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

[Tide]

I just realized that I've played this many maps and I haven't used Sacrifice yet. What does it do anyway? Do I get EXP for using it? Can I replace Laura with it?

That's actually pretty normal. Sacrifice is good in a few niche situations, but on the whole, you shouldn't be using it that often. Anyways, other people have already described what it does. And yes, I can confirm that it gives experience: A whole 10 EXP. You can EXP share around by having Micaiah use Sacrifice and then Laura to heal her, but its not a very efficient way of playing for several reasons.

More importantly, I highly recommend against replacing Laura with Sacrifice. This is mainly due to the fact that with Sacrifice, you essentially need two turns in order to heal someone (one for Micaiah to heal one person, then the turn after to heal Micaiah herself since she can't heal if she has no HP). This is not the case with Laura using the Heal Staff.

[Rozalia]

Sacrifice + That regen skill = Lv 20 Micaiah. Once she gets down to 1 hp she'll regen 1 hp allowing you to use Sacrifice again and again. Its best to do it on the prison map where the fail trio join as the boss doesn't move and you can use him to damage Nolan/Aran.

Thats the only use Sacrifice has because its outclassed by healing staves massively.

[Niu]

Estpolis- Finally get the rom to work, thus I can finally hack it, thus I finally feel like to run through the second cycle. This should take less than 10 hours.

[Talaysen]

Sacrifice can be used as backup healing if Laura isn't in range or if Micaiah doesn't have anything else to do.  That's pretty much what it was made for.

---

3D Dot Game Heroes - Started this.  Got the first orb out of six, which takes like two hours.

Gameplay: Is boring.  As hell.  You go around and stab things with a sword.  It's pretty much just Zelda.  Good thing I didn't expect much here.  I guess the first boss was somewhat entertaining.

However, the writing is pretty amusing.  The game references loads of other games.  Games I've seen referenced so far:

Zelda (obvious)
Final Fantasy
Dragon Quest 4
Dragon Quest 5
Demon's Souls

Probably some others I didn't catch/forgot.  Gate says there was a DQ1 reference in there or something but I think I missed it.  Game also pokes fun at some video game cliches.

The fairy is a complete moron though.

Not much else to say.  Game's mostly just a lot of blah outside of amusing writing and style.  Definitely going back to NIER tomorrow because it actually has interesting gameplay.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Sacrifice also heals status, which can be handy. Micaiah never needs a Restore Staff, unless she wants to protect herself from silence. Anyway yeah, overall not too useful, but does have a few niche uses as described.

Also, I'm pretty sure the Bonus Exp you'd get from not stalling out the prison map is worth way more than some Sacrifice Exp on Micaiah given that she has no problem hitting Level 20 before promotion anyway.


FE9 - Haha Chapter 12, such a joke once you know the trick. Using both beast laguz this time.
Wizard of Oz - Oooh, the beach is pretty. Flora wasn't terrible or anything but was <Yulie voice> kinda disappointing. Plunder rules now that it seems almost all enemies have at least Hi-Potions.

[metroid composite]

Kirby Superstar Ultra

You know, I haven't played a traditional Kirby platformer since the original Kirby's Dreamland (played and loved Kirby's Canvas Curse, though).  So far...I'm not really feeling this one, actually.  I mean, the first thing it does is a very easy shortened remake of Kirby's Dreamland, one where my AI partner was soloing the bosses.  Way to crush my childhood memories.

I dunno, I guess so far I'm not sold that adding 6 or so new mechanics really improves the original Kirby's Dreamland.  I'm really suspicious of blocking in...a lot of games, to be honest.  What's wrong with just dodging?  Next mechanic...AI buddies?  Wow, so about half your firepower is out of your control.  AI buddies who transform into a different AI buddy right before they're about to die if they get hit by the right boss move?  Hypothetically you can control this, but it feels random to me.  Special swallow powers?  Fine on paper.  Secrets that require a specific swallow power?  Very hit and miss--sometimes it's obvious "I need to go back and eat that enemy" but sometimes it's just "yeah, I'm not sure what power I'm supposed to use here, and trial and error will take half an hour running back and forth through the rooms."  Next mechanic: Megaman kick slide.  Nothing wrong with this mechanic, although it is pretty underwhelming.  Next mechanic: doubletap to run.  Die in a fire.  Geez, I think I like this mechanic less than "hold down the run button."  What is with game designers thinking we don't want to run all the time, seriously?

I dunno, maybe my opinion will change in the last half of the game, but it's just...I've played through the original Kirby's Dream Land on hard mode with my health meter customized down to 1 HP.  I can't imagine playing through this game like that; right now it just seems too chaotic and determined by elements outside of my control.  And to be fair, maybe further exposure will illuminate order in the apparent chaos; then again, maybe it won't--AI buddies are AI buddies.

[superaielman]

What team are you using, Elfboy? And yeah, map 12 is cake. I don't remember Jill being threatened by much of anything on the map, and I had a subpar team for that battle (No mages!)

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Wizard of Oz - Oooh, the beach is pretty. Flora wasn't terrible or anything but was <Yulie voice> kinda disappointing. Plunder rules now that it seems almost all enemies have at least Hi-Potions.

Yup. Also, the fat phantoms on the beach carry Tree of Life Ashes. Enjoy, because they -will- serve you beautifully. Generally, stealable items are pretty up-to-date, but really, Hi-Potions will serve you well until like Protea.

