Oh, Right, I'm Back

In the excitement of having fully-functional internet and being able to actually use it and play games with it and the like, combined with the excitement of there being all sorts of news flying about, I never really made a "Hey, I'm back and stable" post.  Though, to be fair, I did not to jynx myself by making one since I was convinced something would wreck right after such a declaration as that is how things tend to work out.  And to further being fair, tomorrow is kind of a big deal to have internet which leaves it as prime "Murphy's Law" territory for my net shitting the bed for absolutely no reason.  Or, you know, any of a dozen other issues.  Basically, I'm just saying that it's Spring and shit happens in Spring to drive me even -more- crazy than I am dealing with the fucking heat and allergies.

Still, it's worth it to bring up that I was gone, I am back now, and I have things I can marginally discuss for now, likely to further elaborate on in the future.  Since, thankfully, I was not forced to be idle during my internet break despite, you know, not having internet whatsoever in the grand scheme of things.  My games all still worked (which I hope to hell won't become a 'Novel Concept' in the next decade) so it was simply a matter of playing them without the luxury of being able to look up a single bit of information on them (which...was honestly and unfortunately harder than you might think).  I did have the net for the majority of one day which was spent mostly as a waste which I will describe below, but that night saw its demise and plunged me definitively into the 90s existence.

I want to get into that one day with internet before anything else, however, to explain the friggin' comedy of errors that day took.  As I stated previously, I have a copy of Deadly Premonition:  Director's Cut and I was slightly worried about the framerate and such when I started hearing complaints throughout the internet of it, but I had a relatively cool day and decided it was prudent to throw the game in and give it a shot.  So my thought process was basically thus:  The game came with Pre-Order DLC, that means a Day One patch to include it, right?  That is the case in 99% of situations, so I prepared myself for this scenario.  I tried to open the Store and it claimed that there was a system update.  Fair enough, I initiated it and let it run and install with no issue.  So I try to open the Store again only to find there's an update for the Store.  Which is pretty frustrating but I would be alright with it if it improved the Store's performance.  (Spoiler alert:  It doesn't.)  Regardless, that downloads and installs and I am then afforded the opportunity to download my Espresso Suit DLC which I had assumed was...more than just that.  (I don't think it is.)

So, I downloaded the DLC and installed it, since that usually works, and was more than ready to download yet another update, this time for the actual game that this whole endeavor was centered around.  Yet, when I put the game in and started it up there was no such update that occurred, only a message telling me the Game Data was incompatible and to delete it and try again.  That confused me, but I did it anyway (The DLC created Game Data, of course) and tried again.  This time it tells me there's not enough HDD space for the Install.  Urgh.  Deciding that I can live without a few choice Game Datas for games that have even bigger patches waiting for them, I go into the game one final time and let it install.  That works.  I exit, re-download my DLC, load the game again to make sure it's compatible and it is.  Thereafter, I was more than able to play the game with the realization that I was also more than able to do so at any point in the two hours spent doing all of the above because there was no game update.

I....didn't play Deadly Premonition that day.  Though I did play it a couple days later and am happy to report that, aside from one of the hub areas, issues with framerates don't seem that bad whatsoever.  Now I just need cooler weather or a cooler environment to actually resume playing the damn thing.

As is likely obvious from the screenshot at the top of the post, I also put a good bit of time into Soul Sacrifice and have come around to seeing why some people don't like it.  It's not to say that I'm starting to enjoy it any less, but rather that I feel like my enjoyment has reached its peak and will remain a constant which, in a sense, will bring it down.  I've reached the point of the game where it's only going to get exponentially harder with every leap, as it likely assumes I'm spending the time that I'm spending grinding up Offerings (and Levels in the meantime), but grinding up Offerings....well, it gets a little rough after a while.  Especially when you're playing a Glass Cannon since you either bring along allies and merely suffer getting smacked around (thankfully for no damage) by their AOE attacks that they love to spam, or leaving the allies at home and potentially losing a 10-minute battle because of a cheap shot.

The problem is that, I'm at an area where the second-tier of spells is the normal expectancy, and getting those buffed up is not nearly as simple as it was for the first-tier since getting second-tier when you don't have a recipe means involving a lot of first-tier.  Using the above picture as an example - that's the second-tier Ice Arrow skill.  Without a fusion recipe, I can still get more Ice Arrow (M) spells because I got that one from boosting Ice Arrow (S) a bunch.  And by a bunch, I mean four levels.  Which means getting two to boost to One-star, getting two One-Stars to Boost to Two-Stars, getting two Two-Stars to boost to Three-Stars and finally getting two Three-Stars to boost to (M).  Shit is exponential.  That is sixteen Ice Arrow (S) for one Ice Arrow (M).  Which means thirty-two for a One-Star Ice Arrow (M).  It's honestly just must simpler, of course, to find a level that offers the damn spell, or to stumble across the fusion recipe, but, well, both of those require treadings into areas where I should already have the spell and it gets all contradictory there.

