Revenge of the Hand: MacDaddy Mike's playthrough topic part 2

But first I got to finish up JO, and it looks like that'll happen by tomorrow because I've only got two levels left after I run these off. I played two levels since my last update, the first of which being the Yavin Swamp, which is actually an area I remembered really not liking in the past but found a new appreciation for. Lightsabers don't work too well in the water but I actually didn't try to find out, because I decided at the start of the level that I haven't been using guns enough and that it was time to give them another shot.

There are swamptroopers hidden around everywhere and with all the foliage this level had me feeling a Naked Snake vibe, so I tried to go a little stealthy on this level, taking my time and proceeding very carefully, trying not to alert anyone and then sniping their faces off. It was a lot of fun, and though I hate forced stealth segments and stealth gaming in general, I found myself really taking to it here. I eventually ran out of ammo for my sniper rifle, so I switched to rockets for taking on enemies from afar, 'cause I knew that if I missed I would still probably kill them from the blast radius. I think the weapon that I've used least in this game is the thermal detonators, actually, 'cause I just never think to throw anything in this game, though I can think of a few great opportunities off the top of my head where they would have been very useful.

A few Shadow Trooper fights that were...surprisingly challenging, and a lot of swimming in this level. I got myself lost a couple of times and ended up heading in directions that had lots of ammo and health recharges but were dead ends, usually with a Shadow Trooper fight. I also spent a lot of time in the water looking for secret areas, 'cause I figured that'd be a great place to hide them, but didn't find any in the water at all.

Yeah, my accuracy dropped hard after I ran out of sniper ammo, sue me.

The next stage was probably the shortest yet (unless you count the Yavin Temple ones as two separate levels, which I don't), where you get to jump into an AT-ST and go freakin' nuts as you move through Yavin Canyon. This thing moves real slow and is a beast to handle, and yeah the level is incredibly linear but as far as forced vehicle sections go it's still fun enough. You only have to worry about guys in turrets that are way too difficult to hit and guys with rocket launchers...that suck. 'Not much to say about this one, really. It was incredibly simple, but enjoyable.

Secret areas found: 1 of 3
Enemies killed: 26
Accuracy: 32.79%

...after firing 620 shots. Aiming with the AT-ST main cannon is tough.

Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight really is a monumental game to any Star Wars fan growing up during this period. JK was the first time you got to use Force Powers in first-person, as well as the first live-action depiction of lightsaber combat since the Original Trilogy. The maps are very well-designed and open with lots of secret areas, as well as some tough platforming. It's on the PC and uses quicksaving, so you pretty much dictate your own respawn points without having the modern FPS "checkpoint after every five enemies killed" that we see today. Mysteries of the Sith is very much the same game as Jedi Knight with great advances to the multiplayer (that, unfortunately, nobody played) and some of my favorite FPS level design ever.

Though MotS will always have a special place in my heart, most Star Wars fans will tell you that Jedi Outcast is the best Star Wars game out there (it even topped GT's top 10 Star Wars Games list [http://www.gametrailers.com/video/top-ten-gt-countdown/20168]). It was the first game that really made you feel like a Jedi, but without making you overpowered and boring like in The Force Unleashed (also, no quick-time-events, yay). The lightsaber combat is still gripping and the most fun I've been able to experience across the Star Wars games canon, but there's a lot of attention to detail and great action, characterization and design here.

Jedi Academy was alright, but you can tell they didn't put as much effort into it, and the lightsaber setups are incredibly, INCREDIBLY unbalanced.

Definitely give the games a look. They're going for really cheap right now on Steam, as mentioned earlier, but I'm sure you could otherwise acquire them.
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Mac plays the games he thought he knew (Current: Star Wars-Jedi Outcast - PC):
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/548-zsb/61122424

You encounter a few stormtroopers in the hangar of the Academy (I had an awesome moment where I threw my saber at a rocket trooper who fired off a shot right before my saber sliced him in half, and then I used Force Push to send the rocket flying at another enemy) and from then on it's all lightsaber battles, and some of the most exciting in the game yet. You go through the rooms where you saw Jedi training the last time you were here, and they're still there, only now they're fighting against a legion of Reborn soldiers. You can dive in and help the Jedi, and the more you save the more end up joining you and following you around, which makes later encounters a little more manageable.

