Picross DS

Merry Christmas! And Happy New Year in advance!

This holiday I have a big chunk of time free that I should be using to try something long and complicated. Instead I’m doing Picross puzzles instead. After the runaway success I had with Picross 3D earlier this year and with Color Cross wow has it really been that long ago, I’ve been meaning to revisit the original, and the time just happened to be right. I wanted to see how far I could get, because I quit really early the first time I tried it. The 5×5 puzzles were easy, the 10×10 were barely doable, but from 15×15 onwards, I was just lost.

Having built up experience playing the other games, this time round was slightly different. Probably the most significant difference was that I threw away my foolish pride and used the Hints roulette all the way through. I also took my time, thought a lot about the puzzles and didn’t throw up my hands at the first sign of trouble, so I made it pretty far.

Compared to the other two though, Picross DS isn’t that much fun. Once you get even a little way into the Normal Mode puzzles, the clues all become like “1 2 1 1 1 1 1 1” and stuff like that. Just horrible. The game tells you that “Every puzzle can be solved using logic without resorting to guesswork” but of course they’re going to say that, it’s their game. Also navigating the larger, zoomed-in puzzles is a clumsy affair, so the ease of movement 3D spoiled me with is completely gone.

The only real advantage Picross has over the other games is that the finished puzzles actually look like what they’re supposed to look like. Even then it’s not 100%, especially for the Level 4+ puzzles. Also it scratches my Picross/Picross-related itch. I’m still not a puzzle/logic game fan, but I do crave simpler, more mindless experiences sometimes. So I haven’t quit Picross yet, though I’ve abandoned many of the more annoying puzzles, and I’ll probably be playing it for a long time to come.

Having said that, I actually didn’t set out to play Picross on my DS. I was going to play something “proper,” clearing up the last few DS games I hadn’t tried yet. However I tried Solatorobo and Soma Bringer in quick succession and neither game really ‘clicked’ with me, so I gave up in despair and Picross was the result. With Soma Bringer, I think I might try again this weekend, but the battle system in Solatorobo just put me off. I am reliably informed that I can win every battle just by mashing A, but I fail to see the fun in that. Not to mention the platforming elements are just tedious so, yeah it’s dropped. Now that I come to think of it, I haven’t played a romance/otome game in a while, so maybe I should do one of those instead. Hmm, decisions, decisions. Well, I’ll figure something out.

Almost finished a second playthrough of Final Fantasy Type-0 (slight spoilers)

But then I got to the final dungeon and was like, no. Just no. I can’t do this again, especially since there’s no better ending in store for me since I didn’t fulfill all the obscure requirements necessary to get a different end.

It was a good second run, though. Square-Enix did a New Game+ right and added several new missions as an alternative to the old ones I did on the first playthrough. These are also scaled up level-wise so they still pose a proper challenge. This might piss off those people who prefer everything to be available on a single run, though.

Thanks to my higher level, I was also able to tackle most of the Combat Exercises in chapters 3-6, though I got tired and dropped out after that. This also gave me access to a few more dungeons and quests, including Silent Yard, where I killed an Iron Giant and got a Grow Egg (x2 exp) as a reward. As a bonus, this allowed me to appreciate just how stingy this game is with the EXP. Even with double experience, it still took many, many battles for my characters to level up even once. What a gyp!

The second playthrough of Final Fantasy Type-0 was fun and all, but it didn’t really yield much by way of answers. The few answers I got came from the in-game glossary, meaning I could have just read the glossary instead of bothering to replay the game. What is Mother (Alicia)? She’s a ‘diva’, an outsider observing the world and the choices it makes. There are two such observers, Mother and a mysterious man in a mask. It is this man who turns Cid into an Arbiter of the world against his will, so now we know how that came about. I also learned what Cid’s problem was, though not exactly what he was trying to achieve, and why Qator chose to save Aria’s life. That’s what I learned, but the game also added even more questions in the form of Tiz and Rin, the latter of whom addresses Machina as “the other me.” Say what? I’m not going to pursue this nonsense any more. Enough is enough.

Well, at least I got the Type-0 bug out of my system. I might be a bigger ARPG fan than I’d thought. Left to my own devices I’d be playing Tales of Legendia right now, but my PS2 is acting up again. The power button is all fussy. It only turns on when it feels like coming on, which is less and less often these days. So the PS2 is out, and my PSP needs a break, which leaves the Wii, the DS or the PC as my next gaming platform. I’ll pick something and start in a day or two, once Christmas is over.

Finally finished Final Fantasy Type-0 (spoiling like no tomorrow)

This is the post I started out writing:

I can’t finish the game, so I quit. -_- I’m a little sorry to drop out after 38 hours of hard work, but this is as far as I go. Final Fantasy Type-0 has just become the latest in a long line of Square-Enix games that I’ve dropped in the final dungeon. Other alumni include FF3, FF4, FF5, FF6, FF7, DQVI and DQIX, so rest assured that it is in very good company.

As for why I dropped it, it’s for petty endgame-related reasons. On the first playthrough, you have access to the human ending and the l’Cie ending. The l’Cie ending turns all of Class Zero into l’Cies so they can fight endless waves of those Lulusath enemies that appeared out of nowhere. I made it to fifth or sixth wave before my party members all dropped like flies, leaving me alone. The problem is that apart from King and Cater, everyone else is like 15 levels behind, so they can’t even take a single hit from a level 52 Lulusath, much less three of them. After all, the game just tells you you’re l’Cies, but it doesn’t actually give you any new powers. A possible solution would be to redo earlier, beefed up missions until at least half my players are strong enough to do the deed, but who has time for that?

Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies – Capcom has redeemed itself just a little bit

Yay, finished! For once the final case didn’t drag on forever and ever until I was sick of it. And so, for once, I’m not going to spoil the end of the game. You’ll have to play it yourself to see the final, shocking conclusion. And I do recommend it to anyone who likes the Ace Attorney series even a little bit. It doesn’t fix everything wrong with the series (lying witnesses, for example, are a series staple), but it’s miles better than Apollo Justice and much better paced than AA3 and Investigations.

Overall Dual Destinies is quite good, but like all the other games, the cases vary in quality. Case 1 is okay. Cases 2 and 3 generally suck, but not too terribly. If you can make your way through them, Cases 4 and 5 – 5 in particular – are very interesting. It helps that they’re the only ones where it isn’t blatantly clear who the culprit is. But if I talk too much, there’s a chance I’ll end up spoiling something, so I’ll keep the rest of this post short. Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Dual Guesswork and Speculation (spoilers)

I’d forgotten how long and boring the cases could be. I’ve finished three episodes, but now I’m taking a break. A loooooong break.

Apart from the second Investigations game, I’ve played all the Ace Attorney games to date. Some I really liked (1, 2), some I didn’t care for so much (3, AJ, Investigations). When I heard a new one was coming out, my wishlist was very small.

1.Give the defense more of a backbone.

2. Make the cases shorter, more precise and less nonsensical.

With regards to the first point, I suppose it can’t be helped since the main characters this time are a pair of rookies and their cheerless mentor. But it still bugs me the way they react with shock and awe every time the prosecutor does anything remotely threatening or points out the slightest contradiction. Their every 5th line or so is “Aagh!” “Aagh!” “Aagh!” Grow some balls already. Yes, even you Athena.

On the second point, I’m taking a break because episodes 2 and 3 were so long. That means the last two cases are going to be interminable. I hope at least that they don’t make the killer so obvious in the last two episodes. It’s really painful chasing red herrings for hours when you already know whodunnit and how but the game just won’t let you prove it.