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

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Poor Ret pallies, they will just have to get by on unlimited resources, tons of damage and free/cheap healing instead of AoEing shit down

Played the Warlock a bit, I have no idea how to Demo properly when I setup keys on the run to a boss.  Spell textures not showing up on the ground is bad for a game that is all about zoning LOL YOU DIDN'T GET OUT FO THE INVISIABLE AOE.

Changes are interesting, but the game is still the same.  Probably will stop.  Not going to even log into the rogue so I don't fall into that trap.

Officially digging prot. I just paid out 12k dps on Lootship.

[Yoshiken]

Oh man. My housemate bought Viva Pinata, and it's actually amazing. I'm currently trying to spam Tafflies in order to spam Lickatoads in order to breed more Syrupent. Fucking Sour Crowla are evil and I hate them - everything else is a minor inconvenience at worst and a new resident in my garden in the case of Shellybeans and Sherbats. Oh, I'm getting more Sherbats too. I keep selling Sparrowmints and having Fudgehogs eat my Whirlms now, since I'm done with them. I can probably sell the Squazzils too, thinking about it.

Anyways, needless to say, despite seeming kinda ridiculous, this game is actually hilariously fun. I'm glad my housemate wants to buy Viva Pinata 2, since that means I won't have to buy it myself~

[Tide]

Arc Rise Fantasia - The rant

Oh boy, where do I start? It's not that I had it in for this game. I really did give it a chance and admittedly, it didn't start of bad. It just doesn't last and the game just isn't very redeeming. This is main reason why it took nearly 3 months before I finished it.

In a nutshell, the game is boring. And I mean boring. Nearly everything about it eventually gets to the same point. I mean the music is generic and forgettable, the characters are generic and boring (some of which also fail while they're at it), the story is generic and boring and the game tries to get away with it using cheap twists. Even the battle system gets boring because of how slow paced it gets. It doesn't help that the VA is of course epic, adding epic lines like NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO in complete monotone and  the setting is also dull.

Speaking of characters and plot, this is one of the most generic stories with a group of characters that I absolutely just hate. And I'm not just referring to the villains. Again, bad VA doesn't help here and just adds more hate. Adele is just terrible beyond belief. Same with Dynos. Alf is boring, and there's a bit here and there where he's okay. Then he goes through some actions that just make me want to slap him upside the head. I'm not sure what the writers were doing, perhaps they wanted to make you feel sympathy for him, but no, the reveal doesn't justify what he tries to do and that just makes him terrible. Seriously, the best comparison I can give is that it reminded me of ZAHHAK'S MILITARY GENIUS. Yeeeeeeah. Most of PCs are just there or irritating. Cecille and Leslie are boring, Ryfia makes me want to stab something in my eye. The only even somewhat decent character is Rastan. The twist between him and Serge is kinda neat, but that's 1 of like 8 that the game throws at you. This coupled along with the fact that the plot of this game is really really slow and just makes you go about doing pointless crap half the time does not help it.

As for the Battle System, it's decent, and is the somwhat saving grace of the team. But even then it doesn't last. The game makes you take many defensive moves. Not that this is a problem at the start. The issue is just that it makes you go too defensive. There are some bosses that have OHKO attacks with status attached, have attacks that ignore your defend command along other things. As a result, you need to be nearly at full health every single turn of a battle and most of them take nearly 30 minutes to 1 hour long to finish. This of course, isn't getting to the bosses with limit attacks that can easily MT OHKO you or nearly OHKO you and add a plethora of status. And after fighting for an hour, the last thing you want to see happen is a sudden MT OHKO attack that kills you. This is one of those games where I never wanted to fight a boss going in blind. You nearly need exact set ups in every battle, which of course adds to the slowness of the game because you can't level up your weapons. Which gets to other points that add to the slowness of the game. Magic is often your best source of offense but because magic is difficult to restore, you're often trying to save it. On the off chance you do decide to use it, you have to hunt for items later that restore your magic, taking even more time. Oh and because your weapons need WP to level up but you don't want to use them in battles, you have to take time out to level these too. Finally? The bosses are durable. Worse news, some of them have auto defend or elemental resistances, making them take even longer to die.

