What Games ya Playin' 2012 - Suplex a Train Edition

[Sierra]

You only went to the second world near the end of the game, but you still got Pure White World tendency there?? (To get the Dragon Bone Smasher) You just checked a faq for a few specific things before playing?

Dunno, man. I was mostly playing in online mode, so I can only presume some server event flipped world tendency for me (no longer a possibility now that the game's permanently offline, of course). I know this happened in 1-1 as well, because otherwise I wouldn't have spent all game running around in Miralda's clothes. I certainly did not make any special effort to manipulate world tendency, because I'm still not clear on how that's done apart from dying in body form (+black) and killing bosses in body form (+white).

I did kill the first two Stonefang bosses in body form, but I don't think that's quite enough for pure white (I killed an invader there too, if that helps any)? I killed most bosses in body form, really. Hell, the only one of the intermediate areas to even give me a death was 3-2 (couple falling deaths + FUCKING MANEATERS over and over again).

For the record I did try going to Stonefang very early but said Fuck It after a clown set me on fire.

[Fenrir]

You only went to the second world near the end of the game, but you still got Pure White World tendency there?? (To get the Dragon Bone Smasher) You just checked a faq for a few specific things before playing?

For the record I did try going to Stonefang very early but said Fuck It after a clown set me on fire.

I said that too, but then I said fuck it to the dragon, octopus head monsters, skeletons, and suspended wooden planks in the valley of defilement, and came back to Stonefang.

I had forgotten entirely about White World Tendency events, but it sounds like you just got it on your own. It's pretty much impossible to get White World Tendency otherwise without doing ridiculously unintuitive stuff (suicide in the hub world after defeating any boss!), doing a lot of co-op, or just being enough of a badass to never die. (Which looks like it happened  to you for trying Stonefang late. Usually people die over and over against the Armored Spider and Flamelurker)

You get a shift towards a whiter world tendency for killing bosses in any form, body or soul. You gets a shift towards a darker world tendency when you die in body form. So using ephemeral eye stones to get back to a body form will fuck up your worlds.


Deus Ex 1: The definitive, PS2 version!! Like 4 bucks on the PSN store now.
It feels older than Final Fantasy 1 on the NES.

I just did the tutorial. The stealth section was tough. I was throwing pots and flasks around the place to disctrat enemies, but no one noticed. The camouflage armor and thermal goggles that lasted all of 10 seconds each didn't help much either.
Machinegun robot at the end just got me down to around 8/400 health because I was trying in vain to use those TNT boxes against him.
 I was then reunited with my "brother", who didn't mind me shooting him two times in the chest but got angry after three shots. Things didn't turn out well.... I'm not sure I'm ready for realistic mode just yet.

In any case I'll invest my knowledge in hacking, swimming and computers, and be an asshole. I know how to use the internet and the butterfly stroke, so I'm confident enough to look down on the plebe who can't even send an email or do a front crawl.

[Grefter]

PS2 version sucks, but whatevers, if it gets you playing DE I won't complain.  Actually a pretty good build BTW.  Swimming is better than it seems at first.

[Nitori]

Wind Waker: This game makes me feel nice and smrt, perfectly low IQ for me while Alex can play all the high IQ indie puzzle games or something.

[Niji]

"Disgaea 4: A Speedrun Unforgotten.
Hour 1642, I think i might set the world record for fastest 100% completion of game!"


LOLOLOLOL

[Meeplelard]

EPIC KIRBY!!!: Beaten, got 75% done, not going to bother for 100%, since I played through every stage once and that's enough for me.

I think this is the worst Kirby Game I've ever played, honestly.  It feels dumbed down to the point that it feels like its intended for pre-schoolers rather than just "younger audience."  Kirby Games have always targetted children; that's obvious, but it felt like it was done in a way that was still fun for older players.  This game? Not so much. 

See, Kirby Games still have basic platform standards like the ability to die.  This game? Oh, you get a worse medal!  And since it follows Sonic Logic when you're hit, you can often get back a lot of what you lost if it wasn't near a pit (and unlike Sonic Games, you don't lost ALL your gems, so it doesn't feel like an actual consequence.) 

Furthermore, game removed a lot of Kirby standards.  Ok, so the Lasso is just a different way of handling inhaling; totally cool with that, and hey, I can aim where I through things!  And the car is basically the replacement of Kirby's dash, also fair...
But Parachute is not a replacement for Kirby's flight, and there's no Slide.  Oh, I can use Kirby's Down B from Smash whenever I want!  Pity that doesn't make up for Kirby's lack of power copying, which is generally the highlight of the series.

