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Maxus
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Post by Maxus »

Oh, yes. Fran has a very nice butt.

But, yeah, the game's not doing it for me. Even FF6 had me more engaged than this.

Now that I think about it, I might as well make Fran the Party Leader and least have the camera focus on her.

Now, if only they had some sort of way to erase memories...I'd be playing through Tales of Symphonia again in remarkably short order. I'd give up a couple of FINGERS and half an ear to be able to to play through that game for the first time--again.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.

--The horror of Mario

Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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Maxus
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Post by Maxus »

Okay, confession time.

On some video games, I'm lucky to the point of idiocy. Or I do weird shit.

Examples:

There was an old game. Called Boogerman (when you're 8 or 9, you think anything is funny). I beat the game. I saw a weird different ending where two digitized guys came out and waved at me.

Pokemon's the big one. People usually don't believe me, but here's my weird shit that's happened:

1) I caught a Shiny Vulpix on Silver, when I was looking for a Houndour. This would not have been too weird, except a week later I ran into a Shiny Raticate. And caught it, too.

2) Also on my first playthrough of Silver, I caught Suicune the first time I ran into it in the wild. With an Ultra ball. I saw it, and I figured, "Awh, hell, might as well try...one shake...two shakes...three sh-HOLY SHIT!"

3) I also generally pulled out dramatically appropriate critical hits in tough fights. And on Pokemon Stadium. Except Stadium 2 kicked my ass; in that "You get a random team" cup, someone had a Shiny Pidgeot which had sufficient testicular mass to kick the butt of a Sudowoodo.

4) On Ruby, I can generally catch Regice with a Dive Ball. I don't know what it is, but Dive Balls work wonders on that thing. I also caught Latios with a Premier ball the first time I played through.

I've also had generally good luck with games which have semi-random stats (When I played FFX at a friend's house long ago, my people had good evasion. Like, Auron was dancing out of the way of everything; Fire Emblem was also very nice to me when it came time to level up.)

A friend described it like this:

Only You (Ex): You're lucky to the point of idiocy on some video games, and have freak events happen in your favor.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.

--The horror of Mario

Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
Koumei
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Post by Koumei »

Pfft, I can use normal Poke Balls to catch Darkrai and Arceus.

Of course, that's using an Action Replay, so...

And Shiny doesn't actually mean anything stat-wise, 3rd Generation (such as the Stadiums, IIRC) onwards. In 1 and 2 it gave better stats (hence Red Gyarados was better than regular ones), but fighting Shinies in Stadium shouldn't make a difference.

Now, finding and catching a bunch out in the wild (as opposed to Chaining or the Masuda Method - still by no means close to a guarantee) can still be considered very lucky, I'm not denying that.
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Maxus
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Post by Maxus »

It was in the 2nd Generation--Gold/Silver/Crystal.

Funny enough, I understood the odds of finding one in Generation 2 was worse than being struck by lightning. And I found two in a week, in the wild.

And they were significantly more favorable in Generation 3, but I've never seen one on Ruby. Funny, huh?
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.

--The horror of Mario

Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
Koumei
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Post by Koumei »

How many times have you been struck by lightning?

At any rate, I found... I think one in Fire Red: Shiny Machoke. I also found (as in, without an AR) a Shiny Medicham in Diamond. I think that's all, but there might have been one other shiny in one of them.
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Post by Maxus »

Holy crap. I like Medicham (Pure Power and High Jump Kick, along with some other useful abilities, like Psychic, back in Diamond.)
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.

--The horror of Mario

Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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Post by Maxus »

I'll say this:

Cid's Angels isn't as harsh at grinding as FF12. Hell, if I do it right, I can score multiple points a fight, a noticeable improvement over one point per enemy.

I set my teeth and set to learn a skill which had 140 AP required. Imagine my surprise when it didn't take that long.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.

--The horror of Mario

Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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Post by Koumei »

Maxus wrote:Holy crap. I like Medicham (Pure Power and High Jump Kick, along with some other useful abilities, like Psychic, back in Diamond.)
I originally caught one just so that I could get it to learn Power Trick (the guide book says it "swaps Attack with the enemy") and the three elemental punches. I was then going to breed an Abra with it (Abra has those four moves as Egg Moves) so as to have a pathetically weak Abra (I would refuse to evolve it of course) that could swap ATT with its foes then punch the crap out of them.

