Games you're playing: The 2009 edition.

[AndrewRogue]

WoW - Fuck faction champs fuck fuck fuck.  I don't hate the fight as much as the rest of my guild, but I fucking hate dealing with the fallout of said fight in my guild.

Guild dramaz? Do share.

[Grefter]

Nah not drama.  Just constantly changing strat and 5 minutes to pull with 20 seconds to wipe.  We are an incredibly PVE oriented guild and none of our main raiders at all are remotely PVP oriented, we have like a few people that dabble at fairly low level competing with other people that don't really try.  (There is maybe 2 in our raid that I think would do really well at it if they focussed on it?  I am not one of them).  We have like one guy in the entire guild that really focusses any attention of PVP, but he isn't a main raider and he doesn't do it seriously anymore, instead fucking about with some mates who are the one or two that could PVP alright from the main raiders.

It is just the exact opposite of what almost everyone wants out of the game.  Ever changing fight that needs high reaction time (Oh yeah it was cool, last night people weren't able to dodge Icehowl.  Thanks again US hosted server!) and an ever shifting focus on what needs doing.   Having 6 targets to handle with 10 players in a raid makes it a pretty aggravating fight for a 10 man focussed guild (Have more overflow of DPS per opponent in 25s and you don't have the loot to just steamroll it iitem level wise like a 25s group doing 10 man).  We are probably a bit overly reliant on having our tanks taunting the melee to keep the burst under control in normal.

Oh yeah forgot to note that I race changed to Orc since after a few years of watching undead animation I wanted to look at something different.  Actually pretty happy with it so far.  It hurts not being able to attack Snobolds on my back anymore, but better racials and different animations makes this one a winner.  Oh yeah also Hardiness gving 15% less stun duration and having the boot chant makes dodging Heroic Icehowl still pretty easy even with our lag.  I really need to emphasise how good a faster movement enchant is to people I think.  I take that shit on a caster even.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Faster movement speed: it's why Tankadins are required to put at least 12 points in to the Ret tree.

[Grefter]

The stuff you pick up on the way is pretty awesome at that.  The times where Pursuit of Justice was not viable for Prot were pretty painful times I think (last time this came up I think was just before Wrath was released and you had to get shiny new 51 point talents over dipping deep into Ret)

[Meeplelard]

Does the PC version have Tifa & Aeris' amazing conversation in Junon? ("Don't you just hate this?" "You're probably right.")

Can't say I remember this one.

Again, the PC translation is pretty much lacking in a lot of the mock value of the PS1 version, which is why I could never truly mock FF7's translation (just state "its worse than FF3us's" whenever a Woolsey hater would pop up, and having to put things into perspective for just how well done FOR ITS TIME FF3us' translation was, just to get them to shove it and accept that not everyone is perfect)  It had its issues, but it wasn't so glaringly awful like I'm noticing the PS1 version is. 

It also had more censorship...but in a way that HELPED the dialog.  Basically, swears were replaced with typical gibberish symbols.  So instead of "Shit" we'd get "@&%#" and such.  This worked better than seeing the word cause it left you to your imagination <_<

[Grefter]

Most of FF7 does that.  I think the strongest it has is a crap.  It frankly makes the hype for Cid's dirty mouth a bit laughable to me personally, but that might just be my bias considering I swear like a drunken sailor if I don't pay attention to what I am saying.

[Yoshiken]

FF7 has a very uneven translation. In parts, it'll be censored out, sure. In others, they just don't bother.
Most notably, this leads to Barret saying things like "Shit! You lucky $%&#!!"

FF7 HDINS: Finally got round to continuing the Kalm flashback. Nearly finished with it. -.-

Editing in more progress - Toadilly forgot about Rufus' Welcoming Ceremony. 20 minutes of not being able to pause. Whoops. Glad I didn't, y'know, need food/drink/toilet during that time. >.> (Fear the major problems of an HDINS challenge! -.-)
Got a Chocobo in the 2nd fight, which isn't bad for me. Also have two Tantal Greens going spare now. ;o
Bottomswell was a pathetic joke as usual, although a slightly longer joke than I'm used to, thanks to Bio only poisoning it on the 4th try, and there was a Cure from Cloud in there as well. Aeris died at the end of the fight, but this fight precedes a full-heal, so who cares?
Welcoming Ceremony, I got myself 6 Potions and a Force Stealer. Yay~
Only one fight on the Shinra Boat, which results in one Fire2. Healed off when I checked the menu for the pre-Jenova time. And that's where I am now - start of the Jenova-BIRTH fight.

