All right! (SO3 talk, and Spoilers)

[Zeromus_X]

If ya didn't know, Zeromus is doing a challenge for SO3. It's going to be really fun (and challenging, of course.)

It's from Gamefaqs, where the seconds of your post determine what the challenge will be like, in this case, my challenge will be...

Must use Nel, Roger, and Sophia, as soon as you get them. But you can use other characters until you get those ones.

Play on Universe Mode (I don't have 4D unlocked yet...)

No Item Creation during Main Game, only Post Game. (No problem, don't even do that normally.)

Cannot purchase items. Only allowed items from events, treasure chests, and Gemity prizes. (The truly difficult part of the challenge, especially since Fate will have the 'Simple Sword' for most of the game. Good thing I'm not using him very long.)

Must get the Sophia ending. Therefore, fight Sophia/Fate as the boss of the Urssa Cave Temple. (I've heard it's even harder than Fate/Luther, but that's the only one I've gotten besides Adray.xD)

Must be at level 60 or below at Lucifer. (Or Luther...or whatever you want to call him.)

Level 90-150 for Maze of Tribulations/Urssa Cave Temple. Must do MoT before Urssa.

Level 200 for Lenneth and Ethereal Queen, and Level 255 (max) for Freya. (Uber-fun!!!)

So far, I've done:

Battle Simulator: I just lost. I could've gotten the Regeneration Symbol, but even the simulator gets tough at the third fight.

Incapacitator Robots: Just ran, and juggled them. Sophia died. Haha. xD

Vanguard: Trained to Level 3 on the first two screens. Got Blade of Fury and Aerial. (Yay!)

Norton's Henchman: Ran, tricked them into doing major attacks, and BoF/Aerialed them.

Trained to Level 6 on Vanguard. Blazing Sword. Oh yeah.

Norton: Let Cliff die. He was a good meat shield. AAA/Juggled him.

Inquisitor and Co.: Ran by, smack, run by, smack, repeat. Took a long time.

Giant Crab: Blazing Sword= MP Kill= Fried Crab for dinner.

Earth Monster: Nel's Aerial kicks utter behind against large enemies. Wait for it to do a major, go behind it, and boom, Aerial for 4~5 x ~150 damage.

Kirlsa Training Facility: Very hard. Took along time. (No Nel. ) Aerial smacked 'em, and lured the others into attacking so they would be stuck there while one chases me, then smack him, then repeat. (Takes a very long time.)

Shelby: I'm going to do this today, but I haven't played today, so I may not have time. But Nel now has Shadow Wave, and is officially kicking ass.

*sigh* Nel is so awesome.

And you know what? Albel should have his own extermination service. "It doesn't matter how many maggots you have, I'll crush them all!" xD

I will keep updating...such a fun challenge. (Loves SO3 too much.)

[~Hidan~]

your joking right?

[Zeromus_X]

Joking about what?

I had some time to play today, and I got a bit farther.

Shelby: Shadow Wave.

Went to Duggus Forest and got Roger. Got him to level 10 so he can get Whirling Heat...at least he'll be able to lock up some things.

Mudman: Shadow Wave. xD

Went to Aquatic Gardens of Suferio to get the Annointed Chain Mail and Holy Sword. Now Fate can do over ~150 damage. Huzzah!

What is a huzzah anyway? I've never figured that out.

Tried out the Bequerel Mine...ew. Paralysis sucks. And no Amulets of Freedom either. I'll have to get Fate up to level 16 so he can use Side Kick. (Which...makes him darn near invincible.) Well, at least he'll be able to fight Biwig when it gets up to that point.

I just can't wait for Moonbase. Moonbase...and it's wonderful equipment! (In treasure chests!)

[Zeromus_X]

Actually, I just now remembered I have to talk to Dion before going into the mine. -L-; Now I have to backtrack all the way to Aquios.

Actually, Cliff said something funny that makes sense considering all the backtracking in this game. xD:

"Is this where we have to go? We've done so much backtracking I don't remember any more." Or something like that. xD

The game should be somewhat tolerable after I get through this mine...><;

[Zeromus_X]

Cockatrice: Shadow Wave for MP Kill.

Demetrio and Legion Dragons: Ice Dagger'd the Dragons for a shatter-kill, and Ice Daggered Demetrio until he died.

Albel and Black Brigade Soldiers: Shadow Waved the Soldiers, and the Combo King. (It took a long time.)

Duke Vox: Ice Daggers.

Flying Knight: Ice Daggered it from long range.

