#have any gamefaqs guides

[helladventurers]

Oh no I made the mistake of giving toukiden 2 a try, and it looks like a pretty fun monster hunter clone 😫there goes the remainder of my ps+ time I guess

[skyburger]

"fnaf is the scariest game ever" "no its silent hill" "well i think its resident evil" everyone shut up!!!!!! youre all wrong. its actually zack & wiki quest for barbaros' treasure (on the nintendo wii) but only the level "keeper of the ice". that level scared me so bad as a kid and you can tell because its the only individual level i remember the name of off the top of my head. like there is nothing scarier than a) being chased and b) being on a time limit. and you know what this level has? BOTH OF THOSE. this level is still scary to me im like AHHHHH!!!! and then i die

[hustlerose]

i don't like this sort of dogpiling, but i guess i'll give my 2 cents on the "how to pick up trans girls" article

i think a lot of ppl are having some trouble articulating exactly what is uncomfortable about it. i honestly think a big part of it is his tone, demeanor, and underlying attitude.

there's a lot of words in there like "advantage" and "plan" that betray the way this guy approaches women. this is a game, a sport, a competition. the goal is for the man to get in the woman's pants, but she doesn't want to give it up, so he needs to use a strategy guide

it's this framing that's creepy, it think. if it's a competition, then any dirty trick is fair game. speak dishonestly, be manipulative, pressure her with all you have. press the advantage

or it's the constant millenial stereotyping. as if dropping specific references will score you some points. it reeks of pickup artistry. it's all men who don't really enjoy the company of women, telling each other about how all women secretly operate

i'm honestly relieved we're all having a conversation about this, even in a shitty format like social media. i'm glad we're culturally rejecting this tired old shit. we don't need a t4t version of this type of guy. the guy who gets mad when the gamefaqs "how to pick up chicks" guide fails him. you have to actually try to get to know a girl. listen to her, in her specifics. care for the real girl, as a friend and lover. or she will leave

and please do not build an echo chamber that affirms your masculinity by making you into a misogynist. girls don't find that very attractive

[jesawyer]

Hey Josh,

So I’m trying to get all the achievements in New Vegas but two of the achievements I need are the caravan achievements.

Can you give me any advice to win caravan?

Thanks

Happy Thanksgiving this is the one F:NV question I'll answer this season.

This is probably the best guide I've seen:

IMO the short version is that 10s, 8s, and 6s are the most important numbered cards to have in your decks. Kings and jacks are also valuable: kings to double (or triple, or quadruple) the value of a card (or your opponent's), jacks to remove a card.

Queens and jokers have their place, but are more situational and usually the AI doesn't demand their use. When we were playtesting Caravan in 1:1 IRL games, they came up more often.

[unreone]

Glep Multiverse

Glep

- THE SILLI HIMSELF!!!

- Nonbinary icon!!!!! His sex is green thank you very much

- I think he is specifically an Enchanted Forest critter

- Assigned at social media marketing and recruitment ads. Specifically does it in this style

- He is innocent if you ignored the atrocities he have committed in his lifetime.

- The lack of atrocities he commits in the present is to be blamed on his wife Marge (positive)

- Made it a personal mission to see every meme on the internet ever (a very good thing to dedicate his long life-)

- Frequents at GameFAQs as a poster of most comprehensive guides imaginable that includes obscure secrets and easter eggs

Fleb

- Swapped personality with Allan

- Unemotive because he thinks he have seen it all. Made the unexpected moments he encounter a lot more jarring.

- Instead of paperclips, he was counting buttons for the pilot episode

- His beef with Swap!Pim is that he chomp'd on his fingers-

- He's extra sassier than Allan, with a tendency to assume he's being looked down by others. His insults goes beyond surface levels appearance, it's gut wrenching nasty levels.

- If ever involved in any physical altercation, his blows are more targeted on the weak spots

- When baking desert treats, he always make the exact size large enough to satiate you. You might look at it and be like 'Oh this thing is too big/too small' but no you feel your cravings satisfied

- His motivation in becoming jack of all trades is a mixture of boredom and spite.

Glip

- Switched personality with Pim

- It is common for his lineage to become uncaring and self-serving around his age. And so, he does the most rebellious thing ever and actually connect with others.

- Actively sought to learn multiple languages throughout his lifetime.

- Badass Adorable!!!!!

- Unlike the original Glep, he is more willing to look and act goofy to others.

- Allows Switched!Allan to carry him during their smiling missions.

- Theres another layer to the canon event of him vomiting at the Shrimp episode considering he is married to Marge help-

- Often sends personalized meme to his co-workers

- Frequents Buzzfeed and Quotev personality quizzes

Gliplii

- Shifted personality with Charlie

- Have thousands pic of Alpha Male quotes in his gallery and counting.

- No no no he does have muscles, you just don't see it because of magic

- With that said, he is able to lift things or others that is many times his weight

- He does the smiling missions

- When Jeremy annoys him the second time, instead of punching him like Charlie did, he headbutted his guts.

- Quite jaded with the internet but always comes back because God forbids he misses any drama.

- He have a grudge against Shift!Charlie since the 'boop' that happened on the pilot ends up not being a boop at all, instead, Shift!Charlie inserted his index into his mouth

- Considering he doesn't have a nose is... is his upper lip gonna be the thing ripped off instead in the Gwimbly episode?????? Helppp-

Mr. Gleps

Lmoa I just wanted him be drawn as Mr. BOSS cuz yes

[christiansorrell]

RPG Read-through: .dungeon//remastered

For a while on Twitter, I've been doing read-through threads where I post my thoughts as I'm reading through a game for the first time. I recently did the same with Snow's .dungeon//remastered, a TTRPG where you are players logging in to a dead/dying MMO and exploring the digital fantasy world. I'm adapting those thoughts here for a proper Tumblr post! Enjoy!

First up, credits! Good folks who do good work in my experience. Also, we get the first of what seems to be a common through-line here that I enjoy: an online fandom bent to this all being a sort of GameFAQ style guide for an in-universe game.

My initial impression from most of the interior spreads I've seen just flipping through it is that I really love the style and layout. I think black and white layouts are underrated generally, but it really pops here with the pixelated text/symbols and the old school GUIs.

It's interesting to have these kind of "no bigotry" rules you see in many games couched within an in-universe framing. I think this more personal angle actually makes them land better for me than they typically do in games.

Of course, the author is still powerless to stop the players (just like with any instance of these rules, and all game rules in general tbh) BUT this is worldbuilding too, and it gives me a greater sense for the kind of in-universe fandom that's risen up around .dungeon.

Similarly, here's the game's unique version of safety tools - an in-game help menu that reworks things like lines/veils, x-card and more into the game world itself. I really like this.

Once again, the art in this is just great. I love the Fez-like runes/symbols. My ARG brain wants to know if there's a hidden message here.

I was surprised it was jumping right into the starter adventure, Tutorial Town, but I quickly found out that this is character creation AND a starting area/adventure all wrapped into one, video game-style, and that's so cool.

Each room of the starting area introduces a step of character creation. It's interesting that stats are based on real-world (not you the player at the table real-world but your PC at the "real-world" computer playing the game) ability. Your game knowledge, response time, etc.

As a long time Dota player, I also just really enjoy that the saving throw-like stat here is TILT. I have tilted many times and known many of my teammates to tilt regularly. Just fun to see that phrasing in a TTRPG.

There's more of the in-universe real-world player here than I expected coming in. Definitely has some really intriguing potential. I do wonder though if the intent is to be playing a "real-world" level character or if you are "playing" as yourself at that layer. Both would work.

Monster statblocks. Easy to parse and straightforward to run as the GM (tho at time the layout does have one two many things laid on top of one another that can make them hard to read at first glance - like where "GOBLIN" is here):

Health here is SYNC, and it's shared across the whole party - I'm interested to see how that full mechanic plays out and how it may affect play.

Reaction rolls. I'm surprised to see them given the video game setting, cus mobs in MMOs just always attack you. I've gone back and forth on it with my video game-inspired TTRPG. Don't think it's a bad choice, just one that means the game world is more than a usual video game.

So you have your real-world level Job (based on your characters' out of game job) and your in-game "Role" which follow the classic "holy trinity" of MMO design:

PCs and monsters can team up to attack and can forego damage for stunts - potentially fun/interesting moments happening from that. Monsters deal dmg to SYNC but only per type is interesting, means a crowd of one-enemy is more a long trickle of damage than an overwhelming burst.

Not knowing the ramifications of SYNC damage yet, I'm not sure what the Risk v Reward looks like for Respawns but it's intriguing. Letting your avatar die to keep the party in a stronger position overall (but being able to re-join after a fight) is definitely unique.

This is another fun room (and I like that other than saying late 90s/early 2000s it leaves appearance options open). I am not sure where to find the starting origins tho (they aren't on this spread and there's no page reference). Sadly, the PDF isn't bookmarked either, it seems.

This feels like a smart roadblock to place in player's paths early on. It's unlikely they'll have a lockpick at this point so really, it's about getting players into that creative mindset. What is in the room for you to exploit? What gear do you have you can use in a new way?

Might seem basic, especially to the OSR-experienced out there, but you'd be surprised how many players don't have experience with thinking more freeformly about the game in this way. No fault to them, most trad games condition you to use your PC's abilities/skills as a menu.

Another cool interaction between the layers of the game here (tho I do wish they all played more off of something more than just the tarot card being in the real-world layer). Still wondering if most folks play as themselves or as a real-world level PC.

This is interesting. I wonder if there is going to be a real-world layer to play or if this is meant to be the amount your party can heal between sessions of play (like when the actual real you stops playing in actual real life - this meta layer stuff is tricky to communicate).

I like this - a very short and sweet travel system.

I continue to love this art. Also, this tease here around dual-wielding requiring the discovery of new Roles out in the game world somewhere first is really enticing (I added the highlighter there btw).

This is fun - there are both in-game NPCs and PUGs which are other real-world players' in-game avatars. That extra layer to those types of NPCs is really fun and them running the gamut of fully out-of-character chatting to being hardcore RPers is fun to consider.

Whenever it leans into the digital world aspects, I'm super into it. Very much my kinda thing. I do wonder though how often players can swap their Roles. I don't believe I've seen that said yet - my inclination would be once on the fly (like Final Fantasy's Job systems).

And if these various layers weren't enough, .dungeon also features in-game collectible cards that are sort of enchantments and buffs. I wonder if my real-world level character can spend real money to buy Bytes to buy more packs from a merchant in town? lol

I won't spoil/detail too many more of these but these kind of fun (and common to video games but rarely seen when thinking of the world of a game or the intended way to play) moments are really appealing. Also, this game has Goons in it. Oh no.

Now I'm thinking the intention is the "real-world" level of play should be the real actual you, the person playing .dungeon the TTRPG (as opposed to a real-world level character still within the fiction of the game) since stuff like this would be tricky to track. Cool item!

Tutorial Island is cool, a good blend of char creation, intro to what the game is, and just a fun adventure with a session or more of play to it. I'd have to run/play this to really see but I find the Sync being tied to essentially your real-world session length interesting.

This stuff is cool and leans into that meta/fan-level play that only comes out of these big community-driven games, both MMOs but also things like Dark Souls.

A lot of these kind of possible secrets come as comments in the text, possibly just to inspire the GM and to get players interested in ways that the table can build out on their own over time. So far, I don't see some of the more esoteric secrets to be laid out (which I like).

