Ask Thor

Screw 'boarding: Extreme column!

	Now Playing
	Zelda 64 (Fire bad.)
	Want to be 'in the know'?
	Ask Thor (He's tall. And he loves you.)
	Archive
	See how many typoes you can count! The archives await.

The case of the missing instruction booklet

Do you think if I ask Square nicely, they will send me a copy of the Final Fantasy VII instruction booklet to replace the one I lost? I read somewhere that Nintendo sent out instruction booklets for NES games...

-- Phoenix Reborn

Most likely, no. (Nintendo did used to send out instruction booklets--they sent me a few photocopies for some Little Leage game by SNK--but that was a long time ago, back when Nintendo was king of the hill.) I suggest asking nicely in the Final Fantasy/PSX message board if anyone'd donate an instruction booklet.

Square is currently too busy setting up a rock concert with Metallica to offer any consumer service whatsoever. The concert, which will debut on Final Fantasy VIII's release date, is titled "Rock the Industry". Featured songs will be "The bad seed", "Call of Ktulu" and "Prelude". Hironobu Sakaguchi will sing backup, with his girlfriend playing the tambourine.

(And if you believed that, you're more whacked than I am.)

Maybe Hojo had something to do with it... <shudder>
(Little Zelda 64 spoiler)

Breeding with humans, I suppose... see Final Fantasy 7 and the Xanth series.

Very carefully.

...and I thought my job was tough. Well, either that, or they breed with humans, too. You know, I've just decided: I'm never looking for a date in Hyrule.

Ask Thor stuff

I've been wondering, how exactly do you choose which letters to print and reply to? Do you sort them out by the validity of the subject and the quality of the writing and wit? Or do you simply pick whatever suits you at the moment, whatever catches your fancy, whatever you want to respond to/praise/humiliate publicly? Or do you pick letters completely randomly (e.g. random integer program, picking numbers out of a hat, blindfold pick-and-choose, etc.)? Did you even notice how I ranked these methods from what gave me the least to the most possibility of actually getting a letter in?

First thing I do is read all the mail I receive, except doubles. Then I copy my favorites (more on that later) to a folder called Good Stuff and colorize 'em. Teal for Quickies, red for good questions, dark yellow if they're a group of letters concerning the same debate, etc. Then I shamelessly hit on any female unfortuneate enough to write to me.

As for just what makes a good letter... it really depends. I usually print 90% of the short questions which I haven't covered before--as you can see, I receive few. Then I pick a few highly opinionated letters, pick a few "freaky as Hades" letters, and, of course, pick the Unfit for Print victim example. That, my friend, is the only system I use. So, um, to make a long story short... whatever catches my fancy. Betcha wish I had just said that at the begining, eh? Heh heh.

"Is it just me, or is Cait Sith really hot?"

Welp, you're right. I wouldn't be too hard on Nintendo, though. Spontaneous hair-color change isn't myth, it's happened to me! I've started growing a goatee for a project (don't ask, you don't want to know) and by golly, it's red. Now, I've been blonde all my life, and even started dying my hair red with henna around a year ago, so this is really freaky. I'm not worried, though. I mean, hey, now I don't have to buy any more henna. Score.

And, um. No. It's not just you. I mean, you even included proof. It's kind of amusing proof though--and I'm not even being sarcastic this time. The proof literally amused me, so I went ahead and printed this. Look, guys. Two pictures of Link. Ha ha. Ha. Fun. Can I have some pudding yet?

-- BeerGoggles_FromMARS Daniel Kaszor

Luckily, I receive few letters as crappy as yours. This isn't the crappiest, though. Check Unfit for Print fer king crappy.

~Macho macho man~

-- Andrew

He's right. Andrew Vestal means "manly virgin". (Some could argue both meanings--it doesn't literally translate to manly virgin, but it's close enough.)

And ya know what? If there's ever been a more manly virgin than this, I've yet to see one. <blink>

Questions, spoilers and rants. Oh my.
(Various Spoilage)

Yeah, thats's Red XII in the ending sequence. It's pretty easy to tell... the tattoo on his arm, remember? As for the mathmatics problem... oww. You have a good point, there. I mean, some could argue that Red XIII isn't human, and therefor isn't limited to the human life span--but why the human/cat age comparison, then? If Red was mature when 15 in human years, then by golly he should be pretty, well, dead when he hits 165.

Scary. One wonders why he didn't just call Kavorkian.

