I'm a Serial Starter

Since I was having a hard time getting people to play with me on Xbox Live I decided to take a break and go old school. Like Playstation old. I fired up Final Fantasy VII and played for a bit. After all, that is one of the games that started this whole blog thing about 3 or 4 years ago or however long it's been.

While I'm still not up to playing any new part of the game, I am further along with my characters. With this play through I'm taking my time to level up my limit breaks and all the Materia I've collected. I've been grinding away on the world map and getting into any battle I could when I enter an area. Right now I've got Aries's Limit Break up one level higher than where I was before my stuff got stolen and I've still got a lot of game left to play before I start seeing anything new. My only problem is keeping a consistent rotation with my third party member. And now that I've just picked up Vincent I've got another one thrown into the mix.

After playing Final Fantasy VII for several hours I decided I needed a break from that game. I wasn't in the mood to go back to Xbox so I flipped through all my games to find something new to play. Since my games are alphabetical and I started at the top I didn't get far before I decided to put in Chrono Cross.

This is a game that I've started several times even before my stuff got stolen. I'd start and play for 10 hours or so and then put it away for awhile to play something else (or several something elses). When I pull the game out again I couldn't ever remember where I was in the story. And worse . . . what world I was in (if you've played the game, you know). When I would flip through the strategy guide to see if I could jog my memory about what I needed to do I would find that I missed recruiting several characters along the way because I forgot to do one simple thing. Since I was past that point it usually meant that I wouldn't get to add those characters to my party. After a little bit of soul searching about the time I had already spent playing the game (okay, maybe not that much soul searching) I would restart the game and make it a point to collect those characters. After a couple of days (and another 10-12 hours of the first part of the game) I would put it away for something else. And thus the cycle would begin again.

As it did Sunday night.

I put the game in and instead of rushing through the first part that I've played a million times (at least it feels like a million times) I decided to take my time. If I can get further along in Final Fantasy VII while still being behind, perhaps it could work for Chrono Cross as well. And it has.

That big bird boss in the valley where you pick up the talking skull (weird game by the way) use to give me fits every time I played the game. This time it was a piece of cake. There are other areas that use to be hard but now they're kind of boring because they're so easy. I've probably played the game for 10+ hours but in reality I've probably only progressed 2 hours in the story. It sure makes things easier, but it does get kind of boring grinding most of the time. That's why I put in another game.

That game was Final Fantasy Tactics. It wasn't another start, but it's another game that I've started many times. I guess you could say I'm a serial starter. If I ever get to finish one of these games I think it will be a miracle. Now, if you'll excuse me I've got a game to start.