Editor’s Note: So I found my old Disgaea 4 journal notes, just in time for Disgaea D2 to come out next week. So I figured I’d post them up to break up the monotony and let you know what I thought of Disgaea 4 while I played it.
There are lots of spoilers after the cut, so don’t click unless you’re ready.
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 – Today, Disgaea 4 came out. So after work, I went to GameStop and picked up my copy and started playing it. I spent the night going through the tutorial maps (because there are always tutorial maps), exploring the new home base and the new Senate/Classroom equivalent (the “Cam-pain”, apparently), building my new party (because while they give you a decent starting Warrior and a decent starting Cleric, I prefer Mages over Skulls, and I don’t like using Monsters), and clearing Chapter 1. Chapter 1 set up the exposition to the story quite nicely (prinny extermination, the “corrupternment”), unlike the other Disgaea games, which were just random crap going on. So the story got started a bit faster, I guess?
Chapter 1 – Introducing Valvatorez, Fenrich. Axel fight. Axel’s “death”. First Emizel fight. Chapter 1 ended with Fuka challenging me.
One of the new features in Disgaea 4 is when you key in an attack, it displays roughly how much damage it will do. This takes the guesswork out of planning your attacks. I’m not sure if it makes the game better or worse, but it certainly makes it easier. The display sometimes doesn’t work though…
Wednesday, September 7, 2011 – Chapter 2 started with some Geo Block tutorial maps. Second Emizel fight. Didn’t finish Chapter 2. Had to go to sleep for the night.
Thursday, September 8, 2011 – Chapter 2 continued. Battle against Fuka. Then, after another battle, Fuka joins my party. She seems to be a decent axe wielder. (I assume she’s the Flonne of Disgaea 4, although Flonne is in Disgaea 4, so…)
Chapter 2 ended with Axel releasing all the prisoners. I like how each chapter ends with a cliffhanger intro into the next episode. Awesome!
Chapter 3. Prison Break. Apparently Emizel and Axel are working together now, even though Emizel “killed” Axel last time. Go figure.
Friday, September 9, 2011 – Chapter 3 continued. I unlocked Archers and Star Mages, so I reincarnated my bow-wielding Lady Fighter into an Archer and my Ice Mage into a Star Mage (because the first level bow skill is an ice attack, so…)
Near the end of Chapter 3 was the typical mandatory Item World crawl. Good thing I held onto that low-level armor. Except that the game gave me a special sword that had the level and cost of a 100 HL sword but had the power of a 2000HL sword. Don’t you just love it when a game gives you an awesome freebie?
Apparently one new feature in the item world is branching paths. These one branch gets you more item levelling stuff, while the other powers up your innocents, apparently.
The Desco, the “final boss” was unleashed, and she “killed” Axel. Again. And then the “final boss” fight. Which I’m pretty sure is not the final boss. And then after beating the crap out of her (it was probably the first boss fight with enough HP that she withstood a combo attack from my entire party), she joined my party. Except I don’t like monsters, so…
And no, she wasn’t the final boss…
Chapter 3 ended with the news that Emizel had died. Which he didn’t. Because he was standing right in front of me.
And Chapter 4 began with a plan to infiltrate the Information Bureau. Because apparently the corrupternment had been using the Information Bureau to spread false truths about Emizel’s death (“Death Emizel’s Death”) and about how Valvatorez and all the Hades rebels were exterminated. And then Emizel tagged along because he just wanted to go to the Information Bureau to prove that he was alive. But he’s not actually in my party yet.
Saturday, September 10, 2011 – Chapter 4. As we invaded the Information Bureau, Emizel began to come to terms with the fact that he had been riding on his father’s coattails for his entire life, and decided to forge a name for himself under his own power. At the end of Chapter 4, he joined my party officially. And then Vulcanus, the Angel of Avarice revealed herself. She probably has no relation to Disgaea 1 Vulcanus and Vulcanus prolly is not her real name. But I assumed it will be revealed later.
Emizel is a good unique mage, so I replaced my Wind Mage with him. And gave him Wind magic to fill in the gap. But he can learn all three elements. Yay Emizel!
Sunday, September 11, 2011 – Chapter 5. Valvatorez and the gang go to take over the mid-level demon area. But apparently Vulcanus is in the area and things get complicated…
I got partway through Chapter 5, but decided to stop prematurely in favor of resetting my sleep schedule.
