Soul Hackers - Review

I'm a huge Atlus fan. I'm a huge Shin Megami Tensei fan. And when they decided to release Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner - Soul Hackers, I picked it up the day it came out. This game wasn't released in the states before. Atlus didn't just port this Saturn game, but updated it.

What can I say? This game was amazing. Can you think of something more awesome than a Cyber-Punk Pokemon game?

So the story starts off with you, and the girl in red from the first picture, Hitomi, near a phone line/computer station. She tells you a little about Paradigm X, and asks if you're going to hack the server to get your name on the Beta test list. You hack the system, and a mysterious voice speaks to you through the system.

Kinap switches his form through the game, as he guides and helps you. He is worried that a shadowy group of villains are using the Paradigm X program to steal human souls. You, Hitomi, and your group of friends / hackers, the Spookies, try to get to the bottom of this mystery. Kinap sends you on this vision quests to understand more about who and what you are up against. Shortly after your first vision quest, you find a computer system known as a COMP. When you activate the device, a bizarre orb of light flies out of it and fuses with Hitomi, releasing a demon named Nemissa.

She can't remember anything, and she shares the body with Hitomi. they switch who is in control throughout the story. And after the comp is active, you can finally capture demons and use them. Unlike many of the other Shin Megami Tensei games, the demons don't gain level ups. I don't know if it's the same way in the other Devil Summoner games, because I haven't had the chance to play them.

Like the other Shin Megami Tensei games, you can fuse demons together to create new and powerful demons. When I beat the game, I had collected 66% of them. Which was something along the lines of 120 or so.

The music was enjoyable, but nothing too spectacular. I did really enjoy the final boss theme though. Graphically, it isn't the most beautiful game ever put out, but I find that really doesn't matter. The artwork is amazing, even if most of the enemies are static. And most of the battle backgrounds look like they belong in Earthbound.

Like many of the other Shin Megami Tensei Games, especially the main series, you get most of your demons by talking to them during battle. Every demon has a specific personality, and answering questions right can land you a new demon. Answering the questions wrong can give the enemies an attack round where you can't do anything.

In order to use your demons, you have to summon them. You can do this in or out of battle. However, keeping them summoned uses up M, a.k.a. Macca. You get Macca for killing demons, and you use it like a currency, trading it for Yen, or summoning demons from the list at the Goumoden.

As far as the difficulty was, this game wasn't too bad. Strange Journey was far harder. The only issue I had with the game being unfair was in one of the dungeons midway through the game. The Auto-factory. Most of the enemies there knew a spell called Mudo, which is the game's instant death spell. If you don't have a weakness to it, it has about a 10% chance of landing...but when enemies spam it every round, I game overed a lot there. However, once armor that was available to block Mudo was sold, that problem was gone.

There aren't too many choices you make through the game, but the few you do greatly changes certain things. Early in the game, you are asked to explain what Hitomi's personality is like, and depending on your choice, her type of magic differs. Also, the final vision quest you go on, depending on which boss monster you kill, changes how the end boss fights. I chose to kill Tiamat, because she utterly crushed me in Strange Journey...I will have my revenge.

Now below is a picture I took of the final boss, and my team I used.

 

Most Shin Megami Tensei games have a game-breaker character, and I found her. In the game, you get a third free-to use character, called Zoma Zeed. You can fuse your Zoma with various demons, and it grows stronger. But two classes of demons will actually transform your Zoma into a new demon. Deity and Tyrant. I fused my Zoma with Tyrant Tiezietni (or whatever her crazy-ass name was), and created Hero Jeanne D'Arc. Who had the prayer skill. Which restores MP to full...Yep. There is nothing as enjoyable as curbstomping an end boss. 

Ephemeral Fantasia - Review

So, a few weeks ago, I took upon myself a challenge. I've owned this game, Ephemeral Fantasia for quite a while, but neither time I played through it, I beat it. The game is very long, and very complicated. I used a guide to beat it because otherwise it is basically impossible.

The story begins with Mouse, the guy on the left, arriving at this beautiful tropical island. He was called upon by Xelpherpolis, who is going to marry Princess Lorielle (the girl on the right). Well, what he didn't know is that Xelpherpolis can control time. And that he has unwittingly entered a five day time-loop that at first there seems to be no way out of.

It isn't explained how long the time loop has gone on for, but it is referenced that at least several years of it has happened. But for some reason, Mouse is unaffected by the time-reversal, and keeps his memories. So he decides that he will get out of the time loop, and save the princess.