The rest of the book, as far as I've seen, is lots of resources, gear tables, monsters, etc. to build out the game after player's leave Tutorial Island. The game world here has that anything goes Final Fantasy bent to it. There's swords & wagons, but laser guns & skateboards too.

The setting here is also explicitly queer (mostly seen so far in the "real-world" PUGs) and includes things like sex workers and other elements that it maybe could not have had but that would certainly lessen the richness of its world, the fandom presented throughout, etc.

The spellcasting uses the in-game money as mana points essentially. That's a cool way to limit spellcasting and motivate player's, especially spellcasters, to get out there and make some $$$.

Okay, here's the real-world explanation I was waiting for (after the in-game gear lists and such). This is cool - it's fun to have a real-life layer to this and to have the game's world support that sort of dropping in and out, doing things outside of a full party session, etc.

I know a lot of folks do this with ongoing campaigns anyway, but this is one of those fun things to include here to build that in as an expectation in play. You have your raid nights with friends and you have your little solo sessions after work where you sell your loot.

Now, the rest is a nice collection of random dungeon, NPC, settlement, hexfill tables and more. Everything you'd expect from an OSR-like ruleset but occasionally with some fun added meta-layers.

Players getting a quest from an in-game Moderator and then being able to become a Mod themselves is a really fun idea and something I could envision becoming a long-term goal for one or more players at a table. The threat of encountering an Admin is scary as well!

To finish it up, we've got a cool AASCII-style character sheet, complete with MingLiU-ExtB font (my beloved)!

And that's .dungeon//remastered! I really enjoyed reading this, and I think it has a strong core that's really enhanced by its real-world interaction layer. Gonna put this on "Play Soon" list. There are some smart rules in particular I'll likely steal for a future project.

.dungeon//remastered is available digitally NOW with, I believe, physical copies coming soon. I backed the Kickstarter to get this digital version. CHECK IT OUT HERE!

[fruitytrollroll]

Nine Sols' narrative themes inform every gameplay element btw. if u even care.

saw someone call Nine Sols' gift sysrem for Shuanshuan "too dialogue-heavy" and "pointless" and I went temporarily insane

if the quest moments with Shuanshuan feel "pointless", it's because they are meant to be their own reward and you did them out of obligation!!! why!!! nobody was holding you at gunpoint to MAKE you raise this beautiful precious forgiving baby boy who loves you and nursed you back to health—but like a deadbeat dad on a custody visit just to be compliant with a court order, you spent time with him anyway and you resented him for it. WHAT!!!

also can NOT overstate how the games' themes of revenge and redemption tie into these scenes. they are not by ANY MEANS pointless!!! the way Yi goes out of his way to preserve his culture, by sharing it with the APEMAN he's raising, speaks VOLUMES about Yi's character growth in the 2 years since he and Shuanshuan began living together.

I was personally endeared by Shuanshuan immediately, and was delighted I had gifts to give him—AND that they each had bespoke cutscenes that revealed lore information about Solarian culture, and background information about Yi and Shuanshuan'a lives together?? do you guys know how rare and special it feels to have a gift system that WORKS like this??? SO many games give you garbage trinkets to throw at your companions for a quantifiable affection boost, so I cannot overstate how deeply impressive and heartfelt and dedicated to their story Red Candle Games clearly was to have put in the time and effort to make their gift mechanic so deeply character-driven, with custom animations and environmental changes for every skill you teach Shuanshuan. 🥺🧸✨️

if you don't like social sim elements in games, or the characters didn't succeed in endearing themselves to you, that's fine. They're not for everyone—but I suspect my experience was the intended one! you're supposed to like and care about these characters enough to bring them the gifts you find on your travels of your own volition!!

if you DON'T care about the characters, you can skip their scenes, and the game respects your time by LETTING you do that, AND by giving you an ending that is less involved in the characters' lives. but if you resent these scenes because "ugh i HAVE to do this to get the TRUE ending 🙄" then idk!! I think you are playing the game wrong!!

I think RCG gave players an opportunity to not care, and a perfectly satisfying ending despite it all (THE BETTER ENDING AND LESS EMOTIONALLY DEVASTATING ENDING, IN MY OPINION, BECAUSE RCG IS SO MEAN TO ME 😭), and if you passed that up for completionism's sake... IDK!!

I genuinely think achievments have poisoned too many games that don't benefit from them! Gone are the olden days of playing your big sister's SNES games blind—no online guides, no guardrails, just getting lost and wandering around the overworld, just playing by vibes alone and if you get stuck u just have to take a break and come back later instead of looking up a guide online because there wasn't even a GameFAQs page for it yet—but on GOD we need to get back there. Play games blind. Don't look up guides. JUST ENJOY IT, JUST ENGAGE WITH THE MEDIA, WE DON'T NEED INSTRUCTIONS I PROMISE, YOUR INNOCENT NASCENT FUMBLING IS ENOUGH, YOU CAN PLAY THE GAME AND HAVE FUN WITHOUT SOME CHODE ON "HARDCOREGAMER" DOT COM GIVING YOU A DISRESPECTFULLY SPOILERIFIC BREAKDOWN OF A PATH OR BOSS FIGHT OR ITEM LOCATION THAT ROBS YOU OF THAT JOY OF DISCOVERY!!

anyway. yes, if you forced yourself to sit through the dialogue of character-driven scenes for characters you didn't even like or feel compelled by, just to get the "True" end, then I imagine it would feel "pointless" and like "too much text". But failing to catch your interest is not a failure of the game's storytelling if you only disliked it because you were forcing yourself to do it for the achievment, just to get an ending that wasn't made with your play style in mind!!!

"it doesn't even affect the game's ending :/" *LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER*!!! ALL the sidequests have the CUMULATIVE effect of changing the ending! this is because Yi is a ruthless, analytical scientist deposed from his seat of political power in New Kunlun on a quest for revenge—yet he spent precious time doing a bunch of "pointless" sidequests for his friends he's come to care about, which allowed the villain's brewing plot the precious time it needed to come further to fruition. Yi is on a REVENGE quest, and it is the very act of saving Shuanshuan (thus alerting the island's security systems to Yi's presence) that puts a timeline on that revenge. He exposed himself for someone he cared about, putting his revenge in jeopaedy—and he postponed that revenge still further to make amends to the apemen he once thought so little of as to be complicit in their heinous exploitation!!! YI IS GROWING HE'S CHANGING, SHUANSHUAN CHANGED HIS HEART, AND IT'S ONLY IN THE TRUE ENDING YI CAN COMPLETE HIS CHARACTER ARC BY REALIZING HE FUCKED UP AND ACTUALLY REPENT (EVEN IF I HATE IT BECAUSE IT'S THE SADDEST ENDING, FUCK YOU RED CANDLE GAMES 😭)

also combat is focused around the parry because this game's primary thematic underpinning is giving proof to the age-old adage "fuck around and find out" (it's revenge it's about reVENGE IT'S ALL ABOUT FORGIVENESS AND CHANGE AND REVENGE)

[baeddel]

we tend to think of an exercise of skill in kinesthetic videogames as requiring both analysis and execution. if you successfully execute the winning move, without previously conceiving of the move in the stage of analysis, we say that you got "lucky." yet if you figure out the right move, but can't execute it, then you didn't win at all.

the analysis can be done at any point prior; repeating a move that you learned from your first play through years ago doesn't diminish the display of skill to us. sometimes it's not even important that you did the analysis yourself; you could learn the trick from your brother, from gamefaqs, etc. in this case being able to analyze the game is not part of the display, and the knowledge only matters as a token of prior intention.

in some non-kinesthetic games coming up with the winning move yourself is important, eg. puzzle games. in the 90s using guides to adventure games and RPGs was considered cheating, and they used to have tournaments to see who could beat the game first (this is the subculture Scorpia came from); this is an attitude that has changed over time in a lot of genres. in Nethack, information about the game's mechanics are called 'spoilers', and very few people today play without them. the opposite is generally true of kinesthetic games; not only do players enjoy sharing and consuming mechanical information about the games they play, it's usually expected among high level players ('no vid, no did'). in the past this wasn't always the case; DoDonPachi had a somewhat stormy transition from secrecy to transparency when some high-scoring glitches were rediscovered and used to beat famous records from the 90s which had used them.

players who possess one piece of the winning coordinates but not the other will often express frustration. if they've made the analysis but can't execute the move they'll say, "come on, I know what to do, so just let me do it." meanwhile, players who have executed the move in the past but still don't really know the solution will try anything and everything and say "come on, it happened before, so just give it to me again."

[valle-de-sombra-de-muerte]

Homestuck Reread: Act 2, Part 2/3 (p. 440-614)

Read the previous post here.

We pick up this second third of Act 2 by reading another section of Rose's GameFAQs walkthrough.

Credit where it's due, I like this section title.

Rose wants to know more about this hypothetical Pornsprite. This girl is freaky. Too bad Ao3 didn't go into open beta until a few months after Homestuck began, she would've been all about it.

Interesting how she only cites part of her guide as "logorrheic sludge." Honey, that's the entire guide. Brevity is not your strong suit.

Rose and Jade's first pesterlog. I'll use this as the jumping off point to talk about Jade since she has only appeared sporadically at this point and none of her logs were worth talking about.

Actually, she did have one log in Act 1 where she asks John about his present. The one interesting thing is that she apparently didn't know what Sburb was when John mentioned it.

So John, Rose, and Dave all knew about Sburb and none of them thought to tell Jade about it? Huh... guess that tells us a lot about the dynamics of their friend group.

Anyway, I realize this might be a "hot take" given her inexplicable popularity in the fandom, but I don't like Jade. And unlike with John, there never was a point where I did. I am of the mind that Homestuck would've been much stronger and have a tighter pace if she was cut from the cast of kids (or at least, this version of her. The story could also work if she had some heavy rewrites) and it was limited to John, Rose, and Dave. Rose and Dave alone make for an engaging pair, and I suppose John acts as a sort of "anchor" to ground their increasingly esoteric insincerity and bullshit. If he was fleshed out more, it definitely would've worked.

But Jade doesn't help with this dynamic at all. Like John, Jade is also much more grounded and sincere, but her personality is also coupled with an overwhelming optimism where she believes everything will be okay if left up to chance. If John is true neutral, Jade is 100% positive. He barely reacts to the otherworldly things happening to him, but she actively seems to enjoy them (the meteor crashing near her house is something she wants to explore regardless of the risk, and John struggling in Sburb is "exciting").

She doesn't serve as a convincing counterbalance to Rose and Dave and comes across as more of an extraneous extension of John's lack of danger sense than anything else. Do we really need two happy-go-lucky kids with slight variations on the same niche? The very fact that the story is able to progress without her involvement thus far shows just how little she matters.

These first two acts shroud her in so much mystery, and we barely know anything about her even through these sparse pesterlogs. (As we later see, this amounts to nothing, so all this intrigue is unfounded and only leads to an unsatisfying payoff). At this point in the story, we only know that she lives with her grandfather and someone named Bec (which Dave refers to as a "devilbeast"), she has a "goofy modus" which frustrates even Dave (who, mind you, mocked John for using a simple modus earlier), she lives in a far-off part of the world, and that she has some degree of inexplicable precognition.

Jade's cutesy cagey attitude about her precognitive abilities is fucking annoying, and it is perhaps the worst thing about reading her logs. "oh gee i know all this stuff but its a secret and you gotta find out on your own tee hee! :)" This truly is typical hackshit writing when handling characters with prophetic knowledge. You can't make them too useful, or else there won't be suspense or conflict. Instead they have to act as a ineffectual plot device to softly guide the characters along. Except she doesn't do any guiding. She just unhelpfully alludes to things that the others don't know yet and leaves it at that.

