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Sorry about the delay, and especially for missing April Fool's Day - I usually try to do something a bit different, but the only idea I had was an actual Pokémon video, and unfortunately, I don't have any of the ones that let you choose the gender of the main character. I could have just played a boy named Ellen with a rival named Keats who starts with a Bulbasaur named Daru, but life has gotten in the way of many things, and I preferred to spend my time more directly on the progress of the LP. As such, I finally have the next update for you. The Endless Corridor isn't much more interesting for Ellen than it was for Keats, I'm afraid, but I think the Folks are a bit more varied, at least. Also, the rebels seem to be a bit more openly hostile to Ellen on their home turf. Ellen Chapter 4 - Combat First Half Youtube
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Apr 5, 2014 01:46
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Well, at least there are a couple interesting folk variances in Mabinogian and Garbera and Humpty. Garbera seems to be a nice short multihit aoe with pushback, at least. Mabinogian though...even though its fire and forget, its too bad it is so vulnerable to hit, otherwise it seemed like a good point defense - though, combat in this game doesnt seem nuanced enough to require that. Its too bad, because it looks cool! Humpty seems to suffer a similar issue of being too specific Speaking about the idle thoughts of modernity, I have had discussions recently on theories how the idea of reflection and the mind was created at a certain time in the ancient world and changed the way people thought among other things. Beyond the implication of athiesm and stuff, the change in how people view themselves and other existential type things seems to be relevant to what the chapter is going for. I do like the habetrot appearing everywhere, and the weird perspectives/sizes of objects in the rooms. I wish they would do more with that.
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Apr 5, 2014 02:46
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PlaceholderPigeon posted:Well, at least there are a couple interesting folk variances in Mabinogian and Garbera and Humpty. This is part of the problem with the Folk system - there's no way to make that many Folks all useful. There are too many of some elements and not enough of others, and I think they tried to prevent any pair of Folks from being too obviously exactly the same thing but with different elements (at least, for a single character) by coming up with as many different attack patterns as they could for each element. Some of them end up being really useful, while others just aren't worth the bother. A lot of it also might come down to focusing more on the variety of Folks you fight, without regard to how they behave once you capture them. The Cloak of the Deep is almost useless because there are so few Folks in the game that attack with the Water element, and there's no Cloak to protect from Wind or Charm anywhere in the game, unless my memory's worse than I give myself credit for. However, I find it hard to say that the game would be entirely better if there were more balance - the ability to focus on a few Folks rather than trying to build them all up and switch between them constantly to find the attack you want in any situation could be a plus. I'm pretty sure it would be more fun if all of the Folks were more effective, but I've played games like Chrono Cross and Pokémon where you just can't possibly use all of the characters and keep them all at a reasonable level without spending way too much time grinding - and I'm spending hours doing that in this playthrough of Folklore as it is. The enemies are, at least, quite varied in terms of how they attack, but it tends to be only the miniboss Folks that are complex enough to be very interesting.
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Apr 5, 2014 03:22
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Yeah like you said it's hard to balance games like these to make everything useful. Although one thing i've been wondering about is there some reason the Folklores themselves aren't usable like normal Folks? Like could they just not think of a way to make them anymore useful than the others or something?
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Apr 5, 2014 03:27
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Smornstein posted:Although one thing i've been wondering about is there some reason the Folklores themselves aren't usable like normal Folks? Like could they just not think of a way to make them anymore useful than the others or something? I expect they'd either be so overpowered that there wouldn't be any point to using any other Folks, or they'd be so underpowered that there wouldn't be any point. I don't think we're losing anything by not being able to summon them, and I think we ARE getting something from them - just not the ability to use them.