Add in the fact that the game just LOOKS AND ACTS like a game made for a Nick Jr. Show, and you'll see what I mean.  Yeah, I know the story sort of is meant to make fun of this, but rarely did it feel like an actual parody because the scenes weren't quite silly enough.

And then the vehicles...ok, those were alright...except for the Train.  That was like the worst thing ever.


To the game's credit, the final level was neat only because "Oh right, we're playing a Kirby game!" and throws a lot of Kirby Fanservice at you at once.  Nice that the game remembered this.


Honestly I get the feeling the game was made to be something Non-Kirby originally, and it even had an obvious Non-Kirby protagonist to use (Prince Puff, who is basically Blue Kirby w/ a Crown), then Nintendo went "wait, this won't sell...quick! Put our cutest non-Pokemon character at the front of the game!", and then the game became 10x more pink.


Ah well, I can already tell Return to Dream Land is a lot better just because its back to basics and capitalizing on what makes Kirby good, while also giving you 3 other characters to play with for maximum insanity.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Shadow Hearts 3: The Gate, Part Two

There are two new enemies, both are durable with some new tricks. First is the Len, the boringly-named dark innate enemy in the dungeon. They can cast Arc Shield to slow my offensive progress a little, or Arc Surge to make everyone scarier, or they can use their boss-styled trick, Deadly Poison, which does no damage inflicts the status on everyone with a fast recharge time. Deadly Poison can add up fast so Arc Heal is called for. They also have hard-hit physicals because they're jerks and cast Evil Servant.

The other new enemy is the Janus. With 1366 HP they take a lot of punishment to go down. They also have a boss-style status move, Apathy, as well as the more usual Instant Death physicals, although they only rarely use them and they're fought alone, so eh, not that bad. They can cast Bright Decide or Black Hole because this is the endgame and non-elemental options are becoming all the rage apparently.

Both new enemies are vulnerable to Poison, and Poison 3 (which is 100% I believe) is obtained in this dungeon, so that helps!

I also fight three new Malice Soakers in this area, but since I'm level 41-42 instead of 39, they go much more easily. Also I realise that they're vulnerable to Apathy, which is hugely helpful, as it means that as long as I land it every five turns, they never gain stock ever. Yes, Apathy matters! About time they made a boss-like enemy vulnerable to it.

So this takes us to the final boss!

Lady

Level 43.

Okay, so, depending on how the turn order falls, different things might happen here. She starts with two stock and will use it. I have one PC go before her (Shania because the RNG is being weird), and decide the best thing to do is defend. She takes about 200, Johnny takes about 830. An auspicious start! Anyway, I'm kinda able to tread water for a while, trying to control her stock at all costs while dealing with two actions that can do loads of damage, reviving a lot, etc. Eventually I miss one ring and die horribly. Although I only have one reset, it doesn't feel like there's much I can do... way too easy to get into a heal/revive lock, extremely difficult to do much of anything, and way too much "one mistake = death" in what will be far the longest boss fight to date. Not to mention some resets will have to deal with Lady going first and wiping me out immediately. Not terribly in the mood for that.

So let's do something completely different.


At this point I do some sidequests, grabbing ultimate weapons for Johnny and Shania (except Shania's weapon, coming soon). I also head to Garvoy Valley, with of course the main goal of getting Tirawa. There's a few ways I think Tirawa will help a significant amount.

1) Non-elemental. Since Lady intelligently chooses her hex spells, I saw non-stop Hex Glare (light elemental) which does quite a bit to Shania, so it would be nice not to see that.
2) Shining Zephyr. It heals more than Arc Cure AND does damage. Easily my best healing spell outside MP costs (Full Bloom would be even better, but Hilda's too far behind at this point). This is the biggest advantage, probably.
3) Better stats. Boring, but hard to argue with... Tirawa's notably better than the other fusions at their respective strong points.

There's no comparable boost to Johnny (besides getting Ether Purge, and lol to that), so yeah, it feels like a worthwhile use of my time. Also a slight level push will reduce the odds of Lady-goes-first-nukes-everything. Always a plus.


