Final Fantasy 2 (IV): Retrospective

I'm playing the latest remake of FFIV.
Having not touched the game since I was a little dude, it's fun to see how my perspective has changed over the years.

 - It's really, really fast. All of the dialog feels like the abbreviated version of a modern game. As an adult, this is refreshing. As a kid, this just made sense for my kid brain.

 - ATB. Active Time Battle. As an adult, the combat still feels well-designed and the bosses challenging (granted, this is a remake). As a kid, ATB held my attention better than turn-based because it demanded my constant input. The game's battles were more immediate and the bosses were memorable. That demon wall thing still freaks me out.

 - Cecil, the badass Dark Knight, captain of a fleet of airships (wouldn't that make him an admiral?), is your main character. As an adult, this is a lot more appealing than modern Final Fantasy games. It's like having Auron or Balthier for a protagonist instead of Tidus or Vaan. I don't know why Square assumes that their younger players want a younger character to identify with, because as a kid I thought Cecil was fucking awesome while Palom and Porom were dumb as hell.

Magicians and Looters: Morg Minion

Morg minions are equipped with standard issue longswords and literally nothing else. Not even a toothbrush, which they could really use.

Novel: North of Armageddon

My bro wrote a novel. It got published. It's excellent.
There's a huge number of creative narrative devices in this book that give it a lot of personality and help get you invested in the characters (before everything goes to shit and they're all brutally murdered.) I'm hoping he cultures this specific writing style and tries it out in future projects, because it works really well.


Clint explains North of Armageddon better than I do on his own Tumblr. It's the best post ever because it's 10% "Oh, hey. I published a book. Whatever," and 90% "Let me tell you about the lesser-known projects of Andrew Hussie."

Magicians and Looters: Warlock

Magicians and Looters: Morg Archer on a Sugar High

These new animations are going to make all the morg minions look hyperactive.

Magicians and Looters: Morgman

I love making these animations. Just moving stuff pixel by pixel is so damn easy--Oh crap! Look at the shading on his shoulderpad! I gotta fix that, now...

Magicians and Looters: Gnome