LadyCrimson

Oh gawd ...

Am I boring everyone yet? I've reached a point where most screencaps are spoilers, anyway - so here's a different picture for you. A character is in there somewhere, can you see him? Additional: story started feeling too "serious" so I took off all the bunny/ears and things. I was also tired of never seeing the young mage's eyes in cutscenes so I gave her a different pair of glasses. Pretty! Fire always makes things better.

It is. A trend. I try to be patient but it's starting to be a tad annoying, because almost none of it feels important to furthering plot or chr. arcs, at least not for me. I'm clicking thru most skits faster and faster and faster ... Death Stranding had some super long cutscenes and things but at least they were intriguing sometimes...Tales of Arise writing is just long, dry repetition. Male lead is particularly one-note. I won't explain but ... sigh. ...my husbando makes it worth it tho. ...and the environments keep getting prettier/better. I just wish some of the areas were a little bigger. Don't need "open world" or huge, just ... a little bigger.

I post this not so much because I'm all that enamored of the song (or band) but ... I guess they've really become some kind of global phenomenon. After "Dynamite" they appear to be moving towards making most of their songs sung in English. Which, as a non-Korean speaker, I find a little less charming (and I still have a hard time understanding some of their English spoken singing). But ... supposedly they're the first band since the Beatles to have 3 albums reach #1 on Billboard in a year. Special UN Assembly envoy for the S. Korean President (edit: re: Sustainable Development Goals). Billions of YT views. They've been around long enough now that most of their members are in their late 20's. The power of youthful fans - and social/internet media access - can be a powerful thing. And I think it's a good thing. Music, as it can/does, bringing the world together on global scale. I can dig it.

^ While I'm all for making sure contracts are legally honored/full-filled/one isn't being purposely ripped off etc, I still yet always have a little bit of a hard time being very sympathetic to someone who made 20 million wanting another 50 million so desperately they'll hire mega expensive lawyers and sue. Nothing against her in a big sense, I don't live in that world after all, thus I will never understand it - and perhaps it's also because if I made 20+ million (even with the tax bite) on top of any other excess funds/savings from previous works, I would have said "nice knowing ya all, I'm retired from this fame-game now, bye." ...but that's probably why I'm not famous.

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!