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Apr 5, 2014 03:57
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The trick to Mabinogian is that he's not a fire-and-forget folk, like someone mentioned below, he's a point-defense. You throw out Mabinogian, and then once he's charged up, you move underneath him. He stays for a long, long time. You stand underneath him, and fire off ranged attacks, while enemies move up to attack you, which coincidentally moves them right into range to get shocked by Mabinogian. It has niche use, as many folks do, but give it a shot sometime, like when you're getting rushed by a shitton of brollachon from all direction. It works pretty well. Edit: I can give you a perfect example. As soon as you kill Habetrot, toss out Mabinogian, and he'll gladly wipe out a shitton of his fakes for you, no muss no fuss. You can even make him better by standing directly underneath him, and throwing up Spriggan for a shield. They'll gladly walk up and kill themselves on him endlessly. Captain Bravo fucked around with this message at 21:42 on Apr 5, 2014 |
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Apr 5, 2014 21:34
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I laughed at Mabinogion getting swatted away after flailing around uselessly, they really are building up the list of conditionally useful electric types this chapter. I can't wait to see what other unique and creative attack patterns they come up with for new folks in the upcoming chapters.
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Apr 5, 2014 21:49
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Captain Bravo posted:The trick to Mabinogian is that he's not a fire-and-forget folk, like someone mentioned below, he's a point-defense. You throw out Mabinogian, and then once he's charged up, you move underneath him. He stays for a long, long time. You stand underneath him, and fire off ranged attacks, while enemies move up to attack you, which coincidentally moves them right into range to get shocked by Mabinogian. It has niche use, as many folks do, but give it a shot sometime, like when you're getting rushed by a shitton of brollachon from all direction. It works pretty well. I can see it working on Habetrot, but Mabinogion spins so slowly that there's plenty of time for Folks to slip through, and it won't work against Folks with ranged attacks. I might give it a try in Chapter 5, but as you'll see in the Grinding video, even when you know what you're trying to accomplish with Mabinogion, it's not easy to do.
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Apr 5, 2014 22:17
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It's time to continue on in the Endless Corridor. Ellen has appointments with Lulu and Livane, and it might be fair to say that neither goes quite as you might expect. Then it's on to Tower Brahma, where unlike Keats, Ellen actually has new Folks to capture along the way. The puzzles are pretty much the same, but there are more rewards for performing well. Then it's time for Ellen to learn the truth about her past, and as has been mentioned in the thread, the simple fact that she is Cecilia grown up doesn't seem like anything to fear, particularly enough to breed a path-blocking Mnemosyne. This time, I think we have a bit more insight into just what about Ellen's past has created this fear, and why the knowledge that she is Cecilia leads her to confront and overcome it. Ellen Chapter 4 - Combat Second Half Youtube
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Apr 12, 2014 17:46
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Haha, I love that line. "Do I dare unmask the horrors of my past?" 
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Apr 13, 2014 14:12
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I've been meaning to say this before, but  at how Lulu's last regret was "McConnell... I'm sorry...for not being able to return your car, brah."Just curious, but isn't the room beyond the mnemosyne the folklore of this chapter, Fleshrum? Wasn't Livanne telling us that we'd never be able to get through a labyrinth?
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Apr 13, 2014 16:05
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EagerSleeper posted:Just curious, but isn't the room beyond the mnemosyne the folklore of this chapter, Fleshrum? Wasn't Livanne telling us that we'd never be able to get through a labyrinth? Right - and we're not really done until we defeat the Folklore. The mixing of game mechanics and story elements tends to be a bit muddled even in the games that do it well, but in this case, we're really through the maze at this point, and all we have left to do is fight the boss. Maybe she means that she doesn't think Ellen can defeat the boss, or that she won't be able to figure out the secret of the medallion, or just taunting her with her inability to face her own fear - "the eternal agony of the maze inside your own consciousness".
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Apr 13, 2014 17:22
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I honestly expected Scarecrow to attempt to shank Ellen in that last scene. "I feel like I'm still forgetting something really important." "IT WAS ME." 
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Apr 15, 2014 02:09
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"You thought it was the door beneath the Henge you saw as a child, but in fact, it was Scarecrow! I was your first fear!"