The fights here are tough as nails and high in number, and the first major one you find yourself in has you and three Jedi against five Reborn of high skill level, and seeing that many people fight at once is riveting...like, with rivets. Having slow-motion kill cam on leads to some epic moments, like a slow-mo kill where I did a flipping jump attack to decapitate one Reborn, or another slow-mo kill where I cut two Reborn in half with one perfect swing. 'Granted, I probably had as many deaths myself as I ended up having kills in the end, so quicksaving before every room became mandatory. I kept trying to jump off of my enemies like you can in multi-player, but it doesn't seem to work that way in single-player.

Right before the end of the level you have to fight two Shadow Troopers, one with a strong stance and one with a medium stance, and I had one Jedi buddy around with me to take them on. I let him handle the medium-stance guy and I took the strong one, and though I was able to kill the strong one every time, my Jedi buddy would fall to the medium-stance guy and I would shortly follow him. Surprisingly, when I finally did manage to get them both killed, I had nothing to do with the medium-stance guy, as my Jedi buddy handled him all on his own.

There's a courtyard here that I tried to play around with once using cheats. There's a cheat to spawn characters and a cheat to make all characters and enemies idle, so I turned the latter on first and then spawned something like twenty Jedi and twenty Reborn just to see them all fight and get caught in the middle of the grand battle, which would have been epic on the scale of Attack of the Clones' arena battle. Unfortunately, back when I tried this I was using a pretty crappy PC and as soon as I removed the idle cheat, my game crashed. I'm thinking I might try it again on this comp, which is much stronger and should be able to take it, 'cause that level of carnage is something I just gotta see.

Enemies killed: 26

No secrets left in the game, and no shots fired.

You have to chase him down a little bit, through a secret series of tunnels underneath the Academy, and they're lined with traps that you have to make your way through. There are some falling ceilings, some moving walls, some fake walls, some fire traps--lots of stuff. It doesn't take too long to find Desann, but it probably took me longer than it should have, embarrassingly enough. He stands in this giant room with this freaky power-pillar thing in the middle, and the cutscene before you fight him actually has some clever dialogue.

Then the fight starts. ****. This. Raptor. He can change saber stances at incredible speed, and speaking of speed, don't try to use Force Speed or he'll just use it himself and own you with it. Hell, every Force Power you try to use is a mistake, 'cause if you use Lightning on him he'll take damage, but then he'll just use it right back and his is stronger. Grip doesn't work on him but it definitely works on you, and he really likes to combo his grip with a saber throw for insta-kill. If you're incredibly lucky you might catch him with a Push at the right time, but I wouldn't push your luck (tee hee).

There is a trick to beating him that I did end up using' cause I am but one man, but aside from that the only thing you can really do is match him with your lightsaber combat. There were a lot of deaths on my end, and most of them were quick, 'right at the start of the fight, until I got a groove down on him. I've always been a fan of the medium-stance, and I was able to do fairly well against him as long as I stayed close, but every time I tried to get some distance on him he'd use a Force Power on me and cut me down.

It's a tough and memorable fight, but I think the Jerec fight in Jedi Knight might have been a little tougher for me. I had about seven deaths against Desann and most were at the start of the fight, and when I finally did kill him I thought it felt a little too quick, oddly enough. Still, a thrilling conclusion and a worthy challenge to a game with the best saber combat evars.

