What Games ya Playin' 2012 - Suplex a Train Edition

[Monkeyfinger]

On the other hand, there was plenty of "oh, DA:O's trash fights were so repetitive and dull, DA2's are so much more fast paced and fun!"

[Anthony Edward Stark]

DA2 got panned for having more blatantly recycled dungeons than Oblivion and ridiculous reinforcements in combat that come out of nowhere more than anything else. Also the ending because what the fuck.

The combat thing gets harped on a lot these days, but when DA2 first came out it seemed like most people were praising the combat as a step up from DA:O.

The actual combat might be, but the encounters are a giant step down. Like Fen said, there's a lack of large set piece battles because the game relies so heavily on waves of reinforcements and like nothing else. Part of the reason Varric's quest is so much fun is that the fight IS a large setpiece battle rather than having a few mooks at a time show up in groups.

[Tide]

FFT Priests SCC -

Going on and off on this. Notable battles...

Lenalia Plateau (1 Reset):
First attempt at this tries to fight Miluda without Holy. Delita unfortunately doesn't have enough JP to get anything really overpowered and no amount of job/ability set up gives him enough durability to last more than one round. Even with Shell/Protect, he dies way too quick. Once Delita is dead, my Priests with their staff whacks of 15 damage aren't outslugging Miluda with that much support. So, grind to level 10, Ramza has exactly enough MP for 1 Holy. Everyone covers Ramza and Delita becomes bait. Lock on Holy for 140+ damage to win

Dorter 2 (1 Reset):
I got a little confident regarding Gaf and Agrias along with 2 characters now being able to Holy nuke. Bad idea. I rush ahead with Holy but quickly find the enemy Wizards shredding down one of my Priests and severely damaging another. Arrows eventually kill the other and unfortunately, they were the ones with enough MP for revival. Crap. So okay, go back and instead fight defensively like most other Priest battles with guests. Slowly, I outslug myself a victory.

Zaland Fort City:
5 Move Agrias helps so much because she is able to quickly get into the battle. This battle (like Dorter 2) is all about guests. I quickly Holy off a Wizard, but in order to save Mustadio, I have to dig into my resource pool and heal him, which means I do not have enough MP afterwards to cast it. Protecting and Shelling my units along with Musty helps a lot, along with one of the Wizards getting killed that quickly. The knights are largely irrelevant since they are just so slow (and once they close in, it's easy to separate them with the wall so, only one knight is fighting 3 Priests) and the archers don't have enough damage under Protect. Agrias eventually goes around the wall and Stasis Swords everything that Musty doesn't shoot and kill. My priests manage to off a knight by outslugging him with Protect and Cure. Aw yeah.

Agrias has enough spillover JP to learn Magic Defense Up. LOOK OUT BARIUS HILL SUMMONERS.

[AndrewRogue]

Generally speaking, I can buy both arguments re: DA/DA2 combat. DA2 combat does feel a lot faster and more pleasantly paced, while DA had better encounter design in general.

[Cotigo]

*Reads up.*

News flash.  Video game writing is bad.  Up next, I say something self aggrandizing and potentially offensive! This is the news.

[Scar]

Pokemon White - 612 lil bastards caught.

I am in breeding mode right now. Afterwards i will take some time and evolve the few pokemon that need to be happy in order to evolve. That's prolly my least favorite evolution method other then Feebas which this new gen game fixed.

Still contemplating EV training some choice pokemon too. Seems rather tedious for something I will never be able to use properly.

[Fenrir]

*Reads up.*

News flash.  Video game writing is bad.  Up next, I say something self aggrandizing and potentially offensive! This is the news.

Speaking of which, I've really started FF13. I've begun skipping every cutscene shortly after Yuj has been introduced, then reading everything on the in game database. It is a weird but interesting experience. It feels like reading a weird wiki of Hunger Games or something, that neglects half the events but spends a lot of time rehashing the same things.

Has Grefter commented on Lightning's clothes? What is going on with her sheath? It looks ridiculously impractical and the back of her thighs must really hurt. (I usually never notice this kind of thing)


I'm finding battles pleasant enough so far. Chapter 1 and 2 were snoozefests, but from that point on I had to change strategies a lot to still get good ratings in battle.
Like (console) DA2, the game sacrifices player control and precision for a frantic pace. It's a hell of a lot better than DA2 about it, but I wish a compromise had been found.

Damage numbers have become purely masturbatory, as you get to see 5 different numbers appearing at the screen every second and can't possibly analyze them all. (you just end up watching HP bars go down instead)
Movement can have a pretty major role in battle, but you have next to no influence on it.
In Chrono Trigger you can see who Crono is going to hit with a Cyclone. In FF13 you can't see who Lightning is going to hit with Blitz.
Etc.

