@Zero
I highly doubt it. I think it's just optional. I think it's just battling creatures or something.

Thanks for reminding me, I'd love to try it out with my bro.

Whats the deal with the "Squad" stuff? I saw a bunch of you guys on there (greyed out), and I was like "yeah, I wanna party with them," but it wouldn't let me (of course). So I went to the one that mentioned the single player experience (since I don't like to play with strangers), and all of a sudden I'm seeing all of these strangers pop up! What!

And I could not for the life of me find Alma. I walked ALLLL around the area around the barracks (since she wasn't inside), checked my Affinity chart hoping it would give a clue to her whereabouts, and its like "usually in the Barracks." UGH, she's not in th-- WHAT THE HELL. There she is, standing by a table that she DEFINITELY wasn't near 15 minutes before I walked all over the place. Was she in the bathroom? Possibly, I'll accept that.

So, I'm on an Affinity Mission right now, so I guess I gotta do that before I do anything else. But the Squad stuff? Whats the scoop?


Oh, and I also went Curator, hjort. Collectapedia, wooooo!

This game's incredible. Love it to bits.

@Mr_Mustache
*secret Curator handshake*

Read up on squads here. I haven't read up on the details myself yet, which is why I'm being lazy by linking instead of explaining.

@r_hjort
*secret Curator handshake*

(Just to make sure I'm doing it right, we make our hands like a C, and then kinda make a full cube by putting them together, right? Kinda like a baseball before they finally sew it, or two Lego guys?)

Reading your squad poop..hopefully nothing gets SPOILED for me..

Haha, found a misprint. Someone wrote "advice" instead of "advise." Oh, I think someone who is Japanese First wrote this. Lots of.. "ask for becoming" type stuff.

..Annnnd I still don't understand it. I wanna party with you duuuudes. I already have 8-10 of you on my list, who I assume are already posting in here. There was one name that I didn't recognize at all, but yeah.

Maaaan, this game is sweet. I love that I actually feel that tingling sensation in my stomach every time I jump off a high enough cliff! Games seldom make me feel that way, but for some reason I find this game very convincing in that respect.

@Mr_Mustache
Is that what we're doing? That handshake is so secret I don't know how to do it myself.

My guess is that your best bet if you want to play with people here is to arrange a virtual play date and join the third squad when you log on.

Way more into this game than I ever was with the original, though I enjoyed what I played of the original. Even with less tutorial I think X somehow eases you into the game better.

I could see getting addicted to this game quick, it already had a nice little death grip on me last night. I mean, I went to sleep way too late thanks to this game last night.

The environments in this game are way too pretty, and when combined with the different types of weather it's quite stunning at times. Like just now, when NLA's bright afternoon turned into a slow drizzle with thunder storms, causing the sky to turn into a big gray cloth with a golden light behind it. Or when the mist started rising up from the bogs in Noctilum, and I could see something huge come walking down towards the shoreline while wrapped in fog. Oooooo.

Also, note to self: Don't disturb creatures larger than the average house when they're taking a bath. They don't like that.

@r_hjort

I think thats how the handbook explained it. Speaking of other cool stuff we do, so what specific stuff do we need to do? I was almost a Prospector and REALLY close to picking Mediator. I feel like I haven't done anything as a Curator. Is it basically just Collectapedia, and thats it? I know there is also putting Tyrants in their place, but yeah. Is there one that has me fill out a beastiary? Maybe I should've done that...

"High enough cliff," ugh. I've been doing "longjump" type stuff, like when you're going out the West Gate or whatever and that road dips down, like to see how far I can get. I was running through one of the districts following the yellow arrow, got to an intersection which had a road dipping down on the other side of the light, San Fran style and--- NOPE. THERES NO ROAD THERE. Long as hell drop into WATER on some BOATS in the middle of NLA. And then I took about 20 flights of stairs back up to street level. DON'T DO IT.

@r_hjort

I had to tippy toe past some pretty big dudes in order to recover an item lost in the wild. I learned the hard way that I needed to tip toe..

EDIT- Gosh, theres more than 6 people playing this game, right? Not a TON of action in this thread, and the database page reflects a similar number. I'm gonna call Louuu.

I have to wait till at least X-Mas.......@Mr_Mustache

Sorry man... Take another leap off a cliff for me..

Ok..so...what's it do better than the Chronicles? What's it lacking? I noticed in reviews there are a ton of visual settings/HUD etc. What about audio settings?