The reason I used a guide for the game is because you can only do certain events on certain days, and the game doesn't tell you a damn thing. It takes a minimum of 12 time-reversals in order to accomplish most of what the game offers. I didn't do it all because I wanted to be the game this time.

Graphically, the game isn't nearly as impressive as many other PS2 games, and there seemed to only be twelve or so musical tracks (excluding the guitar mini-game songs). So the music got really annoying after a while.

Before there was Guitar Hero, there was Lute Master. Yeah, there is a mini-game that is actually plot-important. And it is tough as balls. Some of the songs are so damn ridiculous I could barely hit half of the notes. Good thing is, any time the song is needed for the plot, it doesn't matter how poorly you play it.

The battle system was mostly average, but there was one really cool part about it. If you use certain skills enough, they level up. When those skills reach a high enough level, you'll unlock new skills. And Mouse has the ability to learn unique skills when his allies learn some of their skills. It was pretty nice...until the best skills start to unlock, because it takes forever to level them up.

Look at that guy. Straight up wanna-be Sephiroth.

There is a fair sized cast of characters you can get, but in order to do so, you have to do certain events, which then falls upon certain days, and so forth. You don't have to get every single character, but it is really nice to learn those team skills.

Here is something a little different about Ephemeral Fantasia. You have two sets of levels. Character Levels, and Party Levels. Character levels increase your stats, unlock magic spells, and make gaining skill levels take longer. Party levels increases everyone's HP and MP stats. So if a character is level one, but the party level is 25, they have a lot of HP, even if their stats suck.

Oh yeah, and Mouse's Lute can talk. And is named Pattimo.

So, finally, I reach the final point of the game. Xelpherpolis freezes time, and only members of Mouse's crew can move around. They head into the castle to fight Xelpherpolis. And let me tell you, that fight was a pain in the ass. The guide said mid-forties should be enough to win. I was nearly level 50. Ugh. And some of those dungeons were so damn long, like the Water Dungeon. Freaking spent an hour and half in it. Running a square, over and over.

But I beat it. It feels good to have finished it this time. I'd suggest playing it, but you don't need to finish the game. Cause it took move over 75 hours to beat it. That's almost standard Dragon Quest lengths, but imagine staying on the same damn island the entire time.

Being in a Rut

It's almost been two years since I graduated from Ithaca college. And I feel like all I have done since is work. When I graduated, I had several months to find a job that could pay my bills. I tried to get something in my field of Television and Radio, sending my resume to various companies in the Rochester and Syracuse areas.

I didn't get a job.

It hurt. I graduated with good grades, and I am a hard worker. I still needed a job. So I went on to try getting a job at McKenzie Child's, and to Adecco. Well, I succeeded in getting a job at Tessy Plastics. Sure, the job's not bad. The people are nice. But it wasn't what I went to college for.

Oh yeah, while I was in college I spent every weekend and one day a week working at Tops Markets, in their gas station. Then, I continued working at Tops for almost a year after I started at Tessy Plastics. I was working 60-80 hours a week, so I could afford to pay my $1,000 dollar college loan bills every month. Yeah, $1,000 bucks.

When I started going to Ithaca, I had several writing projects, ideas, stories, and such. My friend Joe and I were working on a novel called Wild Frontier: The Barghest Campaign. We wrote close to 80 or so pages in Word. But as my work load increased, I had less time to write.

It didn't become easier after I graduated. It actually became harder. I tried to work on some of my stories, but eventually, I could spend an hour just to write a single paragraph. I got writer's block. My mind still came up with stories and ideas, but I just couldn't write them. I started making excuses on why I couldn't write.

I felt drained. I just didn't want to do anything. My energy was sucked dry.

Back in December, I quit my job at Tops. But even with that, I felt I just couldn't do much. After I got my laptop (thanks to Tessy's Profit Sharing checks every quarter. Hey, even if I pay a lot, I've got to treat myself to something nice every once in a while) I tried to write.

It just wouldn't happen. I still didn't feel it. Now, four months later, I'm beginning to feel new energy and determination. I want to write. I want to be freed from my struggles. And I want to do it MY WAY.

I'm working on a movie script I call 'A God's Beast'. I'm going to start working on Lands of Chaos again. And I've been talking with my best bud, Josh D, about getting back to work on an old project that we dubbed 'Bananarama'. Mix Vegetales with 80's action movies.

I want to do this. I need to do this.

