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She-Weegee! Via マサオ

Ni no Kuni - First Impressions

When you hear the name Ghibli, you think of beautiful stories, top-notch animation, memorable characters and sweet soundtracks. When you hear ‘Ghibli’ and ‘game’ in the same sentence, you know it’s going to be something good. And good it is.

Ni no Kuni - Wrath of The White Witch has everything you’d expect from Ghibli in a tidy package presented in RPG form with help from Level-5. The moment the intro started playing, I was hooked.

If anything, Ni no Kuni is a game I want to keep playing just for the story and some will argue that’s the way it should be with RPGs. For me, a good RPG consists of an engaging storyline with a solid battle system - an even mix of both without either hogging the spotlight. I don’t need to tell you that Ni no Kuni is a fantastic story, so I’ll be talking to you about the gameplay instead.

For those who don’t know, Ni no Kuni’s battle system is in real-time (rather than turn based like most RPGs) whilst utilizing menu options as you move and dodge attacks. Moving with the left analogue stick and selecting menu items with the D-pad at the same time requires use of your thumb and forefinger to operate (or some other weird finger contortion). It may not sound ideal to some, but I’m finding it easy enough.

As far as fighting goes, your character fights but mostly makes use of ‘familiars’ - creatures that are summoned with from your heart using magic. This isn’t an entirely new concept (still waiting for a Jade Cocoon 3) but it adds a strategic element to your battles.

Since your summoned familiars are summoned from your heart, each creature you send to battle shares your HP and MP, meaning you have to think a little harder about which creature to send out and what you want them to do. If your familiar dies, you die. Each of your familiars have different stats - some are better for defense, some better for evasiveness, etc. and you can raise the stats of your creatures to a certain extent. Each familiar will have different skills, strengths and weaknesses.

During battle you can also find random HP and MP orbs appear on the ground which you can pick up to replenish your health or magic. I’ve found that picking up every orb I see can be crucial not only for the purpose of fighting but also solving puzzles outside of battles as well. There are some spells you can use outside of a battle which will consume MP. If you’re out of MP and you don’t have any items to recover with (which can be expensive early game), you have little choice than to enter a battle for the chance of gaining more MP orbs, or leave the area entirely to purchase items, stay at an Inn or find a save point.

If you die in battle, it’s game over (duh). Once you die, you’re presented with the option to continue, in which doing so will cost you all the money your character has (ouch) or return to the title screen and load from your last save. Picking the latter option has no impact on your character and will save you from losing all that hard earned cash.

Outside of battles there are many areas to explore and optional side-quests to complete. Completing quests earn you very helpful rewards and stamps on a card. Once you receive a certain amount of stamps on a card, you begin a fresh card. Each completed card you have helps you claim additional rewards later on. The quests can range from searching for people/items to bounty hunts (please kill X monster at Y place).

If there was anything I’d change, it would probably be the HP and MP being shared, however this makes you think a little harder about what you need to do in order to win your fights. Besides that, it’s a very fun game.
Ni no Kuni might not be for everyone, but if you’re looking for a game with a good story, I would definitely recommend you give it a shot.

Time to fuck shit up

Heyo!

Level 51 now.

Kuu, level 43.

I think purple’s my colour. 

Came across this picture in Tera. I don’t even…

Missing Tera since Open Beta. Can’t wait for it to pop back up :D

If you’re on Frost Reach, feel free to get in touch with my sexy Elf Priest Kuu :)

I’ll be playing during the evening in Australian times, but will sometimes play late too :)

Sengoku BASARA lunchtime!

Enter FF14, version 2.0.

For those of you who have played momentarily and dropped the game (like myself) will this letter from CEO Yoichi Wada persuade you to go back? We’ll have to wait and see I guess.

Allow me to thank you all for your continued interest in FINAL FANTASY XIV. 

One year has passed since the game’s release, and despite the disappointment surrounding its launch, we have received a wealth of support from you, the players. Your encouraging words and continued loyalty have been a source of immeasurable inspiration to everyone involved with FINAL FANTASY XIV’s development. 

In the ten months since the FINAL FANTASY XIV team’s restructuring, we have put forth the utmost effort into not only improving the game’s existing features, but also creating a concrete plan to outline the game’s new direction. Today, I am pleased to announce we can confidently present that plan to our customers. We fully realize this is but a single step towards our ultimate goal, and that to meet the high standards set in the plan, more time is required. In the meantime, however, we will not waver in our commitment to bringing players exciting and engaging content, even as the game moves through its evolution. 

With this, it is my hope that we will continue to receive your support as we will need to bring the unbilled period to a close between late November and early December 2011, and introduce our subscription-based billing system. I appreciate that this decision will not be popular, but it is a necessary step in building upon the foundation our fans and development team have made together and to realize the full potential of FINAL FANTASY XIV. 

The team will stop short of nothing as they move towards realizing the new FINAL FANTASY XIV, and as they do so, I humbly ask for both your understanding and support.

President and CEO, Yoichi Wada

I’m interested but I’ll be spending more time on PSO2 or perhaps RO2 when they come out.