In fact, Jade as a whole is less of a character and more of a plot device, by which I mean she doesn't have any sort of character to speak of. Her overbearing cheerfulness is not endearing to read, neither is her dropping hints that she knows more about what she lets on. She doesn't have any entertaining chemistry with the others either. Her interactions with John are like watching two morons acting excited with each other while the world is literally ending around them. Dave intentionally strips himself of his personality because he has a crush on her and wants to impress her by being "nice," but she doesn't seem to reciprocate his feelings at all. Also, come on, dude, Rose is right there.

Rose is the only one who shows any scrutiny about Jade's "quirky" clairvoyance. But even so, she only expresses this through occasional, bemused remarks. Jade dodges the question whenever Rose asks how she knows about things she realistically shouldn't, and Rose doesn't ever press further.

So Rose had prior knowledge about a game that will bring her cat to life. We later find out that this opportunity to revive Jaspers was her her motivation for playing Sburb. Doesn't seem worth ending the world for, but whatever. I daresay this casts Jade in a bit of a villainous role for planting the idea in Rose's head in the first place.

Actually, if Jade ended up being a twist villain, that would've been interesting and provide, you know, intrigue! Or if nothing else, it would've at least added something of substance to her character, something she desperately needs. Even ignoring that angle, you'd think the other kids might be more than a little resentful toward Jade since she knew the world was going to end, yet never told any of them about it.

But no, Hussie can't implement anything that would've been conducive to good storytelling. Especially if it leads to, gasp, conflict!

Okay, enough of Jade, let's get moving.

I want to bring attention to this passage and compare it to the earlier "symphony impossible to play" one with Rose. First of all, it's worth noting the rain/drought contrast between their respective settings. Unlike the more elegant and cerebral prose in Rose's section, this one reads more like a stream of consciousness from Dave's perspective. Loose and casual, even ending with a Snoop Dogg-esque rhyme at the end before transitioning to an actual Snoop Dogg verse.

Yeah, for those who haven't caught on, John Keats didn't actually say that. Very easy to miss, I'm sure. For those counting, this is also misattributed quote gag #5. I am positively rolling with laughter.

I find it noteworthy the room where Bro has his whole setup is stated to be the living room, not a bedroom. I'm quite certain that the Striders live in a one-bedroom apartment where Dave gets the room and Bro has all his shit in the living room and kitchen.

Dave's relationship with Bro is an inverse of John and Rose's relationships with their guardians. Whereas Dad and Mom decorate their homes with shit they think their kids will like in order to seek their approval, Bro isn't doing any of this for Dave's sake. He fills his home with his puppets and weapons because he's the one into that shit (ironically or otherwise, it doesn't matter). Dave in turn adopts Bro's mannerisms because he craves his approval.

The amount of mental hoops he needs to make in order to justify his brother's fixation on sex and puppets is concerning. Is Bro even being "ironic" or is that just an excuse he tells Dave so he doesn't have to explain this stuff any further? I think the love of Lil Cal, his childhood possession and best friend, led to a love of puppets being a core part of his personality. Everything else that extends from that is up to interpretation.

Like Dave, Bro is also a hipster doofus who does things seen as patently "uncool" in a bold display of being unique. The logic is such: a disregard for what society deems "cool" is what leads to it becoming "cool" ironically. At a glance, Bro's interests include typically "cool" things like ninja weapons, video games, and rapping. Bro plays with expectations by using these interests, which he may very well only enjoy ironically, in conjunction with puppets, which he loves genuinely but passes them off as ironic since most people deem them creepy and uncool. Applying a sexual element to the puppets makes an interest in them even creepier, so Bro does so if only to make his love for them appear even more ironic.

Convoluted and confusing? Yeah, that's Bro Strider, baby.

I don't know how necessary it was to show just how Dave gave Lil Cal a fist bump, but I do like this panel. One of the few reminders we get that these characters are, in fact, small children.

Bro's 6-character password is "puppet" right? It has to be. (Correction: a helpful anon has informed me that the password is actually "lilcal"). Also, just like his home, his desktop organization is also a mess. There's no method to this man's madness.

For all the negligence and questionable parenting methods Bro is guilty of, he still cares for Dave in some capacity. He stays up to date on his webcomic and blogs, and even hangs up one of Dave's SBaHJ drawings on the fridge. I wonder if Bro, on some level, likes the idea of raising a kid that he can raise to be just like him, but is just a woefully inept guardian that he doesn't know the first thing about parenting.

Remember, these are the kinds of websites Rose says she likes.

Just gonna say perhaps it's not ideal that Dave is being exposed to this kind of thing at such a young age. As much as he idolizes Bro and wants to emulate him, he can't get over the fact that all this sex stuff disturbs him. Yet he doesn't even view it as sexual, only as a form of irony, one he can't comprehend until he can somehow overcome his aversion toward it. It's kinda sad, really.

Unsettled, Dave's first recourse is to talk to John to try and calm down. John leaves him hanging. Such a good friend, am I right? He then goes to Rose, where they have the earlier conversation where she says she likes Bro's websites, but this time we get added context.

Dave of course is attempting to act casual about the whole thing, only slightly alluding to his deeper distress, and Rose is just like "That shit rules. I like it." This whole exchange is both tragic and darkly comedic.

Rose really does come across as a little pervert sometimes. She casually drops sexually charged phrases in conversation ("sun's lurid glare"), her username is a lewd double entendre (tentacle the... I'll let you finish that phrase), and she does show a marked interest in sexual topics (Bro's websites, the Pornsprite... honestly I'm surprised she doesn't suggest that to Dave at any point).

Both she and Dave play with innuendo and act as though they're mature and know all about sex. However, Dave's attitude toward sex is more a response to his exposure to it at a young age, whereas Rose is more casual about it and sees her flippant attitude toward it as a mark of maturity. She must love treating sex as this trivial little thing that might make others uncomfortable, but not her because she's soooo grown up.

Also, if Rose truly did give a shit about psychoanalysis, she probably would've picked up on Dave's cries for help in his messages. She really isn't as perceptive as she lets on.

Thank you, Rose, for saying what I was thinking.

Rose gets a kick out of Dave's webcomic and laughs when John makes references to it. Also, she doesn't tell John about what Dave told her earlier about the puppets when he mentions it. How nice of her. John is a fucking jackass though. Seriously, fuck him.

I'm putting a pin in this for later. Rose being able to "see only [...] what John can see, or has seen already" will be important to note later on.

Another tragicomic exchange where Rose continues to make light of Dave's distress. I wonder if she is incapable of seeing Dave as being sincere in this moment and thinks he's overreacting as a part of their usual back-and-forth.

Here it is. My favorite Homestuck page.

Dave wants to please Bro and goes along with his shtick no matter how far he pushes the envelope. This only encourages Bro to go further and further in his methods of fucking with Dave. Is his end goal to push Dave to a breaking point, or does he truly hope something with click that will make Dave truly understand him? Either way, it's fucked up.

I didn't want to get into Bro Discourse during this reread. I know there are opposing camps who either think he's a monstrous child abuser, or a silly guy who did no wrong. Personally, I think that while he doesn't read as outright malicious, it's safe to say this dude is a menace and has no business raising a kid.

It's really skeevy of Bro to incorporate his underage brother in his fetish videos, which will doubtless be uploaded to his site for others to view. This is probably the one of the more damning things he's guilty of.

Bro has reduced the kitchen as a storage space for his weapons. It's a wonder how he's able to take care of himself, let alone a child.

It's stated that Bro doesn't have anywhere else to store his stuff, which further reinforces my theory that Dave has the only bedroom in the apartment.

Yes. Thank you. One can only watch characters launch objects at high speeds for so long.

Dave's sylladex shenanigans are a little more tolerable than John's. Assigning different names to objects in order to make them fit in the modus is more fun than watching things eject once the deck is full.

This metaphor caught me off guard. It's so abrupt and out of pocket, I love it.

Shit's about to go down. Let's see how things resolve when I finish Act 2 next week.

Read the next post here.

[centrally-unplanned]

I played silly 90's eroge game VR-DATE Simulator May-Club, which some lunatics made a browser port of, as I saw people mentioning it on the dash. First off, these old eroges occasionally get remasters, and I just don't understand why they toss out the aesthetic of these things when they do:

You got rid of all the bold pixelation highlights! My dithering! You got rid of the framing box UI!? Look at how they massacred my boy -_-

Seriously those UIs are one of the greatest legacies of the PC-98 era, I am curious as to why they were so common (probably due to limitations on resolution flexibility, so they wanted to keep the main screen defined in scale, but I am just guessing). All ports should preserve them, but I do think there is a development limitations there; modern VN engines aren't quite built for it.

I found the game charming because it is a very comedic game - the main dude wants to bone before starting his corporate wagecuck conglomerate job, and finds a VR world where people date anonymously. So hijinks ensue and you spend tickets to go spin some plates, but half the time you meet up with girls you talk about gender discrimination in the corporate workplace? The difficulties of work-life balance? Handy tips on how to double-tap your company expense accounts for some light financial fraud at hostess bars? And those things are also played for laughs, it just isn't what I expected to find given the tone.

Early dating sim games are often funny this way because they were incredibly expensive - I don't have a price source for this one specifically, but they could approach ~$100 USD and that is in 1990's dollars. Which meant that their market was mainly just working adults, this wasn't primarily teens slipping lunch money over the counter. So the work is full otaku, but a niche of otaku such that you get a certain kind of blend of silly tropes and more adult jabs.

By the way, the game was actually localized to the US, in the 90's? I don't have a rock-solid source but apparently the explicit scenes for two of the routes were removed due to the designs of the characters in question. Which uh:

Yeah, not shocked at that choice.

I found it weird that this "VR world" just looks like the regular world?

Explicitly so, our main dude comments on it. Which you would think, okay, its a budget thing right? This way you get to portray the real world and the VR world with the same assets as you walk through both. But you pretty-much never do that; 99% of the game is in the VR world. So why have that plot detail at all? It made me notice it, and now I am questioning why they went with something so un-VR-like for the setting.

It really doesn't do much with the VR setting alas, though I didn't do all the routes. I love 90's era "the future will be virtual" stuff, but this one didn't deliver on much of any vision for what that would be.

I also can't check out all the routes quickly as I could not find any cohesive Let's Plays of the game. Normally that is how you experience all of these games these days, given their propensity for padding and difficulties in emulating. Maybe I should solve that problem myself lol. Since I did have to play it, shoutouts to Ben Woodhouse from 2003 for your GameFAQs guide and beautiful ASCII calendar of appearance times for helping me get through it

Anyway Akiho is best girl fuck your sexist bosses and get 👏that 👏bread👏; she absolutely has the best collection of facial expressions and her ending has a real touch of heart to it, respect.

[solradguy]

Almost done with the GameFAQs archive FINALLY. Just need to go through it and

Make sure I didn't miss any

Consolidate the files. Some guides are repeated across folders for different systems and it doesn't make sense having, say, 3 different .TXT files of the same guide just because it was published under Dreamcast, PSP, and PS2, for example.

Add guide ID numbers to the guide information template.

