Oooh.. damn. On the run. They wouldn't let me get on the net with my new cellular modem on the plane over here... but tonight is my first column during my BRAD WORLD TOUR.. that's right.. RPGamer columns from all over the world! Today's column is from Egypt, land of a lot of dirt. They call it sand, but it's just dirt that's all the same color, where there isn't enough water for it to be mud. Anyway, a pic at the bottom of the column of me in the desert. Lookin' cool, as always.

Okay, not as always. Shut up. I'll bang ya up real good-like, cravate-man! .. speaking of cravates, I've got a couple Suikoden wavs for ya'll. The beautiful voices of my readers have called forth and pretty much all agree. But you can listen to them all. Vote on the best voice, winner gets a cookie. Voice one: Sidhe sends us an evil laugh, some french which roughly translates to "You like to kiss neckties" and a pretty much universally agreed upon pronunciation. This one is not a neat sounding woman, (sorry), but instead, Psycho Mantis from Metal Gear Solid. Almighty Cheese & Bishounen Goddess Shosetsu thinks she sounds like a guy, but, honestly, I don't think so. And well, I'm the host. You know it. I know-- </brak> ahem.

Other than that, I'll be travelling around the world.. scoping out the RPG market in other countries, and practicing my bad spanish on people who don't even know it's bad! Here's to great American self-righteousness!

I'm at the end of Xenogears; all I have left to do is defeat Deus. I've heard that anti-angel armor can protect my gears much better than extra armor DXs. Well, I've searched the entire Xenoworld (or so I think) and can't find it. Do I need to buy it or find it? Where?? If I need to buy it, is there any better way to earn money than by collecting fangs and scales at anima relic 2? (I'm getting kind of sick fighting those croaker tribes). Please help! And how do you get Fei's final deathblow? Do you have to be on lvl 99? I'm on 73 or so right now. It says 100% after the last deathblow, but I can't use it in battle. What's going on?

Jess

Brad:
Well, I actually looked this one up, and so far as my sources say, there is no way to get Angel Armor stuff from shops. So you've gotta earn it from enemies. The cheapy stuff is actually dropped quite frequently by different angels inside the final dungeon, but the good stuff is the "Anti-Angel Sys" .. which basically completely nulls those nasty things' angel attacks. As I can personally remember, I got the strongest Angel Armor (which may only have been the absorb 50% of Angel attacks one) from fighting the centaur-like angels. Also, as I recall, the Armor is cumulative, so if you get two of the 50%'ers, well, that's 100% defense.. you just might have to give up your Z-Charger. :)

-Dustin

Brad:
The ending where Marle and Lucca rate 'the boys' is in fact a true ending, which I have seen, though I'd be in a world of hurt to tell you exactly when you need to waste Lavos in order to get to that ending.. I'll ask the Spencefather, he knows all that pertains to Chrono Trigger. Not only that, but he's spending too much time coding Webcam32, and needs to get himself some funkey with the monkey now and then. If you know what I mean. ;) ;) Heh, as for the port over to the U.S., I might not get it, even if they do send it over. Why? Because I've got the SNES cart. So nyah :P :P .. as for FF7 vs CT.. well, in my opinion, FF7 just gets the polygonal smack kicked out of it by Chrono Trigger. I loved the combo attacks in CT, and just the story was more fun. CT has enough replay value for 5 games, and not only that.. the music just kicks. FF7 was easier, yes.

What did you think of Final Fantasy Tactics? Personally, I thought it was the coolest game I've ever played, except when Orlandu comes into the game and takes away the difficulty factor. Is there any word on Tactics 2, and is there a decent sound track for Tactics I could find? Thanks in advance bro,

Dan

Brad:
Yeah, it got way too easy when you took Orlandu into your party. I suggest to everyone to never use him if you'd like any sort of real challenge in that game. Also, I like Tactics Ogre better. More people, more strategy, and frankly, I like how much replay TO has over FFT. The choices are cool, there are so many paths you can take. If you're a graphics nut.. well, go play your FFT. If you're a strategy nut, go play a real game like Tactics Ogre.. where you have to work over 70% of the game before you get a life spell.. and you have to have a special class, (one that's hard to get, to boot!) to use it.

That and liches just frickin' kick BUTT. 'nuff said. Homey.
Heh, ba-dum, ba-dum.. Shaker's a Lich!

Hey Brad!

(Sigh, you made me copy and paste this cause I tried to help Veronica get back at you.)

I'm wondering.. In FF8, what exactly does devour do? I read somewhere that it adds to your stats, but I haven't seen it add to anything. It's still funny for it's "animation", though. And, um.. Did you know that you can get Vandal Hearts for 10 dollars at Funcoland? Good price for a neat game.

Everybody wants a rock to wind a piece of string around!

Traxus

Brad:
Everyone DOES want a rock to wind a piece of string around..! Devour basically does just that. You eat enemies. Certain enemies will give you certain things, such as poisoning, or HP, or in some rare cases, (that is, for certain enemies), devour will cause you to gain strength, or max HP, or other goodies. I did already post a list for Devour, so go check the archives for more info. As for Vandal Hearts, I bought it at full price.. back when it first came out. And I'll buy Vandal Hearts 2 the same, I love those games. Lots of guys on the field means more complex strategy. And I'm a strat nut.

This may be wrong, but it says several places (Maybe just one in the instruction booklet, but I've heard elsewhere as well) that in order to use the Suikoden I save game data you need to use a file that is saved after Gregminster, before the final boss. Doing this gives returning characters bonus runes, etc. For example... wait, I don't have Suikoden I. Nevermind.

Sincerely, Evan Pollino

Brad:
I have read this too, actually, and so I believe it is true. Haven't had a chance to test it, unfortuneately. Not enough RPG time .. with all this travelling, you know.

I found out how to identify the songs on the Lunar music CD. If you have WinAmp, great, If not, download it from http://www.winamp.com

Make sure your online while doing this. Open the WinAmp program and click on the playlist button. Then, click on File+ >> Dir +. Click on your CDROM drive with the CD in it. A window will pop up calling the CDDB Service. It will then give you the names of the tracks on the CD.

Cool, huh?

Lycentia ~_^

Brad:
That's cool. I didn't realize they have VG soundtracks in their database. Rock on, Winamp!

-Zack S.

Brad:
I haven't actually written one down.. but I've been interested in programming games and making them, even though my career is pretty much obviously headed in a different direction.. mmmm perl... C++ just does not stand up... .. as for crack-heads writing their plots, well .. maybe they're just getting issues from their childhood out. At least we haven't had any severely sexually deviant main characters... yet.

I really like sunflower seeds!

Dear Oracle,

There is a cancer in the RPGamer staff. JD in the ending of Perspectives said that Gameday 2000 is the game of the year! How can a nonRPG be game of the year! I suggest immediate disembowlment to right this wrong!
-Adoy

OK, CT's being remade for the PSX, so, what's going to happen with all of those little puzzles that depend on the SNES button names? Are they going to change Lucca's mother's name to L1or1o? Actually, since there seems to be a law that flips those 2 buttons, it would be L1xr1x. Oh my, what a lovely name THAT is! That's not even the worst of it. Remeber Zabie? that'd become what? Trxosq?
-Googleshng

Don't you already figure them out in your head when you play it on psx? I mean... c'mon! You are supposed to be some programmer anyway, can't you just do 6+7?
Punko

Dear Brady-poo:

Can you kindly tell me what the first RPG was? I am rather curious, and uhm, now I need to know.
--Selah

I'm very confused. Please help me.
-Confused and Helpless Yud

Is it just me or do all RPGamers love MST3k (Mystery Science Theater 3000), "Weird Al" Yankovic, and having money (one the last one I'm sure everyone loves). Or was it just me, that all the RPGamers I know love those 3 things.

WOULDST THOU BE NAE'BLIS?
~Great Lord of the NaOH

Words from the Wise One: