What games are you playing 2020: The true last year of the current decade

[DragonKnight Zero]

I wasn't watching the clock (by design) but I was playing Mana Khemia when I heard fireworks so I suppose that's the game I had running at the start of the new year.  This is a game where I find the first 90% very enjoyable and the last 10% feels sloggish.  Being a replay, one would think the player would easily dominate but the game still found a way to troll me even when I was paying attention.  Chapter 6 boss fight: Turn order shows Azulflare Mana and Renee right after.  Renee was charging a Full Power Blade.  Her HP is low enough that I go for a kill but don't quite make it.  So of course, the mana casts Boost on her right before it goes off and she overkills Jess with 250 HP of damage on a max of 210.  I still win because Renee goes down right after so no more status to rob me of turns.  Still annoyed because I thought I was doing a good job of keeping Jess alive and healthy and the game goes "nope."

    Game feels paced really well for my playstyle.  I fight the occasional battle here and there but not that many and combined with required fights and job bounties, I earn enough AP to keep up with stat growth.  New chapter starts can still feel put on pause because of a bunch of new recipes and doing a lot of digging into new synthesis but it's an enjoyable experience.

[Random Consonant]

Fire Emblem Three Houses: Cleared Crimson Flower.  As it turns out, it's hard to argue with an axe to the face.

Less flippantly, I have... quite of words about the game for once, but gonna go Azure Moon and Verdant Wind before I spew verbiage on them.

[SnowFire]

WILL: A Wonderful World
Mentioned this in my 2019 games recap, but just finished this up.  It's pretty good!  If you're up for a strictly narrative, reading-is-fun game of course, but eh, 1-developer project, it makes sense.  Some wild crazy soap opera / telenovela twists in it, I enjoyed the ride, and I made it so that a cat would have a friend.  https://kotaku.com/will-a-wonderful-world-the-kotaku-review-1834824840  is easier than me describing the general idea, although I'll say that unlike that review, I enjoyed the framing story of a girl and her dog.

The one disclaimer I'll add is that there is one particular plotline that is still a big NOPE involving a teacher / student relationship (but this teacher isn't, like, 22, which they are in FE Three Houses.  And I still didn't date any students in that myself.).  Also, to the extent there's a political slant...  it's an LGBT-inclusive game with two separate gay relationships afoot if you want 'em to be at least, so that's cool.  On the other hand, the hard-boiled Korean police drama side feels like it was written by a 13-year old fan of The Punisher / Rorschach / Dirty Harry, etc. at times, or maybe the kind of person who posts Thin Blue Line memes on Facebook.  Most cops are useless tools of The System, other cops are on the take and act like video game bad guy mooks doing stupid shit, and only vigilante-style murder of the Bad Gangsters can save the day.  Proud writing about how Back In The Day, it was no rules, we'd totally destroyed the gangs until TRAITORS and stupid RULES stopped us from torturing bad people.  GRANTED the cop writing these letters is a biased narrator, and we also get biased narrators like serial killers who think they're awesome, so you can easily write it off as this person's prayers are to be a cop in a pulp detective story?  I'll still mildly wag my finger.

There's a particular puzzle involving orange text that is entirely too cruel, IMO.  Won't spoil it but it's kinda like Chrono Cross's music puzzle except more subtle.  What's especially annoying is that it's immediately followed by another orange text puzzle that is much easier(think Radiant Historia's "remember where you first met Eruca" if the game didn't immediately clue you before you could feel clever), but with time pressure, that I panicked and attempted to mildly spoil myself on, but actually I'd have been fine figuring it out myself.  Oh well.

[DragonKnight Zero]

FF4 - final dungeon descent

    Finally got around to setting aside enough time for the Lunar Subterrane descent.  To my surprise, Rydia's MP was the most taxed.  Got a number of Allemange encounters and double Blue Dragon encounters and pulled out Bahamut for those.  Most other monsters don't warrant attack spells though I will use a Blizzaga on Red Dragons.  With only one enemy that Osmose can crack magic defense on (unlike US version, Red Dragons have enough magic defense to make it tink for 1) and the game refusing to have it show up, I used a few Ethers before reaching the next save point.  I had stolen around 10-15 extra from toadified Black Puddings so they get put to use here.  Still took over an hour even with a more aggressive approach than I used my last time through.  Rosa had about half her MP left at upon reaching the save point.  Didn't use Blood lance unless it could hit weakness.  Cecil chipped in some out of battle heals to even out out MP usage somewhat.

  With a save reached, the rest of the dungeon was done in shorter playing sessions.  Dominated the altar bosses.  Had Rydia toss a Spiderweb to slow down Dark Bahamut's Flare assault, had Rosa Berserk Edge when she could spare a turn.  Plague died with the death counter at 4, no problem.  Lunarsuars were no problem with Slow and not using Fight on them.  Everyone except Edge has undead or dragon resistance which he solved with Image.  Kain jumps, Edge throws Hellwinds I had stocked up on for this, Cecil runs utility and throws Red Fangs, Rydia goes with Fire3 though Bahamut may have been better for MP cost/damage ration in spite of weakness.  I messed up keeping their HP even so that they'd die at the same time but no one died.

  Didn't really use the Ribbons since I decided dragon resistance on the Goldbands was more valuable to me.  Masamune boss I decided that eating one magic counter was worth tossing a Spiderweb at it.  Rydia does that first turn and her other turns are spent running utility.  Edge images himself and drinks a bauccus wine on his next turn for berserk action.  Between slowing it, berserk Edge, and Cecil and Kain pounding it, I win before it can cycle back around to double Tidal Wave.

  Levels for Zeromus were in the 51-54 range.  Rydia doesn't have Flare and Rosa doesn't have Holy, not that either would have done much good for the finale.  I messed up the opening a bit having Kain jump.  He's in slot 1 and Cecil is in slot 3 and when he came down, Zeromus was still invulnerable.  Rosa Berserks Edge with her first turn.  Rydia was intended to toss a Spiderweb on Zeromus but I did it too early and the first one whiffed.  Cecil swaps his Ragnarok for the Avenger midfight.  Next character tosses a Spiderweb and counter Flare rocks Cecil for about 3000, ouch.  Was able to heal him enough before Big Bang though.

