Tales of the Abyss geniusery + Odin Sphere again
Last time on my Tales of the Abyss game, I was at about 19 hours and I was getting the hang of this game. I was upgrading my skills and my weapons and picking out my clothing/accessories. It was going well, for the most part. I was in the Oracle Knight Headquarters and just about through it, I think. Except I was having a little problem, Luke wasn't using his artes. He had a little X above his status window and a little red X would flash whenever I tried to use his artes.
What happened? I was in the Aramis Spring when it first happened and I had no idea what it was. I stumbled through and headed on out to Daath. Stopping in the shops nearby, I bought one of everything to use on Luke to undo whatever status effect it was. None of them worked, not even the Sealed Artes cure (whatever item that was) was curing him. I was horribly confused. I managed to muddle my way through to the Oracle Knights Headquarters and eventually my week was up and I was kind of seriously frustrated after having spent over an hour and a half trying to figure out what was wrong with him.
Well, I still wanted to finish the story. So, I rented the game again, figuring maybe a little cool-down time would have helped. I loaded my game up, started fighting the soldiers there and still had the same exact problem. For another hour and a half, I tried everything I could think of. I fiddled with the artes menus, I readjusted the cobalt cores, I readjusted the shortcuts, I readjusted everything. Still that little red X haunted me.
I paged through the manual to see if there were any suggestions, to figure out what this was. All it would tell me was that you could turn the artes on/off with the square button, but they were all turned on! I should be able to use them! I had a long, long conversation with Tammaiya about what it might possibly be and I tried everything she could think of, too. (Not easy when she hasn't played the game before.)
I had sort of given up at this point. My spirit was crushed, Luke's artes would remain sealed forever. I'd just keep playing, level grinding him to make up the difference if I had to. I just couldn't think of anything else to do, so I'd just live with it. I wanted to play my damn game, not to spend yet another hour trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with my character.
Then I was wandering through the rooms in the Oracle Knights Headquarters, opening chests to get shiny new equipment and going through the menus to equip everything. Sometimes I'm not sure what kind of equipment I'm getting, so I just go through everyone's menus to see if it'll benefit them, trying to figure out where the Silver Guard (or whatever) went off to in the menu, if it was clothing or armor or what. I was browsing through all of my settings, just glancing through the accessories to make sure I had good ones on everyone, when I stopped to read what I had on Luke.
I noted, oh, right, I have the Dark Seal on him, which increases EXP to x1.5, does x2 damage... and... seals... my... artes... oh, motherfuck.
I am clearly a fucking GENIUS. \o/
(I actually found this incredibly funny and must have LOL'd for a good 45 seconds because of course it's the retarded thing that I should have thought of first. I've played enough goddamned FF12 to know that accessories can come with nasty status effects, but yet the thought never crossed my mind. GENIUS.)
I also played a little more Odin Sphere before I had to take it back, but I still didn't get very far. I think I'm only into chapter 4 of book 1? I have trouble playing it for more than half an hour or so at a time because I want to level grind and... well, the difficult part about leveling in Odin Sphere is that there doesn't seem to be an easy way to do it. Especially if you're like me and tend to hoard food for during boss battles. (It's weird to eat food when I'm at full health!)
The first time I went to fight Brigan, I was only at level 20 or so, I had about 178HP and I kept getting destroyed by him. Of course, it didn't help that I kept losing my patience during that fight, so I would go near him at the wrong times and take way more damage than I should have. But, Jesus, that was an obnoxiously long and hard fight, it took me about eight tries to finally finish him off. ...I may have quit in the middle of a couple of them because Brigan would grab me and pour that drink all over me and half of the time I wouldn't even have time to open my bags to get some food to recover before he started jumping up and down on top of me. One time I'd managed to get him down to 10% and he grabbed me, pouring the drink on me, and asdlfkjas;dlkfjasdkj I WAS SO CLOSE.
So, before I went to fight him again, I ran around the mountains for awhile, collecting Turneys to sell and buying milk for the EXP. I eventually got up to 232HP or so, going back to fight Brigan again. It was still a long, hard fight, but I planted a couple of sheep seeds and I made sure to use my psypher attack to double my strength (instead of using whirlwind) and I maintained more distance with him. I guess the eighth time is the charm then. It's actually not such a difficult fight after you get the hang of it. And I'm getting much better at Gwendolyn's dive attack. ♥
After that, it was more story and I'm surprised at how attached I am to Gwendolyn already. Watching her throw away everything, even her pride and dignity and her heart, for her father is heartbreaking. While I'm already shipping Oswald/Gwendolyn like whoa, watching her deal with the spell that seems to be forcing her to love him is painful, too. Watching her still try to serve her father, even as the little bird points out that she's been abandoned here, is more heartbreak. I hope she can genuinely love Oswald eventually, but in the meantime, I marvel at a story that I've grown attached to so quickly.