-- Draygon (7th of the Dark Dragon Clan)

Now, I always figured it was Cloud's "Pre-Jenova" self giving him those warnings, and asking him about his early years. Final Fantasy 7's storyline is about as clear as a nine year old shower curtain, though, so don't take my word for it.

At least I know how to spell my name

A "coffen" is when Thor edits main.html, interaction.html and archive.html early in the day, but doesn't set the actual at2799.html title until it's after 9am and he's very, very sleepy. I asked for a coffin because I'd like to sleep forever, or at least until the Backstreet Boys craze blows over. If you're still wondering, this fellow has a theory...

***

At the top of the main page of today's article (Wednesday), the title read: 'Hey, where's my coffen?' Was this caused by your powerful subconscious desire for coffee...?

Amused,

--Radien

Sadly, yes. Other typoes included "Final Fametasy 7", "Lufimmortality", and "Tifa Sexhart".

Making Final Fantasy 6 hurt--in a good way.
(Lufia 2 spoilers... not. What the heck do you think?)

Regardless, I have a few other ways of making FF6 more difficult. Read them if you feel like challenging yourself...

1> Complete the game teaching only natural magic users spells. In other words, only Celes, Terra, and Strago can use Espers. In my personal opinion, I preferred FF4's magic system where not everyone was a magic God, and characters learned spells based on their levels. So, characters like Sabin will be only Martial Artists, not magic users, Edgar will be a kick-ass king (he always will be) who can only use his tools, etc, etc.

2> A variation of #1, don't equip ANYONE with Espers. That makes the game even more difficult because you only get a few spells that characters naturally learn. Also, not equiping any Espers means you miss out on the level-up bonuses.

3> While this is not all that difficult, it is a funny thing to do... turn all your characters into Imps, equip them with the Imp gear (the spear, armor, etc), and then go beat Kefka. Oh what humiliation for a Demi-God to be defeated by green midgets!

4> This is also funny... when you fight Kefka, take only three party members: Umaro, Gogo, and Gau. Since Umaro and Gogo are hidden charecters, they have no lines at the end of the game. When your party members go up to Kefka at the end of the game to discuss the meaning of life, morality, and all that good stuff, Umaro and Gogo will be doing the talking. Now that's funny! Plus, when Kefka askes you why you value life, Gau will only say, "Me have my friends" or whatever he says. Then Kefka says his thing about the self-help book, but only one person actually had anything to say. In my opinion, if those three went to defeat Kefka, when they walk in, instead of the usual routine, Kefka should just say, "Who the hell are you?" That would be funny too.

Well, Thor, I thank you for reading this letter. I'm sure it is too long to post, but I will somehow survive. Anyway, I will let you get back to your daily routine of answering the mail. Keep up the good work, o mighty thunder guy.

As you can see, it wasn't too long. I don't mind one or two lengthy letters per column, I just couldn't stomach reading more than 50 letters over 20k in one day... :D

-- Seth

Sweet Jesus, that's not Final Fantasy 7, that's Final Fantasy XXX! Yes, folks, Final Fantasy XXX is a direct sequel to Final Fantasy 7! Now you can finally discover what happened to the Turks, if Barret really was Mr. T or not, and even learn a thing or two during the twenty minute "Cloud and Tifa: The Honeymoon" sequence.

Da quote

-- Ranklchick the Ghoul from Europa

Correct-a-mundo! Enjoy this fine wallet made from actual dead monkey leather. This is, I fear, the last of my dead monkeys, and I will be forced to think of new gifts for my faithful fans. Any ideas, faithful fans?

Help, I think I'm being seduced!

Well, talk about disillusioned! I was all set to propose to you. I mean, you're tall (or so you say), you're knowledgable about RPGs, you're pretty damn clever, and, best of all, you have a cat! And, being a typical girl, RP or otherwise, I love cats! But then you had to go and ruin all my fun... The Vampire: the Masquerade I can forgive, but you... you don't like chocolate chip cookies!? sob...sob... Now I know it can never be...

Well, I'm willing to make an exception now and th--hey! What's wrong with Vampire: The Masquerade? Babe, forget it: I won't go with anyone who refuses to dress all in black, grow her hair long and talk about death incessantly.

<sip> <swig> ...hey, are you trying to get me intoxicated or something?

-- Mala

Naw, I decided to post it. I'll even tell you why: 1) It's Thursday Thorsday Madness, my ego is driving the car that is me. 2) The drunker my fans are, the funnier I am. Hey, if it works for comedy clubs, it'll work for RPGamer, heh heh.

