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On 8/12/2019 at 10:12 AM, DragonFlames said:

Also, Allegra Clark (as Dorothea), Veronica Taylor (as Manuela), Cherami Leigh (as Rhea), as well as Billy Kametz (as Ferdinand) are really good singers. Like holy crap, they're better than some "singers" that are actually in the music business today. In my insignificant, non-professional opinion, at least.

It's also worth mentioning that Abby Trott(the voice of Annette) also did the English version of Lifelight in Smash Ultimate. If Three Houses isn't the who's who of singing video game voice actors then I don't know what is!

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5 hours ago, Lightchao42 said:

Lysithea's A support is tied to the plot, if I recall it unlocks after Chapter 16.

I see. Thank you!

12 minutes ago, TheGoodHoms said:

It's also worth mentioning that Abby Trott(the voice of Annette) also did the English version of Lifelight in Smash Ultimate. If Three Houses isn't the who's who of singing video game voice actors then I don't know what is!

Oh yeah, I forgot. Thanks for reminding me!

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As always, playing Three Houses. Although I did seem to miss the Earth Defense Force 5 PC release as that flew under the radar. It just came out right when I was messing around with Smash Ultimate before delving into Three Houses.

Anyways, I finished my 2nd Route, being Blue Lions. Impressions and stuff in the spoiler before. (Spoilers for Blue Lions and potentially Edelgard's route.)

Spoiler

Welp, that was something. I think the finale section of Blue Lions is a little more stressful than Edelgard's, mostly because El's is "fight monsters" while Dimitri's is "be harassed by siege weaponry." Also, Edelgard's finale was cooler in my opinion. That aside, I did end up rushing through the BL's ending just so I could finish the thing instead of taking it slow and "killing every last one of them." I might have ended up sparing Generic Petra if she was the Assassin in the bottom right corner of the map as I just did Warp shenanigans to defeat Hubert.

I ended up "S" Supporting Not!Mordred Catherine, mostly because my original plans (Ingrid and Shamir) were taken, my backup (Sothis, to get it over with) wasn't available, and because Catherine seemed to fit well with the BL ending. Also, since I was curious, I decided to try out her unique Combat Art on the final boss. She ended up killing the boss before I could see unique dialogue with Byleth which I was somewhat salty over. The S Support convo was pretty sweet though, so that somewhat made up for it.

Also, my planned endings did not go according to plan. I wanted Petra x Ashe (It was sorta sweet, and helped do a cross-house support) and Annette x Mercedes (Best Friends Forever). I ended up getting Ashe x Annette... I have a write-up on my disappointment in a different topic.

The characters of the Blue Lions also grew on me. Felix and Dedue were favorites.Yeah, Felix can be seen as an arse, but he bluntly states his opinions regardless of what others may think. Dedue works well as a "gentle giant" character as well as I loved seeing him doing simple things like gardening or cooking. Having some insight on the culture of Duscar was also interesting. Mercedes surprised me with her character. I thought she was another "generic priestess," but I loved her interactions with the rest of the cast. Ashe was a good boy, although I didn't use him much. Sylvain had some depth to him besides being a womanizer, and I liked Ingrid and her aspirations to be a Knight.
The only characters that I didn't feel much affinity for was Annette and Gilbert. While I liked Annette's timeskip design, her personality didn't do much for me. Also, Gilbert takes the "disgraced knight" thing a little too far for my liking, abandoning his family and home to drown himself in penance for his "failure."

As for Dimitri, he was a solid Lord character. Seeing how his "idealistic self" and the "vengeance seeker" clashed with each other was interesting. However, he does base his revenge only on an assumption and not solid facts, and his redemption arc was rushed despite having a good foundation for it. He basically went back to "Happy Dimitri" overnight. Even though Edelgard's route was shorter, I thought she was more interesting and thought out than Dimitri.
... I also just realized I never got an answer on why he wears the eyepatch. I may have missed it, but I don't think it was ever explained in the main story of Blue Lions.

One thing I did love was the past tidbits about Dimitri and Edelgard. While they were short scenes, they were touching and had a great impact. The ending of BL is pretty sad too.

The credits theme also hit hard as it almost positively has to be about Edelgard. The vocal version is the default for all routes, but for Edelgard herself, she gets a piano version without the vocals. As I'm still on Team Edelgard, it sucked seeing things go terrible for her. Insane Dimitri is fun and Dimitri himself is a great unit, but I still like Edelgard more.

* * * * *

Now I'm onto the Golden Deer to see how that goes. After that is the Church Route, and I may either take a break or do "for fun" runs while waiting for Lunatic difficulty or a "post-game sandbox" mode.

 

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I finished the Verdant Wind route, thus ending my first playthrough of Three Houses. Some spoiler thoughts...

Spoiler

I assume that Crimson Flower and Azure Moon focus more on the personal matters of Edelgard and Dimitri, and since Claude's motives are comparatively straightforward, Verdant Wind instead focuses on the backstory of the world. We got all the revelations about Crests, Heroes' Relics, the 10 Elites and Nemesis, those who slither in the dark, why Byleth has the Crest of Flames, and there was fun stuff all around. Nemesis even came back from the grave to act as the final boss. And amazingly, Rhea doesn't do anything evil! She might still be a villain in the other routes, so we'll see about that. We did learn that she is indeed Seiros though, but we didn't learn anything about Byleth's mother or her presumed relationship with Rhea. Apparently Nemesis is only the final boss of the Verdant Wind route, so I'll see what the other paths have in store later.

The paired endings I got were Lorenz/Lysithea, Ignatz/Raphael, Claude/Leonie, and Byleth/Marianne.

