NEED MORE KONAMI-KRACK
Dec. 2nd, 2005 07:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gogmagogTHIS GAME HAS EATEN MY LIFE. Even now, as I'm working on a Romanticism presentation for Monday (or possibly Wednesday, but I need to have it ready on Monday), it's all I can do not to run back to it. DAMN YOU KONAMI FOR MAKING SUCH FIENDISHLY ADDICTIVE GAMES.
And SuikoTactics is, like, the epitome of that. Suikoden + SRPG is like chocolate and peanut butter, y'know? They just go together so well!
Anyway, first a couple of annoyances: this game is HARD. See, it's one of those games where the enemies' levels keep pace with yours. (Which I hate, because levelling can't save your ass but it can certainly make it nigh-impossible to beat your enemies.) Also, the game has a nasty habit of spawning more monsters just as you're finishing off the ones you've got - this has occasionally happened two or three times a battle, and makes things a bit more difficult. (That was understatement, by the way, in case you couldn't tell.)
Anyway, let's see, where did we leave off...ah, the Underground Path. It turns out it's the same Underground Path that in Suikoden IV led to Warlock's lab. It leads there this time too (after a battle), but the only person there is Warlock's assistant Pablo (another returning character). He tells you that long ago, Warlock opened the gate to another world and summoned a gigantic treelike being into thsi world. The seeds eventually were used as ammunition for Rune Cannons. He eventually sold it to Kooluk, and it was destroyed with Fort El-Eal. (Now we know where Cray got his crazy final boss pet tree-thing!) So there's no more ammo being made for Rune Cannons.
(Also, just a minor gripe, but...everyone in this game says "Rune CANnons," emphasizing the CAN ridiculously. It just sounds kinda odd.)
On their way out, kinda disappointed, Kyril picks up a branch off the floor of the workshop and wonders whether it could be a branch from that tree. They report their less-than-productive results to Iskas, and Kyril gives him the tree branch. Then Iskas decides to go back to the Underground Path, with a couple of merchants accompanying him and Kyril's gang serving as bodyguards. They find nothing, but then Yohn points them to a secret passage, at the end of which they find an underground lake type thing with a one-eyed monster (I'm not joking, it's quite phallic) on an island in the middle. It looks similar to Steele's Rune Cannon, and sure enough it ends up turning the merchants (whom Iskas has sent to investigate) into fishmenthings. Kyril starts freaking, and Andarc has to literally drag him out as they flee.
Once they get out, Kyril apologizes for having gone all catatonic down there, and an ocarina version of the Suikoden Theme of Sadness plays. They go back down to look for Iskas, who they didn't think about rescuing 'cause they were too busy worrying about their own asses, but there's nothing there - no Iskas, no fishmerchants, no one-eyed monster maker. So they're sitting there on the docks, wondering what to do next, when Dario shows up!
Dario finds out they're investigating Rune Cannons and invites them back to the Pirates' Nest with him. But when they get there, the island is under attack by aAustralian Kooluk named Roget. This leads to a FUCKING HARD battle where your guys, plus Dario, are on one side of the beach of the cove, and on the other side all by their lonesomes are Kika and Nalleo (Dario's son, yet another returner). In between the two groups are a bunch of enemies. So basically Kika and Nalleo BOTH have to survive until the end of the battle to win. And while Kika's pretty much a powerhouse, Nalleo's a wispy little girlyboy. (Seriously, everyone I know thought Nalleo was a girl the first time they saw him in Suikoden IV. I'd say it was the hot pants, but this is the game that also gave us Hot Pants and Lino, so...) He's not particularly WEAK per se, but he can't stand up to a whole lot of punishment. It also doesn't help that all I brought to the battle was my core three (Kyril, Andarc, Seneca) and Rita. Fortunately Rita seriously rocks if you can keep her alive long enough to level up - she can whale (wail?) with that hammer.
Anyway, on like my third time through the battle I finally win, and it turns out that all the pirates' Rune Cannons were taken by the Kooluk. Kika remembers Kyril, though, and since she has to go to Obel to tell King Lino, she has no problem if the Anti-Rune-Cannon-Brigade tags along.
