be less of an issue as the game goes on, as you start to get the ability through proper Persona cultivation to basically have go-to Persona which don't have weaknesses.  More over, his higher level means that he's tougher than anyone else in your party by a decent margin.  Toss in the Endure ability, or the Spirit Bracer which gives him Endure anyways, and the Homunculi and you have someone who'll be able to survive long enough for any loss to be squarely your fault and not the game randomly screwing you over.  As for the AI, that's something which gets worse as the game goes on.  Especially for Ken and Koromaru since Knock Down will have them ignore Light/Dark weakness in favour of trying for critical hits or standing there if their weapon of choice is blocked.  Same with the baffling preference for Diarahan over Mediarama when the entire party is down 200 HP each.  Both of these being things which the Tactics can't cover for, and which would have been nice to have covered.

Aside from that, I suppose the only real gripe I have with Social Links is the fact that all of the ones involving females over the age of twelve that aren't married falling for the main.  Yeah, I can understand he's that really persuasive brand of sociopath that run all the best cons and are really good at getting people to want to trust him.  I mean, hell, the only thing keeping him from being a Tenkei is his small scale of operations.  But dude, not all female/male relations involve screwing each other.  Granted, I suppose this might rankle a bit less if they didn't also use this as an excuse to toss in the FAQ bait complications of trying not to reverse the girls as you try and leech power off them.

Aside from that I'm generally pretty fond of the game.  Yes, it's long, but the time feels well spent.  Namely, the time to digest what happens with each development and move on to the next let the change in the cast feel natural, especially since this is very much a PC focused game.  The Social Links also let you get a connection with what you're fighting for, as well as giving them a way to generally reinforce the central theme of the game with most of them.  (Sun, Hermit, Tower, Moon all come to mind immeadiatly as reflecting the theme of how to live life before an inevitable death)  It felt a bit like they dropped the ball a bit near the end and got a bit preachy, but the game holds before then.  Music, one or two tracks were bad, notably the 'sad' music got grating, and Burn My Dread still needs to be repeatedly shot.  However, the rest ranged from background track, to good in it's own right.  And it helped that they gave you the option to pick one of four tracks for Tartarus.  Also nice was the way they used changing backgrounds for the school, dorm, and town as the game progressed.  It certainly helped add to the feeling of resolve going into the endgame to have the music reflect that.  Same with the small changes in the town itself, with apathy syndrome victims growing or decreasing depending, and the place generally being in a state of disrepair right before the end.

As for what I'm playing now.  I decided to pass on The Answer for right now.  It's on the list somewhere since I do want to see if it's bit of plot is any good, but I'm about done with SMT gameplay for the moment.  Especially having lost a lot of the stuff I had before and the compendium, which is really the heart and soul of P3 gameplay since it is just ridiculous about how it let you multiply the really good skills.

So, I'm moving on with the small collection of games which I own, but have not beaten.  For right now, SO3 is on the list due to having mucked about with VP2's Seraphic Gate recently.  I'm already getting reminded of why I stopped playing, as I really do not like SO3's gameplay all that much.  So, yeah.  I'm mostly just gonna be plowing through this in order to say I've beaten it, and then probably never looking back.  Currently wandering around completely lost trying to find a large dragon.  Sadly, all I have to show for my efforts is no paths forward I can find, and a Dragon Windpipe.

[Clear Tranquil]

Yeah Mitsuru would do that for me too ignore hitting weakness ((disastrious when fighting enemies at a low level on a new game+ file >.>)

You have to make your Dragon Windpipe into a Dragon Flute =D That can be one of the most annoying parts of the game what you need the Dragon Flute for though I've done it so often I don't mind it anymore.

As for gameplay I can give a lot of suggestions on how to spice it up more - mainly experimenting with controlling other characters than Fayt, trying out every skill and different skill set ups, experimenting with tactical skills like Berserk, etc until you find a playing style/battle skill build that you like.