On paper you have to think about two things in battle: The paradigm of your team, and the individual choices of your main character.
But it seems that the game is trying everything to make these individual choices impractical. Itgives you a shiny and easy Auto battle instead, removing player choice even more.
I feel the game could have won a lot by allowing you to queue skills in advance; you wouldn't have to constantly make micro-decisions FAST FAST FAST about your character and could calmly focus on both parts of the battle system. (instead of just ignoring one)

[Cmdr_King]

P4 Arena-  finished story mode.  Since I have not meaningfully learned to play this game, we're just going to talk plot.

In some parts the game does suffer just from formatting.  I made the comment in chat that I was glad I didn't start with Yu, and here's why.  The serious P4 cast spend a big chunk of their stories being toyed with due to the illusion.  And Yosuke, Chie, and Yukiko take a long time to puzzle out what's going on.  Yu has the whole "fuck illusions, reach out to the truth" superpower going on, so that part of his story doesn't play out very much.  Having that breather in there was very nice.

Anyway, despite how the cast, locals, and atmosphere are largely drawn from P4, this is really a followup to P3.  Which is kinda odd since P3 already had a sequel game.  Anyway, the P4 cast mostly retreads old ground and don't get to do much that's really interesting.  There's thematic reasons for this, but it's still odd to play this and realize that it's mostly about Mitsuru and Aigis.  From a plot perspective it kinda makes sense given how closely it follows P4 at least.  It also holds true in characterization, which sits poorly with me.  Maybe this is just me, but it feels so strange for the P4 cast to really suffer when confronted with their old issues, while the P3 cast just shrugs it off.  I mean, in P3 characters just reach a certain point in the story and say to themselves "oh, wait, I gotta be a stronger person now!" and evolve their Persona and very little changes.  Meanwhile the P4 cast, who're stuck with their initial persona, damn near cave when confronted with their hangups that they literally, physically confronted in the last game?  I guess they were going for the fact that they've been isolated, or maybe highlighting that the P3 crew are older?  But it still rings hollow.

The actual plot is good.  The mystery and its solution make sense in the context of the game, Labrys as a character is pretty likable, and the callback to meeting Aigis in P3 got a sniffle out of me, which is always a good sign.  In that sense, how the plot plays out, at least it is closer to P4 than 3.

Dunno how much I'm going to actually do the fighting game part of things.


HOLY SHIT 99.9999% ODDS OF NYARLATHOTEP SIGHTING!  WHO ARE THE OTEHR DUDES IN THAT SHADOW OPS PICTURE?!  That's gotta be junpei, and I think maybe Yukari, but those other guys are definitely not P3 characters.  NEED DETAILS.  IS MA-YA A SUEPRHERO?!  INQUIRING MINDS WANT TO KNOW!!!!

[Dark Holy Elf]

I realised I never made a closing post for XF. Anyway I beat part 4, final boss was challenging but nothing unreasonable. Overall it was easier than I expected; it is like going through FFT at half normal levels; yes your stats are worse, but knowing the skill system well makes up for that.

Anyway, onto nastier challenges I am for some reason far wordier about:


Shadow Hearts 3: To South America!

Rio de Janeiro: notable for having the Warning Device, an accessory which eliminates ambushes and is completely essential to my sanity in this challenge as the randoms are only getting better.

Anyway, Machu Picchu is notable for a boss against which you can't use Shania. This is problematic since nobody else has her combination of damage and durability (only Frank even comes close, but Frank has bad speed and magic and I haven't used him in ages). Johnny is of course ready to go due to his level. For the second I choose Natan. Partly he is less underlevelled than some because I used him recently for the second UMA fight, but mostly he is wind innate, which means he resists one of the boss's attacks. Stats are fine overall too.

The randoms: (1 reset)

This reset comes entirely due to trying to use a Johnny/Natan party off the bat. It isn't very effective. I do eventually start using one but only once I've gotten a good handle on the randoms and have gained a level or two.

Anyway, this dungeon has FOUR different random enemies. Gasp.

Xi Dazuns are the swarming monster of the dungeon. They are tough enough to require Rock Burst to OHKO from Johnny or Natan which is bad since ST spell against swarm = no. Shania can get them with Bright Oracle or Red Bounce though. Their turns are mainly spent on a modest Gale Blast, but sometimes they'll cast Arc Surge and power up all the enemies' spells significantly.

Dicteos are the other kinda fragile enemy, but again, nothing short of Hail Solid (L2 ice) kills them from Johnny/Natan. This is better than relying on Rock Burst because it's a medium radius, but unfortunately it doesn't hit any ground-based enemies nearby (i.e. Xi Dazun; everything else in this dungeon flies). Their own turns are either an unimpressive Red Bounce or INSTANT DEATH fffff. Not 100% mercifully. Leo's Bear goes on one PC to help the odds. These guys are important to kill fast even so.

Xantaks are sturdier. They're tricky for non-Shania to 2HKO unboosted (again, needs Bright Oracle). Weak to light which fortunately is a great element anyway, so that helps. Their own turns are used for Paralysis (argh) and Evil Shade, medium-range stock breaking magic (argh). One of the highest priorities to kill.

