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Got enough Virus Cores? GAF reads/watches/PLAYS the .hack series! (10th Anniversary)

Stage On

Member
You know I still don't get the time dilusion effect they experienced in the aida server.

I mean how can everything that happened possibly take place in only 3 minutes?
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Busy day, busy day! Not much time for playing. However! I can make up for it with informativeness, and also cause... the OP has evolved! LotT short stories Rare Hunter & Reflections have been added! I finally made a description for The End of "The World"! Also there's now a list of characters whose real life gender differs from their in-game one! I created & added more character icons! Jun, Taiichiro, Michiru, Tabby, Phyllo, Lycoris, Chimney, NOVA, Kazu, Lios, Balmung, Orca, Elk, Tri-Edge, Mireille, and Reki! Still got a couple blank spots left (AB Ch.7, G.U. 2 & 3). Any suggestions on who ta fill 'em with?

The informative part comes with this list I put together during my playthrough last year, and have since updated just before posting it right now! Look at this list. It's soooo much longer than the one I was able to compile of the original .hack// games (posted above). Was Rebirth rushed? Stuff like not being able change the equipment of party members suggests yes since it was possible all along in the original games. Whatever the case, its almost all for the best! Living w/o stuff like the B/B camera setting & party members kicking Chim Chims is tough!!


//v1.02: Changes implimented post-Rebirth [Bonus #07]
- What They Tell You
• Weapon Affinity has been added. Different monsters/player classes are weak to certain weapon types.
• You are now able to change allies equipment.
• Party members will now chase and kick Chim Chims, Rare Chim Chims, and Lucky Animals.
• You can now press and hold L1 in fields and battles to keep your party members nearby.
• Dual Swords
-> Dual Sword combo hits have been raised from 4 to 7 with the number of button presses needed remaining the same.
-> Enemies have to be hit once before you can use a Dual Sword charge attack on them.
• Broadswords
-> You can now freely move around while charging a Broadsword attack.
-> Charge Attack guage expanded from 1 to 3.
-> Charge Shockwave now occurs depending on your level of charge.
• Bike missions (the Flag Racing of G.U.) have been added.
• A bike parts shop has opened in Mac Anu.
• E-mail from the previous game is now listed under an archives section.
• There are now tabs in the music/background section to view things you unlocked in a previous and current volume.
• Once Haseo achieves his third form, a new Awakening called "Divine Awakening" will be added to your list.
• Armor and Accessories can now be alchemized.

- What They Don't
• There is now split second delay between selecting a skill and it being used.
• Once all monsters/opponents are dead, Demon Awakening will no longer continue to drain away your Morale gauge (unless ya keep spamming the X button lol).
• 2 new camera options (B/A & B/B) are present.
• When passing a nearby Platform for the first time, an on-screen indicator will popup showing how many you've passed. This does not occur in cloister type dungeons as they only have a single platform per floor.
• You may notice right at the start of the game that your bike is much speedier than in Vol.1. This is due to bike parts and tuning being added to the game.
• There is now a short pause when you change between main weapons both in and out of battle.
• Party members mention when Chim Assassins appear.
• Party members are no longer voiced when spoken to in town or areas.
• Red dots provide a trailing effect on mini-map, presumably to help you remember which way you were going after exiting battles.
• In order to hide the mini-map you must now hit Select then press Circle.
• Monster groups have new patrol routes and are rarely as stationary as they were in the first game.
• Mecha Gruntys voice has been changed.
• Mecha Gruntys dialogue has been shortened.
• Tri-Strikes rengeki text was changed from "Tri.Strike" to "Tri-Strike".
• New smaller rooms and hallway designs have been added to cave dungeons.
• A new type of scenery I call "budding trees" have been added to grassland areas.
• 4 new area types have been added. Wilderness (clear), Wilderness (cloudy), Wilderness (evening), and Cloister dungeons.
• Ryu Book VII now lists each monsters level range, allowing you to more easily create fields with specific monsters in mind.
• Categories for "Undead", "Demon Stone", and "Angel" type monsters have been added to Ryu Book VII.
• The monsters "Carrie" & "Carrianne" were moved from the Demon category to the Crustacean category in Ryu Book VII.
• Ryu Book VIII now lists Bike Parts.
• You are now able to skip by the opening logos. Though doing so takes you to a loading screen!
• Pressing the left stick will cause you to exit the first person camera view. Previously only pressing R2 would let you exit.
• The "Crimson Vs" icon has been moved up two spots in the desktop menu.
• The menu bar graphic at the top of the "News Capture" page has been changed.
• The "Black Armor" no longer raises Physical Attack or Magical Attack and its Physical Defense value was raised.
• Physical Attack and Magical Attack values (they were all 0 save for Black Armor) are no longer displayed under Armor and Accessories.
• The morale guage is reset back to empty after each arena survival match instead of half.
• Advice is now given at arena counter. It can also be viewed in the waiting room.
• Some new monsters from Vol.2 can be found in areas accessible on the Delta server using Vol.1 keywords such as Tick Masks in Δ Freezing Blazing Phoenix.
• "The" (Moon, Death, etc) items are now displayed before elemental scrolls in your item inventory.
• The cost of alchemizing weapons even from the previous game has skyrocketed.
• The map no longer displays when interacting with Mecha Grunty.
• Beast & Demon Awakenings can now be used when the morale guage is half-filled and above.
• Dark & Light elements have officially been added
• Some trap treasure boxes may have bigger guns than ones previously found (I assume they do more damage?)
• You are now able to use Beginner's Text / Book all the way to the maximum level percentage (20.99). Previously, you were only able to use them up to the maximum level but not maximum percentage. (10 instead of 10.99).
• You are now able to access the Skill Trigger while charging or holding a charge attack.
• Bikman's flyer distribution list now shows 160 Player Characters, up from 135 in Rebirth.

- It May Just Be Me...
• Avatar battles feels much faster and their controls more responsive.
• Broadsword is much quicker!
• Demon Awakening feels much less automated and lasts longer.


//The End of "The World"
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file.05
: Even in CC Corp few people knew of Aura and her management of the game. "Aura would sometimes act impulsively, like a fickle goddess. It was Aura's idea to create a replica of the Kite character, and use it in a promotional Giveaway Campaign." Jun says the best estimate as to when Aura disappeared is late 2014 (LotT ended in late 2014... that happy end didn't last long ;.;). 7 years after the original Pluto's Kiss lag, crashing servers and other problems began notably hampering the game and network itself. The NAB suspected it was a new type of virus but couldn't find any proof of it. "The real reason was simply that Aura had vanished." In order to save the game/network/their hide, the top execs at CC Corp decided to ressurect Aura. "This was how Project G.U. was established."

Guardian Ubiquitos: Aura, the Guardian Ubiquitos.



You know I still don't get the time dilusion effect they experienced in the aida server.

I mean how can everything that happened possibly take place in only 3 minutes?

According to Cell data moves at the speed of light. They prolly phrased it that way to be less technical about it but the point was data goes fast. Since they were data, 3 hours (according to the wiki, under 2 hours according to my game save & that's including prologue & previously on G.U. thingys) for them coulda been 3 minutes to everyone else?

Alternatively: subliminal message induced hallucinations /cc corp/ or nanomachines /kojima/
 

Man God

Non-Canon Member
GU looks and plays so much better than the original set it's frightening.

Too bad there's almost no difficulty and that the story (including the connecting anime series) is so boring.

That Ovan motherfucker, he's quite mysterious! Let's hang around with him not answering shit because he is so mysterious. Oh look he disappeared, does that mean we're finally going to do something, not really!
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Another mega update! Having save data from Reminisce opens up 2 entries on the Terminal Disc from the getgo! How generous! One was posted yesterday so here's the next!


//The End of "The World"
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file.09
: "Amagi's experimentation of the RA Program ended in failure." Jun managed to contain the berserk program but the only Epitaph User he could salvage was Magus. Amagi's failure left him mentally unstable, and it was he who caused the fire at CC Corp. And of course the media was only told of the fire itself not the cause behind it. Jun thinks the person most cursed by the ghost of Harald was Amagi himself. Because of the fire, 80% of the games data was lost, and G.U.'s reasearch was irreparably damaged. The G.U. program was put on hiatus and Jun had to take responsibility for its failure.

Genocide of the Unfaithful: What was the reason for this miserable failure? Most likely, it was because Amagi did not approach "The World" with enough respect.

//Cell Vol.2: Infinite Release ~ Chapter 1
"The young girl was like a dim flame up against the wind." A bunch of data formed together to become a virtual cell. This cell was created from a blood sample taken from Midori (S) along with other data about her. Virtual cells are created for the purpose of running simulated tests on, instead of on the patients themselves. But this one was different. "I don't want to die." Her strong desire to live was passed on to this virtual cell and it quickly evolved into what resembled a human female. This cell learned all she could about her body and the black environment she existed in, and upon seeing a hole in the darkness she went to it and was pulled from the hospital database into a world full of light... "The World".

It was there that she saw a boy engulfed in azure flames and a darkness eroding the area. When that darkness noticed the boy it trembled and tried to flee, but he warped after it and she followed as well. She ended up in a cave briefly seperated from the boy, but saw a party of three challenging the dungeon when suddenly one of them began screaming and turned on them as if he'd been hit by a bug. The boy appeared and used Data Drain on the crazed man then returned to Outer Space, with her still following. She was attracted to Tri-Edge because he had brought death. Her first word was his name but he still didn't acknowledge her presence. Reaching out to him was futile for now, so she decided to become a PC in "The World" in order to meet him again. Finding her way to an OS she started up "The World" and set out creating a character. Human, female, Edge Punisher, long black hair and... "As if fated, she input her character name without pause: Midori." On the third day of her "playing" the game she PK'd a PKer.

"With that, I became a PK." Fragments of Midori had dispersed into the sea of data and took a long time to reunite. "I never existed in the real world." the truth left her devastated. Living as a shadow of a real person made her wish for true death. Not by "The World's" standards but by someone outside the systems. Tri-Edge. Her reason for seeking him was the hope of him using Data Drain on her. While thinking about this a piece of data floated by her with Adamas's voice coming from it, searching for her. But she couldn't bring herself to return to his side. He was human and she was data. Extending her heart to him would only hurt them both, so she curled up and shut off all her senses...

//Roots
ifkPQfRHs6kZT.jpg

ep.15
: The age old tale of a boy convincing his brother to play to sneak in a game while the parents are away! Tabby's reminiscing when a monster attacks! She takes it out in one shot then comes across another which she saves a pair of boys from! They introduce themselves as Wool (the nice one) & Cashmere (kinda grumpy one). She takes 'em shopping while Kuhn stops by for a chat with Phyllo. Apparently Haseo's not been in contact with Tabby of Phyllo for a long while. "Don't you know what an attribute is?" "No... what is it?" she didn't even know that to beat the giant enemy crab you have to first break its shell!! And so the beginners end up teaching Tabby! Back in town, Tabby's down cause she's a bad teacher, and Cashmere wants to quit. So Phyllo makes Kuhn train the three of 'em! Which starts with Kuhn chasing Cashmere around and Wool spilling the brothers story to Tabby. Wool failed his junior high entrance examines so his mom became an education freak & puts ton of pressure on Cashmere's studies! Tabby says her older sister is smarter & better at school and her parents have lotsa hope for her "I wonder what it must be like for someone to believe in you." poor Tabby...! The training doesn't go so well which leaves Kuhn almost at wits end lol. He takes 'em back to the dungeon the three were killed in & gives 'em enough tough love to beat the monster! "Hanging out with two complete beginners... It was actually kind of fun." says Kuhn. And Tabby ponders "Maybe there's something here that even I can do."

//Online Jack
ibpSHB9i5x1OgL.jpg

phase.04
: Salvador & Michiru enter the home of associate professor Taiichiro Sugai. "His private life for all to see!" lol. "Do you have any idea what the blood written words in Osamu's ward meant?" asked Michiru. "Are you aware of the Epitaph of Twilight?" she isn't, but Salvador's heard of it! Taiichiro says whoever wrote the words had strong feelings towards "The World" and that the word or anagram AIDA, caught on camera by Salvador is unknown. The name Sakaki on the other hand... well, Taiichiro loads up "The World" on his computer "The boys were also members of a guild called Moon Tree." Salvador seems knowledgable about the game, knowing of Moon Tree, the 7 Counsel, and put together that Sakaki is one of those captains! Taiichiro then loads up a video of the students in the hospital before Osamu disappeared. "Yes. I've come to believe that The World has some sort of effect on peoples brains for some unknown reason." "So everything is connected to the events of 7 years ago?" As the video zooms in on one Tooru Uike, it shows electrical equipment going haywire in the hospital just like it did in Osamu's home! Michiru suddenly gets an e-mail on her cellphone "What? We have to stop it!" and runs off...

//G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
- In the News
• Doll Syndome is spreading with 2000 patients worldwide.
• The first round of crew members are on their way to the space station Village
• Unsubstantial Liability Companies are on the rise with no office buildings needed as employees all work and meet from home via video and chat software.
• A Brain Computer Interface device has been announced which'll allow people move cursors, flip on appliances, and more with just a thought.
• A solar power plant has been completed in Mongolia's Gobi desert.
• CC Corp claims the people who felt they were trapped inside the game were actually victims of a program using subliminal effects slipped into the game by a cyber terrorist.
• Salvador Aihara's popularity shows no sign of stopping, as he plays himself in a movie partly based on his real life.

- On the Boards
• Leader of the Medic Union, Heal Red (Seisaku) asks others who were trapped inside "The World" to meet up so that they can make a report to protest CC Corp.
• Card game lovers are thrilled that Crimson VS. has returned!
• Golden Jet starts a megathread containing area words along with real and rumored history of various Lost Grounds.
• A player named Town got chewed out by Pi for "studying" her characters graphics! And Kazubolo wishes she'd join his guild "Soul Companions" lol.

iMLc3MRl13G7Z.jpg

Sometime later after returning to reality, Atoli e-mails Haseo about her hand and they go to meet at the fountain in the alchemy district of Mac Anu. He suggests she take time off but Atoli says she'll never quit cause doctors can't help her an people important like Sakaki are there. Hearing his name again makes Haseo send her on her way so he can sulk alone "I can't save anyone by myself." then gets an invite from Kuhn to go yell at Yata, but that wiseguy is a step ahead by summoning them to Raven's @HOME. Kuhn yells at him saying they should shut the servers down but when everyone else disagrees he up and quits G.U. Haseo sticks around but still gets very snarky at "the great and mighty Master Yata" calling him a coward and such. Once Haseo heads out Pi speaks up, gently questioning Yata but he reassures her and she goes off on her next mission. CC Corp isn't so lenient and basically tell him what they told Kamui several years ago: stop thinking and just do your job.

iIt29e8vYb4XF.jpg

Silabus says Gaspard is talking crazy and needs Haseo to help calm him down! Haseo was on the AIDA server to so Gaspard turns to him to convince Silabus of his tale... but Haseo denies it, and they convince Gaspard he was just dreaming. Ovan drops an e-mail offering to meet Haseo at Hulle Granz to offers all the help he can give. About time! He shows up and lashes out at the guy he admired and followed! Ovan tries to tell why he disappeared but Haseo doesn't let him get that far! Ovan does get to tell him that AIDA & Epitaphs attract one another and to gather the eight phases of Morganna to learn the full truth. Later on Haseo gets mail from CC Corp stating that Θ server Dol Dona is now open to him and that the Canard @HOME has been moved there so lets check it out! Silabus & Gaspard are excited that Canard is now an intermediate level guild and even Haseo thinks the new @HOME is awesome, and still gets ticked off by Death Grunty! New town means new quest shop so the boys go to take on the Steam Scientist's Test!

iCHPdwBVH6mt6.jpg

Dr. Kepel wants 'em to take out his berserk robots to retrieve their Memory Module and gives 'em items to help weaken the bots. Sounds familiar~ All goes well an good 'til the fighting begins. The two robots go down easily but suddenly jump up and fuse together! The new robot nearly wipes out the trio all at once! After the quest is finished S&G take off and Haseo finds Alkaid chasing after a crazed Sirius (and then my game/ps2 messes up and the quest must be replayed!). Somehow Alkaid blames Haseo for the dude losing his marbles. A mail from Pi states AIDA signals were detected in the last Holy Palace title match and thinking it could be related to Sirius, Haseo heads off to find Alkaid. Who ambushes him at the Chaos Gate, tells him to go on an adventure with her, and forks over her member address!! Suffice to say, Haseo's confused and just goes along with it! By the time they reach the Beast Temple Haseo gets Alkaid to spill her guts. Ever since Haseo became emperor Sirius quit going to Icolo and teamed up with a winged man and a naked man. She begs him to join her in the next tournament and Haseo agrees!

ibqKEXtZ041hFt.jpg

Haseo takes on the solo quest Challenge of the Goblins! A dude named Kafu lost a challenge, his bike, even his pride to a certain group! Haseo's to take 'em out and when he arrives at the area he's challenged by... the Gold Goblins!! Up to their old tricks of being speedy rather than fighters, Haseo's gotta take all 5 down with his bike in under 5 minutes! He manages with time to spare but they swear to return! Another quest clear and campaign opened up! On route to registering for the tournament, Pi drops in to give him an update. Ever since the AIDA server a number of players have been infected and it continues to spread. Atoli shows up to apologize for the arguement back at Hy Brasail and rejoins Team Haseo citing that she can't keep relying on others!


Too bad there's almost no difficulty
Chaotic PKs early to mid Rebirth are difficult! They are easier games on the whole but there is stuff to balance it out like not being able to spam items and carry less of them. The SP cost of Healing and Attack skills are way higher than in the original games to. So things can go bad if the more then one party members low on health! Boss battles especially can turn deadly very fast!

That Ovan motherfucker, he's quite mysterious! Let's hang around with him not answering shit because he is so mysterious. Oh look he disappeared, does that mean we're finally going to do something, not really!
That's awesome and makes me wonder if there's a .hack abridged series out there somewhere lol.
 

Stage On

Member
Alkaid get :) It's funny how tsunder she is at first.

Crimson vs is so incredibly broken, it takes a bit but once you get the right set of cards you're virtually unbeatable at it.
 

Psxphile

Member
Crimson vs is so incredibly broken, it takes a bit but once you get the right set of cards you're virtually unbeatable at it.

I liked that I could set up a deck and let the automated system play it for me while I was playing the real game. It's always nice to log back to the desktop after a long dungeon and find your newly-configured deck wiped the floor with all comers.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Phew! I think we're due some more bonus material! Whaaa? I just had bonus content two days ago? Well its not like me to hold back! My philosophy is to go full strength! Bonus #8'll be...


//Chat [Bonus #08]
ibjw3KFTTREMGJ.jpg

Did you .hack chat? I did .hack chat! So just what was this website anyways? A cute visual chatroom? Or something more? As someone who played around with it I'd say it was alil more then just a chatroom. Chatting by and far was the primary function but there were other stuffs ta do! You could go to areas to hunt for treasures... but watch out! There were sometimes monsters to! And events!! Of course there were other "servers" besides Mac Anu cause I distinctly remember Carmina Gadelica, an there were prolly others represented. Mac Anu was upgraded to match its G.U. counterpart on October 12th, 2006 (as far as I can tell anyway).

ibnRiWTGNko4iG.jpg

What were in the treasure boxes? Stuff to decorate your own private room with! You could invite friends in for private chatting and could even have a NPC man the place! You could give the NPC its own personal greeting/farewell text for visitors and yourself to see! Speaking of customizing, you didn't have to use the provided .hack character avatars. If you had the skills you could create your own! I had no skills but woulda never used anyone besides Terajima Ryoko anyway ^_^! Oh and it didn't matter if you weren't japanese cause the site itself had (machine translated) instructions for english readers! It truly was a nice lil free service for lovers of "The World"!

iGFOdKb5UCndo.gif
isRQdMTUuEqxq.gif

.hack//Chat
May 28th, 2004 - April 30th, 2008
R.I.P.