The template looks like this:

GUIDE NAME DOWNLOAD .TXT [this will be a download link] FAQ ID: #### Date: yyyy mm dd - Version: - Author: - guide description

The oldest file in this archive is Abe Belonio's "Guilty Gear by Team NeoBlood FAQ" with ID 4521, posted either late June or July 1st, 1998. The youngest, and final, file is Andrew Storm's "Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- Arcade Game Script Guide," ID 72659, posted 2015 December 11.

It's been genuinely fascinating going through these things and writing summaries of them all — I'm excited to get to share them with the community here soon.

[blazehedgehog]

Have you ever played Chrono Cross?

I own Chrono Cross! Chrono Trigger is one of my favorite RPGs of all time! I was psyched to play Chrono Cross!

I was extremely disappointed by Chrono Cross!

Chrono Cross feels like a game made almost to spite fans of Chrono Trigger. Vastly different art style, vastly different world, with a lore that basically says "Remember everybody you loved from Trigger? They're dead now. And they probably died tragic or embarrassing deaths."

It fills that void with a lot of incoherency. Because Cross hangs its hat on having 44 collectible party members, very few of them have any impact and basically never participate in the main story. The English localization is even structured in such a way that most of the cast pulls from a single library of side-character dialog that gets fed through an "accent filter" depending on who is saying it. Meaning 97% of the cast is not written to have any legitimate role in the story.

What story can be gleaned is a deliberately confusing mess of mysteries layered within mysteries, none of which ever get explained until the last 3-5 hours of gameplay. So you toil for 27+ hours not having any idea what's going on or why, only to get hit by a freight train of dense lore as you start to round the final bend.

I only know this because a friend explained it all to me once, about FATE and the lineage of the Dragonians and all of that late-game lore.

In truth, I got stuck in Chrono Cross and not even pouring over 3 different GameFAQ guides could get me unstuck. It was some event involving one of the versions of Captain Fargo, or at least that's what I thought I had to do. It was some time after the "switch" event with Serge (if you know, you know) and all the guides said I had to get Fargo to go back to Marbule or something.

But it never worked. He never budged. So I didn't know where to go. After a week of throwing myself at that problem I gave up and resigned myself to never finishing Chrono Cross. This was back in, like, 2002 or 2003, so faded memories by now.

Which I was fine with, because honestly, I was getting pretty bored to tears with the game. There's only so much "you don't know what's going on because it's a 𝑚𝑦𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑦" before you get tired of it, and systems-wise it wasn't grabbing me either. That was Square's "experimental" phase, where they were messing with (or straight up deleting) core RPG mechanics just to see what would happen. So Final Fantasy 8 screwed with the gear and magic systems, and Chrono Cross screwed with how you gain experience points and level up.

Which is to say you kind of... don't? Only bosses give EXP, so that basically means you're always guaranteed to level up after every boss. There's no reason to fight fodder enemies outside of getting item drops. Which would be great if they let you avoid most monster encounters, but they don't, so it just wastes time and contributes towards nothing. And battles get needlessly drawn out thanks to the elemental field system, too.

It's a gorgeous game, full of absolutely immaculate art direction. I'm a lifelong fan of any soundtrack with Yasunori Mitsuda (and I even have an autographed Chrono Cross songbook from him!) But anything about the story or gameplay is wet cardboard to me.

I keep thinking about going back to it, starting over fresh, seeing if I like it more now that I'm an older and different person. But I haven't gotten around to it yet. Like a lot of RPGs in my life right now it's locked behind the promise of "maybe after I finish Mother 3" which is going on two years now -- but I picked it back up this week and am rounding the final bend on that one, if you can believe it.

[sntechsupport]

Hey, how accurate is that one sburb wiki that's run by gnomes? I know they got a few things wrong early on because they didn't know the game tailors itself to the player's species and their only outside source was that gamefaqs guide from that one session that got famous, but as long as I'm viewing the wiki later in the timestream after they started getting more editors I don't see anything that's obviously incorrect.

Fuck me if I know. It's not any one official wiki. (There is no official wiki, and strictly speaking this blog is ran on the side, too.) And we don't exactly have the capacity to crawl through wikis to check for their reliability. We have a code to duct-tape together.

Sincerely

SN Tech Support (Gear)

[so2collection]

Star Ocean: Blue Sphere Beginner’s Guide

Introduction: I've been on a bit of a Star Ocean kick lately, and thought I'd take my hand at writing a Blue Sphere "Tips for Beginners!" type guide (based on the English ROM translation)... With Second Story R coming out soon, I figure that more people will be interested in Blue Sphere, too.

I hope my experience and the tips here help you on your adventure!

I played the game once before, but the save data was on an old computer... I want to add it to a list of titles I've completed!

Read more advice/tips under the cut! I’ll provide general tips on how to learn things, what characters to use, Private Actions, and other things! :)

Which characters to use? To start, you can pick your roster out of a few characters. Generally, Dias and Chisato are the best fighters. Precis excels at Item Creation. You'll want Celine if you plan to play late/post-game content.

However, for the first section I recommend taking Ashton. He is also a good fighter and I hear he's easy to combo with. If you've read interviews with the devs, they recommend Ashton and Precis as the game was originally made around them and one other character (they forgot) but eventually added everyone due to popularity. :)

Anyway, I recommend Ashton because he learns Cooking the fastest of anyone, according to seiju-info, a website I will have to reference often due to the lack of English resources. I'll also reference GameFAQs. You'll want cooking early on and you can buy a frying pan in the first town. Fol is very difficult to get in this game as you only earn SP from battles, no cash. I'll explain this more in depth later.

For a dungeon walkthrough, I found this GameFAQs guide useful

If you can, also use the maps on GameFAQs or purchase your own copy of the Star Ocean: Blue Sphere Final Guide. It has full-color maps, but is fully in Japanese. Still, I found it useful, especially in the dungeons. According to the devs, the dungeons got a lot of 'feedback' from fans... and for good reason. They're kind of long and annoying lol but if you're a Star Ocean fan, especially of 2, I think you should give this title a shot. It was made to bridge the wait for Star Ocean 3, but I'm using it as a bridge between my playthrough of Second Story I recently finished again and the remake... :)

I’m not learning new moves / spells?

If you're wondering why certain characters aren't gaining new moves, it's probably one of the following: you aren't making combos, you're levelling the wrong Skill section, for mages you aren't using a variety of spells, or you haven't created their moves through Machinery. These are specific to each character. For my party of Dias, Precis, and Celine... (Dias: combos, Precis: machinery, Celine: the right skill tree / learning the lost magic skill).

I can say at the beginning of this, I don't understand how the skill trees work at all. Just level the 2 the character is good at (Dias is Sense and Battle for example). This is important because if you leveled Dias in Knowledge, it would block off Battle if you raise Sense too high. 

Technology VS Sense and Battle VS Knowledge

So, for Dias, we would level Sense (so you get Psychometry to get his ultimate skills with combos), Battle, then put any points into one of the others.

Celine needs to have certain stats met and use a spell x number of times to "spark" the next spell. For her ultimate spells, she needs to level Knowledge for Lost Magic. However, if you want her to have the highest INT and forego her final spell (which isn’t worth the increase from Boost) look at Technical instead.

Mages won't learn new magic using spells on their own, you must control them / spam specific spells, so it's good to use low level enemies to learn new spells.

Item Creation tips

That's why it's good to have some reserve characters for Item Creation, such as Ashton for Cooking. Why Ashton? Well, he learns it the quickest. There really aren't any charts availible for this, but each character unlocks different skills as you level them; it is not like the original game where you get to choose. He learns the 3 skills required the fastest by unlocking them the earliest.

Think of it this way: pick 3-4 of the characters to use in battle and use the rest for only Item Creation! Because of the teleport function, it’s easy to switch them out.

Each Item Creation skill has a mini-game involved. It only uses the directional buttons and you can master the quickest/best way to do them easily. Cooking, with the Frying Pan for example, is right (short time), left (short time), right (long time) as you “flip” the ingredients. You don’t want them to burn or spill. I’ll go more in-depth with these as I unlock them myself.

Celine is one of the best characters to learn Alchemy. We will need it towards the end to make the elusive Blue Sphere for ultimate weapons.

Private Actions - How To?

Private Actions are few in this game and require very specific character conditions! If a PA says “OUT” that character must NOT be in the active party. If it says IN, they must be in the active party.

They also can happen pretty much anywhere: in towns, dungeons, ect.

How to play? General strategy?

To switch characters in battle, use Select.

To use items in battle, press Start.

To defend in battle, press the down arrow.

Break objects (tables, chairs, some plants) to sometimes find items.

If an enemy is too tough or blocking a path (that isn't a boss) you can attempt to run by moving to the far right of the screen. If you fail, your character runs out of their hidden stamina stat for awhile. If you win, the enemy disappears and you can snag any treasure / move on with ease.

PA's don't have any indicator. It's like talking to your comrades around a town and everything, but it feels more like an NPC interaction than a traditional Star Ocean PA. Because of the character IN/OUT (of active party) requirements, they can be easy to miss.

Forest / Crash Site

Bowman is also useful until you get to the Scout Village (Herb Gathering on the candy cane striped plants). To gather some herbs and to view Bowman's PA, exit Scout village and cut down the bush to the left. There will be a path where you can see the long-leaf stripey plants that Bowman can harvest. If he's not in the party, talk to him and initiate the PA. 

Private Action - Forest / Crash Site - Bowman (OUT) - Bowman gives you herbs.

Bowman references the Metox, saying it's a very powerful herb :p

Scout Village

Private Action - Scout Village - Precis (OUT) - Precis is looking for parts to repair the ship. 

Sometime during the Mile Ruins (maybe before?), if you have an herb, one will randomly be selected if you talk to the boy near the entrance of Scout Village. You will get a Kitchen Knife (used for Cooking) in exchange.

Fuck this NPC in particular. Get the Hell out of the way, bro!!

Mile Ruins

Finish the Mile Ruins. Don't forget to use the bomb on the crack in the wall to turn the elevators back on, especially to visit the 6th floor for some good items like earrings for Celine. There are other areas that require the Pull Field Skill and Precis' Hover, so you'll have to come back later on for the other items.

Vending Machine 1st Floor - Give it a lighter touch to get a useless but one-of-a-kind ??? Jam you can’t get anywhere else.

Check drawers for items and fol!

When you get out, go to the shops in the back of town. The left shop should have a discount, so buy some blueberries and a Frying Pan. Also buy Meat. Level up Ashton in Knowledge, Sense, and Tech until he learns the 3 skills for Cooking (Good Eye, Recipe, and he should start with Kitchen Knife) (If you're having trouble selling items, remember to scroll right to sell from other item categories; took me a little time to figure out. For the mini-game, gently move left to right and try to aim for the flipping food, because if you drop it it takes time which lowers your overall score. Try to aim for over 100.) If you can't afford meat to make steak, I highly recommend using the vegetables (which she usually has one sale, too!) to make Twice Cooked Pork and Amazing Vegetable Stir Fry, which also sells for a lot of Fol.

The shop on the left has Bombs if you need them (you'll need at least 1 to clear the path on the lower right of town). He will also give you the Bunny Comm.

There's a PA we can do. Ashton IN, Dias OUT. Kick out Dias and grab Precis and we can use her Pull ability to get some of the items we missed.

Private Action - Mile Ruins - Ashton (IN) / Dias (OUT) - The two reflect on their swordsmanship. Particularly, that weakness comes with aging. This also opens up another PA later in the game.

If you also teach Precis Machinery, you can learn Hover by making a Nuclear Jet. I think Machinery needs to be at level 5 to learn it. Don't bother learning it now, though, as we can't buy any soldering irons...

