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| Jeff Plays What YOU Pick V3!; Breath of Fire 2 it is! | |
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| Topic Started: Jun 4 2009, 03:57 PM (409 Views) | |
| Jeff | Jun 4 2009, 03:57 PM Post #1 |
Lord of Pie & BBWs
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Because I love LP and I can never let Sean be happy for TOO long, I present you the next trio of choices. You know the drill. First to three votes wins. Option 1) Boktai: The Sun Is In Your Hand Genre: Stealth/Action Pros: Fun, straight-forward, some choices to be made concerning the path to the end and boss order. Cons: Somewhat short, still pretty linear. Option 2) Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past Genre: Action/RPG Pros: Interesting, fast-paced, fun and interesting Cons: Fairly linear if you don't know the tricks (which I do). Option 3) Breath of Fire 2 Genre: RPG Pros: Colorful, funny, interesting RPG in an otherwise Final Fantasy-swamped era. Cons: Linear as a game can be. Get to votin'! *EDIT* Choices have been changed. By the way, don't be a douche and actually vote for a game. *EDIT 2* Poll's closed. Thank you to everyone who voted. Edited by Jeff, Jun 5 2009, 07:35 PM.
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Come visit me and my thought processes at my website: http://www.publishedauthors.net/tdotdw/news.html "In the cold light, justice and morality always look corny and you can't wave the flag and look cool. But like it or not, society needs its heroes." - John Hart; actor who played The Lone Ranger. | |
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| Sean | Jun 4 2009, 03:58 PM Post #2 |
The ⑥of Four Against Nature
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I vote that Edited by Jeff, Jun 5 2009, 11:33 AM.
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| Rem | Jun 4 2009, 04:03 PM Post #3 |
Why yes, I do like snickerdoodles.
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I vote number 3. Schoolwork? Who needs schoolwork? Bah! LP I say! |
 Have you ever wondered what color air is? | |
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| Root | Jun 4 2009, 04:11 PM Post #4 |
The Speaker for the Dead
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Not everybody needs to break from LPing to focus on schoolwork, Sean. Go for option 2, A Link to the Past. |
Does being the only sane one make me the insane one, in a sort of way? Though my eyes could see, I was still a blind man; Though my mind could think, I still was a madman... "Yes there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run...there's still time to change the road you're on" | |
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| Sean | Jun 4 2009, 04:13 PM Post #5 |
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The ⑥of Four Against Nature
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Bah, 2 I guess.... |
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| Dietaku | Jun 5 2009, 10:03 AM Post #6 |
Grade A /B/tard
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HELL NO, freaking Link! I say BoF2! |
| "SHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANE!!" | |
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| Jeff | Jun 5 2009, 08:29 PM Post #7 |
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Lord of Pie & BBWs
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Once again, thank you to everyone who This Let's Play, we'll be Let's Playing the SNES RPG Breath of Fire 2 - who beat out Zelda: A Link to the Past, by a literal coin flip. The Breath of Fire series (BoF 1-4 and Dragon Quarter) are a series of under-rated RPG games. If Final Fantasy is the French Vanilla of RPGs, Breath of Fire is the Rocky Road - without deviating too far from standard RPG tradition, there are elements employed to liven it up a bit from the RPG staple of "Mash A until bad guy dies". Breath of Fire 1 was, ironically, brought over to the states by Squaresoft even though the BoF franchise was created and developed by CapCom. Suffice to say, BoF1 was the most convoluted game of the series and suffered from the worst translation of any of the games thus far, even for 1994. Breath of Fire 2 hit stateside shelves a year later and both games were ported for the Gameboy Advance in 2001 and 2002, sequentially. Breath of Fire 3 and 4 were released for the PlayStation and most fans of the franchise continue to pretend Dragon Quarter didn't happen. The games share some universal constants the first being the plucky protagonist: Ryu.  (From left to right: 4, 2, 1, 3, DQ) Ryu is always the main character - a sword-wielding mute with the power to transform into a dragon. Usually playing second fiddle or, if we're really lucky, fourth or fifth fiddle is Nina, a winged princess from Kingdom Windia or some variation thereof. Often appearing is the scaled sorceress, Bleu/Deis - a snake-woman with a spunky attitude and the cosmos at her beck and call. Finally, there's Ladon - god of the dragons, who usually serves as either a mentor or the save spots in the games, but more on him later. Worthy of note is the guy who did the character art for the series was Keiji Inafune - the MegaMan guy. Which might explain why the series just stopped dead and has never been heard from again all the while, Capcom resumes crapping out Street Fighter 2 over and over again with a different packaging. *ZING!