Part of my strategy to break myself out of this rut has been this blog. By writing various articles on topics that matter to me, I feel the energy as I express what is going on in my mind. I am expelling it into the universe, and I am sharing it with everyone who reads my blog. And so, I will keep on keeping on, because I need to enact the change in my life, not wait till something comes and changes it for me.

So, thanks for believing in me. I'm not going to stop. This time I will work my way to the top.

My Top 25 favorite Final Fantasy Characters

This list will contain my personal favorite final fantasy characters. The key point of this is characters who had a large effect on the story, so heroes, villains, and maybe even some side characters will be in this.

25: Galuf

The reason I picked him is because of all the heroes in FFV, I felt he was the best, and primarily because of his death scene. Unlike Tellah from FFIV, when he fought against the Big Bad ExDeath, he actually "killed" him. Tellah managed to hurt Golbez, but you knew right away that Golbez wasn't really dead. ExDeath remained "dead" for a while longer only to reform himself from a sliver of wood.

24 and 23. Biggs and Wedge.

Biggs and Wedge are two characters that appear in multiple Final Fantasies, and though they differ in each game, they are tied with the story. My first encounter with the pair was FFVII, my first of the primary FF games. They were a part of the Eco-terrorist group Avalanche.

22. Balthier

Every game needs their own Han Solo. He is by far the best character in FFXII. I felt like he had the most development, and he had great reasons for being part of the story, especially because his own father worked for the empire, and for a time he was a Judge.

21. Cloud

Despite the fact that I love FFVII more than any other game in the series, I felt like Cloud lacked in some ways. Granted, some of these defects were great for developing his story, and he is perhaps the most iconic hero in the series, one single plot hole was never explained. How exactly did he defeat Sephiroth? And I mean this as before he was genetically modified by Hojo, I mean their first encounter in the mako reactor near Nibelhelm.

20. Mog

Mog appears in multiple games, first appearing in FFVI. He switches from a playable character, to puppet/video game, to mail carrier. He is one of the more iconic creatures, only bested by the Chocobos.

19. Barrett Wallace

Barrett Wallace was the first black character to appear in a Final Fantasy. And though there was some racial stereotyping, he was a very strong character. He wanted to save the world the only way he knew how, so his daughter could live in a better world. He fought the demons of his past and never gave up, no matter how hard the going got.


18. Kain

I hated this asshole. He went from friend to foe, back to friend, back to foe. Sure, maybe he was brainwashed by Golbez, but he aggravated me to no end. However, he helped drive the story forward and stands out as a strong character.

17. Kuja

Okay, so maybe he is a bit to feminine. I have heard rumors that he was actually a she in the japanese version, but I don't know whether or not that is true. Kuja stands out to me because he manipulated the heroes, and Queen Branhe. You weren't too certain what he was planning until he finally snaps.

16. Tidus

Goofy laugh scene or no, Tidus was a strong, compassionate, if naive, hero. He wanted to help, even if it would only aid him to return to his home of Zaanarkand. It was refreshing to play as someone so vibrant in a game, and even after he found out that he was merely a dream of the Fayth, he kept going, for Yuna's sake.

15. Cid FFIV

There was something awesome about that gruff airship builder. The first playable Cid in the final fantasy series, he was badass. He could scan enemies, smash them with hammers, and build airships in the blink of an eye. And he just wouldn't die.

14. Gilgamesh

I love Gilgamesh. Especially when is he voiced by the same guy who does Bender from Futurama. He first appears in FFV, as the flunky of ExDeath, who eventually turns against ExDeath to help the heroes. After that game, he would appear either as a summon, a bonus boss, or just rumors floating around. He collects rare swords and can hop between dimensions.

13. Dr. Hojo

I hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate him. But he was one of the two major villains in FFVII, and I don't mean Sephiroth. If it wasn't for him and Jenova, Sephiroth would never have come into being. Hojo twisted people's lives, for science and his own selfish desires.

12. Zidane

Ah, Zidane. The thief with a tail. His history is a mystery, but love at first sight drives his quest. He was a thief with morals, and he soon was pushed up against impossible odds, and an enemy not so different from himself.

11. Cait Sith

The first time I played through FFVII, I was too young to understand much about him. But in my more recent playthrough, I realized something about him I didn't before. Reeve, the pilot of the robot Cait Sith, may have been a spy for Shinra, but once he found out the real deal with what was going on in the world, he helped them. He betrayed Shinra to help Cloud and Co' to stop them, to stop the Weapons, and to stop Sephiroth. He stands out more than the other characters because he had some very difficult choices on where to lay his loyalty.