Garvoy Valley:

Three enemies here. The swarm one, Tsui Zooi, is the dangerous one, for sure, as they have Instant Death. And there can be up to six at a time. Yeah, I equip the Crucifix from the Gate and a Leonardo's Bear to not have to put up with that. They also cast Arc Cure which is pretty significant healing so not leaving things half-dead while Tsui Zoois are around is important, and cast Rock Javelin. Their combos and doubles involve their two attacks in some sequence.

Ignis is a rare enemy whose element is completely obvious before you see its attack spell! (Which is Red Gravity, if you're curious. Stupid stock-destroying noise.) They use a boss-style Apathy status attack which is kind of a drag if the battle is going to last a while but generally isn't too bad.

Xukrus has loads of HP and no real status weaknesses to speak of. They use a boss-style multitarget Seal attack, but fortunately they're kinda punching bags past that, so an opening round Arc Rage followed by just beating on them works. Their Doubles involve Gathering -> Bright Decide which is pretty benign overall. I still try to stop them but it's a low priority compared to the other enemies.

Not much to say here. These enemies are quite damaging... probably a bit moreso than Gate enemies on average, but outside possible Instant Death whoring it's really not too bad. No resets either.

Oh and around 80-90% through the dungeon Shania gets the Dream Porter and what little remains gets absolutely carved in half, lol 2 free stock gauges per battle, goodbye everyone I hope you enjoy Gathering/Entrance followed by three more attacks each battle.

Tirawa

So Tirawa's big gimmick is that she is a boss (with all the benefits of boss recharge) fought by only Johnny and Shania. Oh noes.

Unlike my failing it up against La Sirene, I'm able to mostly coast here. Tirawa only uses two attacks: a 2-3HKO physical which also destroys stock, and Shining Zephyr, which is 4HKO magic and drains. Both are purely singletarget, which is a mercy since there's no worrying about when both PCs might be hit simultaneously. If Tirawa Doubles, she will do the only thing she can, which is use both of these. Combined, they don't kill, at least against the usual Ashra's Earrings Awaker Johnny and fused Shania, so seeing Doubles isn't too bad.

In general, as such, it's a reasonably easy fight by this challenge's standards... I'm sure they figured that a quick-hitting boss for two PCs would be enough. The draining does drag the fight out a bit past its listed HP score, and it's difficult to Hard Hit (thus necessitating laggy Red Novas) but otherwise it's completely uneventful until Tirawa hits low HP.

At this point she uses Sunlit Vale, which is terrifying, as it raises all of her stats. Now her physical is a strong 2HKO, the draining is a 3HKO, the Double kills, and her speed is extremely good. Durability's also improved but whatever, no offence happening during this phase aside from periodic hard hits. It's only five turns, just five turns of carefully watching an enemy who goes from being weaker than most bosses to significantly stronger (if still, mercifully, lacking any sort of crowd control). Defending more is also not a bad idea during this phase, of course.

After the buffs evaporate, Tirawa's HP has recovered from a quarter to nearly half, but it's easy enough to gear up and deal with the remaining offence at this point.

Levels were 45.

I level up every one of Tirawa's statues EXCEPT the new skills (as she starts with Shining Zephyr, the only one useful against Lady) to level 4, and head back to the Gate.

[Fenrir]

PS2 version sucks, but whatevers, if it gets you playing DE I won't complain.  Actually a pretty good build BTW.  Swimming is better than it seems at first.

I guess those giant concrete walls weren't in the PC version. Them + loading times really are annoying, but I could handle Vampire Bloodlines loading times, so whatever.
Unlimited inventory in the PS2 version is probably blasphemous, but I rather like it. Human revolution had a really limited inventory; I could maybe have 3 guns at a time. I could replace one for another one, but then I wouldn't have much ammo + all that ammo I saved up for this gun would be wasted. I think limited inventory might make me try new things less, when it's trying to do the opposite.

Add pistols to my build. I like the lethal approach in this game, I love both my crossbow and my 10mm gun, and I've already started with one point in that anyway. I'm trying my best to avoid rising lockpicking instead, but it's hard. I might give in.
Swimming did indeed look like the one lovely worthless skill out of all of them. I can't really imagine there being that many sunken levels in the game.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Three guns at a time makes sense to me.  You ever tried to carry three guns at once in a fashion that leaves you able to do stuff?

[Grefter]

Ammo doesn't take up space in the original DE, so changing weapons isn't such a big deal.  There is enough space to do things, but whatevs inventory Tetris isn't the high point of games.  It really is load times and more cramped areas and shit that makes the console version bad.