Rupart Jungle

Before you descend into the jungle you can trigger a fight with a Baboon. He's a little difficult but he gives a whopping 20 SP per fight and is a good spot to grind up characters if you need to. Just heal for free at the ship or the old man with the kid's house and save before fighting it each time. I did this 3-4 times just to have some extra SP handy (and it should be enough to teach Precis Machinery Lv 5, but again, no soldering iron yet...) You may want to invest it in Dias Sense skills instead. I've been leveling Celine's Knowledge, since that's what she needs to max out first. In one fight Dias and Precis were dead and I used Firebolt, which sparked Celine's Starlight spell! She also has Bless and I don't think she started with it, but I'm not sure when I learned it.

Spell - Starlight - Celine - Requires: Monstrology Learned, Use Firebolt in battle

A lot of enemies in Rupart Jungle are difficult, but save often and you'll manage. Once you talk to the guys about the permit for the two ruins, continue to Ava City. We can finally buy a soldering iron here, so you can have Precis learn Machinery lv 5 and then score around 200 points and create the item (save scumming is recommended...). Make sure to restock any items you need. Do some cooking and upgrade your equipment, too.

Garp Ruins

In the Garp ruins I used Dias, Ashton *required for his Fire Breath field action, and Noel. Some of the enemies are tough. You'll also want to bring a few bombs, mostly for the room behind the boss.

After the ruins I leveled Precis' Machinery to 6... It makes the soldering iron faster in the mini-game, the higher the level... but after two hours I still can't manage to get Hover (I barely score 110 points most of the time, because the iron is so wobbly...) On the bright side I made some money and got a lot of Opera's KMs, so that will be nice when I get her. 

Note: I did give it one last shot, and wouldn't you know, I got the Hover ability... I didn't even score that high of points, so I'm confused? I did learn that the farther away a node is / more diagonal it is, the more points you earn, so perhaps it's advantageous to wait for further/diagonal nodes? I wish you luck obtaining the Nuclear Jet for Hover! I'll make a short trip back to the Mile Ruins and Garp Ruins and get items I missed, then go return to Ava City and talk to the Jabba the Hut Man again lol

We finally see a little plot in this game...!

Leviabor Ruins (First Trip)

The Leviabor Ruins sucked. I think everyone knows that lol I used Dias, Precis, and Celine but I highly recommend bringing Noel instead. Celine learned Energy Arrows, though, which helped a bit! I only did the required floors for the time being and I've been focusing on maxing out each characters main skill branch for now.

I sold a bunch of Gold ingots for like 8k Fol... IDK if I'll need any later (I'm sure they can be made with Alchemy) but I didn't feel like putting athritis-hands through the riggamaroll of Cooking.

Spell - Wind Blade - Celine - Requires: INT 12, Use Firebolt in battle Spell - Energy Arrows - Celine - Requires: MP 160+ / Resistance learned, Use Starlight in battle

Speaking of, I haven't learned any new KMs for Dias. I can't combo at all. I couldn't even combo with Ashton, who is supposedly the easiest... so yeah, late game is gonna be rough.

Ava City (After free from prison)

Remember the girl you saved and got sent to Leviabor prison for? If you talk to her boyfriend, he gives you an item based o what console you are playing on (Gameboy gives a Might Chain... Gameboy Color gives a ???. I'm using Gameboy Advance emulator, so I got a Lunar Talisman)

Yay, Ernest! I guess... I probably won't use him...

I kind of forgot about PAs, so here's some I did to take a break before the Gravis Forest. I remember my last playthrough I did this forest on the Super Gameboy and yeah... you thought it was bad in color. It's ten times worse when its limited to like, 2 colors... a monotone mess. If I didn't have the strategy guides I'd never get through it.

Private Action - Ava City - Bowman (IN) / Celine (OUT) -  Bowman has a daughter! And her name is Erys! :o Notes: If done before recruiting Opera, you get this PA. If after, an Opera PA occurs instead. You can't get both according to the guide I'm looking at. Apparently this PA leads to more rare items late game as it unlocks a PA later.

Private Action - Ava City - Chisato (IN) / Celine (OUT) - Chisato helps the girl on the west side of town find a job to support the girl’s brothers. Unlocks a hidden shop. The secret weapon shop (below) has decent upgrades!

Go through Gravis Forest until you find the hideout, then talk to the soldier on the west side and show him the permit you got in Ava.

Gravis Forest Part 1

Follow the beetles

Look for the old man

Use a map

If you can combo, this place might be pretty easy. I can't get past 2 hits, so I focused on my mages and spamming Dias' basic attack to keep the apes in the second section from decimating my party...

Celine learned Curse during my time in the forest. Spell - Curse - Celine - Requires Fairyology - Spark with Firebolt

Spell - Bless - Celine- Start (I had her spark this, I swear... but the guide says she starts with it...)

Also, I don't really use Noel, but he learned a ton of spells including Dispel, which is very handy when you get confused by the beetles.

Spell - Dispel - Noel - Start (Oh, I didn’t notice...) Spell - Silence - Noel - Start (Really? I guess I was looking under Magic and not Technique...)

Apparently he starts with Bless, too? IDK

Hideout

In the hideout, it will be registered to your teleporter, so if you want to switch some characters around, go for it. There's an inn and a shop in the hideout as well, so restock and move on through part 2.

Gravis Forest Part 2

For the gorilla boss, Dias had HP around 450+ and I let him take hits because I can't combo to stop the arm spin. Try to use the Up+B combo to "kill" the arms first, if you can. When you're back at the hideout again, talk to the guy out front to heal and then save. The boss, Atlas, died with one shot of Celine's Thunderbolt... sure is nice to see anything do damage in this game. You'll be healed and sent to he Slave Village. Save again and prepare for another boss... Three of Celine's Thunderbolts took it out. :)

Slave Village

Private Action - Slave Village - Precis (OUT) That PA in Slave City with Precis should be open. Noel asks Precis what's the matter and offers her one of Chisato's snacks to cheer her up :) When that doesn't work, Noel starts calling a doctor (Bowman) for her. Precis finally spills her worries, about a friend named Latry (Razzly maybe?) who might forget... to record Precis' soap opera... Noel is not amused.

After the events on your second trip to Slave Village, you open a new path to Nusa Beach. On the far left you can flip some switches to make a shortcut back to the ship... for some reason, I guess.

We have some optional dungeons to do for now, so return to the ship/restock/ect.

Remember those soldiers outside Ava City blocking that dungeon? We can go now.

Ralph Ruins - Optional

Be careful where you step, it's similar to Gravis and that you can fall easily.

The wires on the lower levels seem impassable; all you need is someone with the Jump field action.

I recommend bringing Precis with Hover so you can reach some treasure and also not fall as often. This is especially useful for the conveyor belts just like in Leviabor. All I can say is just gather as many batteries as you can and on the basement level, look for a generator near a red snake in the bottom left of the overall map that says something like "activates elevator movement". Head as high as you can on the elevators and then all the way left you'll see the crab boss. You have to live long enough, but 3 Thunderbolts takes him out easily. *update note about Precis in conveyors in Leviabor.

Behind the boss is a treasure with the first of 10 Rings we need for the Cave of Trials. Although I'm not planning to do them... but we did miss one in Garvis forest. If you want, go back and get it now (look for unusual, square hole right of the entrance to the forest). If I have time, I’ll add a guide at the end for the rings and how to open the last dungeon (as well as Celine’s Telelport).

Crane Ruins - Optional

BRING A FULL STOCK OF BOMBS, you'll need them! 

I highly recommend anytime you need to restock go to Scout village, because they often have sales on Blueberries and food ingredients. Plus, the bomb shop is right next to the item shop.

Crane Ruins are located south of Ava City (if you hit Slave Village you went too far, you need to go south, slightly east, south, and east again). Unfortunetly you need Precis (and a guide I saw recommended Ashton) for this dungeon, so you'll probably go with Dias, Ashton, and Precis... You could manage with Dias, Precis, and Noel, too. Celine is helpful for the machines and crabs, so if you don't need a healer, take her instead.

If you did that PA back in Mile Ruins, there's another with Ashton and Dias on the generator floor of the Crane Ruins. It's a shame you need Dias out, because you'll likely have to complete the dungeon and then return without him to see it. Luckily, it isn't too much of a feat.

Most of the enemies are easy here, except for the big rats. Try to avoid them and if you can't, use KMs if you have them or run.  

The upper floors have blocks you have to move onto buttons. Make < style arrows with them in the direction of doors you want open on that floor. When you get Floor 2 and 3, you can combine them to move say, > right and ^ up, but there's just some treasure here. Your goal is B1. You'll need Swim/Dive and Hover makes it easier. Collect the treasure by hovering to all the platforms and then take it section by section and dive for treasure. If you activate the generators on the bottom floor, you can also open up stairs to a boss. I tried a few times but Dias wasn't even scratching him, so I gave up for now. I'll come back to that ugly green bastard later.

Ocean Cave (Nusa Beach) - Optional

The final optional dungeon (Ocean Cave) is in Nusa Beach (go South as far as you can, if you got to Vanis city you didn't go far enough; look for the barnacles) and you need Swim/Dive to complete that, so chances are you'll be taking Precis then. I did check and other characters can learn it, but not as easy (well, Dias at least) but I'll just drag Precis along... I'm gonna gripe about it in my review, but it really sucks how you're forced to carry around Precis as an HM slave, since she sucks so much in battle. 99% of the time she's just dead in fights because it isn't worth the 5 blueberries to heal her. I think if they ever remake this game, there should be some sort of machine to carry around the abilities instead, so you don't waste a slot. Or, even better, a way to switch characters from the ship to your active party in dungeons... It would increase your options and this game is all about not giving you any options. For example, combos being the only way to give fighters more KMs is bad design. Not that they would have MP to use them anyway, because the ideal way to level them gives no MP increases... Just... bad design.

This is how an average fight is going for me. Fun! :(

I'm ranting a lot at this point because this Ocean Cave was my third dungeon that day and I was just burnt out and exhausted of enemies that take 5 minutes to kill, keep respawning, ect. Even with a map, knowing what to do is confusing. I went and found a lever I couldn't flip and a door that needs the lever to open? But then I read in the guide you need a keycard.... So this morning, that's where I'm at. Bored, tired, and I just want the game to give me a break.

The Ocean Cave is added into the teleporter, so feel free to leave/return for supplies if you need to. I decided to go back, use some SP, and experiment with Smithing.  Longsword + Meteorite (50 Point Score) should make a stronger sword, but we don't have Meteorite. *sigh* So my thought process was, well, I'm taking damage, so maybe I'll make better armor.

Enchantment Use the chart on this site to determine the Armor latent value.

How it works: Armor + Source = Better Armor. Each Armor has a set amount of points needed to make it based on the formula below. I'll use the example the guide provided me. Formula: Armor Latent Points + Score Divided by 2 = Total Score (The Total Score determines what you get) Magic Resist Armor (35 latent points) + Score of 27 or higher Divided by 2 = 31 Total Score = Resist Armor possible.

I want to make a Duel Suit, as it's one of the best armors... So I used: Resist Armor (25) + Score of 125 or more = 150 Divided by 2 = 75 Total Score in theory should get a Duel Suit... (Note: I couldn’t get the score high enough, so no... I think I need Titania Source and max level for Enchantment...)

