LadyCrimson

I have decided. Hootle is the best character in the game. a master actor of expressive feeling ... a shoo-in for the Owl Academy Awards. Still haven't controlled her. I just switch to take scenic pics sometimes. You will get knocked through the air and onto your backside, often. The beachwear DLC outfit for my husbando was also worth it. Hey, there's a bikini DLC for the shield-woman, so fair play. Thanks, Bandai Namco. Can't tell if Rinwell's grin = appreciation or mocking laughter.

Yeah those Fetishes were super annoying, especially if a crunchy sorceress. On the other hand. teleport let me avoid them a lot of time. Those Act 2 tomb guys who raised the dead or summoned skeletons or something could be a serious PITA too if you didn't kill them fast enough. Actually, thinking back on it, I think I liked Act1 the best, then Act 4, then Act5. The only reason one went back to Act3 was to farm Mephisto over and over and over and ... honestly the main appeal for me re: Diablo games was starting completely over from lvl1 and the loot hunt. Which was sort of missing in D3 - loot just wasn't as fun, stats/uniques/sets etc wise, imo.

Act 2 was always the least interesting Act, outside of Hardfore Chr. Killer Mr. Duriel. I would almost never go back to it/farm there with high level characters. I haven't bothered yet because honestly I played D2 for 3-4 years, maybe 4k-5k hours. The remake looks good and more stash sounds nice (although I had D2 mods that allowed that in single-player anyway) but I have a feeling after an hour admiring the new look and any QoL changes, I'd stop caring. Perhaps one rainy day. Tales of Arise: progressed story. There was this huge segment (20-30 minutes?) of nothing but dialogue cutscenes and skits, all mandatory or auto-triggered. One after another after another. That's a bit much. I hope that's not the start of a trend, but oh well whatever. I still love the action/environment etc. so I can put up with it until post-game anyway. They weren't all boring, but again the general writing style doesn't really work for me. They're either preaching or giving each other inspirational "you/we can do it!" speeches or something and because they go on for far too long I sorta fall asleep.

Spent most of the day first grabbing video stills from then editing/compressing game videos, because apparently the difference between recording in constant 3-12 minute bursts in high-quality 4k all the time vs. using 1440 (what I'd usually do) = sucking up 1.5-2TB of space in no time. Oh sure, the disk I record to started with 3TB free, but every 2-3 days you still gotta clean house before it gets out of hand. I hate losing quality tho. Edit: every video taking 20-40 minutes to render drives one batty too. Hurry up! eg, I need an 8TB disk...although, that might not be enough either. Do they have 64TB disks yet?

The problem with being a caster who has to stand still for a long time to cast some spells.... ...is that sometimes they catch up to you. JRPG's - the place to get all your culinary advice. Maybe because of all the chaos but I didn't notice at first that these things weren't just a strangely shaped, singular creature. Now that I've noticed, they're kind of cute. I suppose I need to play the dedicated mage someday (figure in the lower-center). Only one I haven't tried as combat leader yet. I'm not that fond of her character (outside of her owl), so I sort of avoid her...her spells are nice, but I prefer having two who can damage and heal, so I don't really need her.

*yawns, blinks blearily* ...two artes at 4 star, several at three star, a smattering at 2 star. ...5.5 chr. levels gained (not a lot considering the hours spent), meaning I'm a bit over-leveled for where I am, now. ...player's combat ability/understanding improved a lot from pure repetition. Still totally suck at evading, but have figured out pulling only r-trigger makes chr. spin to one side a bit to avoid, so that helped (no two-button/two hand pressing). ...upped difficulty to Moderate (there's Story, Normal, Moderate, Hard - 1 other I forget) and can now auto-combat defeat some stronger special enemies. Which is great when you want to video record stuff with the HUD disabled. ...time to progress story a little further. ...having all the party members increases their humor/personality interactions, making them all feel a bit more "there". Yup, maybe it took a little while to seriously warm up to it, but I'm lovin' this game. Still nowhere near as much silly fun as FFXV but it still hits my obsessive-brain.

