Gaming Thread

[daft alchemist]

I stayed away from most of the skills that required a blood sacrifice. I would only use ones that would do quick damage for a little HP loss just in case my other skills weren't entirely cutting it. And anyway. When you're literally absorbing the life out of someone, it doesn't matter if you lose a little health just to cause some damage, now does it?

[zoner]

as far as damage goes, I'd rather give a lot and take nothing than get a little and give a lot.

[Cobra5]

I used a few blood sacrifice spells... Blood renewal, Enfeebling blood, and another I think... even though I was primarily a Death Mage.

Sure you have to sacrifice health but to be honest, and especially for a Death mage, losing a little health was easier for me to deal with then losing a lot of mana, especially since us necros have so many life-leeching/self-healing abilities. I needed as much mana as I could get, especially when I was playing the party healer as well.

I had no compunction at all sacrificing my health. At times I would use Blood renewal when I was already around the 25% health range... I killed myself once or twice but it's saved my life many more times then that. The spell's strength always made up for the sacrifice of health, I mean hell, Enfeebling blood if used right can shut down their whole melee force (And more often then not you'll be able to leech the health back in no time, doubly so for blood mages who are the ones doing all the sacrifices anyway). But... in the end, the allure of summoning hoards of the undead just overpowered me. If not for that I'd have been a Blood mage all the way. Curses are cool too, and my main switches between two builds, Death/Curse+Soul Reaping and Healing/Soul Reaping. Insidious parasite was one of my favorite skills, especially against sword warriors. That attack speed will be their downfall, bwhahaha...

[zoner]

the most fun part about quests is seeing how many in a row you can do before you lose health...at least for summoners. it may be impossible for others

[daft alchemist]

Oh man. I just bought Trauma Center: Under the Knife tonight for DS. It is by far the most intense game I've ever played. It is so heavy into imersion that you do really feel like you're every move and choice will either heal or damn the patient you're slicing into. There is a slightly supernatural twist to the game in that the main character guy (who you play as) has this special talent called the Healing Touch which is supposed to have something to do with being descended from the greek god of medicine...I dunno. Basically, the guy has super concentration, and when you use the healing touch time slows waaaaay down for you and allows you to do so much in what looks like just a few seconds to everyone else in the O.R.

I'm actually stuck on a patient at the moment. You go in to fix an aneurism, but another shows up. So you fix that one, but then another shows up and also two others that are a bit bigger (if they get too big they burst and spurt blood). So you fix those, but then four huge aneurisms show up at once, and that's when you pull out the healing touch because you'll be screwed otherwise, let me tell you. I've only been able to successfully remove and sew up one aneurism at that point because of how quickly they grow in size. Plus I'm not really great with the magnification tool or the syringes just yet, but I'm getting there.

Bottom line, awesome game. There's a little bit of that overdone anime stuff where your guy will shout "Let's start the surgery!" while he has his hand out like he's choosing Pikachu or something. I actually think it's funny, and I also assume that that's how the makers intended it to be. If not, oh well. It's still good for a laugh anyhow.

Edit: Yeah, I'm fairly certain the game overdoes the images on purpose considering the "warning" screen in the beginning says things like "all character/cases/etc are fictional" and "any simiarities to actual people/diseases/cutting edge medical technology is merely coincidental." Also, it's funny how many little asterik'd warnings they have on the bottom of the booklet pages about how the game does not in any way give you any sort of medical authority and the only way to obtain that is to go to nursing or medical school. Then again, if they didn't put that all over the place, they would get slammed with the literal biggest lawsuit of all time if someone actually tried to do real surgery after playing.

[daft alchemist]

Ok, this game is getting way, way cooler. There's an actual storyline forming now where there's some sort of new type of medical terrorism (not bio since it's a virus I guess?) that's causing some serious damage in people. Due to the healing touch and all, you're the only surgeon (that I know of so far) who can completely remove it from a person's body. I've encountered three different strains of it so far, and lemme tell ya, even though you're the only surgeon who can do it (which seems a little superhuman I guess), the surgeries are really, really tough.

The first strain was like little fish that swim in organs and make huge lacerations in them. You have to ultrasound the organ to find them, cut them out, and then try to burn them up with the laser while they flop around on the organ, and you have to try not to burn the patient. The second strain had two types to it and they look like moving comets (one red and one blue). When similar colors meet, they make a LOT of tumors, but when opposite colors meet they get tangled together for a while and you have to drain the stuff out of them until they turn black and white and stop moving so you can excise them like any other tumor. Not fun, but I felt so good when I finally beat it.

The third kind is crazy. It forms this weird solid scaley sort of membrane on the organ. The scales themselves are shaped like triangles, but there are white thorns that form at each corner that hold the scales down. You have to take out the thorns before you can remove the scales, but each time you do, if there are two thorns close together, more scales will form. That was an interesting one, but fun since it was more like a puzzle than surgery.

I had to perform surgery on an airplane too. It was an easy procedure, but there was turbulence quite often so I would have to stop what I was doing because at the peak of the turbulence, any time you touched the patient with any tool (even the ultrasound or the sterilizing gel).

