Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!

[Pyro]

Hey don't forget Karol who sparks an Altered Arte from an Altered Arte! (50% healing one)

[Dark Holy Elf]

Metroid Fusion:

Clear time... 1:37
Your rate for collecting items is... 1%

Woot. Anyway, still didn't like the Ridley fight much but I did get notably better at it as time went on. SA-X was fairly tricky given the beam OHKOs and impacts high 2HKO, but fundamentally more manageable, less random a fight so you can get her into a pattern (proably about 8 resets). Omega Metroid, well, OHKOs but fairly simple, couple more resets here.

Overall difficulty of bosses on this run: Nightmare >> Ridley > Yakuza >> Nettori > SA-X > Serris > Security Robot 2 > Omega Metroid > (bosses who still kinda suck)

Pretty fun, not sure what's next.

[Taishyr]

Wow. Impressive, that, though, wait- which bosses are Yakuza/Nettori? Everything else I can see (semisurprised on SR2 being up there) but not really sure which two those are.

I'd poke you into FFTA2 but IIRC you were taking a break from strat games. Still, I think it's even cheaper now, so.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Yakuza = spider
Nettori = plant

SR2 really wasn't too bad, just 4-5 resets or so as I mentioned in an earlier post. Still, he 2HKOs you and isn't totally trivial to avoid, so that gets him above the earlygame bosses who are just bad (Serris aside obviously) and Omega Metroid who is brutally simple but just kills you in one hit if you screw up.

Glanced through the 1% FAQ now that I've done the game and I notice the guide barely even mentions Ridley dismissing him as fairly easy. I wonder if I'm missing something. For all that he's one of the easiest on normal files, I still found reliably avoiding him on 1% a real pain since he just closes in on you and you pretty much have to guess what he's going to do sometimes. Wouldn't shock me if there's an AI exploit there I never keyed in on, though.

[Taishyr]

Oh, right. Yakuza and Nettori.

...wait, shit, Nettori would've been fucking painful for me. Even more power to you.

[AAA]

Deus Ex-Still Pacifist! Zero direct kills, though there was one guy who gibbed himself with a LAM trying to get me. Since I went for the "Paul lives" story path, the hotel was a major pain in the ass. I ended up just spamming gas grenades and using Fast Run to cheese it. Definitely the hardest part thus far. Prod has overtaken Baton because people simply do not go down in one swing anymore. Also part of the reason why I'm saving up for Master Melee! This is the optimal time because I'm swimming in multitools and lockpicks, and hacking still gives me plenty of time. Augs are the one where you blow missiles up, Environmental Resistance, Fast Run, Microfibal Muscle, and Bullet Resistance. Only found one upgrade cannister so far, which went to Fast Run.

[Meeplelard]

Super Street Fighter 4: Played through the game with Ryu, Dudley (even did him legit, as in Medium difficulty, 3 round matches!), Zangief, Cody, Guy, Juri, Guile, Chun-li, Ken, and Blanka.

Game is...well, exactly what you'd EXPECT it to be.  Which is to say, its Street Fighter 4 with a bunch of new things added in.
...which is by no means a bad thing.  Street Fighter 4 was already a damn good game, so it just being a better version of Street Fighter 4 means its just more awesome!  At least in this rendition, they have a significant number of additions to justify making a whole new game; 10 characters and new ultras for everyone is nothing to scoff at. Reworking the balance, NEW PLOT!11!!!, music, stages, bonus rounds, etc. just justifies the game even further, for all that among those the Music is really all that matters (I don't care what you say; Daft Punk Balrog's Theme > stuff), and the rest is more like "SEE! NEW STUFF?!!?!? TOTALLY WORTH THE VERSION!!!1!11"  Whatever, the game costs only $40, which is damned cheap for a new modern gen console game, so how the fuck can I complain <_<?

Also, won a mini tournament at school with Dudley for SSF4.  Rules were Single Elim, 1 Round, 60 seconds (its a mini tournament, we wanted it to not take forever, especially cause a lot of people entered), new characters only (as in, the 10 new guys relative to Street Fighter 4.)  The semi final match was literally down to the last second.  Got one last hit in that knocked his health to basically invisible measures, just like mine was, and the timer hit 0.  I apparently had a negligible amount more, but hey, its enough to win!  Won a $10 Gift Card to Best Buy.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Mana Khemia - Late to the party, but this is a good game. Very tightly designed. The growth system is the most fun Skinner box I've had the pleasure of being trapped in. Everything just feeds off of eachother so well, and the game doesn't leave you guessing as to what you can synthesize when, or when a new recipe is available. And even the act of exploring and creating recipes triggers cute little character interaction scenes. It's just very synergistic, and the battle system is tons of fun to play with - especially when the randoms are challenging. Bosses could stand to be a little more challenging as once you stop holding back to conserve resources, they can become too easy.

Party-wise, I've been using everyone to fill out their grow books, though Nikki and Jess tend to be the most useful. Flay, Roxis, and Pamela are good for boss-slaying (Physical damage, Magical damage, Endless resources and Immortal body in case of death, respectively). Vayne and Anna exist to help me set up Variation Burst. Muppy has yet to be not a hinderance.