Of course, Obel Palace is like a massive nostalgia-fest. Lino! Flare! Akaghi! Mizuki! Setsu! (Okay, maybe I wasn't that happy to see Setsu.) Kika tells Lino what happened, and since Kooluk and the Island Nations have a peace treaty after the events of SuikoIV, Lino figures this was done stealthily and unofficially, so they must be stealthy and unofficial back. He talks about sending someone into Kooluk to find stuff out, and Kyril volunteers. Lino's skeptical, but then Kika deadpans "I can vouch for them, we go way back" which is kinda funny because a) they've only known each other for like a few days over three years, and b) the last time she met him he was like 12. XD
But anyway, Lino agrees, and assigns Akaghi and Mizuki to go with Kyril. Kika also joins. A crapload of stuff opens up on the World Map - Nay, Na-Nal, Iluya, and of course El-Eal. In addition, Obel has a crapload of stuff to buy (and Adrienne as the blacksmith!).
Also, in a campfire scene (accessed by Resting) somewhere around this time, Andarc asks what Seneca's doing and she replies that things have gotten so eventful that she's started a journal of her own. Aww.
As you leave Obel, Flare (Lino's daughterand Hot Pants' sister) and Trishtan (the hypochondriac warrior whose "medicine" is actually flour) insist that they're coming along too, and join your party.
Anyway, I head back to Middleport and recruit Pablo. He's another magician, which comes in handy 'cause till now my only mage was Andarc. Meanwhile, at the Quest Guild a crapload of missions involving friends from SuikoIV have opened up. There's treasure hunting with Rene, delivering a letter for Ramada, doing errands for Chiepoo, etc. I start with delivering Ramada's letter to the "woman in red" at Hermitage Island, who turns out to be Maxine, who joins (yay, another magician!). Then it's off to the Deserted Island, where Chiepoo has a store.
(It's funny: A guy on the Deserted Island tells you that the island is known as Hot Pants' island, because he spent time there. But the imported text is in a really weird font, so it looks like this "Some call it J o s e p h 's island, because J o s e p h , the hero of the Island Liberation Army, spent time here.")
Of course, while I'm there I go towards the coast to do Rene's treasure hunting mission, and GODDAMMIT. It took me FIVE TRIES to beat this battle, because it's SO HARD. See, it's pretty much a normal battle except that Rene is in your party, and the victory condition is her digging up three Prime Gold Ores. So basically, your other party members have to fight off the monsters and keep her safe while she digs.
The problem is that she's at level 1 and has like 15 HP. So basically if she takes ONE hit from any bad guy, she immediately bites it. And also there's those goddamned cheap Giant Crabs on that island, which doesn't help matters much.
Oh, but one good thing - if you continue after losing a battle, you keep the experience you earned on your last run through it. Which is good, but it can be frustrating when you're like "goddamn, I've already gotten Rene up to level 3 (which doesn't particularly increase her survivability, by the way) and I STILL haven't beaten this battle!"
Next is Fort El-Eal. :D
Anyway, now for more from the Massive BPAL Imp Shipment o' Doom (I'm almost done, though, honest!):
ZEPHYR
A gentle white scent, breezes laced with the scent of springtime blooms and citrus. Lemon, lemon verbena, neroli, white musk, white florals, white sandalwood, China musk, bergamot and a drop of vanilla.
In the bottle: Kinda light and floral and sweet.
Wet: I'm not really getting any of the lemon, or the white musk, or the vanilla - just white florals and a bit of sandalwood. There's also a slightly smoky undertone, which might be the neroli or China musk, but it's not unpleasant.
Dry: Well, it gets a bit more citrussy, but not particularly lemony. It blends into a light fragrance that's quite nice, but not particularly memorable.
Verdict: Nice, but it's not really me. Too floral.
HADES
The gloomy Hades enriches himself with our sighs and our tears. The Unseen. Eldest brother of Zeus, Husband of Persephone, Lord of the Underworld and Commander of the Demons of the Underworld, God of Wealth, whose epithets are Clymenus [Notorious], Eubuleus [Wise in Counsel], and Polydegmon [He who receives many / The Hospitable]. Though he is a dark, morbid and morose deity, fierce and relentless, and is stern, pitiless, and sometimes cruel, he is by no means an evil God. His justice is true, even-handed and absolute, and he is possessed of unbreakable loyalty, single-minded devotion to duty, and immense courage. A dark, palpably sacred chthonic blend: black narcissus and cypress, stephanotis, opoponax, labdanum, onycha and ambergris.