Edit: Ok so I'm bored so I'm doing it anyway - *battle system spoilers obviously* -

* Berserk ON is a must for everyone, it makes battle much more fast paced and less boring. Not so much stopping to recover fury is involved.

* Convert Damage to MP Preserve will make female meleers like Maria/Peppita/Nel much more durable if you find you're having any problems with that. Sophia too though she shouldn't be getting close enough to get hit anyway.

* Fayt can be a pretty boring character unless one knows his tricks, Air Raid, his O XX juggle combo or his blade enhancements with flip kick juggling makes things more interesting and interactive with him.

*Cliff is generally solid all round. He has great DEF and high HP so he can do pretty well even on AI. He was dominating Fayt with the AoE Hammer of Might on my first playthrough. Hammer of Might can also be pretty great damage too in the main game.

* Maria can be used for long range safety to snipe away and MP kill enemies with low MP. Apart from that though she's all about Scatter Beam maingame. Spam it at every oppurtunity and it'll gain extra hits and be completely hax in no time~

* Sophia is decent enough. She basically comes with built in FAM mode being able to hit enemies on the field from anywhere on the field with her spells. Weak damage though even though she can cancel combo some of the better spells as battle skills unlike Adray.

* Mirage is faster than Cliff with more MP but less HP and damage. Crescent Locus/Triple Kick interrupt enemy attacks well though.

* Adray ... makes a great heal batter and stat buffer! >.> Also his Aerial is godly.

Dunno which optionals you're going with so I'll detail them all -

Nel has long range safety with Flying Guillotine (as well as Ice Daggers on large targets), is very useful with Ice Daggers. Apart from that though she isn't really anything special until Mirror Slice (L52) unless you take the time to build up Whirlwind for Whirlwind + passive hax. Also has Healing by default too so yeah a nice general all rounder.

Power Dance is hax with Peppita. Comes out faster than Power Up, MT, higher ATK boosting % Kaboom is a decent enemy disrupter that deals relatively good damage. Power Dance > Faerie Friend is broken for the main game but can require positioning/some player skill/No Guard to pull off.

Albel is worth Aura Wall and Aura Wall only. Vampiric Flash is decent in it's own right and makes Albel look good on his own but it's nothing compared to other characters.

Roger makes for a good HP/DEF tank and seems to have somewhat more reliable AI than the other optionals. Is a beast on disc one with Charge combos but starts to lose out to Nel/Peppita damage wise sooner or later.

[Talaysen]

Load times and slow downs.  This game has a lot of them.  Is this a PSP exclusive thing or was it prominent in the PS2 version?  Cause there's an annoying load time with a load screen and everything every time I initiate a battle, and the game randomly lags when I do simple map actions.  I can live with it, but it is still annoying.  So wondering if this is a "PSP Port sucks ass" thing or if they were present in the PS2 version too?  I don't expect people to know just how different the PSP and PS2 version is, but I figure people would at least be able to say how big load times and such were <_<

Basically what Snow said.  PS2 version had noticeable lag in places on the field, but not much in the way of load times.  PSP version adds a bunch of annoying load times because the PSP sucks.  If you haven't tried using the Jump Start feature, I suggest that.  It should make the load times somewhat less ridiculous (though still noticeable).  It's in the options menu.

[Captain K.]

Avalon Code:  Made a badass sword and shield, and then PLOT TWIST happened.  But that's okay, because now I have Dan Hibiki-style Gadoukens.

[Yoshiken]

VP2: Started this yesterday. Didn't like the battle system at first, but it's not that bad now. Just wish it moved a little faster...

[metroid composite]

Crono Trigger DS

(spoilers)

So...Crono died, there was some talk of getting him back, but I didn't really know where to go, so I went to this black obelisk place which was fairly difficult, but I managed to get through by actually using my Hi-Ethers and Elixirs and stuff (sadly the "save MP" accessory had been on Crono).  The real problem came towards the end when, after some Lavos spawn ate through all my Athenian Waters because it OHKOed on counterattacks, I was left with exactly 1 Athenian Water with which to fight Queen Zeal (someone who has Hallation + poke).  Somehow managed that anyway.  This opened up the Lavos fight, tried it once, but he had an MT move that OHKOed my healer, so I figured I should go revive Crono first.