I plan on going for the Blue Lions next, but for now I'm taking a break from Three Houses so I can resume playing through the Ace Attorney series. I'm currently on everyone's favorite case, Turnabout Big Top, though personally I never had a problem with it despite it apparently being one of the worst cases in the series.

Edited by Lightchao42
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Apparently, the Golden Deer route is called "Verdant Wind" in-game. So we have "Crimson Flower" (Red), "Azure Moon" (Blue), and "Verdant Wind" (Green)...
Must. Not. Compare. To. Dynasty Warriors.
Ah, screw it. This is now the Golden Deer Theme in my head.
This is the Blue Lions Theme.
And this the Black Eagles Theme.
Phew, finally got that one off my chest. Where were we? Oh yeah, Three Houses.

With the Golden Deer, I'm completely playing against my character: almost everybody is on a mount right now, either horse or wyvern. Specifically (Spoilers for characters that join you on the Golden Deer)


Lorenz is a Dark Knight
Ignatz is a Bow Knight
Claude is his own class that rides a Wyvern
Hilda is a Wyvern Lord
Seteth is a Wyvern Lord
Leonie is a Bow Knight
Marianne is a Holy Knight
That's 7 out of 12 characters that are on a mount. As for the others:
Byleth is a Hero
Lysithea is a Gremory
Flayn is a Bishop
Alois is a Warrior
Raphael is a Brawler



Never before have I used a team that predominantly consisted of mounted units. What the hell, me?
 
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So i finished my second Crimson Flower playthrough on Hard (i said i was gonna swap to Normal but then i said nah). The big thing that came out of this route was that i honestly appreciated Edelgard's character more. Oh and i also S-Supported Dorothea this time. Of course, the main reason i was replaying it was to see the interesting dialouge from the Blue Lions when they are recruited into the Black Eagles. I'll leave some of the stuff i found interesting here. Spoilers, obviously.

Spoiler
  • Sylvain: Sylvain's dialouge and backstory honestly lend themselves well to Edelgard's cause. Sylvain has his own dislike of Crests because it makes it seem that women only want him for his Crest and not for him, as well as for what it did to his Crestless brother.  That results in him constantly flirting as a defense mechanism. So in that sense, he's better than Inigo, who just flirts for flirting but i can't decide who i like more. Anyway, Sylvain would definitely see the appeal in joining Edelgard's quest to destroy Crest society, even if he doesn't hate Crests as much as Edelgard and Lysethia do.
  • Ingrid: Ingrid mentions how joining the Black Eagle Strike Force is not only betraying her homeland, but she's also betraying her dead fiance, who died during the Tragedy of Duscar.
  • Felix: Felix basically just said fuck you to his dad when they meet on the battlefield. He also has a unique battle dialouge with Dimitri (Dimitri gives a "you betrayed your homeland" speech when fighting any of the Blue Lions but with Felix, that extends into "you killed your own father, Felix", to which Felix replies that he'd cut down anyone who gets in his way, including family and friends. Damn, Felix really is a shounen villain.)
  • Annette: Annette also fights her father in this. I posted screenshots before but when she and Gilbert face off in the final battle, they basically have a "whatever happens, happens" talk before Annette Excalibur'd the fuck out of Gilbert.
  • Mercedes: Mercedes......actually didn't have any interesting, i guess. Probably because she is actually Adrestian so in her case, she never betrayed her homeland to begin with.
  • Ashe: Ashe talks about how he's doing just what Lonato did: rebelling against the Church of Seiros. He says that Lonato would approve of his actions. Interesting irony here. What Ashe condemned in Ch.3, he ends up doing in Crimson Flower, if recruited.

 

I had also recruited nearly all of the Golden Deer (i forgot Raphael lmao) but their dialouge isn't nearly as interesting. Except for Lysethia because

Spoiler

she shares the same personal experience as Edelgard. Out of all the non-Black Eagles characters, Lysethia's reasons for joining the Black Eagle Strike Force make the most sense.

But i already knew that because i had her recruited in my first playthrough.

I did later find out that Hilda actually has a paired ending with Byleth in Crimson Flower but seeing as she's completely unrecruitable in that route, playable Hilda in Crimson Flower must've been something that was scrapped at the very last second.

Another thing i found out (or rather did because i found out prior to doing it) is that Ch.17 has a bit of a different outcome. Major spoilers in here, don't click if you haven't played the route.

Spoiler

So in Ch.17, there are two outcomes, depending on how Dedue dies. If he dies as a human, Dimitri will meet him in the afterlife (which is what i got the first time). If he dies as a monster, you'll get this CG instead.

EB-1HDFU8AUmVPz?format=jpg&name=small

There's a lot of emotion here. King Dimitri, having been defeated, is powerless but you can see that his hatred for Emperor Edelgard still burns. Meanwhile, the sunlight is shining upon the victor of the battle, Edelgard, while the defeated Dimitri is under the dark rain clouds. Personally, i find this outcome of the Ch.17 battle to be more emotionally impactful so i prefer this one to Dimitri simply meeting Dedue in the afterlife (because you don't even get to see the afterlife, it's just a black screen).

Anyways, i'm 5 chapters into Golden Deer, so while i'm quite familiar with the Golden Deer folks, they will actually have screentime this time, so i'm excited for that. That said, compared to the Black Eagles and the Blue Lions, i'm finding myself either disliking or being indifferent to some of the Golden Deer students. I'm specifically referring to Raphael, Lorenz and Ignatz. I had experience the latter two already and Lorenz is honestly a contender for my least favorite student. Ignatz isn't bad but he's just kinda......there. I joked about Raphael being Ilyana 2 but no, he actually is Ilyana 2. In a game where everyone feels grounded, Raphael stands out as being somewhat close to Awakening/Fates gimmicky. Ok, perhaps not that much but he stands out in a bad way. Even some of the more "gimmicky" Black Eagles and Blue Lions characters didn't feel "gimmicky" that much. I am hopeful that the Golden Deer having screentime now will improve my perception of those three characters. And on the bright side, Claude, Marianne, Lysethia (who i plan on S-Supporting in this run), Hilda and heck, even Leonie are actually pretty good. Leonie's whole thing with idolizing Jeralt really only comes into play with Byleth. Her Supports with other characters hardly bring him up.