  Despite the small messup of the opening moves, ended up making Zeromus look like a chump.  All he got off was that one counter Flare, one Big Bang, and one Meteo before the trio of berserkers took him down.  (i had Kain jump before deciding to use another Wine on himself.  Soon after, Rosa has a free turn where she could have cast it on him, oh well)  I had forgotten to retrieve the cleaver from the Big Chocobo before going into the final battle though it ended up not mattering.  Rydia survived Big Bang so she spent the fight as an item bot (and one rod smack for about 180, hardly gamechanging).  Meteo only hit Edge.

[Cmdr_King]

Pokemon Sword- fin.

That shouldn't really have taken so long.  I mean, it's still pokemon, and it's mostly pretty charming, the way they restructured the endgame is cool and I think they got the multiple 'rivals' thing way more right here than in XY.
But it feels short and like you're always either crawling uphill or just stomping all over everything?  I dunno.  Good use of music though, and Dynamax being used regularly throughout the game is a nice change from how Megas worked.

I ended up with a ridiculously unbalanced party, like I looked up where to get some members just to swap out EVEN MORE Fire types.

Cinderace- Solid, being pure Fire kinda works.  Got a lot of milage out of Bounce?  Kinda unspectacular.

Corviknight- kinda boring.  Still good, gets Brave Bird at reasonable levels, great Dynamax anchor, but boring.

Toxtricity- late addition that ended up a bit underlevelled.  Also learned later it had Plus and not its GOOD ability, but hey, something that actually hit SDef >.>

Dragapault- caught way above the rest of my team level, it's pretty powerful, honestly kinda annoyed it's first tier wasn't available earlier?  Late-game "2 levels from last evo" catches lose something.

Wishiwashi- I mean with all those fire types...  anyway so I didn't use one long enough to see how Schooling worked in gen 7, it's solid but unremarkable overall.

Chandelure- inherently cool, starts with new and improved Willowisp which is nice, only meaningful downside is not getting a proper fire move... but with its stats you can get away with Fire Spin for raw offense...

I dunno, feels better than Gen 7 for sure, better thought out execution of its new gameplay changes, but lacks... something.  7/10

[Dark Holy Elf]

Let's talk about Three Houses some more.

Crimson Flower Maddening

Byleth: Falcon build. I recruited everyone so her skills were very diffuse and she suffers a bit in Advanced tier (Wyvern was not happening), but still solid of course.

Edelgard: Brigand -> Wyvern. Good lord Raging Storm 5 times per map is stupid as hell at the end, that singlehandedly ensured that this route's endgame is easier than AM's. Besides that, is a lord, is great.

Ferdinand: ASSASSIN. First time seriously using the class, it's... okay. Mobile for infantry (ignores terrain) but still infantry. It frees up a flying batallion. Built him as a dodge-tank and he was an effective one but no Alert Stance means he'd have been even better as a flier.

Hubert: Mage -> Paladin -> Dark Knight, Frozen Lance hype time. With Hubert's magic it OHKOs quite a lot of things, but his durability/enemy phase is terrible. Not having 3 range between going Paladin and getting the Arrow of Indra is also a downer.

Petra: Pegasus Knight/Brigand -> Wyvern. Turns out you can master both Death Blow and Darting Blow without delaying Advanced jobs much if you put in some effort and using the Knowledge Gem. Turns out that on Petra's already dumb stats, this is crazy good. Probably the #2 PC.

Dorothea: Standard Mage -> Warlock build, Thoron/Physic/Meteor all day every day, great as always.

Caspar: I wanted to keep using him so I made him a dancer. Caspar is not good guys.

Bernadetta: Pegasus -> Sniper -> Bow Knight. Honestly I'm... not sure how I feel about the Pegasus -> Sniper transition, trading mobility for power is surprisingly lateral (Sniper's stats are kinda bad). Was decent with mobile Vengeance/Curved Shot in tier 2 and as mobile Encloser against monsters at the end.

Mercedes: Standard Mage -> Bishop -> Gremory build with Thyrsus, same as previous playthrough, great as always.

Shamir: Got her ASAP so her stats are actually solid, then she gained speed every level for a while and actually got Hunter's Volley a couple chapters before the timeskip, did a bit of a crit build. Fell off at the end since her middling growths and Sniper's poor mobility on the last couple CF maps caught up with her.

Jeritza: Lateish pickup but a solid one. He's got good stats outside terrible charm, and can use magic though Heal is about the only thing I got much out of. I should have beelined for his budding talent which is Darting Blow, adding on to his already solid speed. He also learns Counterattack but it doesn't feel OP in player hands? Also I married him because I <3 people who need serious therapy apparently.

Linhardt: Filler healer who was my twelth.

Lorenz also saw some use early but got dropped; I made a point of building supports for him, Hanneman, and Manuela, in addition to the rest of my team.


Unlike AM I didn't really use the Retribution batallion, it was easier just to have Edelgard go murder any bolting mages and there aren't nearly as many of them anyway. Not having Rafail Gem makes a few bosses a bit rougher (mostly Indech and the Tailtean Plains duo) but mercifully the final boss has significantly less crit than AM's (and less almost everything else for that matter).


Okay good that's four playthroughs in the books I should probably play something els- Verdant Winds Maddening

Up to Chapter 12. I'll post more when I'm done but the highlight is Annette with almost-base Wyvern Str one-rounding the second Chapter 10 boss with an Iron Axe. *Nelson-laugh*

[Random Consonant]

I am shocked, *shocked*, that anyone in wyvern would dunk on him so hard.

Oh yeah I never did team breakdown for Crimson Flower.

Byleth - Enlightened One because I'm a dope and recruited everyone and left her there.  It... exists.  I guess.

Edelgard - Pegasus Knight -> Wyvern Rider -> Wyvern Lord.  Turns out the game is secretly FE10 and wyverns are OP.  Turns out Edie is also fast if you get her Darting Blow.

Ferdinand - A completely mystified bee -> Wyvern Rider -> Wyvern Lord.  Underperformed early and jumped around a bit before deciding he actually wanted to be useable and ended up pretty good.  Went and got Armored Blow on him for reasons that I'm sure made sense to me at the time.

Dorothea - Mage -> Warlock -> Gremory.  Random hates 4 move, news at 11.  Gremory probably wasn't worth it normally but she decided she wanted Lysithea's magic growth so I was okay with not having Black Tomefaire.

