krad

i forgot to mention how fucking devious vayne's speech was last FF12 loveblog post..... like, legit was writing notes on how smooth and well structured it was from turning a hostile audience to one on your side. gonna come in handy for corporate shenanigans. :3c

too smooth, obviously. anyone gives a speech (to commoners) (looking like that) in a video game is obviously up to no good but like, dang, writers are doing some cool shit in this game.

anyway, i JUST discovered (lol) jobs and the license board... listing my combos below for those who're curious:

shikari/foebreaker = basch (i spoil my favorites rotten and this *is* technically listed as the best set. i know story-wise knight fits best on him but i'm leaning on Good Gameplay just because i'm not a FF expert by any means)
knight/bushi = balthier (high stats in everything, good heavy physical wall.)
white mage/mechanist = fran (since her stats are slightly wobblier, mechanist sounds good there, and she's been holding up ok as the party white mage so far since even before buying all the licenses.
black mage/red mage = ashe (high magic stat, she'll be fine here. i also like her being offensive tbh)
monk/?? = vaan
(i uh. don't intend on using pandelo much. sorry!)

* also you can regen MP faster by having your mage walk in circles??? thank fuck. guess my old trick of 'leave the tv for a while' won't work but at least you're not up shit creek between battles.

almost through the barlehiem(?) passageways  .... i hear the game opens up a tad after that which i'm really looking forward to. tried doing the threxla hunt (no2 i think) with just vaan when he was wayyyy underleveled but loling now how i'm going to curbstomp the thing.

hehehee, so a number of you are into my FF12 loveblog :D 

* this game seriously reminds me of the phantom menace, especially naboo; aka my first consistent thought watching the opening cinematic! (which is not a bad thing; I loved that movie and AOTC). the noveau-ish architecture was the first bit i cottoned onto, but even the story started having some echoes like the world being invaded by a colder/metal-er empire, a traitor being in the midst, everyone freaking about a royal (or two) getting killed (-and also one of the royals coming back, since I'm fairly sure I've seen Ashe in the party before).

* speaking of, Basch is the most obvious walking case of Krad Bait(tm) I think I've ever seen going in blind. military captain turned traitor (with his own motivations)? check. kind of a dilf? check. kills royalty? check. clearly having his whole arc by eventually being a returning playable character that everyone (in game) probably hates? check. I can almost hear a number of you cackling because the spider senses are telling me he's got a few more bait-isims coming. :P 

* neutral on Vaan (the actual lead once when you've gotten past the prolouge section) so far; he doesn't annoy me outright like most FF protagonists (with the exception of Cloud); but I don't know enough about him to judge yet other than kind of digging his pragmatism.

* I actually quite like the battle gameplay so far! Parts of it remind me of Vagrant Story; not nearly as tedious as running into random enemies all the time, but there's a strategy to managing both the real-time part as well as the sequence of attacks planned ahead. plus it gives you time to admire the architecture in between; half my time with Vaan so far is just wandering around admiring how full of life the shops feel. This is probably one of the densest PS2 era games in my memory, at least in terms of number of NPC's i see on the streets. i wonder if unsounded's author got the idea of two-toes from this game; the similarities to the lizard species look striking.

* that said, I unfortunately got what i think is a severe case of motion sickness from the game last night? I don't get motion sick from games in general, but was noticeably woozy after running around the desert looking for treasure and the first tomato bounty hunt. going to see if playing for a shorter time + sitting further away from the TV + not going so crazy moving the camera around would do the trick.

currently I have one eye dilated from an eyedoctor's appointment (which always have a higher chance of me getting a migraine from with all the bright lights), so I'm waiting until this evening when that's back to normal before picking this up again. it's hard to resist though!

between being in turbo clean mode with purging my resources/"future projects" folders, and having a spot of KOTOR 2 nolstagia thanks to one of neotula's reblogs, i found my last KOTOR 2 loveblog text post, while playing through it for the first time.

