What games are you playing 2014?

[Grefter]

Pretty much, but I don't understand Agares' aggressive action against the City State in that case.  He generally seems competent and effective, but his crazy son has clearly usurped a great deal of political power in something that should really be an absolute monarchy.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I got the impression that Agares was supposed to be rather weak actually, and that the aggressive action pretty much happens because Luca orchestrates the plan to make it happen (with Rowd, at the start of the game).

[Cmdr_King]

It's definitely worth remembering that Agares, confronted with kidnapping and assault on his family clearly orchestrated by the City-States, basically ran away and hoped for the best.  It's pretty believable that Luca was able to get the support he needed in the court and army out from under him.  Granted, at the same time basically everyone except Rowd and possibly Gorudo were also in on the "Get Luca killed before he can genocide TOO many people" plan.  Have to wonder how down they were with offing Agares.  Like, were they just following Luca along because he had too much support to openly oppose, or were they aiming from the start to get someone else on the throne through Jilia?  Odd thing to think about.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Alternatively they may have been following him because he was a killing machine and trying to oppose him too openly meant he would come down on you. Hard to say no when someone says "do what I say or I will go all Mortal Kombat on you."

[NotMiki]

I liked the Catacombs! A LOT. It's one of my favourite areas actually.
Having to rush for necromancers instead of just playing defensively like the rest of the game
Kicking skellies so they don't get necromance'd
Wheelies
That evil spiral staircase
Getting lost
Patches
Invading people and tricking them like Patches
Trying to rush for Pinwheel just for the 20 flasks when I'm obviously too underleved for it
I don't mind the more linear design in DS2 though.

Catacombs has some great elements and some ffffffffffff elements.  I love how necromancers and skeletons work.  Once you know, it incentivizes gutsy gameplay in a game that usually rewards caution.  But figuring it out?  Not so much.  Also, bonewheels?  Hilarious.  But.  Climbing back up from the boss if you do the dungeon early?  Not hilarious.

I wonder if there is another dungeon in the game where the difficulty varies to such a degree based on previous knowledge of how it works.  Probably not, even if you don't take the shortcut down.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I love how necromancers and skeletons work.  Once you know, it incentivizes gutsy gameplay in a game that usually rewards caution.

Or you just use a holy weapon. Which frankly is just as easy to figure out as the way you're "supposed to" (especially since it's not obvious there even are necromancers when you first reach the auto-reviving skeletons), and if you ask for help / use a guide / pick things up by osmosis on the internet is the way you'll probably learn instead anyway. Regarding the second point, I was always a bit mystified by why you'd do that dungeon early (even with holy weapons I found it annoying and unfun, though I guess having more flasks for O&S isn't a terrible move); didn't even realise you'd have to do a long walk out if you did. That's terrible. The game was usually pretty good about creating shortcuts back from locations so it's weird that Catacombs doesn't have one.

tl;dr put me down for team Catacombs hate.

[jsh357]

I love how necromancers and skeletons work.  Once you know, it incentivizes gutsy gameplay in a game that usually rewards caution.

Or you just use a holy weapon. Which frankly is just as easy to figure out as the way you're "supposed to" (especially since it's not obvious there even are necromancers when you first reach the auto-reviving skeletons), and if you ask for help / use a guide / pick things up by osmosis on the internet is the way you'll probably learn instead anyway. Regarding the second point, I was always a bit mystified by why you'd do that dungeon early (even with holy weapons I found it annoying and unfun, though I guess having more flasks for O&S isn't a terrible move); didn't even realise you'd have to do a long walk out if you did. That's terrible. The game was usually pretty good about creating shortcuts back from locations so it's weird that Catacombs doesn't have one.

tl;dr put me down for team Catacombs hate.

The only reason you'd have to walk out of the Catacombs is if you lit a bonfire in Tomb of the Giants before placing the Lordvessel, which is not recommended under any circumstances.  As long as you don't do that, a Homeward Bone gets you out of the Catacombs no problem.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Doesn't it take you back to the last bonfire you used, i.e. one in the catacombs itself? If my memory is failing and there's no bonfire in the catacombs then that's an even worse design problem than having to walk out.

(Alternatively if my memory is failing even more and a homeward bone takes you back to Firelink Shrine or something then never mind.)

[jsh357]

Doesn't it take you back to the last bonfire you used, i.e. one in the catacombs itself? If my memory is failing and there's no bonfire in the catacombs then that's an even worse design problem than having to walk out.

(Alternatively if my memory is failing even more and a homeward bone takes you back to Firelink Shrine or something then never mind.)