There isn't a ton of underwater bits, but there is enough that a skill that cheap doesn't go that much astray.  Like I am not saying maxing it out is a great idea for all builds (which I assume you will do), but a point or so has an appreciable effect and is very affordable.

I have of course done Master Swimming and Aqualung just to be able to stay underwater for 10+ minutes at a time.

[Twilkitri]

Unreal - up to Noork's Elbow

Not really holding my interest.

Enemies seem to have bizarrely high health, considering I'm playing on the easiest difficulty.



Mario's Picross VC - Played through, essentially

It's Picross.

Did the Time Trial mode a couple of times, but it's not really my cup of tea. Did the easy mode course after the main courses, which made it pretty boring.

Shortly after I was done with it...



Picross e - Completed easy/normal courses

...this version came out. Tsk.

The smaller puzzles were seeming to be taking far too much advantage of the coloured final result, and being more abstract than necessary as a result, but that doesn't seem to be happening as much in the larger puzzles thankfully.

I'm a bit unhappy about using the stylus on the larger puzzles (with correspondingly smaller grid boxes), but it's still probably better than using the face buttons.



Dillon's Rolling Western - two days into first attempt at town 6

Currently got three stars for the first four towns and two stars for the fifth town. Looks like I only just barely had enough to unlock (? I haven't actually failed to meet the requirements yet, so I'm not sure if that is what they're actually for) the sixth town - I don't know how I feel about having to go back to old towns to improve my score if I get locked out of the next town.

I'm mostly enjoying it anyway, although it is a bit aggravating at points.




To The Moon - played through

I feel that it lives up to its reputation. Really should have bought it directly ages ago rather than waiting for it to come out on Steam.

Noting that I had to disable DEP on it before it would run.

I feel that it had too much gameplay, in the sense that the block-flipping puzzles shouldn't have been necessary (especially since it was tracking your total moves but that never ended up being used for anything?). Controls were off, clicking on things which weren't right nearby often resulted in the characters walking past what you'd clicked on and not commencing interaction with it.

Pretty awesome/depressing all up.

[superaielman]

FF1 Mod of Balance- It's a fan mod that attempts to bring PSX/NES level challenge to Dawn of souls.  I'm at Chaos.

The changes: EXP and Gil have been scaled down. Equipment prices are much higher, and there is much, much better gear in the stores to compensate. Some recovery items have gone up in price (Ethers have jumped from 50 gil to 1000 gil). There are now a dozen classes you can pick at the beginning, which range from pure fighters to pure mages.  I ran with Master, Ninja, Priest, and Archmage.  Enemies are generally stronger; notably so for Air/Fire/Water/Earth elementals.

The good:  This mod fixed some things that absolutely had to be changed to give DoS enemies a chance. While he did cap temper spam at 2 castings per person, I found it to not be a notable limitation until Chaos.  Enemies absolutely needed more durability and damage, which he gave them. Increasing the costs of ethers was such a no duh decision. Ribbons needed the nerf stick as well.

The bad: Okay. Here we go.  That drop system? Everything drops something useful, including stat up items. The problem is that gil has been decreased so much that you  are pretty reliant on getting lucky for drops early on for cash.  Equipment is horrendously overpriced for the first third of the game or so. What makes it worse is that magic is still relatively cheap. The magic/physical balance is completely fucked until after you get the airship.  Ethers are still insanely cheap for the value. Most of the game has  your black mage spamming his best elemental damage, your white mage healing and your fighters taking on a secondary role. The pricing on gear gets better after the airship (More cash available for one, items take up less of your budget), but earl y on it's over the top. There wasn't much in the way of good challenge. Most of my resets have been from MT damage of doom, with a dash of status or two thrown into the mix.  It's easier than FF1 PSX until the airship, where it gets steadily harder.


The ugly: Bosses. They are terrible until Tiamat's last form, which has no durability but can OHKO your fighters if you get unlucky. . Tiamat 2 was literally two resets until she didn't open up with her MT nuke.  The guy who made the mod increased the range that spell damage can do. There's too goddamn much luck involved at points with evading magic and damage, and that gets old. Chaos is what pushed me from thinking it was a good attempt to bad fan hack range. He is close to unbeatable at my levels. I'm at L42 and OHKOed my entire team with Tsnaumi. What the fuck?  Blink did absolutely nothing to slow down his physical either, it's either ITE or he has a lot of accuracy.   Being completely unable to even slow down Chaos's HP or being unable to blitz him means you need more levels to just tank through his MT stuff. Scaling Chaos for doing side dungeons is a seriously poor choice, when the rest of the game clearly is not scaled for it.

