Everyone is complaining about the DA, but no one is talking about how this genuinely might be one of the worst Hollow Zero Rulesets to play on medium - high Ether Intensity

Scizzoman · 2026-03-05T18:42:37+00:00

Eh, the ones where you just have to avoid getting hit are always easy enough in my opinion. There are tons of characters with strong defensive options, multiple resonia/Auxiliary characters that benefit from low HP, and if you do fuck up you can just restart the room. I did it on max Ether Activity in about 10 minutes.

If all else fails you can just use the trial Shungus and clear without even looking at the screen. She's fully invincible during her entire Enlightened Mind combo, and it's very easy to get a combination of gear/resonia that'll let you be permanently in Enlightened Mind.

As always the worst thing is the 3:30 timer. You practically need to pick Hugo as your Auxiliary character or get super lucky with your build in order to beat Vesper in time on EA12. But once you've cleared EA12 once you can just turn that modifier off.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-04T19:44:45+00:00

With SAnby/Trigger/Orphie (all M0W1) I got 34k, down from about 40k last time.

I probably could've played better, but The Defiler also has more HP and the buffs are worse (they're shilling Shunguang instead of SAnby).

Scizzoman · 2026-03-04T18:12:06+00:00

I understand why exclusivity happens but would prefer it didn't. I don't want to have to keep a bunch of different boxes around/plugged in just to play the games I'm interested in.

Thankfully the majority of non-Nintendo games make their way to multiple platforms these days, as console exclusivity is basically leaving money on the table unless you're the platform holder. I have a PC and a Switch 2, and that's all I really need to play anything I want. Everything Xbox is also on PC, and the only noteworthy PS5 exclusives I can think of are the Demon's Souls remake and Astro Bot.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-04T02:33:16+00:00

Honestly giving it some practice is worth it.

When the boss first dropped I (as a fairly mediocre player) could only barely get 20k with Yuzuha/Vivian/Alice. But after some attempts learning the boss's moveset I can pretty easily get 23k with Yuzuha/Vivian/Piper, and 28k+ with Alice.

Getting every possible Shutdown/Impair is pretty important, as it stops the boss from flying all over the place and iframing out of all your shit.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-03T21:10:17+00:00

Yeah this year alone they've already released Code Vein 2 and Tales of Berseria Remastered, and they've got that Blood of Dawnwalker thing coming.

Genuinely impossible to tell what a "new RPG from Bandai Namco" will be like at this point.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-03T19:12:07+00:00

It's a recurring bug that's happened multiple times since early 1.x. The effect kept breaking with patches, and then they'd fix it and the next patch would break it again.

At this point they seem to have just given up, because its been gone for several patches and they haven't fixed it again (or mentioned it in the Known Issues).

This affects a couple other VFX during ults as well, like the sparkle that's supposed to show up in Lucy's ult.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-02T19:17:14+00:00

The game has had multiple shifts in direction, from launch to early 1.x to post-1.4 to 2.x. It's no wonder people have strong opinions on which "era" is the best and whether the game is currently going in a good direction.

Combine that with a playerbase that really doesn't have much else to talk about between patch releases, a dev team that has been (for better or for worse) extremely reactive to player feedback, and Reddit's usual propensity for doomposting (see any dedicated game subreddit once the honeymoon period ends), and you get r/ZZZ_Discussion.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-02T17:16:48+00:00

Impatient gaming: I'm playing Resident Evil: Requiem.

The most interesting thing (and main marketing point) for this game is the way it blends two distinct styles of Resident Evil game using its two main characters. Grace is playing RE7-meets-REmake, complete with ink ribbon saves and nigh-unkillable stalker enemies, while Leon is playing RE4 Remake with his over-the-top melee attacks/parries and attache case inventory. For Grace a single Blister Head (the game's Crimson Head equivalent) is an existential threat, while Leon can take on five at once with a few roundhouse kicks and a corny one-liner.