Still, the actual game part is still fun, which is what matters of course.  It's just that I feel myself getting more into the thought-process of playing the game rather than just playing it, which is the trap I fell into with Disgaea 3.  Though, to be fair, you have to do that with Disgaea if you plan on doing anything but stumbling your way through the lackluster main story.  Still, just because the things you have to do to conquer even little parts of the 'bonus' content (which is lined up, in my case, as the epilogue to the game and doesn't read as 'bonus' to me whatsoever) are 'extra', that doesn't mean you can do whatever the hell you want with them.  Which is something I've been meaning to bitch about, but haven't gotten quite around to it just yet.

I've talked a few times about The horrors of Mushroom Baal and the horrible grind to get close to his level, but something I've really failed to break-down here is the actual context of what's going on here.  Mushroom Baal is the last fight of the epilogue which is basically just a lot of fan-wanking as you fight a bunch of characters from the game and games previous who have 'lost' something to a 'mysterious' Overlord.  As an example of that, the last fight before Mushroom Baal is Laharl, Etna and Flonne along with a field of crazy prinny soldier things.  Without exaggeration, I could throw Dinah as she is into that fight all by herself and she would win it.  Laharl and Co. are somewhere in the Effective Level of 2000-3000 and honestly are not all that impressive.  Dinah is, of course, Effective Level 9999, but her Sum Level is 30,000 and change.  As you've seen, she comes nowhere close to the Effective Level 4000 Mushroom Baal that has 1.2 Million ATK and is the fight directly after Laharl/Etna/Flonne.  I want to make that clear.  You have normal battles against previous characters like Axel and the mentioned trio and then immediately after, NIS just decides to punch you straight in the dick with a character that you cannot kill unless you've been grinding like a motherfucker.

It is further compounded by the issues that have summarily sprung up from my plans to just raise a really good Majin for Dinah to eat for an all-around boost of no small quantity and the Evilties that come along with that.  Majins, as I have stated in the past, simply require more Experience to level up.  Why this is is entirely beyond me because restricting them strictly because they get good Evilties seems a little overboard, but at the same time, the Evilties are literally all the Majins have.  Their stats being overall the same is nice, but unless you buff them with Class World and feed them someone for weapon skills, they're not going to be useful except for in the most specific of circumstances.  There is a lot of work to put into a Majin to make it 'good' even if it didn't have the EXP restriction.  With that, it's just fucking ridiculous.  I mean, I guess the benefit of an automatic 50% boost to all stats because of an Evilty is pretty crazy, but not fifty-hours-just-making-this-asshole-useful crazy.  When all that's going to happen is that he'll end up getting eaten by Dianh for about 100,000 (MAYBE) stat points (in full, not counting HP/SP and distributed between the stats) to be added to her well, and getting the Evilties she so needs.  And I will still have grinding to do to bring Dinah up to combat-readiness with Mushroom Baal after that.

There's absolutely no getting around the stupidly long grind either.  Either I grind this method, or I hop into a Legendary Item or Weapon's Item World and do all one hundred floors of it (not counting floors I have to redo because I went into a mystery panel) all so I have the 'privilege' of trying to Reverse Pirate the item for Statisticians who are the innocents that grant you more EXP when on an item that you have equipped and are, of course, a fucking rare spawn.  Reverse Pirating, by the way, requires that I have a Pirate Ship, which I do have, but if I didn't, that would mean...being in the Item World -again- relying on random chance that Pirates will show up on one floor at some point and I can murder them for their ship.  So I do all that for Statisticians and then I go through some sort of dupe thing with a particular weapon for more of that or something (which I will have to Item World beforehand) all just so I can grind my Majin more, hoping that the statisticians bring him up to normal, if not better, EXP gains.  It's one of those things that helps in the long run, of course, since it means free EXP for anyone when I'm specifically grinding them since I can just give them the item or move the innocents, but it's so fucking monotonous that it's not worth it.

And I cannot....cannot stress enough that this is not even the biggest fucking challenge of the game, this Mushroom Baal fight.  Because it's not the Land of Carnage version of the fight.  In which Mushroom Baal has about 20 Million in most stats.  I am not doing that fight for obvious reasons.  The most obvious among them being fuck you, Nippon Ichi Software.

I just wish I was fucking done with this grinding good goddamn

Grab Bag of Gaming Thoughts

Today has just been one of those days.  I sort of floated between four different games today without playing too much of any of them in any real sense, and I'm not exactly sure why.  It's possible that it's a focus issue as that has been something of a problem lately, but it seems more than that.  I may hilariously suggest that I'm restless, having had really nothing to do today which should have been relaxing, yet I fear it had the opposite effect if this is any indication.  Still, I could also blame it on the slight remnants of the foul mood I experienced the other night since it has not completely gone away yet.  Just, y'know...mostly.  Thankfully.  Still, I'm not quite sure -what- it is, other than annoying.