Sadly, I then discovered that Power Trick only swaps your stat boosts to ATT. So it's better for a Medicham that used Super Power (thus taking the ATT penalty) against a Dragon Dancer/Sword Dancer.
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Post by Crissa »

I can only remember twice. But the tree outside was hit and exploded, and my room was the only one that faced it. A limb came down about 3' in diameter and blocked our driveway.

A year later I would find my first cat there under the thimbleberry canes, where she had died, poisoned by the neighbors 1/4mi down the hill.

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Post by Psychic Robot »

A year later I would find my first cat there under the thimbleberry canes, where she had died, poisoned by the neighbors 1/4mi down the hill.
Those fuckers. I hope your vengeance was terrible to behold.

Aside from that, I'm looking for an MMORPG to play. I've been playing Warhammer Online, but that's been an unpleasant experience that firsthand demonstrates Mythic's incompetence at game balance. I've played WoW before, and it was a turd, and it can only be a bigger turd now. I'm considering the free trial of LOTRO, but I don't like the lack of character customization in it.

Any suggestions? (No DDO, even if it is free.)
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Post by DragonChild »

City of Heroes/Villians is kinda decent, but Champions Online is coming out soon, and that looks fantastic.
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Post by mean_liar »

They all look fantastic until you play them, generally. They're like RPGs that way. :)

I really liked CoH but I played it early on. It was my first and only MMO experience and the constantly changing rules of the game drove me to quit... but until then I really did have a blast.
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Post by Psychic Robot »

Or does it look Fantastic!?

Yuff yuff yuff.

My only fear with Champions is that it's going to end up too similar to COH/V. As much as I hate grindan and raidan, I do like upgrading items and equipment from time to time.
Count Arioch wrote:I'm not sure how discussions on whether PR is a terrible person or not is on-topic.
Ant wrote:
Chamomile wrote:Ant, what do we do about Psychic Robot?
You do not seem to do anything.
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Post by Crissa »

We'll see. I think he's kinda learned his lesson about add-ons to a later product. People only pay attention to what something is when it is released, not what it is currently.

-Crissa
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Post by mean_liar »

You mean Jack Emmert?
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Post by Count Arioch the 28th »

Maxus wrote:I'll say this:

Cid's Angels isn't as harsh at grinding as FF12. Hell, if I do it right, I can score multiple points a fight, a noticeable improvement over one point per enemy.

I set my teeth and set to learn a skill which had 140 AP required. Imagine my surprise when it didn't take that long.
There are places where you can set up an infinite combo.

You get one point for every kill, but you also get one point for every job-related ability you use. The trick is finding free abilities you can use that doesn't harm enemies and keep using them.

I've found that certain jobs are great right out of the box (Black Knight), and some you really need to get abilities for (Berserker and Samurai are both terrible when you get them).
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Post by Maxus »

I'd figured that'd how it works. I have Yuna on White Mage, and she's very much into praying.

As a side note...I need to pick up FFX. I know most of the story, but I'd like to have it.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.

--The horror of Mario

Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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Post by Crissa »

mean_liar wrote:You mean Jack Emmert?
I think. I'm terrible with names, and I haven't talked to him in a year since my boss was laid up this spring with a heart attack. Medical expenses + no travel == no work for me to do.

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Post by Koumei »

Count_Arioch_the_28th wrote: I've found that certain jobs are great right out of the box (Black Knight), and some you really need to get abilities for (Berserker and Samurai are both terrible when you get them).
Berserker sucked dick at first. It's great for short fights, when levelled up - Berserk + Haste + one of the protective spells, I forget which, is really handy. However Haste and the protective spell both wear off after a couple of turns, leaving you in a useless rage. And Assault is a terrible ability: let's ALL rage, so the player can only watch and hope we don't get killed!

Samurai lives and dies by Coin Toss and the Damage=MaxHP-CurrentHP ability.

Black Knight starts amazing and gets better from there. Also, Sacrifice is hilarious, and I recommend giving your least favourite character Black Knight just for that, so she keeps suicide bombing.