Finally there is the Wariche, which has quite beastly HP (over double what Xantaks have). They're weak to wind, and their preferred actions are a SDef Down physical which is decently strong to start with and Rock Burst. After SDef Down spells can do loads of damage, from anyone. To make matters worse if they combo they will use both of those attacks in sequence, which of course does quite horrific damage, and can even hit flying Shania because the physical knocks the target down.

Anyway, this set of randoms is, as you can probably tell, a bit of a step up: a bit harder to kill, and their attacks are on average a bit more danagerous. The non-Shania parts which I attempt later are particularly tricky, and I increasingly start making use of strategies I haven't bothered with in the past, such as casting Surge more often (as it lets PCs OHKO groups of scrubs with a simple Bright Rage, and Shania can OHKO Xantaks with Bright Oracle). Arc Cure and watching HP definitely needs to happen more, too.

Kerufe (8 resets)

... ack.

Well let's talk about her attacks. Her first three turns are spent on Poison (twice), which inflicts the status MT twice at fast recharge time, and Gale, which boosts speed. Neither of these attacks are ever used again. The second use of Poison inflicts Deadly Poison, but this isn't really that big a deal... just heal the status and move on, it doesn't even deal damage unless it exists on a PC at the end of their turn. The fast recharge does mean that she gets off all three of these attacks before any PCs get a second turn, however, and she gains a lot of stock from it.

After that, she has four attacks. One is Gale Blast, which does 3HKO (maybe even 4HKO to Natan) wind magic to a line. Another is Pre-Ignition, a similar damage non-elemental attack (so 3HKO) to a large area (it gets two PCs sometimes, especially after revival or at the start of the battle). The last two attacks are physical and they are -nasty-. Solid 2HKO to both PCs. There's a normal physical, and one that inflicts Slow. Slow is pretty much terrible, it means around one third less turns. Between that and her quick recharge time it is incredibly easy to get overwhlmed.

If she gets a double, one of two things happen. One is Gale Blast into Pre-Ignition. Not so bad, doesn't kill anyone at full HP... though it can be awful if the party is in bad shape due to the AoE and retargetting possibilities. The other is a high angle physical into Air Shot, which is a combo magic spell. Screw elemental resistance, this easily OHKOs Natan, and Johnny gets overkilled. The only good part is if the physical kills and the second half of the attack retargets, the Air Shot misses since it can't hit ground-based targets. Overall these doubles are actually slightly less scary than Jeb's but only slightly.

Anyway, Slow makes this a hard battle. It can't be blocked or healed (it and Gale simply independently co-exist). The Gale phase is particularly nasty but mercifully it's only at the start of the battle... still, about 5 or 6 of my resets occur as a result of this phase directly. Of course, things are made harder still by a lack of Shania; my durability and damage both suffer significantly.

After some experimentation with magic builds I end up retreating to physicals as my main source of damage, because (a) Earth Edge never goes away and always boosts my damage by 120%, (b) Hard Hit destorys stock at no cost to my turns, and (c) the boss flies so Rock Burst is out short of combos, meaning the best magic attack a non-Hilda PC has against her is Rock Bump. Also, physicals can apply some useful status effects; I end up going with P-Defence Down because I have the L2 and it usually kicks in, adding a further boost to my damage. Another option is P-Attack Down which would have a more significant effect but is much rarer since I only have the L1; a tradeoff.

Arc Gale also proves crucial to my stratgy. With the boss getting so many turns, Arc Gale helps keep things under control a lot. Doubleturns still happen all over the place but a 30% speed boost does add up.

Johnny has both Arc Gale and Arc Cure, and uses those two a lot. He may also cast Rage on Natan or Earth Edge if needed. Natan is responsible for the offence with attacks and Hard Hits if Kerufe gets even half a stock bar, as keeping her from doubling is critical because if Natan drops I lose Earth Edge, and if either PC drops I lose Gale (though also Slow to be fair). Natan will also use Rage on himself if needed. Of course, both PCs chip in with various items: Thera Seed is notably better than Cure on one target, Thera Root even gets used rarely if Natan is on low health, one Magic Seed is needed for Johnny during the fight, and Pure Seeds are needed for Natan periodically. Johnny has a Blood Jewel so Sanity isn't a concern for him; as long as I make a ring he'll never lose a turn to berserk, although he does lose all his stock when this happens. When Johnny has nothing better to do, or the only PC injured is he himself, I have him defend to withstand pain and use his healing more efficiently with Arc Cure after Natan gets targetted.

Arc Gale and Johnny defending are the two main discoveries here which let me finally turn the corner, though lots of subtle changes are made to my approach throughout. Obviously the hardest fight yet, may be the hardest non-Lady boss on the challenge but we shall see.

