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[Wanoah]

There may still be one or two of you hereabouts that are familiar with the sort of long, rambling forum posting I used to inflict on people back in the day. Some of you may have read some of my posts, and maybe there's someone out there that remembers that I have a bunch of opinions on games and gaming and what I think it should and shouldn't be. You're probably wishing that you get get the time reading all that tripe back somehow, but it's gone: I stole precious minutes of your life that you could have spent hugging your children or making love to beautiful women. I'm going to steal more of your life away now. In good conscience, I can only recommend that you don't click any of the links below. In fact, stop reading right now.

Still here? Well, don't say I didn't warn you. Anyone familiar with my views on games will probably have a hunch that the Final Fantasy series is likely to represent everything I think is rotten in the world of gaming. You might suspect that I would having nothing good to say about them. You might think it possible that I may at some point have vomited pure hate-flavoured vitriol at the merest mention of a Final Fantasy game. You'd be right.

It's fair to say that just about the worst thing I could do would be to make a firm commitment to not only play a Final Fantasy game, but to finish one. I'd rather play through a 24 hour Fork Lift Simulator marathon after suffering a stroke than waste days of my life playing through a game I am practically guaranteed to hate every minute of. A game that robs you of many many hours of your life that could have been better spent winning that Nobel Prize or boning the aforementioned beautiful women.

Obviously, I have made a terrible mistake. A terrible terrible mistake. I have made that commitment to play through a Final Fantasy game. I was even stone cold sober at the time. All things being equal, I start the torment this coming Sunday. I plan to chart my progress with some kind of diary - links to the introductory bits are below. I'm not sure how much I'll write, or how often: it rather depends on how much this damnable thing damages my brain. I may be incapable of speech after the first day. I may be only capable of rage like the infected in 28 Days Later. All I do know is that it's unlikely to be pretty.

Anyway, without further ado, I present I Fantasise About This Being Over: a story in an indeterminate number of parts. Enjoy. Or don't.

Part One: The Challenge
Part Two: Why I Hate Consoles
Part Three: Storytelling In Games
Part Four: I Hate Fantasy
Part Five: The Horror! The Horror! 25 hours with FFX
Part Six: Failure and Resolve

[Myrhial Arkenath]

Your blog thing is borked in Chrome, screen goes white after a second and displays [ur=http://stats.wordpress.com/g.gif?host=www.wanoah.co.uk&rand=0.9156052952166647&blog=12221513&v=ext&post=58&ref=l]this[/url] image. Might want to look into fixing that.

[Wanoah]

Thanks for letting me know. And curious, given that it's vanilla Wordpress with a common template.

[Lillith Blackheart]

Why would you challenge yourself to play a horrible game the whole way through?

[Zuzanna Alondra]

Trick: You only have to play Biltz ball *once*  -  any games past that are optional.

[Wanoah]

Why would you challenge yourself to play a horrible game the whole way through?

It's a very good question. I have been somewhat vague in the blog posts as to how this came about, but I'm not challenging myself. I have been challenged by someone else: someone who is taking great delight in my misery. There was also reciprocation: she had to go to a football match (she hates football). When the bargain was struck, I didn't realise just how unequal it was. Tbh, had I realised, I would have insisted that she watches an entire season of football.

Trick: You only have to play Biltz ball *once*  -  any games past that are optional.

Yeah, I got past that Blitzball bit. I was actually looking forward to it on the basis that it was some kind of sport, and therefore might be somewhat enjoyable. Predictably though, they made it unimaginably awful, as only people entirely unacquainted with the concepts of sport and fun could.

I am currently languishing in some place where I keep getting hit by lightning. For some reason. Because the random battles every five paces weren't tedious enough. :/

[Lillith Blackheart]

Tbh, had I realised, I would have insisted that she watches an entire season of football.

Hey, by then you might have even finished the intro portion. . .

[Wanoah]

Tbh, had I realised, I would have insisted that she watches an entire season of football.

Hey, by then you might have even finished the intro portion. . .

/o\

[Mizhara]

Tbh, had I realised, I would have insisted that she watches an entire season of football.

Hey, by then you might have even finished the intro portion. . .

Urgh, don't say that. I've already thrown away the FFXII disc, after about 25h or so of playing it, and I'm still not sure I'm past the intro. God that was an awful game.

Edit: No wait, FFXIII, isn't it?

[Kaleigh Doyle]

I still play FF1 for the nintendo. Does that make me a bad person? 

[Zuzanna Alondra]

I am currently languishing in some place where I keep getting hit by lightning. For some reason. Because the random battles every five paces weren't tedious enough. :/

I remember that place... ew.  I had to load a walk thru to live through it myself.

[Lillith Blackheart]

I still play FF1 for the nintendo. Does that make me a bad person? 

No, because Final Fantasy was really good up to FF7. Then it took a dive, and each additional one has continued that dive.

For Mizh and Wanoah:

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2010/4/14/

That is all.

[Benjamin Shepherd]

Never beat a single game of Final Fantasy, but I love the orchestral music, good production value when it comes to that.

[lallara zhuul]

If you read the dialogues then it makes your life a lot easier.

In that spot you can dodge the lightnings by pressing one of the buttons once you get the obscure cue from the game.

There was some thingie there about twiddling with the pylons to get something, I forget what.

[Lillith Blackheart]

Do this, Wanoah:

Ask her if it has to be FFXIII.

If it does not have to be FFXIII, you can still be spared.

Get FFVII. It's considerably shorter of a game (like you would be done with FF7 by the time you finish the intro of FF13 assuming you just rushed through it) and also not as god awful.

Save yourself if you can, man.

Save yourself if you can.