What Games are you playing 2015?

[Veryslightlymad]

Hey, ID, this is neither here nor there, but do you play League of Legends under your usual call sign? I only ask because my roommate was paired up with an Infinity Dragon the other day and then you magically reappeared shortly thereafter.

[Grefter]

I just... fuck me.  This game makes me hate myself.

Yeah, that's the game's fault. Sure.

10/10 GOTY amirite

I don't blame the game for my vanity, emotional instability and self esteem issues.  Edit - that's what you are for after all.

Fen, that would work, need to build a function to handle comparing negatives.  Need to make sure to store results efficiently as well when comparing 3 as well.

[InfinityDragon]

Hey, ID, this is neither here nor there, but do you play League of Legends under your usual call sign? I only ask because my roommate was paired up with an Infinity Dragon the other day and then you magically reappeared shortly thereafter.

I haven't played LoL in a while now, and that was never my tag.

[Veryslightlymad]

Coincidence, then.

I like to think that my randomly thinking about you summoned you back into the existing universe.

[AndrewRogue]

Shovel Knight: Maingame beat. Fun. Pretty. Plays well. Pretty much a super well executed modern platformer. Using shovel hop in the middle of things is confusing and cost me a few deaths (as is the surprising sensitivity of starting it). Still, fun. 8/10.

[Fenrir]

Human Resource Machine: I really thought I had the most elegant solution to that last problem

[Reiska]

The Vaan/Basch deal mentioned above was what made one of my best friends quit playing FFXII, because he couldn't take the writing seriously after that (and he has an impressively low bar for RPG writing to boot).

The group over at the Phantasy Star Cave forums finished their Phantasy Star Generation:2 English patch, so I played through that.  TLDR: If you didn't like Phantasy Star 2 on some level already, don't bother, because more than likely, everything you disliked about it hasn't changed.

Rather than going into a long discourse in general on Phantasy Star II, I'll just talk about what changed throughout the game.  In general, this remake shares a lot in common with FF4DS, in both the good and bad ways.  The plot is, of course, the same as it's always been, but, like FF4DS, it's a fair bit more fleshed out.  The PCs get slightly more character development, for instance.  The overall flow of the game is same, but there's some added content here and there.  This would bring me to the first downside of the remake: almost all of the added content is annoying, padding, or both.

The remake changes layouts in a couple dungeons.  The most notable changes are in Nido Tower (the second dungeon of the game - the layout is now much more straightforward, but the dungeon is a bit longer) and the Control Tower (it's no longer a god-awful elevator maze from hell), and Skure (it's also less of a maze).  There are subtle alterations to Climatrol's layout as well (it ends up being slightly shorter as a result).  Even when layouts aren't changed, treasures often are - a lot of redundant equipment in the Dezorian dungeons got turned into big piles of meseta instead.

In any case, the game plays more or less the same until you reach Zema.  Once there, you're thrown into an annoying fetch-quest that I think is supposed to be a callback to the first game - sometime between the Genesis version and this remake, Rolf has forgotten how to speak the Motavians' native language, so now you have to do an annoying fetch quest to get a key item that allows you to do so.  It basically consists of talking to everyone in Zema (the road to Kueri won't open till you do this), then going to Kueri, then going back home because of course you have to meet Kain, then going back to Kueri and talking to everyone THERE, then going back to Zema and doing it again.  Then you have to do another annoying one to actually get the Jet Scooter: instead of just going down the back side of the dump and talking to the Motavian there and getting the scooter, you have to go down the back side of the dump, talk to him, return to Zema, buy a key item from a guy for 10,000 meseta, then go down the FRONT side of the dump and give it to a specific Motavian on the bottom floor.  Oh, and if you talk to the wrong Motavian on the way, he'll take it - without asking - and you have to go buy another one.  (What the fuck, Sega.)

From there, the rest of the game pretty much plays out the same as the original again, at least in terms of game flow.  The game is overall less grindy than the original; the only part I had to consciously grind was to get that 10,000 meseta for the key item.  In large part, this is because PCs not in your party gain EXP now.  It's not full gain - I didn't pay attention to the exact rate but I suspect it's between 50% and 75% of what active members gain - but it's enough, given the way level requirements scale (quite steeply beyond a certain point).  You can also, instead of having them gain EXP, work on creating items instead.  I found the item creation feature to be completely useless and horribly grindy; your mileage probably won't vary.  It's probably best ignored.

The battle system's changed up some.  It now pauses between each turn like most games rather than running your commands until you press a button to interrupt.  Basic physicals come in one of three attack levels.  Level 2 attacks are the baseline and what your party members will use on autobattle.  Level 1 attacks are more accurate and have an initiative bonus, but do about 1/4 to 1/3 less damage.  Level 3 attacks are less accurate and have an initiative penalty, but do about 1/4 to 1/3 more damage.  In general, I found level 2 attacks to be optimal, but there were times where the other levels were useful.

Each PC now also has a special skill meter which is filled by either making basic attacks or defending.  The rate at which it fills varies for each PC, and defending it raises it a bit more than twice as fast as attacking.  When the meter is full, a special skill unique to that PC can be used:

Rolf (Royal Guard) - Party is made completely invincible for 3 turns.  This blocks literally everything, including Dark Force's corruption attack.  His is also the slowest special to charge, taking six turns of defending to fill the meter.
Nei (Final Force) - One PC's TP are restored to full.  Takes four turns of defending to charge.
Rudo (Revenge) - Hits a single enemy for ~375-450 ITD damage.  Accuracy's similar to regular attacks (it can miss).  Takes two turns of defending to charge.
Amy (Nareverser) - Revives one PC at full HP.  Takes five turns of defending to charge.  Worth noting this is the only source of revival for around half to 2/3 of the game.
Hugh (Sulfur) - Hits all enemies for ~100 ITD damage and inflicts Paralysis.  The Paralysis from Sulfur ignores immunities; it works on every enemy in the game, including Neifirst, Dark Force, and Mother Brain.  However, it can miss.  Takes two turns of defending to charge.
Anna (Medical Treatment) - Removes all status ailments from all PCs.  Takes three turns of defending to charge.
Kain (Burst Touch) - Hits all enemies for ~200 ITD damage.  Takes two turns of defending plus one physical attack to charge, IIRC (I didn't use Kain much).
Shir (Tornado) - Hits all enemies for ~125 ITD wind damage.  Note that since it's elemental, a number of enemies will resist it and only take ~65 instead - most notably just about all robots.  Takes two turns of defending to charge.

Elemental damage is a thing now; I noticed very few overt elemental weaknesses, but resistances definitely exist.  So Nafoi isn't the end-all be-all tech anymore.  Rolf is still the best caster though.

PC balance is still a mess, and is arguably worse than the original game, though.  To break that down...

