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I just finished Sky FC and have just started SC after playing the Cold Steel games and I'm really glad that they moved away from arts needing certain orb element combinations. Was Cold Steel the first games to just have specific arts on orbs or do the Crossbell games do that to?
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 18:56 |
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# ? May 29, 2024 23:58 |
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IceBorg posted:
Being a ragtag group of anime dudes does though, every anime world can at any moment drop everything for a rock band arc like the School Festival. And while FC has Turbo, its the barest minimum of Turbos and is only good for gameplay. 3/10 Geofront Crossbell Turbo is the same turbo, but now it eviscerates your playtime and effects Text speed. 5/10 Cold Steel Turbo is our Lord and Savior. Doubles every speed, doesnt need to be held down, barring like 20 lines based around the model's moving, works absolutely perfectly, I need it put in every single game ever. 10/10 Starsnostars posted:I just finished Sky FC and have just started SC after playing the Cold Steel games and I'm really glad that they moved away from arts needing certain orb element combinations. Was Cold Steel the first games to just have specific arts on orbs or do the Crossbell games do that to? Cold Steel. Azure introduced Master Quartz.
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 19:00 |
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Starsnostars posted:I just finished Sky FC and have just started SC after playing the Cold Steel games and I'm really glad that they moved away from arts needing certain orb element combinations. Was Cold Steel the first games to just have specific arts on orbs or do the Crossbell games do that to? admittedly it is also very time consuming especially with how many characters the series has, but i thought it was worth it.
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 19:18 |
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Yeah my first experience with FC was that it felt incredibly slow and sometimes the combat was frustrating, then I found the turbo function after the prologue and it was all ok. The last dungeon was more complicated than it needed to be and I used a guide for it, thankfully it wasn't really replicated in future games. Portability is nice but you'd have to be pretty hardcore to want to play the PSP version over PC.
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 19:33 |
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Amppelix posted:i thought that was the most fun part of character building, seeing how many spells you can squeeze into your orbment combinations. in CS you basically just equip the quartz that have the biggest number next to them and don't think about it any more than that. That also lead to long-line orbments being objectively better in every way though, as they could just learn All The Arts Poor Tita, stuck on the same orbment tier as Zin
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 20:15 |
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Veryslightlymad posted:They are a third faction. Period. They're pretty explicit in wanting to get Crow back and reunite the class. This literally cannot happen if the Imperials win, as that government sees him as a terrorist. While the Noble faction doesn't even consider Crow a criminal, (since he's on their side) the rest of the class is pretty on the ball in seeing them as autocratic usurpers that would be terrible for the common people and also by this point in the game personally kidnapped Rean's sister and tossed Machias's dad into political jail. Oh hey, I remembered this If you have time, I'd really like to hear your elaboration on this I can definitely see now where you're coming from though Class 7 basically took up the Bracer's mantle to help the people of Erebonia in ways that the Noble Alliance and Imperial Army couldn't or wouldn't allow. And these small acts had a snowball effect, from saving Elliot's sister leading to Celdic being liberated, helping Angie leading to one of the 4 Great Houses pulling their support, to eventually saving the Emperor himself from the Noble Alliance and foiling Duke Ceyenne's schemes. And it would have paved a way to a big government reform, since the corrupt heads of both factions were out and people like Machia's dad and Rufus appeared to be more level headed and an improvement over Duke Ceyenne and Chancellor Osborne... if Osborne didn't come out the left field to reveal that he was still alive and Rufus was his sleeper agent. So now the old Status Quo was brought back... or worse, Osborne has no one to stop him and he's emotionally manipulating Rean into working for him and crush anyone who could oppose him. That's one part of the ending I really do like. Rean's now in Crow's place: burdened with the title of Chevalier and all but conscripted to fright for the current ruling power of the state, if only because he feels responsibility for the current state of things. And Class 7 is traveling around Erebonia, doing what they've been doing during the Civil War, only avoiding Osbrone's radar now: helping the people in ways only they can do, get stronger, and prepare for the moment they can save their dear friend. SgtSteel91 fucked around with this message at 23:21 on Jul 26, 2021 |