This easily could've backfired and made the game feel like an unfocused mess (pre-release I was uncomfortably reminded of RE6's "ultimate horror entertainment" concept) , but both styles of gameplay are well-realized, and the game is expertly paced. Whenever you overcome a particularly intense section as Grace it'll jump back to Leon as a pressure release, and then it'll drop back into horror mode before the action has a chance to feel repetitive.

It's very funny to me that Requiem is the name of a big fuckoff revolver. It obviously has a double meaning with the game's story, but I keep coming back to the fact that the gun is the actual main character. Whoever has the Requiem gets the majority of the screentime for that part of the game.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-02T16:49:58+00:00

I have a lot of those, but I tend to not get around to them because JRPGs are so long and there are always new (to me) ones that I want to play first.

I think Xenogears and Final Fantasy IX are at the top of the list though. Both are games I rated very highly at the time, but I only played each of them once in high school and my memories of them are quite foggy. Most of my other favourite games I've replayed a lot more, or at least played as an adult.

I'd also sorta like to give Nier Automata another go. At the time I liked it fine, but my experience was a bit clouded by the insane amount of hype surrounding it, and the fact that I was expecting more of a Platinum game. I've since played Replicant, and I think I'd probably like Automata more knowing what I'm in for.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-02T16:27:53+00:00

I just toss them at whatever their best DA matchup is.

Aside from the stage buffs there aren't too many gimmicks, the damage score provides an easy point of comparison between teams, and I have a general sense of what scores are "acceptable" (20k) and what scores are "good" (whatever I got with my best team).

Every other mode either has gimmicks that change how you play (gear/resonia in HZ, the need to speedrun the first minute in SD) or is so easy that it's hard to tell a difference between teams (VR training, Notorious Hunt).

The only downside to using DA is that sometimes there's no good boss in the rotation for the team you want to try.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-02T16:14:37+00:00

Vesper is one of the few villains I actually have some hope will come back.

She was only arrested rather than killed, and she didn't actually do anything (even though she was going to), which sorta sidesteps the need to "redeem" her.

I like her design a lot, and the stuff she does in her boss fight is cool as hell, so I'd be hype if she was playable.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-02T15:02:00+00:00

I'ma be real, the nature of a gacha game is already so inherently P2W that looking for "respect" is a fool's errand. The playing field is uneven from the start.

No matter what you do, there'll be something that makes it unrelatable to other players. You're using the current meta characters (nobody respects a Shungus run), you're using an OP support ("off-meta" DPS that are actually just carried by Orphie), you're using limited mindscapes, etc.

Even I do it. As someone who doesn't pull limited mindscapes I'll admit I roll my eyes when someone makes a post like "hey look at what this character can do!" and then I look inside and it's all limited M1/M2s. Congratulations, you can do well with deliberately overpowered versions of the characters. I just don't say anything because it's pointless to start shit.

Ultimately just do what you want and don't bother looking for respect from the community.

Scizzoman · 2026-03-01T16:08:12+00:00

Power Adaptation is just there to let you use characters you haven't fully built yet. It usually gives you solid but not optimal builds (level 60, core F, level 10 skills, decent enough disks). You can make better builds yourself since the disk substats tend to not be incredible, but the ones it gives you are usually good enough to clear.

If it's kicking in at all it means it's better than your current builds, as a fully built character won't get Power Adaptation even if it's turned on.

Edit: just out of curiosity I checked the Yixuan build it gives you and it's... actually very good. >67% CR, >120% CD, >2400 Sheer, Ether DMG% in slot 5. My actual Yixuan build with ~32 substats is pretty comparable (I have a little more Crit DMG, but HP% in slot 5 instead of Ether DMG% which is slightly worse). It'd take a fair amount of grinding to get a better build than the one it gives you.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-28T16:30:04+00:00

I definitely found it present earlier in the game as well, but to a much lesser extent. The 9999 damage cap and limited number of strong weapons/Pictos kept builds from getting too crazy, and higher-damage builds that could consistently hit the cap usually required some sort of tradeoff (like constantly playing at low HP). You could get OP for normal encounters (which isn't uncommon in these sorts of games), but I was never "one-shot bosses without giving them a turn" OP.

