Dissidia on May 16th--Finished Firions's Destiny Odyssey

Dissidia on May 16th (Sorry, this post was delayed)  

I finished Firion’s Destiny Odyssey. I recorded some Quick Battles playing as Firion and then as Kuja. For some reason I like to pit Kuja against Sephiroth, because Sephiroth is a very hard opponent to beat, and Kuja’s attacks miss 50% of the time. At least I know how to dodge now; before I didn’t know how to dodge and there were attacks I could’ve saved my fighter’s ass from. When Kuja dodges, he says, “Well, now…” I can fill it in with “Well now, isn’t that interesting?” or “Well now, don’t be so stubborn, I want my attack to actually HIT you, Sephiroth! Cuz you’re so mean. Yes.”

One battle with Kuja I saved because he finishes Sephiroth with the EX Burst Attack, in his red Trance form. “Talent can be so cruel.” Whether Kuja’s in his normal form or his Trance form, he always appears womanly. I wonder if anyone also put Kuja against Sephiroth and came up with fan-fiction from the result.  I'm sure it happened.  (Gasp, OMG) Maybe I can give that a try…….? 0.O That battle I saved was really good. I used EX Burst, then it didn’t work, and then Sephiroth used his, but luckily I pushed the O button enough to defend Kuja’s life points from Sephiroth (I mean, hit-points…where did I get “life points,” Yu-Gi-Oh!?). It seemed that Sephiroth was going to win. But then I had Kuja use EX Burst when his EX Gauge was full again, and that finished it.

So what happens now? Well, Kuja is fuzzy and kinda nekkid, so….yuh know…

LEVELING UP

Bartz is level 12…still…

Jecht is level 2 now

Kuja is level 2 since I played a couple of battles as him against Sephy

Gosh, wouldn’t it be better to see this battle rather than having me write about it? Man…

My Interpretation of my Crisis Core poster

Back in January 8-10, I went to the Anime Los Angeles 6 convention. This was my third anime convention, and I didn’t get a regular poster yet (I got wall scrolls in the past, though) until this third time. This time, one poster I did pick up was one with three characters from Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII: Cloud Strife, Zack Fair, and Sephiroth. I thought I’d never have this image as a poster. But now I do. ^,^ Here’s a LINK to what it looks like (even though this image is from the cover of an import book in Anime Castle and there is Japanese text on it).

After some time passed, I started to look at the poster in a different way. I have it placed on the back of my bedroom door so I see it every morning and every night. Then at some point, I came up with some sort of interpretation of the way the characters are standing and positioned in the poster.  They are each looking at a different direction, and I believe this has a significant meaning, which I will get to little by little.

Let’s start with the lighting. The light source seems to be coming from the left side. It doesn’t seem that there are other main light sources. It doesn’t seem to be sunlight, but it can be seen that way.

Now let’s look at the positions of the characters. Sephiroth is standing facing the right, behind Zack and Cloud. He is holding his Masamune sword. Zack stands closer, holding his Buster sword behind his back, facing the left, and Cloud is in the foreground looking the other way.

After deducing where the light is coming from, I looked at what Sephiroth is doing. He is facing away from the light. He is facing the darker side. He is holding his sword, ready to kill anyone who gets in his way.  He has his mind on fulfilling Jenova's goal.

Now let’s look at Zack Fair. He is fully facing the lighter side with confidence.. He is holding the Buster Sword (honor sword) behind him and has a serious expression on his face, a proud expression, perhaps reflecting on his SOLDIER Honor. Though his heart is heavy with the loss of his mentor Angeal, it is also light with the desire to reach his dream of becoming a hero, and being successful in the world.

Last but not least, let’s look at Cloud Strife. Cloud is in the foreground, with his body facing the left, but his head turned to the right. His eyes are downcast; he is reluctant to face the light. He is looking back at the times he was weak and not able to be his best whenever it was his time to fight. Also, this is Cloud after he and Zack escaped from Nibelhiem on their way to Midgar (he is wearing his FFVII outfit, not the FFVII:AC outfit). He is reluctant to face this light because he is full of guilt for not being able to be strong enough to protect Zack in the past. He feels guilty because of this weakness. Cloud worries if he will ever be strong enough. He is in between the light and the darkness (implied by the left side of his face in the shadow), and his facial expression is that of sadness, as he is lost in thought.  So saaaad...