# ? Jul 26, 2021 20:46 |
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Yinlock posted:That also lead to long-line orbments being objectively better in every way though, as they could just learn All The Arts
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 20:57 |
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I mean, long lines are still good for more caster-y characters in Cold Steel, just in a more nebulous way via max EP
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 21:13 |
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Max EP doesn’t seem that useful considering regen and nuking are so easy
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 21:20 |
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Veryslightlymad posted:VSM, you fool. Your theory about Andre being the fourth anguis/Thousand Oathbreaker has a serious hole in your reasoning. Namely Sharon. You have Sharon in your party in CS2. You can have Sharon in your party and you can talk to Andre. Thousand Oathbreaker was her superior before either of them even joined Ouroboros. If they were indeed the same person, doesn't it stand to reason that she would have some sort of reaction to his presence? The problem is, of course, that she doesn't react as soon as you enter the Central Plaza. You can enter the plaza, walk right up to Andre, talk to him and Sharon won't react. The little conversation doesn't appear until you've spoken to either Theresia or checked out the Duke's mansion and then walk near the western or eastern exit of the Central Plaza. (not necessarily entering the plaza, it also plays if you see either event, quick-travel to Artisan Street, enter the plaza from the south and then walk up to either exit) Granted, it doesn't completely rule out the theory, but you'd think they'd disable the conversation if the player approached Andre or talked to him prior to walking across its trigger point.
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 21:49 |
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MythosDragon posted:And while FC has Turbo, its the barest minimum of Turbos and is only good for gameplay. 3/10 Extremely wrong imo, gameplay is the most important turbo and the amount of time it takes for a single one of Cold Steel's fade-to-black animation skips is longer than it takes to run across an entire map and win a battle with high-multiplier Geofront turbo. The only reason Cold Steel's cutscene turbo even matters is because the games are now full of extremely long garbage 3D model cutscenes with full voice acting instead of snappy sprite animations and instantly skippable text boxes. Bring back snappy sprite animations.
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 23:47 |
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Irony.or.Death posted:Bring back snappy sprite animations. YES PLEASE While Azure definitely feels a bit primitive compared to Cold Steel in regards to the way Master Quartz work, the sprite work in the Crossbell game is fantastic. I actually found that Crossbell lost some of its charm when rendered in the Cold Steel engine and the characters lost some of their personality.
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 23:50 |
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The one on one at the end of SC still looks great.
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# ? Jul 26, 2021 23:56 |
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Irony.or.Death posted:Extremely wrong imo, gameplay is the most important turbo and the amount of time it takes for a single one of Cold Steel's fade-to-black animation skips is longer than it takes to run across an entire map and win a battle with high-multiplier Geofront turbo. The only reason Cold Steel's cutscene turbo even matters is because the games are now full of extremely long garbage 3D model cutscenes with full voice acting instead of snappy sprite animations and instantly skippable text boxes. That fade to black is a PC thing and no one likes it, Curtiss made a patch for it to function like it does on PS4. Sprite animation good, but the sheer slowness of sky is fatal as evidenced by a large portion of the thread saying they'd never play it without turbo. Also the 2D games have more voice acting overall, and arnt really designed around that voice acting, I took a break from Azure, so I'm still only halfway through, but I've had 3 points where cutscenes went on for an entire hour between being able to save. Meanwhile, even CS4 only has like 3 points where it goes on as long despite the huge casts and generally it'll give you a break to save in some form. Its also mainly for NPCs, I'd probably have given up on playing Crossbell if it had Sky turbo and I couldnt speed up textboxes during the 2-3 hours it takes to scour crossbell every time it updates.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 00:05 |
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I mean I think a larger portion wouldn’t play Cold Steel without it. I don’t think I could finish Cold Steel without it Especially with the added animations that go on forever.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 00:08 |
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Cold steel is the perfect example of the idea that complicating something doesn’t make it better
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 00:11 |
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Barring obvious things like S breaks, Lost Arts, and the new tier of spells for CS3; I can't think of any animations that go on longer than 5ish seconds?