In the bottle: Er, cinnamon and celery? It sounds like it shouldn't work, but it kinda does. XD
Wet: Some kind of spicy scent - not cinnamon, but something similar - combined with a kind of musky wood and a minty overtone to it all. It's really much nicer than I was expecting both from the description and from the name of the scent. I was expecting something musty and super-musky, but it's not like that at all.
Dry: It's still pretty consistent. I want to say it smells like incense - it doesn't really, but it has that same kind of rich, spicy, slightly musky scent that you can get with nice incense.
Verdict: Wow, I like this much more than I thought I would. It's not at all dark and gloomy, but instead just rich and spicy.
Let's Positive Linking!
- Apparently rewards are not particularly motivating after all. It sounds paradoxical, but actually I can believe it - I've seen it and, hell, been the same way myself at times. XD
- Food critic wins Bad Sex in Fiction award. At least he's much more graceful about it than that douchebag Tom Wolfe was. If you want to see his selection and the runners-up, go here. Marlon Brando's is horrible, but then there's the winner, which ends with the words "Like Zorro." XD
- A literary plagiarist is caught. And while I think what he did is deplorable, I'm irritated by the way the article's author uses that as a springboard to tar everyone he ever had any kind of dealings with. And while he may have a valid cricism about the guy favorably reviewing his friends' work, there's also the fact that the writing workshop these writers met at is a pretty good writing workshop, and so it's probable that yeah, they ARE all pretty good writers (though hopefully the others are more original). It's like people in the literary world (or who want to be in the literary world) who complain that the Iowa Writers' Workshop folks get published disproportionately highly, and claim that they're being favored somehow. When in actuality, it's probably that the Iowa Workshop takes a lot of the creme de la creme of young literary authors, so it's probably that they're just really good writers. (It's kind of like complaining that Ivy League graduates are disproportionately represented in political office, and so it must be a SINISTER PLOT BY A CABAL OF ACADEMICS TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD when it's really just that the people who have the smarts and/or the money to go to Ivy League schools also have the smarts and/or the money to make it in politics.)
- Where are all the great women comic book artists? This mostly just amuses me for its referring to girls' manga as "shoju." XD
And a meme, taken from![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
firestorm717:
Also, apparently LJ is still being spotty about sending me comments. x_x
And SuikoTactics is, like, the epitome of that. Suikoden + SRPG is like chocolate and peanut butter, y'know? They just go together so well!
Anyway, first a couple of annoyances: this game is HARD. See, it's one of those games where the enemies' levels keep pace with yours. (Which I hate, because levelling can't save your ass but it can certainly make it nigh-impossible to beat your enemies.) Also, the game has a nasty habit of spawning more monsters just as you're finishing off the ones you've got - this has occasionally happened two or three times a battle, and makes things a bit more difficult. (That was understatement, by the way, in case you couldn't tell.)
Anyway, let's see, where did we leave off...ah, the Underground Path. It turns out it's the same Underground Path that in Suikoden IV led to Warlock's lab. It leads there this time too (after a battle), but the only person there is Warlock's assistant Pablo (another returning character). He tells you that long ago, Warlock opened the gate to another world and summoned a gigantic treelike being into thsi world. The seeds eventually were used as ammunition for Rune Cannons. He eventually sold it to Kooluk, and it was destroyed with Fort El-Eal. (Now we know where Cray got his crazy final boss pet tree-thing!) So there's no more ammo being made for Rune Cannons.
(Also, just a minor gripe, but...everyone in this game says "Rune CANnons," emphasizing the CAN ridiculously. It just sounds kinda odd.)
On their way out, kinda disappointed, Kyril picks up a branch off the floor of the workshop and wonders whether it could be a branch from that tree. They report their less-than-productive results to Iskas, and Kyril gives him the tree branch. Then Iskas decides to go back to the Underground Path, with a couple of merchants accompanying him and Kyril's gang serving as bodyguards. They find nothing, but then Yohn points them to a secret passage, at the end of which they find an underground lake type thing with a one-eyed monster (I'm not joking, it's quite phallic) on an island in the middle. It looks similar to Steele's Rune Cannon, and sure enough it ends up turning the merchants (whom Iskas has sent to investigate) into fishmenthings. Kyril starts freaking, and Andarc has to literally drag him out as they flee.
