What Games Are You Playing: 2008

[Nitori]

FFXII: Got to Phon Coast, land of the Zodiac Spear-ruining 4x4 row of chests (although I haven't seen them yet nor am I even bothering with the Zodiac Spear.) Apparently there are only two or three more completely pointless dungeons before the next significant thing happens, yay~

[BaconForTheSoul]

FE7 no resets.

Eliwood mode beaten.  Due to generally playing when I'm tired I lost quite a few people, but on easy mode that doesn't matter too much.  In terms of people that I lost that I actually used...  Kent, Guy, Will, Matthew, Legault, and Lowen all went down.  Also lost guy a quite scrubs just cuz I forgot to bench them and didn't want to protect them.

Went into final mission with Oswin 20/17, Lyn 20/17, Eliwood 20/15, Hector 20/15, Erk 20/15, Rath 20/20, Athos 20/20 (obv.), Rebecca 20,17, and Nils.  Yeah, somehow I failed to get a lot of 20/20s.  Nino getting offed and missing the bonus mission probably didn't help.  Leveling Kent/Guy/Will to almost 20 before they died also didn't.

Final mission Erk and Nils got pewpewed.  Once I hit hard mode I'll have to try.

Notes: 
Lowen SUCKS.  I'll have to check stat topic, but pretty sure he just fails at life.
Erk SUCKS.  Again, gonna check stat topic, but he has to be the worst damn mage.
Rath is sexy.  Archer on a horse + Swords is sex.
Oswin laughs at end game boss physicals.
Rebecca is mediocre, think I'd used her before, but she does her part.  (She ended up with higher str than Rath in my game, despite stat topic saying he wins by 3 and him being a higher level.  GG variance.)

Hector mode time.

Edit: Yeah stat topic has Erk as the third LEAST damaging unit in game, ahead of Serra and Renault!!!!!
Lowen is a bit tougher to tell, he outtanks the other knights, but he also has 2nd worst damage, only a pount ahead of Isadora (who has 5 higher speed, meaning she doubles a hell of a lot more.)  He's probably the worst or 2nd worst knight, ahead of maybe Marcus.

[Meeplelard]

Believe Lowen's speed is a lot closer to Isadora in practice than the stat topic claims.  He has higher Con, so he can use heavier weapons with being weighed down less compared to her.  I seem to recall one of Isadora's big failings was her Con was a lot lower than the other Paladins.

[DomaDragoon]

Xenosaga: Jellybeans, Gumdrops and Beer: 5 hours in, starting the wacky fun that is doing random good things for people so that they give me stuff. Jr is the worst charades player ever. The universe currently exists to annoy the hell out of Shion. Things are good. Cutscenes are still too long, though.

Dawn of Sorrow: Finally got around to beating Julius Mode (that final was probably the best fight in the game) and got 100% map completion. Yay.

Kirby Canvas Curse: Beat the tutorial and the first level. A cute little game.

FFTA: Just got the first Jagd. Average level is about 8 at this point. Starting to abuse the Monster Farm after unlocking Curealls.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

SO3 - Scatter Beam is L4 already? Dear god, I don't think I fought even twenty battles with Maria.

[Taishyr]

DomaDragoon: Any interest in stat-topicing the game? >_> <_<;

[Fudozukushi]

Lost Odyssey: An actual challenging Turn-based RPG.  Shock and awe.

The first two bosses are serious jackasses.  Found the second one easier due to sheer luck.

Plot is, vague and stuff.

Thousand Year Dreams are a nice touch.

[Xeroma]

Tales of Destiny Director's Cut - Beat Leon mode, unlocked Chaos difficulty in the process. Fun.

Leon mode didn't really add enough new, though it gave Leon a new BC[think TotA Mystic Arte] and a retardedly overpowered aftergame spell. Not bad for a 20 hour romp or so, though.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Arcanum- I made a super-strong, retarded Half-Orc. His name is Scott Steiner and he rambles incoherently every chance he gets.

