What Games Are You Playing 2013?

[Meeplelard]

<explaining the joke>
You can customise characters' outfits in The Last Story
This includes removing clothes (within reason)
Djinn enjoys looking at sexy human flesh
</explaining the joke>

The joke only goes so far when even the "naked" outfits are still more clothed than a number of games where characters full outfits still show of a lot of skin(...except Syrenne...)!

[dude789]

<explaining the joke>
You can customise characters' outfits in The Last Story
This includes removing clothes (within reason)
Djinn enjoys looking at sexy human flesh
</explaining the joke>

The joke only goes so far when even the "naked" outfits are still more clothed than a number of games where characters full outfits still show of a lot of skin(...except Syrenne...)!

There's also a "naked" dye that de-equips characters even further. You have to unlock it by doing one of the sidequests, but I think characters with it are just in their underwear. Alternatively, you could go the route of the SA LP and use really tight clothes combined with skin tone dyes. 

[Meeplelard]

I see.   Well, that changes things a bit, and chances are I won't be making much use of it at all!

[Scar]

Been playing a free version of FFXI for awhile now.

It's saving me money.

[DjinnAndTonic]

I was very equal opportunity about it. Guys and girls alike were equally naked.

Tales of Xillia: Oh man, Leia annoys me a lot in her introductory stuff. She gets better but goddamn does she make a terrible first impression. Kind of fun to play as her though. I may end up going back to using Jude because she has a lot of lag after her aerial attacks. She makes a weird healer.

Dear Tales of Xillia: Please don't take away my characters anymore. I am playing this game with my friends and when you do that, my friends cannot play. Especially do not do this for 5 hours straight after having given me nearly the full party before.

We invited another friend over to join us for video games and we decided on ToX, only to immediately get thrown into a Milla solo section... and then a Jude solo section... and then a Leia/Jude duo section. It's bad enough that it is suboptimal to play with unlinked PCs, it's worse when you don't even have the -option- to link.

[VySaika]

Well it would hardly be fair to only undress half the cast.

FE13: Decided to get around to a serious lunatic run. Feel pretty good that i cleared the first 3 maps(not counting the tutorial) on my first try. Map 4 is going to be a bitch though, as Fred only has 3 shots of Silver Lance left. Once renown awards open up, I am going to break this thing wide open and start creating uber kids to wreck the second half of the game with. But getting there will be the trick.

[Sierra]

Baldur's Gate, Tales of the Sadistic GM

Oh man. So I was just kind of dicking around in unexplored zones because I still didn't know where I was supposed to go (because I'd totally overlooked the necessary plot flag by visiting the wrong inn in Beregost) when I stumbled into this town called, I forget, Whatshisface's Beard or something. A bunch of cultists immediately spawn upon entry and steal that worthless dagger I got from killing the Demonknight. I chase them and kill them because hey, they've got red circles around their character models. Not too much trouble until I get to the cult HQ basement.

Cult leader instacasts Horror, summons a demon that immediately silences the whole team and paralyzes half of it. Okay, reset, try that a few more times until I manage to kill the mage before she can get her spell off. There's six cultists standing around the room but they don't do anything. I figure the game's glitching out, but hey, no arguments on my part because this fight's enough a bastard already. After a couple tries I manage to kill the demon without any casualties--at which point one of the cultists explodes and the demon respawns. Aw god dammit. So new plan, kite the demon around the room while the rest of the team murders the cultists one by one. This isn't easy either since he still has decent damage and a pile of status hax, but eventually I pull it off with just Minsc dead. Okay, no big, I can get him rezzed--then Imoen and Shar-Teel explode and turn into ghouls. WHAT THE FLYING FUCK.

At this point I FAQ the fight to see what the hell is going on. Okay so he has a spell that puts an invisible timer on someone and when it runs out they're dead forever, no resurrection, poof. Whyyyyyyyyyyy.

At this point I'm done playing the way the game wants me to. Imoen stealths in around the cult leader and shoots the cultists to death from outside her visual range. This takes a while because Imoen has party-worst damage hands down and there's six of these guys and they're kind of beefy, so I wander off for like twenty minutes while she plinks them all to death. No biggie, I had chores to get done anyway. Finally the cult leader's all alone and I can just straight up blitz the fight. It still takes a few tries because demons, man.

So what's my reward for this ordeal? Absolutely nothing. I poke around town a little more, this one dude's all "Hey go visit this isolated island for me there's relics to loot and everything." FUCK YOU no I'm done here.