Monday, September 12, 2011 – Chapter 5. Only got through one battle though, since my cats were distracting me by being social.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 – Chapter 5. Encountered “Vulcanus” again. Neither she nor Valvatorez wanted to fight, but Fenrich (who previously made Valvatorez promised to eliminate the angel if she got in their way) tricked Vulcanus into attacking by telling her that there was a bounty on Valvatorez’s party, but greatly exaggerated the amount. The bounty enticed Vulcanus into attacking, and there was a boss fight.
Except Vulcanus was dual-wielding Magichanged Sabercats. That’s right! She has *dual-wield Magichange*! Which meant high stats, tons of HP, and a tough boss fight. Except that her minions were all prinnies, so getting past her minions was easy. Vulcanus herself was still quite tough, though. Upon scoring the finishing blow, Fenrich went from level 31 to 39.
And then it seemed like Valvatorez and Artina were going to be re-united, but then Axel appeared with a gun, fired a shot at Valvatorez, but Vulcanus took the bullet.
I get the feeling she’s not dead though…
And then Chapter 6 begins with…
Fuka: I can’t believe this is happening! An angel died to protect a demon? And then revived so casually?
Vulcanus: Please don’t kill me. I was only knocked unconscious.
She makes a great gunner, so she’s replacing my thief Katie as the gunner. She’s also a healer, like Sapphire from Disgaea 3.
So Chapter 6 is about a virus that turns people in Axel. Nasty stuff. Unless you like Axel. In which case it’s awesome stuff.
Thursday, September 15, 2011 – More Chapter 6. Haven’t finished the chapter yet.
Friday, September 16, 2011 – Cleared Chapter 6. 2nd Axel fight. It was easy, because all his minions were level 5 clones of himself.
Then, they claimed that it was time to invade the corrupternment and that it was time for the final battle. The intro to the next chapter even described itself as “Final Episode”. The save file described it as chapter 7 though. And also, there are so many unresolved plot threads that it’s prolly not the end. I hope it’s not the end, anyway.
Saturday, September 17, 2011 – And finally, since the end is in sight for Disgaea 4 and since I’ll want to go into the post-game with some prior knowledge, I went and picked up the Disgaea 4 strategy guide. Apparently, it’s a different publisher now. The guides for Disgaea 2 and Disgaea 3 were Doublejump, and it was novel-sized. The guide for Disgaea 4 was Brady Games, and it was magazine-sized. I haven’t looked inside it yet, since I don’t want to look inside until after I’ve beaten the game. But I hope it’s as good as if not better than the Disgaea 2 guide. Disgaea 2 guide was really well done. (Disgaea 3 guide? Not so much.)
And then it was time for more Disgaea 4. Cleared Chapter 7. Boss fight against the President. But after defeating him, he revealed the Netherworld was being controlled by a human, who then revealed himself as Judge Nemo. As it turns out, I was right, it *wasn’t* the final chapter. (The end of Chapter 7 said “Final Episode 1 End”.) But now they’re saying Chapter 8 is the final episode. I hope it isn’t over yet. They still haven’t resolved any of the character plot threads. If they intend to resolve them at all…
Thursday, September 22, 2011 – Chapter 8. Going to the Human World for the final confrontation with Judge Nemo. I only got 4 battles in. (Isn’t Flonne supposed to be in this game?)
Friday, September 23, 2011 – Finished Chapter 8. Relation between Fuka and Desco was finally reviewed. Battle against a second, more powerful version of Desco called Des X, which was a 2-stage battle, interestingly enough.
And I was right again! It’s not the end. Now we have a 3rd “final chapter”, this time fighting Judge Nemo on the moon! (There are hints that the angels are involved.)
Wednesday, September 28, 2011 – Started Chapter 9. Apparently, Judge Nemo made a deal with the aliens, who want to exterminate all humans, and told them to destroy the moon. So now I’m fighting alien androids who wish to destroy the moon in order to exterminate all humans.
“Vulcanus” keeps invoking the Archangel, so I get the feeling Flonne’s gonna show up soon. Also, this chapter doesn’t feel very “final chapter”-ish, so I get the feeling that there’s another chapter after this.
Thursday, September 29, 2011 – Part way through Chapter 9, Flonne appears! I knew it! She makes a Deus Ex Machina and saves the day by summoning the super robot Great Flonzor X! Except it’s not fully-powered, so she can’t save the day just yet, so Val and the gang need to find a way to power up the robot, and hence there’s more to the chapter.
Also, “Vulcanus” is confirmed to be Artina. (And her in-game name actually changed to Artina, too.) Also, it’s hinted that Judge Nemo knows Artina. Intriguing!