Enemies killed: 1
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Mac plays the games he thought he knew (Current: Star Wars-Jedi Outcast - PC):
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/548-zsb/61122424

I already gave an incredibly brief rundown of the game, but having played through it again really renews my appreciation for it. The story is simple yet somehow polished, and I really cared for the dialogue and Kyle's characterization, though the ending seemed a bit too abrupt for my liking (it really felt like there was supposed to be one more camera angle or one more line of dialogue before the credits hit, but no). I wish I didn't have to go through so much trouble to run this game, but forcing myself to get a new video card also opens up other game options that didn't work for me in the past, like Knights of the Old Republic and the Penumbra games.

Every time I play one of the Jedi Knight games I lament the loss of great level design in shooters, and here it's no different. Lots of open concepts, big areas, few corridors, and set pieces that don't feel like gimmicks. I can't stand playing an FPS on a console so I don't know how I would appreciate this game on the Cube (and I'm curious how saving works there, too, 'cause I was quicksaving like nothin' else while playing this), but the PC controls were great and the only problems I had were with hit detection on the sniper rifle sometimes.

The cream of this game truly is the lightsaber combat, and while I still think the game peaks at Cloud City with your first Reborn encounters and some of the more challenging stage design--before you get too strong in the Force and can take down troop squads with ease--that's not to say that the rest of the game falls short in any respect, and the last couple of stages where you get to fight alongside other Jedi make me giddy inside and will surely make you feel the same. Online can still be a lot of fun as long as you find yourself a good server, but it could use a little bit more balancing between the stances.

Any Star Wars fan should check this out, but really I'd recommend any of the games I've played in this topic so far--yes, even the Super Star Wars trilogy, as frustrating as it is. You can check out the sequel/expansion to this game, Jedi Academy, but I can assure you you won't like it as much as Outcast. 'Not a bad game, just easily the weakest of the series.

So starting tomorrow I'll be jumping into Chrono Cross. I had originally planned on today but I got called in to work really early and I'll be out for the rest of the night, so it'll have to wait. Later in the week I'll get my recording equipment set up and may get started on Ninja Gaiden III as well, 'knock that one out while I'm playing through Cross.

On the side, I've been playing Chrono Trigger: The Bad Loading Times Edition. I am saved at the entrance to Heckran's Cave.

The last played may be a little off, because I only played the game for an hour or so before I got swamped with schoolwork and dropped my playthrough. The last time before that was probably 2005 or early 2006.

Though it is Chrono Trigger that's on my Top 10 Games of All Time list, it's only because I felt like doing one per series and Chrono Cross just happened to not be edging out that day, but the two games are so close together for me that my favorite ends up being whichever one I'm currently playing. Trigger has a lot more memories to me because more of my friends played it and it was a simple story with simple characters that had a lot of charm, and I was able to share that experience with many people over the years--but Cross is something that has always sort of been mine, and none of my immediate circle of friends have given it a chance. A lot of fans are sensitive about this game because they expected "Chrono Trigger 2", but I don't think I could have ever been happy with a direct sequel to Trigger that followed the same characters, and I applaud the Cross team for the risks they took in this game and all the accomplishments that came with them.

More than anything, Chrono Cross is about depth. Everything was taken into deeper territory--the story, the characters, the combat system, the equipment system, magic, the music, I can go on and on. I've seen the argument that Cross' story has "almost nothing to do with Chrono Trigger" and that everything about it feels "tacked on", but seriously, these people justwere not paying attention.

Speaking of music, I've mentioned before (I think in my first NG2 video) that there are a few games whose intros I never skip when I turn the game on, two of which being Ninja Gaiden 2 on the NES and Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, and this is another:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=923fVDDwaHo

There is nothing more beautiful and exciting than this opening. One of the most perfect songs in videogame history (which should have won our second VGM World Cup, stupid Braid) to one of the most entrancing series of images, and everything right after seeing Kid on the beach and zooming in on her face gives me chills, especially the way it shows all the characters turning to the beat. When I saw this intro the first time I played the game, I knew I was in for something special. Hell, I showed my mom the intro and she was amazed by it, and asked me to get her the soundtrack to the game later.