Bernadetta - Archer -> Sniper.  Existed and was generally okay.  Strength was tempermental at times but never ended up as bad as Ferdie did early-mid.

Petra - Assassin.  Went dodgetank with Sword Avoid +20, forgoing actually having a dancer in the process.  It worked somewhat but of course it's less good against mages and gambits.

Ingrid - Pegasus Knight -> Falcon Knight.  Was kind of bad on offense midgame but pulled up and was always dodgy and laughed at mages.  Could also use Arrow of Indra decently enough.

Sylvain - Mage -> Warlock -> Dark Knight.  Turns out he's actually okay at being a speed mage.  Dark Knight was Random hate 4 move but considering how badly the final map pisses on cavalry I probably shouldn't have bothered.

Mercedes - Priest -> Bishop -> Gremory.  Probably should have blown an Intermediate getting her into Mage but oh well.

Leonie - Cavalier -> Paladin -> Bow Knight.  Why the fuck did I bring her into the final map again?  At least she was durable and could bait fliers to their death.

Jeritza - Nice stats/skill levels, dude.  Probably shouldn't have bothered bringing him to the final either though, it's full of stairs and burning floors and aaaaa why do we need to reinforce flyer supremacy this hard.

Mentions also go to Marianne (tried to use but ended up slower than Hanneman what the fuck), Hanneman (hey he's actually okay if you're willing to give him Thyrsus and keep him far away from literally anything), Lysithea, Hubert (midgame mage swarm wait Random didn't you say you hated 4 move YES WELL) and Annette (tried to use, somehow gained more two stat levels than Lysithea, a character designed to gain little else -but- two stat levels.)

[Cmdr_King]

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night- finished.

Probably the most successful aspect of the game is the way in which it embraces itself while letting the audience realize what it's doing or not at their leisure.  Castlevania was always deeply silly at its core, and Bloodstained is the same, but critically the silliness is always uncommented on.  Portal kitties and punk rock demon chicks simply exist, and unless you do three menus deep in the glossary you'll never know if the game knows how weird that is or not (it does but isn't telling you, which you can tell because this is also a game where a measurable percentage of your stats are expected to come from eating sweets throughout the game.)  If they didn't have an interesting story reason for a big game-long quest chain, then by god they were going to be memorable some other way.  KILL THOSE MURDERERS DEAD.

Despite some clear technical issues (which may simply be Switch-related in some cases), this does feel smoother and more polished than most Castlevania games in many respects?  Miriam feels more responsive and the choices between weapons more meaningful than Soma, who she's cribbing on most heavily, exploration seems a bit less clunky than SotN, and boss patterns feel more telegraphed but less predictable than most Castlevania, in a "I could probably have gotten good if I'd wanted" sorta way.  Item spam was simpler, especially because Miriam is powered by trying new foods, but y'know.  It's objectively good if the option exists.

That said while it's definitely a soundly made game and I like the way it handles its cheese, it's also not a game that leave much impression beyond the memes, which of course have faded out some six or whatever months on.  Nothing it's doing wrong, just lacks an extra something something overall I guess?  Probably partly related to having the big time out gap in the playthrough though.  7/10 either way.

[Random Consonant]

Fire Emblem Three Houses: Dance moves > the ability to turn into a stupid looking boss.  (Cleared Azure Moon.  Man do I not want to think how rude some of this would be on Maddening, game easy but it's not really because of the enemies for the most part.  I'm sure someone's going to tell me that named generic guy with the HP-1 spell actually moves there for starters.)

Byleth - Tried a mage build, it's not great outside of Nosferatu dodgetanking but it was functional.  Coinflipped between Gremory and Mortal Savant and went the latter.

Dimitri - Went swords and dodgetanking with him.  Would've worked better on the enemy phase if I bothered to give him Alert Stance+ instead of Sword Avd +20 (less panicking because he gained HP for one) but there was still something funny about making him Lord of the Dance (except I didn't actually -use- dancer again) and the final having 0% hit on him forever.

Dedue - Actually gained speed at multiple points so I stuck with him.  Too bad his charm is ass so he runs screaming from anything that can use an offensive gambit at that point and he only has offense on player phase.  Having someone to punch out all of a mage boss's blood was nice though.

Felix - Had performance issues which were probably not helped by dithering and not training riding to get him into Bow Knight.  Still had too much going for him to ultimately ditch.

Sylvain - hey it's time for flyer overload.  btw Azure Moon is not a great route for flyer overload if you care about having batallions.

Mercedes - Yep.  Was the one to steal Lysithea's magic growth this time around.

Ingrid - Decided it would be funny to go the opposite of her Crimson Flower performance, frontloaded on strength/magic but then didn't want to gain them for a while.  The dodgetanking was still great of course.

Bernadetta - flyer overload time awww yeah.  Amusingly ended up with the exact same strength as Felix.  Bow Knight might have been the better choice for the route than a second Falcon Knight but I was kind of in a no horse mood after Crimson Flower.

Dorothea - Decided she wanted to be speedy this time around.  Got the boots and stayed in Warlock.

Hilda - More flyer goodness.  Annoyingly refused to gain speed for a time but wound up with high strength so I went with it and threw some speedwings because Freikugel is silly.

Lysithea - Actually got Dark Range +1 in time for the final two maps so I decided to put her in.  Being able to murder certain enemies is nice, as is Warp.  Everything else is less nice.

Seteth - Filler flyer, except because I am bad at the game lazy he was the only member of the flyer brigade to have an A rank in Authority.

Tried Cyril, Point-Blank Volley is nice but he's otherwise so very medium.  Still better than trying to use Caspar good lord.  Missed out on Annette's paralogue because I didn't realize it also required Annette/Gilbert C but I'm sure I lost nothing of value there.

[Luther Lansfeld]

Random, too, has damned us all.

I will finish my report on Evade Bitch Dimitri when I finish my playthrough. Gave him +20 evade Battalion, evasion ring, and sword avoid +20. No Alert Stance + because I invested all of my time in Move +1. He is my tankiest character by far. Unlike Random, he is actually a Dancer.

[DragonKnight Zero]

Dug up my old Mana Khemia postgame save and made some progress in the bonus dungeon.  A task made more difficult since I was goofing around to see how far I could make it without Treasure Capes. (which is the easiest way to reach the bosses)  Eventually got a lucky run where every random I do get caught by was escapable and got away without severe injury.  One stretch left.  The bosses have, strangely, been getting slightly easier since they don't have Darlvero's gimmick of healing for thousands every 4th turn as well as buffing their stats in the same move.  The last one does very little damage (though gets lots of turns so the stun meter piles up).  Except for Grand Cross which is overkill damage.  Only to one so a Nectar and other healing patch up the victim.  Or just waiting it out if it's Pamela.

  I've had this game for over a year and only just realized revival can be used on the back row.  Mind blown.  Already checked a FAQ and noticed the last set of bosses down there won't be so easy.  Three at once, may find myself making some of the higher end attack items to get through without Overrealm loops.

  Beat a Secret Gangster while on one of my trips down in the bonus dungeon.  Verdict; not worth the time.  Unremarkable cash, I don't need the AP, and item drops are scrambled down there so those super randoms aren't guarding any unique or valuable drops.  They have ?? HP so fractional damage and instant death don't work.  They also have vastly inflated defenses to the point of being perfect.  So the only way to do more than 1 damage a hit is criticals and poison ticks.  On my team, only Vayne (had Glasses of Death for crit rate up) and Roxis (had Critical ++ from a Aqua Core that got passed up onto his weapon) could do meaningful direct damage.  Pamela was MVP.  Her poisoning skill did the bulk of the work.  Since using a defensive assist allows the character swapped in to survive fatal attacks at 1 HP, I was able to outlast the punk.  Took a while for the poison ticks to drop the Secret Gangster to 0, reapplying when it wears off and chipping in whatever damage I could.  Surprisingly resilliant to stun but not immune, I stunned it once giving one chance to do meaningful direct damage.  As I'm leaning on a mechanics exploit, the eventual victory felt hollow.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Verdant Winds Maddening

Beat! Last map was interesting, the enemy stats were very high so it was a little better than I was expecting, but still the easiest final battle overall just because good lord that swamp is not helping you, guys. Behold my wyvern army and despair. Also Mr. Boss probably should have had more than 100 HP on this mode.

Byleth: Brigand -> Wyvern. Didn't do the full pegasus build because of chasing recruits around so no Darting Blow was a bit of a bummer in terms of doubles, but monster str + Axefaire shenanigans meant she had great killing potential anyway, ORKOed a murderhobo when nobody else could, also was the only person who could do meaningful damage to the emperor and not be OHKOed back.

Claude: Brigand -> Sniper -> Special Snowflake Wyvern. Also really good; got str-blessed and had his usual better speed. Didn't get him Alert Stance+ but did get him Move+1, so that was nice, he roamed around killing almost everything with some combination of Brave Bow, doubling for a KO, and Fallen Star, and of course the latter has a nice nifty effect. Felt like the overall MVP.

Hilda: Brigand+Pegasus -> Wyvern. Stacking the blow skill is good. Less strength than the above two but still got the job done very well in most situations. Bane in authority I guess, too bad this route hands you a broken C-rank batallion which is just perfect for someone with her high charm and iffy authority.

Leonie: Pegasus -> Sniper -> Bow Knight. Had loads of defence so could do some concrete tanking, especially with how hard she was to double. Bow Knight of course is the best ground class, and her Point-Blank Volley gives her another tool many of them lack, though of course just Brave Bow'ing or doubling things works fine in many cases too.

Lorenz: Mage -> Paladin -> Dark Knight. Same build I did with Hubert last run. Lorenz is a bit worse at it because he misses some OHKOs Hubert gets due to lower magic. As a Dark Knight he was kinda versatile but the bad faith list really holds him back.

Annette: Mage -> Wyvern. Also ran a magical combat art. Never returned to mage but hey, she was mobile and had a decent rally, and the Bolt Axe (no Arrow of Indra in this route), so it's something. Not a great PC, would have been better in Azure Moon where she gets a OHKO option with Dust.

Catherine: Pegasus -> Falconknight, with a return stop in Swordmaster in late Advanced tier. Swordmaster vs Pegasus is kinda interesting I guess, that's sad. She had pretty good offence and decent enough durability via evade (Alert Stance later) and not being doubled, but not exceptional in any regard.

Shamir: Sniper -> Bow Knight. After Sniper fell off late in CF I decided to do the Bow Knight version, and also snagged Reposition so she would have more utility. It all helped. Still solid with early Hunter's Volley. Definitely worse than Leonie but there's no shame in that.

Marianne: Warlock -> Mortal Savant. My only true mage. This party is probably the weakest I've ever used on Maddening due to only one non-dancer Physic user, Marianne was kinda essential but never totally excelled in part because she was speed-screwed so her durability went in the toilet. Still, Physic + Thoron + the magical sword combat arts add up.

Ignatz: The dancer. Before then he was a weird mage with Physic and good speed to double things but not much power, obviously was one of the weaker units or I wouldn't have made him a dancer.

Cyril: Brigand -> Wyvern. Stats are just worse than other wyverns... honestly kinda forever. Compared to Hilda he eventually passed her on speed but she has Darting Blow and he doesn't, whoops. Point-Blank Volley is a nice extra trick against enemy fliers (though needed some accuracy work because they ORKO him back, enemy fliers in Maddening are silly).

Knowing which units show up in the important (western) locations of Hunting by Daybreak definitely coloured who I used; Ignatz and Lorenz got used in large part because of this (and I was basically set on making one the dancer), while Raphael and Lysithea I could more easily leave by the wayside when they didn't turn out too well (though I did use both through much of part 1 and continued to use them as adjutants forever).


Going to take at least a bit of a 3H break now. Next up is Indivisible.

[Cmdr_King]

Paper Mario- finished at last.  So I played roughly half of this a few years ago and I don't... really remember most of it?  And the first chapter or so when I picked it back up last week or so kept that up, but after that I do think they find their stride.  Indeed, suddenly in C6 I kinda had a "ohhh hey okay this is the stuff they ramped up for PM2".  Silly things like the doors in Bowser's Castle giving you quizes?  Yes please.

Overall the main thing different between the two is how partners is handled and it's the biggest area where playing PM1 second makes it seem worse than it probably is.  I guess if the "partner swap doesn't take a turn" badge had been available way sooner it would be an interesting tradeoff between the partners being full PCs, but as is it's just this finnicky aspect of the game that really slows everything down since a big chunk of the enemy design assumes you're using a specific partner.  Not that Mario can't pick up the slack, but you have to kit him out pretty specifically to make that work.