Yeah, especially when you're just playing on "normal." I'm not even quite half-way through the main story yet I think. But I'm a stubborn jack--- and I am going to get all my fave artes to star-3 or 4 at least, darnit. I spent days and days and days killing that giant damage impervious mech in FFXV so I could have 6+ of the top accessory (on console no less) and this game's grind will not defeat me! Besides, I have the perfect spot for farming skills on mobs over and over. (you don't get much XP btw for repeated farming, purely about lvling those artes...). edit: on the bright side, all the things mobs drops is making me 'rich.'

I finally realized that yeah, those artes (skills, spells) all my chrs are using level up. There are five star rankings. To get a new star the chr. has to use the specific arte a certain number of times, ever increasing (100, 500, 1000, 2000 etc). Increases damage, occasionally unlocks a new arte or an improved version of the arte. But the AI is terrible about this, even if you uncheck most of them so it can only pick from/use a few. Thus I spent the last two days controlling the two chrs. I like to be "leader" (I control them) trying to manually spam-fight mobs just to raise 4 or 5 each of their skills. One skill or skill combo, done over and over and over and over. Ffffffffffffffffffff....it's definitely faster than the Ai would ever do, but still takes forever, especially spells with longer delays. Plus it's boring...got a few to three stars at least. I guess 5 star in many skills for all the characters would be an end-game grind. Maybe I could try using only two in the party so enemies wouldn't die as fast/you could spam more attacks each combat...

Attack animation picture spam! Not combat or a party character but ... ... the samurai outfit DLC for my husbando was worth it, far as I'm concerned.

(You'll have to imagine everything overlapping each other constantly+loud sound effects, sometimes drowning each other out...) It's on! You're mine! Out of our way! Elusive Deity! Rotating Piledriver! This ends now! Rising Phoenix! Annialhation! Death Bolt! Stalagmite! Resonate with the Earth! Stalagmite! Resonate with the Earth! Stay away from my friends! Hold nothing back! Azure Storm! A thrilling performance! Raging Lunar Storm! Gemini Aqua! Flame of Fury! Benediction Light. Shine, Radiant Light. Demon Fang! Double Demon Fang! Demon Fang! Double Demon Fang! Armor won't save you! Crush! Another incantation ruined. (casting interrupted) I'm such a failure. (KO'd/dying) Magma Ray! ... Back into the fray. I'll bring you back from deaths abyss. (resurrection spell) Talon Hurricane! Now I'm in the groove! Catapult! Searing Flame! I never miss! Tempest! Now I'm real mad! Swallow Blade! Eat this! Regeneration! Regenerate! I won't lose, not now, not ever. Rising Wyvern! Mirage! I'll grind you into dust! Devastation! Swallow Dance! I'll tear you apart! Elusive Deity! Rotating Piledriver! Behold! The Earth's Pulse! Tectonic Vision! (special big attack) (....I don't think I've ever played a game with so much constant audio "noise" in 90-120 second fights, it's like being in a small room full of people trying to outshout each other - wonder if I'll think other games are too darn quiet, now) Re: the game itself, currently amusing myself with grinding for a few chr. levels and some crafting material as a break from just plowing through the linear plot.

Well, Keto has helped with "brain fog" feelings but I still feel like my brain is not the same. Basically almost falling into coma last year etc, I just feel slower, much more forgetful, unable to concentrate/stay on track, lose train of thoughts, sometimes even not making real sense while trying to converse, mental tasks that were easy take longer to focus/finish, blah blah. Those days right after getting out of hospital hubby said he was worried I wasn't going to recover in that sense at all, so it must've been pretty bad those first days home. I mean, on the surface I'd probably seem fine/normal "aging" to folks but y'know, spouses know you. Anyway ... I was never a genius, I'm far better than then, now, I don't think it's getting worse, and I'm not saying I'm at Joe Biden levels, but it's a little distressing to notice. (edit) Like when I'm simply paying bills online and I'm staring at the webpage for way too long with papers in hand without typing anything before I realize I'm still sitting there doing nothing, as if I don't recognize initial intention/what I'm doing). That all said ... apparently the parts of the brain that allow one to obsess on simple tasks like ... a game you're enjoying ... seems fairly unimpeded (I just can't handle "mastering" combat anymore...) So I think I'll go do that some more.