Time when equipping Chocobo Lure: 2h 42m (= best, -2 from average)
Time before Jenova-BIRTH: 3h 11m (-1 from previous best, -5 from average)

[NotMiki]

Yeah, just replayed FF7 and there are definitely more "shits" in it than I remember.  Maybe they censored that a bit for other regions?

[Yoshiken]

Iunno, I've got the PAL version, which is generally the last version to ever exist. Screw you PAL.

FF7: Jenova Birth, screw you. Forgot to back row before the fight, moved Tifa there at the start but wasn't sure if the others were already or not. Found out pretty quickly that they weren't when they got hit for a LOT. Ended up using all my Phoenix Downs trying to revive them to switch rows, and then ate repeated Tail Lasers, meaning it wound up as Tifa vs. Jenova-BIRTH. She put up a good fight! About 7 Limit Breaks before I ran out of Hi-Potions/Potions and died. ;_;

[Captain K.]

KH358:  Finished Mission Mode, although that only leaves me with 320 crowns.  Have to complete 38 more missions to unlock the last item. 

[Grefter]

Consider how I talk online and when I am in my normal relaxed state and not worried about being arrested in a foreign country and shit or bothering anyway, shit does not rate very high in my lexicon either.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Does the PC version have Tifa & Aeris' amazing conversation in Junon? ("Don't you just hate this?" "You're probably right.")

Can't say I remember this one.

Again, the PC translation is pretty much lacking in a lot of the mock value of the PS1 version, which is why I could never truly mock FF7's translation (just state "its worse than FF3us's" whenever a Woolsey hater would pop up, and having to put things into perspective for just how well done FOR ITS TIME FF3us' translation was, just to get them to shove it and accept that not everyone is perfect)  It had its issues, but it wasn't so glaringly awful like I'm noticing the PS1 version is. 

It also had more censorship...but in a way that HELPED the dialog.  Basically, swears were replaced with typical gibberish symbols.  So instead of "Shit" we'd get "@&%#" and such.  This worked better than seeing the word cause it left you to your imagination <_<

FF3's got a damn fine translation hampered by some serious censorship issues. From what I've heard, the Japanese version is extremely dry and pretty lacking in snappy dialogue.

[superaielman]

FF7's profanity wasn't shocking compared to what I had heard at the time, but it was by game standards. I don't remember any profanity in games before FF7.

[Meeplelard]

FF3's got a damn fine translation hampered by some serious censorship issues. From what I've heard, the Japanese version is extremely dry and pretty lacking in snappy dialogue.

Yes and no.  FF3us' translation did get some benefits in its writing, primarily on the grounds of Kefka, where apparently even Kitase himself said Woolsey pulled off Kefka better than he could have (and he openly admitted he wanted Kefka to stand out in this way, so the "Kefka was suppose to be just creepy, BUT TOTALLY SERIOUS!" is total bullshit lie), but for the most part, it didn't really benefit in that way.  I've heard claims like "Terra was more reserved in the Japanese version!", but considering the GBA translation is apparently very close to the original japanese (Kefka aside, where they took most of Woolsey's aspects and even added a few new one liners), I'm calling bullshit on this; its people taking some slight diction change to mean more than they really do.

Woolsey did have a few futz ups of course.  One of Setzer's first lines about the Empire "Making him a wealthy man" was actually the complete opposite; he says "Business has been slow thanks to the Empire."  Unsure why Woolsey changed it, but it was changed nonetheless.  Etiher way, its stuff that didn't actually hurt the overall impact of the game; at best, it made some idiots who take things to mean more than they really do.  But considering the time it was made, and games surrounding it at the time (a lot of early era PSX games come to mind...like FF7...)?  Its a pretty damn awesome translation, and idiot purists just can't seem to get the picture.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Better than Lufia 3's translation! Clearly, a masterpiece ahead of its time.

[Meeplelard]

Better than Lufia 3's translation! Clearly, a masterpiece ahead of its time.