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Apr 15, 2014 02:30
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Poor Charlotte. Not only is she so lonely without any children her own age around that she sneaks into the Netherworld at night, it seems that she's worried about her uncle's health and can't sleep. Fortunately, Ellen is building a fighting force of extraordinary magnitude, composed of spirits forged in the traditions of her ancestors. She is a magnificent leader. Let's quest. Ellen Chapter 4 - Quests First Half Youtube
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Apr 19, 2014 15:18
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A true pub owner knows not to drink their own merchandise.  P.S.: Pub owner best character in game.
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Apr 19, 2014 21:20
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Why wouldn't they use the quests to give you a chance at less common Folk in the chapter like Spriggan and that exploding one that you find in that single room? Or even the two robots? Instead of multiple rooms of bog-standard melee folk.
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Apr 20, 2014 02:19
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PlaceholderPigeon posted:Why wouldn't they use the quests to give you a chance at less common Folk in the chapter like Spriggan and that exploding one that you find in that single room? Or even the two robots? Instead of multiple rooms of bog-standard melee folk. Well, Candela, at least, is a secret Folk - you can only ever find it in that one room, after you've captured all the other Folks in the chapter. It's like Shefro, Kraken, and one other Folk from the next chapter in that regard. And there's one other Folk that I consider secret that you find in a completely different way. Unless you were talking about Skriker, in which case, yeah, that would have been nice. On the other hand, we've got one quest left for this chapter, and it's a strong candidate for the best quest in the entire game. Also, the most difficult by far.
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Apr 20, 2014 03:32
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Nidoking posted:Well, Candela, at least, is a secret Folk - you can only ever find it in that one room, after you've captured all the other Folks in the chapter. It's like Shefro, Kraken, and one other Folk from the next chapter in that regard. And there's one other Folk that I consider secret that you find in a completely different way. Unless you were talking about Skriker, in which case, yeah, that would have been nice. On the other hand, we've got one quest left for this chapter, and it's a strong candidate for the best quest in the entire game. Also, the most difficult by far. Yeah I was talking about Skriker, since it would have been a nice little reward for it to show up in a Quest if someone missed it.
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Apr 20, 2014 04:06
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PlaceholderPigeon posted:Yeah I was talking about Skriker, since it would have been a nice little reward for it to show up in a Quest if someone missed it. Well, if you've been through the Endless Corridor, you've seen at least one Skriker, even if you weren't paying attention, so it's listed in your Folks menu. Then you just have to search the rooms you've visited until you find it - that's how I found Shefro eventually, after doing the DLC quests that introduced it. I forgot where I'd seen it and trusted the list that said I'd seen one in the wild, went back to the Faery Realm, and found it there. That was long after I'd captured Habetrot, so it was no problem capturing Shefro with little effort.
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Apr 20, 2014 11:50
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Nidoking posted:Well, if you've been through the Endless Corridor, you've seen at least one Skriker, even if you weren't paying attention, so it's listed in your Folks menu. Then you just have to search the rooms you've visited until you find it - that's how I found Shefro eventually, after doing the DLC quests that introduced it. I forgot where I'd seen it and trusted the list that said I'd seen one in the wild, went back to the Faery Realm, and found it there. That was long after I'd captured Habetrot, so it was no problem capturing Shefro with little effort. Right, I wasn't suggesting that it's not possible to methodically find Skriker through diligent searching. I'm a fan of being able to do things multiple ways in games like this, though. Questing could be an alternative to spending time in particular rooms finding specific folk. You want to search and grind for folk ids and items in the area? Cool. You want to quest and find those folk and get the items you could have grinded for in the level itself? That should work too. Especially considering a person would be doing quests separately from the area itself, it should have things above and beyond that area or some different opportunities. Nothing unique to quests, though, unless they physically give it to you as a reward, because that would make the trap of 'one chance' folk which is a lovely thing to include in a game like this.