Once they get out, Kyril apologizes for having gone all catatonic down there, and an ocarina version of the Suikoden Theme of Sadness plays. They go back down to look for Iskas, who they didn't think about rescuing 'cause they were too busy worrying about their own asses, but there's nothing there - no Iskas, no fishmerchants, no one-eyed monster maker. So they're sitting there on the docks, wondering what to do next, when Dario shows up!
Dario finds out they're investigating Rune Cannons and invites them back to the Pirates' Nest with him. But when they get there, the island is under attack by a
Anyway, on like my third time through the battle I finally win, and it turns out that all the pirates' Rune Cannons were taken by the Kooluk. Kika remembers Kyril, though, and since she has to go to Obel to tell King Lino, she has no problem if the Anti-Rune-Cannon-Brigade tags along.
Of course, Obel Palace is like a massive nostalgia-fest. Lino! Flare! Akaghi! Mizuki! Setsu! (Okay, maybe I wasn't that happy to see Setsu.) Kika tells Lino what happened, and since Kooluk and the Island Nations have a peace treaty after the events of SuikoIV, Lino figures this was done stealthily and unofficially, so they must be stealthy and unofficial back. He talks about sending someone into Kooluk to find stuff out, and Kyril volunteers. Lino's skeptical, but then Kika deadpans "I can vouch for them, we go way back" which is kinda funny because a) they've only known each other for like a few days over three years, and b) the last time she met him he was like 12. XD
But anyway, Lino agrees, and assigns Akaghi and Mizuki to go with Kyril. Kika also joins. A crapload of stuff opens up on the World Map - Nay, Na-Nal, Iluya, and of course El-Eal. In addition, Obel has a crapload of stuff to buy (and Adrienne as the blacksmith!).
Also, in a campfire scene (accessed by Resting) somewhere around this time, Andarc asks what Seneca's doing and she replies that things have gotten so eventful that she's started a journal of her own. Aww.
As you leave Obel, Flare (Lino's daughter
Anyway, I head back to Middleport and recruit Pablo. He's another magician, which comes in handy 'cause till now my only mage was Andarc. Meanwhile, at the Quest Guild a crapload of missions involving friends from SuikoIV have opened up. There's treasure hunting with Rene, delivering a letter for Ramada, doing errands for Chiepoo, etc. I start with delivering Ramada's letter to the "woman in red" at Hermitage Island, who turns out to be Maxine, who joins (yay, another magician!). Then it's off to the Deserted Island, where Chiepoo has a store.
(It's funny: A guy on the Deserted Island tells you that the island is known as Hot Pants' island, because he spent time there. But the imported text is in a really weird font, so it looks like this "Some call it J o s e p h 's island, because J o s e p h , the hero of the Island Liberation Army, spent time here.")
Of course, while I'm there I go towards the coast to do Rene's treasure hunting mission, and GODDAMMIT. It took me FIVE TRIES to beat this battle, because it's SO HARD. See, it's pretty much a normal battle except that Rene is in your party, and the victory condition is her digging up three Prime Gold Ores. So basically, your other party members have to fight off the monsters and keep her safe while she digs.
The problem is that she's at level 1 and has like 15 HP. So basically if she takes ONE hit from any bad guy, she immediately bites it. And also there's those goddamned cheap Giant Crabs on that island, which doesn't help matters much.
Oh, but one good thing - if you continue after losing a battle, you keep the experience you earned on your last run through it. Which is good, but it can be frustrating when you're like "goddamn, I've already gotten Rene up to level 3 (which doesn't particularly increase her survivability, by the way) and I STILL haven't beaten this battle!"
Next is Fort El-Eal. :D
Anyway, now for more from the Massive BPAL Imp Shipment o' Doom (I'm almost done, though, honest!):
ZEPHYR
A gentle white scent, breezes laced with the scent of springtime blooms and citrus. Lemon, lemon verbena, neroli, white musk, white florals, white sandalwood, China musk, bergamot and a drop of vanilla.