[Clear Tranquil]

Scatter Beams is nuts. Some player has a video of Maria defeating EQ with it in one minute. That's possible w/th a twinked Dream Hammer set up too (I've tested both set ups for myself xD) but Maria still manages to do it a few seconds faster <_< Still the Dream Hammer strategy is probably better on the chibi super bosses due to SB's accuracy problems on smaller targets. Also risk of AAA at short range >_>

S03 - Defeated the 4-D mode versions of the post game final cave temple bosses with Mirage (L66), Nel (L72 and Peppita (L79). Used Crescent Locus > Triple Kick with Mirage whenever I could but mostly Power Dance > Kaboom cancels starting the chains with her short X counter if possible. Much love for counter X > dance extended invincibility frames. I <3 Kaboom (fast, reasonably decent damage when a fair numbers of it's hits connect, interrupts enemy attacks and can knock away) Once one of the bosses went down I had Mirage and Peppita gang up on the remaining boss whilst Nel restored their HP. Pressure assault of powerdanced Triple Kick and Kaboom ftw. My reward was my first Tri-Emblem of this playthrough hurrah.

Still working on the final button push trophy. Finished levelling Kaboom and going to work on levelling Triple Kick now. Nel already has Whirlwind maxed but I'll have to level her Increase HP damage or Stun later -_- Might make her a low ATK power weapon to auto level Stun whilst allies heal the enemy with elementals though cause ... yeah.

[Pyro]

Lost Odyssey: Up to disk 3

The main plot doesn't really interest me. Its a bit silly at times with too much emphasis on being EPIC and not enough emphasis on day-to-day things. Luckily this is covered by the frequent dream sequences, which provide stories about the more mundane aspects of Kaim's long life.

Combat system is shaping up now that I've got almost all the party members. Its pretty much have Kaim (or Kaim and Seth) in the front row tanking while the mages stay in the back row and dish out elemental magic damage. The way the battle system is laid out, spells tend to be slower than physicals and item usage. There are exceptions to this depending on who is casting the spell/what they are casting, but that is a pretty good rule in general. The best spells take 2 turns to get off, although there is a skill that will let you shortcharge them (Give to Immortal mages? Why yes!)

The difficulty has been all over the place. At one point I was fighting randoms that had OHKO damage and were protected by a frontline that nulled physicals. Not pretty. But lately the bosses have been really uninspiring in terms of difficulty. Hopefully that will change here soon.

Looking to be a pretty average game overall.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

SO3 - Scatter Beam is at L8 and Flying Guillotine is yummy. Life is good.

[Nephrite]

Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance

Up to Chapter 20. Ike is, um... wow, I don't really know what to say about him other than he's fast, hits like a train and takes hits well.

Astrid, however, is probably one of my MVPs, she's incredible. So is Jill, by being a great tank.

I'm enjoying the game a great deal, although it doesn't seem it really pushed the limits of the Gamecube very much.

[BaconForTheSoul]

FE7 Hector Mode-

Managed no deaths of any important characters this time, although I used a lot of random meatshields that I didn't care about. 

This time had 3 lords, Athos, Jaffar, Renault, Vaida, Nino, Sain, Will, Barte, and Matthew at 20/20.

Lords/Athos are obvious.  Renault is obvious fail. 
Matthew- Even fully promoted etc. he's fairly sad.  Does fine sitting in a forest and letting enemies come at him though.
Barte- Never liked Warriors before, but he's pretty sick.  He can even smash the dragon as good as the lords with Reed's axe.
Will- Shrugs, Rath is better
Vaida- Not a fan of flyers, but she did fine
Jaffar- Better than Matthew in every way.  Matthew was faster, but they both doubled everything so it doesn't matter.  (DL wise speed actually helps him though.)
Sain- Seems like one of the better knights.  Doesn't have Lowen/Marcus fail at least
Nino- Still evil, figured on no reset I'd get her killed again.  This doesn't happen unless Sonia gets her though.  Once she hit level 9 or so she could solo maps.  Her evade is ridiculous, and by 20/20 she was actually ahead of Lyn thanks to some RNG goodness.

Random note:  Stat topic has 20/15 Lyn at 19.1 str, my 20/20 had a whopping 16!

Time for hard mode... and I'm thinking no resets is going to be annoying.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Believe Lowen's speed is a lot closer to Isadora in practice than the stat topic claims.  He has higher Con, so he can use heavier weapons with being weighed down less compared to her.  I seem to recall one of Isadora's big failings was her Con was a lot lower than the other Paladins.