* Speaking of MegaMan, Breath of Fire 2 suffered from what I like to call "MegaMan American Box Art Syndrome".  Ironically, this art is superior to the first game's. Everyone's on-model except for Ryu, who is apparently attempting his best Conan the Barbarian impression for some... reason. Well, enough ragging on Inafune and the art, because below a rugged exterior lies easily the 2nd best game of the franchise (BoF3 being the best by a long shot) with a colorful cast of characters, fascinating game mechanics and a surprising sense of humor. That's enough history on the game, so let's dive right on in.  Ahh, shiny gold and blue logo. How I have missed you.  I'm going to go ahead and tell you that the most popular ROM version of the game comes with a trainer in it that can lock your HP at max. That's fine, I guess, if that's your thing (I'm not using it) but if you do, don't turn it on right away. Just trust me.  Right away, we're given a name prompt. In BoF1, you could rename everyone in your party when you got to a certain point, but you don't get that luxury in this game, so I'm going to run with the default name of Ryu.  Oh, hey, what's that?  AAAAAAAAAAHH!!! WHAT THE CRAP, MAN?!  I'LL DO WHATEVER YOU SAY, JUST GO AWAY!!!  Well, that... somehow worked as we're now at a gray-scaled church. A little girl runs out the door too fast for my clumsy ass to screencap and then her elderly father appears.   You're then given control (you can get a free fishing rod from the chest of drawers, for what it's worth) and you go downstairs or otherwise, he'll just keep yelling up at you.   Even though I'm not readily aware of my relation to her or you, I'm going to assume for simplicity's sake you're my dad and she's my sister. So! I'm off!  Huh. Kind of a dull place. It could use a little - ah, I dunno - color? Yeah, that was a bad pun. Sue me.  Two things to note - everyone in the town basically knows who you are and that little emblem on the text box. A gimmick unique to Breath of Fire 2 is the "Dragon Tear" a gem Ryu has in his possession that reflects how the person he's speaking with feels about him by the color it shines. Dark colors like purple and dark red are negative, yellows and teals are a more neutral feeling while brighter colors mean a more positive connection and a rainbow flash means they're your best friends. Pretty much everyone in town gives a yellow reaction, though that's not really important right now.   I might go ahead and state here that the music played in these fields is some of the prettiest video game music ever.  Just north of there, color springs back into the world! Yay!  You then find Yua in front of a massive dragon, but you also find a monster!  You can try to fight, if you want, but this is a scripted event. The trainer will prevent your HP from going down, so you'll be stuck in an event loop and the fight will never end. However, once you're HP hits critical...     A little on the slow side, but brave.  Ha-ha! You got yelled at and I didn't!   Huh. That's not   Yes, yes, you and the dragon killed "the monster" whatever that might entail. Very nice.  ...  Anyways, Father Ganer takes Yua back home, basically allowing Ryu to do whatever he damn well pleases.   Huh. I don't see any harm in that.  OH GOD! I SEE THE HARM IN IT NOW! OH GOD! OH GOD!!!  When we return to the town, dad and sister are missing and no one recognizes us. Huh.  I wasn't aware Bruce Banner got into seminary!  Eva? You mean... no. No, no, no. Let's not get into that.  He then invites you to stay the night. During the night, we meet a strange new friend.  Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the dog is talking. After four Breath of Fire games, that's not the least bit odd, believe it or not.  Umm... to stay in the city where everyone shuns me and I had to ask permission to sleep in my own bed? I don't think so. Got something better in mind?  I see no way this could possibly go wrong. Let's go!  The gate to the village is now unguarded and we can book it. As you go, it'll begin raining and Bow, the dog, will complain and you should head to the cave to the west.  Using the candle, they navigate the cave before seeing something... odd.   Oh God! Not again! Bow gets swatted aside like a bug, and Ryu steps up to protect his new friend.  Ooo... not liking the dark purple gem like that.  I didn't say anything!  Oh God!!! One hit did TEN TIMES the amount of HP I even HAVE!!!  Yep. Gonna pass out now.  Okay, I was right. Father and sister.  So... the monster didn't kill me?   Is it a world where monsters rule?  Oh. Guess not.   That sounds really bad.  Didn't I just, y'know, get massacred?  Guess not.  Ryu and Bow, now somewhere in their teens or 20's, work as "Rangers" which is basically a hired hand/bounty hunter organization.  Bow becomes angry and complains about the task. Bow: You'd have to be pretty stupid to lose a pet!  Elder: Sorry, little one. They don't seem to want to do it! Bow: HEY! Wait a sec! Ryu: What?   You manwhore, Bow.  So, Mina's pet is named Suzy, huh?  That's putting it rather mildly!  Sounds good. Quick check on our menu screen~  Ahh. Nice! This lists where we are currently, the goblin indicates the encounter rate (sleeping means there's no random encounters here), our money, our party, and our options as well as how the party is formed (with more people, more tactics become available). That makes for a nice start. Now, to properly introduce our heroes!  Ryu Bateson Weapon of Choice: Sword This is our protagonist character. In-game, he's mute except for yes/no prompts, so I'll be playing his "voice" throughout our journey together. As I said before, he's a dragon clansman but he doesn't know it yet. Shh.   Bow Weapon of Choice: Bow Our team's deadpan snarker. A real "lady's man" and something of a wise guy. No, seriously - he's a good guy and his ability to hunt on the overworld map is very, very valuable early on in our adventures. Look forward to more very soon! |