I am capable of recruiting the Black Eagles and Blue Lions via renown right now but i'm gonna hold off on it for now. One of the best things about this game is that recruitment scales. So imma just let the game train the future recruits for now. I'll start recruiting in Ch.7.

 

12 hours ago, DragonFlames said:

Apparently, the Golden Deer route is called "Verdant Wind" in-game. So we have "Crimson Flower" (Red), "Azure Moon" (Blue), and "Verdant Wind" (Green).

Verdant Wind is a weird name for the Golden Deer route because Crimson Flower and Azure Moon both match up with the respective colors of the House leaders but as you've mentioned, Verdant is green, not gold. And Claude doesn't wear green.

Missed opportunity for the route to be called Golden Wind (as in JoJo Part 5).

 

12 hours ago, DragonFlames said:

Never before have I used a team that predominantly consisted of mounted units. What the hell, me?

That's Three Houses for ya. The amount of customization in the game is great and it allows you to do things that you couldn't or wouldn't do in other games. Like, in my case, i'm actually using Fighters, Warriors and Thieves, classes i pretty much ignored in previous games. I don't know if they'll keep it but in the context of Three Houses, i prefer this to the pre-determined classes of previous games. 

Edited by Armagon
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6 hours ago, Armagon said:

That's Three Houses for ya. The amount of customization in the game is great and it allows you to do things that you couldn't or wouldn't do in other games. Like, in my case, i'm actually using Fighters, Warriors and Thieves, classes i pretty much ignored in previous games. I don't know if they'll keep it but in the context of Three Houses, i prefer this to the pre-determined classes of previous games. 

Oh yes, definitely. I love that you can make people any class you want. I love these kinds of customization options in any game.

So, I finished up the Golden Deer route earlier. Holy crap. Just. Holy crap. I can't remember the last time I had this much fun with Fire Emblem. Sure, the start was a bit rocky, but damn if the payoff wasn't worth it. I am SUPER glad I played this route last (well, not last, because there's still the Church Route, but... you know), because honestly? I like saving the best for last and Golden Deer 100% delivered on that front. Don't shoot me, but I believe that the Golden Deer path might be the one the writers did first or intended to be saved for last.
In any case, here are my thoughts on the Golden Deer Route (MAJOR SPOILERS! DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT YET FINISHED IT!)


I LOVED this route and I take back everything bad I said about it in the beginning. The reason being that Claude has even more relatable motives than Edelgard and Dimitri, wanting everyone in the world to live in peace and harmony together no matter the race, faith, or nationality (which is incidentally incredibly topical and lines up perfectly with how my ideal world looks).
One major reason for loving this route is that Those Who Slither In The Dark finally get explained and are dealt with in an epic manner. First, they throw freaking nukes on a fortress and then their headquarter turns out to be a cyberpunk-esque underground fortress. I can't remember the last time Fire Emblem had something remotely futuristic in it, so this came as a huge shock.
Another shock was the backstory of Nemesis, Seiros, the Crests and the Heroes' Relics: apparently, Nemesis, who used to be an ordinary bandit, was used by TWSITD to take revenge on the Children of the Goddess for banishing them to the underground. He stole Sothis' body and heart and had the Sword of the Creator crafted out of those things. The other Relics were apparently created in a similar manner. So that awesome chainsword you've been swinging around? Yeah, that's the spine of the loli that lives inside your head. Holy shit. IntSys had some balls when they came up with this and put it in the game. It's also a nice subversion of their home-trope of legendary weapons being something holy and all that. Here, they are the exact OPPOSITE of holy. Respect, Fire Emblem, respect.
They also revealed why Rhea is a bit of a nutcase. Not only is she Seiros, but she's the sole survivor of the tragedy of Zanado, in which Nemesis and his goons (the 10 Elites) massacred all the Children of the Goddess, and wants nothing more than for things go back to the way they used to be. And that is her motive for trying to revive her mother through any means necessary. I admit, they got me. When I first saw Rhea, I had a hunch that she was Seiros herself and found her a bit creepy throughout the entire thing, but now, my opinion of her has done a complete 180.

All in all, rating the routes I've played so far, I'd say Golden Deer > Black Eagles (Edelgard) > Blue Lions when it comes to the story. As far as units go, the Golden Deer really came through for me, to the point where they ended up being better than the Blue Lions, my current number one until now.
I even switched Lysithea from Gremory to Mortal Savant by the end, because it's one of my favorite classes in the game aesthetically (and her white-grey color scheme fits incredibly well with it), even if it is suboptimal for her to be in that class (frankly, I don't care). Wrecking face with a forged Levin Sword was fun and her attack power was such that she didn't really need double uses on her Dark Magic. Unsurprisingly, I ended up S-supporting Lysithea as well. Her S-support out-cute'd Annette's. The CG at the end was incredibly sweet. Also, her ending with Byleth is perfect.

With the Golden Deer route, this game has finally firmly established itself as my favorite Fire Emblem game and it's a strong contender for my personal game of the year.

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10 hours ago, Armagon said:

I am capable of recruiting the Black Eagles and Blue Lions via renown right now but i'm gonna hold off on it for now. One of the best things about this game is that recruitment scales. So imma just let the game train the future recruits for now. I'll start recruiting in Ch.7.