10. Wakka

Wakka may have been goofy, and have a goofy name, but he was a very strong character in FFX. He had to give up on his favorite thing in the world, Blitzball, because of a mix of reasons, most prominent, his promise to guard and protect Yuna. He always tried to stay upbeat and protective no matter what happened.

9. ExDeath

You know, ExDeath may not have been as evil, or out there as some of the other villains. But the concept of what he was is what sold his character for me. Over thousands of years, evil demons were sealed with a sacred tree. Their evil leaked into the tree and slowly brought it to life. And all that ExDeath wanted, was to destroy everything, to return it to the void. FFV may have been more campy than the other FF games, but I still feel he had the potential to be the greatest FF villain.

8. Tristan

Okay, maybe Mystic Quest is one of the side games, but Tristan was the coolest character in the game. A ninja/thief, he gave you bombs, and the most powerful claw weapon in the game. He would pop in from time to time, and leave when he felt like it.

7. Kefka

As if clowns/jesters couldn't get any worse, Kefka shows up. And practically becomes a god. He was insane, and the strongest and most vibrant character in FFVI. He is also, in my opinion, the best FF villain.

6. Jenova

Jenova, the entity that fell from space, the creature that was pulling Sephiroth's strings the entire game. This thing, straight out of H.P. Lovecraft was horrifying. It came from who knows where, and it tried to kill or corrupt the world. And of course, scientists felt like they should mess with it.

5. Cecil

Out of all the main characters, I think I like Cecil the most because I find his journey, his development as a person, to be the most complete in the series. Once a dark knight, now a Paladin, he fought against his own kingdom after witnessing the tragedies that Baron was inflicting upon the world.

4. Ramza

You know, it's kind of hard to deal with something terrible. But a game of terrible things happening to someone would normally aggravate the piss out of them. However, Ramza was a strong character, trying to protect his friends and country. Some compare his story akin to King Arthur. He had to fight against friend, foe, brother. Against an evil religion summoning demons, and in the end, he won, and was marked as a traitor.

3. Cid FFVII

Cid Highwind was a badass. His only goal in life was to make it into outer space. An airship designer, badass pilot, and skillful warrior, he stood out to me because he had an even fouler mouth than Barrett, and his backstory was tragic. He was going to launch a rocket into space, but one of the technicians became trapped near the engines, so he had to abort the mission. He joins the heroes mostly because he is bored and wants some payback.

2. Vivi

There are only three times I was brought to tears by a final fantasy game. Aerith's death, the ending to FFX, and Vivi's fight against the black Waltz on the airship, when you see the dead bodies of the black mages falling from the ship and the look of sadness on his face. I loved Vivi's story, despite how sad it was. He was perhaps one of the finest characters in fiction.

1. Auron

There is only one word that can describe Auron. Badass. He journeyed with Jecht and Braska on the pilgrimage. Witnessed his friend become the final summon, and kill Sin...then kill Braska...and then witnessed Jecht turn into a new Sin. He went back to Yunalesca, and fought her, only to be killed. But not even death would stop him. He journeyed to the Dream Zaanarkand, and helped bring Tidus to reality, so that he could end the cycle of Sin and the sacrifices of the summoners. He stands out as the strongest and most devoted character in all of the final fantasies. Unlike other characters who fought and died against pure evil, he came back, to do it all over again.

Giant Monsters: All Out Assault

The other day, my brother and I got into a discussion about giant monsters, mainly because we decided to have a giant monster movie day. Our discussion was about humans vs giant monsters, and why we believe our modern weaponry might actually be effective.

First off, we have armor piercing weapons, bunker-busters, nukes, powerful drills, and more. Now, if these weapons were turned against giant monsters, they should be quite effective.

Godzilla, for example, is about 100 meters tall. In most movies he is taller than the average sky-scraper. He is known to have powerful regeneration, though not as good as say, Wolverine or Deadpool. Radioactive weapons actually heal and power him up, but in the movies, he would either be hurt by electricity, or powered up. Second, the use of the drill-missiles actually did hurt him. With the wounds created by drill-missiles, all you would need to do is fire high-powered non-radioactive weapons directly into the wounds.

Now Gamera is roughly about 60 meters tall. Quite a bit shorter than Godzilla, but he is a flying turtle. Yep, you can laugh first. I'm going to focus on the Gamera from the 90's movies. The issue with defeating Gamera is that he could essentially revive, because he is tied into a power source known as mana. But what I enjoyed was that humans weren't completely worthless in the trilogy. In fact, human weapons actually could injure, and if they really wanted to, kill Gamera, Legion, the Gyaos, and Iris.