As you can tell above, I played a little more Disgaea 3 on my Vita, perhaps the most time I spent with any game today, and got Dinah up to Level 9999 for the second time in her overall lifespan.  Each and every single one of her stats saw an appreciable upgrade from the last time she was 9999, due not only to the stacking effect of the whole thing, but that I jumped into her Class World the six times that were available to me and raised her base aptitudes through that.  The nice thing of that, of course, is that those Aptitude points are permanent, so the next Level 9999 will see another appreciable boost from not only this round, but the round from the next six times that I'll be able to jump into her Class World after this upcoming reincarnation.  But there is a bit of work to do yet before reincarnating her again.  Perhaps a little too much.

Disgaea 3, or at least the Vita version of it, has an option that allows a character to absorb another one once per incarnation cycle.  (So, between reincarnations, basically).  The limitation is basically that the character absorbed cannot be higher than the Sum Level of the character doing the absorbing.  So no making a level 9999 character and having a Level 1 absorb it.  Nor reincarnating a level 9999 to 1 to have a Level 1 absorb it (since the Sum Level is what matters - that reincarnated Level 1 is not, in fact, Level 1).  Beyond providing a stat boost, whatever active skills and Evilties equipped by the character stand a chance of being transferred to the character that is doing the absorbing.  So if you have a character that doesn't have a Fist forte, but you really want them to be able to use Big Bang, then just have them absorb a Martial Artist that has the skill equipped.  Bing-bang-boom.  Of course, it sounds a little better than it is.

Really, the only reason to have a character absorb another is for the skills and evilties.  The stats that are gained are a mere 3% (HP/SP excluded) which is both a weird-ass number and totally not worth the effort whatsoever.  Take Dinah, for example.  If I were going to have someone absorb her (which I would never do), the biggest boost they would receive would be 12,487 to ATK, and really, not even that because that's her adjusted stat with equipment.  So let's be lazy and just round it down to 400K because I'm not going to bother removing her equipment just for this kind of thing.  12,000 to a stat might seem like a lot but it's...well, obviously not, considering that came from a stat that was 400,000.  From a character whose Sum level is in five digits.  A character with an unholy amount of time invested into her.  When you consider that one of the post-game bosses has 1.7 Million in a single stat, it's absolutely chump change, and should only be bothered with for the little extra that it will boost your stats for the -next- incarnation.

However, as stated, the Skills and Evilties are the -real- prizes here and when we're talking in terms of this, then the ultimate goal is clear.  You want a Majin.  You want a Majin who makes it to the highest level of the Majin Class and gets high-enough level that it can learn its "Violence" Evilty and you're going to want to equip that and (possibly grind it up to 9999 before you) have your good character absorb it.  Not only do Majin's have the best base stats overall (technically; their aptitudes suck out loud and I imagine they get outclassed in specific stats by other classes, such as Defense by Heavy Knights), but that Evilty in particular is something that you want.  You want it bad.  "Violence", when equipped, cuts down all earned XP by that character by 50%, but raises -all- stats by 50%.  So, say you have your character grinded up to level 9999 already - you don't need XP, so slap that on and BAM, 50% stat boost right fucking there on top of the bump you'll have gotten from the Majin's stats.  Which, again will only be a slight bump, but it'll be amplified by Violence.

The other Majin Evilties are nothing to scoff at either.  One Man Army buffs the character's stats by 100% if it's the only unit that is available on the map and cannot be reinforced.  (So either nine other characters have been dispatched and killed, or the Base Panel has been disabled)  Revival states that, if the character's HP is under 25% at the end of a turn, it'll be raised back to full before the next turn.  And finally, Vortex sets all Aptitudes to 10%, but gives another 100% Stat Boost, which I'm not quite sure how that evens out on the positive side, but apparently it does.  The issue with Majins, beyond their abysmal Aptitudes (first-tier class has straight 65%s and the Top-Tier only has 85%s, minus Class World buffs) is that they have no Weapon Fortes so they can't learn any weapon-specific skills normally, they have shitty movement range, and I swear that they only earn 50% of XP normally.  Perhaps it's because my Majin has to kill everything single-handed that it feels like it's taking forever, but I'm almost certain that he's not gaining levels at the same gait as everything else.

Still, this can be remedied by the absorbtion method as well, really.  Make a character that can learn the attacks you want (basically a female Martial Artist.  Precision means you'll always be able to heal unless you don't keep up on it (Precision is a unique skill and can't be transferred, I am a dumb) and Big Bang is the attack you need) and get those things that you want.  Then have the Majin absorb her and slap a fist weapon on him.  Now he can grow a little easier.  Sure, it seems a little silly or perhaps a little meta to have a character that you're raising purely to get absorbed to, in turn, absorb another character, but it's Disgaea.  That is literally the name of the game here.  Well, not literally, because the name of the game is Disgaea, but you know what I mean.