How does the affinity chart differ from the last game? Do you people like that little glowing ball that helps you with quests? When do you hear your characters voice in the game if you are a silent protagonist? Can you change your characters looks etc somewhere in NLA?

I got the game in the mail today, but no time to play it. Maybe I'll squeeze in at least the character creation tomorrow.

Some of my pics. The game is stunning. Just stunning.


These were all taken in an area which essentially amounts to the outside of Peach's Castle in SM64. Running to NLA is your first objective and it took me hours to do it. I spent time just looking around, exploring, collecting, leveling up, and it was grand. I did the first five mins of the game in like 3 hours. Playing this game at your own pace is the way to be. This is living.

Oh and believe me when I say these pics do no justice whatsoever to how this game can look on your TV.

Finally starting playing. Love how right from the start you can basically run to the city or do a ton of exploring (I did a little bit.) Didn't really love how once you get into the city it's a good 45 minutes of cutscenes and tours and everything but I suppose that often happens in RPGs when you get into the main city for the first time. (This also happened to be the point where Shirley started watching and after a half hour or so if it I had to explain to her that no, it's not a game about running around a city and watching cutscenes...)

I like the quick switching between melee and range weapons. Feels really nice.

Areas so far are big and beautiful and amazing.

Soundtrack is pretty good overall, it's cool how it isn't just a rehash of Xenoblade's soundtrack but I have a feeling I won't like it as much when all is said and done.

But yeah overall I'm loving the game. Definitely feels like Xenoblade while also feeling new.

I might put off upgrading my computer to get this game for Christmas...

So I notice you can target different parts on the creatures, and sometimes I hear something like "part destroyed, now get close and attack!" but I don't quite understand this battle system. How much does it matter what part you target?

@Zero

From what I understand, you can target appendages and it'll give you more items from certain enemies and even disable some of their attacks. I'm still confused on that part though...

I just realized that despite having spent hours upon hours crafting and placing gems in the original game, I haven't even dabbled in that sort of thing now. Time to pay NLA a visit!

@VofEscaflowne Hmm, I see these big guys with 4 legs you can target and I wonder if you take out all of the legs would it fall down or something? But they keep killing me so I can't find out lol.

@Zero

Oh I'm not sure about targeting specific body parts like that... the combat in this game is still really confusing

@Smerd

I haven't used the Follow Ball AT ALL yet. Maybe I should.. I wander a lot, and often take the long way around.

--THE OTHER DAY (CAPS do not equal EXCITEMENT), I SWAM FOR 5 STRAIGHT MINUTES AROUND THE SOUTHERN TIP OF YOUR LAND AREA. THERES NOTHING OUT THERE AT ALL, AND NO WAY BACK TO THE LAND.

Beach to beach, what a mess.

And I have NOT found a place where you can alter your person after you make them. PICK SOMEONE YOU LIKE.
(Has anyone else found a place to do this??)

Your silent guy talks out on the battlefield, never in cutscenes.

VofEscaflowne said:

@Zero

From what I understand, you can target appendages and it'll give you more items from certain enemies and even disable some of their attacks. I'm still confused on that part though...

No confusion, I think you got it right! Its that part of Monster Hunter where you gotta beat on a horn for minutes before it busts open, but here it goes a lot quicker. There is an actual meter that you can see, so thats really cool. And everything (so far) seems to bust pretty quick. I mean, the longest fight I've been in so far was like 3-4 minutes, so yeah. (And those Grexes near the start that were supposed to pose such a huge problem? Haha, I had leveled myself up a good deal before I even got to them, OOPS.)

@Zero

Are you talking about the..Wood Lapyx or something? (Carlos' 4th and 7th pics from the bottom?) No, they won't collapse, but I think busting a knee startles them where is messes up one of their attacks? Things get pretty frantic out there, and the stuff that your people are SAYING are actually clues as to whats going on, and what you should follow up with. They aren't just barfing words.

Look in the Soul Voices section and see if that makes any sense to you. I moved some of mine around a bit, and it turns out that every time I hit a CRITICAL on someone, my guy says something, and then my enemy has Topple I, which allows me to rip off an awesome follow-up attack. Make it your own thing, ya know? I can't really explain it better. Can someone else?


C'mon, I don't know the most about this game..do I?? I can't be the most informative!

Lets all figure it out together. What other questions do we have?