Granblue Fantasy at level 170 – Good things come to those who refuse to grind

URBLAAARGH MRGRGROGH!
That means “Good morning and welcome to another update on my Granblue Fantasy progress!” As I mentioned a year ago, I’ve quit pretending I’m capable of quitting this game. It’s just that I’m largely satisfied with my grids and have no serious intention of upgrading (what’s Magna 2? Is it tasty?) so a yearly progress report is more than enough.

Earlier posts from my Granblue Fantasy journey:
Levels 1-13 (I must admit that contrary to my fears at the time, stamina limits never materialized. I have more AP than any sane gamer could ever use)
Level 40 (so cute, I actually thought I could stop playing any time I wanted)
Level 50 (to think that now Proto Bahamut raids are as common as dirt and I have like 500 Champion Merits…)
Level 80 (lol, that “fire” grid. I miss those days)
Level 90 (I was so proud of MVP’ing those Omegas)
Level 103 (my grand “I quit” post. Yeah, about that quitting thing…)
Level 140 (the more things change, the more they remain the same)

What have I achieved in a year?

⚔Built a Varuna grid. I had to spark twice for a second Murgleis and a Blue Sphere, but there’s nothing hard about pressing the ‘Draw’ button a few hundred times. I was hoping this Anniversary Roulette would overlap with March’s Legfest so I could spark a third Murgleis at a discount, but not even Cygames is that generous. I’ll post the grid later with the rest of my stuff.

⚔Got 17 characters up to level 100: Gawain, Altair, Lady Grey, Yuel, Sarunan, Cagliostro, Charlotte, Magisa, Arulumaya, Lancelot, Siegfried, Vaseraga, Uno, Vira, Silva, Amira, Yngwie (most recent). A few others are between 99 and 91: Scathacha, Hallessena, Metera, Ghandagoza, Albert, Jeanne d’Arc.

⚔Made 8 out of the 10 eternals. I have everyone except Eahta and Funf now. If I could scrounge up another 45 Rainbow Prisms right now, I could get Eahta. Maybe this is a good time to use those Cerulean Stones. I mean, what else are they good for? There we go.

I’ll beat him up later, there’s no rush. After all, apart from Siete and FLB Uno, none of them have made it to my party front lines. They boast so much in cutscenes, but they’re not impressive at all. I’m only getting them all because I have nothing else to do with my time and stamina.

⚔FLB’d the following summons: Lucifer, Bahamut, Tiamat, Colossus and Yggdrasil Omega. I don’t need to FLB Leviathan, Celeste and Luminiera because I have Varuna, Lucifer and Bahamut. Lucy and Baha were a PITA because of the Silver Centrum requirement, oh how I hate those things.

For the others, I find Magna 2 trains tedious and Magna 2 battles unrewarding. I get irrationally angry when I put in a lot of effort only to get Soul Animas and fodder weapons, and at my age I need to watch my blood pressure (only half-kidding). So I just joined whatever raids I found in the wild for many, many, many months until I finally had enough anima for the FLB.

I finished all three just recently, just around October/November. And then of course March rolls around and Cygames increases the anima drop rate… I have nothing to say :-<

⚔Got my first MLB Arcarum summon: the Sun. I was aiming for Judgment, but then I realized what a tedious process it was with the Primach anima and Silver Centrums (again) so I picked the one everyone says is the most useful. …Except I hardly ever use him because I use Auto-Battle 90% of the time these days. But I’m still working on FLB’ing the Sun for lack of anything better to do. I also want Justice for my water team, but one thing at a time.

⚔Made an Ultima Sword without hosting Proto Bahamut HL or fighting Ultimate Bahamut HL. I leeched for the Proto Baha horns and painstakingly bought Ultima cores from the pendant store, one a month for almost a year. Would it have been faster to just fight UBaha HL? Of course. But I don’t wanna, so there. I can’t tell if I’m getting any benefits from the Ultima Sword, but I must be… right? I’d have to remove it from my grid, test, put it back, test… faster to assume something that annoying to get must be really powerful.

I made the sword Wind because I heard it was a good mainhand. It’s only just now that I’m typing this that I realize… I’m still using the Revenant Dagger as my Wind weapon. Not only that, but the last Proving Grounds event dropped an even better mainhand? …I don’t know what is going on any more. Granblue Fantasy is just too frustrating when it comes to stuff like that.

Stuff I haven’t done and like to pretend I won’t do but maybe I will

– Haven’t unlocked any new classes except Glorybringer since I finished Tier IV last year. The mastery bonuses aren’t worth it IMO.