//Cell Vol.2: Infinite Release ~ Chapter 2
Bordeaux and her goons are up to no good again, giving a sound beating to a young female Twin Blade... "This is too easy, Nanase. You're boring me to death." said Bordeaux. They healed Nanase up so they could inflict more pain upon her but Bordeaux caught site of Midori and changed her target. Without realizing it Midori had re-entered "The World" and now drug her soulless body around fields and towns. She got flash mail from Adamas, Silabus and Gaspard who were all worried about her. Even Haseo sent her a message but none of these stirred any emotion in her "Even these tears are artificial." Bordeaux & crew followed Midori into a field and went about their usual method of assaulting people. However, Midori didn't care and let them do as they pleased "Even if I did feel pain, it isn't anything more than a 0 turning into 1."

It'd been a week since Midori had disappeared but Adamas searched daily. Silabus & Gaspard tried to help as they to were worried about her. As the three of them were speaking Haseo sent Adamas a mail saying there are rumors on the community forum. He checked the info which matched Midori's description, sent a thank-you mail to Haseo then headed back to the usual grass field... where Bordeaux & Co. are still mercilessly beating her. "I'm not used to somone taking a beating without screaming and wailing. Button mashing isn't easy for us, you know?" As she was about to lay down the final blow... Adamas squeezed his way between 'em to shield Midori! Seeing someone with spirit, they decided to kick Adamas around instead. And try as he might, he couldn't even land one hit on Bordeaux.

He tried so hard for her yet she could do nothing but watch as they killed and taunted him "Boss, remember the dead can't talk?" "That means you can't complain if you weaklings get hunted down by me." ...before the trio could realize it, they were dead at the hands of Haseo's scythe! "They barely even boosted my EXP." sneered Haseo who then left. Midori & Adamas decided to go back to town to avoid further confrontations. "It's a long story. Do you have time for it?" "You bet!" it took an hour to tell him her tale and he totally believed it "The world sure is an amazing place. Human thought is based off electric signals, so its basically the same concept as all the 0s and 1s that form The World. From that perspective, I don't think it's all that strange for a person's thoughts to take form here." The two of them decided to try and meet Midori (S)... if she was still alive. They'd first have to locate the hospital she's in but that'd have to wait as Adamas needs to hit the sack. Midori was ready meet the real her and face her future... when she noticed black spots on her dress and body, filling her with fear.

//G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
ibdpyjcGEYMblO.jpg

Alkaid wants to go on The Cat Smiles Silently quest with Haseo! He obliges and they find out Dr. Pao wants 'em to kick the White Malice Cat as part of his Lucky Animal research! As soon as they enter the area the sneaky kitty attacks and curses them with halved HP/SP for the whole area!! The group tracks the cat down and gives it a good kicking to clear the quest! Lucky Animal campaign now open! Haseo apologizes to Silabus for giving up the title of emperor & choosing the new team without consulting him. Silabus seems fine with it, supporting new players is more his thing anyways. The first round has Team Haseo facing the former Holy Palace champs, and Alkaid got alil annoyed when Haseo & Atoli did some private chatting in the waiting room! The former champs weren't tough at all btw. Guest announcer Antares notes that Haseo has a fighting spirit about him "Perhaps he has a girl he wants to protect! Heh heh heh!" After the match, Alkaid praises Haseo for looking out for his friends on the battlefield and a scene with Sakaki conspiring with Bordeaux to get Haseo plays out...

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A new job extension quest for all those Adept Rogues out there! Silabus & Gaspard wish to accompany Haseo on the Seeker of Karma, though they seem strangely nervous about it. Together they hit up the area Θ Burning Fallen Seven Sins! This event differed from the previous one, instead of navigating a maze-like dungeon solo, Haseo & friends needed to correctly answer questions about "The World's" backstory to progress. Along the way Silabus & Gaspard reminisced over how they met Haseo and got him to join Canard. However, Haseo still has dickishness in him and yells at them for having fun then leaves them behind to finish the event on his own. At the beast statue he angsts over everythings easier alone and that he shouldn't even have friends then sees the light "I'm such an idiot..." he rushes back to apologize and brings S&G with him. Its a good thing to, since 3 people must open the treasure at once or else it'd disappear! The only thing he asks of them is that they stop asking if he's upset, and asks if they always think he's mad and they dodge answering lol. With the event completed his third form is regained! Scythe get!

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Questmania returns! A post on the board lead Haseo/Alkaid/Gaspard to Θ Chaotic Fortified Guard where they hear the familiar voice of... Habuzi!? Looks like he and a friend returned from the underworld to backstab their comrade Ilad and steal the Ancient Egg! As usual they send some minions after Haseo while they run off as their former friend warns Haseo that the world could be destroyed if the eggs hatched, before passing away. ;_; Up next is the Gathering Shadow quest where Bikman asks Haseo/Alkaid/Gaspard to find the Shadowless Dogs and bring him some of their tail fur. They chase 'em around the area, testing out their awesome new Awakening in the process, only to get cornered by the dogs! But with a good eye the *real* dog amongst the fakes was spotted and taken out to clear the quest. Flier campaign is a go!

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The Masquerade quest to obtain an intermediate bounty hunter license came up and Haseo/Atoli/Piros set off to find the Beekeeper's Mask. The entire shrine was devoid of monsters! That is, until they found the item. Then the place became flooded with 'em, with as many as a massive 4 groups per room! Escaping was a tiring experience but when it was all said and done they became bounty hunters once more! PKer campaign is live! Zelkova gave Atoli a great area for leveling up so her, Alkaid & Haseo go to Θ Excusing Illusion's Route! Alkaid briefly questions the area but decides its a good one. She also decides it is good that Atoli isn't Haseo's girlfriend. Both Atoli and Haseo denied they were a couple... so alls fair, right? Haseo later gets an e-mail from Nala who wishes to discuss Atoli's condition. Wanting more information to help her, he decides to meet the old guy at the suspiciously worded area Θ Clever Genius's Moon Raven...

- In the News
• Real life TCG's are back!
• A linear train lines begun construction. The trains will be unmanned, instead controlled remotely and can get from Tokyo to Osaka in under 50 minutes!
• Globe Circle Corp's online game Forbidden has launched! It's of the F2P variety and has players pilot spaceships to visit and explore, attack others ships, and even invade planets!

- On the Boards
• Crimson VS player Kagari can't win! Other players chime in to teach Kagari about deck "concepts" (and make my head spin in the progress!)
• Players discuss a new batch of Chaotic PKers!
• A strange voice was heard inside a dungeon before a player was kicked outta it! Haseo asks for and receives the area words~


Alkaid get :) It's funny how tsunder she is at first.

Crimson vs is so incredibly broken, it takes a bit but once you get the right set of cards you're virtually unbeatable at it.

Alkaid's great! So great infact that I'ma use a bunch of those text-books I hoarded earlier to get her weapon level up to max~! I'm glad VS is broken cause it lets faq writers make good decks for me to use to win with ease! Woohoo!

I liked that I could set up a deck and let the automated system play it for me while I was playing the real game. It's always nice to log back to the desktop after a long dungeon and find your newly-configured deck wiped the floor with all comers.

Yup its another nice breather between checking mail/news/boards. Feel bad for beating its champ though. He deserves it way more then a cheater like me >.<;
 

Stage On

Member
Oh man I totally forgot that chat ever existed. I never used it much since I couldn't understand most of the other people on it.

Crimson vs being so automated is great. You just build your deck and it does everything else for you.

The rules are really hard to understand so I'm not sure I'd want to do it manually anyhow.

Even when I understood most of the rules at one point sometimes the result the computer would give me would be something totally unexpected.

I do feel bad at how Mary Suu Haseo is. He's like number 1 at everything. Crimson vs is like the only thing the Champion was good at and we had to take that away from him :(
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Aww man it woulda been great to have Haseo get his third form in both series at the same time. Gotta stop slacking on Roots! Anyways I wonder why Kuhn's "illness" doesn't act up when he's around Tabby? Must not be into beastgirls? Oh yeah! OP updated to include 2023's .hack//bullet!!


//Cell Vol.2: Infinite Release ~ Chapter 3
Midori exits "The World" back into the sea of data, finding her way into Adamas's M2D! Seeing the real world through his "eyes" was quite an experience! The pair determine that there are 3 hospitals in the area around the CC Corp headquarters worth checking and together they visit 'em. The first two had no patients named Midori (S)... third times the charm? Adamas must've looked kinda shady cause the receptionist wouldn't disclose any info! Midori noticed a girl watching Adamas from a distance as he verbally sparred with the receptionist and told him to go speak with her instead. Its turns out this girl is Kaho! Midori & Adamas remember her as the lone Harvest Cleric who helped out when Bordeaux lynched him. She remembers to! "You're the guy who got the snot knocked outta him!" Kaho sure doesn't hold back!

Midori's gotta tell her tale to Kaho in order to get anywhere, so while in the hospital the three of 'em meet up in Mac Anu! Kaho doesn't really get it... but believes her all the same. Unfortunately "No visitors are allowed. Only her parents can see her." she's in critical condition, no doubt about it. But! Kaho says that if Midori can really travel anywhere on the network she could surely get into the hospitals intranet and from there a camera in Midori (S)'s room! So off Midori goes~ Through the security camera she sees Midori (S) hooked up to many machines, looking like she could die at any moment. Midori wanted to help but "The gap seperating the real world from the virtual world was infinite. There was no way for her to cross it."

"My problem is that I'm thinking like a human!" she transferred to the medical equipment and soon came to a gate. If human thoughts really created from electric signals the two could converse! With that in mind she hacked the gate... and was confused to find herself in Mac Anu? "Who are you?" A lengthy explanation later Midori (S) was glad she gave birth to Midori and asked her to live on in her place. She really has given up all hope. Determined to save her, Midori leaves to hook back up with Adamas & Kaho in the real Mac Anu. Midori believes that Midori (S)'s will to live was inherited by her, and that if she can return to being a single cell and re-enter the girls body, just maybe she'll regain the will to fight off the mysterious illness. Wouldn't this cause Midori to disappear? None of them wanted that. But how would she delete all the excess data she's acquired as an AI? It was then she noticed that the black spots on her body had begun to grow...

//Roots
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ep.16
: Taihaku's deep in thought at Briona Gwydion when the graphics distort and Ovan approaches. He thinks maybe they've met before but Ovan says nah, but does say there isn't anyone who's not heard of Taihaku of Icolo. Haseo's at Hulle Granz replaying Shino's final moments in his mind, looks at the Sign there and just loses it "Damn it, damn it, damn it!" Tabby overhears gossip about an official event and sees Kuhn passing by and asks him about it! "You mean the Forest of Pain?" he tells her abit about it then heads off "I'm busy trying to setup a new guild." Haseo goes to Phyllo for info mentioning he'd visited Shino in real life "And because they don't know the cause they don't know how to treat her. That's why I need to track down Tri-Edge right now." unfortunately for him Phyllo says no. Tabby or Haseo. Who should Pi & Yata have Saburou follow? They joined at the same time and both came into contact with the unknown. Pi tells Saburou to make contact with Tabby, though Saburou thinks Haseo is much more interesting.

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Taihaku arrives at Ran Hati and proceeds to enter the Forest of Pain event. Tabby must be into the rumors board cause she heard the FoP's prize is a chance to fight Tri-Edge. Haseo overhears this and asks if its true but Phyllo logically spells out why that cannot be the case. "I care about Shino. I wanna do something to!" but Haseo tells Tabby she's useless and can't do anything. This angers Phyllo enough to drag them to a field where he and Haseo argue then fight! Phyllo kicks his butt despite being a Harvest Cleric! Haseo says he'll save Shino even if it kills him which really upsets the old guy "Talking about death is not something you should take lightly!" Yata's been spying and is now interested in Phyllo. Phyllo wishes Haseo would stop thinking he can do everything by himself. Saburou finally approaches Tabby and Pi approaches Phyllo! Meanwhile more and more people are entering the FoP... and dying. Haseo sees their bodies and continues in anyway "All I have to do is get stronger. Stronger..."

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ep.17: Tri-Edge shows up at Briona Gwydion for a quick search then takes off. Inside the FoP Haseo's beating on monsters "I'll get even stronger. I'm gonna save Shino no matter what." Pi asks Phyllo why he won't go somewhere private to talk but he burns her by saying he has nothing to say to her! Yata shows up saying "You've encountered the girl." then a flashback to a young girl to passing time chatting with Phyllo. "It was through her that you and Ovan met." Haseo keeps fighting, Tabby & Saburou keep chatting but its time for a change of plan. Saburou's to tail Haseo into the FoP. She catches up to him and throws a heal his way but he's ungrateful about it! "What an interesting kid he is." Ovan's in Briona Gwydion and who should show back up but Tri-Edge? "So. You came." The two begin battle. Tri-Edge blocks all of Ovan's shots then prepares to fire off a Data Drain, while Ovan rips the lock off his left arm...

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Still tagging along, Saburou theorizes Tri-Edge is an AI then speaks of Aura another AI CC Corp couldn't do anything about. Somehow Ovan got the upperhand on Tri-Edge, damaging and forcing him to retreat. As a result of their fight a fresh new Sign was carved into the ground. Tabby finds Kuhn and learns he's started a guild to support beginners! "Hanging out with you the other day made me realize that's something I'd be capable of doing. It's called Canard." she then meets a guy named Seisaku... Back in the forest Taihaku comes across Haseo & Saburou "Hm. Wait a second. You're that..." hm? Taihaku knows of Haseo? They speak about the event abit then part ways. Saburou decides to follow Taihaku who calls her a parasite lol. Without the girl supporting him, Haseo's roughing it solo again with just one day until the event closes.

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ep.18: Tabby's frustrated Haseo's doing his best while she's doing nothing. She can't even check on him because messages can't be sent to people in the FoP from the outside. "Just three hours until its over." Haseo is outta luck, not time, cause a monster just killed him. Saburou lost track of Taihaku and is wondering what to do when she gets a message from Pi " How come you can e-mail me from outside the forest?" Pi just tells her to get back on track following Haseo! Taihaku made it to the end of the forest. He pulls out a shiny new bayonet then disappears! "There's still 2 hours left." Tabby asks Phyllo what he does while he's sitting there logged in and he says he reads and plays with his cats & dogs. Its implied his wife has passed away so its just him and the ageing animals. ;.;

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"I shall ask you a question. Is my daughter safe and sound?" in a strange area a strange upsidedown dude questions Taihaku. He don't know the guys daughter but hopes that she is well. That seemed ta be an acceptable answer cause Taihaku was then transported back to the forests entrance as the first player to clear the event. Haseo catches up to Saburou who says she's quitting the event and leaves him some healing items & her member address!! Pi is pissed Saburou quit her assignment and Saburou is pissed that Pi is hiding stuff from her! At long last Haseo reaches the forests end where a pair of blades await him. He then ends up in the same place as Taihaku "Who are you? And who the heck is your daughter?" bad answer. Seisaku joins Tabby at Ran Hati in waiting for Haseo to return and Tabby finally has an idea of what she wants to do. The events ending and the area is being deleted... and suddenly Haseo drops down outta the sky looking very different! "Pi. There's no doubt now. He possesses the factor."

//G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
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Using the Sign in the area Haseo met Nala in the new Lost Ground Wald Uberlisterin but the old dude had nothing to say about Atoli besides that he and Haseo have the same goal. He then sold out his fellow captain Hiiragi, telling Haseo he's their next opponent and gives him an armor! The second round came up and Alkaid teasingly questioned if Atoli could fight someone from her own guild. Of course she said yes then Alkaid says don't take everything so seriously but Atoli says she doesn't in a serious tone e.e Guest announcer Antares takes credit for Haseo's turn around an he's like "What are you talking about old man?" lol. The announcer makes the mistake of calling Hiiragi a he and Hiiragi says he'll kick his ass! So the announcer changes his tune and now refers to Hiiragi as a girl hehe. Anyway his team was chumps that went down in practically one shot each. After the match Atoli says she won't be able to log on for awhile cause she must visit a hospital not in her area but that she'll be back for round 3 for sure. Then Alkaid invites Haseo to &#920; Troubled Her Antitheses for training! Everyone else was busy so it was just the two of 'em versus the world!

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Apparently they're the advance guard of Team Haseo and need to work together properly to protect Atoli and to learn teamwork they... what else? Battle monsters. Somewhere along the way Alkaid mentions having seen a dazed Endrance in town. He didn't even notice her an just rambled on about finding his Mia. The reward for beating the boss of the area was Dual Swords called Lit Honeysuckle. Haseo asked her if she knew what honeysuckles symbolize and recalls back to a time when Shino gave him the same(?) item and told him the meaning of it. "Devoted Affection"!! Alkaid denies knowing anything about it and runs off back to town! Canard hit Rank 4! Platform Transport expansion get! Gaspard thinks Silabus has been down lately and asks Haseo to go with them on The Silent Chim quest. Dr. Kubo's Chim Chims are missing and its up to them to find 'em! It was pretty weird going through a whole cave without seeing a single Chim Chim and it made Silabus think of the Mary Celeste. It reminds him of pizza o.o? Weird. The culprit was a large Chim Assassin... the Assassin Dad! He liked collecting Chim Chims but didn't like getting kicked himself! Quest cleared, Chim Kicker campaign open! As for Silabus, it turns out he missed the arena battles alil but is okay now.
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Round 3 is vs Nala's team. Maybe he sold out Hiiragi so he'd assuredly have a shot at Haseo himself? In the waiting room Alkaid mentions her and Haseo's training which gets Atoli kinda worked up! "To.. to... together?" Anyways Nala & crew lasted longer than Hiiragi but in the end it was almost as if he let himself lose. Can't complain about that! Sakaki's once again chatting with Bordeaux saying its up to her now. Hiiragi is saddened Sakaki is associating himself with someone like her but continues to follow his "lord's" orders. Atoli says its not fair Haseo & Alkaid trained alone so now she's forcing him to train with her at &#920; Lingering Aching Love! Too bad for her that Alkaid happened to notice her preparing for an adventure and muscles her way into the party! Things were alil awkward but turned out nice & friendly in the end! After that Kuhn shoots Haseo a mail saying he's overwhelmed fighting AIDA alone wants Haseo to help him out at &#920; Secret Mind's Surpassed! Finally some more Avatar action! Or not. Wandering through 4 freaking blocks to fight 1 boring ol' AIDA <ANNA> ~_~; Skeith's second form is pretty nice looking and strong... got rid of that AIDA in well under a minute! Kuhn thanks Haseo for the help an now in a rare occurence all of Haseo's contacts are available to party up! ... .....

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Alkaid sends an e-mail saying she heard from a player that can tell her what happened to Sirius! She's going ahead to the Lost Ground Coite-Bodher and asks Haseo to meet up there. "I've got a bad feeling..." She encounters... someone from Kestrel who PK's her before she realizes what's going on. It wasn't a normal PK however, as black spots accompanied the attack. Haseo arrives to find Alkaid slumped down on the ground. "What... what is this...? My character is fading... No... my consciousness is... fading..." Haseo begs and pleads for her to not go but she can only offer him some words of encouragement, and tells him to find Endrance and have him take her spot on the team. Then she fades away...

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"Alkaid's... a Lost One..."


- In the News
• Salvador Aihara's been made the goodwill ambassador for Brazil's tourism industry!
• A way to produce and harvest tons of hydrogen from seaweed has been discovered.

- On the Boards
• JunePride is looking for a missing friend who's been online since the server problems but never responds.
• Nuada posts the current top 10 Crimson VS players an once again Gaspard and niu wang claim the top two spots.
• Kazubolo left quite an impression on a female player called Arius. She was swooning so much she drew a picture of the two of them!


Oh man I totally forgot that chat ever existed. I never used it much since I couldn't understand most of the other people on it.
I forgot about it pretty often an never got ta use it as much as I wish I could've! Never even took any screenshots of my time there ;_;

I do feel bad at how Mary Suu Haseo is. He's like number 1 at everything. Crimson vs is like the only thing the Champion was good at and we had to take that away from him :(
Its okies! Optional stuffs always non-canon!
 

Stage On

Member
No Alkaid, not Alkaid!!!!!

You know thinking about this part of the series makes me want to try my hand at growing some Honeysuckle flowers.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Thanks to this thread and these re-re-replays/watches/reads I've contributed to the .hack//wiki alot more then I used to! Its good ta help ^.^ That place may be rough but at least its not lazy like dothackers! Anyways I really really wanna like Roots 21 but it just gets Cell & Midori pretty wrong. And that sucks cause she's a cool character!


//Cell Vol.2: Infinite Release ~ Chapter 4
Meeting her virtual self left Midori (S) with hope and she came to the conclusion that she did still want to live. Sadly though, her time is nearly up. The safe zone she'd created in her mind was beginning to crumble and when it all turns to dust she knows she'll have passed on. In the game, Midori suddenly realizes that the black spots had been in her body this entire time. Back when she encountered Tri-Edge for the first time, she was still basically a newborn and thought nothing of it entering her. Fearing the beast inside may come out at any time Midori set out for the area her professional victim job takes place in order to spare as many innocent bystanders as possible. But waiting for them there was a number of PKers, Bordeaux included. Adamas was scared but Kaho wasn't and told him man up! Midori wasn't up to playing a vicitm today and challenged the lot of them to a real fight with Kaho and a reluctant Adamas as backup.

But before each side could get it on several PKers went berserk! They were infected just like Midori. She decided to help save the still sane players there, even if it meant helping Bordeaux. Meanwhile in a cave dungeon Silabus & Gaspard are on the run from infected PKers! With a Platform in sight their hopes of escape rose, but just as they went to use it a flash mail from Adamas came in! Haseo got one as well but three PKers he'd just defeated had revived and turned crazy, infected as well. The sight of their twisted bodies made him nervous... and excited to take them on. Midori had to convince Bordeaux to stick around and help fight the crazy players since they're destroying the very area itself, showing Bordeaux may care a little about the game.

Once he and Gaspard had escaped, Silabus went to check the boards and saw tons of posts about players going nuts. It was truly an outbreak of bugs and CC Corp still hasn't done a thing about it. S&G rush to Midori's area and began reviving and healing the regular players, hoping to turn the tide against the crazed ones! "Let's finish this in one go." "Pft! Don't order me around. Once this is all over you're next." But the three berserk players were to much for everybody. There seemed to be no way to win and to make matters worse a bunch of gawkers who'd heard about the battle on the forums were showing up. Then it happened... Midori's worst fear came to pass as she let out a piercing scream. "Midori's body began to transform. A scream of despair echoed throughout the land."

//Roots
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ep.19
: Pilocchio's tending to his shop when a noob strolls up calling his prices a scam! Pilocchio thinks the newbie is Tawaraya, but he denies it and says to call him Tohta. Inflation hit shops all over and its suspected this is due to Real Money Trading. Exams must be over cause Cashmere & Wool have logged back in! Tohta goes to Phyllo and the old guy figures him out right away. Phyllo asks what took Tohta so long to rejoin the game and is told its cause he's a college student preparing to go study overseas! Pilocchio slashes prices and when questioned by his partner Ita says its what Tawaraya would do, hoping he'd acknowledge him. W&C return from dungeon crawling and sell their unneeded goods to Pilocchio! Meanwhile, shady guys led by the even shadier Ochi discuss falling prices and how its hurting their business. Always the worried one, Pi tells Yata there's a rumor that Tawaraya is back but he's not concerned. Business slows to a crawl when rumors that P&I are remnants of TaN spread and Ochi stops by to rub it in. While spying on Haseo, Yata's also spies on Pi who's spying on Tohta! Blargh! Tohta figures out that Pi was Ender and asks her to tell Naobi that he's gonna lure the RMT's out. P&I play their role demanding the RMT's stop but get attacked by them, however W&C show up to help fight 'em off! Tohta tricks 'em into admitting their illegal activities and Yata uses his powers as an admin to ban the baddies! Back in town Yata just happens to pass by Tohta and whispers to him "I've paid back my debt."

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ep.20: "Do you know Tri-Edge?" no? Then you're dead. 3 PKers fall to Haseo's scythe. Tabby's so into rumors! She's now heard that Tri-Edge has disappeared. Yata's next step is to awaken Haseo's factor and Pi suggests shaking him up, explaining how hers had been awakened during a very emotional moment. Since Haseo's mentally unstable right now it should be a cinch right? More rumors! Tabby says she read that people are saying Haseo's lost it! She's decides to go see for herself. Meanwhile Tohta hits up Pilocchio & Ita for info and they tell him a rumor. Someone saw a player fight and defeat Tri-Edge at a Lost Ground! Now they need to find the player who witnessed that. Tabby greets Haseo at the Chaos Gate and offers him an item but he blows her off. Well... it's a start.

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Pi wants Saburou give back her PC so she can use it on Haseo but Saburou says she's keeping it! Pi gives her a week. Tabby & Seisaku are chatting about how much of a jerk Haseo is but that she still wants to help him. Saburou PKs a passerby and comes to the conclusion that Pi wants to test Haseo's power... and goes to test it herself. She survives alot longer than the average player but he kills her. He returns to town to get info from Phyllo, but the old guys not going to help so Haseo slinks away... with Tohta in pursuit! Taihaku stops by to chat with Phyllo and says he believes Haseo is the only one to have truly cleared the FoP, and if going nuts is the reward he's glad he didn't clear it! Tohta approaches Haseo in Hulle Granz and greets him with some of his catchphrases and for a moment Haseo snaps back to reality. "Tawaraya?"

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ep.21: At the Chaos Gate in Mac Anu a female Edge Punisher in a blue kimono with long black hair... appears very distressed. When asked what's wrong she simply says Tri-Edge and warps away. And that's how rumors start spreading of a player who got away from Tri-Edge. Ita thinks Phyllo is the one that got away, but Pilocchio's off to hunt for more info all the same. Yata spies on the female player "Tri-Edge. The Lost Ones. A series of mysterious phenomona. Is this PC just another player that got swept up with the tides, or is there something more at play here?" Tabby wants advice from Phyllo but he's not logged in all day which is very strange. In his place, Tohta suggests Tabby should be a guild master! Saburou reflects on her loss to Haseo "I can't get that guy out of my head!" while Haseo approaches the female player and takes her up on her "hit me if you can" service. Tabby starts a guild and tells Seisaku she wants to heal not just Haseo but his victims as well. At the same time, mystery girl and Haseo go at it and she skillfully evades his attacks until his minute is up.

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We finally learn the girls name. Midori. Pi approaches P&I offering 'em info to pass along to Tohta, then goes to see Saburou who offers the PC back but Pi doesn't want it anymore. Pi says Saburou can keep it and to not bother her again. "Why can Midori comes across Tri-Edge when I've been hunting for him?" hunt harder Haseo. Tohta's a busy guy. He first approaches Midori "I wanna know more about that player that was fighting Tri-Edge." she doesn't know, nor can she remember anything else about the encounter. Then pays Tabby & Seisaku a visit, telling Seisaku he'll need to dump his character and make a new one! A Harvest Cleric and that they should have at least one more player. Seisaku mentions his real world friend Hideyo is gonna start playing soon and'll ask him to join. Finally he visits Haseo to tell him that Tri-Edge had indeed been defeated by someone. And so Haseo's back off for another match with Midori. They battle for reals this time and Haseo ends up dead. "Guess you're just not strong enough."

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ep.22: The Paw Pad Squadron makes their debut! In spectactular failure they not only aren't able to heal players but get their butts kicked themselves. Kuhn encounters AIDA in a cave, the experience causes his factor to awaken. "How do you expect to go around helping adults when all you have is the strength of a three year old?!" a little tough love from Tohta gets the PPS off to level the heck up! Pi approaches Kuhn to recruit him, saying his PC is dangerous and he shouldn't hang around his current guild. Tabby inquires about Seisaku's goggles and Hideyo says its because Seisaku admired the guild master of the Twilight Brigade... but Ovan wore red glasses says Tabby. Oops! Some admirer! Kuhn stops by Canards @HOME to bring Silabus & Gaspard out on an adventure "Let's go raise your levels!" As it happens, the Canard crew happens upon the same area as the PPS and helps 'em out.

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Later on the PPS's hanging out at Arche Koeln. Tabby mentions her family doesn't get along so Seisaku says they could be a family! "Now matter how uncertain things are a family will stick together, right?" someone better hold him to that. And as to Tabby's loneliness, Seisaku can help with that if they meet in the real world!? Roleplaying! Tabby's the mom and the dad is... Seisaku? Nope! Hideyo says Tohta! This makes Seisaku wince! Pi takes Kuhn to an area with AIDA to lecture him about it and his power "Try to imagine the effects of a power you can't control." Tohta suggests the PPS follow Haseo around to heal him and the people he kills. That way they'll get famous and more people will join! A sorrowful Kuhn regrets to tell S&G that he's gonna leave Canard. He just wants them to be able to play the game normally and hands over leadership to Silabus. More players get killed by Haseo but this time... they're revived! Haseo is healed to! The PPS is on the move! Course this just annoys him "Idiots."

//G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
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Atoli was praised by Kaede for remembering stuff she read in a strategy guide and was given new area words! She wants to use 'em right away and e-mails Haseo & Alkaid wanting the three of them to go and train for the finals! But Alkaid hasn't replied yet. Haseo goes with her to &#920; Ephemeral Time's Memoir and after another weak AIDA attack he tells her what happened and she blames herself as they head back to town. Haseo's wondering where Endrance may be and gets mail from Ovan telling him exactly what he needs to know! That guy sure is being helpful lately. So he sets off for Indieglut Lugh alone. Before he gets there, Bo is apologizing to the still crystalized Endrance for not being able to go against his sister to free him. When Haseo arrives Saku is there and irritated to see him! As usual she thinks he's trying to steal Master En from her and she kinda loses it. Supposedly AIDA's to blame but I say its just her Endrance fanaticism!

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Either way she summons her Avatar, the really cute Gorre! Apparently Bo is with her and reluctant to help attack Haseo, but she makes him anyway. They were a really tough pair and almost won but Haseo squeaked out a win. Saku was in control so she prolly felt the brunt of Data Drain which caused her to take a nap. After making sure Bo was okay, Haseo calls out Endrance who's still super sulky over losing "Mia". You get the feeling he doesn't have much of a life outside the game but Haseo doesn't care and basically tells him to stop dicking around cause he needs him. Pi's picked up AIDA signals in another area and asks Haseo along to help out and also that the third member is up to him. We haven't seen much Piros action lately so he'll come along! Maybe they'll get to see his super secret super attack! Haseo wasn't paying good attention cause instead of using the Warp Point he used the Platform and exited the area by mistake. Whoops! After yet another dinky AIDA got disposed of she said being PKed by people infected by AIDA is the game so she should take Atoli's place in the next match.

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It's time for the finals and Atoli is disappointed over being left out but accepts it. In the waiting room Haseo & Pi figure out that they're alike in the way that neither like being treated nicely! Endrance never showed up so its just Haseo & Pi versus Bordeaux/Negimaru/Grein, the latter of which were chumps. The twisted looking AIDA infected Bordeaux took credit for killing Alkaid which pissed Haseo off so much he let his guard down and got trapped by AIDA arms! This is when Endrance enters the arena to stylishly save Haseo and diss Bordeaux in one swoop! She unleashes the AIDA <Oswald> possessing her. It looks like a real creepy spider and was no pushover. Haseo managed to Data Drain it with just a shred of his health left! But something strange is going on. The crowd is utterly confused as to what had just gone down, almost as if they were able to see it all...
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After the match Endrance notes that he and Haseo are more than "friends" o.o and Saku decides to be friendly and give her member address too, though Haseo ain't buying that act. Gaspard sends an e-mal saying he saw a post about Tri-Edge on the boards, so Haseo checks it out and figures Piros found another Sign. He heard to the Lost Ground Sif Berg and Piros mistakes him for Tri-Edge... again! Then goes through his whole "hypothetical" story of a graphic designer out for revenge! Haseo's heard all that before and tells him to just stay away from Tri-Edge for his own safety! Next up he gets a mail from Atoli asking him and Bo to join her on a quest~

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- In the News
• The comedy duo Usagimaru & Rei-chan make their CD debut this month. Their group is all the rage in Japan, with spots on tv shows and live performances!
• Six 10 year old Doll Syndrome patients disappeared from their homes & hospital two nights ago.
• A 16 year old girl from Sapporo was found comatose at home while playing an online game... ;_;

- On the Boards
• Kaki Leader confirms Crimson VS cards can be obtained in "The World" but forgets how. Luckily butt-Rice remembers using the area word "Competing" will net you a card from a Beast Temples chest.
• Fuchu saw Kaede looking extremely cool in a field slaying monsters and drew a picture of her! Zelkova was there to... but he was just chasing Chim Chims lol.
• Players gush on and on about how cute the Medic Union PCs look!
• Syake sees Piros the 3rd and a girl named Natsume every month in Mac Anu meeting to discuss manga! She's heard they're two of the legendary .hackers but finds it hard to believe someone so shiny & golden like Piros could be one!


You know thinking about this part of the series makes me want to try my hand at growing some Honeysuckle flowers.
To suck out their sweet tasty goodness?
 

ban25

Member
Hmm...I played Infection when it was released, but couldn't finish it. This thread makes me want to pick it back up again.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
This is gonna be a fun update~ but first. I'm allowing myself a Cell break! Yay!

Fun Fact: Roots episodes 22 to 26 never aired on US tv. So we're covering new territory for people who used to stay up until 5 a.m. each friday night to catch the latest episode, but never bothered to later get the last couple dvds!

UnFun Fact: Even though Roots was the first anime tv series with an HD broadcast, it still has yet to be released on blu-ray (or hd-dvd lol), anywhere! >.<


//Roots
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ep.23
: The Paw Pad Squadron's chilling in town when Haseo passes by. Hideyo calls him papa which annoys Haseo. He's not the type for roleplaying! Later, Haseo stares down a PKer with a weird face asking him about Tri-Edge and as usual ends up PKKing him. Kuhn is fussing over not being allowed in Raven's @HOME yet, saying he hates secrets. Well Yata's a reasonable guy so he lets him right in! "Have you heard the legend about the .hackers?" Kuhn should know... He later goes to warn Tabby that tons of PKers are gathering to gang up on Haseo! Phyllo says Haseo needs the tough medicine of getting beaten down but Tabby disagrees. Some regular players tell Haseo that he might be able to meet Tri-Edge by waiting in a certain field, finally a breakthrough! Phyllo stops by Pilocchio & Ita's shop to demand they tell Tohta to get in contact with him! The old guys sure on edge these days. Haseo enters the field and finds himself surrounded by an untold number of PKers "I'll take you all on!"

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The PPS makes it there and decides to focus on healing Haseo only which is easier said then done. Tohta finds Phyllo who asks him to find out who set the trap Haseo's fallen into this time. "Wow this really is a Haseo festival." says Saburou who's content just watching the lynching. Some PKers notice the PPS healing Haseo and turn their sights on them! With P&I's help, Tohta fishes out Bordeaux who takes credit for the trap and says that once Haseo becomes famous for beating all them PKers, her team will take him out and earn mad respect! And succeed he did. Bodies everywhere, including those of the PPS whom he just callously leaves for dead. Tohta reports back to Phyllo saying there's no grand conspiracy against Haseo. At Arche Koeln Seisaku and Hideyo leave the PPS... unable to carry on trying to help someone like Haseo. Tabby's left all alone again and is later threatened by Haseo who tells her to never follow him again. "I don't need anybodys help. I can do this on my own."

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ep.24: Thanks to his feat in the previous episode, word gets around that Haseo killed 100 PKers at once by himself and he becomes known as the Terror of Death. Bordeaux and her group are up to their usual antics when a much stronger Haseo butts in and mops the floor with 'em. Pi informs Yata that Ovan is back and Tabby's sulking when Saburou shows up to try and cheer her up! "What about you?" Haseo's doing stuff for Shino but what is Tabby doing for her? Seisaku & Hideyo decide they want to continue healing players and Tabby overhears an arguement between Sakaki and Haseo. Ovan returns to town where Haseo notices him and dumps Sakaki to go give chase and catches up to him at Arche Koeln. "Its been a long time Haseo." "What have you been doing for the last 6 months?" He tells Haseo that Tri-Edge will return to the scene of the crime.

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Stubborn headstrong Haseo charges off to &#916; Hidden Forbidden Holy Ground ahead of wise, collected Ovan who's going to make preparations (prolly picking up recovery items in town) for the battle with Tri-Edge. There, Saburou was waiting and does her usual thing of sitting back and watching unnoticed. At the cathedral, Haseo reminisces about a time he and Shino were in the Hulle Granz Cathedral when Kite shows up! Wait... did Haseo call him Tri-Edge? "It's entirely up to you Tabby." Phyllo's words don't reach Haseo anymore so he leaves it to her. Her words do reach, that's why he always runs from her. Saburou has a front row seat for the battle while Yata/Pi/Kuhn watch from the Serpent of Lore. This Tri-Edge guy seems to take no damage and has a green luminescent glow around him much like Data Bugs did. In any case the two fight and Haseo easily loses. Tri-Edge Data Drains him and Haseo passes out... "It seems that Haseo's battle with Tri-Edge has altered his data!" exclaims Pi. At the battles end Saburou is at a loss for words. Tohta asks her to tell him what happened "Haseo was... He's been erased."

//G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
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Mushroom Hunting? Sounds like a nice casual quest! Marel wants them to obtain an Eternal Mushroom from a cave full of tough monsters! Atoli's glad Haseo came with, Bo's happy he got invited, but Haseo's skeptical since things don't end well in places Atoli invites him! Strangely the cave has no monsters! In their place is 3 teams of PKers!? They say Haseo's acting like a bigshot by coming to this dungeon. Huh? Haseo doesn't get it either. Further inside Bo thinks he heard someone speaking and when they reach the end they find Negimaru rehearshing a speech about his new PKer-only guild. After a sad tale about how Bordeaux & Grein went missing after their last match with Haseo, he and his two flunkies taunt Haseo. They expect 9 other PKers to show up so they can all take him on... but they were taken care of already. Negimaru and his two flunkies attacked, got beatup, and ran away save for Negimaru. Recalling the first time he met Bordeaux and got pummeled by her, and when they first met Grein and he got pummeled by him, he draws out the strength to use items and continue the fight alone! They beat him again and he decides that as a PKer he must take out at least one of 'em and aims for the "midget" Bo! Saku takes control and spanks Negimaru with a surprise Vak Don! She then proceeds to lay into him verbally so hard even Haseo thinks its brutal. Negimaru runs away crying and they obtain the mushroom to clear the quest. Alls well that ends well... I guess?
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Saku sends an e-mail demanding Haseo invite her and Endrance for 'special' training. "I can't ignore her, or I'll pay for it later..." Once there Saku tries to get Endrances attention but his eyes and mind is only on Haseo which upsets her! Visiting the area &#920; Raging Scheming Conclusion he got from the boards, Haseo encountered Krewhaha who steals the Nucleus of Light from him!! Canard hit Rank 5! Shop Acorn can now sell up to 10 items at a time! With those tiring excursions outta the way its time for the title match! Haseo/Pi/Endrance are ready to go when Atoli shows up wanting back into the group, still blaming herself for all of this. Kuhn shows up saying he'll fight in her place. He won't back down so Pi lets him take her spot, leaving it all up to the boys!

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The Winged Guy and Naked Guy turn out to be immortal! Sirius was really fired up and got in lotsa counterattacks and his Divine Awakening: Demise Claw was vicious! When Team Haseo decided to focus on just him and ignore his mirage-like teammates the AIDA <Helen> controlling him came out and got shut down fast. Seriously weak compared to Bordeaux's. After it fell, Pi was able to guide Atoli's Epitaph back to her which cured her paralyzed arm! The real Winged Man & Naked Man showed up and killed the AIDA copycats then took off with Tri-Edge in tow. Which left Haseo wondering why Tri-Edge & his pals targeted Shino if they're also fighting AIDA? Then much like Kite before him, Haseo had his own moment of doubt. Well anyway when he logged out he found an e-mail from someone he'd never expected to hear from again... ;_;
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&#920; Bequeathed Insatiable Mysteries ...eh. The moment Haseo arrives Phyllo messages him "...What do you want to know?" as usual Phyllo is up to giving advice and tells Haseo to meet up with him in the area. When he does so, he opens Haseo's eyes to Adler's Keys. Mysterious items needed to unlock he and his characters hidden power. Next Phyllo gives him the words to a new Lost Ground Phyllo. At Caerleon Medb Phyllo says he's leaving the Sacraments of the Eight Phases to Haseo, who he realizes something is wrong. Phyllo's character seem empty. This is when Antares steps in and expalins that before Phyllo died, he left his character and instructions about they keys and temple in Antares' care. This was his last will. After Haseo claims his Lost Weapon he senses something about it. "I can feel it... Phyllo's spirit... Thanks... Phyllo."

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While Haseo's off checking his mail and relaxing in the real world, Atoli is getting royally jerked around by Sakaki. He says she must atone for her sins of allowing the AIDA server to be created and all the pain it brought others. She still feels he's the only one she can turn to and he uses that to his advantage by saying even if everyone else hates her he'll pardon her as long as she follows his orders. She agrees and then...? Haseo's not in the mood for a crowning ceremony but heads off to Hy Brasail all the same. After being presented his award its time for chatting! Gaspard's so happy he feels like he won! Silabus asks if Haseo will aim for the Sage Palace title next! Saku's fallen in love with Master En all over again and Endrance is happily gazing at Haseo! Antares is accessing from a bar getting drunk again and gives Haseo his member address! Haseo asks Pi what they can do to bring back the Lost Ones and she's like all we they can do is not run away. Piros thought up a better prize for Haseo! Instead of a kiss he squashed Haseo with a great big hug!

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Haseo got tired and went to be by himself. Wondering why Atoli, nor anyone from Moon Tree was at the party. Suddenly Pi, Kuhn & Kaede came running up to him. Sakaki has started a revolt! Zelkova was PKed by Atoli! And to make matters worse, Moon Tree's @HOME has become a small-scale AIDA server! Haseo/Pi/Kuhn hurry back to town and to the Chaos Gate to warp there, but... their access was denied. Pi explains how AIDA must be evolving through its interactions with players and Epitaphs. It's now picking and choosing whom it wishes to observe and experiment on. In order to get to Moon Tree they'll have to hack a Sign, so Yata sends them off to gather the needed Data Seed. Meanwhile, he's awfully pleased Haseo's finally handed over the item he found back in the original AIDA server...


- In the News
• Work on the movie about "The World" is progressing, and its CG actress is supposed to be very realistic!
• Haseo's become famous thanks to his sweeping of the Demon & Holy Palace tournaments, both on his very first try!

- On the Boards
• Negimaru posts about his missing friends, asking for help locating them.
• Another post about a strange NPC pops up and Haseo asks for and receives the area words.
• Players once again wonder about the "special skill" used by arena emporers Endrance and Haseo. One person thinks maybe Haseo got the skill for clearing the Forest of Pain. Another suggests that Endrance and Haseo are former .hackers and the skill is from that era.
• Players post about the Moon Tree coup and not being able to enter their @HOME. One even ponders the guild may disband like TaN had.


//Online Jack
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phase.05
: It turns out the one who sent the e-mail was Osamu Kawaguchi "Help me, Miss Tajima!" he says he's becoming more and more violent when playing that game. He wants to stop but Sakaki won't let him! They follow her to the school and Michiru wonders why her school. "Sakaki and the school must have a connection." suggests Salvador. Michiru climbs the gate but gets alil caught up... resulting in Salvador getting a nosebleed! She goes alone, denying him access since he's not school staff! So he gives her his camera for protection! "Night time in the school is really scary..." "ooooo Michiruuuu...." that is scary! Oh wait its just Salvador messing with her over the headphones LOL. "But I'm getting worried about you! If anything were to happen to that precious body of yours before marriage..." "You are totally hopeless!" Ignorning him she enters the computer lab and finds 5 of the missing kids acting... weird as they begin approaching her... "HEEEEEELLLLLPPPP!!!!!"


Hmm...I played Infection when it was released, but couldn't finish it. This thread makes me want to pick it back up again.

Welllllll what're ya waiting for? Its not that long a game if ya don't go for full completion! Letting a game sit unfinished is something I try hard not ta do!
 

jvalioli

Member
I started replaying Infection today. Haven't played any of these games since they were released and it looks like I've nearly forgotten everything.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Its like the 20th in Japan now ya? Well that makes today 10 years on the nose since Infection was launched over there! Hurrah!

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Happy Birthday .hack//Infection!!


//G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
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Haseo, Kuhn, and Endrance go to hack the Sign at Sif Berg to infiltrate Moon Tree! Meanwhile Yata's paid another visit by a CC Corp messenger who says the higher ups aren't happy with the current situation and with him. Yata's unconcerned about the warning and carries on his duties. Waiting inside Moon Tree is Nala who'll accompany them to the throne room. Haseo asks the old dude is, but Nala maintains he's just a normal player. btw Melo Grunty is sad the guilds in chaos ;_; With the warp to the throne room not working they have to take the long way. Moon Tree's @HOME being an area isn't just for show. It really is like a temple dungeon, even Chim Assassins show up! Up first was a bunch of Unit 7 players. These berserk AIDA influenced players were no pushover! They were setup with gear to inflict all kinds of status effects and would even at times guard against skill triggers! Waiting at the end of Block 2 was Matsu! He understood Sakaki was behind all this, but as he was indebted to him he stood in Haseo's way. After being defeated his PC faded away...

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Block 4 was a maze of warp points (this is the first time the series will dick you over by warping you just steps away from monsters/players) filled with Unit 5 members who were even tougher. Hiiragi awaited at the end of B4. She's really in love with Sakaki and is prepared to do anything for him... like getting pounded into the ground by a Beast Awakening! Endrance gave Hiiragi a lesson in love before her PC faded away. B5's another minor maze full of Unit 6 members who were all female PCs. At the end was Sophora's group who attacked without a single word. The team of Twin Blade "ninjas" attacked so fiercely they brought Haseo's group to the brink of death! An awakening spared their asses! "...I've failed..." the only words spoken by Sophora as he... she?! faded away. Yup, despite having male PCs these guys were actually girls! With the throne room just ahead the group advanced forward... but suddenly Haseo found himself alone in a school??

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The first hallway was filled with the voices of angry adults...
"Prepare and review!" "Act your age!" "Aim higher!" "What would the neighbors say?" "If all your friends jumped off a bridge would you jump to?!" "No I don't remember raising a child like that!"

The second hallway was even more horrible, filled with the voices of snotty teenagers...
"Hey you! Yeah you! Do you watch that show? There's no way you don't watch it." "You have problems!" "You're messed up!" "You'll be ignored to!" "Unbelievably messed up!" "She's looking this way." "Why not smile back?" "I wouldn't go for a weird girl like that!"

After passing through another door Haseo finally arrivied in the rather warped throne room. A shadow of Atoli went on about how she did her best but that it was impossible to please both her parents and friends. Sakaki was there to, taunting Haseo and taking credit for being the only one who truly cares about Atoli. He and AIDA push her until her Avatar, Innis awakens. Finally he announces his plan to use AIDA and the internet to control peoples hearts to make the real world a place where no one ever fights or gets oppressed. That's a heck of a grand scheme! Haseo and Atoli begin fighting and Haseo was so distracted by her cries of "I want you to look at me! Nobody ever looks at me!!!" that he kinda got his butt kicked until realizing when she is and isn't a mirage >_>; Sakaki watches, talking to himself. Seems odd that he could know so much about Epitaphs, AIDA, and the Morganna Factor very top secret stuff. "So then, it's just as he said it would be."

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After Haseo wins Sakaki runs off like a real coward. Atoli's still blaming herself for everything, thinking she's all alone until Haseo gives her a slap and a stern talking to. Zelkova was able to return and after consoling Atoli and mentioning that all the people lost in the Moon-AIDA server are returning, he spills Nala's true identity. Yata?! Seems he has enough free time to role multiple characters "just in case". Haseo wants to know where Sakaki is and Yata gets on it. He works fast and tells the others to meet at the Serpent of Lore. As he's logging in, Tri-Edge emerges from his coffin fully restored and warps away with his pals. Yata let's them know Sakaki is headed to the area &#920; Thinking Innocent Life. It's decided that Haseo, Pi, and Atoli will go to speak with him. Pi detects massive AIDA signals in the area so they proceed with caution to the top where they find a Sign and get snuck attacked by Chim Assassins >_<; Right as they're being warped, Tri-Edge and his pals show up. Ovan as well, who blocks their way. He's not about to let them through so the three charge as he smirks and breaks the lock on his arm...

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Haseo and the others end up in Briownya Gideon where they find Sakaki wondering where everything went wrong and Atoli says she can't go along with his current ideals. He chastizes her for always relying on him for every little thing then turning her back and betraying him? He then explains his plan again, a perfect world just like Atoli's always wished for and begs her to come back to him. When she says nuh-uh, and Pi threatens to delete his account, he infects himself with AIDA! "Sakaki will never die! I'll surpass the system!" The AIDA made him extremely strong, coupled with his ability to paralyze on contact made him very dangerous. Worst part of all, he seemed very focused on trying to off the healer Atoli. After the battle he kinda maintained that he'd never die but ends up falling into the abyss. Immediately afterwards, Ovan shows up to congratulate Haseo and give him a present...

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- In the News
• A "depopulation crisis" is occuring across the board in MMOs. Players are quitting en masse and no one can figure out why, but it always starts with a few reports about black spots...
• The makers of M2D are hoping to get their female userbase up by launching a line of them in cute new colors and female targeted software.


I started replaying Infection today. Haven't played any of these games since they were released and it looks like I've nearly forgotten everything.

It was pretty much the same for me! I hadn't replayed the originals in like 5 years and had forgotten much of the little things >.<!
 

Stage On

Member
Lindsay said:
To suck out their sweet tasty goodness?

Nah for their symbolism. They'd make for a great gift to give on a date.

Lindsay said:
- In the News
• Work on the movie about "The World" is progressing, and its CG actress is supposed to be very realistic!

Man alot of those news posts really seem to be foreshadowing stuff that would come later in retrospect
 

Kwixotik

Member
These games were pretty cool. I played/own the first two (Infection+Mutation) and I played all of the GU games (never beat the third).

I have a box set of .hack//Legend of Twilight vol. 1-3 I'm thinking about selling. Any idea how much I might get for it?
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
http://www.cc2.co.jp/cgi-bin/hack_10th_enq/msgenq.cgi?

10th Anniversary poll! Vote for your favorite character outta 110 choices ranging from &#969;RICE to Hiroshi Matsuyama (wait a minute...)! Umm... er, and more prominent characters of course! Don't forget ta leave a comment!! Gotta rep Terajima Ryoko ( &#23546;&#23798;&#33391;&#23376; )!




Also I found this super nicenice image on pixiv for .hack's 10th!
(hope its ok to repost here!)


Nah for their symbolism. They'd make for a great gift to give on a date.

Man alot of those news posts really seem to be foreshadowing stuff that would come later in retrospect
Ya could save some for the yummyness part! Lotsa foreshadowing everywhere if ya look for it! I dun wanna go super crazy looking into things way to deeply though lol.

Still waiting for Tail Concerto 2.
Keep waiting! /Gabi/

These games were pretty cool. I played/own the first two (Infection+Mutation) and I played all of the GU games (never beat the third).

I have a box set of .hack//Legend of Twilight vol. 1-3 I'm thinking about selling. Any idea how much I might get for it?
G.U. 3 is the best one gameplay-wise! Soooo much hax it makes Sora's Blades blush mwahaha! If its the LotT anime boxset it might be worth something since its not been produced in awhile. Not so much for the manga.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Mega update? Mega update. A whole lotta truths being dropped here! This makes 6 games down, 3 to go! 2/3rds of the way there! ...wait, what? n/m! Anyway wtf @ Data Seeds! In ep.08 of Roots it was clearly stated Virus Cores are used to open the path at Coite-Bodher to Megan Fi. Not. Freaking. Data. Seeds! I know Scamco wasn't at the top of their game when localizing G.U. but messing up and renaming Virus Cores is just dumb!!


//The End of "The World"
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file.08
: Concerned with Amagi's plan, Jun states he stole the Epitaph User character of Tarvos and hid in is home computer. "But Amagi didn't bat an eye." he'd created a dummy EU character and went ahead with his plan. If he succeeded in bringing back Aura his genius would be considered on par with Haralds, and if he managed to control her he would have surpassed Harald in the eyes of many. Amagi wanted to fuse his mind with the Ultimate AI to become a god within the network. But the RA Program crashes and in an instant took out 80% of "The World's" data. The seven Chosen Ones controlling the Epitaph User characters fell into comas, while Amagi who had been using the dummy character suffered mental damage...

Genetics of the Unknown: He was playing with Genetics of the Unknown, and unfortunately, I knew it was only to further himself.

//Cell Vol.2: Infinite Release ~ Chapter 5
Tri-Edge entered an area which reeked of death. Haseo was there to, but several berserk players had managed to take him out and his PC disappeared. He'd never know just how close he'd come to finding his nemesis that day. Tri-Edge eyed the players and rushed forth to take them out with ease. Over in Midori's usual area the place itself is getting demolished with cracks in the sky and wireframe popping outta the ground. She hugged herself trying to keep the beast inside while pleaing for everyone to escape, but no one could hear her. Regular players are still at it fighting with the three berserk ones while Silabus/Gaspard & Adamas/Kaho all try to reach Midori - who's body had just been taken over by the demon. It went around effortlessly killing other players like a serial killer. Midori soon sensed the presence of Tri-Edge as he moved towards the area. "Why is he coming here now, of all times?"

She searched her database of knowledge and realized the truth. "He'd never raised his hand against a normal player. All of his prey had suffered from some sort of anomaly." The beast stared down Adamas, raising the Dragonblossom sword high when... CC Corp chimed in saying they'll be performing maintenance in 10 minutes. Everyone must log out or risk data loss. It was then that Tri-Edge appeared. The beasts trembled in fear and the original three raised their weapons to attack, not wanting to go down without a fight! But it was futile. He took the three of 'em out then turned his gaze to the one controlling Midori. "I can't let him kill me... not now." She had to fend off Tri-Edge and and somehow return to Midori (S)'s body all before the maintenance began. But Midori needed control of her body and to that end she allowed herself to merge with the beast. It penetrated her soul in seconds and she soon regained her senses, along with great power. "Two tremendous powers clashed in a world on the brink of destruction."

//Roots
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ep.25
: Rumors spread that Haseo quit! Tabby wonders where Phyllo is as she approaches his usual spot but he suddenly appears "Let me guess, your pets pulled the cord out of the socket?" "No, no... They're not around anymore." She tells him the rumor and says she knows it isn't true, that Haseo won't quit cause he's the only one that can save Shino. Pi explains to Kuhn that Haseo's been knocked back to Level 1 rather than becoming a Lost One and with that in mind Kuhn decides to head out. Seisaku tells Tabby that he likes her but she's not ready to give an answer as there's something she needs to do. Phyllo arrives at Arche Koeln to meetup with Ovan who called him there. "Listen to me. Ovan, you must tell me exactly what it is that you want Haseo to do. So tell me. What did you do? I promise to take whatever you tell me to my grave." Seisaku finds Tabby again and says "Our new guilds ready. We're calling it the Medic Troop Union. And Hideyo's made friends with a guy named Governor Tadashi and..." she stops him, saying he doesn't have to report to her as she's not in the same guild anymore. Back at Arche Koeln, Ovan opens up "I was..." flashing back to him appearing in Hulle Granz, his left arm throbbing in pain as Shino enters happy to see him. She rushes towards him and... suddenly she's struck down.

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"I have heard enough." "That is the truth. Phyllo. My problem is, my problem is exactly the same one that you have." Sometime later Tohta reports in to Phyllo who says he has a favor to ask of him. Silabus & Gaspard check out the goods at Pilocchio & Ita's shop when Kuhn pops up to speak with 'em! "I don't think I should ask you this, but there is something I'd like you both to do." he asks that if they see a guy named Haseo, they should help him as he seems to be in trouble. The two cheerfully agree to help! Back at the the bridge Tohta is stunned but agrees to Phyllo's wishes. Tabby returns to whats left of Ran Hati where she bumps into Saburou. "I think I may have met Haseo." unable to believe Shino was a Lost One, Tabby went to the hospital she's at and thinks she found her and Haseo there. Tohta meets up with Phyllo at Hulle Granz, but Phyllo seems different. "Are you Mr. Tohta? Mr. Tohta, isn't it?" "Yes... I am." they don't have much of a conversation but Tohta thanks him for coming and reminds Phyllo that he can forcibly quit the game. Phyllo understands and does so, his character disappears... and this would be the final time he'd accessed the game... ;_; Haseo finally logs back in, confused. "What is this? It can't be?" realization that setting in everything he'd gained in the game set back to zilch.

//G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
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The first gift Haseo received was one of Tri-Edge's arms! "You fought Tri-Edge...?!" "No, that's..." Ovan clutches his left arm in pain and the graphics seem to distort for a moment. "Haseo, let me show you how those scars are made. Burn this into your eyes...!" he once again breaks the seal on his arm and the group is almost at a loss for words at what they see. Attached to his PCs left shoulder is an AIDA arm!! Pi speaks up but it attacks, killing her in an instant. Haseo can only gasp in shock before trying to tell Atoli to run but it gets her as well. Much like Shino, Alkaid, and others before them, their PCs fade away unnaturally. "That is why you must destroy me, Haseo!" utilizing his Bayonet, Blade, and AIDA arm, these three weapons create a fresh new Sign on the ground. Haseo doesn't want to believe it but Ovan doesn't even humor his wish and tells Haseo to meet him at the Lost Ground Megin Fi.
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After Ovan left Haseo noticed he'd gotten an e-mail. Hoping against all hope that it was from Pi or Atoli he quickly logged out and found it was from... Matsu? Disappointing, but its good he recovered! He greeted Haseo in Dol Dona and gave on update on Moon Tree's situation. Many players have quit not just the guild but the game itself and the guilds area can't be accessed now. He'll keep on playing and hands over his member address! Sweet! Haseo/Matsu/Saku went off to do some training/item gathering but got game over'd by the chaotic PKer Immortal Goriki -.-! Anyways Yata reminded Haseo he can get to Megin Fi via the Sign in Coite-Bodher. Haseo scurries right over there but finds he doesn't have enough Vi......... Data Seeds for the pillars there. As luck would have it, Yata found that the area &#920; Misjudge Precept's Symphony has AIDA signals and sends Haseo there to drain them for the remaining seeds. But he only got one! Luckily back in town Pi was there with the last one needed, which Yata had gotten from the item Haseo'd forked over. It took some time but her & Atoli had recovered by the way. Recalling how he and his entire party got an ass whopping from Sakaki, Haseo decided to re-evaluate his gear! Some alchemy and customization later, he headed for Coite-Bodher. Alone.

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In the past the members of the Twilight Brigade activated one of each pillar but now it was just Haseo. He did so and used the warp to Megin Fi, the place Ovan disappeared from so long ago. "...You were the one who PKed Shino?" Ovan says yup and also takes credit for manipulating Sakaki. It was all for Haseo. To make him grow up strong? He says he'll make Ovan pay and the battle begins! Ovan & AIDA put up a good fight with fierce combos, super laser attacks, things that healed Ovan and dealt light based attacks against Haseo, and of course the AIDA arm which would toss Haseo around followed by Ovan attacking with all of his weapons at once! Despite all of that the battle drug on long enough for Ovan to become impatient. "Surpass your limits!!! Kill me!!!!! Come The Rebirth...!" "You... you're an Epitaph-User?!" C'mon Haseo. Did ya really expect anything less?

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Like so many other Avatars, Corbenik was massive compared to Skeith. His shots hit more often than not and the AIDA arm helped out as well. Luckily Haseo was on his A game and brought things to a quick conclusion! "No... This isn't the death I've been wishing for..." Ovan muttered as his PC faded away. Yata was watching from the same spot Naobi had lured Ovan to back in the day. He condescendingly congratulated Haseo and asked if he was happy. Of course not! Then he really rubs it in Haseo's face that the Lost Ones won't return just because he PKed Tri-Edge.
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"My fight is over...
But then, what's really changed since I began?
In the end, I wasn't able to save anyone...
...I'm tired... Shino...
I'm done...
For now I just want to go back to the real world and rest..."

After the shorter than last time credits have rolled, a scene in the Icolo @HOME takes place. Taihaku is hanging out thinking to himself when someone or something lets themselves in. He may not have invited a guest, but he got one which caused him to yell out in pain!

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Some time later Haseo sees an e-mail from Atoli. She wishes to discuss the past, present, and future with him at Hulle Granz, so he logs in and heads over there. What was he saying before? Whenever Atoli invites him someplace things turn out bad? He was right about that! After some idle chitchat Atoli suddenly gets a terrified expression on her face! A hand is placed on Haseo's shoulder from behind... "Become stronger Haseo. Strong enough... to destroy me!" What happened from there? We can only guess. I imagine either Haseo shit his pants and forced a log out, or Ovan said "Well, catch you later Haseo!" and walked out.

- G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
Game Cleared: 33:38:04 (79:13:38)
Game Cleared 100%: tbd

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- In the News
• Last night, popular entertainer Salvador Aihara fell into a coma and was hospitalized.
• Online Jack is in danger of no longer being aired due to breaking into a school and damaging property there, along with broadcasting the names and faces of six children without parental permission. Michiru has been suspended for 6 months but parents are looking to get her fired.
• The first civilian to visit the space station Village was launched into space yesterday!
• Toho Electronics announced they've successfully created a low-cost 3D television. $10,000 is a steep drop from the current $30,000 models!

- On the Boards
• Players discuss the story of Salvador becoming comatose. Judecca considers the possibility that Salvador was playing "The World" and got put into a coma by Tri-Edge!
• Princess Sakuya makes a thread stating she'd been hit on in the game for the first time! She says the man is named Kazubolo and that he said he's a celebrity in real life for his hard hitting investigations... Apparently, right now he's hanging out in Dol Dona~

//Online Jack
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phase.06
: Michiru welcomes viewers and recaps the situation of the six kids. "I've been under pressure, not only from school but also from other somewhat related organizations." they wanna her to keep quiet but for the sake of her students she's gonna report the truth! The video changes to what happened that night in the school. The kids wrangled her to the ground when Salvador broke in through a window! "You kids leave her alone!" the five kids quiet down and step aside to reveal a sixth "Tooru Uike? Don't tell me you're Sakaki?" Salvador asks. "The time has nearly come for me to release the great power. From the online world to reality. In order to change this rotten world." Salvador runs up telling him to knock it off, sets one hand on the boys shoulder and... gets knocked out by an electric shock! Tooru says Michiru is next and directs the other kids back at her. Fortunately some cops show up "Hey! What are you kids doing?" Annoyed by the interuption, Tooru and the other kids vanish! "This is not a made up story. This bruise is proof of what happened." those 10 year olds got her good. She and Salvador had tracked down the truth and came to a terrible conclusion. "All the parents watching this program. Please stop your children from playing these online games. The World is dangerous. This game will control your childrens hearts."
 

Stage On

Member
I really like how well online jack is tied into the overall game. It just feels more connected especially when you can run into the man character and talk and trade with him.

Haseo must have had a laugh watching it too. I can just see him going "That's Sakaki?"
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Thats a wrap for Roots & Reminisce! We're almost done... or are we?? Alil over 52 hours for Vol.2 which is a drastic decrease from last years 78 hours. For the future I definetely gotta remember to stock up on Beginner's Text/Books in Vol.1 cause having those are huge time savers in cutting out lotsa endgame weapon leveling! Nearly 100 hours between 2 games? Yup these three's time'll easily surpass the original sagas even with me playing at my best!


//Cell Vol.2: Infinite Release ~ Chapter 6
"All we can do now is stay and see how this ends." Adamas & Kaho are the only remaining players in the field, if it could even still be called one at this point. Midori no longer resembled her old self yet the two could definetely sense her aura. She and Tri-Edge battled it out doing very little damage to each other as another CC Corp message popped up stating maintenace is 5 minutes away. Meanwhile in Midori (S)'s mind, the world she'd created to protect herself continued to crumble "The body she had abandoned in the real world would probably stop functioning soon." She tried to think of ways to stave off death and came to a simple answer. "I want to live." her will to go on had already created one miracle. If she continues to hold onto that, then maybe...

After being killed off Silabus & Gaspard logged back in and tried to re-enter the area Midori and the other were at but access to it had been blocked by CC Corp. As maintenance time loomed near all they could do was hope for the best while logging back out. At the same time, Haseo approached Phyllo for info on berserk PKers but Phyllo suggested Haseo knew more about them then he did. This was true as Haseo had crossed blades with them. Midori & Tri-Edge were at a stalemate but as the fight drug out it was clear he had the upperhand. Annoyed by this, the beast took hold of Midori's body once again and started fighting with just brute force which was a losing battle. Midori reviewed all she'd learned up to this point and it became crystal clear what she must do. "I need him to shoot me now!" The beast had a moment of indeciveness which allowed Midori's strong will to take control again. She said thank you to Adamas, then faced Tri-Edge.

"Show me true death!" Midori shouted at Tri-Edge as she plunged her sword into her own body. Tri-Edge got the hint and raised his right arm. "Good... That's exactly what I want." his light pierced her body, wiping out the beast within her. She plunged her Dragonblossom into the ground to leave something behind of herself. Then just as she'd evolved, Midori devolved back into a single cell. Maintenance lasted roughly an hour. This was because CC corp took the lazy way out and rolled back data causing many to be upset over lost items and exp. Still, all was back to normal save for the permenantly lost data of a PC named Midori. A month later, Adamas and Kaho met up in the real world to pay a visit to Midori (S). On Midori's final day in "The World" Midori (S) had begun to recover. Adamas was still upset over Midori's self-sacrifice but the moment he saw Midori (S) his anxiety vanished. "Nice to meet you, I'm..."

//Roots
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ep.26
: Haseo aimlessly strolls around town when Tohta spots him. They head to a more private place where Haseo's filled in on Phyllo. "Knowing he had cancer with only 8 months left to live, how could he continue to come and play the game? And he was worrying about me?!" "During his last few days he wanted to live them out calmly, as if nothing had changed." Having passed on Phyllo's "stick to your guns" message, Tohta feels ready to leave the game and is pleased to know that Saburou will keep an eye on Haseo, even if only from a distance. Pi & Kuhn are off hunting AIDA again, however this ones different... it seems to be evolving? "Forget about getting a sample, that thing was a beast." Kuhn manages to defeat it, but Pi's left worried what may become of the world if they spread and continue evolving. Over in Coite-Bodher a man approaches Haseo "I have a feeling I could become friends with you." this man... this... Silver Knight feels they have alot in common but Haseo simply tells him to get lost. Boo! If only they both knew~

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Tohta's saying his goodbyes to Pilocchio & Ita when they reveal they've opened a guild for information! Tabby shows up stating she has a goal in real life so she'll be leaving the game. She forks over her weapon to P&I who agree to hold onto 'em until she comes to get them back someday. Saburou goes to have a nice lil chat with Haseo and tells him there's someone always watching him and that he should go to see her already! After being rejected, Seisaku's kinda lovesick hitting on girls and trying to get 'em to join the Medic Union! Haseo gets a super hug from Tabby as Ovan watches. "You're the only one that can save Shino." "No, not on my own." "Listen... I've been thinking of becoming a nurse!" and if Haseo can't save her, she will! Yata decides its time for Raven to make contact with Haseo and also names the mysterious anomaly - AIDA. Meanwhile in Outer Space, Tri-Edge... er, Azure Kite and his pals are on the move. "Become stronger Haseo. Strong enough to kill me." mutters Ovan to himself. The series ends with Haseo standing alone at Arche Koeln reminiscing over all that's happened and we get a glimpse of Haseo's future as he calmly announces "Now. It's clear."

//G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce - Overtime
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The first order of business was ta clean out the storage! When there's just no space left ya make some by dumping old non-rare stuff ya got no use for! After that was the hunt for keywords. There's about 30 of 'em to obtain! in this game an I got 22 of them just by aceing areas you're given in-game so getting the last 8 wasn't a long journey! After all that it was time to take down the Crimson VS champ, Gaspard! Eventually. He may of won a few times at first but after some faq checking he went down! btw Did ya know there's 10 guild shops besides Acorn? And only one is open at a time? That sucks! I got the special accessory from the 5 in Vol.1 and 4 of the 5 new ones but throughout the whole time I played the Saltmania guild never showed! This is cause the shops are on a cycle that gets broken through logging out & reloading. So ya gotta go to an area and come back to town until the one you need shows up... and pray they have the accessory in stock! Fun stuffs!

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Campaigns! Bikman's Model was taken care of easily with the super useful Flier Radar! Lucky Data Collection came next. Kicking 50 Lucky Animals was easy enough but kicking at least 1 of each proved to be alil harder (since they changed the formula for where they appear) but easier since ya got the Animal Radar! Stray Mecha Grunty finished up right after that as easy as ever. I love seeing that lil guy blast off. Highway Master came next as Haseo took to challenging 5 bike courses, mowing down Chim Chims in his path and completing the necessary 50 runs, plus more. He took the top time on each course, but that was really hard and sensing better prizes for doing this in the future, decided to not save his victoty data. Chase the Bounty got finished up with relative ease. Defeating 50 PKers including the 7 Chaotic ones wasn't to bad now that everyone had high levels an good gear. Er, oh yeah! The Chim's Kicker campaign was cleared but it took awhile cause trying to get a crown from King Chim Chim is a real pain in the butt!

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btw If ya thought the story was over you're wrong cause there's still tales to tell! Haseo's not the only one to get a Lost Weapon! Atoli felt a part of her own self in hers. Kuhn found within his a way to power up to help bring smiles back to players of the game. Bo sensed Saku, and Saku sensed Bo in their weapon. Endrance felt "her" spirit within his and believed that "she" was now with him. Pi felt the spirit of her older brother and finally obtained a weapon only for her like she as Ender had desired way back when. After aquiring all but one, Phyllo's PC returned to give Haseo one final message. "Haseo... Whatever you do, don't lose sight of your hope... Or yourself being happy in the future. Good luck..."

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The hunt for Kazubolo began! Who's Kazubolo? Some silly guy that posts on the image board pretty often and claims to be the "last hope of The World." The first time Haseo encounters him, he mentions being hospitalized but happy to be surrounded by nurses! He didn't want his M2D confiscated so he had to log out when one came along. Guess his hospital isn't as open minded about letting patients play games as Midori Shinomura's is. The next time he showed up he was getting tired of nurses and wishes his favorite teacher would pay him a visit, and mentions he's there due to electric shock. In the third and final encounter with him he's getting kinda defensive, saying he totally isn't Salvador Aihara... until he finally cracks and admits to it! He gives Haseo a wallpaper and "secret password" to keep him quiet then heads off once again. Adeuuus, Aihara!

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So about the Ancient Egg... seems its gonna hatch! The Invasion of the Super Beings quest is live! Haseo takes Bo & Antares with and near the dungeon entrance the evil dudes start taunting the group. Something about Haseo & Co's ancestors misconduct? At the end of the dungeon they meet up with the evil ones and are warped to... Dark Morrigu Barrow?! Ages ago, Cernunnos found the egg buried at this location and after studying it, left it for Ilad to watch over. Long ago when the humans were at war with the gods, the humans made a living weapon that fed on its surroundings to grow. "Come forth... The One Sin!!!" ooooh snap. This creature can switch its element to nullify attacks! But the wizards screwed up... they'd only recovered two out of six elemental nucleus'. So this The One Sin only had light & dark elements at its disposal. They also messed up by thinking they could order it around and paid for it with their lives. Haseo/Bo/Antares fought hard and managed to knock it back into the abyss... However...

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It wasn't over. Not yet. There had been a second ancient egg hatched. This time it was up to Canard to take down a God Eater. Haseo/Silbaus/Gaspard went to Dark Morrigu Barrow where they found it just waiting there for 'em. This things defenses were extremely hard away at and its attack power even higher! The One Sin had nothing on this monster. Thank goodness for accessories that double the effectiveness of recovery items! Without that Canard woulda been crushed, and nearly were anyway! Playing the role of healer and attacker wasn't easy for Haseo but he manageds. They did a pretty good job in the end. Managing to beat it after the second time its barrier was knocked out. Had it been able to put it back up, things may not have turned out so well~

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With the Ryu Books maxed out Canard hit Rank 6! Storage upgrade! They can now store 75 items and equipment instead of 60! Basic Alchemy has been unlocked meaning we can now alchemize stuff in areas via platforms which is extremely useful to say the least!! The last stuff to wrap up included collecting the 3 "hidden" Crimson VS cards to complete the set. Fighting Doppelganger not once but twice, this time being rewarded with some pretty awesome weapons! After that was Avatar battle refights. Gorre was still painful cause Haseo don't know how to prevent its Paradise Invite attack. <Oswald> & Innis went much better! Gatekeeper & Corbenik was just plain sloppy. <Helen> was even easier! Lastly was getting everyones weapon level up to 20.99. Which meant a buncha arena battling and in doing so over took the top team in WP. And that's that! I still got 7 Beginner's Texts and 28 Beginner's Books. I'm glad I was able ta hang on to so many cause it was only near the end that I remembered just how useful they'll be for what's coming!

- G.U. Vol.2: Reminisce
Game Cleared: 33:38:04 (63:28:11)
Game Overtime: 18:23:50
Game Cleared 100%: 52:01:54 (97:37:28)


- Next time on .hack//G.U.
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Ovan: Once, there used to be a goddess statue here. A goddess that exists in "The World".
Sakaki: Well now. Shall you and I play a game HASEO?!
Atoli: No! Such terrible power! ...evil intentions are overflowing the internet!
Sakaki: Let us judge Haseo! Is he innocent? Or is he guilty!
Players: Guilty, guilty!!
Haseo: You've been telling me to get stronger, from the very first moment you and I met.
Ovan: There's... there's no more time.
Haseo: Become strong? What is it you want?!
Ovan: The last resort... No. I guess this was the only resort right from the start.
Haseo: Ovan! Is this it? Is this what you wanted the whole time??
Ovan: Aina......
Haseo: I... I won't go back. I won't go back to being the Terror of Death!
Haseo: Destiny isn't decided on the whim of some goddess!
Haseo: This is... the worst thing that could ever happen...
Pi: All we can do, is not run away.
Saku: Who called me?
Haseo: An extension that surpasses the system parameters? This is... the Xth Form!
Haseo: We the players make this world what it is!
Haseo: Joy.
Silabus: After all, Haseo's the leader!
Haseo: Sadness.
Pi: You resemble me.
Haseo: Love.
Alkaid: What does a honeysuckle represent?
Haseo: Hate.
Bordeaux: I'll destroy that Haseo bastard!
Haseo: Hope.
Atoli: No matter what, I'm gonna do my best in this world!
Haseo: Despair.
Ovan: Can you see the path, Haseo?
Haseo: All these feelings I've carved deep into the world... are going into this one attack!
Haseo: Ovan! I won't run! And I will finish this once and for all!
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I really like how well online jack is tied into the overall game. It just feels more connected especially when you can run into the man character and talk and trade with him.

Haseo must have had a laugh watching it too. I can just see him going "That's Sakaki?"

It'd be better if ya could run into him even more beyond this one event. But I did like how he, along with other people you'd see posting on the boards in Vol.1 began showing up in-game in Vol.2! An I doubt Haseo watches OJ otherwise knowing him he woulda went to town on Sakaki during what's to come!
 

Stage On

Member
Oh man I absolutely love the trailer for volume 3, I must have watched it dozen up dozen times waiting for it to come out back in the day. Thought I kind of wish it hadn't spoiled the xth form


It'd be better if ya could run into him even more beyond this one event. But I did like how he, along with other people you'd see posting on the boards in Vol.1 began showing up in-game in Vol.2! An I doubt Haseo watches OJ otherwise knowing him he woulda went to town on Sakaki during what's to come!

You might be right, I just figured that what we see outside of the world but still as part of the game was what Haseo would see. So it makes sense that he'd have watched online Jack as well.

He does grow as a person quite a bit over the games so maybe he just had the tack to hold back a bit by the next time he saw Sakaki or had more important matters on his mind then making fun of him.
 
Reading about Hack brings back a simpler time in my life. I really wish Cyberconnect 2 would bring back the series on the consoles. Granted, I love Asura's Wrath, but I miss what caused them to be grand.

Listening to the full version of Roots OP brings back so many memories!
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Mega update ya say? Yup cause I'm once again covering all the current stuffs! Soooo the majority of Cell takes place over the course of about a month, meaning Roots 21-24 also did. Pretty crazy huh? Anyways it time to add a couple more real names & places to the OP! This update is brought to you by the number 7 btw. (EotW file.07, Cell Vol.2 "chapter" 7, the first 7 chapters of Redemption, and Online Jack phase 7!)


//The End of "The World"
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file.07
: Jun & Jyotaro kept on looking for the Morganna Factors and when all 8 were collected they were able to create all 8 Epitaph User characters. However, Jun realized it could be dangerous unleashing the Morganna Factor into the net again. "The use of a power that shouldn't exist, could produce giant distortions all over the Internet." These "anti-existences" had come about once before through the use of the bracelet Aura had created in the form of Cubia. "If the distortion field produced from a single Bracelet resulted in Cubia... there was no telling what the distortion caused from eight powerful Epitaph Users might do." Jun urged Jyotaro to put the RA Plan on hold until his concerns were resolved but Amagi said nope. His program's perfect and won't produce any distortions unlike Haralds System had and went ahead with the program...

Gathering of the Unwilling: The salvage of the eight pieces of the Morganna Factor would literally become a gathering of the unwilling.

//Cell Vol.2: Infinite Release ~ Epilogue
Months ago~ "Have you ever heard of Dragonblossom?" Phyllo asked Midori, then asked what kind of weapon she used. She said she's got a low level sword and explained that as a Professional Victim it didn't matter because she never wielded a weapon anyway. "While I was out and about I came across a fascinating area." Phyllo invited her to come along with him to this place. They arrived in Indieglut Lugh and its massive tree awed Midori while Phyllo mentions he doesn't think anyones stumbled across this Lost Ground yet. He then pointed to a Broadsword sticking out of the trees trunk. "You may not use any weapons, but 'you should cut your coat according to your cloth." With his blessing she pulled the sword from the tree and immediately felt like the sword was apart of her.

"A week had passed since Midori first started playing "The World" with Kaho & Adamas at her side teaching her how to play. The character she'd created greatly resembled the virtual Midori, coincidentally or perhaps a subconscious act? The two took her to a grassy field and called it a Lost Ground. This was the place the virtual Midori had disappeared. There were no scars or signs of the battle between her and Tri-Edge, but there were also no monsters or chests or breakable objects. There was one thing however. Dragonblossom. Where everything including its master was long gone, it remained. Neither Adamas nor Kaho were able to pull it from the ground and believed only Midori could do so. They were right cause she was able to pull it out with ease and and felt the previous Midori's emotions, as she'd left behind a fragment of her memory in the sword. "I shall honor what you fought and sacrificed for." she wasn't sure how or what to do just yet, but with time and friends by her side she'd figure it out eventually. "After all, my story is just beginning."

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption - That's why I'm here
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It all started with a sick little girl... long ago at Hulle Granz, this girl wished she could get better in order to live with Ovan and be together with him in real life like they're together in "The World". Back in the present in a white room, Ovan regretfully reports to the unconscious girl that Skeith's Data Drain wasn't enough to seperate AIDA from them. The AIDA speaks up, taunting Ovan "Yes that's right... I'm the one who made your sister a Lost One...!" Meanwhile, Haseo returned to Briona Gwydion to collect his thoughts on all that he'd learned, wondering if Ovan had been using him from the very beginning and what he wanted from him. "I won't run from this! I will finish this once and for all!!"

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At the Serpent of Lore, Yata can't seem to fathom why Ovan would place "The World" in so much danger. He even seemed to take it personally that Ovan hadn't come to him for help with the AIDA inside of him. While he ponders this and the possibilty of AIDA spreading outside of the game and manipulating people worldwide he gets escorted away by company goons "Your access to the Serpent of Lore has just been terminated." CC Corp has some good news for Haseo! His character is now able to travel to the &#931; server (what no &#923; server this time?) root town Breg Epona and thanks to his victory at the Holy Palace, Canard now has an advanced @HOME in this new town! He also gets anonymous mail saying his Divine Awakening has been upgraded to an Avatar Awakening which can drain Virus Cores from monsters to upgrade Lost Weapons. Huh? Virus Cores? Are they sure they don't mean Data Seeds?? *rolleyes* Haseo meets up with Silabus & Gaspard in the nifty new @HOME... and discovers Atoli was there in his blind spot again!

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So after all thats happened this game starts on a... more mellow note. It seems that Melo Grunty of Moon Tree has gone missing! It's up to Haseo/Atoli/Silabus to find and convince him to return! Death Grunty tells them Melo left a message saying he was in &#931; Universal Ocean's Glide and doesn't one anyone to come looking for him. As if! Despite not wanting to be found he keeps sending messages saying he's on a small hill! They find the grunty who's all sad that Moon Tree's @HOME is gone and thinks its his fault somehow. Atoli consoles him and he promises to never run away again! He later sends an e-mail to Haseo saying he'll return to his homeland for now "I guess even NPCs have homelands to go to... Hey, wait a second!" looks like Haseo's really getting into the spirit of the game! Pi also sent mail, calling an emergency meeting at Raven's @HOME. Where she reports that Yata has gone missing both in the game and the real world. Yet a glimmer of hope presents itself when the Serpent of Lore suddenly activates...

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There they find a very AIDA corrupted Sakaki! He claimed he'd surpass the system back when they fought him and apparently he has managed to do so. He then started pummeling Yata's empty PC body, angered that Yata had left the game rather than stay and bow to him. This was a sight Pi didn't take well to. Sakaki then ordered them all to pledge allegiance to him... but all six Epitaph Users were like, no way. We're outta here. Pi later fills Haseo in out the details she'd uncovered about Sakaki. Apparently he claimed he can control AIDA and that CC Corp believes it can't be eradicated. So they hired him and gave him complete control! Those idiots! Since Haseo's supposed to lay low and blend in with regular players, he goes with Silabus & Gaspard on the Dubious Dog quest. They have trouble tracking the monster down due to its speed! Deep into the dungeon it suddenly appears behind Gaspard! Silabus tries to warn him but Gaspard has confidence "And even if there was something dark and creepy lurking around here, I'm an experienced high level Shadow Warlock. I'm not afraid of some stupid dog monster." ...only to scream out in terror when he turns and sees the thing right there! This Heatwave Hound was a true beast. It nearly beat them all to death! With Haseo playing the healer they managed to put it down and as a result Haseo earned himself an Advanced Hunter's License. The Chase the Bounty campaigns renewed with a fresh new list of Chaotic PKers to hunt down!

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Pi asks Haseo & Atoli to come discuss things in a place out of Sakaki's eyes that even the Serpent of Lore can't see. They head to Wald Uberlisterin where she installs a new feature into their PCs which enables them to use Area Hacking! They use it and end up in an Outer Dungeon a place that's both "The World" and not. After some discussion about what they should all do, Pi says she'll go to search for Yata in the real world. Afterwards Haseo gets mail about the upcoming tournament which includes details such as PKing now being enabled in the towns Lumina Cloth & Breg Epona and a strange message from Taihaku. "And Taihaku... was he the kind of guy to use cheap taunts like this?" Sirius calls him to Lumina Cloth where the two meet and watch a title match between Taihaku and the challengers. Its plainly obvious to all that Taihaku's sword is infected with AIDA and Sirius likens the situation to when he himself was infected by it. Haseo says he'll get to the bottom of it to save Taihaku and Alkaid. Sirius notes that Haseo has changed for the better.

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Sakaki sends an e-vite to Haseo to join the tournament, if not he'll spread AIDA seeds all over "The World"! That's not so much of an invite as it is a threat. A mail from Silabus says Canard should have a meeting, leaving Haseo worried they hadn't gotten word of the situation in towns. He zips right over and witnesses some PKers killing Gaspard right outside their @HOME. They threaten to take out Haseo next until they get a better look at him... and realize he's the Terror of Death. They then scrammed! Inside the @HOME Silabus is pissed, Gaspard is scared, and Atoli is upset at these new rules which allow PKing in towns! Unfortunately, Gaspard won't be running the guild shop for awhile >_<! Kuhn says everyone should meet up at the Outer Dungeon in Wald Uberlisterin again to report in their findings. Endrance and Sakubo are online but didn't join the meeting this time, so they decide to just mail 'em later. Anyway Kuhn mentions that its odd no ones questioning the new rules and that maybe all of "The World" is slowly becoming an AIDA server!

- In the News
• Salvador's outta the hospital but things aren't looking to good for his show. People believe he's been using special effects to get viewers and what he claims is the truth is backed up by no one else.
• Problems with the space station Village's balancing system and engines are appearing and causing a worry it may crash down to earth.
• The network car navigation system "3NS" is causing numerous accidents.
• CC Corp's announced a new arena tournament and appointed a director to oversee it.

- On the Boards
• Remaining Moon Tree members upset the guilds area has been locked off complain about it!
• Masaki and his friends encountered black spots in an area. Two of them managed to run away, but the other never returned and is listed as online but never responds to messages...
• Crimson VS has been updated with new cards & something called Delta Combos!
• E-zou claims to have discovered a new type of Chim Chim, as big as a King Chim Chim but with a white beard and halo!

//Online Jack
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phase.07
: Equipped with the headcam, Michiru enters the hospital and heads for one Carlos (Calros in engrish) Aihara's room. "Mr. Aihara? Mr. Aihara?" she pulls back the covers on his bed only to find a dummy! "eek!" "You know you can't be so easily startled if you want to be a professional reporter." but she doesn't want to be one, and when he reminds her she was fired as a teacher she gives him a sound beating! "And just who's fault is that?!" lol. She interviews him on the way out and he says his jobs not done. The kids are still missing and must be saved! "Doll Syndrome and The World. We must shed some more light and discover the truth!" to that end they head to the university Sugai works at for a talk with him. Thanks to Online Jack, his books flying off the shelves! But he's not gonna rest easy either. "Professor Sugai, where are you going?" "Isn't it obvious? To save the children of course." "Right!"


Oh man I absolutely love the trailer for volume 3, I must have watched it dozen up dozen times waiting for it to come out back in the day. Thought I kind of wish it hadn't spoiled the xth form
Same here! I really wish the original games had previews cause G.U.'s & Links were great! I wish Xth hadn't been spoiled either but on the other hand the boxart for Redemption is the best of the bunch imo!

You might be right, I just figured that what we see outside of the world but still as part of the game was what Haseo would see. So it makes sense that he'd have watched online Jack as well.

He does grow as a person quite a bit over the games so maybe he just had the tack to hold back a bit by the next time he saw Sakaki or had more important matters on his mind then making fun of him.
The first thing he does when seeing Sakaki is calling him a bastard lol. He's grown but not above rightfully lashing out at jerks! News prolly don't interest Haseo and he rarely checks out the boards an stuff unless directed to by others.

Reading about Hack brings back a simpler time in my life. I really wish Cyberconnect 2 would bring back the series on the consoles. Granted, I love Asura's Wrath, but I miss what caused them to be grand.

Listening to the full version of Roots OP brings back so many memories!

Don't we all wish it came back home and not just as a fighting game? ;_; That Roots OP is good~ hearing it some many times while playing Link last year kinda got me to rewatch that series and replay the G.U. games!
 

Stage On

Member
You know I wonder who made the Lock for Ovan's corrupted arm in the first place.

I didn't think of this before but how is it legal for CC corp to hire a little kid? Isn't their anti child labor laws in Japan or something?
 

Pietepiet

Member
Going through this thread makes me so bummed that G.U never came to Europe :\

I've been thinking about going through the first four games. Is it worth it? I own the first one, the rest is pretty hard to come by for a decent price it seems.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
I wish we'd reach a new page since its killing even my computer to load this one up lol. Gonna have to switch back to 50 posts per page x_x Anyhow just like last time having a save file gets ya two Terminal Disc unlocks at the start! Just one more file left~ btw ya gotta love Lv.3 Arts! They're cool and powerful and decrease in SP cost and recharge time! As long as your weapon level goes up. Leveling can take the course of the whole story and beyond since Haseo has multiple weapons to grind away at and others spam their arts so quick they'll often run outta SP real early into an area. If only there was... oh ya! All those Beginner's Text/Book's I'd saved up! Those'll give me a good boost an get the leveling moving along nicely!


//The End of "The World"
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file.11
: "The World R:2" was released on December 24th, 2015 just about a year since the R:1 data loss which surprised even Jun! However R:2 was full of bugs and seemed rushed so it needed lotsa maintenance an updates. All Epitaph User characters were lost save for Magus and of course Tarvos which was still on his home computer. "Project G.U. was gone, Amagi was beyond any hope of recovery." so he thinks things should be safe now so long as the Chosen Ones don't return to the game and feels his goal of preventing another Cubia from being born was accomplished! His last duty is to keep Tarvos hidden and prevent people from learning of the Morganna Factor... but things took a turn for the worse. Jun starts to sound increasingly worried as he speaks of Ovan, who's got a guild (with members including Godo, B Set, and Sagisaka... well at least they spelled Ovan & Shino right >_>) going to search for the Key of the Twilight and wonders how Ovan learned of Harald, the Epitaph of Twilight, and other secret things. "I have confirmed that Ovan's left arm contains indecipherable data. What on earth is it? Please, stop Ovan. I'm begging you. Everything is Ovan's doing."

Guide to an Uprising: That man will become the Guide to an Uprising!

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
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"AIDA is endangering The World's operation, and that's got CC Corp's higher-ups backed into a corner. So much that they had to agree to Sakaki's unsurpassingly ridiculous demands." says Pi. She asks Haseo to enter the tournamanet to buy time until she brings Yata back. Haseo sees a message about dungeon with a door that won't open even when presented with Chim Spheres! He asks for and receives the area words! But first things first, gotta throw away the emporers crown once more and register for the Sage Palace. Matsu and Antares show up saying they're going to be in it to. Haseo tries to talk 'em outta it but its no good. AIDA may be influencing them! While they go off to train Gabi shows up! He seems to think he'll be in it to, but Haseo isn't so sure. IYOTEN & Asta claim to be in the tournament as well and Haseo's just alil peeved they don't recognize or remember him! Suddenly, Silabus sends a flash mail saying Gaspards in trouble!

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Over in Breg Epona Gaspard wants to open up a shop while Silabus tries to talk him outta it. Haseo's okay with it though "Go for it Gaspard." "No matter how many times they PK me! I won't give up." Yay Gaspard! Yay Shop Acorn! Matsu mails his reason for entering: the winner allegedly gets any wish they want in "The World" and his will be to restore Moon Tree. Also Zelkova & Kaede have gone missing!! Antares on the other hand just wants one last big shot at "being on stage". Haseo/Piros/Gaspard go the check out the odd dungeon mentioned before at &#931; Unknown Mortuary's Shady Rite! Strangely enough the locked doors all accepted Chim Spheres and opened for them. Three evil wizards are at it again, mumbling about suffering, Cernunnos, and some ceremony. They send some monsters at the trio but those got knocked away quickly and the evil dudes take off. Next Haseo went to tune up his bike to smash more goblins in The Goblins Are Coming! quest! Kafu lost to them again and in doing so had his favorite muffler taken away. With a much better bike and the ability to use boost this time around, the five gold goblins soon eat Haseo's dust! The Highway Master campaign's open once more!

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Kuhn wanted everyone to gather at &#931; Calm Betrayal's Longing to discuss who'll on Team Haseo this time but like before, Endrance and Sakubo are no shows. Atoli suggests they may be at the end of the dungeon so the three head over to it, and along the way they learn Anomalous Data doesn't just hide Outer Dungeons but also items! Endrance & Saku show up only to say they're not joining in and then take right off. Weird! Usually Endrance wants to be with Haseo! So it'll be Haseo, Kuhn, and... Atoli! To their surprise she shows that her Avatar has been awakened so she needn't fear AIDA, at least not as much as before. Sometime later Matsu invites Haseo on the Hail Bikman quest. Kinda odd since they'll be rivals but sure why not go? Bikman's in a slump and needs inspiration so they gotta be his bodyguard through a dungeon to gather materials. But once they arrive his true intentions are revealed! Bikman caught wind of a Grunty Tribe meeting and wants to paint them! When they find the Gruntys, they spy on 'em! Everyones nice and friendly except Death Grunty. He's being all exclusionary like Haseo used to! But after some talk he decides to join in and they do the Grunty Dance!!! A big ugly monster with a face on its tongue tries to break things up but they beat it and Bikman decides not to reveal the private lives of the Gruntys. Bikman's Model campaign has returned!

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Round 1 is here! The opponents are... a secret? In the waiting room Haseo checks the Opponent Advice board but all that pops up is a message from Sakaki mocking him! As they enter the arena proper, the crowd boos the heck outta Sakaki but quickly change their tune when he reveals his plan. Team Haseo has to face five teams in a row! Now the crowds chanting "kill kill kill!" wanting to see Haseo beaten. The matches begins and each team turns out to be people Haseo had PKK'd in the past including really tough Chaotic PKers! Unlike the usual Survival Battles, HP/SP aren't restored to any extent between rounds which made this legitimately tough. They won all five but Sakaki said its just a warm up for the next round. Right afterwards Kuhn runs up and drags Haseo & Atoli into the audience to watch as Sirius fades away at the hands of the Hetero Trio, a group of hacked & AIDA infected players which Sakaki created. Pi lets him know via e-mail that Sirius has become a Lost One. "Once again I couldn't save anybody. Dammit, I just can't forgive myself..." Mail from Kaede says she wants to discuss something with Haseo & Pi at &#931; Wise Calamity's Water Mill. They meet and Zelkova asks if they found anything in the Outer Dungeons which shocks Pi. Kaede & Zelkova leave Sakaki to Haseo then leave. Pi wonders just who the heck Zelkova really is, mentioning that he'd e-mailed her private phone! Later on in e-mails Zelkova suggests luring Sakaki into battle so he can be Data Drained which'll seperate him and AIDA. This should cause CC Corp to get rid of him! While Pi mentions that when Yata was a player he had a great reputation as an informant and was a former dot hacker, great at information analysis which is why CC Corp hired him to handle AIDA & G.U. where they had failed.


You know I wonder who made the Lock for Ovan's corrupted arm in the first place.

I didn't think of this before but how is it legal for CC corp to hire a little kid? Isn't their anti child labor laws in Japan or something?
Ovan worked for the NAB and was old friends with Yata so he must know his way around computer type stuffs so chances are he made it. As for Sakaki I made up this super hypothetical situation! Picture this: a 10 year old teleports into your office and electro-shocks the security guards! He claims he can control the bugs infesting your moneymaker and just asks to be made an admin or something. What kind of shady businessmen wouldn't turn that down! Or how Pi explained it above!

Going through this thread makes me so bummed that G.U never came to Europe :\

I've been thinking about going through the first four games. Is it worth it? I own the first one, the rest is pretty hard to come by for a decent price it seems.
All fans are prolly bummed the series never landed over there since its clearly hurt the brand in all of the west. The first 4 games are worth it if you were into the first one since gameplays the same across all of 'em. Each one can also be cleared alot faster then any G.U. game whether your going for 100% which can make for nice "quick" replays! But if going for everything is the goal they got some nice hours for their buck I think?
 

Stage On

Member
Ah I love the guild grunties and how the npcs seem to have a life of their own in "the world."

I wonder who Zelkova really is and what his connection to Helba is if any given what we find out about him in this game.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Sad! So sad! No more TV series. No more (localized, canonical) novels. No OJ or EotW at the moment. I can just kick back an focus on a game! And maybe bonus stuff. Ya, let's do a bonus! Another version upgrade for #109! Also omg I totally missed the Gold & 1/2 off alchemy extensions granted at the start of the game cause the message that popped up telling ya about 'em did so when I was playing in teeny tiny screen capture mode LOL. Also I updated the OP to include links to other GAF-iversary threads!

If I questioned whether or not Rebirth was rushed given all the changes in Reminisce, should I consider that to rushed because of this list? Its not as long~ but still... alot of this stuff prolly goes unnoticed by many. But with a keen eye for detail one truth prevails! btw I also went back an updated the v1.02 list with some new findings! My eyes aren't keen enough!!


//v1.03: Changes implimented post-Reminisce [Bonus #09]
- What They Tell You
• You may now alchemize equipment with a difference in level of up to 20.
• You may exchange items (and equipment) for GP on the Storage screen by placing a cursor over the item and pressing Triangle.
• The "Divine Awakening" has been upgraded to "Avatar Awakening" which allows you to collect Virus Cores.
• "Lost Weapon" status has been added to your main in-game menu.
• Crimson VS has been upgraded. Delta Combos and 65 new cards have been added.
• Gold Extension & 1/2 Off Alchemy have been added to Canard's "Expand Facility" menu.
• "Lv.3 Arts" have been added. Their recharge time and SP cost decrease each time you raise your weapon level.
• You are now able to use "Data Search" by pressing R1 outside of battles.
• You will now see the face icon of the character holding the equipment when you are selecting "Equipment to Add."

- What They Don't
• Party member icons briefly show a "loading" graphic in various menus.
• Numerous voices have been tweaked including Death Grunty, Mecha Grunty, Lucky Animals, Arena Announcer, and the Rengeki guy.
• The tracking dots on the mini-map are now larger and colored white.
• Now when multiple party members level up their weapons after a battle they'll all be shown at together instead of seperately.
• Scrolls are now listed above recovery items in the item inventory & storage.
• Canard is no longer listed in the Mac Anu @HOME entrance.
• The take platform to town option now defaults to "no".
• Haseo's avatar voice clips are new.
• When alchemizing equipment you will be returned to the one you just alchemized instead of being sent back to the top of the list. This helps cut down on scrolling through the list to get back to where you were.
• Monsters resume moving around instantly after using a smoke screen/bomb to escape from battle instead of standing still until it wears off as they did in the previous game.
• If your equipment pack is full and you defeat a monster that drops a piece of equipment, the square button is now shown next to its name to allow you to see what it is customized with. This applies even if it isn't customized.
• The order in which customization items are listed in the item inventory & storage has been corrected.
• The Signs in &#920; Hidden Forbidden In Heat and &#920; Hidden Forbidden Battlefield are no longer active. In the latters case, this means the Lost Ground Megin Fi can no longer be reached.
• The Lucky Animal Radar now has a "Lucky Data Status" which says whether you've kicked the animal in the current area before or not.
• A sound effect now plays at the "Symbol Fragments are starting to shine." message.
• The text after collecting the last Symbol Fragment used to be "The Symbol Fragments have started to shine..." This has been changed to "Symbol Fragments are starting to shine."
• The battle result screen no longer ends until you press X. It used to display for about 5 seconds before ending on its own.
• The version number on the games login screen has changed from 2.26 to 3.58.
• The trap door warning message has been shortened. It used to be on screen for about 4 seconds, but is now there for about 1. This means the whole animation of trap doors closing and camera zooming to the unlock button goes by much faster as well.
• The Stray Mecha Grunty campaign is shorter this time around, requiring only 30 rescues as opposed to 50.
• 3 new area types have been added: Forest,
Forest (of Pain)
, and Outer Dungeon.
• Adler's Keys are no longer present for collecting in areas.
• The voice that says "Crimson VS" at bootup is now male.
• The version number for Crimson VS has changed from 2.00 to 2.67.
• The "Game Tutorial" of Crimson VS has been updated to include section 1-3 which displays information about the version update.
• Names for combos(?) or deck types(?) you have set up are now listed in "Deck Edit", "Practice Battle", & "Battle Entry" in Crimson VS.
• If a guild shop isn't carrying items, but is carrying equipment it will now start you on the equipment menu rather than the item one.
• Bikman's flyer distribution list now shows 173 Player Characters, up from 160 in Reminisce.
• At the Quest Shop menu, there has always been a "Sort" option but it never did anything! However in this game, it will list them newest to oldest or newest mandatory to oldest mandatory - followed by oldest optional to newest optional.
• Pressing start allows you to skip the Beast and Demon Awakening opening sequence.
• A category for "Divinity" type monsters has been added to Ryu Book VII.
• Bike Courses 6 - 10 have been added.
• Lumina Cloth's Material Shop & Black Market have been updated with new goods.
• Even bigger trap cannons have been added.
• After a certain event, Ryu Book I will now keep track of how many Double Triggers have been performed.
• After visiting the
Forest of Pain
for the first time, Ryu Book V will now track how many times you've visited it.



//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
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While Haseo logs in Saku & Endrance meet with Taihaku. Round 2 pits Team Haseo vs IYOTEN, Asta, and the Chaotic PKer Maniac Helluger! Haseo was pretty pissed upon learning they still target new players and he vowed to cut them into pieces as his eyes glowed red! They put up a good long fight and just as they were about to lose, Haseo lost it! Sakaki pushed him to drown in his own power and use his Avatar and it seemed like Haseo was going to do just that... but he snapped out of it at the last second "I... I won't go back... to being the Terror of Death!" Sakaki left disappointed and the match ended. Matsu mailed Haseo saying Antares beat him in the second round! And Kuhn wants to on The Chim Chim Song quest. Kubo's Chim Chims have gone missing again and its up to them to locate 'em, though Kuhn's acting abit strange. Insides the dungeon there are no Chim Chims in sight on B1. At the start of B2 they encounter a single one which runs off! They catch up to it after defeating a mildly tough boss monster and watch as a Chim Chim use the Platform to warp! They follow and end up in Coite-Bodher where gathered Chim Chims are dispersing their Chim Spheres, which kinda looks like a fireworks show! Kuhn says the Chim Chims are returning energy to the land and that he was down because he'd wanted to do this quest with his "girlfriends" but "I've been dumped again!" poor poor Kuhn. Forever alone. Haseo was gonna yell at him but was instead impressed Kuhn could keep on going like normal despite all that's going on! Back in town, Kubo realizes cultivating Chim Chims is bad and that he'll start looking for a more natural energy source. And Kuhn... well... he sees a girl passing by and gets right to hitting on her! Chim's Kicker campaign is back!

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And this time when Haseo's logging in, a scene with Sakaki and one of CC Corps flunkies takes place. The company is upset he's allowing infected players in the tournament and Sakaki reminds him that if they want to go back on their agreement, he has plans of his own. Sooo its now Round 3 with Team Haseo vs Team Antares! Student against Master! They went down somewhat easily and Sakaki uses this to his advantage saying Antares threw the fight! Then he incites the crowd further by playing back videos of Haseo cheating in previous tournaments by using his Avatar. The crowd judges him guilty and Sakaki is about to banish Haseo from the Saga Palace and game itself until Taihaku steps up... accompanied by Endrance and Saku who've sided with Sakaki! Taihaku requests that Haseo be allowed to continue, stating that the cheaters who sullied the arena could never beat him. Amused by this Sakaki allows it and later mails Haseo saying he can control the Hetero Trio's bodies and minds with but a thought! He's really going to far! Antares says they need to talk and invites him on a quest...

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- In the News
• Associate Professor Sugai's book is a new best seller! However, skeptics of its content remain. Professor Shimokitazawa (where have we heard that name before?) says it contains no medical logic and is just an opinion piece.
• Internet cafes have been hit hard lately and some businesses are adding food, maids, and relaxing music to attract customers.
• The NAB has finally stumbled upon the AIDA "virus".
• Reports of players being unable to logout occured again during the Moon Tree incident.

- On the Boards
• Oshino 8 Seas talks about the report about AIDA and says people should quit "The World" if they're worried about their computers becoming infected.
• Players talk about the charges against Haseo, many wonder if the many people that teamed up with him along the way are also cheaters.


I wonder who Zelkova really is and what his connection to Helba is if any given what we find out about him in this game.
I think thats a mystery CC2 will take with 'em to the grave x_x
 

Psxphile

Member
Replying to help bump this onto a new page, and also because I want to ask in case it hadn't come up before (or perhaps it did but I missed it): Lindsay, will you be playing through .hack//Link too? This is the .hack game I'm most curious about (I'm sure I'm not the only one) and would like to see what exactly us westerners have missed out on. I'm especially curious because from what I've read, it helps answer one of the mysteries introduced by the G.U. Terminal Disc but never expanded on.

Which I won't go into here because SPOILERS if what I read was accurate.

Though I would have preferred playing the game myself. I think you mentioned something about a translation project?
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Cute manga time! I never said there weren't any canonical, localized manga left! Kuhn, Silabus, Gaspard, Nanase, Haseo, Atoli. Canard's whopping 6 members throughout the entirety of Roots/G.U.! Guess the beginners they help out never join up? Such a small, small guild!


//Alcor ~ Chapter 1
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"I used to go by the name of Nanase." a player who looks just like Sophora reminisces to herself in the Moon Tree throne room. Back in winter of 2016, Alkaid has just become the Demon Palace emporer! Watching from the stands is Silabus who's super excited over this! With him is Gaspard and Nanase who wishes she could be like Alkaid and is happy to have joined Canard because she gets to be near Silabus! "I wish he'd notice me a little..." thinks Nanase who ran off to a field alone... or not? Bordeaux and her crew show up and Nanase runs off as they give chase! Silabus came there looking for her! ...so he can take her to Alkaid's crowning ceremony. Just as the PKers catch up, so does Alkaid who knocks the trio away! "Thanks, Alkaid. How did you find us?" "Intuition. Pure intuition, my boy!" Nanase's happy to be saved until seeing who did the saving, and the focus of Silabus's attention "Why... Why does it always turn out like this?!" At Hy Brasail, Nanase's kinda sad and walks away from the crowd. She tries to strike some cool poses like Alkaid but her controller gets tangled up and her PC falls over! Some people there mock her for looking like Alkaid yet being nothing like her. Nanase starts crying and Alkaid drags her off the the pavillion asking what's wrong and then asking if Nanase's ever done anything worth praising?

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
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Haseo/Antares/Gaspard take on the Steam Professor's Research quest. Dr. Kepel's latest robot went haywire and tried to bite him! Its up to the adventurers to defeat it and retrieve its memory. When they get to the area Haseo asks what's up but Antares says they can talk after the quest! Blah! They lured the beast outta the lake and beat it up real good. Antares then says he was trying his hardest in their match but noticed Haseo holding back and told him he won't become emporer if he keeps doing that, and to ignore the people calling him a cheater since he's got a higher purpose. Stray Mecha Grunty campaign unlocked! Finally, the tournament finals are here! Team Haseo vs Team Hetero. As promised Sakaki manipulated the suffering trio, citing Haseo as the source of their pain. They weren't easy! Two Lord Partizans drilling into ya and a Flick Reaper with his wide AOE and even levels made it take a few Beast Awakenings to knock 'em down. Sakaki called out the AIDA<Grunwald> which had infected them as the kids begged desperately for someone to save them and Haseo said he'd defy Sakaki and use his Avatar. The AIDA had strength comparable to <Oswald> but its defense was lacking so it went down hard. Team Hetero's PCs returned to normal and hopefully the kids would be okay. Now Team Haseo moves on to the finals to face the friends who'd betrayed him. And of course the emporer Taihaku.

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While they wait, Atoli wants to go on the Story of Kudan quest! Dr. Pao wants 'em to kick a Silvermane Kudan to get data on it. A simple enough request! They found the lil guy... sleep-rapping o.o their kicks woke him up and as per his power, he gave a prophecy of Haseo's future. "A grave danger that is creeping up on our world... A resurrecting Demon and the abominable Army of Death that follows him... And you are destined to take part in the great battle to come! And when all the must be done... is finally done. You will have a surprising and unexpected encounter!" Quest cleared! ...but... Haseo noticed something "Atoli... Was she always as cute as she is now?" Anyhow he wrangled the area words &#931; Clashing Frission's Oracle outta a board poster and delved further into the Abyss with Silabus & Gaspard. The voice of Folset, the God of Law called out to Haseo. Saying he is the only one who can stand before Cernnunos in battle as his "Judge." One of the evil wizards appeared and instead of the usual scrubs threw out a boss monster to try and take out the "Judge" but Haseo & Co. took it out instead! Canard hit Rank 7! They can now store up to 120 items and equipment! Now that's handy!!

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Its time for the title match! Saku said she'd bring Haseo to his knees but Taihaku said his two tagalong teammates should stay behind. Frankly, he didn't need teammates. His AIDA infected weapon allowed him to make everyone move slowly and cancelled out all attempts at Awakenings! He managed to kill Atoil & Kuhn and nearly Haseo! After losing enough health and faltering the sword got knocked away from him and destroyed. At the center of that destruction was Haseo who almost became infected himself before repelling the AIDA. Sakaki's pissed that Taihaku failed and boots the guy out then enters the arena himself to finish off the weakened Haseo. Atoli & Kuhn try to defend him but Sakaki warps them away!
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He moves to attack Haseo but Endrance stabs him in the back for reals! He was only pretending to go along with Sakaki and waiting for a moment like this to arrive! Saku wasn't aware of this and left rather dejectedly. Sakaki gave over his body and mind to the AIDA<Victorian> he'd infected himself with and declared himself god of "The World"! Haseo couldn't muster the strength to summon Skeith until Atoli, Kuhn, and Endrance lent him some of their own! The outta control Sakaki attacked fast & hard so Haseo attacked faster & harder and won! Once again Sakaki ended up falling down into a pit! He landed in an Outer Dungeon where Ovan happened to be hanging out at. Sakaki said he'd done everything according to Ovan's script and begged him for more AIDA but that wasn't gonna happen. "The Pursuers" arrived and Ovan left them to deal with Sakaki.
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At Raven's @HOME Pi told everyone she'd found Yata in the real world but that he wasn't doing so well due to CC Corps betrayal. She said she was trying to get him reinstated and Haseo left dealing with the company up to her which she accepted "That's why I'm here." Later she mailed Haseo some more info on Yata "The hardest thing for Yata to deal with is having his own abilities questioned. He's too talanted, you see. And the most sensitive person there is." him sensitive? Who knew? He also got a rather fired up mail congratulating him on the tournament win "For some reason I feel a lot of personal passion in this writing..." He's supposed to go meet with Taihaku, but before that he heads to Hy Brasail! (optional missable event alert) There's no victory party this time. Just a lone guy who'd followed Haseo since he started out in the Demon Palace. The announcer!! He complained about how his guest commentators always got drunk, forgot to comment, outstaged him, and always disappeared! It was all worth it however and he'd continue to announce and watch for Haseo's participation in the future!


Replying to help bump this onto a new page, and also because I want to ask in case it hadn't come up before (or perhaps it did but I missed it): Lindsay, will you be playing through .hack//Link too? This is the .hack game I'm most curious about (I'm sure I'm not the only one) and would like to see what exactly us westerners have missed out on. I'm especially curious because from what I've read, it helps answer one of the mysteries introduced by the G.U. Terminal Disc but never expanded on.

Which I won't go into here because SPOILERS if what I read was accurate.
Its to late! I already went back to 50 posts x_x! I'm not sure if I'll be doing any of the third season. Movie/Versus stuff'll prolly be covered in the OT for that but as for Link, Quantum
and other materials people'd be surprised to find are canon
idk. I dunno japanese an only vaguely grasped at Links story when I played through it alil less then a year ago. Also it took me 65 hours just to clear the main story! Not saying it wouldn't go abit faster this time but there's a whole lotta stuff in there.

Though I would have preferred playing the game myself. I think you mentioned something about a translation project?
The people translating it got like a 2 1/2 hour video covering the bare minimum main story of Link up on youtube since last summer. I checked it out and it helped me understand things better but 2 1/2 hours outta 60 some loses alot of character depth and whatnot. Dunno if I'd recommend someone watching it before playing the game themselves, it'd feel like cheating and maybe alil lackluster. They're working on a translation patch little by little but have yet to release it to the public. I'd prolly try my hand at covering Link if they get it out sometime this year~ but I get the feeling they'll get distracted by the newly released movie/game/ova!
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Ya know I originally thought the whole tournament thing was dumb especially using it in all 3 games but it really paid off in Redemption. Stuff Haseo pulled previously came back to haunt him, and for once all the fights were legit in difficulty and you winning not because of a cutscene but because of your playing. Its still sorta overkill having it be such a big focus but it greatly redeemed itself.


//Alcor ~ Chapter 2
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Alkaid's just defended her title and Saku congratulates her on winning! However some people aren't as nice. Endrance stops by saying Alkaid has no power! Nanase's off in a field chasing after a Lucky Animal but trips up and falls! She rolls onto her back and looking up at the stars, remembers an encounter she had in the real world. In a library a girl approaches the cute glasses wearing Nanase noticing she's reading a book about constellations "You like stars too, huh?" this girl Nanase calls Kuramoto-san points out the star Alkaid of the Big Dipper as her favorite and says they should go stargazing sometime which makes Nanase all doki-doki! When she stopped daydreaming, Nanase overhears people saying Bordeaux's picked Silabus as her next target! He receives an anonymous message pleading for help at &#916; Cursed Spiral's Scorpio so off he goes and quickly encounters Bordeaux! Poor Silabus is still such a noob the PKers had to spell out to him that they sent the message. Nanase rushes into Canards @HOME saying who likely sent the message and a super nervous Gaspard says they'd better go help! Nanase isn't to sure though "You know you'll just get PKed. So why...?" she breaks down saying she can't go, that she'd be of no help. Over at the arena Alkaid watches Endrance win his finals match with a flash of light "That's enough out of you, cheater! I'll make sure to destroy you!!" Gaspard finds Silabus dead and rushes to revive him when Bordeaux steps up and whispers to him... "I'll give you a juicy piece of info. Nanase-chan's dirty little secret."

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
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In the Icolo @HOME Taihaku invites Haseo into the sage room and says its rightfully his now. He asks if he'd leanred how to fill a void but Haseo doesn't, saying he's no good at thinking about deep stuff like that. He also turns down the sage room since has enough trouble pulling Canard along. As he heads off, Taihaku wonders what the Forest of Pain had taught Haseo about life. Saku messages Haseo asking him to meet her at the backstreet in Lumina Cloth. She gets right down to business saying she's quitting the game. Now that Bo has Haseo to protect and make him happy, she's outta a job. Because... Saku's body only exists inside the game, and her mind inside of Bo's. Haseo tries to stop her but she tells him to mind his own business and runs off. Ovan approaches Yata at the end of a dungeon and the two old friends have a not so pleasant talk. Yata's resentful and jealous of Ovan for having awakened his Avatar and being chosen by AIDA. "You're a stuck up, know-it-all boy..." Boy? Ya mean Yata's not a wise old man? Within all the confusion at CC Corp, Pi grabbed control of G.U. and used the Serpent of Lore to locate Yata. She and the others saw the results of Ovan's prodding... Yata was beginning to awaken.

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Haseo & Pi rushed off to and through the area &#931; Ethical Prodigy's Prophecy where they find Yata moaning and groaning how he loves "The World" more than anyone else as his Avatar awakens and goes berserk! Haseo calls Skeith and tries to put a stop to him but fails! Thank goodness for instant retrys! He gets it right the second time receives a prophecy for beating Fidchell "The abberant key, borne in thy left arm. The Key of Twilight, borne in thy right arm. The final wave, the surge of rebirth... shall become light and fill the world. Thou shalt lead the new gods to their twilight. Thou destroyest and createst, thou powerless one... As the stirring footsteps of a giant shadow sound. Oh blessed be the little ones..." thats almost as gloomy as the one the rapping cow gave 'em! Once Yata was back to normal he started sulking again saying he can never be loved. This is when Pi gives him a slap and says he's the one who's been rejecting others. She takes him and leaves, telling Haseo to give her some more time to set things right.

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Soooo what better way to kill time then to take on a solo quest? The Last Stand of the Goblins! In a strange turn of events, the client couldn't be reached so the quest shop employee just gives Haseo the area words and sends him on his way! Awaiting him were the Gold Goblins! Martina challenged him not to play "tag" them but instead beat 'em in a 5 lap race around an area neatly shaped like a track! It truly was a photo finish cause even I wasn't sure who'd won until the end! He earned the amazing accessory Demon Safe Shoes accessory which allows him to walk right up to a monsters face and not have combat be initiated unless he wants it to be! Anyhow they made him the same offer they made Kite seven years ago, become a goblin and race with us! He turned 'em down but if he even changes his mind they'll be waiting! As Haseo logs out, a scene plays with Ovan arriving in a white room and noticing that the PC of his comatose little sister is gone. Haseo gets mail from various people including the announcer who regretfully states there'll be no crowning ceremony. A message from Bo asks him to stop Saku from leaving. And a message from Saku gives him the choice to be rid of her permenantly or beg her to stick around. He takes the nicer route and replies saying no one can replace her as Bo's big sister!

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Pi picked up AIDA signals in Breg Epona... in a town?! That's not good! In the back road of the town, Bo encounters Aina and not noticing the AIDA around her asks if they could play together. Pi and Haseo head to the back roads and watch as Bo, Aina, and AIDA vanish. With Area Hacking they enter an Outer Dungeon but find no signs of Bo. Haseo logs out and catches a mail from Gaspard about a post on the rumors board mentioning a ghost girl and says he's not afraid of ghosts, just for the record! Its not terribly informative but Pi chimes in saying the person who posted is in town. Haseo tracks him down but the guys apparently had nothing but trouble since making the post and wants nothing to do with it and leaves! Then a scream is heard! Haseo rushes to the bike parts shop and finds Piros the Third screaming and charging full steam ahead! He asks what's wrong and Piros says he's heard about a hacked PC and won't stand for it! Haseo says its no use getting worked up if he doesn't know what area she's in but Piros says not to underestimate him! "What? Don't tell me..." "&#931; Fading Moonflower Glory! Let us depart! Justice is on our side!" despite saying "us" he charges off on his own anyway! Haseo's kinda pissed off Piros is involved, but decides to grab Pi and follow him to the area~


- On the Boards
• According to the beast maniac Tanu, there are going be wedding events in R:2 and he wants to marry Gabi!
• On the rumors board, Tenjin says he's heard there is a place in "The World" called Paradise and you need the queens permission to enter.
 