Levels were 23 Johnny / 22 Natan.

[Sierra]

P4A: It is Arcsys so the tutorial consisted of a billion different defensive and combo moves you can use in X situation with X/Y button combinations and I immediately forgot all of it in favor of spamming special attacks. Oh well. I assumed I'd be focusing on Mitsuru because oh my god look at her, but all she has is charge moves and double quarter circle moves. Bleh. Labrys proved much easier to use, tore through arcade mode without too many problems. Haven't messed around much with story mode yet.

Why does the Japanese robogirl have a New Yawk accent.

[Grefter]

Because her name is Aaaiiiiiiiigis.

Dragon Age 2 - Finished my replay.  I liked the story more than I remembered and I disliked the combat more than I remembered.

[Talaysen]

I feel the game could have won a lot by allowing you to queue skills in advance; you wouldn't have to constantly make micro-decisions FAST FAST FAST about your character and could calmly focus on both parts of the battle system. (instead of just ignoring one)

You can queue skills in advance...  You don't need to wait until your ATB bar is full to select skills.

[Pyro]

REplaying Atelier Iris Eternal Mana:

The original idea was to get the Edge Cast bow this time that I mised my first playthrough so I could nab every item! But I think I ruined that idea by giving the shopkeeper the wrong vacuum cleaner and locking myself out of her quests... Which would suck balls.

Thinking of redoing the stat topic on this game with Crystals taken into account. Which mostly serves to make Klein and Lita more tanky since they get 2 crystal slots instead of 1. It also makes everyone want to use customizable weapons. I think it would raise the fighter's damage since the logical crystal to use (Battle Lord Power x3) is +105 HP/Atk. I guess you could argue folks want Speed Up options and whatnot but everyone would want that ANYWAY so it wouldn't effect the averages (and more slots isn't good for this since one or two speed crystals makes speed differences completely meaningless).

Klein is pretty awesome, as usual. DAMAGE and utility in one good package. Lita is all about killing shit dead with Fast Attack and a few Double Attacks stacked on her already Double-Attacking Astral Claw. That can get a bit silly. I'm impressed with Delsus' Feint Shot since it cancels enemy attacks before they take place, including for MT moves that would whack him. Niiiice.

[DjinnAndTonic]

P4A: Yay, a Persona 4 sequel! I had no idea that's what I was buying, but it's not a bad one. Cute story so far. I've only finished Brosuke's story mode. Fun BlazBlue-esque fighting game in there, too.

FF4-2: Beat Edge's story. Edge was pretty cool, actually. Too bad his Ninja buddies were obsequious piles of blandness. Still ended up being an above-average chapter of FF4-2. Which says more about FF4-2 than Edge's story... Also, the current "random PC jumps into the battle to rescue you" count is at 8. I have only finished 4 character chapters. This game... >.>;;

Tales of Graces: Slightly advanced the story! This game takes forever when you play with someone who works a different schedule than you... Sophie got blind or something. Also, Richard is probably the first Tales villain that's not horrible. He's actually pretty effective in the scene with Sophie. Better "Possessed Villain" than Kain, at least!

Lost Odyssey: lol, just kidding. I've turned it on like 4 times and got distracted by something else 4 times in last week.

[Grefter]

Gongora's boots have that effect on people.

[Idun]

Radiant Historia - restarted file. Still have a 10:41 file, but don't know what to do with it. This one is ~2, lookin' for the informant, goin' to the Mines.

Final Fantasy Theatrhythm - finished all the series tracks though I admit I failed hard (Avg. B) with FFIII. Slow music is slow. Perhaps considering redoing them after I play in the chaos shrine much longer. Got my fourth or fifth dark note, didn't know the game had -achievements - still rocking the Light/Terra/Cloud/Squall party despite their sayings ending in lols. Mm, there's a song on Ultimate I was going to try from FF13, and then I tried it for 2 seconds and then I died so I said yeahlolmoving on, at least until I get expert with everything. Doesn't seem too hard.

Got trolled in Mario Party 9 by Waluigi. ): Made me sort of sad. In fact, I came in third! I need to pick less troll characters! Koopa is my bro though.

DDD Demo - fun fun fun. Well, I don't particularly like what I've seen of his pokémon-like animals, but it's not too far of a cry from 358/2 so learning curve is really short. Getting used to using shoulder buttons on a handheld again. Figures using your finger instead of stylus is best in this case, *nods* Not going to lie though, an 'ish misses Donald and Goofy. So with this, I have 29 more times to play this demo. Coo' beans.

[Yoshiken]

Long FE9 post incoming!