– Haven’t uncapped any weapons or summons to level 200. I know up to level 100 is called MLB (max limit break?) and 150 is FLB but 200? SLB? ULB? MFSLXYZB? Whatever it is, I haven’t done it. And I just checked the requirements for Lucifer…

Actually very reasonable except those Malice Fragments. Guess I should FLB Lumi quickly and run native Lumi x borrowed Lucifer instead.

– Haven’t unlocked the new light and dark Seraphic weapons. I checked just now but I’m gated by Rainbow Prisms. AGAIN. And I won’t be surprised if Primarch animas and Silver Centrums are needed further down the line, because why not? Let me use Cerulean stones to find out… Yuuuuup. At least there are no Silver Centrums.

– Haven’t unlocked any of the Arcarum Oracle characters. Naturally, since I haven’t FLB’d any Arcarum summons.

– Haven’t added a single Magna 2 weapon to my grids. Thanks to the Anniversary weapon ticket, I can get one if I want. I just don’t know what’s worth it. I hear Grimnir Harps and Earth Axes are good. How many and what should they replace? I’m sorry, I haven’t a clue.

– Haven’t fought the new Huanglong & Qilin or Akasha or Tiamat Malice or whoever the latest ultimate mighty boss de jour is. I’m not even sure what they drop. Something about FLB materials or a new kind of weapon? Are they even any good? When I think about all that effort for something that might be outdated when the next FLMLSLB ultra weapon comes out, I feel so lazy. My regular magna grid will have to suffice.

State of the Grid Address

And with that, it’s time to post my current grids, barely upgraded over last year’s edition! Just like all those FIFA and MLB and NFL video games. Parties, grids and summons in approximate order from most powerful to least.

Water, water everywhere

I started out as a Wind main but Varuna is so hardy and HP-ful and easy to build that Water is my go-to party these days.

When I spark the 3rd Murgleis, it will replace the Wilhelm fist, which is cutting into my HP. The issue is that this party crits pretty often, which I credit to the Wilhelm. What to do, what to do… Eh, I’ll worry about it once I actually have that Murg.

Varuna for double Varuna. I have Bonito but no desire to spend Sunstones on him and no Kengo, Vajra or Summer Grea to take advantage of Kengo memes. Lucifer is for healing and stats, Baha for charge attacks and stats, Yggdrasil is for healing cap up and stats. Athena for… legacy reasons? I’ll replace her with Justice if/when I build her. Or better still, I’ll replace her with MLB Grand Order for the drain. Right after I finish this post.

I used to wonder where people got all those + marks for their weapons and summons, but you’ll pick them up naturally as you play. Especially as you do HL battles and Arcarum. Doubly especially if you gacha draw frequently.

The nice thing about mainhanding a Murgleis is that between the 35% damage cut on ougi (which is pretty much on demand because I usually run Berserker) and Uno’s damage reduction options, I actually have really good sustain. This party doesn’t go down easy at all. If I could just hit harder so battles don’t take so long.

Speaking of battles, I beat Xeno Ifrit NM120 in two turns in the most recent re-run. I remember how unbeatable he seemed the first time round. And now it’s almost as if they nerfed him, I can’t believe it’s still the same boss. Progress like that is why I can’t stop playing Granblue Fantasy.

I’ll be sniping MVPs everywhere this week, so if you see me, say hi!

You Light up my Grids

I haven’t replaced the last gun yet because it’s not that easy to get Lumi swords. That, and I’m sure there must be something else that fits better in that slot, like the enmity dagger Metatron dropped for me the other day. Same for the EX Katana in the top, is it really the best I can do? And there might be better mainhands out there as well. Plus the new Seraphic harp might have a place as well. This is where I should do some research and find out what’s optimal for a light grid, and I will, but not today. I’ve come a long way with Light but I’ve still got a long way to go.

Nice HP, guys! I’m shuffling through my light characters these days, trying to find the best party. FLB Sarunan is really useful for survivability. Jeanne and Albert are both useless. Lucio doesn’t bring much to the table except that nuke. Silva’s custom debuff is nice and she ougis a lot, but she lacks the sheer murder power of her Water counterpart. You can pry my Summer Heles from my cold, dead hands. Etc etc.

The answer, my friend, is blowing in the Wind…

Almost the same as last year’s grid. If you track my Wind grids over the years, you’ll see only minute changes because Wind is really easy to build. That’s why I still recommend it for easily-confused newbies.

I’ve got a Windhose from Proving Grounds, but I’m not sure where it fits in. I don’t want to replace the sweet multi-attack I get from the dagger but I don’t want to let the guns go either so guess the dagger has to go. 🙁 And now that Xeno Sagi is back with a new weapon, maybe there’s a place for that Arkab fist in here as well. Just kidding, no way I’m grinding for that thing this month. Maybe next time.