But enough about all that. Let's get to the game.
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Mac plays the games he thought he knew (Current: Chrono Cross - Playstation):
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/548-zsb/61122424

It's been so long since I've played this that I was actually worried about where I was walking because I didn't want to trigger a random encounter, forgetting that there are no random encounters in this game. That said, I didn't want to get into too many combats here because I knew they wouldn't be worth a damn, but immediately I was wow'd at how great this game looks. I don't know if it's fair to compare it because I don't quite remember when the release dates were, but compare Cross to something like FF7 and it just blows the competition out of the water. Everything looks crisp and clean, the animation is fluid, the camera work is simple but effective, and probably the hardest problem to avoid in this generation is having models that don't stick out too much from the background, but in this game everything looks right, you know? Plus you've got this kickass boss battle music pushing you on, and it's a heart-pounding sequence.

When you get up top and have the visions of things to come, I remember just being all "what the hell is going on here?!" while still being absolutely captivated, and then it happens.

"Serge......"

"Good morning, Serge!"

Perfect. It's an absolutely perfect opening to a Chrono Trigger sequel, and just seeing those words appear on screen at once gave me shivers and made me so excited for things to come. I'll compare this to Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, and I think it's a comparison nobody but me would ever make, but what I truly appreciated about SM was that its full effect was achieved by your having played the original Silent Hill, and then having your expectations of that story being played with. Knowing how Silent Hill's story goes, you expect SM to follow certain conventions or plot points, and it's only because of what you expect that you find yourself tricked into the game's biggest plot twist. With Cross, nobody really knew what to expect, so when the game opened with this seemingly random sequence that didn't make any sense to the player, bringing us back with a callback to Trigger's opening was both engaging and reassuring, but also somehow mystifying.

Hear, hear. This game is inextricably tied to Chrono Trigger, but many of its allusions are subtle at first and it requires much more digging to fully understand. I very much appreciate this game's depth.

The soundtrack of this game is phenomenal. The way it takes the themes of the first game and harkens back to them, at times more subtly than others, is always appreciated, and some of the tracks and themes have incredible power to them. The Arni Village theme is one of the most gorgeous pieces I can think of in a video game, as is Another World (or I think it's titled Voyage by some). Like Chrono Trigger before it, this game's soundtrack has moved me like few other games' have, and when combined with the lush environments and the wide, colorful palette, it helps this game secure a place in my mind that many games can't reach.

Even before I start this (I still need to find the disc and my PS1) I'm already thinking of combinations for my final team. I love Serge and Glenn, and, being the prototype Magus, Guile is also one of my favorites. Can Guile be pulled through to the end? I don't believe I've ever tried. I think I always end up dropping him in favor of Kidd. She's such a likeable character and plays such an important part to the central storyline that I feel bad leaving her out.

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ZSB is to gamefaqs as the autobahn is to roads ~Kane
McGray: He'd Kill You for Legacy of Kain to be Continued.

The story is very heavy about the idea of choices, consequences, and perhaps one of the most devastating questions any man can ever ask himself: what if? Trigger's story had a few twists and turns but it was never anything really substantial, and never dealt with topics as mature as Cross attempts--don't get me wrong, I still love Trigger's story, but for completely different reasons than Cross. In every way I feel Cross is a maturation or evolution of Trigger, and while Trigger focused on a heroic time travel story, Cross examines the consequences of changing the future.

There's a conversation in the fisherman's hut that I specifically hunted down when I started looking around in town:

Fisherman: Oh…Ah…Hi Serge…I was lost in my thoughts there. You know how Kiki’s growing up so quickly? Sometimes, I’m just amazed at how much she resembles her mother. Yeah…I guess my wife is like that, too. She’s been very much like her mother since as long as I can remember…I guess that demonstrates how life continues to live on through generations. It’s been about 10 years since I became a fisherman. Back then, I still had other aspirations, but I ended up succeeding my dad. I guess you can say, everything here represents 10 years of my life. Lion sharks, sawfish, 6-horned narwhales, you name it…They represent all my hard work and dedication. I love my job, and I’m happy with my current lifestyle and all…but lately, I get to thinking when I see Kiki…About how I could’ve had a different future…If I had chosen a different path 10 years ago…Then I’d be living a completely different life than I am now. I’m not saying which one wouldn’t been better…But I just wonder where the other path may have led me…I guess the longer you live, the more you wonder about another “you” that might have been. Boy…Life sure is complex…