Also, Flora isn't amazing or anything, just kind of better than the utter jokes you'd expect first bosses to be. The ones that make you run for your money in Oz are Holly and Ju Kaku (hitting weakness on Strawman off that speed? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Power Boost+Battle Wind off near-Strawman speed? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!).

[hinode]

Eh, Holly hitting Strawman weakness isn't a big deal; I typically don't use him for bosses besides dispel and maybe Gnaw anyways. Protea hitting Tin Man's weakness worried me much more. That said, Holly was the only witch that actually used Magic Charge + big ST move on me, which was pretty damned scary; thank GOD Mirror Skin was up at that point.

Ju Kaku is pure evil though.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

I found weakness-hitting relevant for one reason mostly: Strawman is such a good item boy and I kept needing the MT item healing to come out before Holly got a turn (I was at a high enough level that he went first more often). Other than that, he's not really getting much of an outing on bosses... but impressively, -that- one niche was really relevant for me. He's also kinda neat for guaranteeing a Power Boosted Battle Wind next turn with First Wind shenanigans if you care, because the witches tend to -love- dispelling Power Boost. Also, Magic Charge'd Blazing Fire overkills Strawman, no questions asked, while a Magic Charge'd Blizzard won't even come that close to KOing Tin Man if it goes off. Well, keeping Strawman in the back would solve -that-, but I needed the healing to come out off that speed often and badly.

BACHELOR #2 EDIT: Well, Protea does overkill Tin Man with Ice Ballx2 quite badly, and given the ratio you give up on him, that could happen easily...

[hinode]

I never had any use for an item boy in boss fights unless the risk of Dorothy dying was severe *cough*Ju Kaku*cough*. 1 ratio meant that getting sufficient turns was never an issue so long as she stayed alive.

In particular, I had really good luck with keeping Mirror Skin up against Holly, she probably ended up doing more damage to herself with magic than she did to me.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Yeah, I never had that luck. *Mirror Skin.* *Dispel.* "GODDAMMIT." *Mirror Skin.* *Murder somebody else, Dispel.* "GODDAMMIT!"

[Dark Holy Elf]

What team are you using, Elfboy? And yeah, map 12 is cake. I don't remember Jill being threatened by much of anything on the map, and I had a subpar team for that battle (No mages!)

I'm pretty sure having no mages makes that an above par team, not subpar! <.< Honestly, all you need is 4 PCs who can take at least one hit from a raven and you're fine (a fifth helps but isn't strictly necessary). Jill is in no danger partially due to that Laguzguard, which halves their damage and makes up for the fact that they double Jill (granted, her Def is pretty high).

I'm planning on using a party of Ike, the four beast laguz, Zihark and Stefan, Rhys and Soren, Rolf, Tauroneo, and Largo. Not an overall strong or especially well-balanced team, heavy emphasis on people I've not used through the entire game before (one or two exceptions there to fill in support chains, mostly).

[Pyro]

Oz bosses tend to be good. I had to go back to Ju Kaku after getting my ass handed to me by Holly the first time and there were a few other instances of hard fights.

Pokemon: Platinum.

Beat the E4 courtesy of Gyarados and Dragon Dance, along with Reflect/Light Screen/debuff setup on the first poke they sent out. Dragon Dance is really the most badass move in the game.

Infernape and Garchomp were the other heavy lifters of the team. Infernape just had awesome offense and speed, Garchomp was just monstrous all-around.

I used a variety of other Pokes, but wasn't impressed too much with any individuals (Staraptor was better than I had anticipated, Leafeon much much worse). Not going to do the aftergame, I don't think. It's funny because I figured I'd save the Masterball for something other than Giratina, and I never ended up grabbing anything at all with it. Oh well.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

SH2 - HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLY SHIT IS RASPUTIN COMPLETELY LAME OR WHAT

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Good thing he's not the main villain. Plus, you get to see Amon go apeshit on him.

[Yoshiken]

For me, he was redeemed entirely through "No, YOU will bite ME!"

Hey, they never made him out to be too serious a villain, did they?

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Nor were the entirety of Sapientes Gladio, really. SH2's first-half antagonists are Tales villain-level failure.

[superaielman]

Having recently seen some incredible tales related fail in the villain department, I am going to have to disagree with Rasputin being lamer than that.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

I'm not saying he's -lamer- than the ones I know. But god damn if Rasputin couldn't have been a boss in Klonoa, much like over half of the villain cast in Tales of Legendia.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I don't praise Tales villains, or indeed anything about the series, very often.

Rasputin is lamer than Tales villains.

[hinode]

You know you've screwed up on your writing when you somehow manage to turn Rasputin into a lamer villain than the likes of Mithos and whatshername from ToD2.

[NotMiki]

If you're ever in need of an awesome Rasputin, Devil Summoner awaits.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

You know you've screwed up on your writing when you somehow manage to turn Rasputin into a lamer villain than the likes of Mithos and whatshername from ToD2.

And yet, the rest of the game's writing makes us overlook this, especially when Yuri goes apeshit on an old man.

[Rozalia]

Disgaea 3 - So I'm going through the list of the bonus content which are all rank 27 levels containing lv 188 enemies. There was a rank 41 level but surely enemies would be lv 500 or something right? BAM lv 9000 overlord Baal!
As I like to see big shiny numbers I let him curb stomp me and as Baal smacks Mao into oblivion *Bling* You earned the trophy "Who Wants to be a Milliondamagaire"