Rolf is still very clearly the gamebest PC.  He's lost none of his strengths from the original and he still learns basically every offensive technique in the game, including the newly added ones.  Megid doesn't hurt your party as much either (but it's still not going to see play unless you're overleveled).  He's slower than in the original game, now being just slightly faster than Rudo.
Nei is notably better on the whole, with an expanded support technique list, but has trouble with offense against defensive opponents in the later parts of the game she's in.  Most notably, she gets Shift/Deban/Nares.  She's also now way faster than everyone else (nearly 2x Rolf's speed, from memory).
Rudo hasn't changed meaningfully in any way.
Amy is now clearly the gameworst PC.  She has game-worst durability, game-worst offense, game-worst speed, and all of the unique abilities her skillset gives her can be duplicated by storebought consumables.  She used to have a niche in MT healing, however horribly inefficient it was, but she's lost that, as the remake made Star Mists buyable on Dezoris (for 1000 meseta a pop).  Moon Dews too, for that matter (at 12000 each).  Sure, they're expensive, but what else are you going to spend the money on?  Better that than lug around a PC who is slower than most of the enemies in the game and gets literally OHKOed by half the randoms on Dezoris and Dark Force and Mother Brain.  Through Deban.  Yes, she's that bad.  Remake Amy may just be the worst PC I've seen in any JRPG ever; she's a warm body for a bit, then she might be worth bringing for Deban until you get the Snow Crown ... maybe... and then you should never, ever use her again after that.
Hugh is probably the third-best PC now, strangely enough.  His paralysis spell works nearly 100% of the time on randoms (as long as they aren't robots), and even against robots, he has a better variety of attack techs to fall back on, plus Sulfur is probably the best PC special in the game that is actually usable.  Having him around for the final bosses makes them _unbelievably_ easier (it almost feels like cheating, but considering both of them have MT near-OHKO at the level I took the endgame at, I don't especially object).
Anna is ... marginally worse than on the Genesis.  In particular, her offense pre-Dezoris went from being kind of okay to being really awful, and she doesn't bring anything else to the table since she, like Rolf, got nerfed on speed.  I used for most of Dezoris all the same, until I switched Hugh back in for the final dungeon.
Kain doesn't stand out as much when Hugh has Sulfur, but he's probably still a very credible (maybe the best?) fourth party member choice.  I didn't use him as much as I probably should have so it's hard to say.
Shir has much better late-game offense now (the Laconia Dagger bug was fixed - her basic physicals almost keep up with Neisword Rolf now!), plus Tornado is a pretty good special, if not quite as good as Kain's.  Her durability isn't completely awful either; I ran her in my final party and didn't regret it.  That said, she's also nerfed on speed some.

As I alluded to above, the PC speed curve is a lot different: Nei is _way_ out in front.  Rolf, Rudo, Anna and Shir are all basically tied with each other; none of them are more than like 3-5 points of speed apart at equal levels.  Kain and Hugh are a step slower than that group, and more or less tied with each other, and Amy is gameworst.

Like FF4DS, on the whole this game, despite being less grindy than the original, is actually more difficult on average.  Lategame enemies hit EXTREMELY hard - there were enemies in the Nei equipment dungeons that were doing 3HKO damage on Rolf/Rudo (or 2HKO on Hugh/Shir) through Deban.  Dark Falz and Mother Brain themselves had borderline OHKO ST damage through Deban (it WAS enough to OHKO Hugh once) and MT which was just barely shy of being 2HKO on Rolf through Deban.  It's impossible to state just how much easier Hugh's Sulfur made these fights; the paralysis probably wiped out a good 3/4 of their turns.

That's about it, really.  There's a long and stupidly involved sidequest you can do to revive Nei in the remake; however, it requires clear data from the PS1 remake, which I don't have, so I didn't mess with it.  If you do it, she does get a weapon upgrade on Dezoris. 

[Veryslightlymad]

FFXII:

Got past Tiamat, who, barghle. I got this boss to like, 5 HP or something. Enough where the health bar was invisible before dying once, so when I did finally beat it, it was a pretty big relief.

Vaan: Has been clever-to-good lately, aside from the "never ask a woman their age" joke. His vitality is starting to really show how good it is, and I gave him boosting equipment to take advantage of it, and then I started giving him Hammers, because why not? Hammers are hilarious. Vaan will now hit from between 2 and 800 damage (party average is a little under 300). I'm pretty reasonably sure that his average is much higher than anyone but Basch at this point, so I think I'll keep him on that high random bullshit train.

Balthier: Still awesome. Honestly, I don't really like the gameplay in this game too much. Balthier here is the main reason why I keep playing. He's finally carved out a niche for himself as my Technick character, so he's got that going for himself.

Fran: Hey look, this character has story. So... she's basically an elf and the Viera are along the same asshole lines as Tolkien's original shitty elves. I haven't had much luck finding new magic in a long, long time, but she's still got bows, and that armor I found way back when is still the best I've got, so despite falling behind on damage, she's still not a liability by any stretch of the imagination. Even though everyone has Cura/Raise at this point, she's sort of my designated healer since, well, she has boosted MP and I might want Basch's for something else.

Basch: Speaking of. He now has 3 quickenings before any other character has one. On top of that, he's got my best weapon by far, consistently hitting for 760ish damage which is more than double just about anyone else, save Vaan and Penelo. Basch is the dude that I point at to make things die. If I'm struggling with small-fry for some reason, he makes a really good healer, since he has more than double anyone else's MP, too. He has had no story to speak of in this update.

Ashe: Really needs to not trust that little shit Larsa. Basch lite currently. I gave her Step Mine (fuck you, Traveler. You're a shitty name. Step Mine forever) so I have a secondary/tertiary nuke for hard bosses. Otherwise, she's just a really solid tank, trading quite a lot of Basch's damage output for huge pools of HP and better evade and a relic that helps her shield block.

Penelo: Continues to shatter worlds. POLES, son. Between the combos and the hitting MDef, it's just a great weapon. Better still, I gave her an evade-increasing relic. Look, I think we can all agree that Flans are the most annoying enemy type in this game of VERY ANNOYING enemies. Poles wreck flans. If you play or replay this game in the future, consider getting a dedicated pole-user just so you can not have to deal with asshole flans.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Since Zenny seemed concerned that we didn't have enough #FEDL...

Fire Emblem Awakening - Playthrough finished. I mostly didn't do any reclassing this time, and had the goal of getting every kid PC I hadn't gotten before (Owain, Brady, Inigo, Nah, Gerome). Unit notes...