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 00:25 |
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I always found Cold Steel to play a bit faster than the previous games. Though I never had the turbo in Sky and Zero at the fastest option. Hate that they changed what button turbo mode is on for CS3 though.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 00:53 |
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i like the 3d animations in cold steel 3/4 honestly, theyre a bit jank but they work. having stuff like zoom ins and broader camera angles works well. and the sprites in sky/crossbell were terrible, lets be real. they look like donkey kong country enemies. also hajimari and kuro just straight up look nice also voice acting is good.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 01:21 |
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I will take the sprites in Sky/cross bell over the cheap 3D models every time. They look so bad
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 01:23 |
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They should bring back sprites only for the cute cooking animations from Zero.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 01:24 |
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Endorph posted:and the sprites in sky/crossbell were terrible, lets be real. they look like donkey kong country enemies.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 01:27 |
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Considering how long Falcom used the little clay dolls, I'm super fond of them. But 3D has like, a dozen times the mainstream appeal, and Cold Steel has straight up one of the best 3D aesthetics, so I do consider it an upgrade. Only downside is the weird perspective that since Cold Steel is 3D, its automatically hornier than the game with sunscreen rubbing and penguin panty snatching.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 01:35 |
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I like the 3D models, even in CS1+2. I like being able to see the world from different angles, from the ground perspective and following the main character, rather than being a distant floating camera looking down at the world. I like being able to see the characters be able to perform far more motions and gestures and body language than could ever be portrayed with the chibi sprites. I also think that the battle animations look cool. I also like the fade to black turbo mode animation skipping, because if I am going to speed through battles, I'd like to let my eyes rest and just focus on the sheer mechanics. Visually, the one thing I miss from Sky are the expressive facial portraits by Nao Tatsuo, which aren't mutually exclusive with 3D character models. There are plenty of 3D anime games out there that have expressive facial animations. The Crossbell games that had art by Enami Katsumi did not have expressive facial portraits like Sky did, so I presume that the lack of them after Sky is a deliberate choice on Falcom.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 01:53 |
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The 3D models are worse IMO because the "put weapons away after a battle" cutscenes look significantly less awkward when they are the little sprites.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 02:05 |
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Don't worry about the 3d animation being stiff and using a lot of presets (see: "walking away while waving behind"), with Hajimari, they're going Full Motion Capture so movement is a lot more naturalistic
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 02:10 |
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Nate RFB posted:The 3D models are worse IMO because the "put weapons away after a battle" cutscenes look significantly less awkward when they are the little sprites. *Shrug* Doesn't bother me. It's standard in other Final Fantasies and JRPGs and in WoW. It's one of the limitations of the medium that I accept. If you go down that rabbit hole, it starts costing a lot of money to animate for what is honestly a minor detail, and it opens up a lot of questions. Like, how does Gaius carry his spear around? If it magically sticks to his back like a character in FF12 (or in WoW if you have weapons sheathed turned on), then it can look silly. It'd also be hard for Gaius to just walk indoors during gameplay, or else the spear will clip through the doorway (unless you do the WoW thing where houses are way, way bigger and not realistically sized). Is Gaius going to slow down before going through a doorway everytime to take the spear off of his back so it fits through the doorway? The other option is to do what real spear carriers did back in the day: just have them carry around all of the time, which is doable... if you're willing to invest extra money into animating that little detail in cutscenes. But then you have dozens of characters with such weapons that would require extra attention by animators (ie, Laura's/Aurelia's/Matteus'/Zector's/Ariarnhod's giant weapons. Randy's stunhalberd. Randy's and Shirley's WH40k style chainsaw guns. Leo's fist weapon. Etc), and that time would add up. It'd be a nice polish touch for sure but it's not high priority. Looking at the gameplay footage of Kuro, I guess Van "sheathing" his sword is a small touch, but it draws attention to itself. There is no actual sheathe, it's apparently just hanging in the air from nothing, exposed to the elements. Is that blade like nano-meter levels of sharp? If Van accidentally brushed someone, would it cut the other person? Etc. Questions that you don't think about if it just disappears and you forget about it. Junpei posted:Don't worry about the 3d animation being stiff and using a lot of presets (see: "walking away while waving behind"), with Hajimari, they're going Full Motion Capture so movement is a lot more naturalistic I think that the motion captured animations don't look good. The abstract artstyle of the anime characters is very jarring when combined with the rough, realistic human like movements. The hand animated 3D animations look more naturalistic.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 02:16 |