Plotwise, cleared the bandit camp and the Cloakwood mine. Nothing much to say about either of these. Apparently I am up against the Iron Throne, look forward to bitchslapping Joffrey in person. So now there is actually a Baldur's Gate in my Baldur's Gate game, how about that. I immediately hit the shops, maybe there is something worth spending my hoarde of excess gold on in the game's only metropolis? The first shop I visit sells nothing but cursed gear. Whyyyyyy.

I also found a gender-switching belt. Oh hey, Shar-Teel, got a present for you, pal! (I'd do it if I thought she'd react in any way, but BG1 didn't put much effort into scripting its entirely-too-many PCs.)

[Fenrir]

I kinda liked the fight myself in the solo playthrough, but I had to cheat. By killing the six cultists then going up the stairs and resting. Evil Satan from the Depths is too fat to fit in the staircase.

The fight on the island is worse. Good thinking on getting the hell out of there.




Yattaf has done every BG2 sidequest + killed the two dragons + beat every cowled wizard fight you get by casting magic in the city. Not many opportunites for lawful evilness. She's on to siding with vampires and rolling over the rest of the game.
The mage stronghold quests were pretty fun. I'm going to keep "Yattaf's dagger" in my inventory and kill the final boss with it. Also needless to say all three mage kids are dead dead dead.

[Nitori]

GTA5: I think Xenosaga plot made more sense

[DjinnAndTonic]

FE13: All children recruited! Fuck those paralogue maps. Inigo and Owain are the best. Noire is hilarious, but doesn't flip out and go crazy nearly often enough. Severa makes me angry. Cynthia and Brady have some good moments. Laurent, Kjelle, Yarne, Morgan, Nah, and Gerome are just bland. I'm probably gonna stick to using the main cast and the three kids that I actually like.

Tharja is still MVP. Henry is up there too. Seriously, I'm reclassing everyone I can into Sorcerers next time.

[Fudozukushi]

ToX: Back up to endgame.  Jude now has max attack as his base.  Yay or something.  Milla's side of Chapter 4 was interesting.  It also taught me the best way to play as her.  Jump in the air and spam Thunder Blade until everything dies.

[Sierra]

BG1: Well that's done with.

I'm not sure exactly what happened with the Sarevok fight. Well, I'm not sure what happened the time I won. I quite definitely recall what happened when I tried to deal with it as a real fight, which was in turn half the party getting ID'd instantly and some asshole Haste-spamming Fireball arrows at me. So I decided this was obviously not a fight you're supposed to deal with fairly and lobbed a couple fireballs at the gang from offscreen before running to hide behind my summon cordon. Only Sarevok followed me. His goons definitely weren't dead, because I still saw battle messages from them killing stray wolves, but I guess their boss just ran too far away for their AI to keep track of him? Fine by me! He's enough of a meat grinder on his own, tore right through waves of summons while everyone sniped at him from the doorway. I wanted to let Hobocat killsteal, but nah, no way I'm sending the cat after a killing machine he'd probably need a crit to hit.

The cat can pickpocket, did I mention that? He's about as bad at it as you'd expect, but the mental image is no less fantastic for that.

Pretty glad to be moving on to BG2, BG1 isn't something I'd likely replay on its own merits. The dungeons are horrible clusterfucks of narrow, twisty corridors and the cast lacks the personality of its successor. I just spent an hour or so tooling around Irenicus's dungeon and that place alone evidences more character than all of BG1's environments. Sidequests are also all very bland. Kill/retrieve X sums up every one.

The fact that Sarevok didn't feel any need to change out of his totally metal demon armor and put on respectable clothes for the ducal initiation meeting (and that no one questioned this) conveys everything of consequence about the intelligence of Baldur's Gate citizenry.

[Shale]

FE9: Stage 19. Hawks stole the boss kill in 17.4, but I got the Adept scroll so I'm calling that a net win. Promoted a bunch of people in 18, got the triangle attack, now it's time to try and not kill any crows. This will certainly not be a pain in the ass.

[Grefter]

If you were wearing shit that metal you would never change out of it for so many reasons.  Primarily because of how goddamned long it would take, but partially because that shit is so fucking metal.

Also the Familiar Pickpocket is why the Elmonster solo that was linked earlier goes for a Chaotic (neutral?) Sorc, so they can save scum and get some useful stuff early game BG2 (Ring of Regeneration from dude with the shop in Waukeen's Promenade is the big win for solo games).

[Meeplelard]

FE9: Stage 19. Hawks stole the boss kill in 17.4, but I got the Adept scroll so I'm calling that a net win. Promoted a bunch of people in 18, got the triangle attack, now it's time to try and not kill any crows. This will certainly not be a pain in the ass.