The only Catacombs bonfire most people will use is the one right at the entrance, which is before the drops.  It's a very short walk back to Firelink Shrine (you can pretty much ignore the skeletons on the way even)  There IS a hidden bonfire in the Catacombs, but it's less convenient than the entrance one and I have never actually found it myself, so I'm not sure how often it gets used.  Even if you used that one, walking out of the Catacombs themselves is not that tricky; getting out of the Tomb of the Giants is an enormous pain.  I did it one time because I was using a Faith build and wanted the Large Divine Ember early (not worth it; normal weapons will still do more damage probably) and will never do it again.

[Fudozukushi]

The Ballad of Bobstein.

[NotMiki]

Regarding the second point, I was always a bit mystified by why you'd do that dungeon early

The only reason you'd have to walk out of the Catacombs is if you lit a bonfire in Tomb of the Giants before placing the Lordvessel, which is not recommended under any circumstances.  As long as you don't do that, a Homeward Bone gets you out of the Catacombs no problem.

Because you didn't read a guide that tells you there's nothing down there worth the while and it would be more productive to do it later, natch.

p.s. I totally lit that bonfire before placing the Lordvessel.

[superaielman]

Han Cunningham, possible father of Hugo. Agares himself struck me as a pretty weak king in general but not a bad person. (To Rob since it didn't quote my post)

[Sierra]

Doesn't it take you back to the last bonfire you used, i.e. one in the catacombs itself? If my memory is failing and there's no bonfire in the catacombs then that's an even worse design problem than having to walk out.

(Alternatively if my memory is failing even more and a homeward bone takes you back to Firelink Shrine or something then never mind.)

The only Catacombs bonfire most people will use is the one right at the entrance, which is before the drops.  It's a very short walk back to Firelink Shrine (you can pretty much ignore the skeletons on the way even)  There IS a hidden bonfire in the Catacombs, but it's less convenient than the entrance one and I have never actually found it myself, so I'm not sure how often it gets used.  Even if you used that one, walking out of the Catacombs themselves is not that tricky; getting out of the Tomb of the Giants is an enormous pain.  I did it one time because I was using a Faith build and wanted the Large Divine Ember early (not worth it; normal weapons will still do more damage probably) and will never do it again.

Ditto except I wanted Wrath of the Gods early instead. Whatever the reason, climbing all the way back up from Tomb of the Giants on foot is basically the worst thing in the game.

[Fenrir]

Play online for the "Fake wall" messages. That bonfire actually saves a bit of time if you do the Catacombs properly (which you're probably not doing)

You meet a necromancer pretty early in the catacombs so it's easy to find out how they work.
Holy weapons are hard to get and pretty crappy against skeletons early on. You have to level it up and uuugh.
I beat Catacombs before Blighttown IIRC. Less "NOPE" first time through the game.



Megami Tensei 1 (on Snes): Beat Medusa.
Got access to the least important mode 7 world map ever made. It has to be seen.
Good job.

The gameplay is very similar to SMT1-2 except you never get these totally awesome guns. So it's very different.
I hope I'll get some MT damage beyond Cerberus's attack at one point, because right now PCs are just attacking enemies at random, and that's a terrible thing when there are 8 enemies. It's FF1 except ten times worse.


Kingdom of Loathing: Went back to it after like 10 years from some reason? Let's see:
- Finished after one month as a Sauceror, ascended to an Avatar of Sneaky Pete/Fonzie.
- Playing takes like one hour per day. It's crazy.
- There is so much shit now, so much shit. So much. That's what happens when you have guys working full time on a game where what takes the most time is not creating graphics or balancing gameplay but writing flavor text.
- The game unfortunately becomes very faq-baitish near the end. I guess you had to be there and collectively solve the puzzles. All alone it's just not happening, after the earlygame.

[Fudozukushi]

Bobstein spent a couple hours fighting Vince and Niko because it turns out they're actually kinda tough if you're not an end-game murder machine.

Especially when you're a poorly equipped SL1 run too.

[Grefter]

I wouldn't recommend trying to blitz down necromancers without a Holy weapon first play through either.  The game just doesn't support that kind of play well at all.  Doing it with a Divine Gargoyle Halberd was bad enough.  Was doing 69 damage a swing to skeletons, that took 4 swings to kill them.  To really sanely do it early you would need to know to use and have an upgraded Crushing weapon (gods help you if you try with a piercing weapon) .  If you have a Divine weapon you at least can still play slowly and there was only one or two Necromancers that I wasn't able to pick off with a bow when I wasn't having to manage skeleaggro.