I'm not entirely clear how Sources play into the calculation, but they seem to provide some sort of bonus when scoring points? So, save scum and use rare Sources to easily create high level armor. (High level sources: Elf, Dark Elf, Titania)

I tried for a little while, but the two just kept swapping between Resist/Magic armor. I think I need Celine's Enchantment level higher (it's only 4) to make the mini-game easier, so we may as well get back to the dungeon and get some SP for that.

Back at the Ocean Cave... The keycard we need is on the third floor. Try to hang left for most of the time and you should reach it across a tiny water section. I went to where the guide said the card was and was back at the lever, which I could magically pull now. I have no idea what's going on (perhaps you have to examine the door on the lower level first, which is bullshit) but we should be able to move forward now. At the statue room, pull all the levers except the reset, go down the stairs, hop down, pull the green blocks, and drop down. You can unlock the door for later (you have to return with Teleport to get the treasure... ughhhh) and go fight the boss who is easier than almost every enemy in the damn cave. Grab the chest behind it and leave so we can go do the story again.

I will say, it is nice we get to see an Edifian as a reward for this bonus dungeon... So there's that.

Vanis City

Don't waste money on the Elf Sources; you'll be able to buy the good ones soon.

I've been wondering where Opera is too. :( She's my favorite character, so imagine how sad I was that you can't use her for half of this game. Speaking of, this is almost the half way point. Not including resets and deaths, I've logged about fifteen hours playtime, so seems about right. The shops don't offer any better weapons, but there is some better armor for your mages. Get that when you can.

Private Action - Ashton OUT Noel IN - Ashton's feeling a little hopeless and Noel tries to cheer him up.

Private Action - Leon OR Opera IN, Ernest OUT - (I used Leon) They discuss how strange the planet feels (as if man-made) and how Edifice compares to Expel.

Private Action - Chisato OUT - Chisato has one line that just says Vanice City is kinda peaceful.Talk to the guy in the bar and we learn Opera is researching with another scientist in the City of Knott. Head South of town once you're ready. 

Road to Knott

Bring a few bombs. Most of the enemies are easy.

Don’t walk forward on the beautiful screen above... you take damage lol

Ah, the infamous

Ruddle sidequest

begins. If you explore thoroughly, you'll find him on the way.

Please use CTR F to find my updated guide later (See: Scream), because I made an error here.

Spell - Noel - Cure Light - Requirements: INT 40+ stats, spark with Heal Spell - Noel - Fairy Heal - Requirements; INT 70+  stats, spark with Cure Light

Noel knows this game is gonna ramp up, huh?

Knott

The Blue Sphere, huh? I’ll be back for you, sir.

Oh my god we finally get new boots and a new weapon for Dias. There's also Rune Bucklers, if you haven't gathered enough from dungeons for your mages. You can also buy the Dark Elf Sources now, so level up someone in Enchantment (Celine is difficult because you need to max her Tech first... so you can't level it to max, but you can get it high level) and try to craft some better armor.

Speaking of, Dias and Celine have 2-3 of their skills maxed in their primary category. I have been avoiding battles on the Road to Knott, so I may go back and train. The plants are fairly easy and they give around 35 SP each.

Enchantment, attempt 2

It took me about 10 resets to get a Magic Armor and a Dark Elf Source to become a Magic Resist Armor. I had to score 50 to get it. The trick is finding the 3rd checkpoint (when the cane glows white) before the timer runs out. When I tried again with the Magic Resist and a Dark Elf Source, after only 1 checkpoint I somehow got the Nexus Armor... I don't get it, either, you guys... Ideally I want another Nexus Armor and something stronger for Celine. I created a Mithril Coat for Celine and it seems if you get checkpoints in the center, it scores higher. Part of this may just be luck. I wish I understood it better...

I’m on my way! Woosh~

Knott Secret Ruins

Once you're ready head into the laboratory of Knott (top right of city) through the 2nd room on the right, at the back. I can't help much with the dungeon, so please follow a guide. 

Opera and Dias are my favorite characters... I feel re energized, even if I can’t use her in battle right now... (You CAN use her, but there isn’t any reason to over Dias, sadly.)

After you run into Opera, go down another floor, move the switch to the left in the first room (I used Noel with Pull because I wasn’t taking Precis again if I didn’t have to) and then head down a few times and you'll be at the boss. When you get to the room with the two big long-nosed blue guys (Carlas???) use Celine's Thunderbolt to take them out and save before going through the bottom right door.

In a random battle I accidentily used Bless instead of Thunderbolt. Celine got Anti.

Spell - Anti - Celine - Requires: RES 50+ stats, spark with Bless

Spell - Magnum Tornado - Noel - Requires INT 45+ - Spark with Wind Blade

I love how Rival casually is like "let's look for the LOTR stone!" and we just go with it.

I think I have trauma from the “join event” text from Star Ocean: the Second Story Ending 86 Guide I made... ;__;

The boss isn't too bad. Celine's Thunderbolt takes out a few parts. Finish him off with Dias forward stab regular attack and you should be good. I did have to heal a few times with Noel. After the fight, grab the Palantir and teleport back to the ship, restock, and then go find Rival in Knott.

Knott (again) lol Meet with Rival. She explains that she met Opera while looking for new discoveries. Rival is trying to find some ancient spaceship and asks everyone to go explore ruins. (For real, we should have just taken parts from Knott and fixed our ship and GTFO lol we have to help her because Opera helped her... oh, wait, no, we said Rival helped Opera after she crash landed... sure lol Opera only saved Rival from some rando rolly polly. Whatever. We have to go meet a guy at the bar in Vanis City.

Vanis City (return) Leave Knott and teleport to the ship and then to Vanis. Go to the bar and talk to the green guy, Simon, to learn about some ruins. The Ocean Cave, to be exact... which we already did. Upon leaving the bar someone shows up and says go to Knott! So back we go.

Knott (AGAIN) You'll be forced to fight red beetles, like the ones in Gravis. They should be cake now if you've levelled Dias a bit. They took a few forward slash basic attacks each. Same strategy with the 3 grey beetles. Once you save Rival, you find out that they unleashed some awful monsters from Gravis forest's underground. When you're ready, go to the door at the back of Rival's room that you couldn't go to before.

Gravis' Forest Path

I took Dias, Celine, Noel. Make sure you're fully stocked, this area isn't on the ship teleporter.

Bring a bomb if you're playing on a Gameboy/Super Gameboy 1 (Note: must be original, not a Color or Advance) and when you come upon a tower, you can use a hidden door on the right to enter or blow up the crack with a bomb (Mobile port only). I'm really kinda ticked because if you choose the item on the right you get a Blue Sphere just handed to you. This plus that Might Chain from earlier makes playing on a Gameboy or Super Gameboy 1 almost worth it... So, sadly I didn't get this item. I remember in my old playthrough this was around where I put the game down because the angel inside looks like Lenneth. Her sprite gets reused a lot in this game... I really thought it was Lenneth, though! :p Apparently her name is Maria--maybe an allusion to Star Ocean Til the End of Time (this title was a holdover until 3 released, so...)

Continue forward along the path until you reach the cave. Along the way are more of the red beetles. For the boss fight ahead, if you're using Celine, you may want to aquire Ray or Southern Cross. Here's how: Use Starlight (have MP 100+, INT 40+) to gain Ray and then use Ray (260 MP+, 80+ INT, know Herbology) to spark it. It's highly likely you won't have her Tech maxed out yet to learn Herbology for Southern Cross, but Ray should work in a pinch. It only took me four battles to spark Ray.

Gravis Forest II / Gravis Forest Cave

The red beetles seem to go down quicker with Starlight, but also Dias should be taking them out in 1-3 hits on average. I also had a red beetle drop a Mithril Mesh once I reached the forest, which is an upgrade to the Nexus Armor.

There are many hidden paths that lead to treasure, ect. so make sure you have a map handy. Go right and just keep going right and you'll stumble upon the Brown Card. After this, explore as thoroughly as possible to get everything. Most of the enemies are really easy, especially if you get initiative.

There is one room on the center/right side that has a large enemy called the Dragon Warrior. Luckily, you'll need Teleport so you'll have to come back later for this. If you beat him 5 times you get one of the rings for the bonus dungeon. If you have Ashton, you'll also get some cool dialogue between Gyoro and Ururun.

When you come across the room with two levers in the center, move the left one and continue exploring a bit. You'll need to get to Floor 2 to finish the puzzle. Along the way you'll probably see two chests, one in the top left and one lower/right from that. Once again, you'll need Teleport for them. I don't know what dev expects me to backtrack for this crap, because I don't plan to. Go across the bridge you lowered to Floor 2, flip the switch. Falling here does nothing, so don't worry about it. Go back across and you'll see some yellowish stairs. Use Jump to get back to the double lever room and swap the order from before, which lowers the stairs completely. Save before going to the boss room.

Apsaras (hey, I recognize you from Megaten!)... not how I expected you to look. Anyway, I tried the Japanese website guide of using Ray, but... it did fucking nothing. The Official guide only recommends raising STR as high as possible and says even specials do very little here. Basically, this battle is gonna be a slog. Use items to your advantage.

Seriously, this boss sucks. I almost put the game down.

My strategy was to control Dias and do a sort of attack a bit, back off/heal as needed, attack some more. Be careful, if you take out it's legs, it just insta-kills everyone after a few attacks... I'm seriously debating using cheats for this fight, because it's that hard. I KNOW the game wants me to combo to prevent it from attacking, but when you suck at stupid fighting game ass skills, it's useless. There really needs to be any kind of work around...

Okay, so I was reading up and the JP website says Dias just needs MP and to attack based on range for some of the lower level killer moves. Go figure, he only just now started getting an MP boost. I still can't combo for shit (got a 6 somehow in the boss fight) but I did put some points into Awakening. However, I don't think that's what helped... So I equipped this random ass ring I had because I think it gives you Strong Blow? Anyway, this boss went down in like 20 seconds once I had it on Dias! I DON'T KNOW WHAT THIS GAME IS ANYMORE. For information on where I got the ring, it was on B1 Floor of the Ocean Cave! It's called the Eclipse Ring and the Official guide translates the ability added as "Strike". I don't know what this ability is exactly but it seems to have saved my ass here. I got flashback to the Protection Rings / Barker fight in Star Ocean the Second Story... Ironically, that boss fight was what kind of gave me the idea to look at accessories. Nice to see something stayed from 2 that was actually worthwhile.

Return to the ship, restock, return to Knott and go to the lab and talk to Rival. She explains that the Edifians were destroyed by a flood/tidal wave and that someone may have caused it. To learn more, she asks us to take her to Scream (and Lung). These names, bro... Anyway, we gotta go back to the road to Knott and find a new pathway.

Road to Knott 2 If you remember where we saw Ruddle, with those plant octopus guys, go back there. Rival opens the previously locked door and we're at Scream.

Scream You will need Precis' Hover if you want all the items, but they should be gemstones and armor you saw like four dungeons ago. What you really want are the Sharp Edge and Sorceress Knuckles, if SO2 taught me anything. I was pretty boggled considering those are potentially strong / really strong weapons for Claude and Rena in SO2... You just need Push for those, so Noel should be fine. (Note: I later learned Rena uses knives, so... I guess the knuckles are good for Noel.)

Star Ocean has this thing where it really ramps up it’s environments late game and I’m feeling it! Scream has great graphics and atmosphere. (I forgot to get a picture, though...)