And yet, Lufia 3's is superior to Lufia 2's, from what I recall <_<

[Clear Tranquil]

Iunno, I've got the PAL version, which is generally the last version to ever exist. Screw you PAL.

FF7: Jenova Birth, screw you. Forgot to back row before the fight, moved Tifa there at the start but wasn't sure if the others were already or not. Found out pretty quickly that they weren't when they got hit for a LOT. Ended up using all my Phoenix Downs trying to revive them to switch rows, and then ate repeated Tail Lasers, meaning it wound up as Tifa vs. Jenova-BIRTH. She put up a good fight! About 7 Limit Breaks before I ran out of Hi-Potions/Potions and died. ;_;

Does that mean you have to start over from the beginning?

[VySaika]

LFT - 2x Flame Whip > Weigraf 3. Also, Velius down in what has to be my closest fight with him EVER. I was relying on UNDEAD to have Shiki(Ramza) get back up instead of crystalize, and every party member died at least once. Counter on Kohaku was 0 when the bastard finally bit it.

Team is:

Shiki(Ramza) - Ninja w/Talk Skill. Usually uses knives, is using Flame Whips for now because it amuses me.
Akiha - Female Wizard w/Yin Yang and Short Charge. Also Ignore Height as a random move skill for the halibut.
Hisui - Female Samurai w/White Magic, Half MP and Move +2(from spillover and a couple props). Overall MVP, really. Two really nice skillsets there.
Arihiko - Male Monk w/CHARGE and Equip Armor. Yeah, not much to say here. It's an armored Monk, you all know what this can do.
Kohaku - Female Squire w/Item, Throw Item and Auto Potion. She's been bouncing around to other classes, namely Dancer for the time being, to pick up MOVE+3! All around solid char.

Also using the special chars:
Mustardo - Knight w/Snipe and Equip Gun. Breaking shit at range is fun.
Agrias - Geo w/Holy Sword and Attack Up. Using an Axe. Split/Crush PAWNCH has never been so much fun.

Will build up Rafa/Malak as well, I'm sure. Into what, dunno yet. But I'll certainly use them.

[superaielman]

L4D2 demo- Good stuff. The starting weapons are definitely rebalanced. The Assault rifle/Autoshotgun balance is closer as well. Why? Less ammo for the shotgun tier (68 total shells vs 138 for first tier, 100 vs 138 for second tier) and the game feels more wide open than L4D1, making that range matter.

Melee does have a cooldown, melee weapons do not as far as I can tell. I got a machete at the beginning, and welp. The horde does not like! (I do however).

I had some major lag during the horde event in stage two of the Parish. Probably have to turn my settings down.

[Pyro]

Nostalgia:

I find myself NOT being nostalgia for the days of SNES design where characters were cardboard, the world was laughable, the plot was a pointless cliche, and the balance was just thrown in there as an afterthought. The game's lack of polish is brutally obvious.

If there is one thing this game DOES do right, it is to remind us all that nostalgia is bullshit and the past sucks.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

And that is why you'll never play AtL2 again. I still wish I could go back in time and unplay the AtLs I played.

[Random Consonant]

LFT - Cleared Bed Desert.

Yellow Brick Trainwreck - Yay magical easter egg hunts!  7/10 eggs gotten thus far.

Nostalgia - Game seems inoffensively generic, though the lack of polish is ;_;.

[Pyro]

And that is why you'll never play AtL2 again. I still wish I could go back in time and unplay the AtLs I played.

Nah. AtL2 at least had some surface value in the narrative/characters having discernible personalities. When I say Nostalgia is like an SNES game I mean it.

Lufia 1 style SNES game.

[Shale]

Judging from the name, isn't that kind of the point?

[Yoshiken]

Advance Wars 2 - Been replaying this via ROM. Despite still having the original cart. Whatever.
Doing an all S-Rank Campaign, and I've two missions left on Blue Moon and 3 on Yellow Comet (including the one I've not unlocked yet). The Yellow Comet mission that holds the lab map (with 8 cannons and the fortress) and the Blue Moon mission where Colin has to survive for 14 days are both giving me some major trouble. I managed 269 on the Blue Moon one (it's 280 for an S) and 279 on the Yellow Comet one. ARGH.
Idly, does anyone know when I unlock the other nation's COs for the War Room? I want Grit back. D: