For a long time I've been a perfectionist about a lot of things. It locks me up more often than not in RL... but in video games, it can be pretty awesome. In the past, my "perfect" approach was to slowly accumulate everything in a game - for example, getting every last ability, item, and sidequest in a Final Fantasy game.
Lately, I've taken a different approach: blitzing. I've been finding more perfect ways to defeat games quickly and flawlessly, avoiding the dreaded Game Over completely while still moving as fast as possible. Some examples of this:
- Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door - defeated Shadow Queen with Mario at 10HP, 5FP in one play session of 12 hours straight
- Super Mario Bros. 3 - level 6-7 without a single death (failure... for now)
- Final Fantasy IX - perfect save file, including all missable items and the Excalibur II... I'm halfway through the first disc, whoopee
- Final Fantasy XII - Order of Ambrosia as fast as possible... I'm over halfway there at 30 play hours
- Metroid Prime - final boss defeated in short order, I could've sworn I started on Easy mode, and the game seemed easy... then I found out it had been on Hard
- Zelda: Majora's Mask - every single item and sidequest, including Fierce Deity, in four 3-day cycles
- Super Mario 64 - final Bowser without collecting a single coin (yes, it's possible... barely)
Since my budget does not include new consoles and I seem to have exhausted the kind of games I like on the consoles I have, necessity has given birth to invention in the form of new ways to play. I've also been playing some games for a "natural" playthrough - zero grinding, just make the most of what I get en route to the final goal. For FFVII, that meant straying from my old "give everyone a random collection of magic materia" strategy, instead defining clear roles for each player. I discovered that the stat bonuses on materia, despite looking small by themselves, can add up to a lot. In FFV, it meant finding a combination of two or three jobs for each character that, when added together, could defeat every major roadblock-boss without resorting to cheap tactics like spamming Bahamut or Gil Toss. (Incidentally, a Dragoon with White Magic is kind of nifty.)