Now everyone go: AWWWWWW.  :3

So how does that sound? I may be over-doing the interpretation, and also I could be wrong. It’s just my personal thoughts on how to see these three characters in the poster. Let me know what you think.  Or don't.  I just thought it would be interesting to share.  :) 

Crisis Core on Jan. 30th-31st, Part 2

Welcome to Part 2 of the post "Crisis Core on January 30th-31st."  ^,^ <3
    

The second part of the battle against Sephiroth is about to begin. The screen says "If you are driven to the edge, the game is over."

• "The fight with Sephiroth is not quite finished, so I'll see how it goes.  Oh, and 'One-Winged Angel' is playing, too."
• "31,000 HP now!!"
• "Ha ha, you didn't get me!.....How did my DMW go back to normal??"
• "At least he doesn't have to get behind me anymore.......Take that!.......Nooo!... He was getting me with the 'Angel' attack again."
• "Oh, I...I see what's happening!  I have to finish him before he knocks me off the edge.....[gasp!]  NO YOU DON'T, NO YOU DON'T!!" (Sephiroth does his Octoslash attack, and then Zack falls back to the floor).  "Aw that didn't hurt me much."
• "[gasp] NOO! (Must've been his Heartless Angel spell again  ):< ........Tseng, please help me out here!  (Then Blizzaga levels up.)
• (Watches the scene--------Tseng: "Is this the end?"  Zack: "I'm trying, I'm trying!!"  And then I say "I'm really trying heah!"   Tseng attacks Sephiroth and then I say "Yeah, like Sephiroth is in the middle of a desert!"
• (Another Heartless Angel attack) NOOOOoooo! (At least the Cura spell works) "That f***ing saved my life."
• "Oh no, please!........IdontthinkImgonnamakethis........I don't think I'm gonna make this round...Oh no, I did NOT make it."  Zack screams as he falls to his death, and I said "NOOOooo."
• Sephroth is like "I did what I had to do" (and then he walks the same way that he does in the fire)
• In a sad voice: "Crisis Core, Final Fantasy VII.  It doesn't say Game Over, it just says the title.  I think I have to fight from the beginning of Sephiroth's battle!"  [fake sob]
• "That look that Sephiroth gives Zack before this second part of the fight says: 'I'm going to enjoy this.'"

So, all of that (plus the ones in Part 1) was what I recorded with my voice recorder.  I'm glad I did, because I said some things I never would have remembered during the gameplay without recording my exclamations. :3

     I did have to replay the Sephiroth battle.  But I did so differently; I unequipped the Blizzaga and the Poison Twist materia, and replaced them with the very powerful Thundaga and Vital Slash materia.  Those helped a bunch...they took a whopping 2000 HP or so out of Sephiroth each use.  And Osmose materia saves Ethers. Yeah!

     So, to summarize the rest of the session, I got passed the part where it was Cloud who finished off Sephiroth, and now, after five years had passed, Zack is helping Cloud escape with him from the Shinra Lab and on their way out of the Shinra Manor, where the save point is on the lower floor.  Zack clears the way before he goes back to Cloud and helps him walk.  Poor Cloud  :( 

      I went crazy when an unconscious Cloud fell into Zack's arms in the Shinra Lab.  I screamed, and I squealed, and the sweater I was wearing was very unnecessary ^,^;;  Zack freed Cloud from the glass pod, and after he caught him he said Cloud's name.  It was like a reunion with an embrace.  I liked that.  It was a touching and bittersweet moment. They are so darling... :3  <3

     Zack is now level 41, up from 40.  After all that fighting, scene-watching and fan-fiction-inducing visuals, I wanted to play just a couple more Easy side missions.  So I did "Fun in the Sun: Vacation Time" and "Mysteries of the World: Kactuar?"

     There are still munnies, leveling up and items to pick up.  I believe there still might be some gameplay involving Zack and Cloud's escape from Hojo and Nibelheim.  Come to think of it, Nibelheim is some ways far from Midgar.  At least I'm closer to finishing the game, but I am closer to crying too.  I have a new poster on my bedroom door (I bought it at Anime Los Angeles 6 con) that has Sephiroth, Zack, and Cloud ( :3 ) and now that I have it, well...I hope it won't be too painful to look at after I do finish the game.  Cloud looks sooo saaaad  3:  He needs kisses...