( it's unfinished! but there's enough meat in here that i think y'all would appreciate. )

tl;dr - sudden keen need to replay it. the text post doesn't capture how much how its atmosphere stuck with me, much like Myst. some screenshots I get a visceral feeling of forbidding terror and yearning immersion, the highest compliment I can give a game.

so i finished Lupin III: The Woman Named Fujiko Mine

overall: great for a classic caper anime, worthwhile to watch and entertaining in a way that's not too demanding. fantastic art direction. subversive queer/feminist themes for its time that certian slices of tumblr would go nuts over. not quite as "classic/brain screwy' as Utena but vaguely in that direction. i was legit on the edge of my seat for the first half of the finale; there were some neat twists and sets being pulled out.

but the second half of the finale was kinda .... (imo) badly fumbled in a few ways. naturally this had me asking myself how i would have done it.

( all of this won't make sense unless if you've seen the show. massive spoilers. kind of bitchy fyi, but no hard feelings lol. )

> watching Lupin III: Fujiko Mine anime
> 'hey it's pretty good. mature, super nuanced wrt character dynamics, fantastic art, the lady cast kicks an amazing amount of ass. interestingly sexual/borderline sleazy in a way you wouldn't expect but not tasteless. apparently there's some whack ass psychological horror stuff too.'
> 'you know all this needs is one of krad's guilty pleasure tropes'
> gets hit with the ep4 plot twist
> me: PFTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT------


( spoilers )

been itching to finish conquest lately for a few reasons (getting to the dang spoilers so i can write the cast better, so i can read some more of y'alls work, and i miss FE gameplay) ~ here's me plowin' through the endgame maps!

( surprisingly, very little ship nonsense mentioned. :P )

so i'm still right before the final chapter or two in FE: Fates, Conquest.

I love this game so much that i am not ready to actually "finish" Conquest yet, and my brain being temporarily Gunter-obsessed and foaming at the mouth at hot badwrong ossan smut, raised a suggestion of replaying everything from Ch15 (when he comes back) to the final. With just him, Corrin, and Kana, as a challenge.

I actually really like this idea, cuz I want to savor this shit, much like my seventy-five-and-counting path of radiance playthroughs. i've played most fire emblem games at minimum of three times, often 10+ times. i don't get bored by fire emblem lol. and this first playthrough of Fates, I'm having a hard time paying attention to the characters because there's so MUCH new cool gameplay and plot, it's challenging enough that i'm not noticing the nuanced character lines or timing.

gunter is notoriously bad for having absolute shit tier level ups but i think with emulator save-scumming i can make him viable enough, gameplay wise, especially since i'm still only playing on ... easy or normal, I forget. plus Corrin can solo everything. Kana would be added as something new to mess around with so it wouldn't get monotonous (plus i skip the earlygame which tends to be the more monotonous bit). i get to savor these freaking maps again + the main plot and daydream of fucked up smut and get the plot timing right with several drawn strips i want to do. still saving Revelations as my challenge of hard mode, once when i'm used to these mechanics, and opening up a whole nother set of richly detailed characters.....

yes. ossan detour time >:D 

before anyone asks yes i have done zihark+ike solos for both tellius games lol. him being a trueblade before P1 Endgame was real silly and fucking hilarious.

omfg literally the first thing after the last chapter i get to was ... f!corrin/gunter's A support.

( heads up for flagrant fe-style incest and just a whole lot of fun nasty )

at the last battle of tears!( given it's been out for a while, i just, i don't have the energy to do detailed spoiler tagging, just assume all major spoilers before the endgame LOL. I'll try to be somewhat vague about the big stuff but heads up.  )

----

(also i'll try to keep this as free from spoilers as possible but a very specific set of story-relevant ruins in hebra canyon had me internally yelling for joy of 'OMFG THIS IS WHAT HATARI (as headcanoned by me in ghost in the dunes) LOOKS LIKE 8D" (can you tell i had an absolute ball writing that fic lol)

there was something so wonderously massive / 'had to be built by hands of incredible strength and size' and old world and desert-ish-y that i was all 'oh man this is absolutely how zihark beorc felt like when they saw laguz ruins in the desert of death for the first time.'

whenever i start actually running out of the initial steam on this i am for sure taking a *shitload* of screenshots to draw some hatari stuff. there's even a really cool lattice-grid like texture between the clever use of sands and like, religious iconography and symmetry and ahhh shit this is the fun zone.