That's true with heavier weapons. Isadora does have access to lighter weapons which make her much faster than Lowen. *punts Con hype*

That said, with those weapons, her power is low enough to give her issues in that department. So her offensive advantage over Lowen is slim at best, and he kills her defensively.


PW2 - So yeah, I start case 3. Apparently this one is set in a circus. My first thought is to wonder, why did they do this? Seems like a pretty lame, dated setting to me.

*meets the lion tamer*
*meets the clown*
*meets the ventriloquist*

... PW writers are geniuses.

[AAA]

ST-Still working on this. Went through the lab. Man, that first map was a pain, everything had like 5 levels on me. At least ST is nice and lets you keep EXP. Nice touch there, I give the game points for that. Oh boy, Iskas is a villain color me fucking surprised.

Using Kyril, Andarc, Seneca, Tristian, Corselia or whatever her name is, and Kika.

[Niu]

Disgaea3- Duplicate trick is such a wonderful thing. At this rate, I'll be having enough EXP house to get me to lv.9999 At last I'll be able to crush the Ten Gentelmen.

[Clear Tranquil]

S03 - Cleared the 4-D battle arena. Tried Mirage out for the single rankings and she was doing reasonably well up until the final battle of rank B where an Aurora Monster type proved too difficult to handle <_< That thing drains HP and MP like crazy and it's attacks are fast and difficult to recover from too >_> Used Peppita for the rest of the solo fights even though I forgot to equip Power Dance and a Tri Emblem for the second attempt of rank B.  So that Aurora monster took a while with counter X > Kaboom. Equipped Peppita with the Tri Emblem and gave her a Power Dance > Magic Hook > counters w/th Increase MP damage set up for the rest of the ranks. Too easy. A Chimera type in S rank went down in two or three hits and I thought that must be some sort of glitch or something but when I scanned it whilst doing the team rankings turns out it only has around 6000 MP <_<

Team battles were also easy and the Mirage/Nel/Peppita party made their way through the Ranking Battles well. Defeated the Dragoon Knights three times to access the Champions. Nel did some insanely awesme damage with powerdanced Whirlwinds on the dragon since it's weak to wind whilst Mirage and Peppita supported with Triple Kick and Power Dance > Kaboom. Though one of the fights ended very quick when Kaboom scored w/th ID. Defeated the Champions with Nel (L79), Peppita (L86) and Mirage (L73) Kaboom bypasses the knight's 9999 evade so he wasn't a happy chappy and once he was down I switched control between Mirage and Peppita to keep the Cresent Locus > Triple Kicks and Power Dance > Kabooms going on the witch.  Nel was hidden safely in a corner to revive/heal as needed. Have the Victory Trophy now.

[Twilkitri]

Finished SRWC3.

The final was actually capable of doing fair damage to hairybot, something which no other unit had managed since even before he was completely fully upgraded. Did not make him difficult at all however.

Hum. Volke was the only character that managed to get his 6th spirit, and most characters only got their 5th ones in the last level they were in. For all that SP was horribly restrictive in any case. Volke ended up with a max of around 88 or so. All the more reason to love the godly Train spirit, which doubles the amount of PP you get in the next battle (so normally, from 1 to 2) for the low low cost of 60 SP. So worth it. The remote version costs 80! and I don't think anyone actually had it at the end anyway.

Unless there's something I'm missing, it seems that you can't carry over stuff from the one play to the next. Which makes it all the more odd that you get to get bonus PP after the final map.


Elly from Dunbine (Goloan Captain) has a skill that automatically gives her Alert for free at the start of every turn after she's gotten 110 will. Radha is jealous. On the topic of interesting skills, the final seems to have a skill that makes him ignore Alert status, but I'm not entirely sure on the specifics. Volke ended up with me having given him Focus, 5 ranks in Infight, and 2 Support Attacks. I didn't give anyone else anything because no-one else ever got enough for anything worthwhile. I could always have upped their stats for the bargain basement prices attached to those, like 10 PP for 1 SP.

Interestingly, Aura Barrier blocks all ranged-class attacks in this game instead of just beams, but it has a cut in power along with that. Reduces damage by only 1000. Didn't see any regular Version-Ups in the game, only weapon ones, and this list says that they're supposed to be in it, so I wonder what that implies.