Stage On

Member
I love the little glimpses we get of the characters in real life in stuff like Alcor, especially since we don't really see much of that outside of what they tell us about themselves in e-mail chains.

I mean we know Alkaid's a book worm but seeing it is a whole other story.

And man is .hack full of characters who have mental issues. Lol Who would have gussed Saku was the result of a split personality and not a flesh and blood sibling?

And really who would actually be heartless enough to chose for her to go away? She rocks!
 

Psxphile

Member
I thought she was a pain in the ass, and she never cut Haseo any slack. If it wasn't for Bo I would have chosen to let her go.

Lindsay, are you implying you don't know the backstory of Yata's player? Or are you just baiting the audience with sarcasm?
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Soloing Ovan sure isn't an easy task~ rewarding though! In some ways its abit easier, since babysitting two other party members can drag things out.


//Alcor ~ Chapter 3
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Alkaid is upset that Silabus got PKed and says she's gonna make Bordeaux pay! She's also pissed that Nanase hadn't come to help when Gaspard blurts out "I heard she's in league with Kestrel!" As Nanase enters, Alkaid glares at her and leaves. Silabus & Gaspard try to play it cool and take her to run shop Acorn! Silabus initiates a half-off sale and all kinds of people come by... like Gabi which puts a small scare into Nanase & Gaspard! It comes time to close up for the day and they part ways, Gaspard still worried but Silabus has faith! "No matter what Bordeaux says... Nanase belongs with us at Canard." After cheerfully saving her data, Nanase is confronted with a grumpy Alkaid who accuses her of being in cahoots with Bordeaux! "If it's true I'll never let you get away with it!"

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
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As soon as they arrive Piros charges right out complaining! "That pretty young ghost in the cutesy goth clothes is nowhere to be found!" was his information wrong?! He leaves but Pi says they oughta look around just in to be sure. The dungeon's of the warp maze variety which is annoying when ya get sent backwards! Near the end they're able to area hack to a new outer dungeon where they find Bo & Aina! Aina wonders why Bo is one person, yet also two at the same time then disappears. Bo didn't seem to be in any danger but since AIDA targets Epitaphs its good they got him away from her safely. Pi's got more anaylsis work and Haseo needs stuff to do besides sitting around! Saku replied to his previous mail saying Bo calls him "Big Brother Haseo" and that a real big bro is better than a big sister that doesn't exist. Haseo could tell her to vanish but instead reminds her of the birthday present Bo got her and that her support makes him happy even if she's not there in real life. Antares wants to go on the Lawless Fort quest! A quest where PKers attempt to take out hunters in order to earn the title Chaotic!

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At the entrance of &#931; Vulnerable Barren Safe House a group of players mock Haseos group saying they'll take down all the PKers! They then die to the first one. Haseo's group takes out 6 former Chaotic PKers looking to re-earn their title and at the end encounter Negimaru and his underlings looking to become Chaotic! "Lone Azure Negimaru" says that if he becomes a Chaotic PKer he'll be famous so Bordeaux & Grein will have to come find him! Haseo gives them a chance to run away, which the underlings do, but Negimaru stays to fight and gets creamed. Suddenly... Grein shows up! He and Negimaru umm... talk? After fighting Haseo in the Holy Palace, Grein passed out and woke up in a hospital. He had to stay for awhile and they wouldn't let him play games, then when he got out he was to shy to approach Negimaru! But thank to Antares the two reunited... and challenged Haseo! Negimaru was already half-dead so he fell fast. Grein was alil tough but 3 vs 1 meant he went down soon after. Negimaru vowed that once Bordeaux was back with them they'd defeat Haseo for sure! With the quest over Haseo went to collect his reward when Grein appeared "Thanks." he talked!!

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Mail from Pi says to get over to Raven's @HOME. Meanwhile, in the white room Ovan recalls how it all started. He and Aina were peacefully reading books in the white room when black spots appeared and darted straight towards Aina. Ovan threw himself in its path, became infected, and PKed Aina. Everyone gathered at the Serpent of Lore to discuss Fidchell's prophecy but Ovan interupts them! He tells 'em to get on over to &#931; Immersed Crime's Paraphrase if they want to learn the whole truth. Haseo heads there alone with Yata and the others following from a distance. Avoiding all monsters, he gets to the last block and uses Area Hacking to get to an Outer Dungeon. Now avoiding Outer Bugs he finds an anomaly within an anomaly and Area Hacks to create a warp to the Creator's Room! A part of Harald's black box which even the Serpent of Lore can't see! Ovan briefly shows off the fact that he and Aina had found the original, complete Epitaph of Twilight which must make Yata mad jealous. He then says that defeating him may have a slim chance at bringing back the Lost Ones so Haseo charges into battle! Alone.
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Although Atoli, Kuhn, Yata, Bo, Endrance, and Pi were also there this fight wasn't for them. This was a battle between men! Not annoying young ladies, lovesick young men, know-it-all boys, little kids with multiple personalities, 20-somethings who never leave the house, or old hags. As such Haseo fought Ovan and game over'd somehow (some serious bull I swear!). However he returned and won the second time around! 'Course with Ovan enough is never enough. Despite his Avatar having a bigass AIDA gun attached to it and an impenetrable supremely defensive shield this time, Haseo still (barely!) defeated him with a double dose Data Drain! It musta did the trick cause Ovan was pleased. His Avatars special ability "The Rebirth" could now be activated in order to reinitialize the whole network, getting rid of AIDA and bringing the lost ones back! Haseo calls him out on his selfish plan which caused countless people to suffer but its to late for complaints cause the rebirth has begun! Aina responds, Ovan fades away, and as for Haseo...
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His PC ends up badly damaged in some sort of desert looking place as a giant flying turtle with a city on its back draws near! "Am I... am I dead?" Zelkova calls out to Haseo saying the rebirth heavily damaged his PC and consciousness "You must ask your Epitaph... just who 'Haseo' is." Haseo reminsices over everything he's done since losing Shino, how he acted, used people, cared only about his power, but then began to change somewhere along the line. He came to care about the people he'd encountered and was determined to see things through to the end. His Epitaph shows up and questions Haseo's answer. But Haseo's mind is made up, and so his Epitaph says Haseo doesn't need him anymore "See ya." However, Haseo isn't gonna let him go that easily and says they're going together!
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In addition to restoring Haseo's consciousness, this decision... this unison creates a new job extension for him! The Xth Form!!! This is when Haseo ceases to be Haseo and in turn becomes Hasemoé! He's got a pair of dual guns which can be reloaded manually or automatically (the latter of which takes alil extra time), he also has Double Trigger which allows him to get in some extra shots after a regular skill trigger/rengeki attack, and can also dash around in battle! Now that's what I call one heck of an upgrade! He awakens in a strange looking place, full of strange looking PCs~
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I love the little glimpses we get of the characters in real life in stuff like Alcor, especially since we don't really see much of that outside of what they tell us about themselves in e-mail chains.

I mean we know Alkaid's a book worm but seeing it is a whole other story.
The more real life stuff the better! I used to think the second season of .hack kinda failed in that area compared to the first, but going through it all again proved me wrong! And Alkaid is a bookworm?! Guess I'll be rediscovering that soon!

And man is .hack full of characters who have mental issues. Lol Who would have gussed Saku was the result of a split personality and not a flesh and blood sibling?

And really who would actually be heartless enough to chose for her to go away? She rocks!
I didn't guess it! And I wouldn't get rid of Saku... cause that would bar you from a certain special event later on. An now I remember there's still at least one more mentally unstable character to be introduced later in the game!


I thought she was a pain in the ass, and she never cut Haseo any slack. If it wasn't for Bo I would have chosen to let her go.

Lindsay, are you implying you don't know the backstory of Yata's player? Or are you just baiting the audience with sarcasm?
So what your saying is you'd never have Haseo
marry
Saku? Thats prolly a good call if so! An I'm not sarcastic I'm just being alil goofy!
 

Stage On

Member
The xth form rocks! Haseo gets an unreleased duel gunner class upgrade. I love pulling his double trigger and doing extra damage to a foe and his more mature look also reflects his inner growth over the series as well.

And Alkaid is a bookworm?! Guess I'll be rediscovering that soon!

Are you not doing the greeting card chains? This is part of one from the second game

Haseo
>What do you usually spend your time doing?

Alkaid
Reading books at the library and fast food places,
I'd say. I can concentrate better when I read
outside of home. Besides, I'm always logged into
"The World" whenever I'm home :)

I love the cards since using them reveals so much about the characters outside of the world. Too bad they are limited so you have to use them wisely and have multipul saves to see everyone's e-mail chains.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
More real places & names added to the OP! Ovan is 26. Aina is 12/13. Man. That's one big brother! Along with mentally unstable characters this series has its share of not-so-happy families to. Tsukasa, Tokuoka, Mai, Shugo/Rena (non-canon),
Jyotaro
,
Pi
, Tabby, Wool/Cashmere, prolly some others I'm not remembering at the moment.


//Alcor ~ Chapter 4
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In real life some girls were mocking Nanase for changing her look to imitate Kuramoto's. Kuramoto gives her a bop on the head "That look doesn't suit you at all! And FYI... You were cuter with glasses!" she ended up doing the same in the game, making her PC styled after Alkaid's. While she's moping around in a field being saved from monsters by Kuhn, Alkaid's wandering Lumina Cloth feeling extra irritated. Her title match vs Endrance is coming up soon and its got her on edge. When Kuhn & Nanase return to town he asks whats on her mind and she's all mopey about not being strong like Alkaid. "Why not just do what YOU can, Nanase-chan?" He says she's got a charm of her own... when a peeved Pi shows up, seeing Kuhn hitting on the girl! She reminds him they gotta check out the data for the coming title match and says Alkaid will probably lose, which Nanase denies! Hearing that Alkaid will fight even knowing she may lose, Nanase asks if there's any quests to earn items that don't involve fighting!

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
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"What is this place?" "Welcome to the Netslum." being greeted by a dog-looking thing probably made Haseo question if he'd actually regained consciouness or not lol. A place full of junk data, hacked PCs, and AI's. "Zelkova... are you the one who hacked my PC?" "Yup!" kinda hard to believe! Apparently Netslum is Zalkova's "home". The other Epitaph Users show up and reunite with Haseo, who learns Yata is pretty famous in Netslum and that the ship Tartarga itself is alive! Even with Ovan & AIDA gone there's apparently still danger left, so to help Haseo out, Zelkova & Kaede give him their member addresses!!

"The activation of the Rebirth caused network problems in the real world on a global scale. Finance, communication, transportation, the media... all aspects of life were affected. The Third Network Crisis. Yeah, that's what society called it. But in the midst of all that, "The World" became peaceful again. Since the Rebirth activation, there hasn't been a single report of any AIDA phenomena anywhere. Ovan... Did you get everything you wanted? The Lost Ones are gradually returning to normal in the real world. But... But Shino..."

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Saku replied again. For someone that's leaving forever she sure isn't going fast. She asks how Haseo knew about the present and says its none of his business! This is getting irritating so he could just say screw it, but nah! He tells her the white chrysanthemum Bo got her means "I'm here for you." A CC Corp mail says they're so sorry for disconnection issues! Sirius drops a message saying he's back, but can't reach Alkaid. Kuhn says CC Corp's gonna blame Ovan for the crisis and that no one can find him in the real world, if he's even still alive. Yata chimes in noting that doctors saw a change in Shino Nanao's brainwaves and that the Lost Ones recover at different rates. Secondly he wants Haseo to meet him at Morrigu Barrow. There he tells him to look down over the cliff. They see lotsa small flying thingies and four large lights. He calls this the Anti-Existence of the Rebirth. Cubia. (Jun must be rolling in his grave about now.) Just as the Rebirth spread through the network, so will Cubia and then the true apocalypse will begin. "Once, seven years ago... When The World and the real world were in danger, I was indeed on the battlefield." a few images from the past flash by and we see Kite, BlackRose, Mistral, Balmung, Lios, Cubia, and... Wiseman. "I will not allow The World to be destroyed." Yata member address get!

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Saku mails Haseo seeming much happier, now knowing what the flower meant and says she won't vanish! Aina sent a mail telling him she's waiting at &#931; Incensed World's Build-Up. He goes to meet her and the first thing on his mind is "How do you know who I am?" She was a Lost One before he and Ovan had met afterall. Apparently her sleeping consciousness occasionally connected with the AIDA in Ovan's arm and showed her his memories. Haseo says its good she's fine now since that was Ovan's wish but she disagrees. Ovan is now the comatose one, on the verge of death. She asks if Haseo remembers when he first met her brother "My brother saved you, remember? He guided you and helped you. So I don't understand, why didn't you save him?!" the upset little girl runs to the platform and warps out leaving Haseo at a loss for words until the game world begins shaking "What the hell was that tremor?"


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- In the News
• An international arrest warrant has been issued for the 26 year old Masato Indou, known as Ovan in the online game "The World, for allegedly creating the AIDA virus.
• Nuclear power plants all over the world are experiencing meter malfunctions due to network troubles. If this keeps up a global meltdown may occur.
• The international space station Village may fall from orbit within the next 12 hours from unresponsive controls on the ship and from earth.
• The supersonic commercial airplane put into service earlier this year made an emergency landing off the coast of Kochi thanks to a failed autopilot.
• An experimental magnetic train derailed, causing damage to a residental neighborhood.
• After the most recent episode of Salvador Aihara's Online Jack, where Salvador, Michiru, and Taichiro broke into a CC Corp lab, the show has been suspended.

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- On the Boards
• Some players are pissed at the Indou guy for causing many online games to be taken down.
• butt-Rice is having a bad day, he lives near 3 nuclear power plants, and where the magnetic train crashed. Because of this he had to evacuate to a shelter where he's bored to tears!

//Online Jack
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phase.08
: The trio (plus the trusty cameraman!) head to CC Corp Japan's #4 research lab, where Sugai uses a device to break the lab doors security lock, much like Bith the Black did way back when. "I asked a hacker friend of mine for a little backup on this one." He says if he loses his job while saving the kids so be it. Michiru's been axed, as has Salvador's show, so welcome to the club professor! CC Corp apparently had a division that looked after Doll Syndrome patients in secret. They come across what looks like the very same room Sugai had shown them previously where the kids strange electric power ran amok. Salvador takes the time to taste test some chips to determine how long they've been there "About a week or two old, I'd say." The big monitor in the room suddenly lights up showing an image of "The World"'s log in screen then a glimpse of Ovan before the words "Initialization program commencing. Epitaph activated..." and in bright red letters "Rebirth" followed by the same bright screen flashing Haseo had witnessed. Afterwards Salvador glances up to see the rest of his team cuffed and surrounded by officers/guards. "I don't understand what happened!"


I love pulling his double trigger and doing extra damage to a foe and his more mature look also reflects his inner growth over the series as well.
Mature? Who cares about that! He looks cute now!

Are you not doing the greeting card chains? This is part of one from the second game

I love the cards since using them reveals so much about the characters outside of the world. Too bad they are limited so you have to use them wisely and have multipul saves to see everyone's e-mail chains.
Ohhh no I haven't been doing those mail chains. iirc they're the same in each game, so I usually just wait until the very end to learn about each character... through lotsa save file reloading since there aren't enough of each greeting card to send to everyone.
 

Stage On

Member
Your latest post brings up one of the few things about .hack that really makes me roll my eyes.

The network problems effect things in "real" world that it has no business effecting. Stuff like Nuclear power plants and lots of traffic stuff and other things that wouldn't be plugged into the net.

I know it's to increase the dramatic tension but it's so unrealistic since that stuff isn't part of the network in real life for a reason or part of a closed network with no connection to the outside world.
 

Psxphile

Member
You're talking about the same series that has a goddess A.I. existing inside a digital infrastructure? Digital copies of human souls running around a virtual world? Not that you're wrong or anything...

I'm reminded of Mega Man Battle Network series and how just about everything in that world had a jack-in port for the little PET devices, from kitchen ovens to traffic lights.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Does anyone else feel bad hunting the Gomora's? They're kinda cute and I like their cries... ^_^;


//Alcor ~ Chapter 5
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Silabus & Gaspard are sad Nanase hasn't shown up at Canard today, not knowing she's looking for a quest! She is told of one that doesn't require fighting! Simply kick one of each type of Lucky Animal and some mystic dual swords will be all hers! Just ten more to go... but whoops! Her notes blew away! "I thought that I may be able to change myself in The World. But... I haven't changed one bit." With two more days before Alkaid's title fight she's determined to get those dual swords and by doing so it will be the end of "Nanase". As she runs all around looking for the animals, Kaede finds a note left behind by her "At last... I've found you." Later, Nanase is running around in the real world! She bumps into some girls, who note they heard someone is transferring out soon, on her way out of school in a rush to get home and drops her Lucky Animal notes which Kuramoto happens to spot and pick up. "That's right... tommorow's the title match."

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
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Yata informs everyone that Cubia's already become a burden on the game and network. In the midst of the meeting Bo comes rushing in saying some monsters are after Aina at the area &#931; Fleeing Dismayed Emotion! Haseo & Bo find and swat down the three Cubia Gomora's which were pestering her but she goes on a rant blaming Haseo for not saving Ovan and saying she was happier in a coma still connected to her brother! "You can't throw all your painful feelings at somebody just because it hurts." Bo steps up to the plate to vouch for Haseo's kind heart and gets Aina to stop throwing blame around. The three of them return to Raven's @HOME where they find out those three Gomora's were only a few of the unlimited amount Cubia can produce. Without all eight Epitaph Users an assault on Cubia wouldn't end well "If only we could converse with god..." says Yata. God? Oh hey, Shino mentioned Aura long ago, so Haseo decides they should head to the Hulle Granz Cathedral. Yata and Aina are going as well.
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Aina whips out the Epitaph of Twilight and becomes possessed while reading it. This causes Haseo's Epitaph to react and Yata comes to a shocking realization "It's you Haseo. The Key of Twilight, is you!" Haseo summons his snazzy new upgraded Skeith and shares data with the possessed Aina but then... they appeared. Azure Kite, Orca, and Balmung. And they came ready to fight. Aina's still out of it so Haseo & Yata fight valiantly but lose! They fight smarter and more aggresively and win the rematch though! If you can call it a win "Can't these guys die?!" they're still itching for a fight but a voice commanded them to stop and so they did. Haseo learns the truth about them, they're guardians of "The World" who only go after anomalies like AIDA & Ovan. Yata asks the person speaking through Aina how they can save "The World". "I have no power to decide the future of this world." Azure Kite floats up to Haseo and gives him a copy of weapon "Empty Skies" then the three guardians leave. Aura says its up to the players, people to do save the world. Then she returns to sleep in the sea of data. Crap. There's nothing more to be done so the trio return to town.
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"Most of the players have begun logging out, having sensed something unusual is going on." says Yata. Towns may be shutdown soon so if there's any last minute business they have to take care of, they'd best do it now. Haseo visits Death Grunty and learns Canard hit Rank 8! For a meager fee of 800,000 GP, Haseo & Co. can fully restore their HP/SP at a Platform once per visit to an area. Also Shop Acorn can now stock 15 items! Now instead of the regular PCs you'd see running about, you're treated to an entirely new and unfamiliar set. Some of these players carry some exotic items so trading with them is worthwhile, if you can put up with their constant freaking out over viruses and whatnot. With preparations complete Haseo returns to the Serpent of Lore where Yata says Cubia's consuming the servers and that they must abandon ship! All logged in players are to be warped to Netslum! There, a mini-Serpent of Lore is set up in the ships bridge and Pi's surprised to see Zelkova can use it! "Zelkova's skills are equal to yours and mine, Pi." He informs them of the nuclear meltdowns just waiting to happen and Haseo decides to fight to save both worlds!

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While Zelkova contacts regular players, Haseo has a look around the town and reunites with Silabus & Gaspard! They don't know whats going on but take their guildmasters advice to stay put, and Gaspard even decides to open a shop there! Who should show up next but... "Stupid!" