Rebecca Rudeen - 14:48 EST

Is there anyone here who's unimpressed that FFIV is coming out for GBA? As someone who's still trying to struggle her way through FFIV on the PSX, I am. (Did everyone get that or is my use of abbreviations getting annoying?)

Now this important announcement: Apparently, Z-Force's threat of pouring Nair in your shampoo bottles didn't take root (ha, ha) because I didn't get too much to work with today.  So here's my version of the announcement: Send us letters or I will spend my columns bemoaning the Japanese voice actors in FF7:AC without having seen FF7:AC.

Onto your letters.

Howdy partner.

After just reading a local magazine which had there own thoughts on the worse mascot ever, my questions are;

Who is your favourite mascot, and who is your most hated mascot and who had the best and worse sayings?

(Sorry about the welcome but i've just spent 3 hours watching "shudder" bad westerns.

Bainick

Hopefully you were just bored and didn't have to watch bad westerns for Film Appreciation class or somesuch.  (I've had to watch a few doozies in both high school and college.)

Mokona of Magic Knight Rayearth has to be one of my favorite mascots.  He's small, white and portable and is able to create useful things out of thin air--like flying boats and egg-shaped hotels and first-aid kits.  (If you read the original manga that Magic Knight Rayearth is based on, Mokona created a lot more.  A whole lot more.)  He's also got a one-word vocabulary, unlike some other traveling critters. (Puu!)  The only downside is that he tends to disappear in battle.

As for worst mascot, I'd have to say Nall from Lunar.  I survived five minutes of Lunar: SSS and found myself wanting to get to a dentist FAST--his voice was so sweet it oozed honey and butterflies.  He wasn't that much better in Lunar Legend, but the party-reviving feature was a sure plus.

Howdy Current Q&A Contestant,

At Steven Z's suggestion, I've thought up of something I think might be innovative to RPGs: negative HP and MP. Or has another RPG already done that?

Jeremy, the Duke of Otterland

So, you're thinking about a pretense of health/magic kind of thing, huh?  That's something I haven't seen myself.  It'd be interesting, though to see a character who kept on running (on adrenalin?) when everyone else thought he was down for the count.  Or perhaps have an item that temporarily kept you going even when you hit 0 HP or 0 MP when you're far away from the nearest inn/revival spot and you're the only one left in the party.  The only thing that I think really comes close is Earthbound with its rolling HP/PP counter where mere seconds could mean the difference between life and death.

Bucket dahling,

What? MO-OOOOOM!!!!...oh wait, never mind...

Being reluctant to spend huge sums of money myself, I know where you're coming from.  At this point, I'd say that the only thing it'd be really idiotic to get is the Game Boy Micro (which comes out in the next few days, I believe) because I think the GBA SP is much more superior even though it's got crappy choices in color. If you want to, go ahead and buy that system, because chances are you can trade in said system plus a couple of games you're really tired of for a Brand Spanking New Next Gen Console.  They'll still be developing games for the Gamecube/GBA/XBox/PS2 for another couple of years, and there's also a good deal of backwards compatibility mixed in with the next-gen systems so you'll still most likely be able to play FF12 (or FF7, even) on a PS3 without any trouble.

Good luck in the job department.  Hopefully you didn't major in journalism like I did.

Hey Bucket (at least I hope this was sent soon enough for Bucket),

Z-Force was giving out topic ideas, so I'll run with a couple of those.  Anyway, I liked the frist two Xenosagas, much more than 'gears.  I honestly hope they finish the current story arc in Episode 3 though, they need to move on, and I need to stop hearing people whine because they're not Xenogears.  What do you think?

I have never played any of the games in question so I'm not sure what to think.  From what I've heard, once Square backed out of the project, everything fell apart, which is why you've got all this "based on" stuff.

Graphically, it looks all nice and shiny.  I'm concerned about the whole tone this game is getting, because from one of the screenshots I've seen it makes me feel that there's some sort of party game-esque thing going on.  However, it might be a long time before we hear anything else of it other than the names and the faces of the player characters because of all the stuff Squeenix is doing nowadays in regards to FF7.

If you think Mokona Modoki from Tsubasa Chronicle is scary...you haven't seen the original Mokona.

Hello Contestant,

Question for you - which of the next-gen consoles is going to find its way next to your TV, and why?  Also, why were the others not worthy?

Dear Anonymous Person Type Thing,

Playstation 3 because of the whole backwards compatibility with the previous two systems, my massive backlog, and the hope that I'll have the money for it by then.

The only thing that Xbox has that I remotely like is Dance Dance Revolution Ultramix, and the rest doesn't appeal to me--it seems like it's the first-person shooter console.  I do want to hear more about the Revolution's downloading capabilities before I make a decision, because it would be interesting to be able to play Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros. 64 alternately while making "Man, I remember when..." quips.

Now I bought my PSP with the knowledge of how buddy buddy most rpg makers are with Sony. I figured sqeenix or NIS would have a UMD ready to be spun in my PSP real fast. Now we all realize that isnt the case, is ther any light at the end of the tunnel. When is the first RPG coming out? How many should we have by christmas? Whats the best looking one down the tunnel? Help a desperate sony fanboy have faith again.

Dear Anonymous Person Type Thing Who Isn't The Same Person Who Wrote The Above Letter,

The RPGamer Radar shows that Kingdom of Paradise, the English translation of Tenchi no Mon, has a release date in November to get your pencils moving on making your list to Santa.  Ys: The Ark of Napishtim also has yet to be released if you're hankering for some action, and if you've got a taste for cute there's Popolocrois which just recently came out.  The PSP is still a fairly new system, and it's a multipurpose one at that, so I'm sure that UMD movies and anime are going to far outweigh UMD games for at least a little while yet.

If you're old enough to remember the Game Boy first coming out, it was a top seller despite only four games being out at launch time.  So you can wait.

So what is the general consensus of Square Enix's delay of Advent Children? They had to of known what would happen if they delayed the movie, right?

~Sean

I'd rather see a company do it right rather than do it fast.  They're delaying it for some reason, hopefully not just to cast the English voice actors (crossing my fingers for the Last Order OAV to be included!) The sad truth is, piracy is often inevitable, especially since much of the fanbase does not want to pay a whole lot of money for a 1 1/2 hour anime movie even if it is all nice and shiny.  Then again, there's also the whole trust issue, because there has hardly been any talk from Sony that there will BE a Japanese language track with subtitles. Either way, I do intend to see it through honest means.

And then what happened?

While Fenway Park is a great place for a ballgame, it's a TERRIBLE place to hold a job fair.  Oh, my complexion...Anyhoo, the only way to remedy a column filled with short and non substantial letters is to write longer and more substantial ones.  So please do.  Remember what I warned you about, and how that may not necessarily be a good thing.

Watch for a Really Big and Wonderful Surprise* tomorrow.  Because I said so.

Rebecca Rudeen likes surprises as long as she knows about them in advance

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*Surprise may or may not be Really Big and Wonderful.