But yeah, you can feel a lot of the irreverent silliness that is a good Mario RPG here, but it only breaks the surface occasionally.  In spite of seeming a bit down on it I think IS gets the tone right in a way Alpha Dream usually didn't, or at least early 2000s IS did.  We may never know what the fuck happened in Sticker Star.  7/10

[SnowFire]

Fire Emblem Three Houses: Crimson Flower Maddening
Finished!  The post-timeskip maps were something else in CF.  If anyone is bored, I uploaded my run of the final map here:

https://youtu.be/CkdLKsi--08

(I know Djinn saw the first bit, and Elf & Ciato saw the last third or so.)  A 3 & a half hour brutal slugfest.  A few highlights:
* 1:30:25 - 9 ninja reinforcements arrive in one turn, with 3 casualties.  Uh Sothis, time to turn back time and FAQ the rules on this one.
* 2:19:20 - SnowFire attempts to take on a super-buffed Altered Golem with range 1-4 who OHKOs most of my characters and doubles most of my characters.  Thankfully Leonie's Bow Knight, despite being cavalry, can safely toss range 5 Curved Shot and Break Shot to soften things up (and both hit), then Bernie's 5-range Deadeye thankfully hit a 57 hit chance or so.  (Granted, I could have used my final Meteor charge on this guy had it missed.) 
* 2:49:00 - Another megabuffed Altered Golem sporting 20-30 crit on my characters, although thankfully not super-speed.  I'll admit that I just YOLO it a bit here.
* 3:40:30 - I finally go in on the final boss.

Most valuable player of the run: Empire Armored Co., a D-rank Battalion available very early with the Impregnable Wall gambit, which is possibly the most busted gambit in the game.  Throw it on a Cavalry user with Canto like Ferdinand or Leonie, and you can pull all sorts of nonsense where units attack, kill something, get Wall'd afterward, and the Wall-using unit just retreats to safety. 

Will definitely wait for DLC wave 4 before starting Blue Lions, though…  besides, maybe time to hack at Romancing Saga 3 a little.

--
Maps that I took advantage of Cheater Casual Mode (ignoring C1/C7) where I won but with deaths:

* The Gautier Inheritance (C5): Gilbert somehow managed to aggro the entire goddamn map while I was foolishly healing him and he ran back and forth under the watchful eye of the archers.  This mission is really not balanced for a massive mob of Maddening-stat'd enemies descending upon you at once if you want to avoid casualties.
* The Forgotten (Sylvain): Okay, I just would have not even attempted to greedily grab some of the treasure and been fine on Classic, but I sent Ferdinand on what would become a glorious suicide mission that got one of the thieves to 1 HP.  Still didn't get the treasure, which I think was a Speedwing.  Alas.
* Foreign Land & Foreign Sky (Petra / Bernadetta): I could maybe have avoided this death, but I was running a little low on Divine Pulse charges and this mission is incredibly long and grindy, so screw it I took safety.  One of the Commanders charging the victory condition needed to die ASAP, so Petra charged into the middle of like 5 enemies and took her out, then Leonie Impregnable Wall'd Petra, then..  Leonie wasn't able to canto far enough back to safety.  Your Casual Mode non-sacrifice is appreciated.
* The Secret Merchant (Anna & Jeritza): This paralogue is just dumb.  Ninja reinforcement Bow Knights with 12 threat range on a tight map?  WTF?  Thanks to Anna's DLC coming out when I was already deep into CF, this was even "easier" than it should have been since she & Jeritza was recruited super-late and thus overlevel (Maddening XP curve comment goes here).  Didn't care enough to bother doing this perfectly.  (Fun fact: Only old saves made pre-DLC drop can recruit Jeritza "late", I guess..)


Maps I wiped on:
* Legend of the Lake, when done soonish after being available (Leonie / Linhardt): Enjoy super-speed swordmasters in Fog of War w/ Quick Riposte and super-range Wyvern Riders and night vision goggles Snipers and by the time my shattered remnant staggered up to the boss, surprise, he's a goddamn invulnerable supertank.  I saved re-attempting this map as vengeance for absolute last, doing it in the final month of CF..  and it was still one of the most difficult paralogues, although no casualties this time now that I knew roughly where all the enemies were hiding.  Massive HP, Renewal, and Quick Riposte on the boss is just sadistic.

General CF main-story-mission commentary:
* C13: I sent Leonie solo north to man the ballista, except for some sort of Persona shadow Leonie shows up with tons of friends to chase her into Acheron's reinforcements.  She was cornered and totally 100% dead if I didn't win on turn 4, which I barely managed with some Warp usage.  Had to let the treasure go, but I did murder Ignatz to steal his Brave Bow.
* C14: I did this map and the above one without any flyers.  That wasn't smart!  Impregnable Wall and Raging Storm activations were the only way this worked out.  The city was a total deathtrap, I just waited a few turns at the start to clear out the initial wave of aggro'd units and Wyvern Riders, then moved through the fleet while attempting to not get owned by the Almyrans, which somehow worked thanks to Impregnable Wall.  Claude has a zillion Poison Strike archers guarding his fort so approaching it is total death,Meteor + Raging Storm mooks + Smash Claude was how it had to go.  Hilda lived at least!
* C15: You don't really need to defend the center at all past turn 2 or so.  Spent all my time working through the right side where Flayn spawns.  Seteth will eventually realize the jig's up and send his hidden troops charging forward for an easy win for him, but sadly he himself is still baitable and will ride off to do 2x1 damage to a Wall'd unit rather than stay put and win. 
* C16: Could have been an FE6 map.  Everybody is asleep until aggro'd and the obstructions you're supposed to turn off actually help you rather than hinder you by obstructing enemy movement.  The start is a little exciting but that's it.
* C17: This is definitely a map where knowing WTF is going on from a test "screw around at the start while waiting 15 turns" helps.  The Black Eagle Strike Force cowered in tower as the Blue Lions comitted mass suicide, then retreatred and called it a victory?  Okay not really.  I swept through the west side of the map hard and saved the east side for last, then killed the reinforcements commander after she spawned.

Maybe I'll chat about the story later.

--
Also since this is the post-your-3H-team thread..