Powered up Whirlwind. Probably gonna max it our sometime. Leveling up with the Bronze Brute wouldn't be a bad idea either. (Characters only in 20s...><; )

Crystal Statues, Crystal Cerberus: The Statues were easy, if only because of the damage of Ice Daggers. The Cerberus, however, took a few tries. I just Juggled/tricked to doing minor/AAA/repeated it.

Vendeeni Soldiers: Ack! I just can't beat them. But I didn't play much today either, so no wonder. xD I thought of Whirlwind, but it's only at level 3 right now. Maybe Ice Daggers from afar?

[Zeromus_X]

After some much needed leveling with the Bronze Brute (and some nice Fire Crystals and Regeneration Symbols...sweet!), we took 'em down. (Weak Whirlwind-> Strong Whirlwind-> Gather them all up in Whirlwind. xD)

Gonna be busy today. No time for playing in awhile. Ah well.

[Dark FFnut]

How am I only just seeing this?

I despise the Vendeeni Soldier battle. And you have to use ROGER in this challenge? Ah well, better than Peppita at least.

Also, another interesting thing to note - sometime early in the game (at least before Maria shows up) it spoils Maria's "big news" in the dictionary. Getting the Diplo thing mentions Maria, which allows you to read her first profile thing - and know Fayt was experimented on.

If you're planning on going nuts with item crafting, (and I'm sure you know this too), craft a ton of Boots of Prowess and Improve them up to +30%ATK/DEF, then Synth eight of them onto a weapon - more effective than using Ultimate Weapons, plus the defense boosts make you practically invincible. Freya (I've heard) goes down without a hitch with this setup. (Unless you're playing in 4D mode.)

I've never done any of the optional dungeons simply because I have no motive to do so - the ending of this game would have been better if they didn't randomly say "And everyone died OH WAIT NO THEY DIDN'T!!!!!11!!!shift+one" and just made so that even when you stop Luther the deletion is still carried out AND EVERYONE GETS DELETED INSTEAD OF SUDDENLY COMING BACK TO LIFE EVEN THOUGH THEY WERE DELETED. If I delete a file, it doesn't come back because it's capable of thought and its thought means that it still lives. It gets, y'know, DELETED.

...Sorry, had to vent that.

[Zeromus_X]

I know, I figured that out. xD It's funny, that Dictionary.

You don't like the ending? Ah well. I liked the whole story. A fitting end to a great series.

Roger is great, but he has to be leveled up a bit....it's more of a bad thing that he has no weapon for 75% of the game, for this. And Peppita rocks! She just has horrible defence...she's kinda like the Chisato of SO3.

Yeah, BoP are awesome. I used those to make an 'Uber-Fate' for the superbosses on Galaxy. (I beat them 'legitimately' the first time, don't worry. ) Albel's Aura Wall to the rescue!

Heh, well, back to the challenge, I suppose.

Crossell: Heh, easy. Charge-> Aerial. Nel is awesome. *Whirlwind at level 4*

Proclaimer: After two resets, I just gave up on trying to get Sophia to stay alive. I'll just wait until I raid the Eternal Sphere for my much needed Bunny Shoes, and the Battle Arena to get more Bunny Shoes and Star Guards and the 'Get Em! Twin Beast.' team for leveling Sophia.

Edit: Here FFNut, think of it this way: The Eternal Sphere backup program worked. Well, that certainly explains everything. It's best not to think too much of these kinds of things. And of course, the 'I think, therefore I am' philosophy, which also explains it. Still, it's doubtful that they'll make another SO game...

Edit again: BoP will work great on Galaxy. Just need a Blazing Pendant and you can get the no damage trophies for Lenneth and Freya. On Universe, you need the Protection Spell to become uber-rized, and on 4D it won't work at all.

Edit: It certainly isn't my video, but check out the awesome power of Whirlwind: http://youtube.com/watch?v=94g1hh86pL0

[Dark FFnut]

The story itself was great. I just don't like it being a "happy" ending for the characters - makes no sense in my eyes. I think it technically was a happy ending if they were deleted - their universe was deleted, but no other universe will fall under Luther's tyranny. And if Luther wanted to delete the Eternal Sphere, he would've taken out the backup first. After all, isn't it Luther who yells "Data should behave as such!"?

Aerial is insane. It's probably my favorite move in the game, aside from Palm of Destruction (fully Orichalcumized Albel with Palm of Destruction did a nice 6000 per hit against the last Luther battle, since I wasn't going for any sort of character maximizing, so I just wanted to beat the game...).