The other game that I did spend a not-so-small amount of time with today was Thomas Was Alone, a game that I not only finally completed, but mopped up the last few trophies it had to offer for the full 100% completion.  Unlike Guacamelee! and Zombie Tycoon 2, Thomas Was Alone does not offer a Platinum trophy which makes sense given the comparatively small amount of game there is to offer, but the point is, if it had one, I would have it right now.  Which is really all that matters, of course.  In terms of trophies, that is, since the point that really matters, I suppose, is that I actually cleared the game, given I wasn't too sure of my chances of toughing out the last section of the game.

Thomas Was Alone is....an experience, I'll say that much.  Mostly because I'm not sure what else to say about it.  The story seems easy enough to follow and I do believe I know where it went for the most part, but there's really no...feedback or anything - you either know it or you don't and if you're like me, and you -think- you know, then you are probably overlooking something.  That's not to say it in a negative fashion, really, though I suppose something like that cannot be wholly positive either.  If anything, I imagine the last chapter is where confusion is going to set in, since the game changes in fundamental, tonal ways with as much build as you can offer in just a short little narration in the levels leading up to it and the levels involved as well.  Which is...not a lot, clearly.

Despite clearing the game, there is actually something left to it that provides a strong case for a full-game replay, which is surprising to me, but at the same time, it's not.  On top of the narration each level receives, there is also Commentary to each level.  As in, developer commentary, I would assume.  I turned the slider up for it on one level, but didn't have my headphones in, so I didn't hear much and it is unfortunately not subtitled, but it was still enough to make me interested.  If nothing else, it made me consider another playthrough with the commentary on just so I could get a little insight into the game and how it was considered and created, and if only because what other game has done this recently?  Seriously, commentary is -brilliant- as the film industry figured out oh so many years ago.  More things should do this.  I'm honestly confused as to why this isn't the norm already.

Regardless of anything, I would have to say that Thomas Was Alone is a game that I appreciate more than I enjoy.  I like the style of it, I like the way it's structured for most of it, I like the characters of it.  There's so much about the game that I like that -isn't- actually playing it, because actually playing it is....secondary.  Or at least it feels that way eventually after the story has become prevalent and enjoyable, because you're less playing to play, and more playing to get to the next level, to be fed the next bit of narration and know what's happening now.  You want to see just how Chris and Laura are getting on.  How Sarah is up to silly antics again.  How Claire still dreams of being a super hero while John seemingly already fancies himself. one.  You want to see what Paul and Grey are doing in the last chapter.  You want to actually have all of this without the need of going through the motions of jumping here and there to get to the next white outline.  So even though the game missed in that aspect, it knocked it out of the park in the others for sure.  We'll just have to see if I do make that second playthrough, really.

wow, I kind of typed a lot for a lazy day today

Huzzah, Relaxation

Today is the day that I've been looking forward to since....well, Tuesday.  Rather, tonight is because tonight is the first time in two weeks where I was and am able to feel the freedom of nothingness.  No obligations to go to bed at a certain time, to schedule this or that, to wake up at a specific time.  No need to keep this and that in mind for tomorrow for work since I don't -have- work tomorrow.  I got to lay down after work today and just let all that seep out and it felt good.  It felt so good that it basically rocked me to sleep as, two hours later, I awoke in a better mood than I even anticipated being in.  It's honestly something that I didn't even know I missed last weekend when I was sick and it's all the sweeter for having been so long, even if I'm not much of a fan of it taking this long to actually have this feeling.

I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do with the weekend per se, but I know that I'm going to be doing a lot of leaving the house (unfortunately), so it's looking like my Vita is getting time regardless.  To be fair, I probably would be playing around with it anyway for reasons that I will get into in a moment, but it sort of takes the questioning out of the equation which spoils it just a tad.  I like to at least pretend I have plans to play my poor, neglected PS3 again so I can jump back into Deus Ex:  Human Revolution, REVENGEANCE, Tomb Raider and/or Nier, or play one of the games that I haven't even started that I've been saying for about two months that I need to start.  But there's always next weekend for that, I suppose, and next weekend, well, I can always say there's the following.  Procrastination is magical like that.

It does have at least a little bit of merit this time around, however, as I do have an over-arching meta-goal in Disgaea 3 Vita that I am going to accomplish.  I have stated several times that Dinah is going to be my Avatar of Extreme and Unyielding Murder JUSTICE and for a little bit, I thought I had seated her on that very position.  Post-game, however, has a bit of arguing on that point to do, and it is convincing to be sure, coming in the form of the ever-difficult Tyrant Overlord Baal.  Not even the super-secret final form, but just the regular reskinned mushroom enemy form.  But as you can see above, my training of Dinah has barely even begun, so it's not especially surprising that I haven't taken him down quite yet.

