toxicitizen

Ah ok, I thought maybe that was it. I definitely missed a quest then because the last time I saw him Looking forward to my Nightmare replay with a guide to get absolutely everything but right now the priority is FFXV, which I should be starting today. Hahaha, no worries. I'm just glad there's another Trails fanatic on here to lose my mind with. And yeah, I ran into that stuff while looking at a trophy guide. All the more reason to be looking forward to NG+. I vaguely remember also hearing about some (plot important) NG+ exclusive quest/event but that might actually be it.

People said this about CSI but I just played normally and found myself mildly challenged. I didn't try to break it and it seemed fine. In CSII, I read about the, uh... peculiar way the game rolls for AT Delays and decided to give everyone quartz(es?) for it. You have no fucking idea how many battles I just spent wailing on the enemies non-stop with them getting only a single turn in, if even that lol. And Rean might as well have cheats on with the way he generates CP. His starting master quartz + some gladiator gear = unleash his S-Craft and the kills almost fill him all the way back to 100 lol. Which one is that? I have no idea what you mean by that but I'm sure I missed a few.

The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel II I already posted some thoughts in the Falcom thread, so I'll keep this brief. The story wasn't quite what I was hoping it would be but overall it was a pretty solid sequel and even had a few plot twists that make me very excited for Cold Steel III. Now I just need XSEED to announce it soon. Like, real soon. Oh and Crossbell, too. Definitely need Crossbell. Any day now, they'll announce both...

edit: Game complete, epilogue and all. Man, that last dungeon was... not the best. Kinda felt like padding, really.

Oh, fuck my life... Yeah, I feel like the game left quite a few things unexplained. It was one of my main issues with the story, tbh. I can kinda see why people assumed ahead of time that there would be a Sen III, but if I had played II before knowing it officially I would've been equal parts confused and annoyed. This has not been as neat of a wrap-up as SC was. But hey, sounds like I still got more to go so it's too early to get into all this, I guess!

Yeah, that was a lot of bombshells to drop all at once. I spent the entire game being mildly disappointed by the story and thinking how much I wanted Crossbell way more than Cold Steel III but now I'm not so sure anymore... Also ffs, will this game ever end?! I was expecting to finish it earlier this evening but it just keeps on going and going an ugh... I imagine there's no more than an hour or so left but it's way too late to get into it. Gonna have to wait until tomorrow... So much for finishing it in time for FFXV tomorrow lol. I was supposed to watch Kingsglaive tonight, damnit!

Okay, haven't quite finished the game but I had to alt-tab out to post because I'm freaking the fuck out right now! (hugest fucking spoiler) I actually stood up from my chair. I don't think I've reacted this strongly to a plot twist/reveal since Lost. Hoooooly shit! edit 2:

Interesting! I'm not quite done with it yet but I'm at the very end of Act 2 (just about to leave for the final mission) and so far the story has been a bit of a disappointment for me. Now you're getting my hopes up for the final stretch.

Alright, cool. It's on Netflix and that Brotherhood anime is on Crunchyroll, so I might as well watch both this week-end anyway. Game's pre-loading right now. As much as I know to keep my expectations low (especially based on the demo and, you know, it being a modern S-E game), I can't help but be excited to finally play it. At the very least, it couldn't possibly be worse than FFXIII. And I actually like FFXIII.

So, I tried the demo and yeah, it ran a little better than the benchmark. I was even able to turn some things higher than standard settings without too much of a performance hit. Also, a question for those that played the game. The demo is basically Chapter 1 of the game and at some point there's a cutscene about the shit going down in Insomnia (right before they find out about its fall and decide to turn back) that seems so fucking rushed and incomprehensible. I'm assuming that I need to watch the Kingsglaive movie to understand what that was about? I remember reading that a lot of stuff from trailers ended up just not being in the game but some of those shots seemed way too intricate to be intended solely for this rushed montage that barely means anything.

I thought the same thing!!! Even if we're way off, I really fucking love how this series constantly makes you connect these kinds of dots. There's also been an off-hand mention of (small spoiler from the 3rd) Also, and this isn't a spoiler but I'll tag it just in case. Did you make the connection of who Toval is?

Yeah, some boss fights have special conditions for bonus AP. Falcom really need to cut that shit out because it's super obnoxious how some stuff is basically impossible to find without a guide. I refuse to use one for fear of spoilers, so I'm just not worrying about that stuff on this run. So if there's a hidden quest that requires me to talk to a certain NPC at a very specific time to trigger it then that quest can go fuck itself. I mean, I'll talk to people within reason but I'm not going to hunt down every single little asshole hiding in every building. Ain't nobody got time for that. Thank god for turbo mode because otherwise I don't think I'd have the heart to bother with NG+ and achievement hunting. I still find it funny that I was able to clear NG+ Nightmare in ~10h for CSI lol.