The coolest and weirdest "surgery" I've done though was on a bomb. Yeah, a bomb. It was at an International Convention for surgeons, and the medical terrorist group put a bomb in the conference room and locked it. The girl who goes there with you used to be on the police force so she knows a bit about disarming bombs, plus the bomb is a really old style one (since the game is in 2018), and you literally have to perform surgery on a bomb. If you fail, everyone blows up and you have to retry, but oh man...it was one hell of an interesting procedure.

Also, this is a game that I feel no shame in looking up on Gamefaqs. I mean, come on! It's surgery! Doctor's even look up techniques and all that when they do surgery, and I'm not at all a real doctor.

[Jalathas]

That sounds cool. I want to try it, but my DS is busted horribly and I don't have the money to buy a new one.

I've been playing FFXII recently. It's interesting, because the play style feels a lot like an MMO, but different at the same time. I'm not too far, but I already like the game. The costumes are a bit ridiculous, and I hate the Viera girl's accent, but I don't have many problems with the actual gameplay.

[daft alchemist]

There are Viera?! Like FFTA Viera? The bunny-deer chick things?! Cuz if there is, oh man, I'm so going to have to try it sometime.

Have you ever played Crystal Chronicles? Becauses the graphics looked similar, and it made me want to try it, but maybe it's not like CC, ya know? And I would love if it was, very muchly.

I also got Burning Crusade and made a blood elf hunter. I am so, so sad though because the area you go to right after the blood elf beginning forest place is the Ghostlands, and the first thing I saw when I entered it was a deserted village full of Nerubian guards, and I instantly wanted one for a pet, but stupid mean Blizzard counted them as undead and not as beasts so I can't have one as a hunter pet. I would give anything to have a Nerubian for a pet! They were my favorite undead unit in WC3.

[Jalathas]

Yeah, FFXII is set in Ivalice. They have Bangaa and Moogles, too, but no Nu Mou. They replaced them with these wierd things called Seeqs. I haven't played Crystal Chronicles, but I've seen it. It looks a little more cutesy than 12, though.

[SoA]

Cutesy doesn't even begin to describe Crystal Chronicles. Think bad attempt at cute x10.

[Cobra5]

The whole art style of final fantasy has gone to shit over the past few years anyway so who cares how it looks. As far as FF is concerened, its "better then most". But art aside, Crystal Chronicals is easily my favorite multiplayer game of (and since) 2004. Granted, you need quite a bit of equipment to get the full experience, it was a worthwhile endevor.

(Forgive any harsh tones... Final Fantasy just really pisses me off. I used to love it so much and they've taken it to such a different direction, mostly in art and style, and I just can't appreciate it. Oh well. To each their own I suppose)

I did like some bits of the Crystal Chronicals art as well. The cutesy thing (like the dancing parts and the moogles, although they were done well enough) "meh", but then again, its not my style. The Male Yukes were an awesome and pretty original race (The females were terrible, I mean they had cone boobs). The landscapes were excellent as well. And I can appreciate the the game is done as a story, almost like a children's story. It fits the theems well, even if they are a bit wasted on me. But I can appreciate an "Innocent" universe now and again.

Easily one of the best games on GC. Up there with RE4 as a hallmark of the system, which is sad because those two games really show what the system can do, and all of the other games really present a feeling of wasted energy (I don't know wether or not I shoul include Twilight Princess, but its an excellent game as well, although I havn't got enough experince with it to really tell much about it).

So, could I reccommend Crystal Chronicals? Only if you have at least one friend to play it with, and enough Gameboy Advances and attachment Cables to play. If not don't bother. Single player isn't worth it.

Also, yes Sarah, FFXII takes place in Ivalice, but the FFTA "Bastard Son of Ivalice and not the FFT "Awesome Ivalice". Too bad. Then again, I havn't eaten breakfast yet.

[daft alchemist]

Oh my god, eat food before you post here from now on. Because your lack of nurishment seems to have made you forget that I love FFTA and not FFT, "bastard son" or not. I love the bangaa and the viera, and I wish they had nu mou because they're so adorable, and moogles are ftw always.

Also, you never played Chrystal Chronicles single player you dork. Don't judge it. I enjoyed single player, although it is one hell of a challenge. I got easily frustrated at times, and the Marlboro boss will forever stress me out because of how many times I had to retry that battle, but I felt like the greatest badass alive when I finally did, I tell you what.

Also, Moogles in FFCC are so dang adorable!! They're fuzzy and they have no arms, but they're so dang cute still! ;D

[Cobra5]

Yeah, which is what I was saying. Some people like the cute thing (Girls) and some don't (me).

And even including that, I enjoyed the game greatly because of fun multiplayer was.

And I didn't have to play single player to know, I wouldn't have liked it. I mean, yeah, it would've been ok, the gameplay is there. But not something worth recommending. Its the teamplay that is worht recognition.

[daft alchemist]

Teamplay is ftw, but not everyone is that blessed to have friends, or friends with GBAs, or friends with GBAs and who can white mage like nobody's business. ;D (That's a Will reference. I was the ultimate punching bag meatshield, and since he was a Yuke, he went mage and had to heal me a LOT.)

Also, this wasn't mentioned yet, the music is awesome. I truly, truly love the music. Very cool.

[BugHunter]

I actually love FFTA as much as FFT, especially since it was my first hands on experience into the FF universe.