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They were already using it in Ys 9, and people said they liked the animations in that
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 02:21 |
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I don't really notice it in Legend of Heroes at all, but in Agarest I ADORE the weapons just shining in and out of existence so its bizarre to me that anyone would consider that an actual nitpick.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 03:15 |
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Moofia Boss Val posted:Looking at the gameplay footage of Kuro, I guess Van "sheathing" his sword is a small touch, but it draws attention to itself. There is no actual sheathe, it's apparently just hanging in the air from nothing, exposed to the elements. Is that blade like nano-meter levels of sharp? If Van accidentally brushed someone, would it cut the other person? Etc. Questions that you don't think about if it just disappears and you forget about it. Its design is throwing you off, but Van doesn't fight with a sword, he fights with a stylized type of jian, which is a kind of mace. It's not nano-meter sharp. It's not sharp at all. So.... it doesn't have a sheath because it doesn't need one. SgtSteel91 posted:Oh hey, I remembered this Certainly. So, the main knock on Class VII that I see on this board is that they were too naive, and that their insistence on saving Crow was a pipe dream. Also, that they shouldn't be declaring themselves as a third faction, when it's clear they're all-but-allied with the imperialists. But they weren't being naive at all. You know how I know? They very nearly won. Replay what happens at the end of the main game again, and you'll see what I mean. In the infernal castle, after they defeat Testa-Rossa, as things stand, Class VII has Cedric, the heir to the throne, and they have Cayenne, the noble Alliance's commander. By this point, the other noble alliance leaders have either surrendered or been captured, with the possible exception of Lord Hyarms, who is a bit like Lord Rogner in that his heart probably isn't into it. And also, he's not there, so if he wanted to continue their little rebellion, then he'd be doing it from a position that's weakened to the point of destruction. So at the end, after Testa Rossa falls, Rufus comes running in, kills Grianos, (perhaps temporarily crippling Vita...) and then Osborne reveals himself as alive the Iron Bloods square off with Class VII and laugh at you. Millium apologizes and runs over to the Iron Bloods. Class VII's plan of reuniting the whole class and getting Crow back is thwarted by this turn, as much as it is Crow dying. Moreso. Because the government that would be built with Class VII and their allies'--namely Prince Olivert's--input is not going to be the warmongering authoritarian state that Osborne puts into place. And if Crow didn't get killed, I don't think it's be unrealistic at all that he'd face some kind of commutation of a sentence; mostly because he would be on the winning side and winners make the rules, but also because in what actually went down, he risked his life (lost it) saving Cedric. So the entirety on why Class VII lost had nothing to do with the actions of Class VII. The fact of the matter is, without Osborne magically being still alive, they did win. They were that close. Say Rufus shows up without Osborne. Do the Iron Bloods still try to stand up to Class VII? I doubt it. I don't think Millium would defect, for one, and for two, if you look at who is actually in the castle, with the prince, and able to set the rules going forward, it's not the Imperialists. The army, and everyone affiliated with it (except for Claire, and Claire alone) is outside. Ouroboros isn't committed to the Imperialists. They're doing their own thing. Zephyr are mercenaries who follow contracts, which sort of cease to be a thing when their side loses. Who would Sharon, Viktor and Toval side with after they cleaned up? Olivert is going to side with Class VII because, uh, it's his side to begin with. So if Osborne didn't show up, if Crow didnt die, then Class VII won. There was no one left who had the power or opportunity to stop them. That's why the ending is so tragic, and why the game needed the second ending and everything in between: to establish how Class VII would proceed now. Gathering as much information as they can, using their skills and diverse talents to weed out stupid bullshit like Osborne being able to live through a bullet to the heart. Unlike the Noble faction, which was all but destroyed, Class VII is largely still an operational, cohesive unit. One that hasn't given up on why it was in the war in the first place. One that never actually surrendered, either. tldr; It kind of pisses me off that everyone calls them these dumb naive kids, when they played a perfect game and were only defeated by deus ex machina. What story did people read?