However it's not that great in New Game+, because you don't have enough MP for the abilities (and losing HP by using Dark Wave really hurts at that level).
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Post by Sir Neil »

But if you have the "0 mp" accessory, it doesn't use magic or HP.
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Post by Count Arioch the 28th »

To be honest, I never 100% warmed up to berserker, I only thought Rikku looked cute as one.

Dark Knight is one of my favorites, and I use it constantly. Unless I specifically need a three-job combo to do something, there is always a black Knight in my party. And the 0 MP accessory takes away their only real downside (lack of MP + high MP cost spells). Although the only one I really use is the one that shoots meteors. I like the Garment Grid that gives you a bonus to Power and Magic (can't think of the bullshit names they gave them) when you go through the gates, spam Darkness, and throw in the meteor spell when I have one target.


I've never had problems with Black Knights losing HP, for one thing the 0 MP accessory stops you from losing HP, for another my second character is always an Alchemist spamming free mega-potions, unless I need one quick. Then I mix a Hi-potion with a potion and get it almost immediately.

Then again, I never got too far into the last levels of the Via Infinito, the whole place bored me to no end.
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Post by Avoraciopoctules »

I started Tales of Symphonia 2 a while ago. It is hilarious. The main PC has multiple unskippable black-and-white flashbacks to conversation snippets that happened a single digit of seconds ago. The majority of the characters live up to the Tales tradition of filling the world with unintelligent bigots. The main PC's mentor has a theme song that draws hilarious parallels between him and Duke Devlin in Yugioh abridged ( http://www.yugiohtheabridgedseries.com/ ).

The game is also fun. I recommend playing it with others so that you can talk about the ridiculous parts.
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Post by Maxus »

It's a shame. Tales of Symphonia is one of my all-time favorite games. I don't know why, but I had fun with the story and, by the time I'd reached the end, it'd felt like years had passed since the beginning.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.

--The horror of Mario

Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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Post by Lago PARANOIA »

Tales of Symphonia is really ham-handed, cheesy, silly, and kind of pretentious.

However, the game completely believes in its own message and I also feel that as kind of clumsy it is in its message that they were sincere even for the silly parts. Especially for the silly parts. I liked it.

The fact that it has an engaging combat system on top of that is a bonus.

However, one thing that really irritates me about the game is that it puts a lot of the blame on the half-elf/human discrimination on the humans and half-elves. The elves themselves somehow completely escape blame from the story despite the fact that they ostracize and kill half-elves altogether. Very little time is spent criticizing their culpability in the bullshit conflict.

They pulled this bullshit in Tales of Phantasia, too. Did Christopher Paolini write this fukken game?
Last edited by Lago PARANOIA on Wed Jul 22, 2009 1:48 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Maxus »

For me, it party the story. And partly the characters, and partly the battle system.

And, yeah, it believes in the message...but it seems like the only reason elves don't make a bigger deal over half-elves is because the elves all live in one village.

And in Phantasia...Well, humans are completely cool with half-elves. They've moved on. Elves still have problems with them.

Anyway, it'd make sense that there's still lingering problems with racism in Phantasia; Symphonia is a distant prequel (something everyone probably already knows).

But, yeah, I had a blast with that game for about two weeks. A lot to do, I didn't know how the story would turn out past a certain point...and I loved the characters and how they had depth.

Except for Colette. Even Zelos showed more character depth than Colette. And that's really disappointing because Colette is hinted at being deeper than she seems, and being a bit less optimistic than she acts...but what's the point of hinting at hidden depths if they're not ever shown?

I mean, really...Zelos is at first presented an a hedonistic idiot trying to get it on with every even halfway-attractive woman he sees.

But then he breaks out some line or something. The one that comes to mind is the skit about him brooding about the discovery that two party members are half-elves. When the hero gets pissed at him for mentioning it, Zelos quite calmly points out that he can tell Raine and Genis are good people and nothing like how half-elves are commonly portrayed. Then he says that still having the feelings, despite openly acknowledging the evidence to the contrary, is probably the nature of prejudice.

Edit: Anyway, the Elves aren't really much sympathetic in either game, what with the prejudice. And I remember a science book in the elf village claimed that the elves' long lifespans meant they were near-perfect and didn't need to evolve. They have some problems.
Last edited by Maxus on Wed Jul 22, 2009 2:34 am, edited 1 time in total.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.

--The horror of Mario

Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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