Solo to 80% and call for help. It’s the only sane way to play. As with Light, I’m currently experimenting with various party configurations. This is one is… hmm, it works but it’s not very flashy. I’ve heard so much about Scath, but I’m not seeing her powers at all. Thinking of replacing her with FLB Metera for the endless delays. Plus I just got Summer Yuel, Birdman and Carmelina to fool around with as well.

Fire in the hole!

I think there’s some perverse spirit within me that compels me to sabotage my Fire grid whenever I can. That must be why I replaced most of my FLB Colossus Canes with 0-star Ancient Ecke Sachs. It’s also why after so many Xeno Ifrit events I still have only one Ifrit Axe and no Ifrit Sword. That’s why I won’t call this grid “weak” because it’s nobody’s fault but mine.

Until I actually fought him, I thought Grimnir was supposed to be a joke character. What kind of joke character hits like that?! If that’s how they roll, then what are the “serious” ones supposed to do? 999999 Skyfall every turn? Grimnir is just ridiculous. Because of him I had to cycle a carbuncle back into my summon pool for the first time in like a year, and I’m not even convinced one is enough.

One of these things is not like the others

It took a while to find a good anti-Grim party. Agielba is really the star of the show, soaking up Tempest Storm with Armored+Substitute and healing back to full with Drain. Summer Ilsa is there solely because she can occasionally paralyze him after his special attacks. Magisa is there for the Blind, but I’m open to replacing her with someone who can cut damage. Maybe Summer Io.

Soon, Grimnir, soon…

BTW, the Agielba-Summer Ilsa-Magisa combo is for Grimnir/Proving Grounds only. I’m still trying various party combinations, just like in Fire and Light. Yuel, Summer Grea, Theresa, Magisa, Shiva, Summer Percival, anyone I can get my hands on. I’m not happy with any of them. They don’t hit hard, they’re squishy, they have all these buttons to press. *sigh*

The Dark side of the game

I’ve got a good team that hits hard and doesn’t die as easily as you might expect. The only downside is their low, low HP compared to other parties. That means it’s easy to achieve and maintain enmity, but it also means they can’t handle triggers very well.

I’m looking to replace that Cortana because of the HP issue. I need something that provides the same multi-attack boost without the downsides. Just realized I still have a Celeste Axe in there. Yes, that’s getting replaced too, just as soon as I figure out what to replace it with. I’ll have to explore Avatar’s library and see what comes up. The fish mainhand is actually a skin for a Qilin sword. All my mainhands are skinned  because who doesn’t like whacking bosses with a fish or dandelion or fluffy pink pillow?

Colossus’ spot is reserved for the day I fully uncap Anubis-sama. Bahamut is such a cool looking lizard, isn’t he?

Finally a party that takes full advantage of the Ultima Sword. This is the party I feel least inclined to tinker with, simply because Dark doesn’t have any other characters I want to use. That said, Vira’s slot is up for grabs because her kit overlaps with the Chaos Ruler I usually run. I considered running Berserker with a Hermanubis mainhand instead but somehow… hmm. I’ll give it a try sometime.

Salt of the Earth

This is the party that puzzles me the most. It doesn’t feel like I’m doing anything wrong, but they’re just so weak without buffs.

They hit like sissies, I just don’t understand it. I mean, this is the standard Earth grid, right?

Give or take a few elements. I guess it’s true that all those swords should be replaced with Alexiel axes. Maybe I need a better buffer than Arulumaya so I can compensate for the lack of hard hits with Earth ATK+, multiattacks and crits. Oh right, I called Siegfried “meh” last time. Forgive me Sieg-sama, you’re actually pretty awesome when you get to level 100. Not to mention you and Threo are the only Sabre-specialty SSRs I have.

Lessee, what happens if I run Chaos Ruler and a team of Threo-Sieg-Arulu with this grid instead…

Nothing happens because I’m too busy writing this post to test it. Okay, laziness doesn’t pay, let’s beat up a dummy for a second.

The damage per hit is still crappy, but MC and Threo are doubling or tripling almost every turn and Sieg is no slouch either. I still need a reliable buffer though.

A little introspection

📕Do as I say, not as I do: You really shouldn’t buy Ultima cores with prestige pendants. Really. Pendants are better spent on hard-to-get weapons and distinctions. I’m including this warning here just in case anyone feels inclined to follow in my footsteps. I’m a very lazy and very patient player and you really shouldn’t emulate everything you see me do.