Finished my challenge run! (Which was, in case people missed it, to use the lowest level party on every stage, and to not allow any deaths. Laguz counted as 2x their level, to make up for the lack of promotion.)
Final stage was "Watch Ike/Ena solo things while everyone else survives" - it took me a few attempts to figure the left side of the stage was easier than the right, and I sent Ena (with a single Laguz Stone) off to the right, Ike went charging straight ahead, and everyone else went left. Once they were done there, they went to help out Ena (who could tank forever, even untransformed, but couldn't kill much) while Ike smashed things. I got to berserk Ashnard twice, failing the first time because I didn't think Ike really needed Elixirs. Turns out, he did. Second Ashnard-run, I was much better prepared, with Ike having Elixirs -and- my healers being much nearer.

Character analysis!

First things first, the levels don't mean a huge amount. I spent some time grinding near the end (I'll post turns for each stage at the end of the post) so most of the obscenely high levels are because of that.

Another thing to note is that I won't talk about anyone I didn't use for more than the stage they joined, although I will note how many kills they got in brackets. Those characters are:
Stefan, Devdan, Tanith, Calill, Largo, Tauroneo, Bastian, Naesala, Haar (1), Lucia (2), Geoffrey (4)

Lastly, I'll list levels, kills and the place in the kill totals. A ~ next to the position means they were tied for it.

Ike - 20/20, 199 kills (1st) - Look surprised, Ike is MVP. With the help of a few items near the end, Ike capped something like 5 stats (HP, Skl, Spd, Def, Res) and smashed things with Aether. The only things that could hurt him on the final stage were a couple of mages, although they tended to miss, dragons, Bryce and Ashnard. Dragons tended to get Aether'd, which meant they did 3 damage. Bryce died surprisingly easy on the second try. Ashnard was the only real threat.

Boyd - 20/4, 58 kills (3rd) - I've never been a huge fan of Boyd, but he wasn't bad here (as the kill count shows). High HP meant he could tank, although he was responsible for a LOT of resets, since he consistently died if any sword user reached him. Still, when he could hit things, they'd tend to die.

Oscar - 20/20, 46 kills (~6th) - My Oscar got pretty RNG-screwed, especially compared to the general blessing I got in this run. He generally didn't deal much damage, but doubled most enemies and was useful anyway because cavalry are fucking awesome.

Titania - 20/4, 38 kills (9th) - Early-game, Titania proved to be amazingly useful as usual by sitting around without a weapon - she gained an entire level before even getting to attack, which says a lot. Once she got to attack, she was relatively useful, although still a higher level than most, and once she left the party, she never rejoined it.

Rhys - 20/5, 3 kills (30th) (29th if you ignore Geoffrey) - I cannot begin to describe how useful healers were on this challenge. Rhys was my first promoted unit other than Ike and Volke, and for good reason. Also an absolute life-saver on the final stage where he had Purge and Physic.

Gatrie - 20/9, 35 kills (11th) - The kill count makes Gatrie look better than he was. Mostly just an iron wall, except he wasn't really great at that compared to other units. Most of the kills he did get were from hitting cats with Laguz Lance, while Soren sat behind him healing. Also almost all of those were on Moment of Fate.

Shinon - 20/10, 17 kills (21st) - Ugh. Shinon was Shinon. A few kills early on, pathetic stats once he rejoined, and I fed him experience on Twisted Tower so that I could guarantee I wouldn't have to use him for Repatriation. Ended up with half-decent stats, but that was only because I forced him to gain those extra levels at the end - he had good growths there, so would have been terrible for Repatriation otherwise.

Soren - 20/16, 52 kills (5th) - Soren took a lot of help at the start. So much feeding him experience, it almost made me question why I ever used him in previous runs. That said, once he neared promotion, he was amazing at killing, and after promoting, the ability to heal coming off that magic was absolutely invaluable.

Mia - 20/4, 43 kills (8th) - Myrmidons are goooooood. Especially when I give them Vantage/Adept. That's a really nice combination. That said, it did take a few forged weapons to make her really good, and in Repatriation, she was actually sat with 4 forged weapons (named Crumcrat, Snagrat, Smashface and Smashface II.) Still, reliable crit rate and amazingly good at evasion tanking, which is much more effective when she gets the first hit.

Ilyana - 20/20, 34 kills (12th) - See Soren, change the healing thing for extra damage. (She got insanely blessed on pretty much everything but Magic, which meant she got doubles more often than not.)

Mist - 20/5, 0 kills - Mist was.. surprisingly useless, actually. She saw most of her use as a pre-promote, and the cavalry thing upon promotion was completely redundant outside of possibly one stage?

Rolf - 20/5, 36 kills (10th) - Maybe I just had bad luck with archers on this run, but Rolf didn't achieve much either. He got off to an amazing start, hitting Lv 8 before Oscar, but then slowed down drastically, eventually reaching an endgame where he could barely deal damage to enemies.

Marcia - 20/5, 46 kills (~6th) - Marcia would have been terrible if not for flight being absolutely amazing. Extra points for Brave Lance smashing on the final stage, which saved me a few times.