Character-wise, everyone is nuts, so the whole thing is pretty light-hearted and easy to gloss over the weird parts. Like Muppy, who is funny, but in a really different way than the rest of the cast and it kinda destroys suspension of disbelief. Tony/Renee are the best. Jess is surprisingly good in-plot, but her CQs make me cringe. I unabashedly like Nikki, but perhaps that's because I know a few people who are a lot like her so she feels comfortingly familiar in the cast of crazies. Pamela is a super-bitch and I love it. Roxis would be forgettable if he wasn't Tsundere-Trance. Anna is just forgettable. Vayne is 'insert yourself here' main, despite not being silent.

And then there's Flay. Who just makes -everything- work.

Anyway, it seems Gust has come a long way since Atelier Iris 1. I only played AI3 briefly (just the end sections with a friend of mine), so I didn't have as good of an idea of what it was like. And Ar tonelico has too much fanservice-rape for me to remember anything about its battle system. So, now that I've -finally- gotten into MK (On chapter 9), I'm really looking forward to MK2.

Suikoden Tierkreis: Polar opposite of MK? Story hasn't let me down yet, but egads the battle system is -still- boring. Also... random encounters?! What year is this?

I haven't been FAQing this... will I miss any SoDs if I play without FAQs?

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

If it's not Suikoden 3, odds are you already missed SoDs if you didn't FAQ. >_>

[Fudozukushi]

If it's not Suikoden 3, odds are you already missed SoDs if you didn't FAQ. >_>

I think there's only like 4 or 5 that are permanently missable.

There's also the goddamn Nanda or whatever is name is.

[Captain K.]

I usually play as the female Pokemon Trainer, but the one in Heart Gold has a stupid hat, so male it is.

HG:  Realized both the Pokemon that I plan on breeding for the tournament only come out female 12.5% of the time.  So many more hours added to breeding.  Sigh.

[Cmdr_King]

Snow's pretty well spot on I think.  Playing Tierkreis casually (that is, not hunting down starts) I had something pitiful like 35% completion on stars, so the sheer volume I think would make them hard to track without FAQs.
Of course, despite the system making every character have a unique combination of skills, the skills themselves are so limited I honestly think Tierkreis has the least-differentiated cast in the series (maaaaaybe Suikoden 1 is worse about this) so it's not like it matters.

[Dark Holy Elf]

MM10 - Got 90% challenges done. Notably, this includes perfecting every single boss on EM/NM (except Weapons Archive on NM, and no reason I couldn't, just haven't yet). Trying to buster most bosses on HM, I've at least beaten all of them except Blade Man and Solar Man. Still, that's enough for now. Giving this game a break. I mean, I figured I could play more, but-


HOLD IT!


Phoenix Wright - Replaying this. Wow, 1-1 is short. Fun so far! Payne isn't played for laughs nearly as much in this game.

[Talaysen]

I haven't been FAQing this... will I miss any SoDs if I play without FAQs?

It's Suikoden so yes.

I usually play as the female Pokemon Trainer, but the one in Heart Gold has a stupid hat, so male it is.

You spelled "awesome" wrong.  Easy mistake to make.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Man, handheld games that need FAQing suck. If I'm already sitting at home on a console, it's no big deal to check a FAQ... but such a pain for on-the-go play. This may be the first Suikoden that I don't get all 108 stars.

Checked a FAQ for now, and the recruiting looks painful to try to memorize for future sessions, so... blargh.

I'm still early enough that I haven't missed anyone yet, it's just a pain.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Snow's pretty well spot on I think.  Playing Tierkreis casually (that is, not hunting down starts) I had something pitiful like 35% completion on stars, so the sheer volume I think would make them hard to track without FAQs.
Of course, despite the system making every character have a unique combination of skills, the skills themselves are so limited I honestly think Tierkreis has the least-differentiated cast in the series (maaaaaybe Suikoden 1 is worse about this) so it's not like it matters.

If they have skills, they're more differentiated than S4's cast.

[Cmdr_King]

Depressingly no.  Suikoden IV at least had a few folks like Kika and Ted, so SOMEONE stood out as being different from another character.  Even without that, elemental affinities meant that different characters could be given the same rune and have appreciably different results.  The same is not really true of two Tierkreis characters with the same skill, although Tierkreis does have a wider pool of skills to draw from than Suikoden IV had spells at least.

[Meeplelard]

I usually play as the female Pokemon Trainer, but the one in Heart Gold has a stupid hat, so male it is.

You spelled "awesome" wrong.  Easy mistake to make.

No, I'm pretty sure he spelled "Stupid" correctly.  the HGSS Female is the worst looking female trainer in the series.  The Kanto, Sinnoh and Hoehn Female Trainers were all passable to flat out good in designs; the HGSS Female was the first time I went "Fuck this, I'm playing as the male."
(Sinnoh's female trainer also has the advantage of not being the Sinnoh Male, who looks similarly stupid to the Johto Female <_<)

[OblivionKnight]

http://i.neoseeker.com/ca/pokemon_heart_gold_conceptart_67nOF.jpg

Looks pretty awesome to me.