I'm actually not a fan of this because, wheres the reward in training your own units when the game grown ones will always be reliable, ever time I've compared my units to those ones... well, they don't. So there isn't a point in leveling them up cause why put effort in?

 

2 hours ago, DragonFlames said:

All in all, rating the routes I've played so far, I'd say Golden Deer > Black Eagles (Edelgard) > Blue Lions when it comes to the story. As far as units go, the Golden Deer really came through for me, to the point where they ended up being better than the Blue Lions, my current number one until now.

 

This is how I rated the routes as well after played Golden Deer, I was surprised how fun it was.

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20 hours ago, DragonFlames said:

Apparently, the Golden Deer route is called "Verdant Wind" in-game. So we have "Crimson Flower" (Red), "Azure Moon" (Blue), and "Verdant Wind" (Green)...
Must. Not. Compare. To. Dynasty Warriors.

Phooie! Guess that rules out starting with GD for me then, I can't deal with BENEVOLENCE! 

And who decided to do away with my pragmatic ends-just-the-means-to-bringing-peace faction? 

 

 

I've started up 7th Dragon 2020-II. So far, I've just reached the 2nd Imperial Dragon.

Compared to 2020, the game's narrative moves faster, since everyone is already used to being in a dragon apocalypse. And while Aitelle is nowhere in sight after a good showing in 2020, Emel has taken over the leadership in Murakumo, whereas she featured only in the background in a minor role in 2020.

I picked Nav 3.6 "Mina" over Nav 3.7 "Miroku", partly because I used Miroku in 2020, and partly because I felt Mina's portrait looks better now. For my trio of dragonslayers, I'm using the classes I didn't use in 2020. Which means a Destroyer (female artwork), and a Trickster (male artwork). They work well together, since I have my Destroyer Counter Stance and my Trickster uses a gun for Hide->Bush Trap. Assuming an enemy dragon does 2 single target attacks on my Destroyer, I get four strong counterblows a turn. Similarly, my 2020 strat relied heavily on the Psychic's Veils for damage.

My third team member is this:

Spoiler

latest?cb=20130329123452

Fabulous!

And on a related note, while I played 2020 using the standard soundtrack the entire time. For 2020-II, once I find Hatsune-Miku, I'll swap the soundtrack over to the diva version. She is in the opening already.

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2 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Phooie! Guess that rules out starting with GD for me then, I can't deal with BENEVOLENCE! 

And who decided to do away with my pragmatic ends-just-the-means-to-bringing-peace faction?

No worries, only the route name color matches. GD is more like Wu, if anything.
Spoilers in case you don't have the game yet. I'm comparing the house leaders to DW characters, mostly spoiler-free, but just to be safe:

Claude himself is somewhat comparable to Zhuge Liang with his schemes. His goals are more in line with DW8 Sun Quan on Wu's Hypothetical Story. It's actually Dimitri who bears the most similarities to Liu Bei, while Edelgard is straight-up Cao Cao. As an extra tidbit: Hubert is similar to either Sima Yi or Jia Chong.

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This week I pulled Tokyo Jungle out of the backlog, an indie game I probably nabbed on a flash sale many years ago for my PS3. A weird game where all the humans have disappeared and you play as the animals left behind fending for themselves. The Story mode follows the exploits of a pomeranian awakening his animal instincts for survival, a war between rival factions of dogs, and a plot of Hyenas trying to take over a lion's den, and their leader is of course another lion who looks just like Scar. The problem with Story mode is that to unlock new chapters you must locate items in a free roam Survival Mode. Unlike a roguelike, the map is always the same, and is shaped like a line leading between various zones with no fast travel or shortcuts between them. As a result, if you go one direction, don't expect to survive heading back the opposite direction without items since nothing respawns and your hunger must always be managed. Survival is the premier mode for setting high scores and having fun unlocking weird animals, but having to unlock Story through it gets old fast when all you have to do is walk to a certain point marked at the end of the map. The unlocking of new animals also involves long checklists of specific tasks that I didn't feel like grinding out.

The story mode ends with an interesting twist leading to a good or bad ending. I chose bad, and like most bad endings it was short and disappointing. Then went back for the proper ending. I guess I rate Tokyo Jungle a 4.8 out of 10. It has so little gameplay variety to be rated an "average" 5 score. And it'll take approximately ten hours to clear the Story and finally learn why the humans disappeared. The map design sucks. The Story scenarios are uncompelling. All of the animals play the same with the same stealth capabilities and fighting style. It's certainly playable as a time waster, but feels like it would have been better realized as a mobile game which is a weird thing to say about a game.

I'm also halfway through DMC5. It's awesome.

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I've reached the timeskip in the Golden Deer route. All things are going pretty good, though i gotta dock some points for this route's version of the Flame Emperor reveal. It literally just happens. Black Eagles version of the reveal was done better imo. On the flip side, this route is asking questions that the Black Eagles route didn't bother asking, which is good. On the timeskip side of things, not a fan of Golden Deer Ch.13. They just throw you into it with no chance to prepare. C'mon Claude, you of all people know that preparation is key. It was also a bait-and-switch map and there's like three of those in this game, why. But i prevailed

Both story and character wise, i feel like Black Eagles - Crimson Flower is doing it better but we'll see.

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Gunning for the 4th and final route of Three Houses.

Only problem is that I have to purposely ignore Edelgard and Hubert, because wasting resources on the two when they won't be around for long is, well, a waste. This also means I'm effectively two units short.

