Here We Are at the End

Well, I did it! I finished Dark Dawn. It was a bit shorter than I thought it'd be. But that's fine, I suppose; it leaves more for the next game. XD

So, I don't want to spoil much of the story, if you feel like playing it. All I'll say is that this fella to the right is fairly important and you'll find out why, though if you're a fan of the previous two games, chances are that you can figure it out from this picture.

Overall, it was fun game. Some of the puzzles were really challenging and time-consuming, others were a bit simple, but hey, you need a balance right? The only complaint I have is the same one that I mentioned in the previous entry - monster encounters. It feels like there weren't a lot of them until you were hurtling towards the endgame and things were getting out of control. At that point, you couldn't take more than five steps outside without finding one. Of course, once you get inside, monster encounters just about shrivel - it was a strange phenomenon. But the reason that I was annoyed by the lack of monster encounters was that you really didn't get to see a lot of what characters' powers were like until you go into a boss battle. And even then, the Psynergy powers were sort of like a time-waster - one which paled in comparison to your normal attack! During boss battles, the focus is all on getting your Djinn out so that you can pull out the big mean summons, which makes sense, but that sort of was the strategy for all of the boss battles. Annoying in some ways, fun in others.

Other than that, I had a lot of fun with this game. Most of the characters were pretty cool, though I sort of feel bad for that last one you get right before things really get rolling. I hardly used her because she didn't have much of an affinity for weapons that actually dealt damage and since she was a Venus adept, it was hard to have her in the party with the main character(who I avoided switching out as much as possible). And aside from that, she didn't get many opportunities for characterization. With five of the party members, there's plenty of time for them to develop and for you to see a lot of them. With Eoleo and Sveta, you get a fair amount of time and the moments that let you know about them are ones that are integral to the plot and very large moments in the character's lives. Himi's was large as well, I suppose, but it just didn't feel as powerful as what happened to Eoleo or Sveta. The other thing that really annoyed me with this game was the fact that we never see half of the "Warriors of Vale" from the first two games. And that's actually an accurate number! Of the eight characters that inhabit the first two games(ignoring that old crawdad Kraden) we only see two! We meet Garet and we meet a much older, much more awesome-looking Issac. But we never see the rest! They are all mentioned, but never seen! They even make a comment to Matthew about how even though he looks just like his father, he has his mother's eyes. It's interesting to me and I'd like to see how the rest of the party aged. Well, that's all I've got. I suppose I can give you my ending stats and whatnot.

Matthew Lv 46 9 Venus

Karis Lv 41 8 Jupiter

Tyrell Lv 42 9 Mars

Reif Lv 40 9 Mercruy

Amiti Lv 44 9 Mercury

Sveta Lv 44 9 Jupiter

Eoleo Lv 44 9 Mars

Himi Lv 42 9 Venus

Oh yeah, I'll leave ya with one last thing: There's definitely going to be another Golden Sun game :]

A Long Pause

Geez, it's been a while since I've posted >.<; Sorry guys. It's been pretty crazy back here at home. Haven't had a lot of time to play, so the amount of progress has felt rather lacking. Though looking back at my last post, I guess it's pretty good. Level-wise it's nothing impressive, but battle is so... secondary in this game, it seems. I mean, yeah, the puzzles are fun, but... I kind of miss when I was running back and forth and monsters hassled me with every fifth step. Sure it was the most annoying thing ever, but, god damn it, at least I got to know the abilities and such. In this game, any random encounter can be smashed to bits by spamming the attack command. Yeah, I get to see my characters "master" their weapons but I feel that the strategy just isn't there. With the boss battles, strategy is a bit more important, but those summons are incredibly beastly, especially the combined ones.

In terms of the story's progress, some interesting stuff has happened. If I remember correctly, I restored the power of Alchemy to twin cities and as a result, I've been able to get closer to the goal that this game started with, i.e. the Roc's Feather. It's interesting how it always happens like that, isn't it? This whole game started with Garet's son being an idiot and breaking their li'l flying machine, so we have to get a feather to fix it. But along the way, stuff gets complicated and as a result, we're saving the world! :D Anywho, other interesting stuff: I've met a beastwoman. She's this interesting cat-girl type of creature and once of her psynergy abilities is that she morphs to beast form and does tons of physical damage. Sadly, she didn't stick with us very long, but I know she'll come back. And I can't wait for it! Also, we have a prince on our side, whose mysterious father is some sort of Adept. I wonder who it is. Oh! One more thing: I've found out that Felix and Jenna are alive! I hope I get to meet them. Apparently Matthew has his mommy's eyes :3 Alright, here's the numerical info:

Matthew 27 Tyrell 27 Karis 26 Rief 25 Amiti 25

Venus 7 Mars 7 Jupiter 7 Mercury 5 Mercury 6

Venus 1 Venus 1

Location: Kolima Forest

P.S. Damn the formatting on this thing! Never does what I want.