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 04:08 |
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The third faction thing is silly because the game identifies the 2 factions as the Noble Alliance and the RMP and the remaining military battallions and then in a lot of Act 2 the gang is helping out or receiving aid from the RMP and whats left of the military in east Erebonia. Like it always makes sense when they ally with the RMP because it's for stuff like saving family members or arresting evil bastards but it doesn't make the Crimosn Wings seem all that independently affiliated. Like I don't think the game is portarying them as naive or anything. They're doing the best they can and making correct decisions to help people, but the game struggles to portray them as a legitimate 3rd faction and Osbourne is able to so easily piggyback off their success because the army they were assisting in taking back Heimdallr were a group that supported Osbourne before his 'assasination'.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 04:33 |
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Veryslightlymad posted:Its design is throwing you off, but Van doesn't fight with a sword, he fights with a stylized type of jian, which is a kind of mace. It's not nano-meter sharp. It's not sharp at all. So.... it doesn't have a sheath because it doesn't need one. Yeah, I think you an I are on the same wavelength Before Rufus revealed himself to be the first Ironblood, I thought his actions of usurping Duke Cayenne and taking out Grianos and Vita was him trying to position himself as a hero for ending the Vermilion Calamity, but also use that to broker a peace with the Imperial Army and Machia's dad, who pretty much was next in line as head of the Reformist Faction, since he seemed to be a honor-bound friendly adversary type, like Camus from Fire Emblem. And with Prince Olivert also being there, yeah it was sooo close to Class 7 coming out as victors in the whole thing. But then Osborne walks in and not only reveals he was in control the entire time, but also managing to turn Rean into his pawn But it's like you said, too. Class 7 isn't down for the count. And the Chancellor being so focused on Rean means he's underestimating all of them, which gives them a chance to turn things around. edit: And on top of the Epilogue showing how Class 7 proceeds, having Millium shed tears for the first time over having to leave lays the seeds for her eventual defection from the Ironbloods, since in the Finale it did kind of sting, on top of the other gut punches, when she ran over to Osborne (I think, I'll have to see when I eventually get to CS3 and 4) SgtSteel91 fucked around with this message at 05:43 on Jul 27, 2021 |
# ? Jul 27, 2021 04:36 |
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Since I started Azure up again, and immediately got hit with this, I really need to vent a tiny bit. WHY THE HELL DID IT JUST TELL ME MARIABELL IS EVIL IN A SIDEQUEST!? FIRST RIXIA BEING YIN, AND NOW THIS? IS THE GAME GONNA TELL ME ABOUT ARIOS BEFORE THE SSS LEARNS IT TOO!?