Golden Deer (Hard, 1st playthrough I did a few months ago)

Byleth: Merc-Hero-Enlightened One.  (Yawn, yes.  Hero's a waste, yes.)
Claude: Archer-Sniper-Barbarossa.
Hilda: Brigand-Warrior.
Lysithea: Mage-Warlock-Gremory.
Marianne: Priest-Bishop-Holy Knight.  (Yes, Dark Knight is probably better offense and Bishop better support, but still, seems in flavor for Marianne.)
Ignatz: Archer-Sniper.  (Hunter's Volley is extremely important so not too sorry about skipping Bow Knight.  Also he got ludicrously Str-blessed compared to normal.)
Raphael: Armored Knight-Fortress Knight-War Master.  (Had I known about Deathblow-premacy, Brigand rather than AK was probably the "right" call, but whatevs.  Also note that the War Master promotion helps fix Raph's Speed from "miserable" to "sort of okay" with the minimum.)

The two characters who went mildly off the beaten path:
Lorenz: Cavalier-Paladin.  Ended up doing a physical Lorenz build, although Frozen Lance off his Res was still pretty key to his performance.  I didn't have Dark Knight unlocked until super-late, and losing Lancefaire when his growths had been modified toward the physical side didn't seem worth it, so I never switched.  Oh well, could still pick between Frozen Lance & Brave Lance for mixed damage.
Leonie: Pegasus Knight - Falcon Knight, did a flying build for her.  She had real problems with Str, but was fine otherwise.

The recruits:
Cyril: Brigand-Wyvern Rider-Wyvern Lord.
Flayn: Dancer.  (I think she works well as one because her white magic isn't stuff you potentially want to spam every turn, like Physic, but rather is rare break-glass-in-case-of-emergency stuff like Rescue and Fortify.)
Ingrid: Pegasus Knight-Falcon Knight.  (Accidentally had the weird stat boost she & Leonie get from the enemy class growths being super-good for Peg Knight / Cavalier.)
Annette: Mage-Warlock.  (Also was benched for the final.  The only late map she was legitimately useful for was Claude's Paralogue, mages in the desert etc.)


Crimson Flower:

Byleth: Pegasus Knight - Enlightened One - Falcon Knight.
Edelgard: Brigand-Warrior.  Note that I used the DLC Shoes of the Wind for +2 Move on her, so she was more mobile than usual.  (I'd planned on going Emperor even knowing its issues, part of why I gave her the Boots early, but holy wow it's still worse than Warrior.  What went wrong, IS.)
Hubert: Mage-Warlock-Dark Knight.
Caspar: Brigand-Grappler-War Master.  (Yeah, Caspar's stat build has problems - if Dedue is the Def-focused WM and Raphael the Str-focused, Caspar's the Spd-focused, eventually?  Except his speed starts out bad and class mins fix the issue for the other two anyway.  His passive genuinely is useful with Petra though at least.)
Linhardt: Priest-Bishop.
Dorothea: Mage-Warlock.
Ferdinand: Cavalier-Paladin.  (I was training him to go to Bow Knight, and he coulda qualified for it, but then he unlocked Swift Strikes in Lances, and suddenly Lancefaire & Paladin was too good to give up.  That said, support/chip Ferdie with Seal Speed & Curved Shot was still crucial, especially for monsters where Sealing their Speed lets Hubert double 'em and the like.)
Petra: Brigand-Assassin.  (While Petra makes an excellent Assassin, she's also the only Flying talent in the Black Eagles, so forsaking that probably should have meant Peg Knight Bernie or something silly like that.  Oh well, made it more exciting this way!)
Bernadetta: Archer-Sniper-Bow Knight-Sniper.  (Yes, she was back to Sniper for the final 2 maps after I saw Elf & Random talking about how they hate cavalry and all they stand for.  I really like Sniper anyway, Hunter's Volley is maybe the best combat art in the game.)

The recruits:
Sylvain: Cavalier-Dancer.  (I like to have the off-house recruits be the Dancer myself, better to appreciate the natural state of all the house characters.  Lack of supports less an issue, too.)
Lysithea: Mage-Warlock-Gremory.
Leonie: Cavalier-Paladin-Bow Knight.  (Going her canon choice when outside house, of course.)

For Legend of the Lake, where Edel & Hubert are forcibly benched, Anna filled the extra slot.  She levels as a Thief, so Assassin was pretty much the only choice, but Assassin is a good class, so I'm not really complaining.

Recruits were kinda picked for me - Lysithea has a support with Edelgard, Leonie has a Paralogue with Linhardt (and I didn't recruit Lin on my GD playthrough), and I hadn't done a super-fast early Sylvain recruit with Byleth-F before, so would give that a shot.

[Random Consonant]

Yeah, Caspar's stat build has problems - if Dedue is the Def-focused WM and Raphael the Str-focused, Caspar's the Spd-focused, eventually?  Except his speed starts out bad and class mins fix the issue for the other two anyway.

* Random Consonant looks at Raphael on his Verdant Wind playthrough.

* Random Consonant laughs bitterly.

Gonna have so many words about these shameful idiots when this is through.

[Luther Lansfeld]

I just wanted to point out that Dedue and Raphael have the same Str growth and Dedue starts with one more, so Dedue should actually have higher STR forever. But Raphael has 5 more HP growth and 10 more luck growth!!! (in exchange for lower speed, defense,and charm growth).

EDIT: SORRY GUYS I FORGOT RAPH HAS 5% MORE DEX TOO

[Random Consonant]

All I can say is thank god the Verdant Wind version of Hunting by Daybreak lets him hide in that goddamn corner because can you imagine living in a world where Raphael actually gains defense because I sure can't.

[Cmdr_King]

Look he just can’t wear armor it keeps popping off, more defense just isn’t possible for softboy Raph.

[Dark Holy Elf]

For all of Raphael's problems, at least he has a bit of a niche with his str/def. Caspar doesn't seem to have one, being unremarkable at best in those stats and every other. Like, in a comparison with Ferdinand, he loses HP/spd/def/cha and only wins str by 1 base / no growths, and nobody considers Ferdinand a stat god. Caspar also has to contend with a bane in authority (the other two units this is true of have waaay better stats).