Lethe - 20, 71 kills (2nd) - Outside of Ike, Lethe was MVP of the run. I wish I was joking with that. Early on, Lethe transforming on the first turn was incredibly useful, and she tore through enemies, taking no damage at all. Once mages became more common, she took a little more care to use, but could still devastate armies easily, and played well into my defensive strategies. Once I got the Demi Band, she was able to push through stages without having to worry about time restraints, but could still hold her own without it, unlike other Laguz. Amazing.

Mordecai - 11, 55 kills (4th) - Would have been almost as good as Lethe, if not for the fact that he takes so long to transform. Once the Demi Band came in, he became a whole lot better, but he was so reliant on it that it really hurt his worth. Still fantastic, but not quite what he could have been, I think.

Volke - 20/6, 13 kills (27th) - Volke was pretty terrible on this run, actually. I did get him to Lv 20 before promotion, which is nice, but he was mostly useless because I had a better thief available who was forced for every stage. (We'll get to that in a bit.)

Kieran - 20/3, 16 kills (~22nd) - Like Oscar, Kieran was incredibly underwhelming. Didn't double anything, was quite frail, and didn't deal a huge amount of damage. His biggest use was to run in with a Tomahawk, attack from range, and then run away again.

Nephenee - 20/5, 27 kills (15th) - Started off reaaaaally badly, but eventually came into her own. She was way too frail to get any use out of Wrath early on, but after promotion, she was able to take out a fair few units on her own. Something of a glass cannon, but a very good one, unlike Kieran.

Brom - 20/10, 24 kills (18th) - That kill count really under-sells Brom. That part where Gatrie failed at tanking? Brom didn't. To clarify just how awesome Brom's tanking was, he was only joined by Ike and Ena as characters who were able to take a dragon's attack on Twisted Tower.

Zihark - 20/7, 29 kills (14th) - See Mia, replace evasion with extra damage. (This is a losing trade.) Vantage/Adept is so good, it should be illegal.

Sothe - 20, 22 kills (19th) - I was really dreading having to use Sothe for this challenge. He's an awful character with slow experience gain, thanks to Blossom, but terrible stats if you remove it. And what happened? He was awesome. Early on, stealing was surprisingly useful, as I managed to grab a few free staves, Vulneraries and Elixirs. Later on, having a Stiletto made Sothe perfectly capable of grabbing kills here and there, and he was pretty integral to a few strategies. Barely hit Lv 20 on the final stage, but capped a few stats in the process!

Jill - 20/5, 26 kills (~16th) - Jill started off incredibly useful - flying is just that good. However, by the end, she'd lost any defensive use she'd had before, and didn't gain any particular offensive use to make up for it, basically making her into a slightly better version of Kieran. In other words, she acted as something of a Jeigan for me in this run.

Astrid - 20/5, 16 kills (~22nd) - See the last sentence above. Astrid started off being able to get some easy kills, and promoted earlier than most, thanks to Paragon. By the final stage, though, she was barely dealing 8 damage with a fucking Brave Bow. Very disappointing end for a character who started off so well.

Makalov - 20/5, 26 kills (~16th) - The fact that he tied Jill for kills makes him seem better than he was. He was, at the very least, better than Kieran in this run, but that doesn't make him good. He was worse than Oscar, who had a bad game, and most of his kills came either from a forged weapon or Sonic Sword vs. Generals/Knights.

Muarim - 11, 5 kills (28th) - Kills do not represent worth in any way. Muarim was an incredible tank, and was fantastic for as long as he held a Demi Band. Unfortunately, like Mordecai, his worth was very much tied to it, and stages with both of them (such as Repatriation) became incredibly awkward.

Tormod - 20/18, 32 kills (13th) - Probably the best mage in this run, Tormod had pretty horrible damage compared to Ilyana/Soren, but made up for it with the extra movement and MUCH higher speed, meaning he consistently doubled where the others were getting doubled.

Reyson - 20 - Didn't get used for a huge amount of stages because, for the few stages he was on, he was incredibly useful, and I made the most of having him, meaning he got a lot of experience. He completely mocked Twisted Tower, making the stage almost laughable.

Janaff - 12, 15 kills (25th) - Ehh. Worse of the two hawks, Janaff had better speed, but worse damage/durability, and that is an awful trade. Slightly more evasive, but not enough for me to care.

Ulki - 13, 19 kills (20th) - Extra durability goes a long way with Laguz. Could quite comfortably tank, and still doubled most things so the speed loss compared to Janaff was irrelevant.

Ranulf - 12, 14 kills (26th) - What can I say? Ranulf smashed things and smashed them well. Technically a better version of Lethe, but with MUCH less availability and transforming later meaning he prefers having the Demi Band. Ends up worse because he joins so late, and Laguz aren't as powerful at that stage.

Elincia - 5 - Barely used her. First stage with her, she was a damn liability who needed protecting. She only came back for the final stage, where the movement helped with healing Ike at the end, but she couldn't deal damage to anything.