[Shale]

Penny Arcade 3: Finished everything (both endings, killed Molly, all classes to level 40). Pretty good game. Great variety and design on the enemies, good gameplay, entertaining writing. Wish things were set up to make class experimentation easier, but seeing your options is such a gigantic pain in the ass that I generally just coasted with whatever setup I had. Endgame relied on Tycho and Moira as buff and heal batteries while Jim debuffed and set up continuing damage (Bottled Rage plus Gardenar effects) and Gabe smashed. Very little can stand up to a Pain Eater/Power Up'd Devil Fist (although I did eat a reset on the Periphery fight because I dicked around too much with the second form and let the Gate build up damage).

[Nitori]

Wind Waker: Tingle is a fine example of an eviler, more capitalism fueled Snow

[Fenrir]

Three guns at a time makes sense to me.  You ever tried to carry three guns at once in a fashion that leaves you able to do stuff?

Deus Ex really isn't the kind of game that makes sense. And gameplay > Realism.
It doesn't matter anyway considering Grefter's previous point, ammo not weighing anything in the PC version anyway (Why did they change that in HR??) + the fact that you're actually limited to 4 guns in the PS2 version (+ a ton of grenades and every melee weapon)

Like I am not saying maxing it out is a great idea for all builds (which I assume you will do), but a point or so has an appreciable effect and is very affordable.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it looks like most skills are like that. It just doesn't seem like master level is worth it, except for weapon skills? I've tried to go without one point in lockpicking but couldn't. Right now I just have 2 points in a bunch of skills, no skill having 3 points. (I'm going to master swimming ASAP anyway, yes)

I'm in 'ton hotel. Nice game so far, but I'm not crazy about it. You had to play it when it was released. I feel like Bloodlines, Alpha Protocol and Human Revolution have taken Deus Ex's ideas and went in much more interesting directions.  (Now if only they could take the skippable bosses as well)
I also have an averse reaction to the 1998-2000 lifeless 3D N64ish look. Reminds me of Hybrid Heaven, Golden Eye, Vampire Redemption...

[Grefter]

I guess so?  I don't really favour Environmental Training or Medicine at all, would consider Medicine an all or nothing skill (depending on whether you get Regeneration or Shielding for your chest slot.  plz dont pick shielding).  Lockpick and Electronics at 2 dots suffices, but there is enough skill points around to get 3 or 4 fairly easily.

Most people do focus on weapon skills fairly exclusively early on because they are damn good.  Every point in them is generally fantastic (except for maybe Explosives).  The jump in accuracy from Untrained to Trained is significant (speed boost for Heavy Weps is astounding).  Trained to Advanced isn't huge for Low Tech, but if you fuck up stealth you will notice it (and if you are going to fuck up stealth you should be using the Charge Prod anyway since it gives huge margin for error).  For Pistols it makes you accurate enough to handle yourself pretty well in a straight up firefight if you want to do one for some reason.  Rifles, well rifles lets you shoot open doors with the sniper rifle (and makes assualt rifle pretty ridiculous).  Heavy Weps it lets you be far more mobile.  Advanced to Master on all weapons pretty much makes you a killing machine with near perfect accuracy on pistols, Low Tech you just do stupid amounts of damage (backed by the strongest weapon in the game....).  Rifles is just downright stupid with 0 recoil on most guns and near perfect accuracy.  Heavy Weps it lets you run at full speed with them.  So you can do hit and fade guerilla strikes from vents with the Flamethrower which pretty much one shots everything in the game.

The dynamics from Heavy Weapons is the strangest and probably the one that rolls best on console, you can carry 4 weapons no matter how big they are.  So Flamethrower, GEP, Plasma Rifle all entirely doable together where as in PC version you kind of restrict your other options while you build up to that point of downright broken.  Mix it up with limited ammunition stock and probably having to leverage your way to the mid game off the strength of 10mm Pistol and Crossbow (and good stealth skills) it makes for a strangely shifting gameplay style.  That said, Flamethrower is OP as fuck and your limited ammo does go a long way.

[Luther Lansfeld]

TOPSP - Replaying this on the Chaos route. Good stuff.



I wish people said this to Kachua more often. (And the PSP version doesn't even give me this.)

[Dark Holy Elf]

Theatrhythm - After about 51 hours I think I'm ready to declare myself done with the game. Notable accomplishments: recruiting all characters, clearing 99 dark notes, clearing all of Stoic Ultimate with S ranks. Most used characters where Lightning and Cloud overall, who are both really good (Cloud in particular is clearly the best character in the game) and personal favourites so yeah. Used lots of Squall, Terra, and Yuna as well.

Overall the game was pretty good fun. In theory I've always kinda liked rhythm games in principle, but (a) portable makes them way better, and (b) I am hugely biased towards this game's track selection. I guess a portable rhythm game all about 90's rock might be similarly appealing but no clue if one exists. The game also had some RPG elements (mostly relevant for chaos shrine) which I found neat to play around with, even if they're a bit unbalanced (FMS are too easy to care about, which ruins some characters like Tidus). It's almost certainly the best new game I've played this year but it hasn't really been a great year so far, no game has really blown me away and that includes this one, but it's good. (DMC4 or Portrait of Ruin is next best.) 8/10 I think. Will likely play again periodically at some point but for now it's time for a break.


SH3: Let's finish this off.

Lady (2 resets)

Level 46. Equipment is ultimate stuff, plus:

Shania: Flare Brooch, Thor's Belt, Crucifix
Johnny: Ashra's Earrings, Blood Jewel, Crucifix

Straightforward enough. Flare Brooch and Blood Jewel are to not worry about Sanity, Crucifixes render Ring Abnormality a non-issue, Thor's Belt boosts Shining Zephyr, and Ashra's Earrings are an HP boost which certainly does save my life on more than one occasion.

Lady works differently from most bosses. There are technically two targets, Lady and Malice Unbral. Lady's invicible to everything and although she gains stock, will never use it, while Malice Unbral has to be the target of all offence and stock control. Both get "turns" (and have different skillsets mechanically, though you have to memorise whose turns result in which moves, because animation-wise Lady does all the attacking), and although neither has quick hits, that's still two enemy turns every round, so it's higher offence than any previous boss. The one nice thing is that you no longer have to play the estimation game of when the boss' recharge rates will cause them to lap your PCs.

Lady's own turns are used for just two different actions under normal circumstances: Crimson Raid, which is just her basic physical (solid 2HKO), and Ring Abnormality, which inflicts Fast Ring and Reverse Ring on everyone. While these are non-random effects and hence not instantly fatal, they're still really bad as missing rings in this fight is terrible, hence the Crucifixes. Crimson Raid gets used the large majority of the time, as would be expected.

Malice Unbral has three different actions. One is Zeal Steal, which destroys one target's stock (without doing damage) and gives half that stock to Unbral. Unbral getting stock is really bad, but this being a turn spent not on offence is good. Unfortunately it has a faster than normal recharge time, unlike most everything else in this fight (Ring Abnormality might as well, not certain). So in theory, a chain of Zeal Steal, lap, combo is possible, but not likely unless both PCs acted just recently, especially given the speed boosts of my PCs' fusions. The remaining turns are used for area-of-effect attacks. Hex spells usually hit two PCs (the battlefield is tight, as for the Malice Soakers), while Camality Gaze hits everyone. Hex spells are only used if they will hit weakness, and solidly 3HKO against weakness (high 4HKO against Ashra's Earrings Awaker with ultimate gear). Calamity Gaze 3HKOs both (though not quite as strongly as Hex Glare against non-Tirawa Shania) and inflicts chain. Chain means the next Crimson Raid will be fatal.

If Malice Unbral builds up stock, you will eat a combo of Calamity Gaze into Malice Dirge (which destroys stock, as before, though that's the least of your worries). With my fusions, earrings, and ultimate armours, this combo is barely survivable at full HP. It is still not something to be seen if at all possible. a D-Combo will do over 800 damage and is obviously extremely fatal short of defending. The D-Combo can only reasonably be seen once, though.

Lady also uses a few other spells in specific circumstances. The battle's real gimmick lies in Lost Progress: if you use any buffs, Lady will counter by dispelling them. This move also has instant recharge so she gets another turn after, too. In theory this can be used to mess with turn order but I don't bother... I can't really afford to give Lady more turns. Also, the first turn below half HP, Lady will cast Entrance (fast recharge), leading to a fatal or near-fatal Calamity Gaze on the next Unbral turn. The first turn she gets below one quarter HP, a Cure which restores 10% HP comes, which just drags out the fight a bit. Finally, when Malice Unbral is defeated, Lady will cast Malice Dirge as a counter. This Malice Dirge is super-charged compared to the normal one. However, if anyone survives it, the battle is automatically won.

