Magnus

I saw a thread on GameFAQs where someone asked what was behind the door on Valak Mountain. The first reply was:

Since you need to have the nunchuk plugged into the Wiimote at all times, I never saw the point in just playing with the nunchuk. Though theoretically the controls should work fine, because the Wiimote just mimics some of the functions on the nunchuk and adds some shortcuts. But yeah, most pointless control option ever, really. :p

Yeah, it's... um... it's not a game for people looking for a good game. It's a game for people who are willing to look past the many flaws of an average game because it has one aspect that's really great and different. I realize that not everyone is willing to do that, but for those who are, I thought the story and characters really made up for everything else. It's funny you should mention Deadly Premonition, because that's another game I got for many of the same reasons, but I haven't had time to check it out yet.

I didn't have any problems with the fishing quest, since the game marks out where you need to go on your map. But in the back of my mind I remembered watching Joystiq's embarrassing fishing video, so I knew I needed to keep my eyes open. It probably also helped that I'd already explored the town at that point, so I knew there was another beach nearby. Never had much luck fishing again after that, though. Only managed to catch underwater plants and humongous buckets. So, um... only two pages? I didn't get this game when it was released after it received less-than-stellar review scores (to be fair, it was never really on my radar to begin with because how awful it looked the first time they showed it off), but I picked it up cheap a few weeks ago. And I really enjoyed it. Not that it's not flawed, because it definitely is. The graphics are... I guess technically competent, at least? The problem is more that the world is really bland for the most part and the character design (outside of two of the main characters) is painfully uninspired. The sidequests are all uniformly awful and most of them are just given to you by NPCs that lack any real personality, like basically every single NPC in this game. I think I played about three sidequests that were more interesting than "I need [number] of [item] for [reason]", and even then the actual tasks weren't much fun. I don't think the gameplay is as bad as people make it out to be. It's not great, but it's not bad either. Combat is simple - you can use your weapon, dodge and cast magic. There's not a lot of exploration, but you're encouraged to do some of it if you want to find items for sidequests or materials for upgrading your weapons. So it's pretty standard. I did like how the game wasn't afraid of mixing things up, though. There are some shmup-inspired sections, at least one boss ripped off from Zelda, a dungeon that gives you rules you need to follow and even an area that's inspired by text adventures. However, the reason I think people should play the game is the story. It takes a while to get going and doesn't really pick up until you get your second party member. Things get a lot more interesting from that point on, though, and the story gets really good once you get your third party member. The story is pretty dark and... I don't know. It was something different. I really enjoyed it. I really recommend doing a New Game+ to get the most out of the story. It plops you back in two thirds of the way through the game and at that point you're so over-leveled that it only takes three or four hours to finish the game again. When you replay the game, you get some more backstory for one of the main characters (both in prose right at the start and then occasionally through voice-overs throughout the game), as well as several extra scenes that wouldn't have made sense when playing through the game the first time. It also features a different ending that complements the first ending perfectly. Seriously, if you find yourself enjoying the story even a little bit, it's worth the extra effort. (The game also has two more endings that can be reached if you play through the last third of the game a third time, but you need all of the game's thirty weapons to get them, so they're a bit more effort (the endings are also the only things that are different when you play the game a third time). They feel more like alternate endings, but they're good in their own right and are worth checking out on YouTube.) But yeah. Play Nier for the story. It's worth going through an otherwise average-but-decent game for. Also, the music is pretty good.

You may want to get it looked at by a doctor. Sounds serious.

Judging by this thread, I wasn't alone in giving this game a pass based on its review scores. I've been on the look-out for lesser-known games recently, though, so I picked this up a few weeks ago. It's actually pretty good. Certainly better than the reviews would have you think, anyway. It feels a lot like an SNES RPG. The story is simple and predictable, but it gets the job done. There are random encounters everywhere outside the domes/towns. The translation is rough at best. But. What I like the most about the game is how well it manages to create a world. All of the different domes feel like they're part of a bigger picture. There's a dome where children are raised and educated. And then there's a dome for the two biggest companies that produce everything in the world and the people that work for them. And there's a dome for artists and entertainment. They're all foreshadowed too, so it's pretty fun when you finally get to them. Most of them are pretty huge, so there's a lot to see, with shops and restaurants and people's homes and farms and... And there are TV shows! Okay, so most of them suck (the "cat trilogy" is mildly entertaining, at least), but still. Some of the educational ones are pretty fun to watch, too. There's one that describes the different art movements in the game. Because, yeah, the designers made up their own art movements. And there are examples of them throughout the world. The world of Opoona is built around job licenses, where everyone gets a license and quotas to fulfill, and once they've fulfilled all of their quotas, they get to retire to Sanctuary, which is basically the game's version of heaven. And of course you get to go there eventually - and there's a TV show about it, so you can find out everything there is to know about it long before you get to go there. Opoona gets a ranger license when he arrives on the planet, and for much of the game, your job is to fulfill different ranger quotas. But it's okay, because they usually end up being related to the main story in big ways. There are also other licenses that you can get. Some of them are required for the main story, but a lot of them are completely optional. There's a cleaning license and a star license. There's even a license where you spend months playing... a banjo? I think it was a banjo. They can all be leveled up several times and have different objectives for each level. So you'll have to find an item for a diva who doesn't want to go on television without it, and once that's done the next quota requires you to fill in for a dancer on live television. So there's a lot to do. There are also puppies and artwork to find and a bestiary to fill out. You can also make friends with people. You'll need seven (I think) for the final dungeon, but there are (I think) thirty people you can become friends with (though a couple are mandatory for the main story). If you go back to talk to them throughout the course of the game, they'll slowly become better friends with you and often give you sidequests. I should point out that despite playing the game for thirty hours or so, I didn't even find all of the friends. Nor did I find (or finish) all of the available licenses. So it's a pretty big game. Obtuse and confusing at times, but big. While I hate random encounters, the battles are usually over pretty quickly and the battle system is pretty fun. You attack using Opoona's (and later his siblings') Bon-Bon, which you can angle in four different directions. That way, you can hit enemies that hide behind other enemies (or bombs, later on), as well as hit several enemies in a row once you've upgraded your Bon-Bon. You can also choose how hard you want to throw the Bon-Bon. Harder throws do more damage, but it takes longer before you can attack again. Other than that, it works just like any other battle system. There are several ways to upgrade your Bon-Bon - either giving it special abilities or things like more strength/defense - as well as items and magic attacks to use. I quite liked the graphics. It's not Xenoblade Chronicles or Skyward Sword, but the graphics, like a lot of things in this game, are simple but effective. Some areas are even fairly impressive-looking, with a fairy grove being one of the highlights. The character design is a bit generic overall, though I did really come to like the design of Opoona and his family. Um. I guess that's it. It's not for everyone, but if you were sitting on the fence because of the mediocre reviews, you may want to give Opoona a chance.