Bernadetta is turning out surprisingly strong this time around (made her an Archer again), whereas in my first Black Eagles playthrough, she was kinda... eh (still better than Ignatz). I made Petra a flier instead of a Thief this time around. She still wrecks everything, as expected. Even Caspar is pretty good this playthrough. I made him a Brawler the first time, now he's a plain old Brigand, which is infinitely better for him. Linhardt and Ferdinand still suck some limp noodles compared to everyone else, Dorothea's Charm stat got the ol' RNG-screwage so making her a Dancer is out (dat irony), though she is blessed everywhere else. (Spoiler character) is too good to be a Dancer, her Magic grew to be higher than Dorothea's (24 to her 21 at the same level), and she's the only one with Rescue, so a Dancer-less playthrough this will be... again.

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Devil May Cry 5. If Capcom's investors asked me why this game needed to exist I don't know what I'd tell them, because it definitely doesn't. It continues a story that hadn't gotten an installment in a decade. There's no untapped market for another stylish character action game, no fad to bandwagon off of. No potential for a battle royale mode. And surprisingly no snapshot mode where the playable characters take out a cell phone for a quick selfie. I mean, I could see Dante doing that, it just ruins the universe continuity of people still calling each other on landlines and 1990s brick cell phones. But the fact is the game does exist. It's game releases like these, with no logical reason for being, that make me feel spoiled. I just sit there, giggling at references and cameos from previous games (and that old ass anime) like it hadn't really been that long since the last Devil May Cry. And we really don't give Capcom enough credit.

Oh, I'm supposed to talk about the game. Uhmmmmmm 8.1 out of 10. Would have been an 8.2 if not for my recent discovery of Red Orb microtransactions? Who the...? I dunno what they were thinking with Nero's Devil Breakers, I haven't been this disapproving of a design choice in these games since DMC2. The inability to switch feels needlessly restrictive, and I wish instead they just blew up through overuse. Because take away these moves and Nero's moveset is just a weaker, less varied version of Dante. Dante's moveset is better than ever and V I honestly wish we had more time with since he's a fun change of pace even if I see why people wouldn't like his passive playstyle. Enemy variety is low, and some of the tougher enemies are more annoying than difficult just becoming un-hittable or un-staggerable after they're knocked down. Tutorials weren't helpfully placed in some instances. One tip for V is that your summons come online faster if you stand near their corpses. I didn't retain that information by the time I eventually needed it, so I wish some tutorials like that one were contextual rather than just tossed about at some point in the beginning of the game hoping the player remembers once it's relevant.

I'll also confess that after six of these games I'm still not down on an action game that cares more about the player playing with his food over just having good reflexes and spacing. Often times I'll dodge attacks just by spamming a variety of special moves without any strategy, and there are only so many ways of comboing helpless enemies before it feels routine. But since so many action games from God of War to Bayonetta, to the Arkham games focus more on reactionary defensive options and letting the enemy dictate the pace of a fight, it's nice to see one franchise still experimenting. I don't like the mission ranking system only caring about stylish points though. I think keeping track of damage or clear time (of fights) still should matter.

Edited by Glennstavos
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Reached the fourth route, finally. As suspected, the fourth route is, for all intents and purposes, Jin, the fourth faction in Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Dynasty Warriors (being an offshoot of the Black Eagles, just as Jin was to Wei, which I consider the Black Eagles equivalent to). Minus the teal color uniforms and this theme song, of course (booo!).
I'm happy, but at the same time, it means I'll be done with Three Houses soon. And that makes me sad...
Eh, it's not like it's going anywhere. I still have a few things I want to try out, but after finishing this route, I have other games that await me. *glances at Super Neptunia RPG*

Here are some spoiler-y thoughts (up to Chapter 14)

I like how Seteth is basically the "house leader" (i.e. he takes the role Claude, Dimitri, and Edelgard did on their routes) for this one. Him and Flayn have become two of my favorite characters in Fire Emblem in general, so I'm happy to see them get some spotlight. The scene that follows the time skip almost made me tear up a bit. The gist is, Byleth gets back to the monastery after his five-year hibernation and the person he meets there turns out to be Edelgard (which greatly surprised me), who, even though she basically turned on everybody, never truly forgot her promise to reunite (strong character writing right there). But instead of a happy reunion like in her own route, Byleth and Edelgard cross swords and come to the conclusion that they will never see eye to eye again. An incredibly powerful moment in my opinion. Had I not had the "pleasure" to play through the Conquest Route of Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth 2 before, I probably would have cried a little bit.

More thoughts on the route and the entire game after I finish the thing.

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Been playing some more Tokyo Xanadu eX+

Now that the Story is starting to move away from cringey High school melodrama, i've been enjoying it alot more. I know it's a high school game and all, but i know Falcom can do better.

Gameplay wise, Chapter Bosses have been pretty damn dope, especially with Believe It firing stuff up. One of the best Falcom Boss Tracks imo. Dungeon Design and Mid bosses have been meh however. Especially mid bosses.

One thing i'd like to point out is: Side Stories. I really like those, as they give the chance for the Cast to shine and interact with each other, without revolving everything around the MC. As this is one of my main complaints about Cold Steel games. If side stories existed in CS, i would've disliked the games much much less.

Some Pictures, including references to other Falcom Series:

Spoiler

Karate Kloe vs. Spidey Spidey
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Theos De Endrogram Beta
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To Make the End of Battle20190818172625_1.jpg

First Stop towards Wars

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Maou Rean vs. Mahou Shoujo Alisa
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Shrine Maiden Karate Towa
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I don't think i will be finishing the game anytime soon, especially with Mom coming to visit me this week, but next on the plan is either Xenoblade Chronicles or Dragon Star Varnir, depending on when i'll finish the game. My eyes are also on Atelier Ryza.

