Crack Menagerie

make up prophecies to force debt-laden nopon in to battle

archaeology
-explore where other races dare not tread

ride pterosaurs in to battle

cut-throat merchants, have the best selection

medical research
-get in to fights with other researchers

run drug trafficking rings that sucker in the high entia

play up cutesy speech to get others to underestimate them

rub themselves with terrible smelling things so others stop picking them up and hugging them

eat bugs

Guess who's playing it for the first time! The script's fan-translated and it shows, it's not like Fire Emblem games in general are known for inventive plots, but the presentation makes it fall flatter than usual. Doesn't help that most of the Support conversations I've gotten so far are pretty short and rudimentary, I guess since this was the first game to really feature them in this way. It also really makes you appreciate how good Nintendo's in-house localization team is, they do a great job of getting the spirit across without being stiff and too literal. Anyway, here's my everyone's-promoted-about-to-start-16x status check.

( delicious numbers )

Everyone's doing very well for the most part! Definitely a lot harder than most subsequent installments, enemies getting to move right when they show up really changes how defensive and position aware you have to be. The desert + fog of war chapter was as annoying as expected, I can't wait for the obligatory ship chapter :P. The game's been surprisingly lenient as far as annoying thief deployment goes though. I imagine I'll eventually regret saying that orz.

Free weekend \o/! So what am I doing with my valuable time?

1. Study orz

2. Raging at Hulu for messing T&B's ep21 subs I need my fix damnit

3. Torturing and working myself in to a jealous rage of European gamers by reading every impression of Xenoblade I can get my hands on WHAT IS THIS BULLSHIT NINTENDO OF AMERICAAAAAAAA (╯°□° )╯︵ ┻━┻

I've seriously been following the development of the game since it began when the only thing on the official page was the beautiful main theme why won't you let me give you my money Nintendo ;_;?



...how's everyone else doing 8D?

It's been, uhhhhhh, how many months since I last posted? Anyway, guess who's on spring break!

Guess who just spent the first day of spring break (not spent at the airport orz) blazing through Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective :D? Absolutely loved the game, but I'm not going to go in to details about the plot since it's one you really don't want to spoil yourself for, especially accidentally.

Want me to repeat that?

DO NOT READ SPOILERS FOR GHOST TRICK.

The gameplay is fun, later puzzles especially can get extremely involved and take split second timing, but the way it's set up is forgiving and encourages experimentation.

It's the story that really makes it shine though, filled as it is with wonderfully goofy characters and WTF plot developments foreshadowed ALL OVER THE PLACE that will MELT YOUR FACE OFF with awesomeness. I did manage to work out the main twist several chapters before it was confirmed, but totally did not see that final revelation coming. You will be wrong. It is also one of those rare beasts, a Japanese videogame that ends well and coherently!...I think. Beat it at 2am this morning and am still trying to wrap my mind around a few details, you'll understand once you get there 8D. Putting aside any minor plot holes that may or may not exist, the ending is still one of the most relentlessly heartwarming experiences ever ♥.

This is a story that doesn't need a sequel, it's just so well formed and complete. Recommended for all ages and skill levels :).

Also, Missile for cutest sidekick ever :3.



EDIT: Forgot the most important thing, same developer as the Ace Attorney series! Though to be honest, even at this early point I think I actually like it more as game-play, pacing, and plotting are tighter all around; benefits of nine additional years of game development experience I guess. So definitely give it a try if you liked the AA games, and consider playing it even if you didn't!

Free Portal on Steam until May 24 :D?

Stays available after the 24th if you were wondering :3.

And two-stop layovers suck. On the other hand, at least that gave me more time to play The World Ends With You 8D. A couple of points:

1) Another Day is the best thing.

2) The brave/equip system is the second best.

3) I will acquire the entire black planet set. Though I can already tell that the 96U battle will be very, very painful D:.

4) Speaking of which, I managed to meet a Fifenfrog in probably my 7th battle looking for it instead of the potentially hundreds it seems to take most people 8D. Ganked its Black Mercury pin of course :3.