Final team

Robin (+Spd, -Luck): Tried for the DL build. Offensive stats did feel a bit low (-Luck lowers them) so not quite as good as she could be. Still good. Third in kills with 85.
Chrom: He was lagging generally so I gave him Naga's Tear. Otherwise he kinda existed.
Stahl: Gained lots of speed and was one of my best PCs midgame. Post-promotion his speed mostly fell back to the usual Stahl territory so much less good by the end, though he always had pdur and good supports at least.
Sumia and Cordelia: Their usual good selves. I favoured staves with them more heavilly than I have in the past, so both got Physic and Mend at least. Too bad Recover is B in this game. Sumia was second in kills with 88.
Panne: Used her long enough for her to get reclassed back to 1, and after that her stats were extremely all-around good. Her Beastbane also ended up very handy. Ended up with capped Skill/Speed (over 50!). So yeah, useful. Lack of 2 range and only 6 move are the only real drawbacks. Ended up the kill leader at 104.
Anna: Provided her usual excellent utility, nothing out of the ordinary here. Lategame I class changed her to Sage and this actually works pretty well provided she can absorb the speed hit, since I had a spare forged Wind tome.
Cherche and Henry: I supported these two to get Gerome. They're in some ways kinda similar, amazing pdur and not-so-great speed/res, so they're great against fighters. Cherche had mobility and Hammers, Henry had Nosferatu and not having a weakness, they were both pretty useful.
Lucina: With Maribelle as her mom she was weaker than normal. Poor Str in particular. Demoiselle is a nice skill at least. Still decent.
Say'ri: Filler with good stats, then valuable as Tiki's support buddy.
Tiki: Lategame MVP as she often is ever since I figured out about reclassing to 1, invincible and killed things shockingly well when paired up.
Owain (Stahl as dad): His stats were pretty solid, though there have been faster myrmidons. I made him an assassin so someone would be able to use bows, got him to C rank there. He was never really exceptional but served his role well enough.
Morgan (Owain as dad): I got him after all the other kids but thanks to the levels Owain had gotten he was actually usable at base, and with Veteran I was able to level him to promotion in a couple maps. After that he was pretty sick with amazing stats, though lack of A rank = no Amatsu or Brave Sword meant that he was basically all stats, and still not as good as Panne or especially Tiki at that. Still useful late for sure.
Flavia and Basilio: As usual, better than the weaker kids/etc, A/B weapon ranks help, so they snuck onto the team.

Not on the final team

Lissa and Maribelle: Still not very good, I benched them once I got access to their kids.
Olivia: I love how dancing is all but mutually exclusive with getting her completely useless kid, that is great. One of these days I'll need to use her without worrying about Inigo so I can actually get a sense of her.
Sully and Miriel: Useful earlygame, got RNG-screwed in Sully's case, and just dropped in Miriel's, mostly due to Ricken.
Ricken: Actually he didn't turn out that good, but I needed to use male PCs and he was one of the better ones after he gained speed like his first 3 levels. Was Nah's dad.
Nowi: Is somewhat better than I've given her credit for? I dropped her when Tiki joined but using both would have been legit enough since she was near to Level 30, Tiki really didn't need the Dragonstone+, or they could trade it in some manner probably.
Tharja: See Miriel more or less, with Ricken and Henry on the team for parenting reasons using her didn't feel as compelling as it often does.
Libra: Filler staff user/dad. Solid in his role as always.
Gerome (Henry as dad): I got him prior to Chapter 19 and I tried to use him out of the box, but after a couple resets I decided to promote him so he wasn't a liability. He was okay, another Anathema user is always good, but wasn't good enough to stay on the team when the party size contracts in chapter 21.


Anyway, game remains fun. Assessment hasn't fundamentally changed, I would like it more if it didn't have ninja reinforcements (great to hear FE14 has done away with them!) but it's still a game I greatly enjoy and still will easily merit loads of replays.


(Kill data again mostly for my own reference)
Panne 104
Sumia 88
Robin 85
Chrom 79
Tiki 74
Stahl 73
Cordelia 69
Cherche 67
Henry 66
Lucina 58
Nowi 51
Owain 47
Say'ri 44
Morgan 35
Ricken 33
Miriel 24
Sully 23
Anna 17
Libra 13
Tharja 10
Flavia 10
Gerome 9
Frederick 5
Virion 3
Donnel 3
Nah 3
Vaike 2
Lon'qu 2
Olivia 2
Basilio 2
Gregor 1
Kellam 0
Lissa 0
Maribelle 0
Gaius 0
Inigo 0
Brady 0

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Beyond Earth's expansion has been out long enough for some general word to form so I picked it up. Overall, I think they've finally managed to differentiate themselves from 5 enough.  It's not as big a shift as 4 to 5 is, but it's probably a bigger change than 3 to 4. 

The main revisions are a general overhaul of diplomacy that definitely isn't borrowed from Endless Legend (play Endless Legend, it's the best 4X in years).  You start with a basic trait that defines your government and then pick three perks, one vaguely gold and industry-related, one kinda growth-related and one kinda culture and science-related.  You can upgrade them with capital, which you accumulate through buildings and when people make agreements with you.  Your traits change the agreements that are available to make with you, which means that each Civ has one agreement that can only be made with them.  The water city-focused Civ, for example, has an agreement that lets you increase the strength of water-going cities and make it easier to move them.  If you don't need to upgrade or buy things, you can use it to buy production like with energy.

The ocean overhaul was the other big thing.  Now, there's lots of different kind of ocean terrains and resources. You can also build cities on the ocean, which gain territory not through culture but by moving the city.  This means that you can more deliberately carve out territory or seize important water passages easily.  In my first game, I played the water city-centric North Sea Alliance and played exclusively with ocean cities.  The big changes are that food is far less important (ocean tiles having great food yields and farms being available in literally every tile) and industry is emphasized further, since you need industry to move your city and ocean terrain with good industry yields are far less common.  Of course, you can also use trade routes to bolster output to try and balance that out, but then you're losing out on very profitable trade yields.

Trade also got a boost, as trade routes can now yield strategic resources you don't have if you have a good diplomatic relationship with your trade partners.  This means you're no longer forced into the position of needing to decide between crippling yourself or angering an ally.  This is one of a lot of little changes (like hybrid affinities) that make the game play better overall.

I've played a couple times and enjoyed it a lot. I don't think I can recommend it over Endless Legend but if you're looking to change things up because you're Legend'ed out, you could do much worse.

[The Duck]

King of Dragon Pass - I started this and I don't know what the fuck I'm doing so I decided to harass the ducks and drive them to extinction. Then they gathered their beast buddies and I got fucking murked.

I do like how there is a bunch of weird lore shit ("The ducks claim to be descended from a great, vanished Empire called Ganderland") and no one really knows what anything means and that is reflected through the game mechanics.

I kind of wish I could on somebody's clan ring in real life so I could give them the worst lifehack advice.