In any case, generally fair game. Considerably easier than C2. Clearly I have to replay F/FF now.

[Crystalgate]

Xenogears: Finished it. Wow,  the difference is quality between disk 1 and disk 2 is huge. It's something in line of Ryudo before he turned into a lovesick people loving wanker to after he did so.

The plot started out so-so, but soon turned out great. We have a conflict with a lot of factions conspiring and struggling against each other. There were also always a lot of things I wanted to find out more about, ranging from what's up with Fei to the motive of various people. It even worked when the character started to philosophize. It did sound like people they were to make sense of their situation rather than trying to be profound.

That was disk 1. Then came disk 2.

First there's the change of narrative mode. That crap is nothing I want to see in a video game. Ok, if it was about some backstory an NPC was expositing, that would have been another matter, but they cut out things that I should have been playing. Next, it became less about struggling factions and more about a lesson of humanity, a very poor trade IMO. Finally, there was to much of the "oh, that was part of my overly complicated plan!" plot device.

Fei was fairly good for being a main character during the first disk. He was a person who could, but didn't want to, fight and got cought up in battles anyway. This worked all well during disk 1 with all the warring factions. It worked less well when the war between the factions ended. Then there was quite a good number of mysteries about Fei, some rather interesting. Those got answeared. For some reason the game then kept adding information about Fei that fealt unneccessary and made things more complicated than it had to be. Also, seeing past incarnations of Fei being wankers don't help him either.

Elly was ok at first. There was nothing about her that I found great, but she did help as a foil for Fei. She had to be rescued a few time, but at least returned the favor, although not as often as she gained that favor. Elly is probably the only character where the change of narrative mode worked in her favor. Seeing her change to some sort of saint is nothing I want to suffer though, so getting told that's happening rather than actually seeing it helped. Still, I think her character was more of less ruined during disk 2.

Citan, the man with a lot more to him than meets the eye. A lot more. And then even some more. Fortunately, he actually do seem very intelligent and capable, so I'm villing to grant him all that. He also toke a major part of the plot more or less from start to the end.

Bart worked rather well. He did annoy some other characters a bit, but not me and that's what counts. His backstory was ok, characterization nice and he interacts with other characters well.

Rico had no relevance outside his own plot arc and his backstory is nothing but a template.

Billy did work as a mature beyond his age, but not really, character. Like Rico, he had little to no relevance outside his own plot arc and that plot arc also contained one of the most tired cliches.

Maria suffer from the same problem as Rico and Billy does, only her plot arc is shorter than theirs. Also, her characterization seem lacking, I never got a good grasp on what kind of person she was. I wonder if the writers themselves had that.

Emeralda seemed like a good idea, but very little was done with her. In the end, she ended up being just another step in a very complicated plan where noone would think twice about it if said step was left out.

Why does Chu-Chu even exist? All she did was to weaken Maria's scene.

As for villains that deserves mentioning...

Ramsus is cool enough during the first disk. Then disk 2's narrative mode stutters his development. Eventually, he finds out that he has been manipulated. This is the part where most antagonists starts to help the heroes only Ramsus never manages to do anything useful then. A pity as he had the potential to become much better than he did.

Miang worked well as a manipulator. I can't say I like where she ended though.

Krelian, the one masterminding a ridiculously complicated plan. To his credit though, his goal does require a ridiculous amounth of components to fall into place. Nevertheless, it did get very old as everything turned out to be part of his plan. Also, his part of the ending is just ridiculous. Try to apply what Fei and Elly said about Krelian to some real life person who's methods involves a lot of death and strife, like Osama Bin Laden.

The gameplay isn't too good. The idea of fighting at foot and with the gears sounds good in concept, but neither system has any dept. Encounter rate is to high and some dungeons are to long (speaking of which, sometimes the cutscenes between the dungeons are to long.) The ability to jump in towns and dungeons turned out to be a great addition though.

Overall, disk 1 is great and disk 2 is crap which adds up as an ok game.