And have you ever seen the Sophia ending? It sucks. It basically has Fayt and Sophia riding a train and then meeting their parents. No romance, no backstory, no plot relevance whatsoever. I heard the Solo ending is more fulfilling.

Okay... and this may be a little late, but myself and Z_X would like this disclaimer to apply to all posts in this topic:

Spoiler Warning: Spoilers for Star Ocean: Till The End Of Time. You've been warned.

[richboywonder]

that is cool.

[Zeromus_X]

Yeah, I've watched all the endings on YouTube. At least they go to Roak, the planet of the first Star Ocean. (Fellpool!!!=3) The main reason I get that ending is for fighting her with Fate in one of the bonus dungeons...but yeah, it's only like a minute long. I've only gotten the alone ending, the Adray ending, and the 'Roger in the cage' ending. (I didn't know how to recruit Roger.) "Ya big lummox!" xD

I loved Palm of Destruction! That, and Hand of Doom were some of my favorite Albel moves, along with Vampiric Flash. (Great for freezing, made leveling to 200s a breeze.) Aura Wall is unmatched for juggling. (I couldn't've beaten Lenneth and Freya the first time without it!) PoD= Great Solid Damage. Hand of Doom= Great HP/MP Damage. Vampiric Flash= Great Area damage. Aura Wall= Awesome.

I hated Dragon Roar though. I've never gotten it to actually go off, I always get hit out of it.xD

Yeah....*edits thread title* xD

Heh, I guess it's all-around SO3 talk now.

Security Service: Whirlwind and Fire Crystals.

*Grabs the Bunny Shoes*

[Zeromus_X]

Security Service (2) and Azazel: Whirlwinded the Security Service (took a few resets), and Whirlwinded Azazel. (I guess in 2003 we can't have religious allusions in our games, still. )

Belial and Beelzebub: Whirlwind. Belial (rocket launcher) is horribly weak to wind, so he was no problem. Beelzebub is just plain...weak. (Purple lip gloss.) I may just reset so Sophia can actually level up and not die.

In addition, warped back to Planet Styx (or Planet Stream, in SO1) and got Laser Weapons from the Robo Gunners. ~850 ATK is a lot better than ~250 ATK, wouldn't you say? (Roger can hit things! Yay!) Got one for Sophia too...for no real reason.

[Zeromus_X]

Executioner Sequence: Whirlwind. Sophia gained some levels from the Convictor fight.

Dark Armors: Whirlwind.

Lesser Eye: Normal Attack->Charge->Aerial. Thanks Marty! Sophia also cast Power Up and Acid Rain. It was awesome doing about 50,000 damage combined.

Crystal Statue (2): Oh dear. This took many resets. I figured out two strategies. 1- Have Roger solo it. (Takes too long.) 2- Nel uses Shadow Wave to MP Kill it. I did the latter.

Dark Eye: Same as Lesser Eye. (And it's true, you CAN jump over the lasers. 0_o; )

Stone Golem: Spread out characters. The thing is so unbearable slow that it takes it a million years to get to Nel. Power Up/Acid Rain and Flying Guillotine chains. Nel died, but Sophia just revived her.

Battlecopter: I'm still stuck on this one. It's either Ice Dagger chains (it's horribly weak to water) or Whirlwind. I'll probably do Whirlwind, though it's gonna really suck having to walk out of the Firewall. ><; (Sophia and Roger will inevitably die. I hope Nel doesn't go over the level limit.)

[Zeromus_X]

Beat the Battlecopter. Strong Whirlwind while afar, dodged machine gun fire, and then went behind it for juggling. NMG'd so it wouldn't catch up to me while I used Whirlwind.

Hiked back to Suferio for the Inn. Will infiltrate Spiral Tower now. Almost there.

[Zeromus_X]

Psuedo Blair. Put Sophia at the other end of the arena. Had Roger and Nel lure her to the other side of the field. Roger attacked her, while Nel did Flying Guillotine spammage. Roger died, letting Nel and Sophia level up greatly. (Mirror Slice, anyone?)

Yay, recurring attack names.

Death Monsters: Few resets, just so I don't waste the precious few ressurection items I have. Whirlwind.

Ruktogias: Same.

Chimera Hawks: Jesus. Elemental absorption. Nel and Sophia are nurfed. Everyone gets shatter-killed before I get to move. Utterly ridiculous. I guess it's my payment for the other battles not being as tough as they should've been. I'll probably get Sophia Laser Beams so she has some way of stunlocking them. Until then, I'll just do something else. (Sleep, perhaps?)