In the bottle: Kinda light and floral and sweet.
Wet: I'm not really getting any of the lemon, or the white musk, or the vanilla - just white florals and a bit of sandalwood. There's also a slightly smoky undertone, which might be the neroli or China musk, but it's not unpleasant.
Dry: Well, it gets a bit more citrussy, but not particularly lemony. It blends into a light fragrance that's quite nice, but not particularly memorable.
Verdict: Nice, but it's not really me. Too floral.
HADES
The gloomy Hades enriches himself with our sighs and our tears. The Unseen. Eldest brother of Zeus, Husband of Persephone, Lord of the Underworld and Commander of the Demons of the Underworld, God of Wealth, whose epithets are Clymenus [Notorious], Eubuleus [Wise in Counsel], and Polydegmon [He who receives many / The Hospitable]. Though he is a dark, morbid and morose deity, fierce and relentless, and is stern, pitiless, and sometimes cruel, he is by no means an evil God. His justice is true, even-handed and absolute, and he is possessed of unbreakable loyalty, single-minded devotion to duty, and immense courage. A dark, palpably sacred chthonic blend: black narcissus and cypress, stephanotis, opoponax, labdanum, onycha and ambergris.
In the bottle: Er, cinnamon and celery? It sounds like it shouldn't work, but it kinda does. XD
Wet: Some kind of spicy scent - not cinnamon, but something similar - combined with a kind of musky wood and a minty overtone to it all. It's really much nicer than I was expecting both from the description and from the name of the scent. I was expecting something musty and super-musky, but it's not like that at all.
Dry: It's still pretty consistent. I want to say it smells like incense - it doesn't really, but it has that same kind of rich, spicy, slightly musky scent that you can get with nice incense.
Verdict: Wow, I like this much more than I thought I would. It's not at all dark and gloomy, but instead just rich and spicy.
Let's Positive Linking!
- Apparently rewards are not particularly motivating after all. It sounds paradoxical, but actually I can believe it - I've seen it and, hell, been the same way myself at times. XD
- Food critic wins Bad Sex in Fiction award. At least he's much more graceful about it than that douchebag Tom Wolfe was. If you want to see his selection and the runners-up, go here. Marlon Brando's is horrible, but then there's the winner, which ends with the words "Like Zorro." XD
- A literary plagiarist is caught. And while I think what he did is deplorable, I'm irritated by the way the article's author uses that as a springboard to tar everyone he ever had any kind of dealings with. And while he may have a valid cricism about the guy favorably reviewing his friends' work, there's also the fact that the writing workshop these writers met at is a pretty good writing workshop, and so it's probable that yeah, they ARE all pretty good writers (though hopefully the others are more original). It's like people in the literary world (or who want to be in the literary world) who complain that the Iowa Writers' Workshop folks get published disproportionately highly, and claim that they're being favored somehow. When in actuality, it's probably that the Iowa Workshop takes a lot of the creme de la creme of young literary authors, so it's probably that they're just really good writers. (It's kind of like complaining that Ivy League graduates are disproportionately represented in political office, and so it must be a SINISTER PLOT BY A CABAL OF ACADEMICS TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD when it's really just that the people who have the smarts and/or the money to go to Ivy League schools also have the smarts and/or the money to make it in politics.)
- Where are all the great women comic book artists? This mostly just amuses me for its referring to girls' manga as "shoju." XD
And a meme, taken from
firestorm717:| My LiveJournal 12 Days |
|---|
| My True Love gave to me... |
| 12 shisochous a-galloping. |
| 11 jantalaimons a-twirling. |
| 10 jokersamas a-dialing. |
| 9 satsus a-dancing. |
| 8 eikittys a-groaning. |
| 7 dincrests a-raving. |
| 6 rathershadys a-flaming. |
| 5 dark blue aheberts. |
| 4 massaging enkiaes. |
| 3 Indonesian angrybabbles. |
| 2 mouse vaulted_eels. |
| And a courters28 in a mulberry tree. |
| Another fun meme brought to you by rfreebern. |
Also, apparently LJ is still being spotty about sending me comments. x_x