Next for PSP is either Sonic Rivals 2 or Dissidia FF (for Tuesday Feb. 2).  Gosh, I really need to return to my console games, like Jak and Daxter The Lost Frontier and Sonic Unleashed.......and don't forget, NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams!

@,@

Crisis Core: FFVII on Jan. 30th-31st...Part 1

After another 2 weeks, I returned to Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII.  This time though, I finally resumed the story.  Back in December I left off at the point where Zack is running to the Nibelheim Reactor to get to Sephiroth.  He had burned down the town, and Zack is mad.  That time, the battery power was low and within the half hour I was able to find a save point and stop the game.

     So,  my PSP's battery was fully charged last night. I wanted to play at 10pm, but my calico cat Kallie wanted my lap.  I call it her "Kallie Time."  I was nice to her and switched my PSP to sleep mode to give her my lap.  While on my lap, she burped. It was the first time I heard a cat burp.  And no excuse me, LOL.

     Anyway, finally at 10:30pm I warmed up with a couple of Easy side missions for Zack.  Didn't level up, but it's okay.  Then I went into the Nibelheim Reactor, and Zack found Tifa, and then went into the Jenova room.  Gosh, I've never seen Sephiroth so happy before...or is the word "nutty?"  The expression on his face was so unlike him...he never smiled like that ever, not earlier in the game, not in FFVII: AC either.  So it was just weird.

     "Mummyyyyyyyyyy," Sephiroth must be thinking o.0

     So at around 11pm, Zack had to fight against Sephiroth.  Sephiroth had over 46,000 HP for this one battle, and 9,999 MP, it's too much!  I could tell it was going to be an interesting battle, so I recorded myself playing it the first time around.  I was equipped with Blizzaga, Cura, Barrier, Libra, Osmose, and Poison Twist materia.  So here are a lot of my exclamations; they can get funny:

• "You get Blizzaga too!" (Sephiroth hit me with the spell, so I give him one back.)
• "What do those crystals (gems) do anyway?  I think they're like tokens (like in Yu-Gi-Oh!) and act as a shield."
• "No you don't!  Ow.  I didn't guard myself agsinst his Cross Slash.  Guard!  Good boy."
• "Ha ha!  Null physical, there ya go!  Poison Twister attack!!"
• "Whoa!  How did he get behind me? ... He turned around again!  He's gettin' desperate..."
• "None of the slot things (the DMW) has helped me yet.......Owwwwwah! (Zack got hit)"
• "Oh, look who it is, it's Sephiroth on the Deeeeeee, MW....Ah, it's my turn to do the Octoslash.  Taste of your own medicine, buddy!"
• "Nooo!  Now it's Sephiroth's turn to do the Octoslash! .........He's all like floating o.0..."
• "I can't even get behind him!  What is he doing... OOOOOOoooooahh (long gasp), I have only one hit point left, whatever he did!"
• "Sephiroth again, DMW...[laughs after watching the memory of Zack with Sephorith, "Your opponent was too weak.  Try another."
• "No, the Heartless Angel!  That's what he did!! It's the Heartless Angel that took Zack's HP down to 1 (from +4300HP ; Cura saves my ass so many times), so that he can have the pleasure of finishing me off physically (in other, more appropriate words, finish me with a physical attack)."
• "Cissnei, go go go go!  Yay!  Lucky Stars Lv. 1, That's good enough for me!........Critical hits the rest of the battle!"
• "I can kinda tell when he's going to attack.  Just like that, when he like kinda...okay like DUCK, or something!......RUUUUUUUNNah!"
• Aww, puppy Zack (DMW memory trigger).....And Genesis saves the day!"  (As Zack does his Apocolypse limit attack, I say, "Take that, Sephiroth!  You and your shampooed hair are done!"

So I (uh, Zack ^,^;;) won the battle against Sephiroth.  However, that wasn't all of it.  It continued into another separate battle, in which Mr. SilverHair had 31,000 more HP.

     I had to divide this post into two parts.   So this is part 1.

Part 2 is next...

@.@

Crisis Core again, back in Dec.18th

 

This post is waaaaay overdue.  Sorta.