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So... I've finished the fourth and last route of Three Houses, meaning, for all intents and purposes, I've completed the game. I haven't gotten every support or anything, but I've finished each storyline, so here are my (for now) final thoughts on the game as a whole. Since Three Houses is relatively new and some people here don't have it/haven't finished it yet, this "review" will have no spoilers. I would like to name some gripes and praises for the story as a whole, but I'll keep that stuff to myself for now.
Look at me pretending to be a reviewer. Pffft.

What I liked

  • Story and characters are amazing in this game. This hasn't changed one bit. Sure, there are some oddities and some characters I don't like, but for the most part, I have little to no complaints. For me, Three Houses stands as the best written Fire Emblem game I've played.
  • The biggest thing about the characters is that none of them are one-note. Each of them feels remarkably human, moreso than every other Fire Emblem game I've played so far. Heck, even the philanderer character, which I usually loathe, has some likeable traits.
  • What I love most about the story is that it is a sliding scale of grey and gray morality and while there are some characters that are clearly on the darker side of the spectrum, there is no clear-cut black vs. white going on in this game. With one notable exception, but I'm not saying which, because Spoilers.
  • The soundtrack, while not Echoes, is still beautiful. There are some amazing tracks in there that will stay with me for a long, LONG time to come (particularly the final map themes).
  • Exploring the monastery is still fun, even after four playthroughs.
  • I love the fishing minigame. Perhaps not many people will agree with me, because it is pretty basic, all things considered. I still like it and it's a great way to unwind.
  • The ability to freely customize every unit on your team is awesome. You can potentially make anyone into any class you want. The only thing in your way is your own patience to train people in things they're not proficient in and your willingness to ignore growth rates.
  • I've said it before, I'll say it again: Byleth is THE best Avatar character the series has had. Similarly to Persona or the Etrian Odyssey Untold games, the character is their own, but you can decide what they say. If you must have an Avatar character (and I'll be honest, I like the idea of it), this is how to do it.
  • Some units spiral out of control so fast it's hilarious. If you do it right, you can have a group of people that can solo most things on a map by the time you reach Chapter 8. As someone who loves to steamroll things on occasion, this is great to me.

What I didn't like

  • The new mechanics are fine in concept, but their execution needs work. I'm of course speaking about battalions and monster battles.
  • The thing that bothers me about battalions and gambits is that there is no way to counter them. If an enemy uses a Gambit on you, you can hope to whatever deity you believe in that it misses, or else you're screwed. There is no middle ground here and I honestly don't like that. On the other hand, gambits missing can screw you over, because their uses are incredibly limited (I'm talking two uses per map, and there even exist some that you can only use once) and you absolutely NEED them to fight monsters, else you'll either do no damage to the things or be dead on the counter-attack.
  • Monster battles are great in concept, sure, and the things look incredibly intimidating and awesome, but here's the deal: maps that have multiple of these things are incredibly annoying, especially if you're not overlevelled. They have barriers you need to break in order to be able to deal damage to them (some barriers make them completely immune to Magic, for instance) and these barriers have their own hidden health bar, usually starting at two, then one, then zero. The only way to remove the barrier in one blow is through gambits. Which can miss. And only have two uses at most. AND they can regenerate their barriers, meaning you have to start the process all over again. Particularly annoying because the monsters have up to FOUR individual health bars, so that means you need to kill them up to five times before they're dead. And the more you weaken them, the stronger they get. There is one that randomly gets a skill that makes it so it gets a 50%+ crit chance against all of your units. Another type gets Miracle... fun! Not.
    TL;DR: If you can't kill a monster in one player phase... good luck.
  • While I do like that some units go out of control, I do have to admit that the unit balance in this game is... bad. Like really, really bad. Each house has at least four units that are absolutely fantastic, two that are good, but nothing special, and two that you'd rather didn't have on your team at all. It's not Radiant Dawn or Fates level atrocious, but it is still very, very noticeable.

Conclusion
While it is by no means perfect, I'd still say Three Houses has beaten Echoes as my personal favorite Fire Emblem game. And my initial thoughts of it being similar to Romance of the Three Kingdoms and by extension Dynasty Warriors turned out to be closer to the truth than I expected. Not that that's a bad thing, mind you, as the plot only takes some elements from those two sources and implements them incredibly well (I would go into specifics, but again: SPOILERS!). In the end, if I had to rank each route, I'd say it's something like this:
Golden Deer (Verdant Wind) > Black Eagles (Crimson Flower) > Blue Lions (Azure Moon) > Black Eagles (Silver Snow)

On to Super Neptunia RPG!
Good lord, that's going to be one massive contrast, I think...

Edited by DragonFlames
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Does it count as a double post if I post this 19 hours later?

I'm two hours into Super Neptunia RPG now and I'm already in love with it. The picture book-style visuals look stunning, the humor is once again on point, and the gameplay is fun, even if the battle system takes some getting used to and I prefer the one in the other Neptunia games I've played so far. Still, it's a great first impression. Though I sincerely hope the platforming in this game doesn't get much harder than it is now. Because I suck at platforming games.
One thing that piqued my curiosity is that Noire's English voice actress seems to have changed. Granted, she only had one line as Black Heart in the beginning of the game, but I could tell that her voice was different (couldn't tell who it was, but it was certainly not Erin Fitzgerald - even if the new actress did an excellent job imitating her Black Heart voice).
Another thing to note is that in this game, there exists a group by the name of Bombyx Mori, lead by a person called Filyn. I'd be VERY surprised if that person DOESN'T turn out to be the thing the name sounds suspiciously similar to. XD

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27 minutes ago, DragonFlames said:

Does it count as a double post if I post this 19 hours later?