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Apr 20, 2014 22:35
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PlaceholderPigeon posted:I'm a fan of being able to do things multiple ways in games like this, though. Questing could be an alternative to spending time in particular rooms finding specific folk. You want to search and grind for folk ids and items in the area? Cool. You want to quest and find those folk and get the items you could have grinded for in the level itself? That should work too. Especially considering a person would be doing quests separately from the area itself, it should have things above and beyond that area or some different opportunities. The problem with that is that there really aren't many types of possible rewards available - there are Folks and there are items that power up Folks. Any reward in the form of extra HP or MC would probably skew the game's difficulty too much, and I don't think there are any other things the game could possibly reward you with. The quests are mainly there for their story significance rather than as means to save time or effort elsewhere - in most cases, I think the quests are actually MORE effort for a given reward, with a few exceptions like Green Quartz that, as far as I've seen, isn't a reward for any repeatable quests. I can appreciate the idea, but in the end, it is a pretty simple game.
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Apr 20, 2014 23:00
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Nidoking posted:The problem with that is that there really aren't many types of possible rewards available - there are Folks and there are items that power up Folks. Any reward in the form of extra HP or MC would probably skew the game's difficulty too much, and I don't think there are any other things the game could possibly reward you with. The quests are mainly there for their story significance rather than as means to save time or effort elsewhere - in most cases, I think the quests are actually MORE effort for a given reward, with a few exceptions like Green Quartz that, as far as I've seen, isn't a reward for any repeatable quests. I can appreciate the idea, but in the end, it is a pretty simple game. I wasn't thinking so much in increasing rewards as having a convenient collection of folks and resources in case one wanted to meet some of the karmas. Though, it would be nice if the quest rewards might coincide with some of the karma requirements of some of the folks for that chapter, or if they provided enough absorbable ids during the combat section of the quest. Say you need to absorb 4 spriggan ids or something - they can put a handful of spriggans in the quest combat, and then boom, you get the karma along with the quest and you don't have to do much extra. That way you don't have to do much more grinding on top of the sometimes repetitive quest combat.
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Apr 20, 2014 23:30
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PlaceholderPigeon posted:I wasn't thinking so much in increasing rewards as having a convenient collection of folks and resources in case one wanted to meet some of the karmas. Though, it would be nice if the quest rewards might coincide with some of the karma requirements of some of the folks for that chapter, or if they provided enough absorbable ids during the combat section of the quest. Nothing says they haven't done that - we haven't seen all of the quests yet. I try to complete Karma requirements during the quests when it's practical, as you've seen, but it's rarely as efficient as just going into the Realms and fighting the Folks you need in their natural environment. The point of doing the quests is to have done the quests, really. The rewards are mostly just tokens so it's not a complete waste of time. I really think you're expecting too much if you want more than that. The DLC quests do happen to come in Folk-Karma Item pairs, though. I think each set of three quests has one that gives a Folk and one that gives the unique item needed to build up that Folk. And then one quest for the other character so they're not left out.
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Apr 20, 2014 23:40
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This week, let's round things off with the quest I've been talking about, and thinking about, since the beginning of the LP... my white whale. This is the one that I didn't manage to complete the first time through the game, even though I didn't play any of the DLC quests until about chapter 5 - and yet I think it has the best gimmick, and if I took it seriously, I think it might well be the best quest in the game. Not that I wasn't taking it seriously during this recording, but you'll see what I mean. Let's just say that this is my favorite use of the game's limited mechanics, and the kind of challenge you can walk away from the game and still be playing for days. Will any quests after this point be this interesting? Who knows? But I doubt it - they'll be leaning heavily on better rewards after this point, so they may not feel the need to make the quests this much fun to play. Ellen Chapter 4 - Quests Second Half Youtube
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Apr 26, 2014 00:59
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Yeah there must be some weird path that you must take in order to get all the folks.
