Been play a lot of MGS3:S, both offline and online. Roughly 3/4ths of the way through Snake Eater, and played enough of the online to unlock the Rumble Roses characters - the 50 hours listed on GameFaqs is a lie. :P

I'd say only the extremes of low playtime count for being good - beating a game in 40 hours that everyone else managed in 50 isn't anything to write home about. Beating said game in 15 or 20 hours is though. Like noted though, there's NPC dialogue and the like - level's still the best indicator, because someone who's vastly underleveled may choose to talk to NPCs/go away from the game so often that the time could even exceed that of someone who fought more battles and beat the game in the same amount of time, but at higher levels.

Faq use also depends - More often then not, yeah, it's a crutch. But some things have no hints whatsoever, so if you manage to get past said point without a faq it may just show that you're really lucky and/or clever. There's also whether you used it to get past a puzzle or a battle. Though to master a game, you likely need to play it and replay it anyway.

This is late, but I honestly do find that Nintendo is, more often than not, very good at localizing games, and it would be interesting to see their crew take on the games of others, such as Okage. Earthbound, as I can recall it, had a fantastic localization, the Mario RPGs all had great localizations, and the FE games seemed competent enough from what I played...

... Nevertheless, they either didn't put their best effort into ToP, or they're just better suited for goofier games like the previously mentioned (exempting FE). Seriously, how the fuck?

I have to agree with invinciblegod's notion - beating monsters and bosses at a lower level than normal would be a good measure of how good someone is at an RPG. Being fast just means you either know exactly what to do, or speedread/rush things - not something that serves as a good measure of skill if you ask me. And beating a game is an accomplishment, certainly, but that just shows that you're competent with RPGs.

I have to agree with Tony's notion too. While there might be some people who are all around very good with RPGs, you can easily kick major ass at one, then be annihilated in another.

For those who're bummed by the tiny manual, espicially after what was given with the original game, Konami put a full thing on their site.

That's won big points from me, good way to deal with SCEA's regulations without blowing the money to make this cost more than 30 bucks. :P

If done well, certainly. Even if it's just alright, I'd probably check it out.

Actually, as I seem to recall it Cloud was in his twenties - 21 if I'm remembering right. He was only an adolocent during his days in the military. In fact, I'm pretty sure that's the last FF to have had an adult main character. You're right though, the way they're used is more important than their actual age, but it's just very, very unusual to me when DQ1 started the japanese RPG back in... 1987 I believe. It's been nearly 20 years since then, and we're still with teenage heroes. Do most of the players from way back then prefer to be 'young at heart', or are the developers just that resistant to changing their stories? :P

Though I'll admit, it seems the older teenager character is better for the 'going on an adventure' tale than someone who's older. But I don't see why a hero in their early 20's wouldn't be just as good.

I'm kinda baffled by the whole 'stick with young teenagers' for RPGs thing. They've been around for a long long time and people in Japan seem to love them, why aren't there more older casts aiming towards the older players? Is it because that even if they like them, they don't have the time to play them so they're not a viable market? Or that it's easier to sell a young character than an old character for whatever reason? I wouldn't be wondering this if it weren't for the fact 99% of RPGs do this kinda crap.

Meh. :P

I don't really want to get in on this they are/aren't emo thing, but I'd like to post something Jimmy said:

[19:20:30] <Jimmy> hello out there
[19:21:08] <Jimmy> i'm way late on the whole CoheedIV fun, but i found an interesting bit on iTunes
[19:21:22] <Jimmy> Coheed and Cambria is featured on the "Emo Essentials" collection
[19:22:01] <Jimmy> damn i wish i would have found this before the kid was banned

... Yeah.

Game came out today, and I got my copy. Not LE, due to funds and the fact the store only got /one/ in. No matter, just making a save was enough to completely open up the demo theater anyway.

Didn't make much progress, and mostly just dabbled in the things there are to do. I think I'll play more of the single player and get used to playing it again before I seriously play online.

I found that both SH and SH:C's casts of party members were lacking in how relevant they were on a whole to their respective game. While they could be entertaining, outside of the two core characters they usually just felt like they were there for the sake of giving you more characters to use.

To Vagrant: I'd just like to note that the N64 also had a fairly long delay to get more units out and extra time for developing games, and it only wound up with two games at launch. Two awesome games, mind, but didn't seem to help the third parties much.

An 8 month delay would be beneficial for games that're announced, shown off, and slated for release at launch, but as it is I'm pretty sure the PS3 will have a shitty launch line up like most every other system to date. Again, I'm going to be expecting all the really awesome games, like MGS4, to come out the year /after/ it launched.

Yup, Ratchet: Deadlocked is short - beat it last night at 7 hours. :P

Dyne's got the track of thought I had. They are not the best solution, but for someone with a PSP but not a laptop/DVD player, they were the best option... Except, of course, for the example he listed, which is more affordable and senseable since you own the DVDs and all that already. :P

Single UMD movie is still better for a single one or two hour trip, but that works best for a much longer trip, plus doubles as a gargantuan memory card.

Amusing you take this long to bring it up when I linked to it forever ago in your LJ. :P

Anyways, this stuff is always great. Really amazing how much Garfield is improved by taking out his speech.