I'm two hours into Super Neptunia RPG now and I'm already in love with it. The picture book-style visuals look stunning, the humor is once again on point, and the gameplay is fun, even if the battle system takes some getting used to and I prefer the one in the other Neptunia games I've played so far. Still, it's a great first impression. Though I sincerely hope the platforming in this game doesn't get much harder than it is now. Because I suck at platforming games.
One thing that piqued my curiosity is that Noire's English voice actress seems to have changed. Granted, she only had one line as Black Heart in the beginning of the game, but I could tell that her voice was different (couldn't tell who it was, but it was certainly not Erin Fitzgerald - even if the new actress did an excellent job imitating her Black Heart voice).
Another thing to note is that in this game, there exists a group by the name of Bombyx Mori, lead by a person called Filyn. I'd be VERY surprised if that person DOESN'T turn out to be the thing the name sounds suspiciously similar to. XD

I enjoyed the battle system as well, to me it's simple and easy to relax and play, which is nice. The game has a nice pace, I think. The dialouge is funny, even if "Bokemon" is a bit cringy. Overall I had a lot more fun than I expected, and 100% completion was easy, since i'm one those that has to. Even the quests, which I usually don't look forward to, weren't that bad.

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1 hour ago, lightcosmo said:

I enjoyed the battle system as well, to me it's simple and easy to relax and play, which is nice. The game has a nice pace, I think. The dialouge is funny, even if "Bokemon" is a bit cringy. Overall I had a lot more fun than I expected, and 100% completion was easy, since i'm one those that has to. Even the quests, which I usually don't look forward to, weren't that bad.

That does sound great. Hopefully, I'll think the same way once I've finished it.
Out of curiosity, how long did it take you to 100% complete it?

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I did it folks! I finished Golden Deer on Hard but literally only because i got lucky. What a badly designed map lmao but i'll get into that later. Let's get into the positives (there will be spoilers but said spoilers will be marked).

Claude's great. He may be the only actually good guy in the entire conflict (as a result, i find him a bit less interesting than Edelgard) but his schemes make him standout in a series where a majority of the Lords are the good guys. You really get a sense of the goal Claude's trying to work for, which in a sense, is the same goal as Edelgard's but with a different method. Most of the Golden Deer were also fun. There's like two characters i'm not a fan of but i'll get into that later. Gameplay-wise, it is longer than Crimson Flower so in that sense, it's better. Golden Deer also gave me more paralouges to play and it was pretty fun. Also, Ch.21. I loved the aesthetic.

Spoiler

I never thought we'd get to see fucking Tron in a Fire Emblem game. With dubstep, no less.

However, there were things i'm not a fan of. Unlike the Black Eagles, where i liked everyone, i can't say the same for the Golden Deer. I kinda dislike Rapahel and Lorenz but the weird part is that in the end, Lorenz actually grew on me more than Raphael. Still don't like either them but i wasn't expecting for me to like Lorenz a little bit more than i used to (it was his Support Chain with Marianne. I actually enjoyed it). But like it's not like i actively hate both of them, unlike some characters from Awakening and Fates. Map quality kinda starts going downhill from Ch.18 and onwards. Ch.19 just begs to be warpskipped and Ch.20 is pretty easy for what it is. While i loved the aesthetic of Ch.21, the actual map layout.....could've been better. And Ch.22, the endgame map. Oooh boy, throwing this one in "worst FE endgame maps". The only good part about it was the music, God-Shattering Star, which is almost on the same level as Twilight of the Gods. I also take issue with the final two chapters of Golden Deer from a writing perspective (and Ch.17 as well). Spoilers

Spoiler
  • Ch.17: Dimitri just dies offscreen. But like why tho? I get that he's not a main character of Golden Deer but if Dimitri was gonna die, he should've done so onscreen.
  • Ch.21 and 22. So while i don't care for Slytherin, i'm intrigued in the lore of the Agarthans. However, we're literally only given one chapter with them and they just kinda die. And then, completely out of nowhere, Nemesis shows up and he's the final boss. Why was Nemesis resurrected? This is the only route where he is but you could take that part of the story out of Golden Deer and nothing would change. Golden Deer goes from having a great villain like Edelgard to Gharnef #16 to Garon #2. I dislike whenever a great villain is killed off only for the mastermind to show up and be a much worse character. As amazing as God-Shattering Star is, the narrative of the final chapter did not need to happen. If it did, there needed to be more buildup. The final map is also just bad. It's like they forgot how to design a map and just threw shit all over the place. It's like they took the final map of SoV.....and made it much worse. Doesn't help that even without the stat buffs from the 10 Elites, Nemesis is way too strong. You have to actually get lucky to beat him.

In conclusion, i enjoyed the Golden Deer route but there were stuff i really wasn't a fan of here. I think Crimson Flower is the better route. Time for Blue Lions.

 

 

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On 8/20/2019 at 6:21 AM, Shrimperor said:

My eyes are also on Atelier Ryza.

Yeah same. I'm actually more interested in the game now than i was before because (i don't actually know if this is confirmed) the game seems to have no time-limit. On the UI, it had the in-game time of day. But not only was it lacking the year (a clear sign of a time limit) but it also lacked the dates. Nothing against Atelier games with time-limits but one without gives me more time to enjoy the game.

3 hours ago, DragonFlames said:

I'm two hours into Super Neptunia RPG now and I'm already in love with it. The picture book-style visuals look stunning, the humor is once again on point, and the gameplay is fun, even if the battle system takes some getting used to and I prefer the one in the other Neptunia games I've played so far. Still, it's a great first impression. Though I sincerely hope the platforming in this game doesn't get much harder than it is now. Because I suck at platforming games.