In particular, in the second Gamera film of the 90's, missiles were capable of destroying the tendrils of the Legion Queen. (The Golden Bug) I thought that was quite refreshing, as nice as watching giant monsters fight each other, seeing humans make a difference was also great.
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I highly suggest checking out the films, especially if you are a giant monster movie fan.

The simple truth is, as our weapons improve, and our knowledge, we would stand better chances against any super threat. Also, another means to defeat a gigantic creature is to enter it. In the Godzilla film, Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: All Out Monster Attack
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They defeated Godzilla when the army captain in a miniature submarine was swallowed by Godzilla. He fire a missile inside of Godzilla and destroyed him from the inside. Regardless of how tough a creature is on the outside, its innards are not as durable or strong.

So, I'm pretty sure that we could hold our own against giant monsters. Also, the new Godzilla film is set to be released in 2014. It's going to be American made, but the early signs show it has a lot more promise than the previous American Godzilla film.

The Yuuzhan Vong

I feel like I want to take my blog in a new direction. I haven't posted in a long while, and I seriously need to get into writing more often. So, what I want to do now is write blog posts on specialized topics I'm interested in. And yes, some of these topics will contain spoilers, so deal with it. Some of these topics are about stuff from years ago, so even if I spoil stuff, you should have had plenty of time to check it out by now.

What I wanted to start off with is this: I read a comment on TV Tropes saying something about how a lot of fans complained that during the New Jedi Order story arc of Star Wars, that they didn't like how the villains of the story, the Yuuzhan Vong, won most of the battles during the beginning to almost two-thirds of the story arc. The series contained a whopping total of twenty-one novels. So, in about fourteen of the novels, the Yuuzhan Vong won.

And here is where I defend the writers. We need to rationalize this, even though we may love the jedi, and the new republic. The Yuuzhan Vong:

They are a race of aliens who came from outside of the galaxy. They use living weapons. They cannot be sensed in the force, and for a good amount of the story arc, it was debated if they were even part of the force. Their culture was a caste system, something akin to India's caste system, however far more violent and binding.

Violence is their culture. They will not give up, they fight until they all die. They capture any survivors and implant them with seeds to force their captives to become slaves. All of their technology is like nothing anyone in the Star Wars universe ever encountered. And that is why it is believable that the New Republic had a hard time dealing with them.

The picture above is of a Coralskipper, a plant ship that the Yuuzhan Vong grow. It is armed with a creature called a Dovin Basal, which creates gravitic anomalies that propel the ship, and also creates miniature black holes to defend itself against attacks. It took several books before anyone really managed to fight against these ships with any luck. It makes sense that it took a lot of time to understand these ships, because no one encountered it, but after they did their research, the New Republic could hold it's own against them better. But it took books.

Now, with the ground troops, it also makes sense that fighting against them took time. Their weapons and armor are alive.

This Yuuzhan Vong warrior is holding a snake-like creature called an Amphistaff. It switches from being a whip to a spear-like weapon, and of course, it can bite and spit acid.

The armor that the Yuuzhan Vong wears is called Vonduun Crab, and because of its thickness and the fact that it is alive, makes cutting the armor with lightsabers difficult.

Next up is the Ooglith Masquer, an Amorphis creature that covers it's host and makes it look like pretty much anything. Many of the Yuuzhan Vong donned these creatures in order to infiltrate the New Republic and carry out spy missions.

The picture above is of a Villip. A plant that connects to others of it's kind. It acts akin to a radio transmitter. Because of how these things worked, it took the New Republic a while to pick up any form of chatter from the enemies. To fight an enemy completely blind is very difficult.

Finally, I come to one of the more disturbing looking creatures that the Yuuzhan Vong have, the Yammosk. It acts like a a highly powerful computer system, and sends out orders to all the ships and warriors in it's reach. Again, it took books before the New Republic could come up with any strategy to defeat these creatures.

But what is perhaps the most important is this: During the war, both sides learned how to deal with each other. And as such, both sides developed new weapons and strategies, but in the end, the New Republic (which changed it's name to the Galactic Alliance), the remnant of the Empire, and the other original galaxy denizens won out because they were far more adaptable. However, it takes time to come up with strategies, and it takes time to understand an enemy, especially if the enemy is nothing like what you may have encountered before.