[Veryslightlymad]

Fire Emblem 7:

Well, it finally happened. After playing through some FE or another like, 6 or 7 times, I FINALLY have a good Pegasus Knight. For once in my life, one of them (Florina) started gaining strength, so she can finally, finally, FINALLY be useful after all my many playthroughs of various games of this series. Good god that took forever. To celebrate her gaining strength an unprecedented THREE LEVELS IN A ROW, I gave her an Angelic Robe. Yes, Florina, go kill shit for the rest of the game. It is finally your time.

In chapter.... I think 9 of Lyn mode. It might only be 8.
Kent got raped so hard he's useless. (4 1 stat levels... never a useful stat) I benched Kent at the same time I benched DORCAS. Yeah.
Sain is bleh. Wil is bleh. Serra is average. Erk, Florina, and Lyn are all fantastic. Lucius will probably be Lucius which is always a plus.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

SO3 - Um wow, I got to disc 2 fast. Robbin Wind was funny, killed a paralyzed Cliff and Nel, then proceeded to get promptly soloed by AI Maria. Then I reset and killed him in fifteen seconds to not lose out on XP. Crosell was funny, too. SO3 bosses take hits like paper.

[Chisa]

I'm about to go on a WA buying/playing/votability spree, so I'm replaying my copy of WA1, and once again, noting that mid-game durability just doesn't exist thanks to the rocket launcher.  Rudy just got incapacitated, so it shouldn't be long before I move on to the ones I haven't played.

Also, perhaps I should weight the third C in my mantra of "Calm, Consistent, Close" a bit less.

[Shale]

In case I disappear from the face of the earth starting tomorrow afternoon, it's because I'll be playing PW4 at any point in the day when I'm not actively working, sleeping or eating something that requires two hands.

[Magic Fanatic]

Kay, um...

Super Mario Galaxy - I beat the main story a LONG time ago, but...  I have like 7 or 8 more stars to go, and I just can't seem to muster up the attention to get them all.  It was a fun game though, even if I spent far too long trying to 1cc the Trial Stages before giving up on that goal (I DID 1cc the ball-rolling stage, though).  I occasionally pop it in and try to force myself to finish it, though...  Success is at ~5% to this mission.



Perfect Cherry Blossom - Good god even on easy I have trouble.  I just assume I need more practice or something - my best characters are ReimuA and SakB for some reason, though.



Pop'n Music - I have 9 and 10, but I find myself playing 13 almost exclusively.  I'm working on improving my skill, but Hyper stages still manage to absolutely obliterate me.  It is fun though, especially with more than one person trying a run.  Home version means unlimited tries!  Yay!  It's a shame that it never got released in the states, though.



Shining Force - I find this fun DON'TKILLME.  I got as far as the first Pao village (I powerlevel characters, and my friend advances the plot, so right now, I have two Vicars - Khris and Lowe), but I refuse to go any further until I recruit Jogurt.  I saw him once, saved...  And now, I can't seem to find him again.  If I missed him, I'm gonna start a new game...

Also, if this game has an actual plot other than "there's the big bad, go kill it," please tell me.



Billy vs. SNAKEMAN - This...  Is a wierd game.  Since you're actually limited to what you can do in a single day, this is enough to keep me playing...  And playing...  And playing...  With even three characters.  They're named for video game references of course...  But yeah.  WilKnights, Van Burace, and DemonIrwin.  No downloads or anything, and getting stuff is pretty easy...  Though the action limits can be frustrating.  It's actually a simple system that relies on a RNG for about 90% of the things that go on in there (Hatbot's younger sibling or something?).  You have levels, which determine how many dice are rolled for when something requires that stat, strength (which for each +1 strength, that value is added to the roll), and range (normally, you can only get 1-10, no matter what your STR bonus is, but if you have a range bonus, like a +1 for example, your highest roll would be a 11 instead).  Doing regular missions takes 10 stamina, special missions take 30, and there's other actions that take different amounts otherwise.  Missions are given to you fairly randomly, sometimes requiring, say, two dice that have a value of 7 or more, or one die that requires a roll of 10, or even four dice that require a value of 3 or more.  Your stamina refill rate and max chakra values go up as you gain higher ranks.  Stamina refills to your max value at rollover each night (which is about...  1 - 2 AM central time), and chakra is adjusted to half its maximum value.

If you want to try it yourself, here's the link (along with the character name of my main):


Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!