[Talaysen]

Depressingly no.  Suikoden IV at least had a few folks like Kika and Ted, so SOMEONE stood out as being different from another character.  Even without that, elemental affinities meant that different characters could be given the same rune and have appreciably different results.  The same is not really true of two Tierkreis characters with the same skill, although Tierkreis does have a wider pool of skills to draw from than Suikoden IV had spells at least.

Two Tierkreis characters with the same skill can differ highly in effectiveness due to base stats and equips.  Mages that can't use good physical weapons won't get much use out of Two Way Thrust, for example (and I know there's at least one mage that gets it).  Fighters won't get much use out of Havoc Cyclone/Fuse Dome (and there's at least one of those too!).

Also:

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Liu - Unique perfect silence skill that's MT.  Only mage that can dual wield maces (and only one of two that can dual wield at all).

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Chrodechild - Only True Falcon user that can dual wield maces.  Makes it quite a bit more effective than the other two.

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Selen - Shrike Strike + Equilibrium.  Only two people get Shrike Strike in the first place, but the other doesn't get Equilibrium making him much less effective at using it.

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Hina - Other dual wielding mage.  Notable for actually making good use of the magic boosting swords.

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Nakil - Has durability of epic and is thus fail for basically anything.

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Zayin - Mage that can't even equip weapons.  Also has Dark Disaster which only three other people have.  Also notable for having good durability all around and having Havoc Cyclone, which is the best ST magic attack in the game.  One of the best mages in the game (suffers from not having MT) and I bet no one even uses him.

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Indrik - Havoc Cyclone (72 MP) - 967 magic damage.

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Yod - Fighter who can't equip weapons.  Ends up kind of fail since Two-Way Thrust is barely even average damage and has recoil.

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Suikoden_Tierkreis_Hotupa - Only character with Dispel.

Yeah, I dunno, there are definitely a bunch of people who stand out for different reasons, I didn't even list them all!  And even for the ones who don't stand out, characters with similar skills may differ highly due to their base stats and equips.  See Indrik doing less than 1000 damage with Havoc Cyclone while the good mages do around 2500.  The same is true for physical skills as well.  And then there are some skill combo setups that are effective and not common (unbalancing skill + unbalance immunity is the big one).  And don't even get me started on the hidden swing count or whatever BS is hiding under the mechanics this time.

I mean, sure, they could've done it better and had more variety, but there's still a good amount here.

[Dhyerwolf]

Depressingly no.  Suikoden IV at least had a few folks like Kika and Ted, so SOMEONE stood out as being different from another character.  Even without that, elemental affinities meant that different characters could be given the same rune and have appreciably different results.  The same is not really true of two Tierkreis characters with the same skill, although Tierkreis does have a wider pool of skills to draw from than Suikoden IV had spells at least.

Unfortunately, so many of those skills end up super redundant anyways! Yeah, there are some niches carved, but I would have liked the battle system a lot more if they made elements count, and instead of giving them all 10 unique skills, they  just made some skill upgrades so there wasn't as much overlap (And maybe some different varities of MT too).

[Talaysen]

The elements thing really does hurt.  I kind of wonder if they're just bugged or something.  Doesn't really make sense to have them otherwise.

[Rozalia]

SSF4 - Completed a few arcades and played online about 50 or so games with 70% of them being wins while gathering 20 trophies. Due to not having played SF4 in months I struggled to beat the AI (Hardest) but eventually after a while I started getting the timings down again and started trashing them.
I play as Ken mostly and I'm happy with his new ultra as I can't land the old one for shit. The new one can easily be used to punish people who make wiffs/mistakes so I'm happy.

As for the new characters I've only tried Juri yet and while I've not played as her extentively her moves seems pretty damn good from what I saw.

[DjinnAndTonic]

SUPER MARIO BROS. CROSSOVER! http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/534416

Holy crap, this is the best game ever made. This dude took a bunch of Nintendo platformer characters and balanced them all to play in the SMB1 levels. The result is amazing. He even uses the music from each respective game.

This is wonderfully addictive, I just wish that I could play it with a controller instead of a crappy keyboard.

So far Megaman has been the easiest one to use, but I'm trying to get the hang of controlling Simon Belmont with a keyboard.

[Cotigo]

SUPER MARIO BROS. CROSSOVER! http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/534416

Holy crap, this is the best game ever made. This dude took a bunch of Nintendo platformer characters and balanced them all to play in the SMB1 levels. The result is amazing. He even uses the music from each respective game.

This is wonderfully addictive, I just wish that I could play it with a controller instead of a crappy keyboard.

So far Megaman has been the easiest one to use, but I'm trying to get the hang of controlling Simon Belmont with a keyboard.

http://www.rpgdl.com/forums/index.php/topic,4412.msg105814.html#msg105814
*cough, cough.*

But I agree this game is a lot of fun.