Monday, December 23, 2019

Final Fantasy This Morning: December 23, 2019


Well, actually written last night, but all the same, I suppose. I'm still setting this for a post time of 8:30 AM.

Anyway, to the point, I was saying in my last Text Play issue that I'm shelving my playthrough of Secret of Mana. It's not because I'm not enjoying the game. I am. I like it almost as much as I do Legend of Mana.

It's got more to do with that I've got a little much to do right now, between my day job, my personal life, and the other two Text Plays I've got going right now. I'm at a point where I have to cut at least one thing so I can focus on making the rest of what I'm doing so I can make it the best I can. Right now, the thing that's getting cut is the Secret of Mana playthrough. Much as enjoying it, I'm not as far along with it relative to how long I've been playing it and the priority I've given each game.

The good news is that I'm planning on coming back to it eventually. When eventually will be, I'm not exactly sure. I know I've said that about at least two games already: the previously mentioned Legend of Mana, and Lufia and the Fortress of Doom. I've finished Legend of Mana and want to take a shot at the New Game Plus feature, but that was a good five years ago now, and I still have to get around that. I've come close to finishing Lufia twice, that I can remember. Once was when I was in college and wasting time on it instead of focusing on my studies like I should have been, and the second time was when I did the Text Play here. The thing that stopped me the first time was that it was the end of the semester, and I think I had a job away from home, and I never got around to finishing the game. The second time, I lost my save file right near the end due to tech issues that I think I since have managed to resolve.

The point of all that is that I do indeed intend to come back to Secret of Mana eventually. I just don't know when that will be right now.

That will leave me with just the Final Fantasy games I'm playing. I've never finished either of those, either, though I've come closer to finishing II than I have IX. I've got a save file for FFII where I'm essentially at the final cave, with stats high enough to make a decent go at it, anyway. It's like so many other games I've got in that I've been meaning to finish but haven't quite made it.

I'm also about as far along as I've made it in FFIX. I should probably mark this next part as spoilers, but I also know the game's been out for just over 19 years, so I'm not sure how necessary that really is. Either way, I think I'm coming up on the part of the game where we kill Zorn and Thorn, the obnoxious little jester guys who pretty much attach themselves to the strongest baddie they can find, and then Kuja smushes them together and brings them back as a two-headed zombie abomination. I've only made it this far once. I'm pretty sure it was between when my parents bought a new house and when I moved into my own place, because I remember getting there in what was my bedroom there at the time. If you'll forgive a little bad language here, I'll be god damned if I can remember exactly why I quit playing that time. Real life, adult stuff, I suppose. I was also neglecting a different set of studies then, too, and I've got fifteen years of the end results I could talk about because of that.

On a related note, between this and all the vacation-related stuff I've been posting lately, I'm recalling a conversation I was having with my mom, my brother and his wife while we were out there. It was something about having entire series of things, and one of the examples my brother used was these PlayStation era Final Fantasy games. The short version of my answer is that I honestly don't know if I would ever have bought them myself had he not still been into this sort of thing when they came out, considering how my thoughts and opinions about gaming have evolved since I got out of high school, more or less 25 years ago now. There's more to that story, of course, but I'll save that story for another time. And maybe I'll finally get to that bit on my observation about item drop rates in these games at some point, too.

I think I'd better wrap this up for now, though. It's getting kind of late again and I've got a busy week ahead of me. It's Christmas and New Years, after all. So, I'll see you soon with more stuff, as always.

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