📕If something is too annoying, wait for a while and maybe it will go away – Cygames is fairly decent about making things easier for players over time. They often tweak drops, requirements, exchange limits, etc. Some examples off the top of my head:
-At first we could only get 1 Legendary Merit a day, now it’s limitless.
-Dimension Halos used to transform randomly, now the rate is 100%.
-Now you can fight Ifrit and other showdowns whenever you want.
-Event character loyalty requirements have been eased.
-Co-op was a pain so they gave us solo co-op.
-Hard+ raids take the frustration out of collecting anima and SR weapon fodder.
-AP for hosting Omega raids went down, BP fills up faster.
TL;DR If there’s a feature or a grind that you find too troublesome to bother with, ignore it for a while and see if things get better. Maybe it will, maybe it won’t, but at least you avoid burnout while you focus on other things.

Better drop rates for everyone!

📕Stay up to date with the meta: All my grids are what was “optimum” when I was starting out. Sometimes not even that. Granblue Fantasy has moved on since 2016 so find out what’s current in 2019. It doesn’t matter when you’re just starting out because just about any on-element weapon will make you stronger. But around level 101 you should start paying attention. If nothing else, it will save you from FLBing more weapons than you need and other huge wastes of time.

📕Characters will level up fine by themselves – I hear a lot about ‘sliming’ characters up to level 100. I’ve never done it myself but I’ll comment anyway: unless there’s a reason to rush or you hardly play the game, they’ll get to level 100 just by staying in your party for a while. You don’t need to force the process.

The Grancypher must be overloaded by this point

📕Most event weapons and summons are useless long-term – I worked so hard trying to get and 3-star event weapons when I started and almost none of them are in my grid now. In fact… scrolls up… only the samurai guys’ light katana and the collab fire axe are from events, and both are due for replacement. It’s not like I didn’t get any use from them or that you shouldn’t try to get good stuff from events. Just don’t stress out over them because they’ll be gone in the long run.

📕Start gathering Rainbow Prisms and Silver Centrums ASAP: As well as other annoying-to-farm items like Primal anima and white dragon scales. If you have BP to spare, join a Xeno raid or Grand Order raid, and jump in any primal raids you find (also a good source of creeds). <– BTW, I don’t actually do any of this. But you should.

Don’t forget: you’re here forever

That’s enough for a yearly grid update, isn’t it? Even after 3 years I still have so much to work on in Granblue Fantasy. It’s a testament to how Cygames is always trying to keep things fresh… or tedious. Freshly tedious. And it’s another reason why you shouldn’t burn yourself out trying to get anything in this game.

A lot of the comments I get on Granblue Fantasy posts are from relative newbies stressed out over their progress. To them I say: chill. Either you’ll be playing for a long time and you’ll eventually beat all those bosses and get all those weapons… Or you’ll drop the game from frustration and all the effort you put in will be wasted. Wait, you don’t want to hear that, do you? It’s true though. It’s just JPEGs on a screen, don’t take it so seriously.

Next grid update will be another year from now, or a bit sooner if anything interesting happens. Until then, it’s back to my regular gaming schedule. So long!

Finally grinded enough to beat Cumulus Vex (DQVII)

I should probably say a few words about how sweet it feels to get revenge, but after all these months I didn’t feel anything. Fighting and training to get strong enough to beat your old nemesis is actually a boring pain in the neck. It’s much cooler in kungfu movies than in real life.

And after all my grinding, going up a level each, giving everyone an advanced class… that damned Cumulus almost killed me again! I was just lucky he didn’t use that wind vortex attack too often, because every time he did Aishe would drop dead. Yes, that Aishe who I turned into a Sage who was supposed to support me with Multiheal. I spent more time resurrecting her than she did healing my party. The real key was putting Oomph on my main character and letting him blast Cumulus with his most powerful attack. DPS > Sustain.

If I had lost that battle again I would have dropped all Dragon Quest games for good, not just Dragon Quest VII. As it is we’re still in business. Sort of. Technically. The reason it’s taken me two weeks from finishing Atelier Escha & Logy to beating Cumulus Vex isn’t because I was spending all that time grinding but because I was spending all that time playing the Picross e series.

I can’t help it, it’s too darned addictive. There’s a definite use-it-or-lose-it aspect to the puzzle solving, but once I shook the rust off my mind I was back in business, baby! I’ve even managed to solve a lot of the Free No-Hint puzzles I gave up on last time. The trick is… Turn off the 3DS! Or put it to sleep or something. Do something else for even 10 minutes and come back and suddenly the next answer jumps out at you. It’s amazing.

Well enough about that. What to play next. I’ve got a lot of half-finished games out there, not just DQVII. But the truth is, they all bore me. I’ve seen what they have to offer, I need something new. Or better yet, more Picross. Maybe I should wipe all my save files and start anew… Yes, yeeeees… It’s been a while since I played anything on the PS2, DS and PSP so maybe something on one of those next time. Maybe an otome game? Or maybe more Picross. Piiicrrosss….