Having run around fucking everywhere trying to find that second bonfire (online, got no messages, lol DS1 connectivity) even with a map and having no success, I honestly found the walk back up not really that bad.  I had become familiar with the bits that get me from A to B just fine.  It is trying to find all the bits and pieces heart at are tucked up the games arsehole that annoy the fuck out of me.  Stll have 0 clues as to where you jump off to get the cleric starter gear.

[Fenrir]

Ok I'm going to show that world map

There's a Floating Castle. Problem: Medusa controls it. You kill Medusa, then meet the Captain there who can teleport you to two places



Select the Corridor and you see that:



That thing in the middle is your castle. Everything but the castle zooms out, to show that the castle is rising.



And then the castle moves to black square above



Select Infini instead,a nd you get to that blue building you saw in the last picture






I am pretty sure this will be the last time I'll see the world map in that game.
Mode 7, more like Mode 1337.

[Grefter]

All these other SNES RPGs are mode7 compatible!  Why isn't our remake mode7.  We need to be able to tell people our game has mode7.  YOU NEED TO PUT IN MODE7.

Siiiiiiiiiiiigh fine okay.

[Cotigo]

I wouldn't recommend trying to blitz down necromancers without a Holy weapon first play through either.  The game just doesn't support that kind of play well at all.  Doing it with a Divine Gargoyle Halberd was bad enough.  Was doing 69 damage a swing to skeletons, that took 4 swings to kill them.  To really sanely do it early you would need to know to use and have an upgraded Crushing weapon (gods help you if you try with a piercing weapon) .  If you have a Divine weapon you at least can still play slowly and there was only one or two Necromancers that I wasn't able to pick off with a bow when I wasn't having to manage skeleaggro.

Lemme teach you this little thing called running past enemies. When you're blitzing down Necros you're not fighting skellies. It's still obnoxious but less obnoxious than the catacombs regularly are.

Kingdom of Loathing

Nonononononononnonono this game doesn't exist this game DOES NOT EXIST

[Fenrir]

I'm pretty sure you haven't permed -every skill-

The new hardcore path things are pretty fun. Well, Sneaky Pete at least is.

I have a talking motorcycle as a familiar, and a live audience that follows me in battle and approves whenever I smirk at them / say my catchphrase (Babababoo!), disapprove whenever I steal stuff.
There are 2 other characters with new skillsets, one path were you're back to school and have to spend 40 turns in school every day, one where bees hate you for no reason and this affects everything, one where you're a bare handed monk, etc.

It's at least great reading the wiki

[Meeplelard]

Bravely Default: Completed, got the better ending before the "Good but not ideal" one.  I didn't even know that option was available and just progressed with plot.  Dunno if I'll bother with the other because sounds like it's mostly just a less complete version of the original that suggests "You saved the day...for now..." but whatever.

I'd rant but honestly it's probably what everyone else says about the game.  It's a good game for the most part but with two main problems being that it overstays it's welcome and becomes repetitive as a result, as well as "Tiz is such a generic phoned in hero it's not even funny." 

Ok, minirant about Tiz now!
Worst part is the game tries it's best to make Tiz out to be the hero when you can clearly see the story was written with Agnes being the protagonist, but mid-development pulled an FF12 and went "people want their generic teenage* male hero Main Character, so we'll give it to them!  Wouldn't have been so bad if Tiz had a character beyond "Morally speaking, I'm completely perfect; if there's ever a question about what is the right thing to do, going with my thoughts is ALWAYS the right way!"  Not quite a Mary Sue, per se, more like a character taken directly out of an Afterschool Special.  Then scene that stands out most is the Bravo Bikini part.

Sage: No woman would dare wear this.
Edea: Is it really that bad?
Agnes: I must do anything to get Olivia's attention.
*gets it*
Edea: ...does this even COUNT as clothing?
Agnes: I can't be seen like this!
Ringabel: Ah, but you'll win the contest for sure! Sometimes you must do things you despise! Who wouldn't want to see you in that, right Sage?
Sage: Indeed!
Edea: Well, Agnes, it's your call?
Agnes: No, I can't go through with it!
Ringabel: Oh come on! Tiz, what do you think?
Tiz: You should wear what you want.  You shouldn't do things because others tell you.  I think you look great without it!

I swear, all Tiz needed was a little jingle and it'd basically be a "Be yourself" PSA moment.  I get that they wanted Tiz to be different than the two pervs, but they could have done it without it sounding like a phoned in PSA moment, like, say...what if he said this...