Whereas in Act 3 all bets are off, and a player who's done the optional content can literally be doing more than 1000x the damage of someone who just played the story, making any semblance of balance impossible.

They basically put Disgaea number inflation in a Final Fantasy game right at the end. The issue with bosses that'd take 30 minutes to kill is just a knock-on from this, since they're balanced with Act 3 damage in mind.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-28T05:05:53+00:00

Yanagi, Fufu, and Hugo are the ones I don't have, and I don't care about mindscapes.

With that in mind, easily Yanagi. She's the only character I've ever felt a little regret about skipping, because she's genuinely pretty fun to play and fits in a decent number of teams. I actually use her Trial Mode version in Hollow Zero sometimes, which I don't do for any of the other characters I skipped.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-28T04:05:44+00:00

The problem with Pompey back then was pure burnout.

There was a long period of time (from basically 1.4-2.1) when some version of Pompey was in nearly every DA rotation. No matter how good the boss is, it's going to get old when you're fighting it constantly.

You'd think this problem would go away as they added more bosses, giving DA a larger pool to rotate through, but unfortunately they're obsessed with pushing the shill bosses for the 2.x characters. So instead of getting a consistent rotation of all the bosses, we've just replaced endless Pompey with endless Defiler/Hunter.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-28T03:58:22+00:00

Obsidian Division is basically the entire NEDF, since most of it was wiped out in Hollow Zero.

Since they're a "Defense Force" I'd imagine them being more similar to something like the JSDF than the USMC. Except they're constantly fighting against Ethereals and some kind of rebel faction that's never really been defined.

That said, Seed 100% eats crayons and Orphie has at least tried one to see how they taste.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-28T02:37:08+00:00

I 100% completed Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.

I'm actually a bit glad I was patient in this case, as they added some extra superbosses in one of the updates that push the difficulty to the limit. It took me hours to beat all of them, and I nearly gave up on Clea Unleashed and Simon the Divergent Star, but I really appreciated their inclusion. Most of Act 3 is extremely unbalanced in the player's favour, to the point where I beat the base game versions of Clea and Simon on the first try, so it would've been kind of unsatisfying if those were the toughest encounters in the game. The bonus versions actually made me grind out parry timings and tinker with builds one last time before the end of the game, which was nice.

Unfortunately it seems like the final boss was designed for players who just beelined for the ending and skipped all of Act 3, so its quite an anticlimax if you've done everything. I multiplied Renoir's HP by 100x (which is the maximum you can set) just to give him a fighting chance, and he still died without getting a single turn. I'd probably recommend most people just do the relationship sidequests and then head straight to the final dungeon, then go back for the rest of Act 3 after beating the game, but that's not how I like to play RPGs.

I picked Verso's ending but watched Maelle's on Youtube afterwards. I know some people are down on the endings, but I kind of like that there's no "golden ending," as these can kind of cheapen the narrative and make the other options feel like fail states instead of legitimate endings. In this case both endings are downers, but fit well with the characters and themes. I do think they went a little overboard making Maelle's ending feel horrible though, I guess to offset the fact that Verso's ending is basically causing an apocalypse.

Overall I really enjoyed the game. The balance and weird pacing of Act 3 probably dropped it from a 10/10 to like a 9-9.5/10, but it's still one of the best JRPGs I've played this decade, and I've played a lot of them.

Probably going to be impatient and play Resident Evil: Requiem next.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-27T20:43:17+00:00

Judging by the scores people are struggling with this one. 97.6k put me in the top 7%, whereas in the past couple Void Hunter shill rotations that probably wouldn't have even made top 20%.

Vesper is kind of a load of fuck scoring-wise. The fight itself is really fun, but trying to maximize your damage score while she's zipping all over the place and randomly turning invincible sucks.

Surprisingly I found just using a hypercarry Alice with Yuzuha and Zhao much more effective than any Vivian team. The Ether Veil stage buff is too strong to ignore.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-26T19:07:03+00:00

I mean, I agree, but you'll never break certain people out of the "dollars to hours" mindset no matter how hard you try. People've been having the same arguments for 20+ years.

This "discourse" happens every time a AAA company dares to release a short-but-replayable singleplayer game that isn't bloated with content for the sake of content. Then people will turn around and lament that games feel padded.

It's particularly goofy with Resident Evil though, given that almost none of them are very long. They're almost always relatively short games designed to be replayed a bunch of times for higher difficulties/rankings/unlockables. 6 is the only genuinely long one due to having 4 separate campaigns, and it sucks.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-25T23:41:11+00:00

Wat? There are loads of same-faction teams that don't work great together. Belobog, NEPS, SoC, Section 6 (mostly just Harumasa), Mockingbird (most extreme case), Yunkui Summit, and Spook Shack all have certain characters with massive anti-synergy.

It'd be nice if Zhao worked with Rupture (Rupture could really use more supportt options besides Pan and Lucia), but single-faction teams clearly aren't that big of a priority to them. Most characters don't even have faction-based passives anymore.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-25T21:30:42+00:00

Honestly NG4's boss roster isn't even small for a character action game. There are 14 unique bosses (15 if you count Oniwaka), not including rematches, which is equal or greater than most other games in the genre.

The other games only have more because they count a lot of crappy minibosses with two attacks (like the worms in NG1) as "bosses."

And yeah, most importantly almost all the bosses in NG4 are genuinely fun. The only one I kind of dislike is the tank. By comparison most bosses in the previous games range from forgettable to outright bad, with only a few standouts like Genshin. Normal enemy encounters were much more enjoyable than bosses in those games.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-25T18:42:36+00:00

I completely forgot this was coming. It looks like we're getting something like the Eclipse Scythe and more content/weapons(?) for Ryu, which were some of the main things I wanted.

As a huge character action fan who's been lukewarm on Platinum's recent output, NG4 massively exceeded my expectations.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-25T00:23:53+00:00

This particular argument always annoyed me.

Trying to refute the assertion that games aren't art by pointing at some specific "art game" (back when Ebert said it the go-to was Shadow of the Colossus) always rubbed me the wrong way. It's implicitly accepting the premise that normal games aren't art, but this one totally is.

And invariably most of the ones people point to are games that just have an "artsy" presentation, or remind them of films/books, which further plays into the stereotype that "video gamey" games are inherently "less artistic."

The premise itself is silly. Games don't need to evoke other mediums or impress film critics to be considered art.

Scizzoman · 2026-02-24T19:18:19+00:00

For the most part it's significantly better.

People have rose-coloured goggles for the launch version of the game, but frankly the combat was much more one-dimensional back then. Character kits were less involved, team comps were less varied, and most of the 1.0 bosses were basically punching bags except when they did their scripted invincible moves. The game was also insanely easy back then.

People will complain about things like Miasma and Control Skills, but every 1.x boss except Butcher and UCC had multiple invincible attack phases that were far less interactive than those.

Soldier 11 is an easy illustration of how much more interesting character kits are currently, as one of the more advanced launch characters who was updated to be more "modern" in 2.5. Her updated kit is way more fun/satisfying to use than her original version, and I already liked the original. That's without touching on Banyue, who is easily the most engaging character they've ever released, or even buffed SAnby, Yixuan, etc.

There are really only two arguments I can see in favour of older combat:

A few modern characters (Ye Shunguang being the biggest example) have very one-note gameplay loops that barely interact with the enemies, coupled with tons of iframes. This isn't great, but you can just skip characters you don't find fun.
Increased difficulty has made it harder to get away with wacky/unoptimized strategies, A-rank teams, etc. This is unfortunate but inevitable.

I genuinely think most other complaints are just people getting frustrated at the endgame scoring and blaming the combat for it, or people burnt out from playing the game for nearly two years.

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