Absolutely. Heart-breaking. It's something everyone can relate to, thoughts of regret, of evaluating your life and your accomplishments, and of all your choices. A conversation with a random NPC moves me more than possibly anything in Chrono Trigger, and yet people say there's no good characterization in this game (of course, they usually bring up bonus characters like Poshul or Draggy for this argument, completely overlooking the fact that Kid, Lynx, Harle, Viper, Glenn, the entire Dragoon line, Fargo and other of the story-specific characters all have better characterization than pretty much everyone in Trigger aside from Magus).

And the scene with Leena on the dock always makes me sad. I can't help it, but their kind of childhood love-story really brings me back to past summer romances when I was younger. Damnit, this game makes me so nostalgic.
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Attractive people love Mac's playthrough videos ~ Reliable Internet Personality
http://www.youtube.com/user/MacDaddyMike

I usually have Serge and Glenn in my final party too, but I'm thinking about avoiding Glenn this time around because he's so common to me now. I've actually never played as Guile, and never even played through his story path in Termina. He was the very last character I needed to get to join my party when I was playing for 100% completion and collecting all the characters, so I just stopped playing when he joined me, 'since it was already my fourth consecutive run of the game in a couple of months, or something like that.

I'm actually listening to the soundtrack as I'm writing these posts up. Currently on "Another Guldove", one of my favorites to play on guitar.

I went south to hunt some Komodo scales and had me a good time doing it. Since I'm playing a new game (and my first new game in a while) I don't have any items so I've been going out of my way to pick up any chest I can, even finding one that I had never seen before. The combat system in this game is complex enough that I don't fully understand all of it, and I'm not really sure what those bars are on the left side of the screen when you're attacking, or why some are grey and others are red, and why they're different sizes and whatnot. I do like that battles are pretty much all optional aside from bosses (and apparently I'm told some of those can be run from or something like that), but I still like to engage in combats for spoils and to up my party's stats. My only offensive element right now is Fireball, but it's doing its job. The main battle theme is probably the only song on the soundtrack that I don't love, but it's grown on me a lot since I first heard it and absolutely hated it. Now I just...like it.

After beating the big Komodo, I met Leena on the beech and we had our talk about "that day", and I told her I remembered the promise and that we'll always remember today (which made me sad), but I don't know what saying that stuff does. There are so many paths in this game I can't be sure what does what. Again, I found myself really nostalgic during this conversation, and then the spooky voice comes in right at the worst time, when it looks like Leena's gonna tell Serge that she loves him or something like that. In another gorgeous cutscene, some weird stuff goes down, and then you wake up for the second time in the game's first hour of gameplay.

I stopped playing here because I have an errand to run, but I'll get back into it later tonight. While saving I noticed that the overworld music had changed--your first clue that you're in a new place. That's neat.

This soundtrack. This town. A fisherman who scored a big game. An Elder who trains me and beats me up. A waitress with a poem. An overly entitled girlfriend. 

I've been to the beach, where I'm knocked out by some mind waves. I wake up to find everyone in town is different. I've been up to the cape to see my own grave. I was attacked by these three douches who kicked my dog off the screen, and this chick showed up to assist me. She wanted to travel with me, but I said no 3 times because I wanted to take the other one with me. The one back in my former town who thinks the real me died. But apparently in this parallel universe, the real me DID die. I'm just a fake to her, but she still wants to help me.

You poor bastard. Got something against emulation?

Oh, I could emulate DS or SNES Chrono Trigger again. I just haven't bothered digging back for emulators or roms since I got this computer a year ago. And at least 2 or 3 other family members with their own PS3s get to benefit from what I've bought on PSN, since they'd never bother with emulation, or PCs for that matter.