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Come visit me and my thought processes at my website: http://www.publishedauthors.net/tdotdw/news.html "In the cold light, justice and morality always look corny and you can't wave the flag and look cool. But like it or not, society needs its heroes." - John Hart; actor who played The Lone Ranger. | |
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| Root | Jun 5 2009, 08:45 PM Post #8 |
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The Speaker for the Dead
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Well then, this is certainly ... special. I quite enjoyed the part where you fell asleep and saw the harm in it :D. Although..it'd be worse if that was your mother. Nightmare fuel enough for you? |
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Does being the only sane one make me the insane one, in a sort of way? Though my eyes could see, I was still a blind man; Though my mind could think, I still was a madman... "Yes there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run...there's still time to change the road you're on" | |
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| Sean | Jun 5 2009, 10:42 PM Post #9 |
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The ⑥of Four Against Nature
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Best part of my childhood: Being mangled by some sort of demon and then somehow living through it. |
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| Jeff | Jun 6 2009, 12:11 PM Post #10 |
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Lord of Pie & BBWs
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With the first objective in mind that does not involve me getting my ass handed to me, we set off! The town is rather nice - roughly twice the size of the one we started the game in. Half of it is blocked off by some blushing teenagers (no, seriously) but that's fine. Everyone in town is spreading rumors about Mt. Fubi, a mountain to the south of the village and weird disappearances of small animals. In the east we find~  Ladon! God of dragons!  Oh. That sucks.  Uhh... ok...  Ladon is one of the places we may now save our game at. If you want, you may also save at St. Eva's churches, but Ladon is more immediately available. You may also save anytime on the overworld map.  Huzzah! An overworld that allows a little freedom! There's a little circus tent here but there's no time for games! We have a mission!  Ahh! A much more fitting form for our hero! Splat some enemies here and there. I recommend level three, at absolute lowest before heading to Mt. Fubi.  After beating a random encounter on the overworld, sometimes hunting spaces (the tall grass) or fishing spots (the jumping fish) will appear. You can take advantage of these, if you'd like. You can change who's on-point with the L and R buttons which will allow Bow to fire his shots at the animals to get free food items. You can't fish just yet, but we will soon.  The hunting spaces are 1-screen in size. There's nothing in this one, but they're worth checking out if your supplies are running low.  To the south is Mt. Fubi. There are some stronger enemies here, but nothing that'll make you wet yourself in terror. Head on in.  Ooo! Mysterious voices! But a lot better translated than the mysterious whisperings of EVO...  A healing fountain in the middle of an area filled with higher-tier enemies? Hmm! I smell a chance to OVER-ACHIEVE! I left this little area at level 7. Which is good, as Bow will learn Cure 1 and Antidote for your trouble. Ryu has very little AP and learns very few spells, but Ryu only uses AP for one reason and we don't have access to that reason just yet, but you'll see.  Lolwut?  Uh-oh. Bow! You first! You're a dog, aren't you?!  The Harpy Sisters! Alone, one would make for a fairly tough common enemy. Three of them make for a tough boss battle.  I meant to mention this sooner, but with the exception of bosses, once you beat an enemy, their HP gauges stop displaying "?" and will actually show you how much health they have left. If you're at a high level, these three dames will present no real threat, biting the bullet at about three hits a piece. At lower levels, this fight's hell because the first round is spent with all three of them talking about how hot Ryu is and how they all want him - so all three will ALWAYS attack Ryu in the first round. Do not let either team member die here - there's no reviving items just yet so you can't really afford it.  