Finished Atelier Escha & Logy Plus with a little help from YouTube (spoilers)

I explored the Fallen Ruins and beat the last boss fair and square. That being the case, I can say I legitimately finished Atelier Escha & Logy Plus. It just happpens that I had 240 days left on the clock and I could only skip forward 10 days at a time. Meaning I’d have to sleep and wake up 24 times just to see an ending… Or I could save myself the trouble and watch the endings on YouTube at 2x speed. Guess which one I chose.

Now I’m done with Escha & Logy, I don’t feel like writing much. But I will say again that it’s 20 times better than Atelier Ayesha and a very satisfying experience. We don’t get the full story behind the Dusk or why the crops are failing, but at least we know that we don’t know, so that’s progress. After dragging it out so long, I’m sure Gust will finally solve the mystery in Atelier Shallie, but I’m not in any hurry to get to it. After all, just like in Ayesha the characters claim there’s crop failure and food shortages, but my container is stuffed with giant pancakes and bowls of soup so I don’t know what they’re talking about.

After they came up with so many items in Ayesha, I didn’t think Gust had anything left, but surprise surprise, there’s a TON of new items to make in Escha & Logy. Soooo much stuff. So many accessories and weapons and armor. Alchemy is also more important to the plot, so you don’t feel like you’re wasting time that could be better spent elsewhere on synthesis.

Characters… Hmm. I didn’t like Logy or dislike Escha as much as I thought I would. They were okay, I guess. Everyone was okay. I liked the paucity of repeat characters, though 0 returnees would have been my ideal number. We got a bit of romance with Escha and Logy, even though I don’t really buy it but I’m not invested enough to argue. Even the last boss was somewhat sympathetic, though it was weird how everyone was suddenly claiming to be her friend and preaching the power of friendship when they’d never even met her before. These JRPGs and their friendship fetish…

TL;DR – It was good, I had fun, lots of time for exploration and synthesis and a heartwarming story with a good ending. If Ayesha hadn’t been so awful I would have looked for more to complain about, but this is such a breath of fresh air after that. Now I feel that Gust has done right by me. I’m looking forward to playing Shallie in a while, but my alchemy itch has been well-scratched for now, so I’ll get round to that in a couple of months. Or I might jump to Sophie for a change of pace and return to the Dusk series later.

Schedule for March: I was close to the end in Tokyo Xanadu eX+ so final push for that next week. This weekend is dedicated to a Do-or-Die attempt to get back into Dragon Quest VII. If I can’t beat that stupid cloud boss by Sunday night, I give up forever. I also need to do a final reckoning with Chaos Rings III and talk about my progress in Ys: Memories of Celceta.

Update 3 days later: Let’s talk some more

It’s been a nice restful weekend. I hung around doing nothing for a while and suddenly I’m feeling more chatty. So let’s talk about the few things that are still bugging me after finishing Atelier Escha & Logy. The main thing is Logy’s so-called “character development,” which was very forced and in fact non-existent IMO. For most of the game he’s just a normal, cooperative worker. Then come end game and he’s spouting all this stuff to Escha about how she helped him change and learn to work with others, blah blah blah. Like, what?

All that changing actually took place in his backstory off-screen. Before the start of the game, in Central. That’s where he went ahead with the airship development and got his friend injured. When he shows up in Colseit, he has obviously learned his lesson already. He’s helpful, works well with others, doesn’t complain even when others hold him back, even the objections he raises about the airship are all sound and rational, and he gives his all to complete the project regardless… Sounds like I’m writing a college recommendation for the kid, haha.

But seriously, Logy is already a changed man when he appears in Colseit. You could argue that he had changed mentally before he arrived and that working with others helped him put those changes into practice. Even then, it would be due to working with everyone in the town, not just Escha. The whole thing felt like an attempt to shoehorn the usual “Power of Friendship” trope in there so we could lecture the boss before beating her. That, and a forced attempt to add romance to the game. I so don’t see it but at least it’s not as creepy as Katla and Micie.

If they really wanted to make sense of the whole “I changed thanks to you” plot, they should have put more effort into showing Logy’s initial reluctance to work with or trust anyone instead of making him so supportive from the start. This is where people will say “Oh but you missed the scene where…” Actually I did miss/skip a few scenes, but only a few. Three in fact.

The first is the one where Logy tells Escha about his past and then she throws herself into his arms and starts crying. I was so dazed, like seriously? Why are YOU crying? This isn’t about you. I figured it would be one of those anime scenes “Wah, don’t blame yourself I’m here for you waaah” kind of things, but I was so annoyed I skipped all the dialogue so… yeah. Not everything is about you, you frivolous pink-haired frou-frou faux-cutesy charlatan.

No seriously, why is this brainless bint the one crying here?