This entire game is just a mess. It's too slow, too boring and while making you take a defensive side for battle isn't bad, it goes about doing it the wrong way, and boss fights are just more of long endurance fest. That's what this whole game is. Win a battle? See how many more you can last before you go batshit insane! Seeing as how I am already insane, this would explain why I am the only one to finish it. Overall, the game is a 2.5/10. Has some good moments and its not the worst thing ever (not Quest 64!), but Jesus.

[Shale]

It is the weekend of picking up old games.

Ninja Gaiden Black: Beat it! Emperor was a pain in the ass, final boss was a pansy though. He didn't block much, his throw was a pain but none of his other damage was that great, and his durability wasn't too high either.

Then I started hard mode. Oh god the pain. Black Spider Ninjas should not appear before I gain my first weapon level. Murai is even more of a pain than before thanks to mooks. I miss Izuna Drop, and giving me an early Lunar does not begin to make up for it.

Super Robot Wars Z: Picked up the Setsuko EX-Hard playthrough! Speaking of pain. I finally gave up on stage 36's SR point, which made it way easier - it's like a completely different level when you're not bumrushing anything and can wait for the bosses to attack one by one. I breezed through the Gravion girl's first appearance, blitzed Operation Angel Down (sadly...such an awesome level!), and then hit another wall in stage 39. SR Point: Kill 75 Corralians in five turns. My best score so far: 43. This isn't going to go well, is it. Doesn't help that Rand's hogging all the good MAP attacks. What I wouldn't give for Seven Swell, or the Nessa Cannon, or for the Hyaku Shiki's bazooka to be a MAP instead of an ALL...any MAP attacked to a Hot Blood caster, basically.

[Niu]

Tide, the game is written by the ToS writer. You should be thankful it is just just boring and bad instead of outright bull shift..

[NotMiki]

Godhand.  The ending credits make beating this game SO worth it.

There are some games so bad they're good.  This isn't one of those.  This is a game where bad meets good, they get totally smashed, can't remember what happens, and 9 months later Godhand pops out.  I don't know how else to put it.

[Random Consonant]

Tide, the game is written by the ToS writer. You should be thankful it is just just boring and bad instead of outright bull shift..

hahaha what

[Scar]

RDR - I'm in Mexico. People are dying left and right. How am I still a free man again? Game continues to be awesome.

[Just Another Day]

PokeWhite

Aaken is the fucking bomb. Moguryu is another developing favourite.

I like that the game provides ample healing spots between towns. Timesavers are good.

Another small but sensible change: badges are no longer connected to HMs. It always seemed redundant to both strictly control when you got an HM and when you could use it.

(dunno if there's any restriction on trading pokemans with HM moves.)

Generally slicker menu navigation really hammers home how badly the box system needs updating.

Difficulty seems to be dropping off around 5th gym. Hopefully it picks back up again. Game's easier than HG and SS, though, definitely.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Saga Frontier - Blue's quest complete! Very short, only took me about 8 hours or so. Granted, I didn't do a deluge of optional stuff... just Sei's Tomb, the Shingrow Ship, and the Bio Lab. Nature of the quest is somewhat to blame, but yeah. I was pretty underlevelled for the end but still certainly good enough to handle BR 9 randoms (which to be fair, I only fought after beating Rouge and becoming uber).

PC notes...

Blue - Overdrive/StasisRune is just as cheap as advertised, no real shock there. 99 magic stat Megawindblasts and TimeEclipses were quite nice for the rest of things, though. Had him fire a gun in some battles to get his speed up, but not enough. Needs to be ranked in the DL clearly, wooo 100x overkill damage.

Liza - Punched things, got DSC, etc. I dunno, see Gen from last playthrough. Didn't get PoweredSuits this time so the fighters never quite took off in the same way, but eh.