I started to sort of ... not ignore, but look at less, if that makes sense ... GoG when I noticed that they no longer let you download all the past patches/versions of their games (straight from website browser version of Library), without Galaxy, or contacting support. Nothing against Galaxy, mind, but when a company removes an ability to (seemingly) try and encourage you to use something they want to promote (a client), I sort of just ... I dunno, it makes me wonder what direction they'll end up going. I've always wondered how profitable GoG could be in the long run (newer indies probably help, ofc). I can easily see them selling/being bought by some big company (like MS/Google/whoever....) at some point, or in the very long just becoming yet another game client/storefront, except they'll have a "DRM-free" listing section. The issue of things like Gamepass or even streaming gaming that could become a big wave of future could make an only 'drm free/offline installers' storefront even more problematic/less profitable to maintain. I'm honestly surprised at times GoG has lasted this long. I mean, I'm hoping they'll stay bucking the trends but I dunno.

Tales of Arise: ---story from the start/for some long hours...predictable but serviceable as a container, but I wasn't loving the overall writing style and it wasn't making me feel anything or curious about anyone/thing, really. ---then suddenly ... wham. That took a bit of a turn. Still predictable, mind. But some good sequences helped a lot. I'm now invested! Well, more than before anyway. And at least am now much more curious about a few things. ---some of the skits are returning to humor and amusing characterization stuff. Not a lot, still mostly repetition or lore dumping, but that also helps. ---it was nice to leave the brown and blue/white of desert/snow behind.

Got everyone, now. This is a common pic capture but the costumes (and ears) are mine! The guy with red hair is now my husbando. Especially after I put those glasses on him. Sadly can only have 4 active at once (although inactive ones still show up in the special animated Strikes). Trying to figure out what combo I like. I asked hubby which of four pics that he liked better. He said with exasperation "I dunno/whatever, she's a cartoon." Dear hubby, my husbando would like a word with you! Pfft, my man's no fun/no help. So this one, then.

Tales of Arise: Well, that 2nd big bad was that ramp up I was expecting. I mean, sure, if you've largely mastered the button-mashing/timing/speed/evading and visual/noise chaos of "wtf is happening?!" and all of that I'm sure it's not the worst, so don't get me wrong here. But if you're a lazy fart like me...haha. Huge sponges, one-shotting - typical battle of mega-attrition, consumable use (AI likes to eat all those up if you let them, btw) etc. That said, still liking the general game. Maybe I just like collecting things/finding all the lootz. ---there are cats in the gameworld, and somewhat prominent at one point. This makes the game score in my head automatically go up by at least half a point. ---so far most the side-quests are no better than the ones in FFXV. "Kill things threatening my farm," very simple things. But at least you often get skill points or recipes or outfit recolors for doing them. ---said side quests can pop up in previous areas later, so check those maps for the icons occasionally. ---some things are poorly explained, like accessory crafting/upgrading. I had to look it up. And for some reason I didn't realize herb affects were permanent until I read it somewhere. I guess I should use those, then >.>

^ I'm going to assume there is likely a bunch of Mishy plushies out there. I want one.

In case anyone is wondering, I have been avoiding major spoiler pics. Hence mostly chr/scenery. ...that's probably enough picture-spam from me for one week tho. I want to get farther into the game faster.

