Future plans:
I'd like to do a solo class run of every FFV class, all 22 of them. Sullla's solo characters are enlightening, but they only tell half the story. So many places that are roadblocks for a solo character (Karlabos, Purobolos, etc.) aren't for a full party, and some places a solo stomps over (Chimera Brain and Almagest come to mind) are huge threats for a party! I'd like to have a counterpoint to the solo characters, as even though they do demonstrate the ins and outs of the class on its own, they really do only show how an overleveled example of that class operates, and not at all in a party setting. How much does that change things? I'm going to find out! No ETA on when I'm going to start this, but probably somewhere around 2017. Keep an eye out for it!
Streaming:
Haven't been doing quite as much of this as I'd like, but that's fine. I've been streaming more often than I had been for quite a while as it is- streamed an entire Four Job Fiesta (random) run over the past couple days, Black Mage/Summoner/Thief/Bard. Stomped over all 3 endgame bosses in a little over 16 hours, then started another run (no750) the next day (today!). So far, that's given me Thief/Berserker/Beastmaster, with the final job guaranteed to be Dragoon or Samurai. If I get Dragoon here, I managed to pull the lowest possible value team.. what fun. Still, it should be fun working out creative solutions to the problems this will present. After all, I forgot to steal Mythril Daggers this time before Galura and had to take him down ~40 damage at a time! Took 30 Potions, 4 Phoenix Downs and intentionally letting characters inflicted with HP Leak die, but I got it done.
Casual Gaming:
I played through Sly 1 and Sly 3, both to 100% completion. Gotta say, Sly 2 is my favorite of the three. The friendships in Sly 1 weren't believable, as Bentley and Sly just seemed to get on each others' nerves and Murray was just that guy who was sometimes there. The banter in Sly 2 was exactly that- banter! Sly 3 lost a little focus with all the additional characters, but the friendships (especially Sly and Bentley) were believable. At least, aside from the whole "Dr. M parallel and Bentley now resents Sly suddenly" thing. That... just felt out of place.
Level design for the 3 games was another interesting study. Sly 1 has contained, small overworlds that branch off to linear or minigame levels. The clue bottles added depth to the obstacles, but not nearly enough to set Sly 1 to a stealth game, instead of the platform game with stealth elements thrown in. Further, the 'super sneaky thief moves' worked most of the time, but when they would lock onto the wrong objects... it was very frustrating dying to what was essentially a control malfunction. The physics were a little questionable as well, with Sly slipping off ledges or getting launched off into the lava by Clockwerk turning his head. Now that was a BS death!
Sly 2 expanded the overworlds, hid clue bottles throughout to incentivize searching the area and familiarizing yourself with the layout before taking on any jobs, upped the guards and allowed interaction with them, added loot to stealthily bring back to the safe house, added power-ups... they were done so amazingly well, even the out of the way nooks with nothing in them served a purpose. I really don't have anything else to add or any tangents, here: I legitimately love the way these were executed. Sly 3...again felt like a step back. The overworlds had a lot of space that was just there for guards to patrol, and nothing other than said guards to interact with. As a result they all felt flat and dead, and I never really learned my way around them like I had to do with Sly 2.
Moving onto the gameplay types, all 3 games have their minigames, and I do feel that these got more polished with each game. Bentley's hacking minigame is the only one that survived all three, and it works better in each one. Sly 2 I think had the better designed levels for it, but the mechanics were better for Sly 3. I believe there's a turret game in each of the games as well, and for Sly 1 it was very poorly done, relying on the one hit wonder mechanic and surprise traps. Sly 3 did it well.
Characters... Sly 1 only had Sly playable, and it showed. He controlled quite well aside from the aforementioned thief move issue. Sly 2 added Bentley and Murray, in addition to expanding what Sly could do. All three of these characters clearly had a lot of thought put into them, and though Sly is the most fun to use with his ability to pickpocket, paraglide and climb on nearly anything, Murray was also a blast to punch through everything. I'm not into beat-em-ups, but I still enjoyed these sections of the game thoroughly. His high jump ability granted him all the mobility you could ever need, as well. Bentley isn't quite as fun to use, as if he gets caught you're pretty much out of luck. Bentley also lacks many stealth options, so playing as him revolves around staying well away from guards and sniping them with his crossbow. Still, the Adrenaline Rush power (or as I call it, turbo turtle) definitely helps this issue somewhat.
Sly 3 has too many playable characters. Sly is basically unchanged from Sly 2, but the level design doesn't really cater to him first any more. Murray loses his high jump and instead gets a ball form that can bounce around, but moves really slowly. He can also steal items/coins from guards by shaking them over his head- nifty, but mostly impractical Bentley gains the ability to pick-pocket, albeit awkwardly and slowly, quadruple jump, hover and melee! Honestly, this is a pretty nice improvement. You even get to play as Carmelita a few times, with a 'lock-strafe' control scheme, ultra high jump, and the shock pistol which apparently is very easy to aim. She's alright to use- nothing special, but nothing bad either.
The new characters are where things start to fall apart. The Guru is added in Episode 2 of 6, and has no combat skills whatsoever. If you're caught, turn into a rock and the guards all lose notice. Yay. The Guru can also possess unaware guards... but they run quickly, are hard to control, and the missions where this matters require guiding them to a specific location. So you end up finding a guard, sneaking up on the guard, kill the guard on the obstacle, find another, get seen, turn into a rock, wait 30 seconds, find another guard, possess them... it's very tedious. Episode 3 adds Penelope, who you only control through controlling her RC Car and Chopper. The Chopper has a turbo and a claw and honestly is no fun to use at all, especially when its claw doesn't latch on. The car is nice though, but didn't really need a character for. Episode 4 gives control of the Panda King, who attacks with fireworks or slow melee. This is honestly a lot of fun, blasting things with fireworks and locking on from a bit of a distance. The problems lie with how late you gain access to his abilities: he's used for a total of 2 or 3 missions, and these are all in a small space. I really wanted to go out n the field with the big guy, but it was not to be. In Episode 5, Dimitri from Sly 2 returns as a frogman. He gets two missions. They both suck. Controlling him comes down to button mashing. It's lame. Actually, so were the boat controls... both Murray's small boat and the commandeered pirate vessel!
I hate the pirate ship parts. You always move, can only steer, have to protect your ship with Sly, the cannons don't reload fast enough, and it took me forever to figure out the only way to survive on the seven seas was completely counterintuitive. You basically have to be slaloming away from the enemy ship, and fire your cannons at the front of their ship as they pursue. Did I mention the game tells you to fire at the broad side of the ship?
Anyway, I enjoyed playing through Sly 1 and 3, but they didn't live up to the second game in my eyes. The one thing Sly 2 didn't do well was 'postgame' stuff, such as time trials/challenges as it completely lacked them. Sly 1 just had time trials, some of which were pretty strict, and Sly 3 had a medley of challenges rehashing the missions from the game. If these missions were more fun, this would be great, but instead the annoying parts just reminded me of how annoying they were (sink 5 enemy ships without being sunk! climb this castle again where everything is too close and Sly locks onto the wrong stuff constantly, under time pressure! redo the dumb RC Chopper defense mission, with half the room for error! defeat this boss starting at half health!) Seriously, some of these would be completely absurd if it wasn't for the Thief Reflexes ability to slow time...
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