Talk:Chapter 3/@comment-50.160.193.16-20140101001725/@comment-50.160.193.16-20140104054658

Ah, but I'm not done. I tend to be long-winded with my "reviews" on stuff, so I usually post first thoughts initially, then save critisisms and realizations for several days later. Like now, for instance :-)

My critisms with Chapter 3 is directed at the combat. Not the monsters themselves: they're insteresting to fight and sexy to lose to as usual. My problem is with the new moves that are introduced. While I enjoyed the idea of Luka losing the spirits and having to fight on his own (and admittedly really enjoyed the logical deduction of "hey, I can enter a trance on my own, it was just a matter of remembering how it felt and emulating it!"), the angel moves are the real let down. Yes, they were heavily hinted at in previous chapters, no way we didn't see it coming, and I would have been disappointed if I didn't get to play with them. But when I finally got the spirits back, I kept expecting Luka to take his angelic moves and spirit powers and merge them together, something which nobody in the history of ever has done before (probably) and which would be an excellent pinacle for him to reach for his leveling/training arc ("When I started, I was having to learn the basics from my biggest not-enemy because she took pitty on me. Now I'm making my own moves that nobody's ever come up with! I *am* a badass!" Luka wouldn't say that, but I would've!). Not to mention inserting a bit of levity when Luka tries to name the move something dumb and Alice has to fix it, or alternatively, Alice names it something really grotesque and Luka has to tone it down.

But no; instead, when the spirits rejoin, they don't even note that he's got new moves to use, not even that he's Angelic. Only Sylph and Undine say anything about his moves, and even then, only that he doesn't have to do them alone now, he can go back to using spirit powers with them. So I kept spamming Daystar on most enemies, only throwing in Salamander every once in a while to refill my SP and spam it again faster. Hell, they didn't even get merged when the spirits' powers returned. And that new omni-elemental move was forgetable, I'm afraid: I would have prefered to see Quadruple Giga upgraded to take only 2 moves or otherwise be usable in normal combats, instead (probably after that epic showing by Heinrich's spirit near the end: "THIS is Qudruple Gigas!" *Boom* -later- "Now my body understands how to do the real thing!" *upgrade music*). I guess I'm porbably just spoiled but to me the new combat stuff in Chapter 3 was boring compared to juggling multiple elements in Chapter 2 changing how I play and progressing through the game "upgrading" old moves into new and powerful versions (to be fair, Sylph's power IS enhanced by combining Angel Dance, but it's the exception rather then the rule).

Speaking of Daystar, I think that's the first instance of Torotoro's dev team dropping the ball I've seen: I REALLY think that move should not have been learned until Luka gets the story dump from Michael in Enrika and learns that his mother was the Sylph Lucifina, because whenever he uses that move, he shouts that his mother is the angel Daystar, which he couldn't possibly know until after he's told. Oh, and also, "Sorry for that massive spoiler, player!" says Tororo belatedly.

I know they probably had their hands full with getting the game out in a reasonable time to us ravenous fans and that the tying up this story in a satisfactory way was a massive undertaking, but I still feel that the combat got lost in the shuffle. The battles as the FHKs were fun and full of surprises, and being able to fight with Alice (FINALLY) was fun, but I'm sorry Luka's combat skills weren't evolved to their logical conclusion like everything else.

OK, I'm done I think.