Friday, September 30, 2011 – My first Game Over, on Chapter 9-6. Long story short, there was a cyborg boss with a Fusioned Magichanged Wood Elemental Axe. I didn’t even know you could do that. Also, she was the last character standing on the map. Needless to say, she destroyed my party. Time to get serious…
After re-configuring my party and focusing on combat instead of leveling, I was able to hone my team into a killing machine and then cleared Chapter 9 with no problem.
But then the anti Deus Ex Machina happened! Apparently, Judge Nemo was consumed by his own hatred and activated Fear the Great, a system created by God to destroy a planet that has too much hatred. Or something like that. And then it was Chapter 10, which was billed as “the *real* final chapter”, and I actually believe it this time. During Chapter 10, Judge Nemo’s past and relation with Artina was revealed. I only got 3 battles in, though.
Also, <3 Heart Cannon.
Saturday, October 1, 2011 – I also had some trouble with 10-5. Until I found the secret warp panel that took me to the top of the level with a stack of Geo Blocks that booster my character (I sent Emizel) and gave him a fighting change. First, I had to take out a Professor with both healing magic and a gun, but thankfully Sacrificial Altar allowed my Emizel to survive. Then, it was a battle of attrition until the Enemy Gate ran out. And then I had the battle in the bag, with only Emizel left and Artina shooting archers from 6 spaces away with her special skill. Cheap shots for the win!
Then, the final battle. It was a well done battle, a final boss with minions like in Disgaea 1 (although not as brutally difficult), and a final boss that gains its power from its minions like in Soul Nomad (though not as powerful). In the end, Fuka made the killing blow and jumped from about level 97 to level 107. My other characters were in the level 80s to 90s range. Time on the clock: 64:07:05.
Sunday, October 2, 2011 – I started on the post-game today and cleared Axel. Next post-game battle was Flonne, but she pulmogorized me, what with her being at level 190 and my chars only in the 80s to 110s range. Welp, time to go back to the drawing board. And by drawing board, I mean power-leveling.
As a side note, the “official” strategy guide from Brady Games is terrible. The guide is missing a lot of important information (notably how to unlock a lot of the cool stuff in the game, powerleveling guides, etc) and is chock full of terrible strategies (notably the final boss strategy is so bad it makes me wonder if the writers even played the game).
Monday, October 3, 2011 – Basically, while reading GameFAQs boards for Disgaea 4 (because all the good info is the boards, not the FAQs), I discovered that Puppy Paw Stick had been nerfed in 2 ways. First of all, it wasn’t a guaranteed drop anymore. Second of all, the dupe rate had been reduced from 20% to 5%. Fortunately, they had a new way of duping, using a glitch involving holdover items being held at Rosen Queen. Apparently, if you use Try On instead of Buy, it doesn’t clear the item from the shop, so you can buy infinite copies of the item. It feels dirty, but I did it anyway because Disgaea 3 got me hooked on duping, and I don’t feel like grinding it out the old-fashioned way.
So yeah. I used the dupe glitch to dupe my Gladiators, Tutors, and Marksmen, Dieticians, and Masters so now I have some uber-equipment. Dwayne will annihilate your nearest enemies!
Also, the more I read about Disgaea 4, the more ridiculous(ly awesome) it gets. Long story short, you can fuse 4 monsters into a weapon, and then dual-wield it. Imagine a guy carrying 4 monsters in one hand, 4 monsters in the other, and smacking you to death with them.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011 – More Disgaea 4. Today, I used my uber-powered Emizel to clear the Flonne stage and Raspberyl stages. It involved a lot of throwing to keep Emizel out of the way of enemy attacks. At this point in the game, he (and everyone else in the game) is pretty much a glass cannon.
Also, giant Raspberyl…
Saturday, October 8, 2011 – I need more mana to unlock the next stage, and I’m not getting mana fast enough. Solution? Dupe Managers. And while I’m at it, dupe these Enforcers I found on Flonne’s Pravda Pendant.
Then, using my Uber Emizel, I took out Etna. Yay me!
Monday, October 10, 2011 – Using my Uber Emizel, I wiped out Laharl. Yay me!
Unfortunately, Emizel wasn’t uber enough to take down Asagi. Lucky for me, I had previously duped piles and piles of level 19998 Gladiators, so I made an Uber Duckie (generic Archer), who took down Asagi for me. Yay Duckie!
Editor’s Note: Well, that’s the end of it. There’s more Disgaea 4, but I dunno how much more I played, or how much more I will play, what with Disgaea D2 coming out next week.
Hope you enjoyed this inside look into the rambly stream of consciousness that happens when I play video games. Maybe I’ll write one for DD2 and culminate in a review.