Caves, Elixirs, and Grunties

College has really murdered my game time, but I am still doing my best to get through .Hack Infection and Final Fantasy 6.

Fabuloussss!

I'm 9 hours into Final Fantasy 6 and I'm starting to warm up to it. Terra went all super sayian and now I'm trying to rescue and/or find her. My party is Locke, Cyan, Edgar, and Celes. One of my big worries is that I am going to miss out on a bunch of characters because I didn't explore enough or something. Hopefully the other characters that haven't been introduced yet are in mandatory cut-scenes or found in painfully obvious places. I've reached the city of Zozo and I think it is an awesome area for a Final Fantasy game. A derelict town full of enemies, jumping from skyscraper to skyscraper, and a cool puzzle with clocks just feels right in this game. Also Edgar's auto crossbow is an amazing ability and should be used without discretion.

This is what computer hacking looks like guys.

Where Final Fantasy 6 has been constantly improving in my mind, .Hack Infection has been maintaining the status-quo. Gardenia joined my group so now I have a long arm that I can recruit to my party. I definitely need to stop and do some grinding though. A friend warned me that if I don't farm the early virus cores now it will be hard to get them later. I'm also plagued with constant feeling that some party members are way under leveled (I'm looking at you Natsume). I should probably raise some more grunties as well but I keep getting noble grunties. For that matter, I don't understand what grunties even do. I can trade with them for some okay stuff but that's about it right? Add to the .Hack chore list Trading with NPC's as well. Somebody must want those Golden Axes I have. .Hack has a lot of nuances that I need to work on.

The real sleeper hit was the random games of Spelunky my girlfriend and I have been playing. After watching so much Spelunkin' with Scoops I looked up some streams on Twitch. One late night I found a stream with an exceptional Spelunky player Latedog. In his stream were a few other top tier players and just generally nice fellows. These guys and gals were a delight to talk to and answered any and every question I had about the game. I actually bought the game because the community seemed so nice.

My girlfriend's character of choice

Most of the Spelunky I have seen is single player, but let me tell you, if you haven't tried the multiplayer you are missing out. My girlfriend and I play with each other and we have a blast. We aren't too good yet, but we always laugh and carry on. The best part is that even when you are dead you can control a ghost that floats around setting off traps and pushing treasures down to a more accessible area for your partner to grab. That small touch makes the game consistently engaging for every player. It's a rare game that leads to multiplayer laughs and not multiplayer fights. 

Comments are always welcome,
-Chemystery

More .Hackin' and Questin'

As another semester begins I continue my trek into .hack Infection and Final Fantasy VI. I expect my play times to be more infrequent so I've started writing down what I was doing and what was going on after each time I play. Hopefully these games will be wrapped up sooner rather than later.

I'm about 15 hours through .hack Infection and I'm really warming up to it. I was pretty upset with the visuals to begin with but I've moved past that and found a lot of mechanics that I enjoy. Most notably, I've never once been lost in the game. Despite the fact that you have to manage information inside The World and from your desktop, the game is paced and designed perfectly so you are always progressing if you want to. It shows some real skill in pacing and story management that I just have to stop and admire.

Your in game desktop

Another great little tidbit are the books of Ryu. These books track your in game stats, like chests open and amount of money spent. The best part is that while you increase your numbers you unlock items outside of The World like wallpapers for your desktop or menu music. It's not a huge deal but it is nice to see.

With any luck it will be a while until I hit the grind wall. So far it seems like there are enough things to pursue that it will be a non-issue.

I'm looking less favorably on Final Fantasy VI though. The game is really jarring to me story wise. I just finished Sabin's segment and now everyone is together preparing for the epic battle. At first I thought the concept of the group splitting up was interesting but the more I played it the more I disliked it. The segments difference in length felt awkward, like the developers had clear favorite characters. The other story part I don't understand is the random narration. Kappas tell you game mechanics, moogles select what segment you want to play, and then random words show up to tell you what is going on in the story. It feels clunky and takes me away from the story.

Why do you exist!?

The pieces are there, I guess I can understand how this would be someones favorite entry of the series, but not for me. I enjoy the characters but everyone's favorite villain Kefka seems dumb to me. Like is...it...supposed to be a clown? Also is it pure evil or humorous? If this is someone's favorite villain let me know what the point is. Actually, explain to me why this entire game is great. Right now it is missing the mark with me.

Have a good week.

                                                                                                                                                                   -Chemystery