Platforming in Super Nep is not that hard tbh. The harder part is actually knowing what is and isn't a platform but even then, it's not too hard. 

3 hours ago, DragonFlames said:

One thing that piqued my curiosity is that Noire's English voice actress seems to have changed. Granted, she only had one line as Black Heart in the beginning of the game, but I could tell that her voice was different (couldn't tell who it was, but it was certainly not Erin Fitzgerald - even if the new actress did an excellent job imitating her Black Heart voice).

Oh yeah, that's been a thing since CyberNep, i think. Erin Fitzgerald left the role due to a voice actor strike (a similar thing happend with Laura Bailey, the voice actress of Lucina).

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3 hours ago, Armagon said:

However, there were things i'm not a fan of. Unlike the Black Eagles, where i liked everyone, i can't say the same for the Golden Deer. I kinda dislike Rapahel and Lorenz but the weird part is that in the end, Lorenz actually grew on me more than Raphael. Still don't like either them but i wasn't expecting for me to like Lorenz a little bit more than i used to (it was his Support Chain with Marianne. I actually enjoyed it). But like it's not like i actively hate both of them, unlike some characters from Awakening and Fates. Map quality kinda starts going downhill from Ch.18 and onwards. Ch.19 just begs to be warpskipped and Ch.20 is pretty easy for what it is. While i loved the aesthetic of Ch.21, the actual map layout.....could've been better. And Ch.22, the endgame map. Oooh boy, throwing this one in "worst FE endgame maps". The only good part about it was the music, God-Shattering Star, which is almost on the same level as Twilight of the Gods. I also take issue with the final two chapters of Golden Deer from a writing perspective (and Ch.17 as well). Spoilers

Wait until the Church Route where the final map doesn't make sense whatsoever AND is terribly designed (because everybody LOVES infinitely re-spawning monsters that can double and kill half your army, right? RIGHT?!?). Also the best battle in the game is missing and happens off-screen, meaning neither Black Eagle route has the full 22 Chapters.

I personally liked Chapter 22 (but my Byleth was ridiculously RNG-blessed, with almost no relevant stat below 40 (except Magic, Luck and Resistance), so maybe that had something to do with it). What I couldn't get is why the heck were there treasure chests there? What kind of final map EVER had treasure chests in it? It reeks of a planned postgame that they didn't end up putting in for some reason.

3 hours ago, Armagon said:

Platforming in Super Nep is not that hard tbh. The harder part is actually knowing what is and isn't a platform but even then, it's not too hard.

Yeah, luckily, I have made the same observation.
Though there has to be an upgrade to the jumping ability sometime in the future, because there have been many platforms, items and people I couldn't get to yet.

3 hours ago, Armagon said:

Oh yeah, that's been a thing since CyberNep, i think. Erin Fitzgerald left the role due to a voice actor strike (a similar thing happend with Laura Bailey, the voice actress of Lucina).

That could be it.

Playing further, I have discerned that Noire's new voice is actually Erica Mendez. A.k.a. Eleanor Hume from Tales of Berseria, Lianna from Fire Emblem Warriors, and - perhaps most prominently - Bernadetta from Three Houses. Yup, shy girl Bernie-Bear and Tsundere Queen Noire are voiced by the same person now. And it works, because Erica Mendez is a vocal genius.
Also, Noire apparently not only sleep-walks, but sleep-COSPLAYS, too, as discovered by Neptune and Blanc.
There are also enemies that look like yellow Poliwraths wearing swimming tights. Oh, Neptunia... never change. XD

In other, not-so-happy news, I think I'm stuck right now. The game asks me to go to Lowee, but everywhere I go, there is a guard that says "This area is off-limits". I have no idea what to do about that nor did the game give me any hints.

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31 minutes ago, DragonFlames said:

What I couldn't get is why the heck were there treasure chests there? What kind of final map EVER had treasure chests in it?

I feel like it was there for you to get new weapons in case your old ones start to break, since you can't restock during the final battle. Hey man, i ain't gonna complain about more weapons for me to use.

32 minutes ago, DragonFlames said:

Though there has to be an upgrade to the jumping ability sometime in the future, because there have been many platforms, items and people I couldn't get to yet.

There is. There's like a summonable platform you get and then you eventually get a double jump.

33 minutes ago, DragonFlames said:

In other, not-so-happy news, I think I'm stuck right now. The game asks me to go to Lowee, but everywhere I go, there is a guard that says "This area is off-limits". I have no idea what to do about that nor did the game give me any hints.

Yes, the navigation in this game can be ass at times. Turns out Lowee on the upper east side of the map instead of the western side of the map (which is where i'm assuming you're trying to go). I made the same mistake too.

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9 minutes ago, Armagon said:

I feel like it was there for you to get new weapons in case your old ones start to break, since you can't restock during the final battle. Hey man, i ain't gonna complain about more weapons for me to use.

Good point. I still found it a bit odd, because as far as I remember, Three Houses is the first FE game to do that.

9 minutes ago, Armagon said:

There is. There's like a summonable platform you get and then you eventually get a double jump.

That's great to hear! At least it means my not being able to reach certain platforms has little to do with me being bad.

9 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Yes, the navigation in this game can be ass at times. Turns out Lowee on the upper east side of the map instead of the western side of the map (which is where i'm assuming you're trying to go). I made the same mistake too.

I did get to Lowee Harbor, which is to the northwest of Lastation, though there was a "You shall not pass!" guard there, too. But Lowee being in the EAST makes a lot of sense all of a sudden... Geez.
Thank you, though! I'm sure I would have waltzed around that snowy mountain with no clue where to go had you not told me!

Edited by DragonFlames
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