Friday night December 18th (and into Saturday morning ^.^;;) I played Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII again because I had to. I shouldn't be afraid anymore to getting closer to finishing the game. I might finish the original FFVII before I finish this one, although that is not necessary.

     To sum it up, I finished finding a couple more of the Seven Wonders of Nibelheim, and then I played into the part when Genesis talks to Sephiroth about the Jenova Projects.  My details are below.  Enjoy!!

     I was still stuck on finding out if the girl in the painting was really walking around.  I made another futile search around Nibelheim and found some more gil, killed some more monsters, and stole some yummy items Zack can use...and I think I got another Thunder materia.  I have a few of those, I can sell this one.  I almost gave up on this little side adventure, when I returned to the inn checking the painting again over and over.  The girl is there, the girl is missing, the girl is there.  I went down stairs.  All of the sudden the male clerk at the inn started making his way up the stairs.  I had Zack approach him, and he says something like "Oh, you scared me!  Well, uh...your room is ready, you are welcome to use it."

     Huh.  I wonder what's up with him.   What could he be doing upstairs?

     Later after catching him going upstairs again, I thought about something.  I should wait until he goes into the room himself and see what happens.  So when he walks up the stairs again, I follow him and stay a little farther behind than usual.  The clerk goes into the room.  Of course, Sephiroth is oblivious, staring out the window and brooding, nostalgic ( I remember Sephiroth looking out the window in the original game, so I know where this will lead soon).  After the man enters the room, Zack runs after him and catches him  lifting the painting and reaching his hand into the wall-safe.  The clerk explains that he has a "nest egg"  he keeps hidden from his wife.  He uses the money for gambling and the painting changes depending on his money situation.  If there's money in there, the girl is in the painting.  If it's the opposite, the painting is flipped to the side without the girl.  For finding this out, Zack gets 2,000 gil!!!  Yay!!!!

     The third Wonder was already found: one of those Gold Bombs or something, I might be wrong.  And then the boy told Zack about the fourth wonder, the "Laughing Safe" ( in the Shinra Manor)....ehhh.  Besides the one piece of paper Zack found that had one clue for each digit of the

     So I gave up on that Wonder and went to the save point in the inn, saved my game (since I fought more monsters and got more gil) and went right to Sephiroth.  So yes: Sephiroth says that the "landscape seems so familiar" to him.  In the following scenes, I learn more about Sephiroth because before he became the villain of FFVII, he had his own human emotions.   After he wonders what these monsters are doing in the mako reactor, he wonders if this was also how he was created.  Just watching him look at his hands, as if trying to reassure himself those are human hands, was so interesting to observe.  He asks himself : "Am I a human being?"  Those are the moments when he struggles with his own identity.

     Sephiroth always believed that Jenova was his mother, a human mother.  Well, I don't remember Genesis being in the original game, but in Crisis Core he reveals to Sephiroth that Jenova was an alien life form.  Genesis says, "I don't know what images of her you've conjured up in your head..."  and then I think to myself, Get ready, here it comes...o-0.

     What is ironic when Genesis calls Sephiroth a "perfect monster" is that Sephiroth doesn't look like a monster at all.  LOL.  But the fact that he has a high level of mako in his body and extraordinary fighting abilities makes him a huge question mark.  Even Angeal called himself a perfect monster, which leads me to believe that he realized he wasn't like other SOLDIER members long before Sephiroth did. Unlike Genesis and maybe Angeal, Sephiroth  doesn't "degrade," as Genesis calls it (his own body is degrading, aka deteriorating), and he asks Sephiroth to "share your cells with me."  Uhh... O__O  But he wants to take advantage of Sephiroth's Jenova-infused cells.  I should say "wanted to" cuz it's in the past.  And somehow, Genesis knew about the Jenova Project G and Jenova Project S (the "s" is for Sephiroth I assume) before Sephiroth did.  But maybe Sephiroth wasn't supposed to know about Jenova and the projects.  [Sigh]  Gosh...

     I dunno if I'd call myself a fan of Sephiroth even if he's from Final Fantasy VII.  But it is nice to be reminded that he never started out evil.  :)

TO BE CONTINUED...

(Next is the buddy-bonding of Zack and Cloud ;] )