Ena - 20, 16 kills (~22nd) - Premier tank. Only existed for a couple of stages, but was amazing for both of them. Easy to grind levels on, which meant she was insanely good during Repatriation, and I really don't think I could have beaten the stage without her there.

From best to worst:
Ike > Lethe > Ena > Mordecai/Brom > Mia > Boyd/Sothe > Tormod > Ulki/Reyson > Zihark > Rhys > Soren > Jill/Nephenee > Ranulf/Muarim > Makalov/Janaff > Marcia > Gatrie > Volke > Ilyana > Titania > Oscar/Mist/Astrid > Rolf > Elincia > Shinon > Kieran

Notable stages for number of turns:
Chapter 4: Roadside Battle: 83 turns
Chapter 17: Day Breaks: 85 turns
Chapter 25: Strange Lands: 61 turns
Chapter 26: Clash!: 42 turns
Chapter 27: Moment of Fate: 270 turns
Chapter 28: Twisted Tower: 1389 turns
Endgame: Repatriation: 18 turns

So, overall, fun challenge, saw some use from characters I've never really used before... Now to carry over the data to FE10!

[Fenrir]

Grefter I need answers:
- DA2 templar path mystery
- Lightning's sheath: What is going on

I feel the game could have won a lot by allowing you to queue skills in advance; you wouldn't have to constantly make micro-decisions FAST FAST FAST about your character and could calmly focus on both parts of the battle system. (instead of just ignoring one)

You can queue skills in advance...  You don't need to wait until your ATB bar is full to select skills.

I mean several turns in advance. being able to plan several turns in advance and being able to interrupt them with the use of an item or a technique would be cool, for example. As it is you can't even do anything after selecting an action until it's finished, or you'll cancel it.

I've reached Chapter 8, 18 hours in. I've also reached 999% combo thingamabob against one boss.

Game: We have all these different accessories. Perhaps you want 30% poison resistance, or 10% physical resistance?
Me: Either a power wristband, or a Magician's Mark, for every character.
Later.
Game: Congratulations, you have unlocked a new accessory slot. This could be the time to reconsider -
Me: SELL ALL THESE PHOENIX DOWNS AND BUY A TON MORE POWER WRISTBANDS

Somehow my appreciation of player characters varies through the game even though I don't watch any cutscene. (Cutscene skip is really painless in such a linear game by the way) Right now I don't like Lightning and Hope, the others are all right.
What can I say. It's weird. I really like this game right now, but I'm avoiding half of it. Like a porn version of Super Mario Bros 3 where I try my best to avoid all the porn.

[Grefter]

SPOILARZ Dunno about Blood Mage with Templars (might try that sometime).  Meredith on the Templar path flips her shit after you kill Orsino yeah and orders the Templars to kill you.  There is talk from Cullen about how they were going to arrest you because hey you harbored at least two Apostates and you just have so much influence in the city.  Then it is pretty much the same as the other path.

Specifically what I wanted was your opinion on Orsino and the way he covered for and worked with Quentin (serial killer mage that kills urmom).  In the Templar route he talks about how Quentin was going to be more fuel for the fire to cut into Mage quality of life etc etc.  I had forgot how explicit that was outlined in the ending sequence though.

Lightning clearly just likes the feeling of tapping on dat ass.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

SPOILARZ Dunno about Blood Mage with Templars (might try that sometime).  Meredith on the Templar path flips her shit after you kill Orsino yeah and orders the Templars to kill you.  There is talk from Cullen about how they were going to arrest you because hey you harbored at least two Apostates and you just have so much influence in the city.  Then it is pretty much the same as the other path.

Specifically what I wanted was your opinion on Orsino and the way he covered for and worked with Quentin (serial killer mage that kills urmom).  In the Templar route he talks about how Quentin was going to be more fuel for the fire to cut into Mage quality of life etc etc.  I had forgot how explicit that was outlined in the ending sequence though.

Lightning clearly just likes the feeling of tapping on dat ass.

Regardless of how you play it out the ending is pretty much unchanged and is based around making you look like a schmuck.  Considering that there's a frame story involved Varric could have at least been like "and so we saved the day and then it was declared the first order of business was ADULT PARTYING" or something.

[Clear Tranquil]

Fenrir - I like the Auto Haste/Auto Brave/Auto Faith/ATB Advantage/First Strike (start with all ATB bars full) type accessories myself 

[Grefter]

From my faceroll autobattle spam play through I can say if you sink some time into the side stuff you can get through almost everything spamming HP up and Str/Mag boosters (barring a couple of useful resistance bits on key fights, like Lightning resist for Odin I think or something).  Still 5 star most fights and the ones that you don't will help you realise that the only reason you were bothering to get the 5 star rating was GOOD JOB SON YOU GET A GOLD STAR feedback as it has no actual impact whatsoever outside of a single trophy for the final boss.