After doing that I ran around and did whatever sidequests I could find.  Got Swallow for Crono along with Luminare, which is brutal when combined with 75% MP cost reduction accessory (randoms die).  Got the prismatic Dress because well...honestly you're giving me a choice between a dress and a helmet; what did you expect me to choose?  There's a stupid amount of stuff in the lost sanctuary--honestly I've been getting kind of bored of the endless "climb up the stupid mountain again" quests.  I haven't narrowed down my party yet, and as a result I haven't used any of the strength/speed/magic tabs.  Currently I'm leaning towards Crono/Ayla/Frog (damage/damage/healing...and also the three fastest characters, more or less).

Oh, I guess I should go over what I named all the characters...

Crono = Fauna.  Was thinking of naming him Flora, but then it struck me that Fauna would be more amusing.
Marle = Nanami.  Named after the Suiko 2 character.
Lucca = Ada.  Named after Ada Byron, first programmer.
Frog = Frog.  What can I say; I've already used Frogger for Yuri Hyuga, and it's hard to top a name like Frog in awesomeness.
Ayla = Marisa.  "Marisa strong.  Marisa smash."  Fits wayyy too well.
Magus = EMOGrl.  Highly entertaining in conversations; I strongly recommend it.
Robo = R2D2.  Eh, not very imaginative; oh well.

[AAA]

L4D-Took us 3 hours, but me and Eph managd to clear out No Mercy by ourselves. Well, we had two people with no mics who ragequit on us after they died on the first level, and two split-screen guys who lasted for a few failed attempts at NM2, but mostly it was just ourselves and the AI. Of course we used the Jesus Room glitch, there was no way we could take on the Finale by ourselves otherwise. I think my favorite part was when we were going up the staircase to the generator room in NM2, and we've been hearing a tank growling for awhile, and Eph took the lead since he had a molotov. We're running around going "Where's the Tank" and then the Tank just sweeps around the corner by the staircase and incaps Eph before either of us could do anything and I had to take all my 10 HP and limp away.

The Darkness-Finished. Dang, that was a short game. So glad I didn't pay 60 bucks for it now. It was an interesting game. Very good atmosphere and storytelling, really draws you into this sort of Mafia vengeance story with horror overtones. The darkness powers are all interesting, but unbalanced. Creeping Dark is way overpowered, the Demon Arm is Awesome But Impractical because you have to be way up close and the hit detection is wonky as hell, the Darkness Guns are fun but you need the darkness energy for your bullet shield, and the Void is broken as fuck and can clear a room full of badguys all by itself, but it does drain away all your Darkness energy so its' a fair trade. The gunplay portion is solid but uninspired, the Darkness abilities are the main show. The game really twists the knife in a few points, and the ending was depressing as fuck.

Solid game. 7/10 or so?

Dead Rising or Mass Effect is next.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

SO4- Fuck the Wandering Dungeon. Fuck it in the ass. No save points, no leaving, and if you die because you are evading some enemies and ducking in to the next room? SOMETIMES IT HAS THE ETHEREAL QUEEN IN IT AND SHE KILLS YOU. Also the loot is randomly-generated. I got a protector out of one chest, and 104 fol out of another. THANK YOU GAME.

[Scar]

When do you guys play L4D? Do you have the Pc version? If you do send me yer info and I'd love to play with you guys. Granted, I kinda suck, but hey it's fun playing with people you know.

[Nephrite]

Suikoden: Tierkreis

I have absolutely no idea how I feel about this game right now. Maybe Konami is trying something different...

[AAA]

Sorry, me and Eph are 360 users. Only PC player I know is Laggy.