On the bright side, you can start leveling Ike again!  Granted, I don't suspect Ike was level 20 for all THAT long (if he reached that at all), FE9 is actually nice about the plot promoting Lord in any event.


Last Story: Zael took over a warship with just his best friend and a mage...and conveniently ran into 2 of his allies who were captured on said ship along the way.  Whatever, all I know is Lisa looks good in Stealth Armor/Greaves, so damn it, she's keeping those on!

Pokemon Black: About to tackle Victory road.  Started using a Vullaby, looked at my levels, looked levels for Promotion, remembered final boss levels, realized I wasn't getting a Mandibuzz, and put Sigilyph back in my team.  If I was stubbon, I'd go grab Tornadus and use him as my flier, but don't feel like chasing a runner around right now.

Other Pokemon are Serperior, Krookodile, Carracosta, Cobalion, and Chandeleure.  Considered using Darmanitan, but effective as he is, he's also BORING (FLARE BLITZ! -> THINGS EXPLODE!  And that's all he ever does), Chandeleure at least has neat typing, even if probably a worse option.


Valkyrie Profile: Just started chapter 3, got Nanami so I have one stupid good Mage in my team, who that is will change!  About to get get Kashell.  Sending up Llewellyn this chapter because I didn't get Janus.

[Hunter Sopko]

I really like Sigilyph. In any other Pokémon game it'd be totally worth using, but Black/White is just horribly cruel to both Flying AND Psychic mons.

[Captain K.]

Sending up Llewellyn this chapter because I didn't get Janus.

You know who's better than sending up Llewelyn in Chapter 3?  ANYONE.

Seriously though don't do it, his Hero Value is too low for the Chapter and you won't get all of Odin's gifts.

[Grefter]

What if you LEVEL GRIND bro?  Totes doable (and stupid, breaking the class reqs impact is way lower than you expect.  Do the same thing when you need a strong swimmer later on and no fucks to give).

[Dark Holy Elf]

I've certainly gotten Llewelyn to the required level for C3's hero value req on a couple occasions. It's... 13 IIRC? High but not crazy unreasonable. Obviously it's not optimum play though.

Also only having 65 hero value is still pretty bad; I wouldn't be shocked if you still get better items from someone with better hero value even if it's not an archer.

[Grefter]

Having done it multiple times (because I am stupid and don't do things optimally like I actually know how to do), it really does take a bit of a grind.  Some Cave of Oblivion abuse goes far.

It helps that I kind of dig using him though.  I have more affection for Layer Storm and BUT THERE ARE NO WORDS than they really deserve.

That and Snow likes Janus and his taste in men has proven to be horrible.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Hey! >_< Low blow.

Tales of Xillia: In our never-ending quest to avoid Ivar, we have taken three times as long to get some damn transport wyverns as it would have to just let Ivar carry us one by one to our fucking destination. Note: I still have not gotten these transport wyverns.

But a whole lot of drama happened! I suspect that Alvin's story must play out a lot differently in Jude's path, because it doesn't come off nearly as bad as everyone was making it out to be. In fairness, it looks like a lot of the scenes in this section would have been Milla-only, making the whole thing a lot more clear than in a Jude playthrough where he's missing out on key scenes of Alvin's motivations and various coverups?

[Shale]

On the bright side, you can start leveling Ike again!  Granted, I don't suspect Ike was level 20 for all THAT long (if he reached that at all), FE9 is actually nice about the plot promoting Lord in any event.

He was L20 since...15 or 16, I forget which. Definitely all through 17. Not a huge deal, I'd have kept him off the front lines while he was at half speed anyway.

Speaking of Ike, Aether kicks in a lot for something with a supposed Skill/2 activation rate. Not complaining.

[Meeplelard]

That's because Aether in FE9 is a Skill% chance, at least according to Serenes.  FE10, where the move is stronger (ITD instead of Defense/2 on the 2nd hit) is Skill/2%, as are all mastery skills, though, Mastery SKills are generally better in FE10 as all Fighters (including Laguz) basically have a multipler tacted on, so it becomes a glorified critical hit.  In fact, on raw damage, I think Aether is one of the worse ones, just you never care because Ike hits so hard that his damage more than doubled is pretty much an insured kill to most enemies.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Why the fuck do you still say things.

It's none of your damn business.

[Grefter]

Look it isn't my fault that Janus is lame and boring.  No amount of adding Poison on his basic physical will save him.