Langrisser. (Not all the topics can be funny, wiseguy.)

Thor, I was very recently introduced to a Anime-styled Strategy/RPG series that goes by the name o' Langrisser, and I loved what I saw. It had gameplay similar to that of the old Shining Force games (which I loved!) and it looked great! The only problem is that what I saw was in Japenese and I can't speak, and more importanly read, a lick of it. The person who introduced it to me knows very little about the series himself and I've had trouble finding info on it. So I was wondering if you, or anyone else out there in RPGamer land, had any info they could share with me on the subject, and if there is or will be a English version of them. I would be much obliged!

-- The BigYoJumbo

Langrisser is a strategy game for the Mega Drive, made by NCS/Masaya and translated to English by Treco. The US version was named "Warsong", and was quite popular with die-hard fans of strategy who owned Sega Genesises. Both of them. The series continued--sadly with no further US releases. It's thriving in Japan, however. A total of 16 (!) Langrisser games have been released in Japan on various platforms, even though there are actually but five games in the Langrisser series. Want to know the secret to good business? Remixes. Heh heh.

I almost miss the funny nicknames. Almost.

I looked at RPGamer's games list today and was shocked when I did'nt see Hybrid Heaven on the list, did they find out it was not an RPG or did they decide not to make a US release, or did lavos destroy it when he bombarded RPGamer? By the way it's an N64 RPG(Supposedly?), that was supposed to be released on 3/02/99 in the US, in case you did'nt know already!

-- Joseph Witham, The "Cat loving RPGamer"

All of the above. Actually, according to Konami... it's not really anything. All they're saying is it'll be released in April. There's no telling if it's an action game with RPG elements (Castlevania: SotN) or heavily modified csRPG yet, so I guess we'll have to wait for Konami to fess up before you see anything on RPGamer--or not.

And speaking of Final Fantasy 7...
(Spoilers. Naturally.)

-- Anonymaus.

Allrighty then. Hopefully, this'll wrap up the *ahem* cough-en debate. (That's one drink, woo!)

Self-absorbed Thursday Thorsday Madness question

1.) Do you have a webpage? If not, why not put one up (you can use RPGamer's server even. heh heh. Free Webspace. Make someone else pay for it. : ) )

I do. It's down right now (long story; pepper sucks) but it'll be back in a few. I'm debating whether or not I should give out the URL. On one hand, it'd be sleezily using my job as a way to promote my private homepage. On another, everyone would be able to "embrace the funny" and get a taste of the real Thor... which, admitedly, no one in their right mind would want.

It's a good name, but people might get me mixed up with the Gamefan guy.

Yeah, but they'd take space away from the real letters, which would pi--er, tick everyone off.

My father. He never watched any sports--hated 'em--but he did like to watch wrestling, with the sound turned down to avoid the lame announcers. (I thought he was insane... then. Now, I agree. Tony Schivani bites. "Best Nitro Ever!" my fat senile Granny.) I watched wrestling on and off up until around '91. Then, last July, I rediscovered my fondness for violent men in tights, and I've been a fan ever since.

WCW. I'd like NWO better (they have cooler guys, all they need is Giant, DDP, Jericho and Goldberg), but they're too into boring Hogan-esque tactics. Like, um, spraypainting. Hulk, Hollywood, whatever you want to call yourself: Gangs don't do that anymore. Now, they kill each other. Live life out of the 80s, dude.

(This is in response to that old letter about the difference between sexes) Well, I was about to use Midgar, but the book title is "Men are from Mars", and Mars is only one syllable, so...

See above. No, not my last answer. Like, five questions up.

-- Mike Dore

Thus ends Thursday Thorsday Madness. Ok, so it wasn't very mad. Next week, I'll have something positively delicious.