Cape Howl always makes me think of Toma's Cape or whatever it was called in Chrono Trigger, where you pour his pop/spirit on his grave. Serge's grave site always gives me the creeps, and not just because visiting your own grave should be creepy, but the line "What came from the sea, has returned to the sea" just...I dunno, creeps me out! The cyclical nature of our lives, and the seeming pointlessness of Serge's. He lived, he died, and you'd think that'd make his life have little purpose, and yet his death put so much into motion. 'Crazy.

I love Kid's eyes. Hell, I love all of the eyes in the cutscenes, they all manage to look so cat-like, and I just adore the look of 'em. As a character, Kid's got a fun personality and some good quotes, and as a party member she has a terrible attack but is the first person to have a multi-targeting element that you can recruit (as far as I know) and she's one of two characters (that I can remember) that can steal items, so that makes her useful enough. I decided to have her join me just 'cause SK didn't, but also because having Leena around would make me :(

I went the upper path on the way to Termina and got me a bellflower, which I guess changes the scene by Dario's grave, but I can't remember what happens if you don't grab the flower on your way there. I also got the egg that, if I remember correctly, houses Draggy, but I ran before the giant bird could fight me. I really like Solt and Peppor (and I really like their theme song) just for their gimmick of explaining color attributes through their banter.

Termina is big and there are a lot of people to talk to, but fortunately I found Guile sitting in the bar and convinced him to join me. Guile enigmatically joins your party! I actually read up a bit on him at some Chrono wiki and it said he has a reverse element grid, meaning he has few lower level slots and a lot of higher level slots--which is AWESOME. And he's a black element, which means I'll likely have him in my final party.

And he floats just like Magus! Guile is AWESOME!

Mac, you're putting into words very elegantly so much of what I love about Chrono Cross, especially the first part of that paragraph. I'm loving it. I too talk to every NPC in this game because they all have something interesting to say.

The game is the most atmospheric game I have ever played. The graphics are amazing and the water-color art style is so vibrant and cool and fits so perfectly. The world of Cross is one you can imagine yourself living in and loving.

I can't wait to join you with this.

spoilers

@Duel - Oooh, I've never thought about it that way before. Well-put.

i c wat u did thar.

I just wanted to say that.

And I always like to screw with your head, Scott.

I boarded a boat and Korcha dropped us off at a cliffside where some familiar music was playing--I actually have no idea if it plays elsewhere in the game, but I heard a remix of it way back in the day by The Pancake Chef, and it always makes me think of that (http://ocremix.org/remix/OCR00676/). Now I know why I've never played as Guile before: this path isannoying. As if I need some jackass at the top throwing boulders at me the entire time when I've got to avoid gushing water and surprise attacks from some rolly monsters. I actually like that you can set it up to heal yourself after every battle. It's very convenient as you don't have to go into a menu if you want to use consumables, and if you don't want to use consumables then you can strategize your battle so that the characters that need healing have the elements open to do so.

At the top you fight a couple of soldiers in a really easy fight, but then surprisingly it gives you a level up for beating them. I was all "eh, is that it?" and then this Garuda-like creature comes in out of nowhere and I have to fight it, and that was a much tougher battle. I don't tend to use a lot of effect-based techs in RPGs like ones that raise accuracy or lower accuracy or whatever (except in FFIVDS where they were all incredibly useful and effective), so I don't know how effective they are in this game on your own party, but having it used on the boss proved a bit of a challenge when all of my guys were missing with their attacks later in the battle. I did end up taking out the Garuda thinger and its henchmen, but I had some close calls on Kid and Serge, and I'm not exactly sure at what point in the game you get revive-like elements.