The next scene I skipped was the animated scene where the airship tries to approach the Unexplored Ruins and there’s all this turbulence and stuff. They try to make it look like there’s a chance of failure, but of course there’s no way they won’t succeed so don’t waste my time.

Same thing with the third one I skipped, where Escha is late to the ship when the ruins are crumbling and it’s like aaah, what will she do? Obviously the writers would never let a main character fall to her death, so I skipped to the inevitable conclusion where she ends up safe and sound. That said, I made the same assumption in Chaos Rings III and got a nasty shock the other day… Gotta find time to continue the story and find out what happens. But that’s a discussion for another time.

Anyway, that’s enough about Escha and Logy. I should probably say something about the 6-man battle system, since I enjoyed it quite a bit. Might be my imagination and the fact that I didn’t play on Hard, but battles moved much faster, characters were more powerful, items were much more useful. There were tons of area attacks so you could clear useless mobs in one strike, and there were specials all over the place but the animation never got tedious. Gust really learned a lot from the mistakes of Atelier Ayesha.

Synthesis: Once you got good items and replicated them through the homunculus, it was easy to unlock all the properties on any item you made. BUT it’s still a pain in the ass to put non-standard effects on items. You know, that tedious process where you have to make item X with property Y, then use X to make another item Z to transfer property Y to the final item, etc etc.

You’ve never heard me complaining about this process before because I flat-out refuse to do it. Any content that cannot be cleared through standard means will simply not be cleared. Luckily in all the Atelier games I’ve played, this sort of chicanery is only necessary for optional bosses. That was the case here, so Child of Terror and Dreadnaught can stay over there and terrorize anyone they want, I’m done.

Right, now I feel I’ve said whatever I wanted to say about this game. Normally I advise people to play games in chronological order, but you can just skip Ayesha and go straight to Escha & Logy, you won’t lose anything. Though you’ll appreciate the latter so much more if you play the former first. All your complaints will vanish because it could be so much worse. You know what, just play the games as they came out. Now back to Picross Dragon Quest VII.

Atelier Escha & Logy Plus – Freedom feels so sweet

Jingle bells, jingle bells, Logy all the way~

7 hours and 26 minutes into Atelier Escha & Logy Plus, just completed the main assignment for Year 1 December. I’ve also been playing Chaos Rings III and Ys: Memories of Celceta, but we’ll save those for another day.

I’m too lazy to write much today, so I’ll just say this is MUCH better than Atelier Ayesha so far. It’s too early to go overboard praising it, but I like the greater amount of freedom you know you have in this game. In theory Ayesha was a very open game: just save Nio within three years. But on a first playthrough you don’t know how long that will take or how many steps are needed. What if you play around too long and don’t have enough time? So I ended up gunning straight for Nio and got her and then it was like… now what? Everything felt meaningless after that.

Escha & Logy does a better job of pacing and doling out the objectives. You know when you’re on the clock, you know when you’re free to do whatever you want. There are core objectives, then there’s stuff you can do if you feel like or ignore if you don’t. I spend one month on assignments, one month on alchemy, another month or two on exploration and combat and it all works out great. If all Atelier games were like this, maybe I’d say they were too regimented, but here the schedule fits the government bureaucrat setting just fine. It’s a different premise from the others, and I’m having fun playing as Logy to make it feel even more distinct.

There are some negatives here and there, but when I compare it to the suck of Ayesha I don’t feel like complaining. I get to make my own weapons and armor again!!!! File that under “Stuff you didn’t know you needed until they took it away.” The alchemy system… I heard people say it was simplified compared to Ayesha’s… I guess it’s true, but I’m still grappling with it so I can’t really say. IMO Ayesha’s system gave me more leeway to pour in elements and unlock properties by playing with the stockyard and picking skills carefully. It took me a while to get the hang of it, but once I did there was nothing I couldn’t do. Still, Logy and Escha are only at alchemy level 24 and haven’t gotten any complicated recipes or great ingredients yet, so I’m on the fence for now.

Is Escha & Logy only 3 years long as well? If it is, I’ll be done in no time at this rate. I’ll return with a proper review once all is said and done. Or if anything dramatic or horrible happens that I feel I have to talk about. Don’t expect to see me too soon, though. Gaming is busy work!

La Corda d’Oro 3 – Ritsu, Kyouya, Daichi, Nanami, Houzumi GET!

Or, more accurately, GET in the case of Ritsu and Kyouya, sorta GET for the others. I saw all their events, qualified for their true endings in all cases, but the only confession scenes I cared about were Ritsu and Kyouya. The others I watched 5 seconds of and skipped the rest.

