Board 8 > SaveEstelle & LeonhartFour in New Houses: Next-Gen Edition [SELF]

(+) Yeah! (+)

I mean, you can have the rank and file be good with the higher ups being evil, kinda like Tales of Symphonia.

I guess the ultimate question for Trails will be (if it goes that route) if the religion turns out to be a total sham like in Symphonia or if it's just the people in charge being evil.

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Dragon Ball Z Episode 15 complete!

Wait, did Piccolo split himself in half to give himself a training partner? I mean, I guess Kami was able to do it, too, so whatever.

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Hmm. Beaten up to the end of 2-3 in CS4 now, and I must say, these chapters are good in the "going around exploring and doings quests" parts, but the main story parts feel really, uh, boring/pointless? Like you're mostly fighting people who aren't really against you, kinda rescuing girls who are kinda captured, and not really doing anything. The Act 1 stuff felt like they put effort into the climaxes at least. This stuff is fillery as heck, like they were planning on making CS3 and CS4 as one game, split them apart, and then realized they had to add a bunch of inconsequential content to make the game longer (shorter can be better, guys!)...
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Dragon Ball Z Episode 16 complete!

I feel like Lord of the Flies already demonstrated that an island full of kids on their own doesn't end well.

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I forgot how long all that pre-Saiyans stuff lasts in original DBZ.

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Mac Arrowny posted...

Hmm. Beaten up to the end of 2-3 in CS4 now, and I must say, these chapters are good in the "going around exploring and doings quests" parts, but the main story parts feel really, uh, boring/pointless? Like you're mostly fighting people who aren't really against you, kinda rescuing girls who are kinda captured, and not really doing anything. The Act 1 stuff felt like they put effort into the climaxes at least. This stuff is fillery as heck, like they were planning on making CS3 and CS4 as one game, split them apart, and then realized they had to add a bunch of inconsequential content to make the game longer (shorter can be better, guys!)...

I generally agree here. Act 2 in particular felt like there was a bunch of stuff that didn't need to be there. There's a part coming up that I thought was really cool mostly, but overall I'd say Act 1 has been easily the best part of the game. I am also only on 3-1 right now though and my impression is that most people like the finale a lot, at least.
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omfg finally beat Dragon Age II

I can't believe this game actually tried to up the difficulty on me at the last second and prolonged my experience by at least a couple hours but the deed is done.

I don't know why but the DA games just haven't been the smooth experience of ME, despite how much overlap they share in game design. But oh well on to ME3 when I have it in me to play another 40+ hour game.

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Dragon Age II is pretty fun if you can overlook that there are like 2 different dungeon/random encounter maps in the entire game. I liked it more than DA:O which is a pretty unpopular opinion I think.

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I overall had fun. The core design was there, and the rinse repeat of quests suited me just fine, but I have high tolerance for repetitive gameplay. I think the tactical combat of DAO was more engaging even if it was more frustrating at times. Not that I wasn't damn frustrated at moments even in DA2. The game could be a cakewalk and then oh man is that a mage BAM your dead

The roleplaying elements may be the strongest of the Bioware games I've played so far. I liked keeping it in the politics of this world, even if lots of characters do pretty dumb things.

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I've been watching a ton of MHA over the past week or two as I procrastinated on writing up my research progress

Got to season 4 today, so I'm almost caught up.

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pjbasis posted...

The roleplaying elements may be the strongest of the Bioware games I've played so far. I liked keeping it in the politics of this world, even if lots of characters do pretty dumb things.

Yeah, it's the roleplay/characters/politics that put DA2 over DA:O for me. Also Snarky Hawke is the best.

LordoftheMorons posted...

I've been watching a ton of MHA over the past week or two as I procrastinated on writing up my research progress

Got to season 4 today, so I'm almost caught up.

That episode in the middle of MHA Season 3 is top-tier. You know the one. Season 4 is great too.

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CS4: Act 2-1 beated.

Exploring Ordis and seeing how it changed was fun. Surprised there was no active voice event or even comment about the lighthouse being destroyed. Obviously Class VII would know it happened during the railway cannon incident but I was sure someone would discuss it. Guess not! In one of the more petty actions of the curse it almost got Riviera Court shut down. Really that whole situation is odd. Like does that really benefit the Great Twilight? The army was getting their conscription office either way, does sticking it to the noble houses that run it really do all that much? I guess it'd funnel more business to Kleist & Co. as the only remaining group and they're clearly shady af and obviously helping the Imperial government out but still. Also, low effort by the curse to just allow Class VII to fix it after all that! Nice to see that someone in the party noticed when an antagonist was monologuing about us from a rooftop for once.

Infiltration of the manor was alright. Got to see where Ordine was found so that was neat. Major LOL at Claire keeping the new Soldats inside the mansion to stop us and the group discussing the ridiculousness of such a thing. Also totally called that Carl Regnitz was reassigned to Ordis for being a pain to Osborne and the Great Twilight back in my first post where you overhear he was transferred! Wrong on him collaborating with the Weissland Army though. Anyway, he remains pretty cool. Claire on the other hand you can go away now. Got an explanation on the symbol in the eyes of the Ironblood though. How Osborne can just bestow this on people is still a question though. ya go my General Zechs. The OG "cool military guy from the Empire."

One thing that definitely played out in this Part is that I found myself thinking at least once, and in many cases quite a few times, that having [character] for possible interactions would be really interesting. For every character. Cool stuff, that, though obviously a bit frustrating that it's impossible to drag around a team that big so you can only see a handful of them.

Also started a bit of Act 2-2 but nothing major. Checked Bonding Events and the back half of Osgiliath Basin and some VM, etc.

Angelica actually has the distinction of being the first person to beat me in VM... ever? That's a pretty good deck theory she's got going there! As for the bonding events, some neat stuff here. My "well let's see who's here and guess who doesn't make the cut" was a tough call between Ash and Alisa. As it turns out... I think it may end up being Juna! Sara's was another good one though it was funny that "after the battle Sara and Rean were exhausted and collapsed" when Sara was never hit and took zero damage, winning in three attacks (plus buffing herself.) Ash's turned out to be very intriguing with the whole mystery of the merchant who found him at Hamel. Not gonna lie my first thought for "traveling merchant" was the Hayworths and while that would be one hell of a plot twist he uh... that doesn't fit them at all lol. I drew a blank for a bit after that but my current theory is that guy with the hunting dog who we meet at the Noce Rest House in Act 1-2 and who is currently in Alster. He apparently hunts monsters and sells the meat so maybe he was around Hamel hunting or ex-military like Maya's dad who was another candidate that crossed my mind and at least in Alster he's drinking. Celine's event was cute. Since I save/reloaded I also saw Juna and Alisa's which are my current outstanding ones until I get the extra bonding point. Juna's was a bit underwhelming IMO while Alisa's is quite emotional and I like it.

However. H o w e v e r. Let it be known I am not here for this George redemption that Class VII/Angelica/Towa are now aiming for. Towa's group was so close, so close, to going "He literally blew up the Courageous this shit isn't getting a happy ending" but Juna somehow swayed them with a pep talk and I hate it. It'll happen, but let the record show I hate it.

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That FFXIV 5.4 artwork yes please. Ryne and Gaia making a baby.

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xp1337 posted...

That episode in the middle of MHA Season 3 is top-tier. You know the one.

Yes, that was very good! I usually much prefer emaciated All Might, but buff All Might had a fantastic swan song.

Speaking of which, before looking up AFO's VA I did not realize that the Japanese voice of Solid Snake, Rider from F/Z, Blackbeard from One Piece, Gaius van Baelsar, and Manfred Von Karma were all the same person!

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The Office Season 7 Episode 7 complete!

So I'm guessing Jim and Pam are Methodists then.

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The Office Season 7 Episode 8 complete!

Okay, that moment when Michael realized Erin actually kinda sees him as a father figure was really nice.

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Dragon Ball Z Episode 17 complete!

Kami: "You all fought well for a bunch of losers.

Oh, and the Saiyans that are coming are twice as strong as the ones that just wrecked you."

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Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood Episode 4 complete!

Man, I had forgotten about the chimera experiments. That was a bit of a gut punch.

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Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood Episode 5 complete!

Scar is a pretty compelling villain.

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BK_Sheikah00 posted...

That FFXIV 5.4 artwork yes please. Ryne and Gaia making a baby.

lewd

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Link BK?
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https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/shadowbringers/patch_5_4/

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I should really do the Bozjan stuff in FF14, but for the past two months or so I've mostly just been logging on to get my weekly MGP and check my retainers

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united states of smash in MHA is excellent. rest of the show is not as good.

dbz filler is honestly pretty enjoyable in general!
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The problem with DBZ isn't filler, it's glacial battle pacing

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Let's get back to Cold Steel IV Act 1 Chapter 3!

I ask around the different districts about the National Mobilization Law for Grace's sidequest. Multiple locals mention that Captain Kate has been acting strangely since the Imperial Defense Force showed up, which is interesting. I also run into Azel, who I'm pretty sure is a Testament in Zero, but now he's a regular working class dude, so that's cool for him. At Times, we walk in on Erebonian soldiers detaining a shop owner for being Calvardian. There are a couple of potential sidequests wandering around town, but it looks like I can't activate them yet, so we're off to the old field exercise camp and St. Ursula.

When we leave town, Jona messages us to inform us he's hacked our ARCUSes and installed some game onto them. For some reason, the main menu music sounds like the character select theme from Mario 2. It's basically just Puyo Puyo, but I'll take it over Vantage Masters, I guess. It takes me a few tries, but I eventually beat Jona. When we arrive at the old field exercise camp, we run into Freddy as expected. He shows us Musse's old Panzer Soldat, as I figured. Musse says she might be able to get us access to the others, too, and she gives Roselia a call to confirm some details. Now that she's learned a few tricks (literally) from Vita, she thinks she can summon them through the spirit path with Roselia's help. And it turns out she's right! Before she goes, Roselia says the anomaly in Crossbell is way more powerful than any of the others. It could be due to the Great Twilight, but there's another possibility (that she neglects to actually name, naturally). She adds that the Heimdallr group is having a hard time of it, too, so we shouldn't expect them to back us up.

Freddy has made a couple of more discoveries on top of this one, too. He found some ruins near where we fought the cryptid in CS3. Then he breaks the news that he spotted the Pleroma Grass while he was fishing earlier, but it was blue, not black. Well, Crossbell does operate by different rules than Erebonia proper, so it's still worth checking out. With that, we're back on the road to St. Ursula.

Eventually, we stumble upon the Stella Shrine, or to be more accurate, it simply materializes as soon as we get close. There's black Pleroma Grass around, too, but nobody mentions it for some reason. Like the first shrine, this is actually a dungeon instead of a long corridor that just leads to a boss. We fight a random enemy literally called MKE Maus, I mean seriously, on the nose enough? This shrine isn't too difficult to navigate, and we eventually reach the boss. I've noticed that CS4's dungeons tend to be simpler than previous iterations, perhaps just to leave room to focus on the story since they've got to cram a lot into this one. After the battle, we get another flashback, this time to Osborne begging someone Rean's life in that house fire. This is a rare humanizing moment for Osborne, so it's too bad it ended so quickly.

That's it for tonight.

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LeonhartFour posted...

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood Episode 4 complete!

Man, I had forgotten about the chimera experiments. That was a bit of a gut punch.

Oh yeah meant to comment on this

Pretty certain that Shou Tucker is by far the most hated character in the show

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That girl and her dog are best friends

they're basically inseparable

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I laughed

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I see that Expanse Season 5 is dropping the first three episodes up front and then one per week for the rest.

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Oh, huh. That kinda fell off my radar. Wish it was a full season dump though.

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Honestly, with how hype season 5 is practically guaranteed to be, it'll be better for the long-term health of the show to keep people wanting to come back to it every week.

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woo great bond scene with Jusis (start of 2-4)
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The Mandalorian Season 2 Episode 4 complete!

That was a very informative episode with some cool references in it. The guest stars are killing it this season, too.

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oh hey Persona 5 Royal is 50% off on PSN for their Black Friday sale, and the Ultimate Edition is too

something to think about

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Dragon Ball Z Episode 18 complete!

Oh hey, Goku finally made it to the end!

also how did no one else in the world notice that the moon was gone and how can Gohan transform with a fake moon

I've got questions about this world

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I got Persona 5 Royal and Resident Evil 3 Remake.

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P5 Royal is some good fun.

I think I'm near the end of 2-2 in CS4 but random power outages have stymied progress over here. Probably wrap it up tonight but we'll see.

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Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood Episode 6 complete!

My wife rejected Winry as a potential baby name, thankfully.

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hey you got a good 50+ episodes to go, bit premature for that don't you think

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Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood Episode 7 complete!

I feel like this next episode is around where I left off with the original.

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CS4 2-4: Ah, yet another chapter where it's good until the end. Questing was good times, as was talking to everyone on the Pantagruel. Very fun to have all these people in one place. Amusing line from Lloyd where he's like "Everything would've gone exactly the same if you weren't there at all" to Rean. I know he's trying to cheer him up, but when you think about it, Rean and co's actions haven't really made anything better for the world/Erebonia, huh? A bit disappointing the Mille Mirage didn't have more to it, but that was solid too. Shame about Rean, Lloyd and co. being lame there. Estelle's all like "Bracers don't fight in wars. We'll dedicate ourselves to evacuating and protecting civilians!" which is definitely a necessary thing to say and a good alternative to fighting. But Lloyd and Rean just keep repeating "third path! third path!" like broken records, without actually having any plans. I thought Act 2 was supposed to be all about Rean and co. figuring out how to stop the war, but they really accomplished absolutely nothing in that regard.