Oh, I'm sorry, you think I'm kidding?  You look at the above image and see that Dinah is level 9999 and go "But Mogs, just where can you go from here"?  You, my friend, must not know the depths of insanity that Disgaea travels to, and you must not have been paying attention to my previous posts on the subject.  Getting Dinah to level 9999 the first time is a mere accomplishment and notice that I said "The first time" - after I clear out the main story once more, I'm going to reincarnate her back to 1 so I can do the whole thing over again.  And this time, I'll be able to add even more insanity to the proceedings - I'll be visiting Dinah's Class World to pump her up so that her gains over this span of 9998 levels will be that much more inflated....and then I'll reincarnate her again and do it over again.  And again and again.  And again.

I have a -lot- of ground to cover, you see, as Mushroom Baal, at base, has 1.7 million ATK, which you can see easily trumps Dinah's measily 242K ATK, with his Defense roughly in the same lines.  With successive training, reincarnating and Class World visiting, however, Dinah's stats will only get better and better with every iteration of her form, and that's even before I finally step properly into the insanity of the Item World, which is not something I'm relishing even in the slightest.  Yet the benefits will be great for what I'm promised is minimal, but tedious, endeavoring.  Basically when I have conquered Mushroom Baal, I will call my relationship with Disgaea 3 severed, but not a moment before.  Because Baal has issued me a challenge, you see.

And Dinah is going to answer that shit.

seriously, she is going to wipe the fucking floor with Baal when I'm done.  Maybe

Yessssssss, Yessssssssssssss

I'm just doing a quick post tonight since I -was- going to do Dragon Fantasy impressions tonight, but the store isn't going to update and, to pass the time, I've been playing Disgaea 3.  Again.  Even though it is bad for my free time, productivity and sanity.

After an inhumanly terrible slog through Hall of Ordeals 3 (seriously, the map took me 76 turns of absolute fucking tedium involving throwing blocks up a tower and then throwing people so that I could, in turn, have them throw more blocks.  It was immeasurably stupid.), I unlocked Hall of Ordeals 4.  Now, the Hall of Ordeals levels have, at least for Disgaea 2 and, apparently 3, been prime grinding spots and Disgaea 3 puts a damn exclamation point on that shit.  You probably have no idea so allow me to elucidate the facts here as only someone who is obsessed with numbers can.

So, as you can sort of tell from the above screenshot, the map has nine enemies arranged in a 3x3 grid.  This grid just so happens to be on a 3x3 grid of Geotiles that just so happen to give +100% EXP.  And you'll notice that Dinah just so happens to be badass enough to clear that shit in a single attack.  (Specifically a Level 4 Big Bang attack)  The Base level of the enemies here is 400, so this is definitely advanced training grounds but once you get to the stage where you can make use of it....oh man.  It is the best spot you could ask for.

Dinah is currently Level 2400 and she was assuredly around 200 and change levels lower than that when I took the above screenshot.  Because not only does this map give fantastic XP, but it gives it fast.  As I am wont to do, I had it timed from the time I start the map to the time I start it again and, because I have animations turned off, it took ~20 seconds.  Given that I have about 4 or 5 Stronger Enemy Bills passed to raise the level from 400 to 810 currently (and I have 20 ranks of enemy levels to work with), this is something that you can grow -with- your character and it's just....it's amazing.  Three entire clears in a single minute.  I'm averaging around 20 levels a go (which means I need to up the enemy ranks), but even if that were -all- you could hope for, that's 60 levels a minute which means 3600 levels an hour.  Obviously the numbers dip the higher your character gets which means you have to compensate by making them stronger which causes a peak and then another slow descent, but I'm sure you see what this is like.

It's like I'm experiencing another of the true insanities of Disgaea as a series for the first time.

I love it.

seriously this is amazing, she is level 2500 already from the few breaks that I took while writing this

Writing Night Time!

It's one of those awkward nights where I totally want to talk about something, yet there is nothing at all to talk about.  In the wake of the "Always-Online" thing (I refuse to call it "Orthgate"), there just isn't a whole bunch of other news (who would've thought, right?), so that's something I can't really fall-back on.  And while I'm sure you would all be riveted with yet another Disgaea 3 post where I talk about how disgustingly powerful I'm making Dinah (spoilers:  she has reincarnated two more times to the fifth Female Monk iteration and is already level 200-something in that), I'm not really feeling like doing that.  Mostly because I sorely doubt you would all actually be riveted with such a post.  Also because there's not a whole lot -else- to add to it except that playing with "Strongest Enemies" bill passed makes getting XP and Mana easy mode so long as you don't die.  And the not dying part is only hard for a little bit.

Anyways!  Since I have this whole writing project on the side, when I have left-over writing capability, I do stuff with that.  And since I have a lot of that tonight and nothing to use it on -but- the writing project, I'm going to do that.  Though, I suppose I can shed a little light on it instead of just being all cryptic about it whenever I talk about it.  It's not like it's a big thing, just a personal project that evolved from something that should have been relatively simple.  Over-complicating things is kind of something that I do, you see.  Though you probably know that by now!