Roufas - Never got Deflect with him (it's hard to get, to be fair), which is lame. Played him as a swordsman/mage, which worked well enough, although Mind Magic was generally disappointing (Awakening doubling move costs, Mindheal being self-only). The palsy move and JP-based damage were both decent, though, and of course he got Starlight Heal which is always good. Generally favoured the sword side though. Actually got Lifesprinkler, though it never really saw genuine use.

Mei-ling - Gunner and light mage. Not sure how I feel about splitting the duties, the upped costs are kind of a downer, but she was versatile certainly, and it certainly wasn't a failed experiment or anything.

T260G - I have a lot to learn in mec fu probably. Had bad luck getting decent abilities, so generally lagged in damage all game although ShootingMastery Hyperblaster is not bad for free offence. Other than that, tanky, though hard to heal, incredibly fast, and held the backpack so he made a very solid utility healer throughout the game.

Both Timelord and Hell's Lord were quite impressive when not cheaped out (I didn't fight Kylin). One could certainly argue I was underlevelled for both, but yeah. Mattered a lot for Hell's Lord whose physical spam did about double what the stat topic notes, generally had loads of trouble staying on top of him. Unfortunately he got UBER BLUE'd on the retry.

Blue quest plot after Asellus quest plot is a bit of a cultureshock. Oh well, at least I got the fun of Blue being a more sociopathic Marza.

I think next is either robots or superheros, not sure which. Also not sure if I'll dive in soon or do something else, do need to finish other things.


LFT Summoner SCC - Decided to give the Kolliery a try. Beat the kos by killing them all with fatal Odins at once on the second round (Angel Rings ensured I got that far), but the 97/03 Blade Grasp Squire on top of a non-fail second battle means I can't reasonably win that unless I pull some crazy Blood Suck shenanigans involving Strago, and I lack the patience to try that. Going to have to level up to the next speed point to beat Hashy, I'm pretty sure.

Suikoden Tierkreis - 88 stars of destiny, woohoo. Near the end.

[Grefter]

Further in Tierkreis than I am now, I am a terrible person.  I am honestly suprised you haven't hated on it nearly as hard as I did, clearly you are not as cool as you used to be.

I beg you, next quest you do that isn't one of the Robots or Superheroes make a 5 gunner team.  Trust me on this, it is more fun than it sounds.(Emelia?  Lute's works if uh you were going to do it and lots of side questing).

POKEMANS - Did I say I got a Scizor?  I beat up Fighting gym.  Did some stuff.  Didn't catch a Houndour like I had been thinking about doing LAWL RANDOMS WITH UPROARno.  I have no idea where I am going at this point.  I went south and reached a new town I think.  I dunno.  I face roll it while I am on the bus or when I am falling asleep and should be reading a book.

Lost Odyssey - Mashed out some snooze stuff getting ready for side quests.  Snooze.  Not good side quests.  Jansen got some pimping action in at least, not bad.  Macking on a princess paid off.  Then there was kids and the scene was killed.  gg writers

[Dark Holy Elf]

Man, when was I ever cool? I like Fire Emblem too much for that.

(I actually don't recall sure what you hated on in Tierkreis aside from its recruitment (making me a bad person because I'm sure you said more when you visited). Recruitment is probably a fair complaint but eh, I'm not the type of completionist for which it would actually bother me. The game is far from perfect in other ways, probably headed for a 6/10 or so (not as good as 2/3/5), but still a worthwhile experience.)

Also, why five gunners? Self-comboing hype? Style concerns? Both?

[superaielman]

Scrap--Lethal guns--shoot things a lot. It's surprisingly fun.

[Sierra]

A few minutes of junk shop abuse should see you adequately geared for that, yes.

And 7-8 hours is pretty much the norm for the game, I thought. That's what I had for Red/Emilia, got the impression that was about the average (and I tended to only do Sei's Tomb/some magic quest/Biolabs for optional stuff). Asellus is longer because they actually finished her story (I also ran her quest first and had the same time as you) and Lute is vastly shorter because he's a waste of space (it pretty much takes only as long as you need to assemble a party and train them up, because there's pretty much nothing mandatory but one dungeon and a boss).