Once you get the weapon upgrades, go through the right door in that same area where Rival is waiting. There's a teleport pad but you can set it to specific places. Going to Nusa Beach or Mile Shop don't have a way back, so don't bother. Select Scream Floor 2 and keep trudging along. Don't go through the upper door. There's a PA with Rena later and if you go now, you lose the chance to complete it.

Your goal is to get the entire tower to line up. Once you get to 4th Floor, save, because the boss is on Floor 5 and he's a bastard. First, I controlled Dias and charged the Minotaur to get some distance between it and the mages. Anything this dude uses KO's mages on impact. I mostly used Celine (with a fire boost and a ring that decreases cast time) with Ray. I wish I had Southern Cross, as it would do more damage... :( It was a big fucking struggle. I used like 4 revives, quite a few MP items, and a all party heal item. Somehow I won. If you get one part of him destroyed he should go down pretty quick after, even if it doesn't look that way. I also had to use a save state about halfway through the battle to save time. It's like 30% luck and 50% cursing, but you'll whittle him down somehow. Just don't let your mages anywhere near him whatsoever and revive immediately. If you wait too long to revive and they're behind the Minotaur, they are good as perma-dead, because he'll attack before you get to even move them out of the way. This entire boss was BS, almost as much as the last one. It's a trend in this game that needs to die.

City of Lung

Ruddle Sidequest Okay, in my last section I wasn't sure about the Ruddle quest. Unfortunetly, I chose the wrong direction and it lead to a dead end (the guide I was following was incorrect, so when I checked the Official Guide... yeah...), so this quest is over for me now that I've reached Lung. For the correct path, use the slapped together, Google translated pics I posted above. (I wanted to add the photo here, but Tumblr would NOT save it for some reason)

So much for my Fairy Ring :( I'm pretty peeved as it's so far back and I'm not doing those boss fights again. However, to make a Fairy Ring (halves MP cost, just like SO2), you can use Rune Metal and score between 270-319 with Jewelry Making (this is how the ROM translates it). I didn't have any Rune Metal, so I might try later.

Private Action *This PA has a small window, do it immediately - IN: Precis - Ship - Rival admires the ship and gives you a Tri-Emblem (increase all stats). I'm unsure if it breaks or something, so I'll save it for the end... This won't be availible if you talk to the Priest in Lung, so do this PA immediately.

Proceed down the path in Lung and you'll be escorted to the Priest, who is promptly killed by Rival. She also forces Claude and Rena to crash on Edifice, just like she did you.

She is the planet's "devil". She leaves and a remaining priest takes you to the top floor to meet an Edifian named Rose.

Rose explains Rival killed the Priest to get access to the Grand Knott, a weapon. Rose sacrifices a literal lung (I guess that's why the city is named that? lol) so you can breathe underwater when you go investigate the Comsat / Komsa Ruins.

Comsat Ruins - Bring a few bombs. - Equip Stone Checks

With the Aqualung, Dias can now use Swim/Dive, so we don't necessarily need to bring Precis. The dungeon is fairly straightforward. If a room doesn't loop back, look for a Microchip; this unlocks more floors on the elevator. There is also an item here we'll need to get Claude (yeah, he has a shitty sidequest; luckily this is the only item you’ll need for it), so make sure you nab the Minsidia by going 80% the way left on the continental shelf, then down to get the chest near the bottom. You'll have to backtrack, so be prepared. Once you backtrack once, teleport to the ship. This way you can just quickly return to the shelf by going to the ship/beginning of the dungeon. Anytime I got back to the starting floor, I went to heal/restock since it makes life easier. I avoided a lot of the enemies here as well, like the rhino-dino looking guys, because they just OKO'd my party all the time.

After getting the Minsidia, go back to the beginning of the continental shelf and retrace your steps across, but go all the way left and all the way down. You may want to grab Precis first because the two treasures here require Hover (a weapon for her and for Ernest--not worth trading out your healer, IMO). You'll now be in the seabed. You might be able to hover if you go left for a shortcut, IDK, but the path around is clockwise. If you want some treasure, go to the first door you see, but if you want to move onto the boss, just keep going clockwise towards the center.

I've had to do a lot of resets just because enemies KO Celine instantly :/ I've been using her Magic Shot field action to get the jump on some enemies and start battle controlling  her. A Thunderbolt takes out the Saber Fins in one shot. The Nautilus' take a lot of damage from Thunderbolt too, but to preserve MP, try to finish them off with Dias. They cause poison, so have Noel w/Dispel or cure poisons handy.

If you can get Celine's MP 200+ and INT 60+, you may have a good chance of sparking Thunderstorm, which may be an option we can use going further since Southern Cross isn't obtainable yet...

The red shark is a sub-boss and if you got Thunderstorm, he goes out in 1-3 casts of that. When it attacks again, you wake up in Aqua City and are greeted by an Edifian. Is that what we're doing here? Talking to them? It's so strange we go through this dungeon instead of searching for Claude/Rena immediately... just sayin'. Go around and talk to the Edifians for the first plot in awhile. You'll learn they fought Rival 200 years ago and failed when she flooded the planet. We also learn Claude and Rena crashed near Nusa Beach.

When you go to talk to the leader, they go on some typical Tri-Ace writing about the Aqualung being able to carry Rose's thoughts and that's how they know who you are and that the Priest wanted you to fight Rival. The leader goes onto say we need two more Edifian's help and must go to Ax and Azul and pass their trials. It's pretty similar to SO2 and the Four Fields. Head right from the leader's room and there are two warps.

Return to the ship and restock as needed. It's time to finally get Rena and Claude. Go to Nusa Beach (Use the shortcut in the Crash Forest or go through Slave Village passage [I also realized the upper left exit of Aqua City is a shortcut, later on... oops]) and get Rena, because you can't get Claude without her. One thing the website guide notes is they are completely optional. There is some text where Claude laments if you fail to recruit them, but since Rena is useful and we want the team reunited... let's go get them and level Rena up!

Nusa Beach Revisisted (Rena) Go to the location shown above (near one of the cities, I think? Before the Sea Cave) and you'll find Rena!

I hope you've been saving Knife weapons... apparently Rena uses them in this one. It feels like a reference to her og PS1 art, where she had a short sword / dagger. She also uses mage armors, so you may need to go purchase some of the better stuff in Knott/Lung. We have to "level" her anyway, so use any spare SP on her and go train somewhere if need be. Go to Lung to upgrade first, then go to Knott since that's our destination. Claude has a disease that a scientist named Rush there can cure.

Also, while you're at Lung, you may want to invest in some Titania Sources and upgrade some things, especially since Rena probably won't have an Isis Tiara, we may want to make her one or something better.

Raising Rena

*Note, she will not learn Gravity Press with this method, BUT Celestial Arrow is better anyway.

Sense - Physical Sensation, Danger Sense, Radio Waves(Transmission)

Battle - Parry, Quigong (I didn't learn these, because I didn't see them come up quickly...)

The above are optional but learn one set before the other.

After learning Sense skills, learn all TECH skills through Lezard Techno.

After learning all the above, raise INT until you get Lost Magic.

I levelled her at the base of the seabed. Use Celine's Thunderbolt to take out the Balloon Fish in a few hits. Enter the cave door and go back out to respawn. He gives 60 SP a go. I just refilled MP with Blackberries until I ran out, rinse/repeat. The cost of the Blackberries can suck, but don't forget that Scout often has them on sale. Also, depending on your playstyle, you may find an easier enemy that gives high SP, just do what works for you. In one "trip" I got Rena to a 67 Skill Level. Everyone else is around 100~ so I figured, close enough. I also raised Taijitsu a little for Celine and Rena so their HP was around 100 each.

Knott Revisisted (Claude) Go to the first door on the left of the science building where all those dungeons were to find Rush. He needs the Minsidia, which we already have. He makes the medicine and so we go to Vanis City.

Vanis City Revisited (Claude) You'll see a big guy right when you teleport there. Talk to him. Claude will be waiting at the ship if you want to use him.

Now we can return to Aqua City. We'll take on Ax first, since it's a bit easier.

Ax - Right

Go the upper left door of the area and climb the shell. You'll face the Lord of the Sea who gives you hints on how to progress. These change each new playthrough, but for my own notes, here's what they were in my playthrough: Go through the door of bubbles. He also gives us something, but I have no clue what it was. (Okay, I'm dumb. Realized this on door 2... grab the item bag that appears behind the guy you fought! There's an item in it.)

Next aim for the door right, right again, and down. There's a door where you repeat steps. There's the King of the Sea who says (in my playthrough) go through the bubble door two times.

Next go up and right through the door and repeat the process a final time. Now is the Master of the Sea. His clue for my playthrough was: You have to go through the doors four times in total.

Lovely. At this point I was running low on blackberries, so I left to restock. I also wanted to see if I could get Rena and spells since we've amassed some SP. To learn Fairy Heal, we need Fairyology. I think because INT is NOT opposite TECH, it's alright to raise and we won't lose points, since we will level it after INT anyway. So I went and spammed Cure Light to learn Fairy Heal. In about 3 fights on the road to Knott, I got Fairy Heal AND Fairy Light in the same battle by spamming Cure Light and using Fairy Heal for the first time... We FINALLY have a full party cure! If we spam Fairy Heal, we have a chance to learn Raise Dead, too...

Item Creation: Jewelry Making

I really kind of want a Fairy Ring for Rena, but I can't get the points higher than 130-150, when I need 200+... I did get an extra Star Necklace (reduces cast time) using 1 of my Rune Metals, though. You'll need to buy the Magical Rasp from Lung and try to make a Circle or Cross shape for the highest points. The highest I got was 180 making circles... :( I think I need the level higher, but it conflicts with Celine's learning path...

I screwed around with Compounding, since Rena had it at level 6 after I trained her up earlier. If you mix Thyme and Rosemary, they make the basic Resurrect item if you score 150ish. Nice to get revives. I know Athelas makes resurrection items and some MP items in SO2, but I don't think they exist here. The best item, the Metox, is obtained through connect battles, so that's out.

Item Creation: Compounding

Thyme and Thyme with a low score can make Mixed or Fruit Syrup (HP/MP small and medium restore) and seem like an easy/good combo to make for the dungeon treks. To get Thyme, you can hunt Hippos in Garp. There's 3 right at the entrance and they go down super fast now that we're so late in the game. Bonus, it can be an easy but grindy way to amass some SP (19 SP each I think), so it's a win-win if you got a TV show to binge and wanna grind a bit. Just remember you can only carry 15 of an item, but doesn't hurt to have a full stack and extra so you don't have to leave dungeons as often. Another alternative is to grab Bowman and go to Scout Village, exit, go left and explore the first two screens for herbs, walk back to the village real quick, and repeat. You should have a plethora of herbs at your disposal after.

Another good herb combo:

Lavendar and Lavendar (Score: Auto / 150+) = Resurrection Mist  (Revives one 100% HP.) If you score around 80, you can get a Mixed Syrup, too.

Lavendar and Rosemary (150+) make a Cure Stone.

Lavendar and Thyme (150+) can make Cure Paralysis.

Rosemary and Rosemary (170+) can make a Mental Pot (increases Symbology in fights)

Now, to get back to the game for a bit... I returned to the bottom/center door near the crab because apparently there's one more guy to fight. He is the Demon of the Abyss, just a giant crab. His hint for my file was: There's a tricky room in the center of the tower, you won't be able to leave it just walking normally. After the door of bubbles, you must go through the door of waves.