Koei made it much easier to get multiple guys in one playthrough in La Corda d’Oro 3 compared to previous games. Even a full harem ending isn’t that hard if you plan carefully and follow the in-game directions. But since they’re so readily available, you don’t get as personally invested as you do when you have to reload three different saves just to try to get an elusive guy’s ending. You don’t have to plan which guy to get first or whose story you really want to see, because you can get them all without trying. I don’t know if I would have felt more passionate about the LC3 guys if I’d had to work harder for them, but I do know I’m less passionate about them because I was so busy juggling different guys simultaneously.

Kyouya  Kisaragi

I liked Kyouya’s route because some of it resonated with me. Since he’s Kanade’s childhood friend, he shows up in all kinds of unimportant scenes, so let’s narrow it down to the ones that matter. Basically Kyouya hates getting advice from others when it comes to his music because he feels like different voices drown out his personal style and expression.

However, as the story progresses he’s confronted with Myoga’s overwhelming talent (in-story only, actually he’s not that special, but work with us here). Then he realizes that the heroine Kanade has improved dramatically by working with and getting feedback from others. Should he ask for help? Stick to his guns? His pride says he’s got to be wild and tough! What to do, what to do…

So he sulks and agonizes over it for way too long and eventually decides to man up. He gets all kinds of advice from people like Daichi, Ritsu and his senpai in the orchestra club and lo and behold, he really does improve (in-story only, actually he doesn’t change much from when you don’t do his route but let’s all pretend). So his is the second route where a character really changes from start to finish, though this time Kanade-lurve is only indirectly involved.

Boo hoo, I suck… Try to cheer me up so I can tell you how much I suck.

To get his Golden ending, you have to let him use Maestro Field in the final concert. He pulls it off, the applause comes down like rain and he’s like “Wow, it was all worth it!” and I’m kind of happy for him. His confession scene is him straight up telling Kanade he loves her as a girl and not as a childhood friend, and then she says she loves him back even though no such loving has been demonstrated throughout the entire route. But he’s happy with that and so am I. It was fun, apart from Kyouya’s whiny phase.

Talk to your doctor about our patent-pending Chest Therapy (TM)

The reason I say Kyouya’s route resonated with me is because of the whole feedback on music thing. In my case it’s not because I’m too proud to get feedback, I’m just not in a position to have a teacher right now. Since picking up the piano again a few years ago I’ve been flying solo, and getting good that way is really hard.

Some of the comments Kyouya gets in the game hit a sore spot, like him bluffing his way through tough passages… stop spying on me! Or not even trying to play songs he doesn’t like. Ack! How did you know? There are so many questions when you’re on your own: Am I playing this part right? Why am I struggling so much with this song? How can I do this better? Even if it’s just a hobby, you can only get so far with self-recordings and Youtube videos. So once again La Corda d’Oro has convinced me to make lifestyle changes and seek some help, at least from those who know better than me. Thanks Koei, I (almost) mean it.

Ritsu Kisaragi

Kyouya Kisaragi’s dull and overly serious older brother. He’s kinda boring and can’t even take a joke so I wonder what persuaded me to do his route. Hmmm…

The world will never know.

Lessee, what were the key takeaways from Ritsu’s route? He injured his wrist due to a fall/deliberate push a year ago and had to adjust his playing style to compensate. Now he can’t play for very long, which means he doesn’t have a future as a professional violinist. Luckily he has a huge interest in building and repairing instruments, so he doesn’t seem to mind too much.

TBH the whole injured wrist thing sounds “off” to me. Isn’t it too soon to write him off like that? Has he been professionally evaluated by multiple specialists? His own brother didn’t even know he was hurt, so do his parents even know? Or care? If I sent my talented kid to an expensive music academy and he got injured, I wouldn’t go “Welp, find something else to do” would I? This situation had better be addressed in the Another Sky fandisc or La Corda d’Oro 4 or I’ll call shenanigans.

In any case, Ritsu knows his time is almost up. He wants to bring glory to the orchestra club and also show his gratitude towards the club advisor who encouraged him when people were being all snarky about his talent as a first-year. And that’s why he’s so fixated on winning the Ensemble contest with everyone this year.

To get his golden ending, you have to get your skill up to level 16 so you can practice the only quintet piece in the game: a string arrangement of Elgar’s “Pomp and Circumstance.” A more anemic and insipid arrangement you will never hear. Even full string orchestras lack that bombastic sound needed to express the full “pomp” of the song, how much more three violins, a viola and a cello. But it meant to be symbolic of all the hard work we put in together to get to the finals, power of friendship and all that.

For Ritsu’s confession, I wasn’t really paying attention, but I think he said something about only being focused on music at first, but now he’s having a lot more fun and laughing a lot more because she’s around. I don’t remember any “I love yous” being exchanged, but that’s okay. The more stoic approach fits his character better anyway.

