One of these things is not like the others...
One of these things just doesn't belong...
So I'm kinda splurging on videogames this week. Finally gave in and bought Luminous Arc and Touch Detective from Amazon, since they've both apparently dissappeared from store shelves around here. Hence the poorly thought-out spam above. Haven't gotten into Touch much yet, but I can say that the protagonist's side-comments on the top screen are quite distracting. Also, that the entire setting is whacked. Luminous should serve as a decent timewaster until FF Tactics A2 comes out here, seeing as how it's pretty much the same exact battle system, but while I'm enjoying it I can't help but find more than a few flaws in it. The major one being that the touch screen controls are incredibly fritzy in every non-battle application. Tapping one of the on-screen buttons causes a completely different one to activate, that sort of thing. Thankfully you can just use the traditional methods to navigate those sections instead, and the controls are much less buggy in the battles. Not always responsive, but they'll open the menu you tapped. There's also these inexplicable white lines that flash on the screen at random, and the occasional lag on the dialog boxes, especially when the (kinda terrible) voice acting is turned on. It's definitely the least technically ept DS game I've gotten thus far. But my main quibble at this point is actually the plot; where Tactics Advanced gave you mostly battles with little intrusions of plot every once in a while, Luminous Arc, for the first few hours at least, is mostly plot with the odd battle stuck in. And not even a particularly good plot. It's pretty obvious right from the beginning that the main characters are on the wrong side, and then they drop hints in every scene like they're made out of lead. But the battles are fun and the art is nice, so it's not a total waste.
I also finally picked up Oblivion last night, although the video card I need to play it still isn't here. It probably ought to be, since it's been in Massachusetts since Thursday night, but apparently it takes UPS a full day to unload a truck. That's kinda the downside of online tracking for them, I suppose. It lets their customers see when their packages should arrive, but it also lets them see how much they dick around with them in the meantime. It's kinda funny, really. I ordered the video card and the DS games at about the same time, early Wednesday morning. The video card was shipped UPS 3-day(free as part of a standard NewEgg promotion), and the DS games with plain old USPS 5-day. The card was jetted across the country from California to New Hampshire in a bit more than a day, and trucked into the MA depot just after 12am Friday morning... Where it's still sitting. The DS games showed up Friday, largely because they shipped from the Amazon distribution center in Springfield MA. Complete reversal of expectations. But when it does show up and, gods willing I get it installed and running, Oblivion should take up a healthy chunk of my free time. Goodness knows Morrowind and Daggerfall did. I'll probably end up even more behind on my Internetting.
On top of that are the various games I've been neglecting. I haven't touched MP3 in weeks, and am still dithering around before the final battle in Phantom Hourglass trying to get more ship parts and the last Power Gem I need. I suppose I ought to try to get online at some point and see if I can trade off some of my extras. I certainly don't need two Golden Ship hulls. And I should put some more effort into Children of Mana, if just to see if it ever develops a plot. At least I can't say I don't have anything to keep myself occupied.