[Fudozukushi]

King of Dragon Pass - I started this and I don't know what the fuck I'm doing so I decided to harass the ducks and drive them to extinction. Then they gathered their beast buddies and I got fucking murked.

I do like how there is a bunch of weird lore shit ("The ducks claim to be descended from a great, vanished Empire called Ganderland") and no one really knows what anything means and that is reflected through the game mechanics.

I kind of wish I could on somebody's clan ring in real life so I could give them the worst lifehack advice.

To quoth the wisest of sayings: "Never-EVER fuck with the ducks."

[Fenrir]

Wow, badass.

That Phantasy Star 2 remake looks like Etrian Odyssey Untold: take the base game, remove the one thing interesting about the story to give fans what they want, add grindy item creation to lengthen the game and fetchquests to develop the story somehow. I guess this is what you do when you remake games and have no idea of what you're doing

Human Resource Machine:
I only have one regular and two optional floors left, but right now I just can't handle it.
Sort 11 numbers at once???
I've still kept meeting about half of the optional goals from Floor 20 on so I don't feel too terrible. Just slightly terrible.

This game is like FF13 in that half the game is a tutorial. The difference is that this is a puzzle game so you can breeze through the easy parts very fast.
Starting from the multiplication level it all becomes hell and you just spend hours looking at your crappy code and not making any progress.

[Veryslightlymad]

King of Dragon Pass - I started this and I don't know what the fuck I'm doing so I decided to harass the ducks and drive them to extinction. Then they gathered their beast buddies and I got fucking murked.

I do like how there is a bunch of weird lore shit ("The ducks claim to be descended from a great, vanished Empire called Ganderland") and no one really knows what anything means and that is reflected through the game mechanics.

I kind of wish I could on somebody's clan ring in real life so I could give them the worst lifehack advice.

Don't antagonize anyone except for the other clans. EVERYONE ELSE is better than you are. If you think they aren't, you just haven't pissed them off enough to extinguish you, yet.

[Meeplelard]

Tales of Encount:

Narrator: When we last left our heroes we...*hammer to the face* OW! What was that-...
Ludger: Shove it.
Narrator: But...
Ludger: No.
Narrator: Oh come on.
Ludger: Leave.
Narrator: Fine. Geez.

*in Bakur's office, Bakur being leader of the Spirius Corporation that we learned earlier from parts I skipped*
Bakur: ...I thought I told you to come alone...
Ludger: You didn't...
Bakur: And who are these?
Ludger: ...friends?
Bakur: ...sure, whatever.  Anyway, I'm here to offer you a job!  The same one your brother had!
Alvin: Ok, there's totally a catch here.  I'm not the only one suspicious about this?
Elize: To be fair, Alvin, you were a mercenary, so taking on shady jobs was kind of your thing...
Alvin: ...my point stands!
Jude: I agree with Alvin.
Rowen: Yes, this guy does kind of rule over all of Elympios when you think about it and he could take over everything because of how economically powerful he is...
Bakur: Fine! I need Ludger because he can use a special power needed to destroy FRACTURED DIMENSIONS, something only he and his brother can do...since they're both Kresniks.
Jude: Wait, Kresnik? You mean...
Bakur: Yes, the same...
Teepo: Oh no! Run from his conviction!
Elle: What's conviction mean? Can we eat it?
Bakur: ...I meant OUR Kresnik...
Jude: You mean the lance guy right? Because I don't know who Teepo is talking about...
Bakur: Anyway, yes, him.  Ludger is a direct descendant, and he can destroy anomalies known as FRACTURED DIMENSIONS!!!
Rowen: Yes, you've mentioned that before, do you mind telling us more about them?
Bakur: How to put it...see that flower over there?
Elize: Yeah?
Bakur: ...good because that has nothing to do with this conversation, I just wanted you to admire my floral workmanship!  See, it's kind of a hobby of mine and I didn't really have leeway in and...
Ludger: AHEM!
Bakur: ...right, so anyway, there are realities that branch off ours, and feed off our PRIME Dimension...we're totally the right one by the way, so don't bother questioning...and we have to destroy these other dimensions.  You've sort of done this already but didn't know about it.
Jude: So you want us to blow up OTHER worlds so ours may live?
Bakur: Yes.
Jude: ...you're the main villain, aren't you?
Bakur: Now now, let's not get ahead of ourselves! I'll even show Ludger how to use his SUPER POWERS!!! and give him a fine salary to deal with his DEBT if he joins us.
Alvin: Let me guess, we can't continue the plot until Ludger says yes, can we?
Bakur: Pretty much.
Teepo: Oh come on and say it already! Want to get somewhere!
Rowen: Come now, let's just see this power Ludger can use.

*one tutorial later, Ludger now can transform into a super demon awesome mode*
Bakur: Good, now hang tight until you get a message for us.
Rowen: Based on historical evidence of this game, I think that means you have to pay off more of your debt.
Ludger: Mrgrgr.
*one debt payment and annoying Nova related nonsense later*
Spirius Corporation: Here's this object, NOW GO TO THE FRACTURED DIMENSION DUMBASS!
Jude: I didn't know insulting your employees was part of your protocol.
Nova: WELL IT IS AND MY TWIN SISTER WILL DO SO!
Alvin: Wait, when did you get here?
Nova: I am like a Ninja...FOR DEBT! BEHOLD MY GLORIOUS HAT POWERS!
Rowen: No, nobody even consider questioning her.  If you value your brains, it will only help to not think about it.
Elle: What did she just saw?
*everyone pratfalls*

*one fractured dimension shift later*
Alvin: This looks like Trigleph but...well...it's Trigleph, what's different about it?
Jude: I know! Me and Leia will split up and the rest of you will go searching in a clearly suspicious area!
Teepo: Wait, Leia was here this whole time? Why didn't she say anything?
Leia: Because a good reporter always pays attention and takes notes! ...also I was too awestruck at his flower workmanship.  I mean, did you guys even SEE that flower!? It was amazing and...
Jude: Ahem, come on Leia.
Leia: Oh, right, sorry!

*at a random natural plant later*
Svent: ALVIN!!!!!
Alvin: ...hi...uncle...I see...you're...uhh...wait, do you hate me or like me in this dimension? Need to get some context here...
Svent: Your mother would be upset with you the way you are acting!
Alvin: ...mom's alive?
Svent: Don't play games with me!
Alvin: hey Uncle, can we...you know...tour the place?  Want to show my friends.
Svent: WELL WHY DIDN"T YOU SAY SO!? So here we grow all food on Elympios and use the power of the GREATER SPIRIT ASKA...
Rowen: Say, is there a chance your uncle is the Catalyst?
Ludger: No reaction.
Rowen: Never-mind then.
Alvin: So...Aska must be the catalyst! I mean I never heard of a GREAT SPIRIT called that...
Teepo: It was totally in Tales of Phantasia and Symphonia and...
Elize: Er...what Teepo meant to say is we haven't heard of it existing in THIS game yet!
Alvin: ...yeah, so...Uncle...about that thing you have...consciousness...*pistol whips Svent* Now let's go kill a Great Spirit!