Fast forward a bit and I'm inside the enemy base, so to speak, and I immediately went north to the stables where I knew I'd find a save point, but forgetting that you need to go here to get a key to the manor. I then played the dragon-feeding minigame, which takes a good deal of concentration and some quick fingers when you go for gold, but I went through every number/difficulty and managed to get all of them on my first try, including the 100 feed difficulty that was incredibly INCREDIBLY close at the end. It got me some awesome armor and a RecoverAll element, so I'd call it a win. And I get to call myself the "Master Dragon Feeder", which I guess is good for something.
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Attractive people love Mac's playthrough videos ~ Reliable Internet Personality
http://www.youtube.com/user/MacDaddyMike

I think this is the first time I'm having two games from this topic going at once, so I'll try to pace them out evenly. Try. No promises.

I cried.
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'Only ran into a little bit of trouble on my way into Viper Manor, and once inside I initiated the trap that gets you into the basement. I like how when Kid's goading the guards to fight you there's one off to the side being all "Guys, don't listen to her, be smart about this", but then he joins in on the fight anyway instead of continuing to be smart and getting reinforcements or something. Put on some uniforms and then there's some walking about, and I tried my best not to get caught by the lamp thingies that drop in the middle of corridors, and eventually figured out that you don't have to fight the doors with the eyes if you try to open the doors while the eye is closed--I honestly didn't realize that before.

It was neat going around and meeting different characters, many of which you could get to join your party later. Orcha, Glenn, Karsh, Zoah, Pip and Luccia are all hanging around the manor and you run into each of them if you look hard enough, but I spent most of my time looking around for treasure, of which there's lots of. I got some good armor for my dudes and a couple of other items, as well as some from those "boxer brothers" where you have to pick the right chest to get an item, and the wrong one makes you fight them. There's a treasure room later with a really tough fight against five suits of armor, but after you solve the puzzle in there you can't claim the spoils because you need Viper in your party to do so. Damn. There are also a couple of chests that only Zoah and Karsh can open, so again it's something you'll have to get later.

Guile is awesome. Not only does he have badass techs and a high magic stat (he consistently does double the magic damage of everyone else in my party), but his level 3 regular attacktargets all enemies. That's freakin' insane! He's definitely sticking around to my final party, but I've already given up on Kid and even had her unequipped and de-elemented by the latter half of the dungeon, as I knew I wouldn't be using her probably ever again. A shame, I guess, because her stealing ability has netted me some cool items already.

Running into the "Prophet of Time" (we all know who you are, buddy) led to some...oddly confusing exposition. There's a lot of talk of what could be happening to Serge, but the Prophet pretty much writes off everything he says as conjecture and "eh, I dunno". Afterwards you get to fight Marcy, and it probably wouldn't have been such an easy fight if she weren't a blue affinity, 'cause I had bought MagmaBombs for all of my party members back in Termina, and they wasted her good. Guile's did 100 damage on its own. I really like how unique each of the Dragoon Devas are in design and personality, though I'd have to say I like Zoah's design the best, 'cause it's just funny how he wears such a giant helmet but no actual body armor.
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Attractive people love Mac's playthrough videos ~ Reliable Internet Personality
http://www.youtube.com/user/MacDaddyMike

I let the intro play a little longer this time because I was eating a sandwich, and there's a demo after the opening cutscene that shows different moments from the game, but none of them actually play out like they do in the game. For example, there's a scene where you run to the west tower in Viper Manor and run into Harle but, not only does this scene never actually happen, Harle's dialogue is actually Lynx's dialogue from the following scene in Viper Manor.

His and Viper's introductions are pretty neat, and I actually forgot that I had to fight Lynx here--which became a problem, because I had already unequipped Kid. Lynx was smart and used a lot of status-effects on me, including locking out Serge's white techs and lowering Guile's magic attack, which made for a very difficult battle. Later he crippled Guile's accuracy, and with some of my best elements being of the black affinity, I had very little damage output in the tail end of the fight. I did manage it on my first try, but I had to use Revive on Kid and the battle ended with Serge at 7 health. Really really close fight. I've gotta stock up on some of those status-effecting elements for future boss fights (I'm looking at you, Miguel).