[Random Consonant]

While I'll be happy to elaborate on my thoughts on the matter once I actually get around to rating the cast, I'm not really one care much for the distinction between someone who has no niche and someone who is bad at their niche.  I might even bring myself to agree that on paper Raph is better than Caspar the shittier Edward on the basis of their early performance but that kind of stat spread just Does Not Work.

[Luther Lansfeld]

Azure Moon Maddening -

Dimitri - Dancing Queen and evade tank. Went with Evasion Ring + Sword Avoid +20%, Brigid Hunters (20% evade Battalion), and tried to keep him and full HP at all times for an extra 20% evade. At endgame, with the full setup, he has 123 evade. Level ups are his worst enemy. When at full HP, very few enemies had more than 10 hit on him. One particularly memorable moment for me was on Dimitri’s paralogue where Dimitri dodged about 15 Boltings, one of which had 9% hit and would have killed him in one-hit, and the others had zero. I was levelling Sylvain in an earlygame class at the time to get a skill and I stuck him as a adjunct to Dimitri. Gaining 2 class experience per Bolting and other hits, Sylvain got like 100 class exp in that fight. Something to keep in mind for the future; evade tank is a great person to stick an adjunct you want getting class exp for. In in my first playthrough Dimitri was my MVP and general offensive world-crusher; this time he is the MVP through evading and Dancing and mobility, with Atrocity in his back pocket just in case, although I haven’t used it much since it drops his evade a bunch.

Oh, and he has 36 strength, 33 speed, and 56(!!!) charm. Not quite as offensively gifted as the previous playthrough but still very respectable. Ended up gunning for Move+1 pre-timeskip, since he can’t train from Chapter 13-18.

Dimitri ended up with 750 battles (!!!!!!) because of all the dumb, dumb tanking that he did.

Dedue - I ended up going with a Wyvern build for Dedue, despite his weakness in Flying. It ended up not being that bad to get the requirements, and I even dipped into C in Heavy Armor for Weight -3 and still had all of the requirements before Level 20. It’s really not very difficult to have people gun for Wyvern, even without favoring them, I have found. The weakness penalty is a bit overrated; it’s like 2x4.5 per training session, and another 4 for the auto-building? This build ended up being quite solid; at endgame, he Waits, Dedue has 52 protect and is actually able to credibly take physical hits, which is good because he’s doubled by everything that isn’t an Armor Knight. Brawlers in particular are a total joke for Dedue and quite challenging for other characters. His mobility means he is a flying tank, which is amazing, and he can run more easily from mages! He is slow as hell, although Wyvern Lord bases mean that he isn’t THAT slow. Great build for Dedue, would recommend.

Oh, and I ended up giving Dedue Defensive Tactics (half damage to Battalions) because his Battalion was running out so quickly with my strategy of having him stand in the front and tank. That’s the first time I’d ever used that skill, but keeping that +4 protect was really helpful in my tank strat.

SADLY Dedue perished on the last turn of the last battle due to my desperation just throwing people in the fray.

Byleth - Standard Wyvern Lord build, but she has Failnaught because reasons. Obviously solid. 46 Charm is solid and good.

Felix - Bow bitch, offensive MVP, and general killing machine with Brave Bow+. Should have gone for Death Blow, I think, but Hit+20 is useful too, especially at long range. Did a bunch of finagling with his Charm and gave him King of Lions. He has a respectable 38 Charm after the King of Lions +10 boost, which is pretty good, especially because he has the support with Dorothea with Meteor Linked attacks.

BOW BITCH became Dimitri’s husbando after Dedue died.

Ingrid - Wyvern Lord with Darting Blow and Repo and Alert Stance +. Ended up defense-blessed so she actually has over half of Dedue’s Protect at 33, but has 37 speed so she… usually isn’t doubled, even on Maddening. Magically tanky as well.

She married Ashe and became a knight.

Mercedes - Bishop, heal bot, super fucking slow and can’t take a hit to save her life, but Physic and Fortify goes a long way.

Annette - Crusher and Bolt Axe Wyvern Lord. Better than Elfboy’s version because Dust does a fuckton of damage, but still not an amazing PC. Wyvern Lord speed boost finally gives her the speed to consistently double Armor Knights. And yet, it’s almost certainly her best build, because her Faith list is trash and her Reason list is quite shaky. Ah well.

Lesbian lovers til the day we die~

Sylvain - 12th man. Ended up making him a Dark Knight with Physic and some utility. Should have gone in for Repo while Adjuncting Dimitri but oh well.

Dorothea - Thoron. Meteor. Physic. My queen. She has the Caduceus Staff for +1 range and is a Gremory.

Petra - Wyvern Lord with Death and Darting Blow and Alert Stance + and 43 fucking speed. The other offensive MVP. Squishy unless Alert Stance + is active.

lesbianz part 2~

Lysithea - 11th woman. Late recruit so it took forever to get her Warp, but she has high Magic and can fuck up an Armor Knight or Paladin. She’s a Gremory. Will sometimes grab Thyrsus from Marianne, especially now that Mari has a horse.

Marianne - Thyrsus + Dark Knight + Physic + Thoron + Silence. All-around useful and versatile. Died on the last turn of the final battle.

Thickets for dodge bitch and my flying Byleth made Hunting By Daybreak a lot easier than on VW Maddening; I was able to keep everyone alive, whereas on VW both Lorenz Hellman Gloucester and Ignatz ended up dying, even after I reset to try again. Chapter 14 was definitely quite challenging, harder than on VW due to lack of Claude. Gronder 2 was hilarious because again, camp out in those thickets, dancing queen, and watch as Claude has like 9 hit.

Enbarr 1… Ferdie’s Honeypie really knows how to fuck you up. Ballistas and siege tomes and Wyverns and flying Demonic Beasts and FUCK YOU FERDIE’S HONEYPIE. I had to honest-to-god reset on that map, mostly thanks to stupid ninja reinforcements ultimately but I was treading water anyway and had used DP multiple times already.

I didn’t reset on the final map, but ended up conceding two deaths because goddamn that map is hard and the reinforcements wore me down.