So, I finished Act 1 this afternoon and did the intermission tonight. I'm at the beginning of Act 2 now and, while Act 1 was basically as formulaic as CSI, it's already obvious that Act 2 drastically changes up the usual Trails formula. Almost feels like Act 1 was the actual prologue and the real CSII is starting now, which really makes me wonder how long it'll be because Act 1 felt way too short to be half the game. Based on my in-game playtime, I'd say I'm no more than a third of the way through going by the usual length of these games. Then again, this is my first playthrough so I'm not following any kind of guide. I'm trying to complete all the quests but it's pretty obvious I'm gonna miss some unless I talk to literally everyone constantly and yeah, I'm not doing that lol. I love me some Falcom NPCs but that shit gets real tedious after 20+ hours.

I discovered a few really good channels over the last year, so I figured a few were worth sharing here. Binging with Babish: A friend of mine got me into cooking channels and this is the most fun one. He mainly recreates dishes from TV shows and movies but also recently started a series about cooking basics, which has been pretty interesting so far. Mother's Basement: This is mainly an anime channel with his bread and butter being analyzing OPs and shitting on Sword Art Online. He does the occasional gaming video, though. I initially discovered him because of one he did on Trails in the Sky, which I'm pretty sure I posted before but fuck it, here it is again. Internet Comment Etiquette with Erik: This is pretty much just a comedy channel about trolling comment sections but it's honestly way more entertaining than it sounds. It's probably my favorite out of all the channels I've started following recently. He mostly does YouTube comments but occasionally he'll venture out to PornHub or Yahoo Answers and the results are always amazing. And finally, L.A. Beast: I didn't think to post this one last time because I don't really follow it myself so much as a friend of mine links me his videos whenever they come out. He mostly does eating challenges (and got some genuine Guinness records recently) but the real fun happens when he does incredibly stupid shit. Like drinking a 20 year old bottle of Crystal Pepsi, drinking a 24 year old Ecto Cooler juice box or doing highly questionable "science experiments".

I really should revisit Bastion someday. I remember enjoying it but not really seeing what it was that made everyone cream themselves so hard over it. Transistor is my favorite of theirs by far, I played it at launch and thoroughly enjoyed it. I started Pyre a couple weeks back but it didn't really grab me. I should get back to it but right now I'm not interested in anything that's not called Trails. Their soundtracks are always amazing, though. At this point, if I was to pre-order their next game I'd just blindly get the edition that comes with the soundtrack.

Ah ok, that makes more sense. But still, swimsuit Alisa is almost the last fucking thing I'd want for a Trails figurine lol, and I say this as someone that actually likes Alisa as a character. Gimme someone awesome like Olivert, Sara or Sharon.

Why does it look like an untextured 3D model? Is that some kind of preview render or is that the actual figurine? Because if it's the latter, yikes...

There is one shadow setting that's more demanding than the others, that's the first thing I'd turn off if you're getting drops. Just had a peek at the launcher and I think it's PCSS for shadow filtering. Durante also pushed out the first patch today, which addressed a crashing issue related to accessories. As for me, I just made it to the exact part where I had stopped playing on Vita. So the real fun starts now!

I think that's a good price for Tokyo Xanadu. I've written my early/mid-game thoughts of it on page 6 of this thread and my overall thoughts in the games you beat thread, if you're interested. It's not as good as Trails but it's probably the best way to kill time while you wait for Cold Steel III and Ys VIII.

Durante blog for Cold Steel 2. Shorter and not as detailed but only because he's not repeating the stuff he already covered for CS1. Hopefully this isn't the last Durante port we'll get to play because, while I know not to expect this kind of quality from most ports, it is really fucking nice (especially for Trails). Going into Cold Steel 2, I can't help but notice how much nicer the characters looked in Tokyo Xanadu and, while that port was pretty serviceable, having some of Durante's improvements would've be pretty damn nice for it. And let's not even talk about Ys VIII... Gotta believe he'll be back for Cold Steel 3 and 4!

Today is Trails day, therefore today is best day. Last year, Trails day occurred bi-annually. Let us hope it happens again this year!

What can I say? I finished the other two and I needed more. Don't know what I'll do after this one, though. There's two more books available on Amazon but they're both short story compilations, which I find less interesting. I'll definitely get them eventually but they're likely to include some of the stories the anime is adapting, so I'll probably wait until it's over to avoid "spoiling" it.

Is the story essentially over at that point or is it retarded like Arkham Knight where you need to do all the tedious post-game shit to get the real ending?

Yep, now we wait until E3 to see if XSEED announce it. Some of their Steam anouncements looked neat. People on ERA seemed hyped for that Coven game, so it might be worth a look. Kinda surprised at no Disgaea PC announcement, though. We know D5 was rated for PC a while back, so I wonder what the hold up is. Would be annoying if they stopped at 2...