Slow Advancement

Here we are! Second update on Dark Dawn! Wasn't exactly sure what time of the week I should update, but for now, Wednesday/Thursday seems like a good time to me since that'd be roughly the day that I started the thing, yeah? Anywho, not as much progress as I'd like, though if I think about it, there's actually a fair amount that went on in terms of the plot and things. And remember how I mentioned grown-up Issac? That's him! ->

Thus far, I've met Kraden, though I have been prevented from joining forces with him, and I've gotten the fourth character! Yay! He's Mia's son, a Water Adept. He's also adorable :3. At the same time that we meet him, we meet his sister, named Nowell. She's also quite cute, but sadly, we had to part ways from her. Besides, there's only room enough for one sassy girl in this party! XP

Other than that, there's not much for me to comment on at this point. The gameplay is very similar to the previous game, though I do like what they've done with weapon abilities. I should've looked at the previous entry before starting this one so I could know if I've commented on this mechanic already, but ah well. Anywho, with the weapons in this game, each one has an ability(most have Critical Strike) and a lot of them have two. The way it works is the more that you use a weapon, the better you get. The better you are, the more you use the ability. After a while, when you've used the weapon a lot and used the ability a lot, you 'master' the ability. Then, you can 'master' the weapon. I think that this just means that you have a higher rate of using the weapons abilities, but I haven't really done a lot of looking into this. Clearly I should XD.

At this point in the game, I'm playing a bit of a bouncing around role, in terms of the actual story. I go from one city, to the next city, then back to the first, then off to a third to go the second and actually progress things so that EVENTUALLY, I can get back to that first village. It's quite insane. Fun though. That's about all that I've got for this week. Here's the levels and such.

Matthew Lv 17 Karis Lv 16 Tyrell Lv 16 Rief Lv 16

3 Venus 3 Jupiter 3 Mars 2 Mercury

1 Jupiter 1 Venus

First Game

Alright, here's the first game: Golden Sun: Dark Dawn. Now, I said that I won't often do recent games, this will be an exception since I bought it the day it came out and I've been looking forward to it for the last month and a half or so XD. This game is the long-awaited sequel to Golden Sun: The Lost Age. It takes place 30 years after Lost Age and follows the story of the children of the heroes from the first two games. I started it yesterday when I got it, so the time will be a day off, remind me of that.

Anywho, so far, I haven't gotten far, but I'm loving it. Seeing how they aged the previous heroes is fun and I can't wait to see the rest of them. I also love what they've done with the menus, it flows so much better than it use to, partly due to the use of the touch screen. I also like that they've given the Djinni a bit more personality. Each one looks a little different, as opposed to all having a li'l template. Of course, the graphics are better by a fair leap, so it's understandable that they couldn't do it in the past.

At this point, I'm heading towards the first 'real' dungeon. I don't consider the initial dungeon a real one because your parents are guiding you through it and giving you advice on how to beat the puzzles. Speaking of which, if you know Golden Sun, you know that puzzles are huge component. Granted that it's early in the game, but thus far, the puzzles have been fairly easy. We'll see if that sticks.

Alright, to end the entries about this game, I'm going to include a few stats. Namely, character levels and Djinni acquired(not specific names, but numbers of each type) and location. Also, I will include who has what Djinni equipped. Here they are:

Matthew Lv 9 Karis Lv 8 Tyrell Lv 8

2 Venus 1 Jupiter 2 Mars

1 Mercury

Location - Just outside of the Konpa Ruins

Let's Try This...

Alright, so, this is probably the third time that I've tried to revive this li'l blog and make use of it. We'll see how it goes XP. Anywho, introduction time, I guess. Name's the Lobster and I'm a gamer. Why Lobster? It's just a nickname that I got and I rather like it, so feel free to use it. Anywho, 'bout this gamin' thing. Here's the deal: I suck at finishing games. I tend to start really excited, and then after a bit of time, I find something else to capture my attention, so I forget about the game and never get back to it. Or, if I do, I've forgotten everything about it, so I start it over and the cycle repeats.

So, I start this blog with a few intentions:

1. Keep track of how long it takes me to beat games

2. Motivate me to finish games

3. Provide the occasional review

I will warn you, the likelihood of me doing any current games is low given the fact that the most up-to-date systems I have are the Nintendo DS and the PSP, neither of which often have games that are really worth the time. Of course, this next post will sort of contradict that, but oh well :P enjoy!