[Dark Holy Elf]

Even if I wanted to abuse the junk shop (I don't, it's lame), I'm not really seeing the selling point of this party. <_<

I'd imagine Lute's quest wouldn't be notably shorter than Blue's? It lacks the part where you fight TL/Kylin but otherwise, it's the same basic idea: "no introduction, do one of rune/arcane quest for one of the gifts and to not be underlevelled as hell, do Sei's Tomb and BioLab because they have neat rewards/are fun, do final dungeon". I did the Shingrow ship as well and have no real compelling reason for why I did besides that there was some stuff for T2 there, but yeah.

Lute is still a waste of space though. At least Blue's quest has one or two interesting story ideas, Blue himself being a schmuck, and ubercheese silliness which was worth seeing just to finally the broken that had been hyped at me for 12 years.

[Sierra]

I'm guessing Grefter hypes it for style points. Anyway, Lute's quest was maybe four hours for me? Probably 75% of that was just wandering around getting my party built up. The quest really just barely exists.

[Grefter]

Style, high speed party that almost always combos for good damage, it is pretty hard to argue with the effectiveness of it.  Also scrap yard abuse is lame, but it is just one more trick in your toolbox and well in this case it gets you Lethal Guns for free.  It isn't really worth doing unless you need a bit of a capital base to start Gold abuse if you aren't going guns.

Things wrong with Tierkreis section!

 I don't think I went on about it to long when I was up there because I figured you guys would play it anyway, I just wanted to try to convey that it would be a poor choice in game for the Ciatos to take on a boat out to sea.

FAQbait recruiting.

Dungeon design being horrible for a portable with blind dead ends that you can have to stop playing while you are in a maze of, makes it very easy to get lost.  This combined with the recruiting makes for a very rough game to play while just chilling on the bus for example, it is fine to have to think on a portable, but it needs to be engaging in a fairly direct way that you can put down and pick up at a given time and be fine.  Pokemans and Fire Emblem both do this quite well in their respective ways.

Trading is bad, it is a mostly static system of shuffling between cities and generating money out of the ether, zzzzzzzzzzz.  Couple this with the price of equipment exploding in price later makes for yet more boringness (entirely able to be ignored of course) with the best way to do it to be refer to spreadsheets or notes you have taken on trade things (you don't need to plan routes or anything stupid like that, but remembering where item X sells and buys best and what else there you can sell at a profit and so on).  So one less component that is good as a portable game.

Finally, for all the jokes about how fast the main talks, good gods does he move fucking slow.  Tierkreis is a sllloooooowwwwwwwwww game without a high encounter rate.  You spend a lot of time in those dungeons with blind dead ends purely because of how painfully slow it is.  It picks up when you get the faster run item (which is entirely optional found in a side passage of a dungeon, it isn't even from a recruit), but it brings it up to tolerable speed, this is no Suiko 4 speed up on foot function, this is a Suiko 4 boat speed up button, ie the speed it should have been from the get go.  Considering this is in a series that fixed this bullshit back in its first sequel by having the main have a run button that made him move at a respectable clip this is pretty frustrating.

All of this makes for a downright horrible portable experience.  It would probably fair a bit better on console.  Suiko Tierkreis is a PS1 RPG on DS.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Man, I dunno, aside from the volcano (which indeed is guilty of pretty much everything you say about it, although at least randoms finally step up from the total fail they are in the first half by then) most of the dungeons aren't really big enough for being lost to be an issue. Fort Arc would have been but it's both optional and lacks randoms entirely.

Most of the rest of your complaints are pretty fair, the game indeed feels like a polish step back on several fronts (EDIT: well uh compared to S3 anyway). Most of them also don't bother me as much or in some cases at all (trading complaints just don't apply to my playstyle, for instance) but yeah. On the other hand this is the same series that just brought me Level 1 initial weapons in a cashcrunch game making half the cast unplayable and stupid ship navigation and oh dear god significant loading times for every single braindead easy random battle so quite frankly maybe my standards have been lowered. At least I can have my blacksmith instagib enemies for like 4 second randoms (load times included) when I'm backtracking an area to hunt for recruits so there's no stupid Waterfall Basin level embarrassment.