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Apr 26, 2014 04:30
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Major_JF posted:Yeah there must be some weird path that you must take in order to get all the folks. The second half seems pretty reasonable - clearly, what I needed to do was head through the passage with the purple crystals, since there must be some sort of Destroy element Folk there, then use that to capture Ga-boi, somehow capture Worthog with that, then run into the room with all the easy Folks where I might be able to use Worthog effectively and emerge with a Daru. That, or backtrack - I never did check to see whether I could open any passages and then return for Folks from earlier. I suspect that I can't, but it would make most of the quest pretty easy. I'd still have to fight Malabaricus and three Alraune without a shield, which is the part that always got me when I played before. I think capturing that Alraune was a fluke, and there's no way I could expect to do it every time. That might mean leaving at least one Alraune alive while capturing Malabaricus and taking it down afterward - also not likely. As for the first half, I'd have to see the Folks in the other two rooms to judge, but I probably need to bring Boobrie out of the room it's in, then return later for Ogma - if that's possible. Depending on how many quests there are in chapter 5, I may revisit this one just to see how far I can get while aiming for a perfect score, but I went ahead and looked this quest up online, and the FAQ said that the prize I got was the best one available, so I think I did as well as I needed to. (I can't imagine how you'd score much lower while still succeeding, though.) The top-tier repeat reward is listed as 6 Cold Tree Nuts. So I don't expect I'll be banging my head against this particular wall for too long.
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Apr 26, 2014 12:55
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Nidoking posted:...The top-tier repeat reward is listed as 6 Cold Tree Nuts. So I don't expect I'll be banging my head against this particular wall for too long. That isn't even worth a half-hearted retry.
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Apr 27, 2014 00:10
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That was a pretty interesting quest. I like the mechanic of relying on upgrades you've already made.
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Apr 27, 2014 05:02
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I'm pretty sure my problems with this quest the first time through the game were that I had never bothered to grind for many Karmas, so getting stuck with Folks like Henky and Worthog, and particularly Alraune, would make it nearly impossible to progress. I'd probably also just plain forgotten how to fight Malabaricus effectively by then. I still think that last room is going to be pretty touch-and-go no matter how much you've built up the Folks you have, but most of the rest of the quest should be pretty doable. Not sure about the Boobrie and Ogma room, though. If Boobrie has an elemental weakness I'm supposed to exploit, I'll have to find it. Also, I spotted a copy of Folklore on sale at Gamestop yesterday, and it's still at a pretty good price point considering how old it is. I pointed it out to my mom and she decided to buy it, so I'm planning to talk her through the basics a bit later today. You might remember that button mashing isn't really her forte, but I'm hoping that the gameplay in Folklore will be a bit tamer than a beat-em-up and she'll enjoy the story enough to keep going. Progress reports possibly to follow! Nidoking fucked around with this message at 13:05 on Apr 27, 2014 |
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Apr 27, 2014 13:02
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I've got some good news, some bad news, some news that's probably good but will have to wait for a full, official goodness assessment, and some absolutely horrifying news. First, the bad news: I haven't heard from Red Rover in a few weeks, so he wasn't available to guest in this chapter's grinding video, and I have no idea whether he'll be returning in the future either. The good news is that I still have volunteers from earlier in the thread, and Zain stepped up on short notice to fill in. The news that I think will probably turn out to be good is that an alternate commentator with knowledge of folklore (or at least, a couple of good books on the subject) has volunteered, so I'll try to work something out - perhaps an alternate commentary track for this video with either the new guest or Rover, if he returns, or just two chapters' worth of Folks in the chapter 5 video, depending on how much information there is. For now, Zain and I will talk about our relative experiences with Folklore, other Game Republic games, and a punchline or two along the way as I attempt to condense two hours of raw footage into a watchable video. Ellen Chapter 4 - Grinding Youtube Oh, and the horrifying news - apparently, nobody in this thread is willing to admit that they've seen Kentucky Fried Movie, and that makes me sad.
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May 3, 2014 15:58
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Haven't seen the movie, but now I am totally interested in it. I love spoofs on old school kung fu movies.
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May 3, 2014 16:26
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Zain posted:Haven't seen the movie, but now I am totally interested in it. I love spoofs on old school kung fu movies. That spoof is just the centerpiece of the movie, but I think it was half an hour long and probably worth the price on its own. It's also the first thing that pops into my head when anyone says "You have our gratitude." I thought Amazon Women on the Moon did a better job overall with the same basic premise, but A Fistful of Yen makes Kentucky Fried Movie a must-see in my opinion. I'm tempted to dig up my TV/VCR and set it up just so I can watch my old VHS copies of both, assuming they all still work.
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May 3, 2014 17:27
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I think what he might be talking about is when you have a folk with multiple karmas that are all "Absorb this folk." I don't think there's a single folk in the game that wants you to capture a different one for it's karmas, but there's a bunch that are "Absorb ten of me!" and then "Good job! Now absorb 15 of me!" That's just lazy design. Edit: Also, it doesn't help you much now, but Skriker is really good in the Habetrot fight. You can see this at one point in the video, but when the lead skriker kills the target, the others will retarget the nearest other enemy. You can toss a couple of them and they'll clear out the clones. Captain Bravo fucked around with this message at 00:19 on May 4, 2014 |
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May 4, 2014 00:13
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Captain Bravo posted:Edit: Also, it doesn't help you much now, but Skriker is really good in the Habetrot fight. You can see this at one point in the video, but when the lead skriker kills the target, the others will retarget the nearest other enemy. You can toss a couple of them and they'll clear out the clones. Bullseye does pretty much the same thing, though. And there really aren't a lot of options for Karma unlock conditions - you've got items, captures, and defeating Folks. That's it. I don't really see too much of a problem with having two Absorb Karmas in a row, because what else are you going to do? The fact that one only unlocks after another is complete is pretty much required, because like he said, you can't be building up both of them at the same time.
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May 4, 2014 00:24
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Hadn't heard of the movie before. It's now near the top of the list of movies I need to see. Also, dear god, so many Gargantuans 
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May 4, 2014 04:55
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Absorbing more of the same folk is probably the least annoying way to level them up too. Unless it is a miniboss I guess. Hello there, Habetrot. 
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May 4, 2014 14:13
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Shei-kun posted:Hadn't heard of the movie before. I'd also forgotten that one of my favorite comedy sketches, Zinc Oxide and You, was also from Kentucky Fried Movie. I kept thinking it was from TV Funhouse for some reason. GimmickMan posted:Absorbing more of the same folk is probably the least annoying way to level them up too. Unless it is a miniboss I guess. Hello there, Habetrot. Well, minibosses aren't usually all that tough to fight - Gargantua's something of an exception, and you don't usually have to fight many of them. Habetrot isn't that bad because it doesn't have much health. And let's not forget that minibosses are usually the most reliable Folks to find in the places they're supposed to be. There's always one when you enter the room. Not to steal the thunder from Zain's guest appearance, but due to upcoming scheduling conflicts, I'm going to have to take a break from LP work entirely for about the first half of June. That means either posting a few early videos and then stopping mid-chapter, or working ahead before then, posting the videos as private, and publishing them on the usual schedule, which I should still be able to do as long as I've prepared properly. To that end, I'm going to go ahead and finish the fourth chapter today, let the voting happen this week, and spend the rest of May seeing how much I can get done. Worst case, there won't be any videos for about a month, but I still have the Bestiary to post for a bit of content, and I expect that this video should lend itself to at least a bit of discussion. It's time for Ellen to reach the end of the Endless Corridor and hear the Faery Lord's side of the story of why he's fighting with Livane. And of course, let's not forget why we came to the Endless Corridor in the first place.  Ellen Chapter 4 - Folklore Youtube So, with that, VOTING IS OPEN for which character we'll play chapter 5 as first.
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May 4, 2014 15:20
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I like the rhythm we have going. Keats Also, the design of the mnemosyne creeps me out. The three vertical pupils in the bulging eyes; the skittering noises; the insectile bodies...so very unnerving.
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May 4, 2014 18:02
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AltaBrown posted:I like the rhythm we have going. Keats Eh, I've seen worse in newspaper comics. Though I'm not being too fair since there's Brooke McEldowney's work. Voting for Ellen for the super secret folk you can only find if you pick chapters in the exact sequence we've been taking until now (my uncle who works in Nintendo told me).
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May 4, 2014 18:08
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