It was over a year ago when a buddy of mine said "Hey, I'm probably going to be running this Persona-based game" (as in a table-top RPG with mechanics based on the Persona series) "at some distant point in the future and I was wondering if you'd be interested?  It's still way far off, since I've got like two games before it, but still."  And I said, "Yeah, I'd be for that." and proceeded to start dreaming up a character.  Being that I was, back then, attempting to keep my creativity and writing from stagnating, I was prepared to do something that I hadn't done previously (nor have really done a lot since this whole thing started):  I was going to make a girl character.  Taking out all the conversation on -that- particular topic (though you know you played FemShep, don't even get all up on me about RPing as a woman) I thought it would be a good exercise to just try and consider things differently and such.

Over a couple conversations, my character for the game was created - Dinah - and I started trying to think of what she was going to be like.  As you may have already extrapolated from my Disgaea 3 Dinah, the character is not at all a prissy-girl or anything like that.  To be honest, one of her big influences is Kainé, if that tells you anything.  (If not, it tells you that you should be playing Nier)  As part of a sort of character personality litmus test I run with any character I make, I posited the theory that there is something necessary in a building where the only plausible entrance is a locked window.  More cautious or careful characters might try figuring out a way to get the lock out of the equation or carefully remove the glass.  More out-of-the-box characters would insist there's another way in than the window.  Dinah?  Dinah would just remove her tie (part of a school uniform), wrap it around her hand and punch through it.  And then probably make a flourish or sardonic statement.  She's that kind of character.

Those conversations with my buddy who presented the idea and thus the means for this character and world to exist in restarted around this New Year's and, presumably in a little bit of annoyance with how much I insisted on talking about Dinah, he prompted me to just 'write a book or something, geez'.  The idea wasn't abhorrent and, as a character, she needs a backstory anyway.  So I intended to write a backstory.  A backstory turned into a short story that describes her pretty well.  And....a short story turned into something that is going to be like twenty chapters long when all is said and done after the way I've plotted it out and actually started to write it.  So I mean, it turns out I kind of am writing a book, but I'm not quite sure what sort of end product it's going to be.  I'm enjoying writing it, I think it's coming out very nicely and it's going to be friggin' long by the time I'm done with it, but it's not something I'm writing with the express purpose of making money.

When it's done?  We'll just have to see.  It's a pretty easy story to hook into - despite the Persona backdrop that she was invented in, Dinah's tale doesn't involve any magic, demons or long-nosed folks in a strange blue room.  It's just a story about a collection of her return trips home from the school overseas that she attends (that will eventually host the Persona-like events) and how they all intertwine because of the people that she's constantly leaving behind when she goes off.  As I said, it will hopefully be a good story, and I'll use some reactions of folks to get a good bead on whether or not it actually is.  Then I'll decide what's going on with it.  For now, though, it's just something that I'm doing, and tonight, it's something I'm going to write in.  Hopefully manage to get another chapter done to feel like I have made progress.

As usual, when I don't have something to write about (Except I kind of did tonight, whoops), I left you some K-Pop at the top to enjoy.  So, enjoy!

is it still K-Pop if it's sung in Japanese, I don't even

Gaming By The Numbers - Disgaea 3: Absence of Detention

This is me understanding Disgaea 3.

It was just the other day when I was lamenting that, try as I might, I simply wasn't enjoying Disgaea 3 because, well, I wasn't.  However, as is often the case, as soon as I finally aired my frustrations, I was able to find a way around them and, as such, I have more or less spent the last two days playing Disgaea 3 exclusively on my Vita, monopolizing damn near all of my free time.  The bug has bitten, ladies and gentlemen, and it has bitten hard.  I wasn't quite sure that I would be able to actively convey just how much of the actual Disgaea experience has now begun to permeate my brain and this was originally going to be a very different post.  And then I said to myself, "Self, what -is- the whole Disgaea experience about?  Oh right, numbers.  But just how am I going to make a post conveying that portion of the ga-

Oh."

Folks, the issue at hand here was that I just wasn't letting the real allure of Disgaea to sink in.  I was trying to play a different game (likely Final Fantasy Tactics) as if it just had a Disgaea skin.  And that dog won't hunt, good sirs, no it won't.  Disgaea is not a game about a team, about you building up a group of battlers shoulder-to-shoulder to stand firm in solidarity against anything.  Disgaea is not a clever mix of balancing classes, jobs, skill and gear amongst a select few to Min-Max them appropriately.  It's not even a game where you meticulously advance the story and pay attention to the enemy levels to anticipate how they'll advance from one stage to the next, taking those as your cues as to when to take your group out for a little bit more grinding for an average level gain of X.  Disgaea is not a series for any of this, which is generally some of the ideals that the Tactical RPG genre caters to.

Disgaea is a series about you pointing at any single character in your roster and saying "You.  You will become my Messenger.  The game does not yet realize this, but I am its God and it's through you that I will impose my divine will.  It is you who will be spoon-fed ultimate power and attention until all who oppose me are crushed underfoot.  It is you who will lead a glorious charge, cutting a swath through my enemies and ensuring not a soul remains alive to curse my name.  And upon that mountain of bodies, at the end of your bloody journey, you will think to challenge me.  And you will know the error of your ways."