The next round, the sisters bicker among themselves and actually ATTACK EACH OTHER FOR YOU. Not only is this hilarious because you can have them kill each other, this is also your chance to heal and strike back next turn. At a high enough level, the fight should end roughly about here. If not, the third turn has the sisters apologize for hitting each other, then resume a normal boss fight, attacking both guys. It's not too hard, if you prepared a little.  Well, no time to waste! Head up the mountain and shove the small stone out from in front of the door which...    Uhh... whoops?  Go a little further on, as your path backwards is now blocked off. Inside you'll find a new helmet item called, humorously enough, a salad bowl. You'll also find a fire rock - a powerful spell-casting item you'll want to hold onto in case of an emergency.  Outside, you'll find the falling boulder blocked off the healing spring, but made the cross over the mountain much easier. Head west for a while more and find a little abandoned shack.   Oh boy. Well, rush inside and find a poor old guy surrounded by big freakin' cockroaches!  What a mess. Attack them once you're ready. By now you should be able to off them in one shot a piece. Ryu also has a pretty decent counter-attack rate which means that they won't last long. They don't even play the boss fight music for this fight. Instead they play the silly event music.  Dude, what's your problem?  ... Oh. Well that IS a boss. If you want to use the fire rock, by all means, but there's no reason you shouldn't be able to out-muscle this thing and just beat it to death.  The old man introduces himself as Niro and then welcomes you into his little homestead. He then offers to share lunch with you because you helped him. Aww, that's very nice of him, isn't it?  IT'S BACOOOOOOOOON!!!  FOOL! I BOIL MY BACON!!! ... Hey, wait a 'tic...   Aww, dude!!! GET THE PIG OUT OF THE POT!!!  Whew. Too close! Well, with our first mission securely tucked into Bow's bag, we can hurry back home and report to the guild!   Mina: Did you give her a bath too?  Mina then informs them that she's going back to her homeland of Windia - which is a pretty sizeable walk from here, as we'll learn later on.   Aww. Poor Bow. At the very least, you get 500 coins for your trouble, which should give you a hefty sum of cash if you did some grinding back in the path with the spring.   Dang. First he was born looking like a dog and now this. Oh well. Let's get out of here.  This doesn't influence too much, since Bow's friendship is already at the rainbow status (they spent 10 years hanging out together. That's pretty impressive for a mute and a dog!). I opt to just go ahead and head back.  Late at night, some tomfoolery is afoot!    The Magic Hood? What's that do, I wonder? Well, we don't get to ask as Ryu drifts back to sleep. Just FYI, the fellow Bow was talking with is named Kilgore. You then wake up in the dead of night and head out to find some "startling" news!  Guard: I can't believe that the thief is bow! Ryu: I totally didn't see this one coming!!! Head north towards the area of incident when all of the sudden-  Ryu: Wow! She has blue hair! Just like me! And she had wings! Just like my sister did! And she's roughly the age my sister would've been had she not disappeared! ... Probably just a coincidence. Gotta help Bow, gotta help Bow!  Trout? Their family name is Trout? Poor guy. You can't get near the house because it's swarming with guards, so let's head back for now. Back at Ryu and Bow's room, Bow pops up again.  I'll say!  You stole something? I doubt it. If you did, you would've given it to Kilgore to pass the blame along if I know you at all...  Ryu: Something like that. But what happened, then?  Bow: I was made to understand that it was Kilgore's and that Trout stole it from him. I was recovering stolen property, so I wasn't do anything bad. I got to the warehouse when all of the sudden-  Bow: A hooker ran me over! Ryu: Wow! You too?! That's probably a coincidence though. Go on. Bow: Well, I looked into the warehouse but...   Ryu: Well, the game had to get started somehow. Bow: Someone's here! I gotta hide!!!  Ladies and gentlemen, the first trash can in an RPG ever. Probably. I mean, this game even has bathrooms! Seriously! The guard comes in and briefly looks around before speaking to Ryu.    Ryu: WHAT?! And where would we go?! Bow: Let's go to Niro's! Y'know, the old guy we met-- Ryu: Yeah, like ten minutes ago. I remember, dude. Bow: I know it'll be difficult to lug a trash can the entire way there... Ryu: Dude, you can get out of the trash once we skip town! Bow: ... I know it'll be difficult to lug a trash can the entire way there, but you're the only person I can count on! Ryu:   At the edge of town, the concerned guard stops us! Oh no! What do we tell him?! (This is a joke prompt. You guys can pick whatever you want. This just happened to be a convenient time to break for now). Look forward to more very soon! |
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Come visit me and my thought processes at my website: http://www.publishedauthors.net/tdotdw/news.html "In the cold light, justice and morality always look corny and you can't wave the flag and look cool. But like it or not, society needs its heroes." - John Hart; actor who played The Lone Ranger. | |
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9:04 AM Dec 3