Tales of Arise: ---Got my 4th party member, Law. He's a hands/feet melee guy. He seems to kick butt and now the party feels more balanced. ---there sure are a lot of loading screens for entering small areas. It's fine on SSD but sometimes it feels like every 10 seconds you're running thru one. ---Some attack moves require two simultaneous button presses, which is hard on my arthritic thumbs. So I finally looked at some combat option menus. Saw default overall combat-style was on "Semi-Auto". There was also Manual and Full Auto. Hm...what is full auto, I wondered? Is it ... what it sounds like? Set it to that. My leader charged into battle by himself...I only had to sit and watch, mostly. Camera still focused on 'leader' but I could move the camera more freely, see everything from different angles, finally notice what the other party members were doing. I started to laugh. I fired up WeMod and toggled unlimited CP/AP (eg mana, action-points, similar), toggled the no-HUD mod I have, and proceeded to run through the next section in this full-auto combat mode. I laughed like a loon, every single time. For some reason it was utterly hilarious to me and I was delighted. A game where I don't have to do anything! Perfect!

Became slightly fed up with HUD and downloaded the Nexus mod to toggle it on/off. It also removes game menu elements, hence toggling it constantly, or only off when you want screens/videos. Anyway, combat is still visual chaos but at least you can get a few combat animation shots now and then without the GIANT TEXT of skill name plastered over them. Or the mini-map. Or ... But without a photomode, normal combat stuff is mostly dull to screen (plus I'd have to cheat hard so I could observe it). Too far away, not visceral enough for me. Mostly they'd look like below, and that's taking stills from sifting thru 4k video frame by frame. Oh well, plenty of nice scenery and stuff here and there, instead!

Wait, there's a new one? .... oh, a sub-channel. Based on clips doesn't seem like it'd be any better than the old one, just prettier. One of those books that I think will never be able to filmed, any medium. Well, maybe a 60 episode animation could. Maybe. I love Greg Kinnear but I can't personally picture him as Glenn Bateman at all, even after watching a few clips. Ray Walston was one of the few things about that 90's series that was perfect imo (also Gary Sinise).

I want my own owl. Also: The enemy might be in there somewhere. Yeah, I'm cherry-picking one second of a moment, but it's one of those "really busy" combat UI/effects graphics, along with a constantly moving camera and often short FoV/PoV. The gals are both ranged and they're constantly tossing big-effect spells/attacks on top as well as any "big" enemy ones. It looks cool, don't get me wrong, but it's pretty visually chaotic, even more than FFXV was, imo. Sometimes feels like I'm just mashing buttonsy hoping I'm hitting something. Maybe it'd be better to play one of the gals and stand back, and let AI control the melee. But I like playing Alphen. I think you can tell the AI to not use certain attacks if you want (like flashy ones) but haven't played with that stuff yet.

I've rewatched this several times and it gets funnier to me every time. William Shatner's self-aware straight-faced humor/trolling (or whatever you want to call it) always cracks me up. I can't believe he's 90. Live long(er) and (continue to) prosper, dude.

Tales of Arise: Reached the point where I get a third party member, so still fairly early I think. Still overall/casually enjoying the game. Couple "not seriously negative but not overly positive" observations: ---at first I liked the skits. But there are so many of them and I keep playing them thinking I might miss something "good." (some you cannot choose when to play, they are triggered by events instead) More and more they feel a little like info-dumps vs.interesting convo's with campy vitality. So now I read quickly and click thru faster, not waiting for the VA's. It's not that I dislike them - it's just there's too many/too long winded for me. ---on Normal difficulty, early combat becomes too easy too fast. You don't even have to bother with dodging/evading. Which doesn't really bother me in my "old age" ways, but it makes me feel like I'm still in tutorial mode and thus I'm afraid to up the difficulty, certain that the next "act boss" is going to 3 second whomp me without warning as a "here's the REAL combat, don't you wish you'd spent time mastering that dodging/evading!" taunt. To balance that out: ---I have yet to feel a need to "grind" for anything, just to keep going/do the few early weapon upgrades, so that's nice such doesn't feel required. Seems well balanced in that regard. ---I really do like the graphical look (well, most of the time). It's not cutting-edge super high fidelity but that sorta cell-shading or watercolor softness or whatever it is, is pleasing. ---the owls, man, the owls. Must...find...all the owls.

Just showing some scenery. Also, you can switch "party leader" at any time, meaning that's the one you control/skillset you use in combat and will see while running around. eg, you don't always have to be staring at only one character's behind outfit.