If you couldn't tell by the screenshot above, Dinah is my Messenger.  And if you don't quite know the Disgaea series well enough, you might think her stats, her standings are impressive.  Perhaps in other games, they would be - I mean ~2,000 in her relevant attack stats (Attack and Speed)?  That's pretty nice by most standards.  In Disgaea, Dinah might as well still be Level 1 in the grand scheme of things.  Though, admittedly, she's doing quite a bit well for herself by this point for not being on a higher echelon juuuust yet.  Though, before I can really explain Dinah's progression in a proper way, I suppose I should do a crash course in Disgaea for those who might not be initiated.  After all, it's a fairly niche series and intimidating to those who know -enough- about it without having actually played it.

In most games, the maximum level for characters is like 99.  We all know this, this is a common thing and that's that.  Well, in Disgaea, the maximum level is, uh, 9999.  As in Nine-thousand, nine-hundred and ninety-nine.  That alone might tell you why Dinah just isn't anywhere near impressive yet, but it's more than that.  You see, again in most games, max level means just that - maximum level, cannot do anything else.  Well, in Disgaea, you can reincarnate all the way back to Level 1.  Why would you do this?  Because you get to stat-stack.  Depending on just how much Mana (the stuff you buy skills and such with) you put into reincarnating determines just what sort of build you get this go around as well as what you inherit.  No matter how you word it, going back to Level 1 is a reset, but your base stats are going to be higher and they're going to grow better as well.  Through multiple reincarnations, you're going to have a Level 1 character that is only Level 1 in title, because that Level 1 could kick the living shit out of other Level 1's.

At this point in time (as that screenshot was taken when I started this post), that's what Dinah looks like after three reincarnations.  Pretty much every class gets higher tiered versions as you grow them up and move on into the advanced forms, and the 'Sky Faller' is the fourth iteration of what is basically the Female Monk class.  The first reincarnation, I went with a B-ranking, where the second and third, I held out for the A-ranked reincarnation, giving her the best skill carry-over (Which I don't think matters if you don't stray classes) as well as the most points to add to her base stats upon recreation.  With that last reincarnation clocking in at 9,900 Mana (400 for Reincarnation number three, 9,500 for A-Grade), it was quite a hefty sink of time and energy, but it's going to be worth it in the end.

It should be noted that I'm at chapter 5 and, at their 'normal' levels, the story-related enemies are like, Level 35.  Tops.  Level 76 doesn't -actually- mean Level 76 since she's been reincarnated thrice, so figure it more around...oh...100 something and you'll see why Dinah is a bit ridiculously OP for this point in the story, but, again, that is not what Disgaea is about.  Disgaea is all about ratcheting up the absurdity to 11....and then a little beyond that.  At your own pace, of course, since there is a definite possibility that doing too much will leave you in a situation where you are completely and totally overwhelmed.  But with great risk comes great rewards - like leveling a newly reincarnated character from Level 1 to 76 within half an hour with minimal issues.

"So Mogs", I can hear you say.  "How exactly do I get to where I can make someone like Dinah who is awesome and violent and dangerous?"  Well, it's quite simple.  First off, the most important thing is gear.  Raise your customer rank in the store a bunch and pass the bills that make the stores sell more expensive stuff.  Gear is what will save your ass when you've just reincarnated and are working your way up the ladder.  Second, make sure you have at least the third mission in Chapter 4 beaten.  You'll know the mission because literally the entire field is "Enemy Level 10% Up".  This is, of course, Vital.  Third, pass a "Stronger Enemies" bill or two.  You might think that you don't want to do this, but you want to do this.  Trust me.  Now, at the start of the level, the enemies are like 20-something - easy pickings.  Run your desired character counter-clockwise through the Warslugs, murdering them as they slowly begin leveling up.  By the time you get to the last one, it'll presumably be in its 70s.  At this point, it's up to you whether or not you want to just kill it -now- (shouldn't be too hard because its HP doesn't scale a whole lot and your character is likely doing 800-2000 damage, well over the 500-600 HP they'll have, even at level 70+) or let it get to something a little higher, like 100 something.  The only thing you have to worry about is how much damage it can do to your character.  End it before it can come too close to one-shotting your character because, given the next turn, it -will-.

That map is, basically, the map that keeps on giving.  Letting the last warslug get up to 100s nets you HL in the hundreds of thousands which quickly adds up for some of the better gear that you're likely looking at by this point.  Personally, the mid-six-hundred thousands is the top-tier of gear I can buy at the moment, but I can pass like four more "More expensive stuff" bills to catch up with my customer rank.  Because of the amount of Warslugs and the levels they can get to, the Mana you get from the map is not negligible either, though I haven't calculated it because it fluctuates a little too wildly because of the very nature of the level.  Of course, the experience is wonderful as well.  It is, for all intents and purposes, the perfect map since it hands you a rather large amount of control.