Daichi Sakaki

…Okay, so he didn’t have a hidden dark side, sue me. But he does have a not-so-secret annoying side. It comes out in full force when some guy tries to ask Kanade out and Daichi’s like “Get lost, we have to focus on the contest.” Then he starts talking about how his feelings for her go beyond just a senpai-kouhai thing… whoa, whoa, I thought you said we had to focus on the contest?

That was his major event. The rest is normal stuff like him helping you retrieve a score you left at school, or visiting you when you’re ill with a cold. He says he took the Seiso Academy entrance exam just for fun but got serious when he met Ritsu and heard him talk about winning the Japanese contest. And you learn he used to play the guitar in middle school, but now he’s good enough with the viola to make it to the national contest, sugoi~.

At one point his parents send him pineapples and he offers you a bit. If you dare say you don’t like pineapples, *SMASH* friendship ended with Kanade! That’s right, he loves her so much he’ll actively destroy her relationships with other guys, but diss his favorite fruit and you’re done. If that’s the kind of shallow guy you want, you’re welcome to him. I peace out’d during his confession and got on with my life.

Sousuke Nanami

Diffident kouhai from Amane Academy. Kanade encounters him trying to smash his cello because he thinks he’s not good enough. After she talks him out of it, he repays her by treating her to lunch at the Chinese restaurant his family owns. Mmm, delicious.

Nanami’s confidence issues continue for a while, but if you train his skill up to level 14, he’ll get chosen to replace Hido as the cello player on the Amane team. This will happen even if you don’t help him train, but then you won’t get his route.

Then he whines and waffles some more about not being good enough, because there’s a cello solo part he wants to play but Myoga won’t let him because it’s not Myoga if he’s not being an overbearing jackass. Like, why would you let the cello player pick a song with a cello solo and then NTR him with your violin?

But don’t worry Nanami, Kanade’s got this. She stalks Nanami through his depression and he eventually musters the courage to tell Myoga he wants to play the solo, right before they go on stage. He even has the boldness to promise that Amane will win the contest if he plays. Thus you get to see his Maestro Field and everyone gushes about the beautiful music he drew out of his cello…

…but of course Seiso Academy wins anyway because if we don’t we’ll get a Game Over. Koei is so cruel. I really wanted to see Myoga and Amamiya’s reactions after the promise fell through, hehe. Instead, alas, the game cut straight to the confession sequence. So I thought, maybe Nanami will bring it up? But no, it’s just blah blah blah I love you. Yeah, I know, I’m very loveable. *skip*

Houzumi (can’t remember his first name… Tatsurou?)

Someone disputed my claim that Houzumi is violent, but I personally counted 6 times when he hit Arata and two more times when Arata begged him not to hit him. The verbs used are 殴る and グーが出る, i.e. not frustrated little love taps but full-on punches. This same Houzumi idiot got his team disqualified from the previous ensemble contest for fighting, and instead of learning his lesson, the only thing he’s learned is how to pick his victims more carefully. Couple that with his grating, raspy voice and you get a character I really don’t like. I just got him because routes are so easy in this game.

I forget the bulk of his events. There was one where he bought Kanade a phone strap, then accidentally broke it, then bought her another one later. Then later on Yagisawa nominates him as the next club leader and he’s like no I can’t and everyone’s like yes you can and he thinks about it for a while and decides he’ll do it. His leadership style is “yell at and beat up anyone who disagrees” and he isn’t even that talented a player so the Shiseikan orchestra club is totally done for. But that’s totes not my problem so I don’t care. Also I skipped his confession scene so please fill in the gaps with your imagination, thanks.

Final Opinion

That’s it for almost all the routes. I’m skipping Toki Housei’s ‘cos I don’t care about him. That’s also it for La Corda d’Oro 3 and me. The Full Voice Special version has a few extras like Contest Mode and some after stories, none of which I’m really interested in.

So here are my final thoughts on the game: the guys are weird and boring, the gameplay is too easy, the music selection is pitiful, I’m sick of listening to string arrangements and I don’t ever want to play this again. The only guy I really liked was Yagisawa, the only route I found interesting was Kyouya’s. That’s bad. But on the plus side, there’s no where left to go but up. Maybe Koei learned from the mistakes of this game and La Corda d’Oro 3: Another Sky and La Corda d’Oro 4 are much-improved sequels. We’ll find out when I play them in a couple of months. In the meantime, it’s good to be done.

Next up: I feel like Gust owes me a good game after the disappointment of Atelier Ayesha. Normally I like to let some time pass between game installments, but this time I’m diving straight into Escha & Logy. Will Gust redeem themselves or am I doomed to more tears? Stay tuned to find out!