Civ 4
Been fiddling around with this for fun and profit. Meant to finish a game of it all proper like since I seem to have not been so good at finishing games since getting Beyond the Sword. So, I got my first religious victory after building the Apostolic palace, and then spreading my missionaries about like a good little pope. Kinda amusing that having everyone have a bit of the religion, but having no one else share it as a primary religion makes the religious victory easier to obtain.
Nier
Ugh, fishing. Why did it have to be fishing. Kinda hoping sardines become storebought later, but I suspect that if that becomes the case, it won't be until the sardine fishing quest is complete. I am also amused that one of the quests I've completed only rewards you with a one time song. But it was an easy quest, and a nice song, so I am content with it.
As for the game itself. Gameplay is pretty simplistic, but there's enough there to be engaging without getting in the way. So that's good. Really digging the setting though. I like Nier. I like all the characters, but especially Nier. He's a cool guy. I mean, he looks like this grizzled western hero type, but aside from a few things, he's pretty laid back. And while he may not care about the world falling to bits, the game does do a good job of showing that he cares about people. Sure, he's helping folks because he needs cash to care for his sick daughter, but I get the impression that the fact that he's helping folks gives him a great deal of job satisfaction. Also, he's pretty upbeat for a guy in a fading world whose only daughter has a terminal illness.
So, yeah. The pace is glacial. But this works. Because it really isn't about saving the world, it's about saving his daughter and helping people along the way. Which is different and refreshing. Also refreshing and different, I have this strange feeling that his idyllic hometown is actually not going to be destroyed.
Up to the Kingdom of Facade. Feels like the plot is finally starting to pick up a little bit. Not sure what's up here, but I have a bad feeling something is going to go wrong.
X Zone 2- Valkyrie/Divine Manakete Teatime Adventures
I mentioned this in chat, but I think I ship T-Elos and Metalface now. They just get so happy when they get their murder on.
This game is pretty much the opposite of Nier. More about graphics and gameplay than plot. And this bit will mostly be in contrast to X Zone 1, which it's pretty much a straight up improvement on. Sure, the plot is still just an excuse plot, but now the heros seem to have actual agency from time to time in terms of where they go next instead of most of the early game being getting randomly teleported from place to place. Heck, they even have actually attempts to get people back home and discuss why the everyone is getting involved in this instead of just "oh, you showed up, guess you're with us now". Heck, you even have Phoenix Wright who pretty actively doesn't want to be around, but does because he needs protection and the group he's with is good at protecting folks. As an added bonus plotwise, the game has an actual focus plotwise early on. Sure, X Zone 1 kinda had the Portalstone, but that kinda got overrun by the individual plots and getting warped from place to place randomly as plot points until near the end of the game. Here, the golden chains are remaining pretty solid as a focus, even with the personal plots filtering in. As for writing, it feels like, somehow, they're packing in even more references to obscure gaming lore. I mean, seriously, they managed to slip a Bad Dudes reference into Demitri's dialogue.
As for gameplay, the core mechanics are the same, but there's been a lot of small changes which I think improve it a great deal. First there's all of the quality of life improvements. Namely, they use that bottom screen to show stats now, and you can tap your way to all of the appropriate stats for any unit instead of having to dig through menus. The information you used to get is also a bit more accessable now. And, they have icons showing what the major properties of moves are, and they give you the info in the middle of battle so you don't need to look it up ahead of time and then remember it. For a series with as many units as X-Zone, this is a great add-on. As for substantial changes, there are three big ones. First, turn order is no longer a thing. You now have Ally Phase and Enemy Phase, and you order your guys in the order you want to. The game still seems to have a preference for what order you work in, but you can override it with trivial ease. Which makes it a lot easier to spread out Exp. Secondly, there's a new resource, SP (Stamina Points) which takes on a lot of the roles XP used to do. Specifically, it's used for skills and for defense/counter. Each pair has their own SP store, which starts at 100 and can be increased with passive skills and equipment, and it recovers at about 30 SP a turn. So no more infinite XP gain by having one unit counter the world. Full defense still runs off of XP, but it's a touch cheaper, and now has a lot less competing with it. Third, the number of attacks you can use in each fight sequence is hard locked at three. A big complaint about PXZ1 was time creep as you started with three attacks per segment, and crept up to six by the end. Here it's going to stay at three. The bonus attack for using all of the attacks is also gone. What you have now is the charge attack system. If you didn't use an attack in a fight sequence, then the next time you use that attack, it's just better with a bonus to damage, XP gain, and I think status infliction. So, you want to switch up your attacks.
None of this gets in to the minor changes. ie. Customization points let you purchase passive skills and improve attacks. Each pair and solo can set one passive skill from a collection of ones they have, which lets you personalize what they'll be doing and which helps you remember what your sea of units are capable of. Facing exists, for both you and your enemies, and you'll want to try and take advantage of it (or really try and avoid letting your opponents take advantage of it. Metal Face nearly one shotted one of my pairs when I let him get a side attack in on them. He freaking doubles damage on side attacks). Also, you can now get the option to counter/defend on animated attacks, so long as they're single target. Map hazards are added to make the maps a bit less dry, though map design still isn't great. And, the Cross Hit system is redesigned. Now, instead of being necessary to get over 100% for XP, it just supercharges your rate of XP gain. However, while it still holds your foe in place, it does so for a limited amount of time, and if enough block crushing damage is done, you'll break the cross hit and send the foe flying. This means you can't just jam all your attacks in and hold the enemy in place, and makes you have to focus a lot more on juggling the enemy. Also means that crits are a lot more likely to be an option, and so you'll be aiming for those more as well.
Finally, your reward for stringing together large combos isn't XP gain, but gold gain. Which brings us to another aspect, you have a shop where you can buy equipment and healing items. Which means no more having to worry about spamming items and running out.
As an aside, graphics. This line of games generally looks good. PXZ1 managed to improve from Endless Frontier, and PXZ2 has managed to improve from PXZ1. It's not important, but it's adding to my appreciation of the game.