Of course, if you're freshly reincarnated, you're likely not ready for that map.  So what should you try, then?  Why "Strongest Crossroad" in Chapter 1, of course.  Five Prinnies and Three Orcs means this is not a difficult map, even with a couple "Stronger Enemies" bills passed.  The beauty of this is that for minimal effort (especially so if you're rolling a character that counters a lot) you'll get a nice handful of Mana per run because the field effects are "EXP + 50%" and "Mana + 50%".  With no bills passed, the Mana is still something like a hundred, whereas with three bills passed, I believe the Mana total that you get is 337 per run.  It's something close to that anyway.  Depending on your character, they can finish the map in half a minute tops or perhaps just over a minute if they don't counter at all.  At 337 a go, if you have a lofty goal to reach, like, say, 9,900 Mana, that's 29.377 times or 30 times.  With the times provided, that's 9,900 Mana in Fifteen to, let's say Thirty-Five Minutes.  That's -only- if you stop at three Stronger Enemies bills which you by no means have to since, even with those passed, the enemies are only like Level 16.  If that.

Is it grindy?  Certainly, it is probably the most grinding I've done in any game in recent memory.  Is it worth it, however?  Given that Dinah has already carved out a niche as an engine of destruction four times over now with each incarnation taking less and less time to get to that point, yes, yes it is worth it.  Most importantly, this mission of making Dinah the singularly most awesome character in my team has succeeded in making Disgaea 3 fun enough for me to continue playing.  That was something I didn't think was possible days ago, yet my entire day today begs to state that there is certainly something in Disgaea 3 to look to if you like Strategy RPGs at all.  Just...be mindful of how you approach it since that has a direct impact over what, if any, enjoyment you will derive from it.

I Wish I Loved Grinding

Disgea 3:  Absence of Detention was handed out last week as a Playstation Plus freebie, which I immediately picked up and by immediately, I mean "overnight for a 14 hour download".  I have a good portion of the Disgaea games, only skirting around picking up the re-releases and such (though I have some of those) so I -have- Disgaea 3 on PS3 already, and I did put a good bit of time into it there before moving on to other things.  That was a while ago, however, and my progress has since been lost, so the knowledge that there would be a handheld version of the game in the Vita port was comforting.  I do some of my best gaming on handhelds, after all, since it's far, far easier to keep at a game when you can take it anywhere you go.  That is unless the game utterly turns you off, of course.

There is nothing inherently wrong with Disgaea 3.  Well, there are a couple things wrong with it, chief being that the story is....terrible, but it is not a -bad- game.  There's not bugs in it, it's perfectly playable, it runs smooth, looks nice on the Vita and there was a clear amount of love placed into the game.  I cannot say "I don't like Disgaea 3" and be telling you the truth, because I -do- like it in premise and concept.

I just cannot enjoy playing it.

It is something that never ceases to boggle me; Disgaea as a series, as games, in story and in mechanics, is steeped in absurdity, practically slow-boiled in it and yet I can't bring myself to enjoy it as fully and wholly as I expect to and as I want to.  You can climb mountains that just don't exist in other games, and then you can climb -bigger- mountains than those ones.  You can reach Level 9999, you can deal a million damage with the swing of a sword, you can turn a Prinny into a handgun, you can go -into- a world inside of a weapon to make it stronger and you can erect a tower of people all for the effort of throwing one to throw another to throw another and so on.  You can do other things that are crazier than the mentioned.  There is not a sane bone in the body of any Disgaea game and that what makes them charming.

I would love it if I could find that enjoyment in Disgaea.  I did, once upon a time, as my save file for Disgaea 2 on PS2 will attest to, but I can't find that any longer.  Every battle just seems like it's the same one and I can't exactly figure out what the differentiation between that and a game like Final Fantasy Tactics, which I have no qualms playing almost any time, but there is some sort of difference there and it is key enough that it prevents me from making an actual effort.  My only idea is the grinding (as you may have guessed from the title) since you can grind literally everything, but I enjoy grinding in other things.  Like....Final Fantasy Tactics.  I would routinely play by the "X2 Rule" whenever I played FFT which was, simply, the "Suggested Level" in the strategy guide that was given to me with the game as a gift...times two.  Suggested level was five, I was level ten, ten, I was twenty, etc.  I love accelerating FFT characters.

There's just some sort of strange disconnect when it comes to the characters you get in Disgaea, though.  Perhaps it's because they're a bit more malleable than most games, but that should be inspiring more than it's not.  I don't suspect that I'll find the reason why and be able to exile it and find that Disgaea 3 'clicks' with me, though I would certainly like that.  I want to enjoy Disgaea 3 as much as I know that I can, and that I cannot it something that is of particular annoyance with me.  Still, I suspected as much and it's only because it was free that I'm playing it - I'm not actually regretting it or anything of that sort - I just want to be able to like good games.  And I feel that, beneath whatever it is that I just don't like about the series, they -are- good games.