Assassins Creed Revelations - Picked this back up finally.  My opinion of it still hasn't really raised.  It just feels rushed and cheap.  Brotherhood did as well, but less so than this.  The number of places on the map that you just get hung up on things is far far more prevalent than AC2 or Brotherhood.  The Parkour gameplay hasn't suffered for the extra bullshit this bad since AC1.  The things they added to the game either cut down on the parkour (hook is terrible and trivializes the most fun gameplay part to the series...) or just throws in extra busy work.  Den Defense thankfully isn't the big offender here although it had potential to be so ALA San Andreas Turf Wars.  The frequency is low enough that I got 1 before I could easily have made them a non-issue.  The part that really feels like it is busy work is the notoriety system.  It is cranked way the fuck up from what it was in AC2 and you just get it for doing more things.  Buying shops out now increases your notoriety?  So running around parkouring like a mofo and buying out shops and stuff means you have to fuck around with notoriety more often.  It doesn't add anything to the game, just one more hoop to jump through (or ignore, which then why the fuck even have it?).  Also in general, the economy in this game is way less broken.  I have found myself having to fuck around to get time to pass to get money out to go buy more things.  Previously this was a less arduous process.   Not that it is a big deal, I might *SHOCK* have to progress the plot instead of fucking around.  Fucking around is what this series does well though so making it a bit more grindy and a bigger time sink stinks of padding the game out, which is a real shame because Brotherhood worked so well in that while being actually about the same length as AC2 felt far more compact.  You hit the ground running and get most of the same upgrades again in a quick flurry.  In this one you like have most of them and they give you the mega snooze hook climby thing nearly right off the bat.  So there isn't anywhere you can't climb to that you need to come back to.  You are mostly just doing direct numerical upgrades when you actually upgrade rather than unlocking cool neat new little things here and there.

Finally bought the crossbow back and goddamn I should have skipped buying blacksmiths and monuments to get that forever ago.  Broken as fuck still but it makes many things less bothersome.

[AndrewRogue]

Persona 4 Arena: Sadly I have not actually had much time to play story mode, as Ashley has been busy.

Have completed a minimum of the first 20 challenges for every PC, with several having a few beyond that (I think I'm up to 26 or so for Naoto?). Some of these have been amazingly assholish to complete (some particularly easy ones gave me the hardest time, ala SLabrys' 15 I think? The jB, A, B, 2AB, C). Some were made a lot easier once Alex pointed out a trick to me (The first shot of Naoto's raid can be made by just holding the button!)

Not sure which character I'm most comfortable with naturally, as I've been just doing challenges until I get stuck (~10+ tries without notable success) and then moving to the next PC, repeating until I cleared at least 20 on everyone.

[Lord Ephraim]

Growlanser: Wayfarer of Time -  We start off as a well dressed silent protagonist shopping with our "sister" who doesn't understand that undergarments go under your clothes.  It's okay though, since we shortly find a shota unconscious in the woods.  They make it clear that he's clearly a boy despite looking as girly as possible in the dialog.  Probably girly voice too but Altus cuts the voice acting because LAZY.  They bring back the multiple choice personality exam from Growlanser 3.  I pick the "......" as much as possible to roleplay as Squall.  Battles still remain objective based rather than just kill everything. However it's much harder than the rest of the series.  My party consists of well dressed mute, wonderful shotaboy, and a muscular pretty boy named "Vallery".   Man, no wonder Niu liked this game so much. I don't remember who his favorite character was but it's a yaoi party with these character designs. I haven't ran into the outrageously dressed female characters yet besides my fairy robot.

[Niu]

Growlanser: Wayfarer of Time -  We start off as a well dressed silent protagonist shopping with our "sister" who doesn't understand that undergarments go under your clothes.  It's okay though, since we shortly find a shota unconscious in the woods.  They make it clear that he's clearly a boy despite looking as girly as possible in the dialog.  Probably girly voice too but Altus cuts the voice acting because LAZY.  They bring back the multiple choice personality exam from Growlanser 3.  I pick the "......" as much as possible to roleplay as Squall.  Battles still remain objective based rather than just kill everything. However it's much harder than the rest of the series.  My party consists of well dressed mute, wonderful shotaboy, and a muscular pretty boy named "Vallery".   Man, no wonder Niu liked this game so much. I don't remember who his favorite character was but it's a yaoi party with these character designs. I haven't ran into the outrageously dressed female characters yet besides my fairy robot.

Diana Sivernale is my facorite, I had her as my avatar for a long time when GL4 originally came out. Shota boy Rems ranked third after Ordinale brothers. Love to the Imperial Guards.
And... before commenting on the main being well dressed, think his black lipstick deserves some comments first.
Also, the original route is FARFAR better then the newly added PSP version routes.
Try to avoid the PSP version routes by all cost by either not giving Pamela the docs she needs, or not saving Vester's henchwomen twins.
PSP version route is BADBADBAD.