*one dungeon later*
Elle: AAAH! It's bright! WHY IS THE SUN ATTACKING ;_;
Rowen: So if I had to guess, Aska must be the GREAT SPIRIT OF LIGHT!
Alvin: Really? I thought it would be the great spirit of puppies.
Elle: PUPPIES!? Yay! Wait, Rollo doesn't like Puppies!
Rollo: Meow.
Teepo: At least he understands sarcasm!
Ludger: Bird, there!
Rowen: Yes, let's get to fighting it...
*one boss fight later*
Svent: NO! ALVIN! HOW DARE YOU TRY TO KILL THAT WHICH GIVES US POWER! ELYMPIOS WILL FALL!
Alvin: Well...we are going to destroy this reality anyway, so...uhh...lose lose for you?
Rowen: Ludger, do your thing?
Ludger: ...no reaction.
Alvin: So it WASN'T the catalyst!? Uh...well...how do we get out this situation without my uncle SHOOTING ME IN THE FACE!?
Aska: YOU WILL PAY FOR MY IMPRISONMENT! *eats Svent*
Teepo: WOW! THAT BIRD JUST COMPLETELY MURDERED THAT GUY! LET'S SEE IT AGAIN!!!
Aska: CHILD OF KRESNIK, ONE WHO HOLDS THE POWER OF CRONOS...toodles!
*Aska leaves*
Ludger: ...
Alvin: ...
Rowen: ...
Elize: ...
Teepo: ...
Rollo: ...
Elle: MY HEAD HURTS!!!!
Alvin: So...back to square one?
Rowen: It would appear to be so, let's hope Jude and Leia had more luck.
*Jude and Leia appear*
Jude: Yeah, we had no luck.
Ludger: Figures...
Leia: We did, however get a lead about a LONG HAIRED GREAT SPIRIT by the Dimensional Rift...you know that place that led to the final dungeon in the first game?
Rowen: Right, I'll stay back and give Svent a proper burial.  Elize, I want you to help me.
Elize: Why?
Rowen: Because we need to clear up space for Jude and Leia to join the team and this is as good an excuse as any.
Elize: Oh ok.
Teepo: Well that seemed rather forced!

*one trip back to that spot that we're skipping because screw it, not interesting*
Elle: There's nothing here! You are all wasting my time! I HATE YOU *sticks tongue out*
Rollo: Meow?
Alvin: This was definitely where the Rift was...what happened?
Jude: Hmm...maybe the fact that the Schism is still in place in this reality means it's still there?
??: Aha, foolish humans, you will know the wrath of...
Leia: JUDE LOOK OUT! THERE'S A NAKED MAN BEHIND YOU!
??: Wait what? Naked Man...NO! I'm CRONOS! THE GREAT SPIRIT OF...
Alvin: Hey, bro! Can you put some clothes on?
Cronos: NONSENSE! A GREAT SPIRIT LIKE MYSELF NEEDS NOT SUCH-...
Jude: But Milla wore clothes...
Cronos: NEW MAXWELL DOESN'T COUNT!
Leia: So did Muzet...
Cronos: Related to Maxwell, DOESN'T COUNT!
Alvin: I think both Volt and Celsius were dressed too...
Cronos: THAT'S IT! ALL OF YOU DIE NOW!!!
*one boss fight later*
Cronos: DO YOU FEEL THE PAIN AND SUFFERING!?
Jude: Uh...we won the fight so not really?
Cronos: ...PLOT BULLSHIT ACTIVATE!
Julius: CONVENIENT EXCUSE TO SHOW UP ACTIVATE!
Cronos: God damn it! TEMPORAL RIFT TO CONVENIENTLY SET UP NEXT PLOT POINT ACTIVATE!
Julius: JUMPING INTO PORTAL TO FORCE LUDGER TO FACE ME ACTIVATE!
Alvin: Uhh...stupid cutscene power of...grabbing children...activate?
Jude: ...seriously Alvin?
Alvin: oh come on! Don't tell me you didn't want to join in on that?
Leia: Can we just jump into the ominous portal already?
Rowen: Yes, let's do that.
Leia: Wait, when did you get here?
Teepo: We were always here!
Leia: ...whatever, let's just do the portal jumping already.
*team jumps in*

Ludger: ?
Jude: Hey, we're at Milla's house...wait, where's Alvin and Rowen?
Elize: Elle's gone too.
Ludger: Good.
Leia: No point standing around, let's get moving so we can find that thing.
*team heads off*
Leia: That...enemy...looks...off...
Ludger: ...crap...
*pseudo boss fight, ends prematurely*
Leia: So...Chronostasis thingy or whatever, wanna do that Ludger!?
Ludger: ...no dice...
Jude: Uh-oh, then what're we going to...
Milla: Humans should not be here! BE GONE EVIL BEINGS! *kills enemies and runs away*
Jude: ...well, we know where Milla is in this dimension I guess?
Leia: Is it just me or did it seem like she didn't recognize us?
Teepo: Milla seems mean here!
Jude: She probably never met us in this dimension...unfortunately...but let's get going.
*at Nia Khera*

Jude: Oh how convenient, the entire team is here...and Julius too.
Julius: Hello, Ludger...
Ludger: Brother...
*intense stare*
Leia: OMG OMG OMG OMG!!!
Elize: OMG OMG OMG OMG!!!
Elize/Leia: THE YAOI POTENTIAL!!!!
Elle: What's...yaoi?
Julius: Let's make this clear...I'm going to destroy this reality and you aren't going to stop me because we're totally doing the same thing and...
Jude: Actually, this is Ludger's mission, given by Spirius Corporation who is also your boss I think?
Julius: ...crap...fine, I'll let Ludger think he can handle this, but he totally should let me do it!
Spirius Corporation: We found an artifact thinga-majig, YOUR NEW MISSION IS TO FIND IT AND BRING IT BACK HERE!
Milla: I thought I told you all to leave this place.
Jude: Milla, we're your friends.
Milla: No you aren't, though I do feel attached to that cat...I MUST FEED IT NOW!
Rollo: Meow?
Elle: NOT WITHOUT ME YOU WON'T!
Ludger: ...
Jude: We have to follow them, don't we?
*at Milla's house*
Elle: Milla makes awesome food because it doesn't have tomatoes and ^_^!!!!!
Rollo: Meow.
Milla: My food is awful, she must have awful taste to think that's the case.
Ludger: Agreed.
Jude: So...Milla...this is your house and...
Muzet: MILLA! HOW DARE YOU INVITE GUESTS WITHOUT ME!?
Milla: I didn't invite, they just kind of...
Muzet: QUIET BITCH! LISTEN TO ME!
Leia: Is it just me or is her eyes like...not opening?
Muzet: NOW SHUT UP AND MAKE DINNER EVEN THOUGH YOU CAN'T COOK! *Smacks Milla*
Milla: I'm sorry sister!!!
Jude: Ok, something is horribly wrong here, and...
Leia: ...and you're staying behind here because yo'll get emotional.  Rowen and Elize, please tie Jude to a bench while me, Ludger and Alvin solve this issue.
Rowen: A wise idea, come young mistress Elize, we have much work to do!
Jude: Wait what!? No! I can totally...heeeeelp!!!!
Alvin: Wow, I'm impressed, way to take charge there, though this was another excuse to clear up party space for someone else wasn't it?
Leia: Pretty much.