Tiz: Well, on one hand, there's no doubt that would get you a lot of attention, I'm not sure that's the kind of attention that'll help us. 

In this case, while Tiz is going "you probably shouldn't wear it", he's giving a more logical reason, not just "Be yourself!"  He's trying to demonstrate a "Con" compared to the pros.  Oh sure, doesn't display much more character, but it's at least not "perfect jesus boy" gag inducing like what he said.  Then bringing up the Vestal Garb because "everyone is dressing so flamboyantly, you dressing in a more simple manner would make you stand out as well, if in a different way!" would have worked, rather than the "I think your vestal Garb is super pretty, you should wear that!"

I've seen bland heroes in colorful casts before, good god was Tiz especially bad about it.  Again, wasn't just he was bland, but also the "everything he says is the morally right thing to do!"  There is on except that worked and that was the Egil arc, because it actually felt like it was a reflection of his character.  Main character fails to protect little brother in game's opening -> sees little boy in danger that reminds him of brother and decides to help him against all rationale.  Still the morally right thing, but at least there's a legitimate sense of motivation beyond "I'm playing the Main Character!"

So yeah, Tiz sucks.  But hey, 3/4 aint bad!  Especially compared to FF4HoL which was 0/4 <_<

*Tiz is 15 in the Japanese version, the entire cast was given +5 years in the US version to make them adults IIRC)

[Grefter]

Dark Souls - Killed the Gape.  Buffed up the Zweihander a bit in prep for Blighttown.  Pyro Hand is up to +7.  Debating whether I back door my way in or not.  I don't think I want any of the loot...  Edit - Other than clubs.

[Niu]

Masoukishin F - So, the game's solution to Neo Granzon and Possesion Masoukishin stomping things everywhere? Gives every grunt stupidly amount of hp. But it really doesn't help. Blackhole Cluster is 20000+ damage up front and super cheap.

[Sierra]

Dark Souls - Killed the Gape.  Buffed up the Zweihander a bit in prep for Blighttown.  Pyro Hand is up to +7.  Debating whether I back door my way in or not.  I don't think I want any of the loot...  Edit - Other than clubs.

Notable things in Blighttown:

-The whip (you don't care about this. Trust me).
-Power Within (pyromancy, but you shouldn't care about this either unless you're trophy-hunting).
-Eagle Shield (admittedly nice, but no longer the best middle shield since it got nerfed to 95% physical).
-Ninja suit (which is great but only because FASHION SOULS).

The only truly important find--the bonfire keeper soul--is more readily accessible through the backdoor anyway.

While I'm babbling more about Souls games, have I mentioned how completely and utterly nerfed to oblivion magic has become in DS2? It still looks perfectly fine in the maingame, and in NG might even be passable in the DLC...but hit NG+ in the DLC and dedicated caster builds are simply non-viable. Full stop. It's kind of like what they did with AotA in DS1, except much more extreme. Enemy elemental resists are just completely absurd in the new zones, especially given the health pools the nastier ones have. Get used to dealing half your normal spell damage, at best, and you'll run out of charges in no time flat if you think you can actually rely on magic as a primary form of offense. My sorcerer on NG++ for example? Had to toss on Crystal Magic Weapon and poke Sir Alonne to death with her shitty rapier because even with like 60 attunement and the fast-casting ring I couldn't reliably get off a Soul Spear without getting stabbed in the face--and even when I did, a couple sword pokes would deal as much damage as my best spells could. Bring a couple allies along and the boss resists ramp up to such extremes that even with top-tier spells you might as well be tossing spitballs at them. Like your best, limited-usage spells chipping 200 hp off a 14k health bar. The only thing I ever see people using magic for in co-op anymore is the buffs (which also don't help a ton, but hey it's a free action before a boss fight), because offensive magic is just so totally worthless in the new zones.

Obviously NG+ isn't the thing they specifically balanced the game around, nor do I suppose it really should be, but this is still pretty crazy on top of all the other hits casters have already taken in recent patches (CSS now taking two spell slots, CSS and regular Soul Spear taking longer to cast, GLS charges being halved, all Lightning Spear variants dealing less damage, GRS dealing less damage, abyss covenant ring bonus reduced to utter worthlessness, the fast-casting ring having a less potent effect). NG+ in the DLC seems calibrated to cater to all those dudes who like to mock caster-types as being easy-mode wusses.

[Fenrir]

There's also the Crimson Set in Blighttown, for Fashion Souls. I've used it too much.
Plus one of these things that upgrade your estus.
The Blighttown slugs are the only enemies I ever farm because they can drop a bunch of green shards at once.