Once done, go back to the second door we went through (the one that was right, right, down, next to 2 crabs); this will lead to the central tower that just seemed to loop endlessly if you visited before. On either side there are two doors. The left is the wave door and the right is the bubble door. There are two gaps that must be hovered/jumped over. Based on our clues, we need to: Go through the door of bubbles two times. We have to go through the doors four times altogether. After the door of bubbles, we have to go through the door of waves. My first guess wasn't right, so I'm not sure I understand the riddle... You'll know if you failed because you auto-fall into one of the gaps. My solution was: Bubble, Wave, Bubble. I have no idea why. Go up the central tower, Raum, one of the Edifians, is waiting at the top right.

After speaking with Raum, we see a scene of Rival raising the Grand Knott (tower/weapon thing, kinda reminds me of Vane from Lunar). You'll be teleported back to the teleporters, where we can now take on Azul.

If there's any PA's you want to do in Ava City, do them now. I'm not sure if they become unavailible after the events of the second tower / talking to the leader after completing both towers...

Azul - Left Start by heading left and down through a hidden path. Step into the pool/teleporter. Grab the treasure and go up. This is where the official guide said to go first, but we need an orb first to open the door. Go back to the entrance, go down and right, right, down and you'll get a Devil Egg in the treasure box. Go back to the entrance and go all the way left and down to get the Devil Fruit. Go back to the entrance a third time, go right through the pool and up, up, then right. You'll see a hole. Put the Devil Fruit there. Do the same thing in the next room with the Devil Egg, then move the two blocks to the lit up areas in their rooms to unlock a pool teleport back near the red shark.

Love the Tria reference lol These guys were so immersion breaking / over the top I loved it

Go through, grab the Blue Orb, and go back. If you go down, left, up there is another block to move (it doesnt change anything yet). Return to the entrance and go all the way left and get on the teleporter. Defeat the two fish to open the doors. Make your way upward until you see another block to move. This time it changes something. Go down and right through the pool teleporter. Grab the item and go back, go up to another pool teleporter. You can skip the first one, but the second teleporter has a Star Cloak you'll really want for a mage. Go back to where you moved the block on the same floor (left, up) and go left through the hidden passage. Go back to the entrance after grabbing the Green Orb. You may want to leave/restock and come back because the boss is soon. There's one orb left. From the entrance go left, down, through the teleporter, then up through the door we can now open. Toss the cap on one of the mages and get the Red Orb. Now we can open the boss door, so prepare/save and head up to put the orbs into the door with the red hinges (similar to the Green orb door we just busted up). You gotta defeat all the enemies. A few Thunderbolts take out the crab. I just ran from the dragon guys since they waste so much MP. A few Thunderstorms took out the boss really quick!

Yeah, this is a lot like Vane’s destruction but in reverse lol

After you go back to Aqua and watch Rival and Ava City duke it out. We learn Rival powered Grand Knott with the Palantir Stone. The Edifians confirm Ava City is destroyed.

Remember those damn elevator ruins from early game? Yeah... :/ Rival has nestled Grand Knott into it and is waiting for us to stop her. They explain the Leviabor Ruins have powers of the ancient race and it's needed to power Grand Knott, which is docked and free to enter. Except for a barrier, which they can get rid of, so who cares. Anyway, I'd prep by trying to make better weapons, armor, and items. Make food, curatives, ect. Then when you're ready, go to Ava City and the Leviabor Ruins. This isn't the final dungeon, by the way. For some reason the game is gonna continue quite awhile. Luckily there is a final city soon that has a ton of good stuff, so you can probably trudge through the 10 Seals and Leviabor fairly easily. We'll see...

Let’s take a detour with...

Private Action Palooza! (aka A lot of PAs...)

There aren't many PAs in this game, but I wanted to go see any still left. There's a few more late game that get you some ultimate weapons, apparently, so I don't want to miss them and I'll include them in this guide. I'll note if there's any that were missed based on time (since some may have closed after the events at Ax/Azul)

Okay, it’s wierd controlling Claude again... :p

Opera, is this necessary??

Spaceship - Chisato OUT - Speak to Chisato to gain her ultimate weapon, the Mirage. (A SO2 reference maybe?)

Ultimate Weapons

You'll notice they have 0 stats. It's because you need a Blue Sphere (Alchemy) and to take them to the guy in... Knott, I think? I'll have to double check.

Road to Knott (Go to Vanis City south exit, down, right, right, down) - Chisato IN, Dias OUT - DiasxChisato shippers will love this PA--Chisato tells Dias it's dangerous to be out in the wild alone and that first impressons are important. She basically says his aloof and succinct words make it hard for the party to understand where he's coming from and everyone worries.)

Ava City - Opera IN, Celine OUT - After completing Ax/Azul / Before Ava is destroyed / Bowman daughter PA can't have been seen (?) - Obviously I couldn't do this one for multiple reasons...

Slave Village (upper right house) - Opera, Dias IN, Leon, Bowman OUT - Leon and Bowman are playing a card game. Bowman lectures Leon on thinking too much about the game, which is causing Leon's losing streak. Dias lectures them for being nonchalant when the world needs saving, but agrees breaks are good, so Bowman offers to play. Opera taught them the game (from Earth - Hanafuda).

Vanice City (go right twice from entrance) - Bowman IN, Opera, Ernest OUT - Bowman sees Opera buying a ton of alcohol. Opera offers Bowman some (apparently the alcohol is better than Earth) and I agreed to let Bowman live it up. They go back to the inn to drink. Eventually, Bowman passes out and Opera keeps drinking. It wouldn't be Star Ocean without someone getting shitfaced, you know? Opera leaves to buy more when she runs out and Ernest brings Bowman back to the ship, telling him not to attempt to keep up with Opera again... lol

Road to Knott (Exit Knott) - Precis IN, Opera OUT - Opera's gun is veering left, so Opera asks if Precis can fix it. Opera's good with machines, but not computer parts... I agreed for Precis to look at it. Opera declines though, scared Precis will return it over-designed. I asked Opera after the PA, too, and Precis gets all mad because Opera won't let her within 10 feet of the gun in fear Precis will make it into an automaton...

Knott (second floor item shop) - Opera IN, Precis OUT - Precis comments on Knott's dark atmosphere, compared to her school. Opera mentions El was a scholar... I think this is a mistranslation as she probably said "Ern", meaning Ernest.

Spaceship - Ashton OUT - Ashton gives you his ultimate weapon 83 Inn's Claw (ROM) / Gine's Claw (Japanese website translation--I think this might be XINE?! Did XINE hand over a talon?!). Ashton says that Gyoro and Ururun want him to use the weapon, but Ashton says it was a gift from (Rasugas)? Does he mean Lasguss (mountains)? Perhaps from his home town that was scrapped in SO2? He says it has the spirit of a djinn inside. I swear I read in an interview Ashton's hometown had something to do with a djinn...

Note before these two PAs, bring Ashton and Claude with you. Dias should be able to handle any enemies. Do NOT bring Precis or Opera.

Gravis Forest (Summit, where the boss was) - Ashton IN, Precis OUT - Ashton asks Precis if she can repair the ship soon. Precis says that means she'll go back to Earth and Ashton to Expel. Since they're supposed to be canonical in a way, I stated 'We'll be seperated again'. Precis tells Ashton he hasn't changed in two years, because he's sad about being seperated again. Precis says it's a good thing he hasn't changed, giggles, and runs off.

Ah, if I'd known about this... I'd brought Claude, too... If you do take my advice, try going down one screen and returning to see if the PA triggers, otherwise you may have to backtrack like I did. If you're lost, just keep heading up from the Hideout as best you can. It doesn't take too long as the enemies that remain go down really quick.

Gravis Forest (Summit) - Claude IN, Opera OUT - Claude snaps Opera out of reading a book. She's exploring the wreckage of her ship and gathering things she might want to keep. I was curious so I asked 'What were you reading?' The Armoured Death and the Knight of Fire are what Claude notices. He says they're very military, even noting Opera's jacket. However, Opera hates war, she just likes good stories that are fiction and finds her jacket comfortable. When Opera mentions a far off planet, Claude reminds Opera that he's part of the Pangalactic Federation (she forgot!)

Nusa Beach (use the Crash Forest entrance) - Rena IN, Chisato OUT - Chisato is worried about the universe constantly at war, saying the Nedians were a peaceful people. I told her 'There's hope in the future' basically. If you talk to Chisato after, she says because of the events two years ago, she became a Battle Reporter, specifically. :)

Road to Gravis (Had to look up where this was... It's the area with the tower where Maria was, so go to Knott and use the back door where Rival used to hang out. Travel down the ladder, through the little tunnel, and you'll see Celine when you exit.) - Rena IN, Celine OUT - Rena finds Celine looking pale. I said 'I'm more worried'. Celine says a bug fell on her (reminds me of the trope they used in the EX anime) If you talk to Celine after, Rena says bugs don't bother her much.

Scream (2F of Serpent Ruins, teleport to Serpent Ruins, leave, head right, then head for the top right of the dungeon) - Rena IN - Defeat the bird. The lady with the bento will die. Use Rena's Rebirth to revive them. This ability seems to be finicky? I guess use it in front of the "block" of floor where the lady died, and it should revive her. If you go to the back there's now a jam shop. Let me tell you, I was so mad lol I was hoping it would have the Aloe Jam that was so useful in SO2... NONE of the jams restore MP... FML. Buy the Blueberry Jam (20% HP restore) at least for dungeon crawling, otherwise this was pointless for the effort involved...

Lung (item shop) - Requires Bowman's daughter PA to have been done - Celine IN, Bowman OUT - Bowman needs help deciding what to get, a dress for Nineh or a toy for Erys. Yeah, the toy seems the better choice, but it's trash compared to the Marvel Dress you get otherwise. (Marvel from SO1? Interesting lol) Move the Star Cloak to Rena and give Celine the massive boost from the Marvel Cloak.

That's all for now! :o We've only got a few PAs left for later... Where were we? Right, Leviabor Ruins...

Due to issues with Tumblr, please be patient. I’m tired of editing/saving 3x just to make updates to this post. It is very exhausting. Fix your shit Tumblr.

FINAL PART OF GUIDE, CLICK HERE

[rainbowravioli]

I'm going through all my burned CDs to see what to trash and what to keep for the move and oh man.

So we have some movies, the anime series of my teen years, a lot of pirated Photoshop versions, anime music, my writing, game guides taken from GameFAQs, and lots and lots of fanart.

I would save all the fanart I liked on the family computer and once it was getting too much (image files were very heavy back in the day) I would burn them into CDs. It's very well organized in folders and the best part for me is that I had any shipping art on its own separate, burried deep folder because oh no what if someone sees I saved a kissing picture?!

I do wonder about the artists. Most of these don't have a signature and I tried to look up the ones that do without success. Hope they're doing well.

[volfoss]

Does Volfoss have a secret fan translation i can't find? I'm coping here

it does not BUT i did go through and write every story section (as line by line as I could) for every single route in my guide :) link to a direct download (via dropbox) and the gamefaqs page here :) most of the info for it before this was all on japanese sites and even then there wasnt a ton outside of the VERY helpful japanese wiki (link to that here, google translate and a good knowledge of the creatures are your friend here :) it has some stuff i didnt put in the guide such as trooper listings and a VERY helpful map that has each town/rebel (what the Volfoss term for towns are. dont ask me why its confusing lol) color coded for each of the big cities that control them). if you need any other help, lmk! i included some of the helpful sites at the end of the guide as i def recommend keeping up the gallery page and the unit guide spreadsheet as u play until u get a hang of the creatures :)