*at Milla's shrine*
Milla: Why do you keep following me?
Ludger: Muzet.
Milla: Yes, she's my sister...
Leia: So...does she like...talk to herself randomly?
Milla: How do you know that!?
Alvin: Face it, your sister is possessed and not the one she use to be.
Milla: Nonsense! My sister loves me and cares for me and protects me and...has never been the same since she almost died doing so...huh...
Alvin: I think we got through to her...
Milla: Alright, let's go talk to Muzet, need to ask her if I can leave the house again anyway...
Elle: Yeah, I have to ask permission from my daddy anytime I have to leave the house!
Alvin: SO ABOUT THAT MUZET THING, let's go deal with it.

*atop the mountain*
Milla: There she is, I'll talk to her in hopes to reach an understanding...
Muzet: Please master! HAVE I NOT SERVED YOU WELL! GIVE ME A SIGN SUCH THAT I MAY SMITE THESE MORTALS!!!
Milla: Hi, Muzet! Can I...talk to...
Muzet: No.
Milla: Well, that didn't work, what's plan B again?
Ludger: Kill.
Milla: But we can't...
Muzet: DIE HUMAN SCUM!!!
Ludger: *goes demon mode* NO!
*Boss fight later*
Muzet: HOW DARE YOU FIGHT ME!?
Milla: HOW DARE YOU NOT PAY ME BACK THAT 500 GALD!?
Julius: Can we kill her already? She's clearly the catalyst.
*after some action sequence and Milla stabbing Muzet and Ludger being all demon and stuff, Muzet dies, team goes back to Prime Dimension*
Jude: Hey we're back! Yes, I'm here now, deal with it.
Milla: What do you mean we're back? We never left anywhere...
Ludger: ...
Jude: ...
Julius: ...
Leia: ...
Alvin: ...
Everyone: AAAAAAH!!!!!!!!!!

*Nia Khera*
Rowen: Ah, so your return suggests you're successful...except what's Milla doing there?
Jude: Good question, what is she doing here?
Milla: I'm here, you still haven't explained anything to...
Julius: Your world is destroyed...
Milla: ...very funny...
Jude: He's...kind of telling the truth...
Milla: No, seriously, you don't joke about that! What about Muzet?
Ludger: Dead.
Julius: Your reality was a fake one and this is the real one and I don't know why you're here, but you are, so deal with it.
Riddeaux: Yes, now give us the artifact! <- This is the guy Ludger owes a debt too.
Jude: What are you doing here and why should we listen to you?
Riddeuax: Because I now have Julius' job!  By the way, you've been fired and are merely former director.
Julius: Jerk.
Ivar: AHAAHHA! I'M HERE TOO AND...
*Jude Punches Ivar in the face*
Ivar: HEY! What was that for?
Jude: ...force of habit?
Ivar: Bah, I'm sitting this one out...oh hi Milla.
Milla: Hi.
Riddeaux: Now give us the artifact.
Ludger: No.
Riddeaux: ...give it to us and kill your brother.
Ludger: No.
Riddeaux: Fine, I'LL TAKE IT BY FORCE!
*Boss fight later*
Riddeaux: NOW GIVE IT TO ME!
Ludger: You lost.
Riddeaux: SHUT UP AND GIVE IT TO ME OR I WILL...uhh...BE FORCED TO BE MORE EVIL!
Ludger: ...fine...
Riddeaux: Very good, now go back to Bakur...also, make sure SHE *points to Milla* comes with us!
Ludger: ...hate...

---
yeah that ending was rushed, but I need to get to sleep, so apologies, and yes, I'm breaking character for that, deal with it.

[Grefter]

King of Dragon Pass - I started this and I don't know what the fuck I'm doing so I decided to harass the ducks and drive them to extinction. Then they gathered their beast buddies and I got fucking murked.

I do like how there is a bunch of weird lore shit ("The ducks claim to be descended from a great, vanished Empire called Ganderland") and no one really knows what anything means and that is reflected through the game mechanics.

I kind of wish I could on somebody's clan ring in real life so I could give them the worst lifehack advice.

That is dark as fuck.

Also you didn't listen to the episode bro, they told you not to fuck with them!

i also got nowhere in my tries at KoDP.  Option paralysis just too strong.

[SnowFire]

EOU, re Fenrir: What was the one plot point you liked in EO1?  (I played neither game.)

Beyond Earth, re Mr. Stark: Dunno, I'm skeptical.  Also trade routes were brokenly *good* pre-patch in base Beyond Earth before getting nerfed in the update, so I'm worried if they're making 'em better again without some hard thought about the implications.  Hybrid affinities are a good thing and much-needed, but differentiating the affinities more is really the thing that'd bring me back.  If you grow from a vanilla template into your own StarCraft race, then I'm down; if you just stick a different coat of paint on the same "larger numbers" military units / buildings, uh, who cares.

[Reiska]

Wow, badass.

That Phantasy Star 2 remake looks like Etrian Odyssey Untold: take the base game, remove the one thing interesting about the story to give fans what they want, add grindy item creation to lengthen the game and fetchquests to develop the story somehow. I guess this is what you do when you remake games and have no idea of what you're doing

I can't disagree.  For as much credit as I'll give the remake for generally tightening up Phantasy Star's worldbuilding and fleshing out a lot of the smaller details and addressing certain plot holes, nothing of value is particularly added in forcing you to deliver a wedding ring from an old man to his granddaughter, then delivering a letter from her back to him so that he'll give you Maruera Berries, which you can then trade to a weird indigenous creature you can't speak the language of to get a ring that lets you do so.  Especially when, in the original game, you could just speak their language right off.  And even then, you're not done; you need to talk to a guy in Zema to learn that polymetryl is a thing that can dissolve anything but laconia, then talk to the dude in the bottom of the dump to learn that the natives need it, then talk to the first guy again and buy some of it for an amount of meseta equal roughly to what you get from winning about 25 battles, then deliver it to a different Motavian.