Ouroboros and co. attacking was disappointing too, since once again, not a single villain was taken down permanently (most of the fights were pretty easy too, though Mariabell was way tougher than the rest, maybe because of the party I had against her). And then rather than having someone cool jump in to help out at the end, we get Olivert. Do the writers think people like fakeout deaths? They're bad, and the writers should feel bad for writing them. Especially when they're as nonsensical as this one. Olivert's death was the main reason given for Erebonia to go to war with Calvard, so a better third path to avoiding war might've been, I dunno, NOT PRETENDING YOU'RE DEAD IN THE FIRST PLACE.

Man, imagine how great this game could've been if it were a good 20 hours shorter...
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Honestly my take right now is that Cold Steel 3 and 4 should have just been kept as one game that ended at Act 1 of CS4. If you're concerned about length then just cut most of chapter 4 from CS4 which was dumb anyways.
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okay I might have a longer CSIV update (just beat Act I and am back in Eryn - there was... a lot right at the end there) but Altina just delivered one of the most savage burns I've seen all game

Sara: *sigh* Youth truly is fleeting... But I'm only 27! I'm still a spring chicken!
Altina: And a headless one at that.

also for the last part of Act I I took Jusis and Machias to Crossbell and while I'm disappointed they didn't get any special ferris wheel scene their linked battle dialog was just as I imagined it (also running into Patiry made me extra glad I brought Machias)

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Janus5k posted...

Altina just delivered one of the most savage burns I've seen all game

Altina is absolutely savage when she's on her game.

CS3: "It was then that Instructor Rean quietly snapped."
CS4 1-2: "The bane of Juna's existence."

She also had a good one just now in 2-2. And she regularly torched Rean in CS3 lol.

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I finished the first Wheel of Time book, and I've already acquired the second. I'm understanding why this series is so hyped.

Main character ranking: Rand > Lan > Perrin > Nynaeve > Moiraine > Thom > Loial > Egwaine > Mat

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I don't even know what my ranking would be and I'm not even sure it's relevant considering how much changes over the course of the series. But definitely my rankings have shifted a lot as I've gone on.

Rand is consistently great though.
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CS4 2-2 beated:

Right as I took the quest from Kaela it clicked with me that she was Calvardian - and probably the Rocksmith Agency, though at this point her exact affiliation is still up in the air. Seems Schera is okay and in the Alster region... but in hiding for reasons. Probably has to do with whatever reason Patrick and Ferris were hiding but it still seems weird. Anyway, to Saint-Arkh for the operation where apparently the curse is actually just a status effect that Elliot's S-Craft can heal. Looks like we might be able to solve this crisis if we just load everyone up with Recuria and start casting it at people influenced by the curse. ...No? Well, I'm sure Class VII will use this new knowledge that Elliot can, at least in some circumstances, heal the curse to help-ahahahahaha of course not. They don't even mention it when dealing with Alan a bit later. Dreknor Fortress was alright I guess and we got Tita and Alfin back, yay.

Also took a quick look in at 2-3's Bonding Events:

Alfin's Bonding Event was nice. She's a good character when she's not being forced into her gag role of shipping Rean/Elise. Altina also had a very good bonding event, perhaps the best yet, but damn you Falcom NO we're NOT doing this. I will hypnotize myself into Altina feeling FAMILIAL love for Rean and no more. He can adopt her as a daughter. and that's it. Stop trying to ruin this bonding event. Towa's was interesting if only for confirming my "totally called it" moment from CS3 that Towa's parents died in the shadow war between the intelligence divisions. It wasn't a particularly difficult call but I still called it when she gave us her backstory in CS3 Chapter 4! Machias and Kurt had interesting events too - Machias for the callback all the way to CS1 with his cousin's fiancee and showing how far he (Machias) has come. Kurt for the whole memory resonance thing. Which leaves Laura. arghhhhh Falcom. This was a good event right up until the forced romance and Laura acting like a mild tsundere afterwards. Laura probably the dropped event here for me this part as a result.

Also more generally I need to be able to bring a bigger party at this point. I was already having to make tough calls on who to leave behind but now it's absolutely brutal.

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xp1337 posted...

Anyway, to Saint-Arkh for the operation where apparently the curse is actually just a status effect that Elliot's S-Craft can heal. Looks like we might be able to solve this crisis if we just load everyone up with Recuria and start casting it at people influenced by the curse. ...No? Well, I'm sure Class VII will use this new knowledge that Elliot can, at least in some circumstances, heal the curse to help-ahahahahaha of course not.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/79042134/947251601
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it really would have been

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here's hoping the Vols don't totally suck this week but it's been a while since we haven't now

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