Ended up getting Dimitri and Marianne’s support for the first time (I had watched it on Youtube before, though). In a game with several serious and dour supports, this one really takes the cake. Both of them CW: suicide ideation discuss their passive desire for their own death and how survivor’s guilt has warped their life. Both of them ponder why they are alive while others have perished, and how they feel undeserving of life. Their entire A support is just… wow.  Uh, yikes. I knew this was coming, having seen a lot of both character’s supports and WOW TWO CHARACTERS WITH EXTREME DEPRESSION HAVE A DEPRESSING SUPPORT? what a surprise, but still. All I will say is that I tried my hardest to avert that as a romantic ending. <_<

Of course, it makes me ponder the responsibility of game developers to include things like content warnings in their games for some content. I feel like this support is borderline on that front, but I don’t necessarily blame them for not having a warning, since I think it’s important to talk about these issues, at least without graphic detail. I think the game is better for having this support and putting these issues in the open.

Otherwise, it’s still AM, still emotional and draining and fabulous.

[Random Consonant]

Fire Emblem Three Houses - 1v1 me bro yeah easy to say when you're a boring pile of stats with a bunch of annoying but non-murderous abilities.  (Verdant Wind cleared.  I don't mind the final map exactly putting the horrible swamp aside (did we really need to make flyers even better intsys) but the boss is pretty zzz compared to Azure Moon's in literally all respects and probably cements AM's as my favorite on hard gameplaywise.  The lategame galaxy brain starting positions on Verdant Wind don't really help much either.  Plotwise... well.  That's going to be in a seperate post.)

Anywho!

Byleth - Swordmaster, recruited everyone so wyvern wasn't going to happen but due to -slightly- better management on my part didn't struggle as much midgame as she did on Crimson Flower.

Claude - Archer -> Wyvern Rider -> Barbarossa.  Remarkably average overall (by the extremely high standards of is good at bow and wyvern) but Failnaught is mildly ridiculous thanks to Falling Star.  Not Aymr but what the fuck is?

Lorenz - I wanted to use him this time and he actually gained charm early so I made him the dancer and actually used the class this time.  His offense was... functional for a time since I went mage route with him prior to that but he pretty much just danced.  Would've been better at it if I bothered to get his Riding skill to A+ but eh.

Marianne - Mage -> Warlock -> Dark Knight.  Oh so this is why Frozen Lance gets hype yeah that's pretty good i guess.  Kind of an annoying route to get there since she's only neutral in Reason but I wasn't feeing the Paladin route on someone with her speed growth.

Leonie - Archer -> Sniper -> Bow Knight.  Oh look that thing that people complain about with 40% str growth characters happened well good thing i have all these strength boosters that i'm not really using thank you gardening.  Critfishing helped of course.

Hilda - Bandit/Peg Knight -> Wyvern.  Resident dodge tank of the route, also wound up with the highest defense out of anyone of the route for what it mattered.  Even putting aside the fact that I'm not all that convinced authority weakness is that big a deal in the grand scheme of things on someone you have from the start (okay sure if you go flyer route maybe, but Verdant Wind hands you a broken C rank flying battalion so lol) she felt like overall MVP of the playthrough.

Ferdie - Paladin -> Bow Knight very late.  I felt bad about killing him on Azure Moon so I went and used him.  I don't actually think much of Paladin as a class and Ferdie's stat line doesn't really help much but he gained enough strength that I was willing to meet him halfway and threw some speedboosters at him.  He's... honestly an annoying poach for a variety of reasons and in all honesty Master class reqs being as... shockingly lax as they are helped him a bit.

Dorothea - Standard Warlock nonsense, as good as it was the last two times.

Petra - Wyvern nonsense.  Obviously worse than Hilda due to not getting the double blow combo and no Freikugel but training in axes as an off-route poach plus the free D in flying makes getting in ez modo, why does anyone hype Cyril again?

Felix - Assassin.  This was a bit aimless but DOORS existed and it was either him or Ignatz who had like 10 less strength (Ignatz was still okay...ish!  Just yeah, Felix.)

Mercedes - Standard Gremory nonsense.  Was a bit slow but had enough magic to pull off the occasional OHKO anyways.

Ingrid - Some stupid Pegasus Knight -> Swordmaster with a brief adjutant abuse stint in Mage once I finally decided on what I was doing -> Mortal Savant nonsense.  Well she learns Physic and this does save on Levin Sword uses.  That's... pretty much the entire reasoning behind why I did this.  It did work obviously but I can't really pretend this was anything other than me being silly.

Lysithea also saw heavy use of course, most of it to see just how feasible it is for her to hit S+ in something (answer: requires slightly more work than what I put in but it did happen on the final map!), the points she has in her favor over the other power mages are worth considering and she does stack up well enough all things considered but she's still a power mage in the grand scheme of things and that's a pretty meh build.  CASPAR also managed to succeed at beating up the Death Knight on Mercedes's paralogue despite my only doing so out of foppery and whim, making the bare minimum of effort, and being fully prepared to write it off again if it didn't work the first time and we are all very proud (Caspar still bad).

[Luther Lansfeld]

I wasn't a big fan of either of VW's final maps; Shambala is windy and dull and sends enemies at you very slowly, and Nemesis is just kinda easy and boring for a final fight (I feel like it would have been okay for a normal fight, but a final boss? Nah). I would say this is a rare place where SS beats something to me (since Fort Merceus is also better on SS due to not having the extra reinforcements which kinda trivalize the map), but I forgot that it lacks Gronder 2. For all non-CF routes, I really don't like Hunting by Daybreak; arbitrarily punishes you for not using your in-house people, so CF lacking that really helps for me. Probably AM = CF > VW = SS for me gameplaywise. My favorite maps in the game are C17/C18 CF, C21/22 AM, and C17 AM/VW, with all of the Chapter 12s and SS"s final map coming in after that.

[Niu]

Atelier Twilight Trilogy DX Box - I know this is coming so I never purchased the enhanced version on Vita. Now I can enjoy them on PS4.

Though, instead of the game itself. The limited box item and pre-order item somewhat impressed me.
It revealed that Flameu and Chrone live past the age of Twilight into the era afterward, and left behind records of days past.
Chrone then even outlived Flameu and left behind recordings of the music they listened in the Twilight days.
My eyes were a little wet when Chrone prepared seats for her friends during the recording despite there are no one to seat on them anymore, and speaking in her not robotic voice to Flameu, telling her that the earth has finally starting to come back to life.

[Random Consonant]

Oh yeah Hunting By Daybreak is a map that someone certainly believed should exist contrary to all reason but I can't say I loved the last two chapters of CF.  Gronder and Embarr are good times though I'll agree.