It's very easily the lowest point of the remake, and in seriousness, is a primary reason why I probably won't replay it for a long time (whereas I will replay the Genesis version, at least in romhacked made-less-grindy form).

The remake does a little better when it comes to addressing PS2's biggest plot hole, the old question of why you can't just take Nei back to the clone lab again?  It largely uses the same explanation as the original game, but improves upon it in that the limitations of the clone lab are introduced much earlier, and elaborated on somewhat.  It's ultimately still really fuzzy science and doesn't make a lot of sense, but it shows that at least they tried.  Basically the clone labs' technology won't work if the body is too badly damaged; the game exposes this earlier, by adding a short cutscene the first time you visit any clone lab after the North Bridge cutscene (i.e., after Teim is killed by Darum), explaining that the bodies of both of them were brought in but were too damaged to restore (Darum, you idiot, why did you BLOW YOURSELF UP after you killed your daughter).  In Nei's case, of course, the body is damaged because she's a hybrid of a human and a Biomonster, and Neifirst's existence is (somehow) what allows all Biomonsters on Motavia to live, so when she dies... yeah.

One of the remake's nicest touches, IMO, is that after you kill Neifirst, every line of dialogue from every random NPC in the game changes to reflect the fact that your party are wanted criminals.  Some of them openly revile you or scream for help/authorities, some urge you to turn yourself in, others openly sympathize with you and sometimes reference the existence of anti-Mother Brain resistance movements.  This even extends to the shopkeepers (though they all, for reasons of game mechanics, fall into the latter category) and the like - the teleportation NPCs will all regretfully inform you that Mother Brain is tracking your teleports, for example.  It's a nice bit of worldbuilding and makes the world seem more alive, although it would probably work better if some shops (those with irrelevant inventories, probably) actually closed to you.

There was one other big change I didn't touch upon in that post, idly, because I forgot: the Neifirst fight was changed around narratively.  Instead of how it went in the old game, where Nei attacked Neifirst by herself and hopelessly got her ass kicked then the remaining three PCs took the gloating Neifirst on, in the remake, Nei still attacks Neifirst by herself, but can actually put up a competent fight thanks to Shift/Deban/Nares and her TP-restoring special.  (Having some Trimates is still helpful.)  You're expected to win the fight with her.  If you don't, then Rolf takes her on (also alone).  If you lose that, it's a game over.  It makes no difference in the ultimate outcome, but having Nei winning the fight be feasible plays better psychologically IMHO.  I won the fight with Nei so I don't know exactly why Rolf goes alone, though.

As for the item creation system and why it sucks.  The way it works is, each of the PCs not in your party can be set to either training (the default, gives them spillover EXP) or producing.  If certain combinations of PCs are set to producing, they won't gain EXP, but will instead work on creating an item together.  The item you ultimately get is, I believe, the number of battle grade points you get before the next time you enter Rolf's house; the exact mechanics are not documented anywhere I'm aware of, but it boils down to "fight X number of battles" and high battle rankings count more towards X than low battle rankings.  So the most efficient way to do it is to grind mosquitoes outside of Paseo since you can kill them in one round easily and thus get an S rank, and it takes upwards of 40-50 S-ranked battles to get anything actually good.  And almost nothing that can come out of this is actually gamebest gear for a character; the sole exceptions I'm aware of are:

• A helmet for Rudo/Hugh which adds 2 defense, 2 dexterity and 6 luck over the next best one.
• A helmet for Shir which adds 4 speed, 3 dexterity and 8 luck over the next best one (but no defense).
• A helmet for Nei which adds 11 defense, 8 dexterity and 12 luck over the next best one.  I guess it might matter if you revive her?
• An armor for Anna which adds 2 defense, 9 dexterity and 18 luck over the next best one.  Nei can also wear it, and it would actually matter for her, since it adds 66 defense for her instead of 2.  It could also theoretically matter for one of Amy/Shir if you use both in the same party, since it's the second best armor for either of them after the Nei Field.
• An armor for Hugh which adds 6 defense, 9 dexterity and 12 luck over the next best one.
• Footwear for Rolf which trades 5 defense for 5 attack, 1 dexterity and 4 luck.
• Footwear for any of the females which adds 3 defense and small amounts of other stats varying by PC.
• Nei's Silent Claw.  The weapon itself is useless, but it itemcasts Vol (biomonster ID), which is worthwhile.
• The Napalm Shot, which is Kain's best weapon.
• Maybe the Wave Gun, as the best ITD weapon Rolf can use??? Probably also Hugh's best weapon if you give him one at all.
• Both of Amy's best weapons, if you give her any at all.

I bothered with all of the above exactly none at all and didn't feel especially disadvantaged for it.

[Fenrir]

I'm typing on my phone (no internet access on the computer for a while) so I can't do long elaboratr posts.

(EO spoilers)

EO1 is Ye Olde RPG until boom you're in the ruins of a skyscraper from Tokyo. It's a fun twist, we have several examples of it now but by the time the gar was released I felt it was pretty fresh. The remake ruins this for literally no reason by having one character come from Ontario + having guns.

More important: EO1´s plot at the beginning is just the city adking your group of adventurers to explore the Mysterious Ancient Ruins (TM)
At one point you encounter an ancient tribe that tells you to please just leave because the place is sacred. Then the city asks you to just kill them all and you do that because duh it's the city they must be right?
I feel that was a nice critisicsm of the classic RPG trope of just barging everywhere and killing everything + commentary on colionalism + a touch of Milgram's experiment (your party is after all supposed to be good guys... Right?)
In the remake no problem you can eventually become best friends with the tribe while still dismissing their culture by still going wherever the fuck you want.


That Phantasy Star 2 fetchquest sounds like something people would REMOVE from the original pre 90's game, not something they'd add to the remake.
I'm also surprised that the item creation is grindy not as in Star Ocean 3 grindy, but actually "grind easy battles" grindy which is ten times worse.
Honestly it sounds like the game that'd have happened if in mid production in 1988 the original Phantasy Star 2 devs gained access to a recent computer + Playstation 2 toolkit and tried to make the best game they could, not having learnt any lesson in game design past 1988

[Reiska]

About right, it's why I can only be so sad that the planned remake of PS4 fell through, because there's a good chance it would have come out worse in the deal.  At least PS4 doesn't really need a remake; it's still perfectly playable as-is.

[Fudozukushi]

Tales of Encount:

Hey, you've reached the part where the plot starts becoming obnoxious and dumb in obvious ways.  Instead of the subtle gaping millions of plot holes starting in Striborg Line.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

EOU, re Fenrir: What was the one plot point you liked in EO1?  (I played neither game.)

Beyond Earth, re Mr. Stark: Dunno, I'm skeptical.  Also trade routes were brokenly *good* pre-patch in base Beyond Earth before getting nerfed in the update, so I'm worried if they're making 'em better again without some hard thought about the implications.  Hybrid affinities are a good thing and much-needed, but differentiating the affinities more is really the thing that'd bring me back.  If you grow from a vanilla template into your own StarCraft race, then I'm down; if you just stick a different coat of paint on the same "larger numbers" military units / buildings, uh, who cares.

Trade routes are very powerful but also you're limited to one per city.  That means there's a hard decision between shipping around industry/food or getting sci/resources/energy which I like.

As far as hybrid affinities go, I think the main game advantage it gives is that I got to choose in many cases between the Purity version of a unit or the Purity-Supremacy version of a unit, so there's a level of mixing and matching that opens up to players that isn't previously there unless you've really tight-beamed onto one and only one affinity's techs.

[Veryslightlymad]

FFXII:

Just beat Mattias and got the Sword of Kings

You know, for all that I shit on the gameplay of this entry in the series, this was probably my favorite dungeon I've gone through since, oh, some of the Phantasy Star 4 ones. Unlike previous dungeons in the game, you're always within fair distance of a save point. The enemies are always dangerous, from start to finish, the boss is mean but not game-breakingly hard. AND it happened to be a major dungeon plotwise, which is nice. It's always a let-down when the best dungeons are just... there.

Plotwise, I'm increasingly convinced Vayne is a fucking idiot, so it's very weird to see everyone tout him as a strategic genius.

Vaan: Actively had good ideas this time. Has a new hammer. Holy shit, Hammers. The low end of Vaan's damage has been reduced to about 150, which I almost never see (maybe that was against a protected enemy?) usually the low hits are about 300, and the high hits can get upwards of 1500. God damn. I have a reward from an optional boss equipped to Basch and HE only hits for about 800 right now. Balthier ignores defense and ALSO only hits for about 800. Hammers OP as hell. You can even use a shield, too. (Having an ice shield on Vaan helped trivialize the ice-themed boss.)

Balthier: Seems angry suddenly. Like he doesn't want to be here anymore. Weird. Went back to giving him Guns, because they're hitting like trains again. Finally opened up a Quickening for him, so there's that.

Fran: Had no plot this time around. Pointed out the obvious several times. Got no equipment upgrades, but, since she's been my mage since the beginning, when I got the ara level spells, she got those and yeah, that's a buff that keeps her relevant. She's also got all the perks that lower magic cost, so she's basically transitioned from my party's black mage to my party's white mage. I'll probably make someone like Ashe take her place on the black magic front. She ALSO got a quickening

Ashe: She's growing on me as a character. Instead of "Yuna-lite" like she felt earlier, she's really starting to feel like an honest-to-god War-leader, despite not having, you know, a nation or an army. Ashe feels like she could be a Suikoden protagonist. Rounds out the list of people that got quickenings this update, hey, she also got an esper, since Mattias opened up right next to her board, and I like not going out of my way for these things. Plus, you know, it kind of makes sense, plotwise. She currently does the least damage of anyone in my party by a fairly wide margin, but she has the blood sword which sort of makes up for it, and she's at least 200 HP tankier than anyone after her.

Basche: Also has no story this update. Has an optional sword and another ice shield and yeah, that's a good combo that executes things. He was by far my heaviest hitter, but then I upgraded Vaan's hammer and Balthier got a slight boost in gunnery. Now he's basically even with Balthier (better because swords are much faster) and WAY the fuck behind Vaan. Vaan is easily MVP at this point, even though he doesn't have a single quickening.

Penelo: ALSO did nothing plotwise this update. Got a new pole just after the dungeon ended, so I'm excited to try that out. Penelo is sitting on about 200 LP, but there's nowhere immediately within reach that seems useful. So.... she's probably gonna do what she did back in the beginning of the game and just rush toward the first awesome thing I get that's in the middle of nowhere.


MVPs on my file have gone: Fran (early game mage)->Basch (ALL THE QUICKENINGS) ->Vaan (Stop. Hammertime.)


Game as a whole made a significant upward turn this last stretch, and that makes me happy. I'm very intrigued that I might someday be able to play this again and have just a completely different experience, or at least, in the earlier/middle parts of the game.

[Lord Ephraim]

Undertale - Eph true ending: kill everything except dogs.  All dogs must be pet.  I may spare Tsundereplane.  Everything else dies.

Otherwise, the game is something you have to experience but honestly it's not really fun to play.  I already don't like bullet hell mechanics.  If it wasn't so easy to get spoiled from youtube and let's plays, then it wouldn't be worth it to buy.

-------

Tales of Zestria - I understand why Alisha was scrapped to become a minor character.  It was to reinforce the relationship of Sorey and Mikleo to appease to the crazy Japanese fangirls and sell thousand of yaoi doujins.  Rose is probably the most rushed character ever.  Oh hey, here's another human character. Btw she can pretty much do everything the legendary once-a-millennia Shepard can do within 10 minutes of her being introduced as a central character.   I blame everything on Niu.

Somehow the game looks and runs worse than previous Tales games (PS3 version here) and the battle camera is about as bad as Operation Darkness.  I also don't like the idea of Hard mode cutting your exp by a large margin.  Trash mobs don't give anything, so they make bosses give majority of exp.  A good 600-700 (that amounts to 15 battles) is lost playing on hard.  There's also the mechanic that dead seraphim are replace by another one, but you cannot revive them until they naturally recover after 2 minutes.  This is a pain because if the battle ends before they recover, then they get no exp.  You can lose multiple levels if this on a boss fight.

What's with the stupidly complicated skill system?  It seems something ripped out of an idea factory game.  Skill are randomized on equipment you find and buy. It's next to impossible to achieve the skill layout you want unless you grind an obscene amount of money and level up the merchants.

Usually the problems with Tales games comes from plot/characters, because the mechanics behind the game are fun and polished.  Here they screwed everything up by trying to different:  using the field map for battles (I love the camera hung up on a door!), limiting who you can have in battle because you don't have 2 humans and a grade system that forces you to grind if you want to get anything out of it.

The good things are ditching cooking after battle to recover HP and instead put it on a skill that naturally recovers HP as you walk around the map.  The rate you recover is pretty high, so you can count on being full HP for the next encounter without needing to consume gels or food.  Food items are produced as you move around and act as stat buffs for a difficult fight. Armatization is pretty cool for a sudden burst of power at the cost of crowd control. Also Edna is cute. That is all.

[Cotigo]

I was considering picking that up because it's actually available on steam. I am no longer considering that. Thanks, Eph.