Unfit for Print

WHEW THAT INTRO WAS LONG ANYWAYS I'M A FIRST TIME CALLER LONG TIME LISTENER. I WAS REALLY BORED AND STARTED THINKING BOUT YOUR BATTLE SYSTEM WHERE IT'S JUST A GIANT BATTLE FRENZY. LET'S JUST ASSUME IT'S GOING TO BE A PSX GAME BECAUSE NINTENDO...WELL YOU KNOW NINTENDO. I THINK THAT IF THE GAME HAD TO USE A HAD TO BE USED WITH A CONTROLLER WITH THE OPTION TO DO BUTTON PROGRAMMING (LIKE THE NEW BARRACUDAS) YOU COULD DO IT WITHOUT MENUS. JUST HAVE EACH CHARACTER HAVE AN ATTACK BAR, LIKE FF3 OR FF6 WHATEVER, AND EACH TIME THE BAR FILLED YOU HAD TO PAUSE AND PROGRAM IN THE ATTACK. SAY THE PARTY CONSISTS OF 4 MEMBERS HAVE EACH R AND L BUTTONS BE A MEMBER. THEN YOU PRESS THE CHARACTERS CORRESPONDING BUTTON AND START YOUR ATTACK. NOW ATTACKS WOULD BE SOMETHING LIKE X IS NORMAL ATTACKS, OR WHATEVER ATTACK STYLE YOU WANT, SQUARE IS SPELLS, TRIANGLE IS ITEM, O IS DEFEND, AND SELECT IS RUN AWAY. OKAY SO HOW DO YOU HANDLE DIFFERENT SPELLS AND ITEMS YOU MIGHT ASK, WHICH I KNOW I'D BE DOING THEN AGAIN YOU MIGHT NOT IN THAT CASE WHY ARE YOU READING THIS? EACH SPELL COULD HAVE A SPECIAL BUTTON COMBINATION LIKE XENOGEARS DEATHBLOWS. THIS WOULD BE THE SAME WITH ITEMS, BUT IT COULD GET MIGHTY CONFUSHEATING SO THE GAME COULD COME WITH LIKE A SOURCE CARD WITH EVERYTHING. OR THE PERSON PLAYING HAS TO MEMORIZE THE BUTTON COMBOS OR RIGHT THEM DOWN WHICH WOULD PROBABLY REALLY SUCK. AND THE GAME COULD SHOW ON THE SCREEN(WHERE ELSE WOULD SHOW THEM DUH) WHAT BUTTONS YOU PRESS WHILST PROGRAMMING ALSO WHICH IS LIKE XENOGEARS.UMKAY

I DON'T KNOW IF I LEFT ANYTHING OUT OR NOT I GOT THIS FEELING I DID THOUGH. THAT'S IT IF YOU LIKE IT THANKS IF NOT lay off!! ITS THE BEST I COULD THINK OF!

ps IF THEY MADE A GAME LIKE YOU THOUGHT OF IT'D BE HELLA BUFF DUDE:)

NOT ALWAYS BUT MOST OF THE TIME

-- mat

The truly sad thing is that some sites print letters like this. I, on the other hand, just post them as a warning. It's called capslock. Press it. Once. Is the little light off? Good. Now, step away from the keyboard with your hands behind your neck...

Kudeita told me to search the net for his old Final Fantasy Chess game, and that's just what I did. Here's a copy for your reading pleasure. // Stifu screamed: "Oh my god! What is sephiroth doing in Super Punch out... eek... crossdressed and under false name (Heike Kagero) and all" Well, um. No comment? I looked around for a screen shot but could find one. Anyone want to help with yet another "lookalike" picture on Ask Thor? :D // An unnamed RPGamer asks: "How is FF4 and 5 for Psx any different for Snes? Is it just the start and ending FMV are added with the same graphics?" Yes. Well, that and a different script. See, FF2us and FF3us were heavily edited. So FF4/5j have a semi-different plot than what we've seen. The PSX versions of FF4j and FF5j are the same as the Super Famicom games, excluding FMV intro and ending, of course. // Michelle wondered said" I know this sounds stupid but you can get addicted to coffee, right? So you would be able to get addicted to Mountain Dew or other caffeine drinks right?" Yes, you could. Lucky for me, I'm not addicted to coffee, just love. (See what I mean? Shameless.) // And finally, another unnamed RPGamer said: "Your pinmanship is sloppy, just like a doctor's." That's true. But my hands are also soft, cool and knowing, also like a doct... oh, wait, you're a Dude. Nevermind.

Other Ask Thor Drinking Game ideas include:

• Three drinks every time Thor talks about how terrible his typing [Spelling?] skills are.
• Three drinks every time Thor talks about how tall he is.
• Two swigs everytime someone mentions the word "RPGirl"
• One sip everytime a girl makes a pass at Thor
• And finally, a case of booze for Thor should a guy ever make a pass at him. He'll need it.

- Thor "The Emperor of Ice-Cream" Antrim
If you can read this you're standing too close to the screen.