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 04:47 |
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I do enjoy the stankface facial expressions of the older games, especially Elie and Tio, even better when you add the evo voices.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 05:21 |
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MythosDragon posted:Since I started Azure up again, and immediately got hit with this, I really need to vent a tiny bit. That's a NG+ exclusive sidequest, so presumably you should know all that already.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 05:35 |
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SyntheticPolygon posted:The third faction thing is silly because the game identifies the 2 factions as the Noble Alliance and the RMP and the remaining military battallions and then in a lot of Act 2 the gang is helping out or receiving aid from the RMP and whats left of the military in east Erebonia. Like it always makes sense when they ally with the RMP because it's for stuff like saving family members or arresting evil bastards but it doesn't make the Crimosn Wings seem all that independently affiliated. Events pretty much needed to go down exactly as they did, at least as far as CS2 as a story goes. For the reformists/imperials to win, they needed both Osborne to not die, and for Crow to die. Let's say only the first part happens. With Crow there, even if Rufus's surprise killing of Grianos cripples Vita to the point of her being useless in a brawl, Crow would not accept surrendering to Osborne, and there would be another fight---now, some of us have played CS3 and 4, and know why that wouldn't go very well, but Class VII at that time probably would have pushed to capture Osborne and the Ironbloods, and paint the entire civil war as both the other sides throwing the country into chaos while only themselves and their allies gave a poo poo about protecting the actual people and re-establishing a functioning government. A huge part of why they don't do this after the Osborne reveal is that Crow was killed. For one, Crow is a very strong fighter, but for two, his death shell-shocked the will to fight out of everyone else. So the traumatized kids just kind of get swept up in the current. But discounting things we know that would be future spoilers---let's say everyone present in that scene is exactly as they were depicted at the end of CS2, and make the singular change that Crow is alive---the question becomes: could class VII defeat the united Ironbloods? I would argue yeah, they probably could, even back then. First, does Millium still defect? Maybe. Probably, even. But I think the combined will of Class VII, especially one that hasn't been emotionally broken, might be enough. Even if it wasn't, that's not enough to tip the scales to the Ironbloods. All of those guys are strong fighters, but with the fall of the Testa-Rossa, as I said earlier, there's no reason for any of the Ironbloods' allies to stick around. Zephyr's employer already lost, so they would leave, but then, there's a not zero chance they would have helped Class VII because 1)Class VII would be fighting the command structure of their original enemy and 2)Class VII has Fie. Ouroborous would have left, as its implied they did. So as tough and comparatively fresh as the Ironbloods all are, Class VII wouldn't be alone, they could drag things out long enough to be interrupted by at least Olivert, Toval, Sharon, and Victor. There's a reasonable chance that Xeno and Leo would also be there. Whose side do you think they would have taken? And just outside the infernal castle, the closest people to the infernal castle were all allies of Class VII. The army was fighting more on the surrounding environs. Right up next to the castle, the people fighting were the rest of Thors' Military Academy, Instructor Thomas, Mueller and Neidhardt. Only Neidhardt might have sided with the imperials, but even that's incredibly doubtful, as the army structure of the imperials doesn't really have any attachment to Osborne himself, so much as they do a coherent government and the safety of the royal family. After saving Cedric, who is frankly too out of it to really say much, Class VII would has the apparent support of all three of the Royal children, and the vocal support of two of them. So, really, if Crow didn't die, they rumble. And if you only look at what the player knew in CS2, and what the party could have reasonably known, Class VII still should have won. They were that close. Veryslightlymad fucked around with this message at 05:51 on Jul 27, 2021 |
# ? Jul 27, 2021 05:47 |
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Those are some big what ifs. I don't really see why Class VII would choose to fight the Ironbloods in that moment. Yeah Osborne is a lovely evil war hawk politician that sucks rear end but at the time he's just resuming his role as chancellor and gloating about his biggest political opposition has been removed. Much like how Olivert and company never made a move against him prior to the civil war I don't think they'd move against him now. Politically and legally he's not done anything wrong. Even with Crow alive and Class VII being his pals I don't think they'd help him assassinate the legal chancellor of Erebonia. That's just not their style. I don't think they'd do a coup right after stopping one. They'd probably help Crow escape or make him flee with Vita or something but I can't see them straight up fighting the Ironbloods. Also don't really see why any of that matters? Honestly, I don't think Osbourne came out on top because Class VII weren't strong enough or motivated enough to fight him or anything. That's not really how the climax of CS2 goes down.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 06:09 |
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Irisize posted:That's a NG+ exclusive sidequest, so presumably you should know all that already. Nah, doll collecting chapter 2.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 06:17 |
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Hmm I think it doesn't show that scene after you finish that quest on your first run, but in NG+ it does show the scene after. I think it plays a tiny bit into a quest in CSIV as a sort of throwback.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 06:22 |
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# ? May 29, 2024 23:58 |
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infraboy posted:Hmm I think it doesn't show that scene after you finish that quest on your first run, but in NG+ it does show the scene after. I think it plays a tiny bit into a quest in CSIV as a sort of throwback. Huh, looked it up, youre right. I've been bamboozled by my own need to 100% the stupid PC game. Good to know. The other point still stands.
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# ? Jul 27, 2021 06:26 |