I really do ♥ Oswald already, just for refusing to treat her like an object and I'm kind of seriously dying to see if there's a fandom for these two.
(I really wish there were a guidebook for this, I would love for a pretty, glossy guide with maps and pictures for this gorgeous game.)
What happened? I was in the Aramis Spring when it first happened and I had no idea what it was. I stumbled through and headed on out to Daath. Stopping in the shops nearby, I bought one of everything to use on Luke to undo whatever status effect it was. None of them worked, not even the Sealed Artes cure (whatever item that was) was curing him. I was horribly confused. I managed to muddle my way through to the Oracle Knights Headquarters and eventually my week was up and I was kind of seriously frustrated after having spent over an hour and a half trying to figure out what was wrong with him.
Well, I still wanted to finish the story. So, I rented the game again, figuring maybe a little cool-down time would have helped. I loaded my game up, started fighting the soldiers there and still had the same exact problem. For another hour and a half, I tried everything I could think of. I fiddled with the artes menus, I readjusted the cobalt cores, I readjusted the shortcuts, I readjusted everything. Still that little red X haunted me.
I paged through the manual to see if there were any suggestions, to figure out what this was. All it would tell me was that you could turn the artes on/off with the square button, but they were all turned on! I should be able to use them! I had a long, long conversation with Tammaiya about what it might possibly be and I tried everything she could think of, too. (Not easy when she hasn't played the game before.)
I had sort of given up at this point. My spirit was crushed, Luke's artes would remain sealed forever. I'd just keep playing, level grinding him to make up the difference if I had to. I just couldn't think of anything else to do, so I'd just live with it. I wanted to play my damn game, not to spend yet another hour trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with my character.
Then I was wandering through the rooms in the Oracle Knights Headquarters, opening chests to get shiny new equipment and going through the menus to equip everything. Sometimes I'm not sure what kind of equipment I'm getting, so I just go through everyone's menus to see if it'll benefit them, trying to figure out where the Silver Guard (or whatever) went off to in the menu, if it was clothing or armor or what. I was browsing through all of my settings, just glancing through the accessories to make sure I had good ones on everyone, when I stopped to read what I had on Luke.
I noted, oh, right, I have the Dark Seal on him, which increases EXP to x1.5, does x2 damage... and... seals... my... artes... oh, motherfuck.
I am clearly a fucking GENIUS. \o/
(I actually found this incredibly funny and must have LOL'd for a good 45 seconds because of course it's the retarded thing that I should have thought of first. I've played enough goddamned FF12 to know that accessories can come with nasty status effects, but yet the thought never crossed my mind. GENIUS.)
I also played a little more Odin Sphere before I had to take it back, but I still didn't get very far. I think I'm only into chapter 4 of book 1? I have trouble playing it for more than half an hour or so at a time because I want to level grind and... well, the difficult part about leveling in Odin Sphere is that there doesn't seem to be an easy way to do it. Especially if you're like me and tend to hoard food for during boss battles. (It's weird to eat food when I'm at full health!)
The first time I went to fight Brigan, I was only at level 20 or so, I had about 178HP and I kept getting destroyed by him. Of course, it didn't help that I kept losing my patience during that fight, so I would go near him at the wrong times and take way more damage than I should have. But, Jesus, that was an obnoxiously long and hard fight, it took me about eight tries to finally finish him off. ...I may have quit in the middle of a couple of them because Brigan would grab me and pour that drink all over me and half of the time I wouldn't even have time to open my bags to get some food to recover before he started jumping up and down on top of me. One time I'd managed to get him down to 10% and he grabbed me, pouring the drink on me, and asdlfkjas;dlkfjasdkj I WAS SO CLOSE.
So, before I went to fight him again, I ran around the mountains for awhile, collecting Turneys to sell and buying milk for the EXP. I eventually got up to 232HP or so, going back to fight Brigan again. It was still a long, hard fight, but I planted a couple of sheep seeds and I made sure to use my psypher attack to double my strength (instead of using whirlwind) and I maintained more distance with him. I guess the eighth time is the charm then. It's actually not such a difficult fight after you get the hang of it. And I'm getting much better at Gwendolyn's dive attack. ♥
After that, it was more story and I'm surprised at how attached I am to Gwendolyn already. Watching her throw away everything, even her pride and dignity and her heart, for her father is heartbreaking. While I'm already shipping Oswald/Gwendolyn like whoa, watching her deal with the spell that seems to be forcing her to love him is painful, too. Watching her still try to serve her father, even as the little bird points out that she's been abandoned here, is more heartbreak. I hope she can genuinely love Oswald eventually, but in the meantime, I marvel at a story that I've grown attached to so quickly.
I really do ♥ Oswald already, just for refusing to treat her like an object and I'm kind of seriously dying to see if there's a fandom for these two.
(I really wish there were a guidebook for this, I would love for a pretty, glossy guide with maps and pictures for this gorgeous game.)