5) Adjustable difficulty? Adjustable levels/drop rates? Nothing being 100% missable? Being able to replay any chapter any time aka New Game++++++++++? A plot that actually justifies a band of teenagers saving the world Shibuya and writing that pokes fun at the standard JRPG emo protagonist model? Just about the only major criticism I can level is at the item organization system or the lack thereof, and even that's not too painful to work around. Another Day absolves it of any minor sins anyway, as well as Shiki's 3rd level Fusion and Shooter's Tin Pin Slammer 'Diagram' and Def March's goofiness and Pi-face (SO ZETTA SLOW) and the Crayon Warriors (seriously, Another Day) and god I love this game ♥.

Super Mario Galaxy is a fantastic game with fantastic graphics and fantastic level design, though the second one is naturally par for course in mainline Mario games. What I did not expect was for it to also have fantastic music, of which one example is this:



So jubilant and free, so perfect in its embodiment of pure joy; there are videogame songs I like listening to just for the nostalgia and the association it has with favorite moments, then there are songs like this.

Is tomorrow, if you're a Super Tuesday state remember to vote in the primaries :).


I said I wouldn't talk about Smash Brothers anymore, and I lied. Sorry. But I couldn't not show this Kirby Hat Compilation Clip :D.
( Hiiiiiii! )

One Piece 486:
( ♥ )

Democratic Presidential Primaries:
Obama wins South Carolina by a margin of 28% ♥.
( His victory speech )

I apologize for all political posts if you're not American, I'm just really excited about the primaries right now :).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJA69C6SlRk
For fun, a really awesome music video of Nina Simone's 'Feeling Good'.


Today has been a good day ♥ ♥ ♥.








Except for Fire Emblem. HHM 19 can go die in a fire.

I get the feeling my flist isn't much for console RPGs, but I loved this game so much I had to get all tl;dr about it anyway.

I suppose it sort of fails as a pimp post, considering people who haven't played it can't read it for fear of spoilers but they're what make it so awesome~ ars;dklfjlkw. Well, if you have a Gamecube/Wii but haven't heard of these games, they're probably best known for their unusual battle system (well, the first one is probably also known for its notoriously bad voice acting), usually called a card-battling game but it really isn't (in the usual Yu-Gi-Oh and various TCGs sense), it just uses cards as the interface between player and world, with attacks being cards representing weapons, defense as cards representing armor and shields, healing items as cards representing food, etc. You start out with a certain hand of cards with each card being replaced as it is used or discarded, and play the cards in ascending order (according to their number in the bottom right hand order), with consecutive strings of cards and other special combinations of attack and special cards doing more damage to the enemy. That's really just a really quick and dirty description of it but anything more thorough would probably be better just looked up in a guide. The character models are all right, but the backgrounds are hand-painted and absolutely gorgeous, while the music is good in the prequel and absolutely phenomenal in the first game.

And if you have played the first one but didn't like the battle system (which was original but had its flaws) or the story (which has some neat twists but is otherwise pretty pedestrian, I admit) this prequel really overhauls it and you can see how much thought went in to improving upon both these and other facets of the game. And though I did't really count the voice acting in the original a negative, horrendous as it is, because it crosses over in to so-bad-it's-hilarious territory and you can turn it off anyway, the voices in Origins are not only much better, but even generally excellent when most people would have been fine with serviceable. Really, I still don't know how it could have scored lower than the first one across the board unless the reviewers couldn't figure out the battle system or hadn't actually played the game (which is a possibility, sadly).

WARNING: Major spoilers for both games and the actual tl;dr under the cut.

( I am the light, dispeller of darkness... )

Anyone who liked the first one should buy and devour this game immediately. And even if you didn't like the first one the prequel is such a huge improvement over it that I'd recommend it on its own merits anyway as it can be played as a stand alone game (though you really get the most out of it from playing the first then Origins).

Yes, I really did write 3,681 words about a videogame. Uh, I really like it? Yeah ♥.