I remember my jaw dropping during the next sequence where Kid gets poisoned, falls off the platform, and then Lynx calls you the Chrono Trigger. It happens incredibly fast, and the text vanishes from the screen only a split-second after it appears, and I remember actually asking myself if I had seen what I thought I had. The story in this game unfolds as if in a great mystery, which is risky for a sequel but, again, I adore it. Up until this point in the game it's difficult to really know how this story connects with Chrono Trigger at all aside from name drops like "Porre" and time as a thematic element, but this was the particular moment in the game when you knew something huge was going on and that it would all tie back to Chrono Trigger somehow. The writers give you bits and pieces as you go along, but nothing really makes sense at the start because you're missing so much of the picture.

Again, I really enjoy that, but I can see how it turns other people off.

Their loss.

Gonna read the Chross stuff once you're done with the game, I should check if EU PSN also has it.

Aside aside, I hope some dudes got some chances to play or get themselves started or whatnot, 'cause I'll probably be playing a little bit every day from here on out.

Okay, so I know that I said I was going to try to avoid Glenn this playthrough because I always get him, but I got the choice to save Kid and I passed on it. HEAR ME OUT. If you don't go with the Glenn route you end up recruiting Razzly who, despite being a fairy (literally, I'm not being derogatory or anything mods), is pretty kickass and is one of the best magic users in the game as far as I can recall...but I already have Guile. I've already got my high-end magic user, and I wanted another good fighter to finish up my party, so Razzly wouldn't have been the right choice for me. That's what I'm going with--you don't like it, blame Guile for being too awesome.

Korcha really makes you feel like an ass for leaving Kid behind, to the point where I started feeling defensive (more so than the last paragraph). It's like having the game tell you you're absolute scum for jumping through its own hoops to get the character you want. Imagine if Kotor was still designed to have light and dark paths, but every time you did something on the dark path the characters would start comparing you to some kind of space Hitler. Actually, I haven't played Kotor so maybe that already happens, I dunno.

I didn't get Korcha and I wonder if it has anything to do with how you answer his mom's question, but she ended up joining my party instead. I didn't particularly care because I just wanted to get Glenn, and then it was off to meet with Radius for some exposition before getting to the ship.

Question: what happens on the other path? Here it looks like I'm going to go straight from the ship to Fort Dragonia, but it seems like there was so much more going on if you go on the path where you save Kid yourself, like going through the Hydra Marsh and all that. If you take that path, do you not go through Fargo's ship and go straight to the Fort, or does the Ghost Ship section happen regardless of which path you take? I honestly forget, because it's obviously been a while since I played without Glenn.

Fargo's one of my favorite characters as well and I usually have him in my final party for his Blue Innate and his steal ability. My final parties almost always have all the characters that use swords 'cause I'm just a fan of swords, and I usually try to have one of every innate duo (white/black, red/blue, yellow/green), so a typical party in the past would be Serge, Fargo and Glenn, though this time I'm opting in favor of having a good magic-user, and Black Innate usually has great abilities anyway, so I'm fine with overlapping. I'm always upset when I get a character of White Innate because I know I won't replace Serge and I'd like to get to use them.

On the deck of the ship you go through a bit of a gauntlet, first fighting three walking armor dudes like in Viper Manor and then facing "Polly", who I absolutely devastated with Guile (who did almost 200 damage with IceBlast) and then murderised Fargo by first filling the elemental field with red through MagmaBomb and then using the Red Innate X-Strike dual-tech with Serge and Glenn, which also did about 200 damage to kill him quickly.

Now the boat is full of ghosts. Yessirs.
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Mac plays the games he thought he knew (Current: Chrono Cross (PS) and Ninja Gaiden 3 (NES)):
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/548-zsb/61122424

My memory is very fuzzy, though. When I make decisions I normally don't take into account who will be best in battle (im a boss so i can win with anybody), I normally go for whatever will make the most interesting storyline.

Can't wait to start this. Hopefully tonight after work.
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We are the ZSB and F*** YOU!!!
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