So... um. Anyone else kind of disappointed in this season? One of the things I really liked about seasons two and up was that they all had overarching storylines. This season was just "Larry spends half the season doing nothing in Los Angeles and then he spends the second half of the season doing nothing in New York". I didn't think he'd be able to top the Seinfeld reunion arch, but this was just... not good. That said, individually most of the episodes were good. Not Curb Your Enthusiasm at its best, but entertaining nonetheless. I really miss Cheryl, though. Way too little of her this season and waaay too much of Jeff's wife.

Meanwhile, the last season of The Sopranos somehow managed to feel both too drawn out and too rushed at the same time. But, um, yeah. The show was great overall, of course. I think the ending just spoiled it a bit for me. That, and the untimely death of Tony's mother. She was my favorite character. I really should watch The Killing. But now I'm halfway through The Shield, so it'll have to wait once again.

There's only one way to respond to that:

That's not how you spell Six Feet Under.

If people don't want to move to Colony 6, then yes, you usually need to upgrade it more. For some reason, the really obvious people in Colony 9 have pretty high demands (Oleksiy requires Special Level 4, I think). I think the only exception is Rosemary, as I've seen some people mention that you need to talk to her with Shulk as the leader. As for affinity with the different areas, it's not only based on quests. You get quite a bit of affinity just from talking to people and filling out the affinity chart by forming links between characters. Though there are some new quests that get unlocked once you've advanced the story a bit more, too. Reyn's skill tree quest is in Colony 6, by the way, but it has some pretty annoying prerequisites. You need to have moved (I think) four specific people to Colony 6 and finished their quests before Reyn's quest becomes available.

Regarding the 3DS being hacked, I'd have a lot more sympathy for Nintendo if they hadn't decided to region-lock it.

Yes. ..................

I don't like how Level-5 has fallen in love with 3D with the 3DS. Where's the 2D love? Hopefully the game will still be good, though.

It's a fantastic game. You're going to love it.

But the early Final Fantasies suck, so... You're not really making a good case for the game. :p This isn't the kind of RPG I want from Square Enix.

Enjoy it while it lasts. There are another 12-13 "kill X amount of X/collect X amount of X" quests in the next area.

You're a horrible friend. :p

No, but at least it used to be pretty good. The last season was just painful. :p

I think it's become worse and worse the last couple of seasons, and the series finale was atrocious (but that was to be expected, considering the rest of the season). :p

There are RPGs that are all dungeon crawling and RPGs that have next to no dungeon crawling, so saying that it's no more a dungeon crawler than any other RPG doesn't really mean much. :p What I meant was that it seems like a game that doesn't have much of a story and is all about its battle system and fighting monsters ad infinitum. Which I'd classify as a dungeon crawler. That's just based on reviews/forum posts/videos, but it really doesn't seem like my game at all, so I doubt this will be, either. Roll on Paper Mario, I guess.

The 4 Heroes of Light just looks like a bland dungeon crawler to me, so this likely won't be any better. Which is a shame, because the music and graphics in the trailer are nice.

I'm still waiting for the last game. Advance Wars is better. Just stick with that.

I barely managed to get through the first season of this. Didn't really find it funny at all, unfortunately.

This is why having limited inventory space for materials is such a stupid idea. The Witcher did the same thing. Also, collectables: Sirius Anemone - overtrade with Nikita Enigma Lotus - overtrade with Npa or trade with Kilaki (two-star affinity) Gold Burdock - trade with Galvin (three-star affinity) Ice Cabbage - trade with Yura (four-star affinity) All of this is courtesy of the Xenoblade wiki, so I can't verify it. Eryth Sea has a secret area where you can find twelve collectables at night, so that's an easy way to get everything you need in that area.