Anyway, this fight plays a bit differently from most. For starters, people dying is pretty much inevitable, so the focus needs to be one not having both die. This isn't as bad as in most fights as at least no buffs are lost. A Calamity Gaze followed by Crimson Raid is always fatal, for instance. Both PCs use Resurrection with immediate priority, of course. Otherwise, the two priorities are on healing and stock breaking. Hard Hit is of course the preferred method of stock breaking, but between Zeal Steal and Blood Jewel it isn't always possible, so Red Nova works if a bit laggy. For healing, Arc Cure and Shining Zephyr have to be used a LOT, as not being at full HP (or at least reasonably high on both) sets up possible paths to loss. Cure Plus and Thera Extracts also come out as well.

Shining Zephyr is absolutely huge in this fight. This can't really be emphasised enough. Very, very few turns can be dedicated to pure offence, and those won't have buffs. Shining Zephyr is not only reasonably damaging (over 200) but acts as a super Arc Cure, so priority is given to using it. This allows the battle to proceed at a reasonable clip. Since the battle is largely a waiting game of playing near-perfectly (a missed ring at a bad time can lead to a game over), having a healing spell which also deals over 200 damage is huge. I could have won this without the sidequests in theory, but it would have to be completely, 100% mistake-free for something close to an hour, so yeah. Here, the odd mistake is survivable... I do see one Double which I barely survive and am able to regroup from. However, many mistakes are potentially fatal, so yeah, the ability to speed up the battle helps.

MP restoration needs to be done now and then (Shining Zephyr is reasonably expensive) but I have a few Mana Extracts sitting around so it's not too big a deal. Sanity I actually never need to worry about, as Shania dies often enough and Resurrection brings it all back anyway.

The battle has nasty spots. The first is the opening turn. A D-Combo comes at the start of the battle and it's pretty hard to deal with. The possibility exists that Lady just goes first and I instantly lose, but isn't too likely... Johnny has more raw speed AND PCs have an advantage on first-turn initiative. As long as somebody goes first, the best strategy is actually just to defend rather than desperate stock-breaking... there's no risk of failure and all two stock get drawn out. Resurrection can follow.

The other nasty point is of course Entrance. Having the other PC Defend as I drop Lady below half HP helps... if time permits both PCs can defend, but the turn order needs to line up nicely for that.

Finally, I hilarioualy almost die to the final Malice Dirge because it is stronger than I expect. That would have been bad.

Not much to say about the fight past that! It is certainly one of the hardest on the challenge due to the low margin for error and of course it would have been insanely so had I not done anything optional. As is I had more trouble with Kerufe, probably, but that's about it.


Not much to say about the challenge overall. It made me learn a few things about the game.

-The Blood Jewel is terrific. At a cost of making you learn a new and marginally tricky ring, and taking stock away whenever it kicks in, it lets you completely ignore one PC's sanity. Hi Johnny. HI AWAKER.
-Fusions are really great. Especially after both PCs got them, I was able to keep my durability above where it "should" be with them and that made a big deal. There's also a nice speed boost. This challenge would have been notably harder with different PCs, particularly not using Shania (Johnny is kinda meh for a long time, although Blood Jewel negated one of his major disadvantages).
-Despite some similarities this game has some pretty sweet boss design. For the most part each subsequent one puts a new ripple on things and they are generally legitimately challenging which is great. I'm not sure what I think of the game's tendency to have status attacks which it rewards you greatly for using a guide and immuning but (especially the fatal stuff) but at least there are lots of unimmunable stuff as well (stat downs etc.).
-Randoms are much easier than bosses though not negligible. They're usually quite fun due to the system even if there's really little reason to wipe to them on a normal playthrough outside ambushes.
-Judgement ring is great. Definitely feels like a timed hit system for all levels of play due to the hit/strike thing, and all the statuses which mess with it (particularly pit fights) is good times.

Lots of fun.

[Meeplelard]

Tactics Ogre: Beat Heim, if barely!

Hanging Gardens?  I entered, first fight enemies were level 22 to my 17 with much better gear and uh, yeah, winning that wasn't realistically happening seeing as it is a "Kill all enemies" mission. Guess I'm gonna have to grind a bit just to close the gap, because the current state is not looking good.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I found the Hanging Gardens way easier than the boss fights at Barnicia or Heim, myself.