Man I like this series, stop making me rag on it.


EDIT: Also, for a game with FAQ-bait recruitment, I have 95 recruits without a FAQ which is way more than I got in the previous two games (granted, in S4's case it was because I didn't give a fuck about S4 by the end. Also involved sailing). I'm sure some of the ones I have left are really bad and maybe I just got lucky on one or two to boot, but yeah.

[DjinnAndTonic]

If it wasn't for its damn good world-building and surprisingly well-handled cast, SuikoTier would be in the 2-3/10 range to me. The only gameplay functions that I enjoyed were the support PCs and the mission system... >.>;;

By the way, the optional missions involving weird character stuff are actually pretty fun. I know you're not a completionist, but I think you'll enjoy them if you've been skipping them up until now.

[Meeplelard]

Lute is still a waste of space though.

What's most insulting is that there was going to be an 8th quest intended for Fuse, apparently, which tied up all the quests together, to show just how all the ones that are tangentially related mix together (like Emelia's Quest has Lute's Final Boss in it, and I think there's a hint that he's related to BlackX, which is the evil organization Red's fighting against...you get the point), you get the point.

It could have been remotely neat too...but then, there's a lot of stuff unfinished in SaGa Frontier *looks at all the stuff cut from Asellus' story*

[DjinnAndTonic]

If the SaGa2 and 3 remakes do well enough, maybe we'll get a proper SaGaF release. I'd call it a remake, but just -finishing- it would make it awesome.

[Dark Holy Elf]

If it wasn't for its damn good world-building and surprisingly well-handled cast, SuikoTier would be in the 2-3/10 range to me. The only gameplay functions that I enjoyed were the support PCs and the mission system... >.>;;

By the way, the optional missions involving weird character stuff are actually pretty fun. I know you're not a completionist, but I think you'll enjoy them if you've been skipping them up until now.

So you're saying that a Suikoden game bereft of things related to writing and plot would be bad? Perish the thought.

I've been doing the missions, yeah - they're easy enough and shed some neat light on some characters and events, not to mention you get loads of recruits from them. There's a few I haven't been able to complete and those I don't stress over because, again, not a completionist.

[Grefter]

The ones you don't have you will have missed permanently straight up going to say that without even asking who you have.  They are gone and you can't get them.  You can like a series and rag on it (see me with it, Tales, POKEMANS, Star Ocean, POKEMANS), not only can you do it, you should be doing it, because what is bad here is bad.

Good example of a bad dungeon early on is the mines, if you know where you are going they are really short and quick and easy.  If you are exploring the whole place there is dead ends all over the place and it sucks.  Worse is repeat visits to the Porpoise people dungeon.  There is a part of the dungeon you can only get to on repeat visits, when you go up one of the geysers it takes you to a room that looks exactly like the path you went up the geyser the first time, but all of the branches off it are completely different.  Each alternating time you go up it alternates between them.  Fine when you know it happens, horrible dungeon design though and can easilly leave the player having no fucking clue where they are, which if they have to put it down you are doing it wrong.  It is much more about how bad the dungeons are for a hand held system that start and stop gameplay comes up.  Pokemons linear paths works perfectly here.  It doesn't make for engaging dungeon crawling, but that is far from the game's high points in this case.  You can do without that side path that has a treasure chest with an out of date weapon in it.

If you want an example of the bad recruits, look up Nakil or Hafin recruitment.

[Yoshiken]

Viva Pinata: Reached Lv 21, got full garden size. Dastardos and the four Sours I've unlocked can't show up now, so I've only got Ruffians to worry about. Money isn't an issue, since Tafflies randomly appear and they can be burnt for easy money. The only problem? I'm completely out of space. I've got, like, 5 Master Romancers awards, and the Sherbat one should give me a load more room when I eventually get it, so I'm doing pretty well - not surprising, it's Viva Pinata.

[Talaysen]

By the way, the best way to get money later in Tierkreis is to wait for prices of items to spike in a location and go sell stuff at like 10x normal price.  Faster than cycling around the world a bunch of times.