[Grefter]

You should look up the track list for Elite Beat Agents Elf.  It isn't exclusively 90s rock, but it is pretty decent coverage.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I played Elite Beat Agents for like 20 minutes years ago and don't remember being terribly enamoured with the music but someone else probably chose songs for me.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Elite Beat Agents music is a bit too eclectic for its own good at times. It mixes stuff like generic nu rock and Queen and Rolling Stones and Destiny's Child. The songs do work in context, at least, but some choices are just kinda baffling. (Sk8r Boi? Seriously?)

[Sierra]

Heavy Rain: Had a borrowed copy of this sitting around for like a year, figured I might as well bash through it now since there's an opportunity to return the thing next weekend.

As a rule, I'm obliged to support experiments, even failed ones, but I can't say I'm much impressed by anything here. It really is Quick-Time Event: The Game. That's it! There's not much else one can say about the gameplay. It's reasonably forgiving, in that you don't always have to perfectly complete a sequence to make it through the scene--except when suddenly it isn't and you don't really know why and man why am I in an acid bath now, I didn't think I did that badly. When you have multiple options, it's not always clear what each one is going to do, which is frustrating (no, game, I didn't actually want to leave my partner to drown in the car while I swam away, goddammit). Every now and then one of your cues gets obscured by scenery, or it's hard to discern because your character's freaking out (an attempt to synergize plot and gameplay which I do not feel pays off constructively). It's just argh. I'd be more forgiving if it was in service of a decent story, but, well...

The developers obviously wanted the most detailed character models they could make, but the result is an effective demonstration that striving towards graphical realism doesn't automatically produce emotive and evocative characters. The adult character models generally look fine, but even then there's occasionally this slight jitteriness of movement to them that doesn't feel quite natural. And juvenile character models tend to come straight from Uncanny Valley, U.S.A.. Not to mention stuff like NPCs blindly walking into each other at the police station, which really pulls me out of the "Interactive Drama" box the game wants to play in and drops it right back into "Right, it's just another game with bad pathing."

Probably does not help that I'm considerably less than enamored of serial killer plots (that was by far my least favorite arc in L.A. Noire as well). The game's writing is never good enough to get around this. Profanity = gritty! Also Strong Female Characters. There is a female PC! Her first action is to get naked and take a shower, then have a nightmare about being assaulted by three masked dudes in her own apartment. She is regularly leered at by NPCs in almost all of her solo sequences. Nice work, writers! (I guess I should be fair and acknowledge that one of the male characters also starts the game by taking his clothes off...but somehow it doesn't feel as cheap there.)

The ending I got didn't make a whole pile of sense, either. Ethan gets to live happily ever after with his kid! Yay? I guess no one told the cops that he totally shot a dude in the head. Also apparently Jayden's a techno-ghost or something. What? I actually don't understand how the path I took to the ending could even remotely result in Ethan being free. "Yeah, the real killer was this private eye all along. We don't have any proof or anything because we killed him and his apartment blew up, but just take our word for it, it was him." Considering one of the only two people who can even vouch for that insubstantial a story happens to have been an extremely suspicious dude who was the police's main suspect and never bothered denying anything, it's really weird for everyone to be 100% convinced of the truth in the epilogue.

Maybe this would make more sense if the FBI guy had lived and put things together so that at least someone in a position of authority could've spoken up about the real story...but as it stands, I can't imagine Officer "Look, just let me beat a confession out of someone so I can clock out" Blake or Captain "You have to break a few skulls to make scrambled brains" Perry are gonna take the time to listen to anything that means they don't get to throw a triumphant press conference.

I will give it a little credit: the extended red herring actually fooled me. I'm kind of reminded of VP2, where for half the game you're too busy eyerolling about none of the characters noticing that SHE'S HRIST DAMMIT to even speculate whether anyone else in the cast might have their own secrets. Some of the VA cast does able work even if the writing usually doesn't deserve it (at the very least, Ethan's VA convincingly captures the visceral unpleasantness of cutting off your own goddamn finger). And they're actually very good about making tense moments feel tense with direction and audiovisual cues. Nothing that adds up to a commendable product, though. This just isn't a place gaming needs to go.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Also Strong Female Characters. There is a female PC! Her first action is to get naked and take a shower, then have a nightmare about being assaulted by three masked dudes in her own apartment. She is regularly leered at by NPCs in almost all of her solo sequences. Nice work, writers!

I think my feminist senses just banged their heads against a wall until passing out from reading this.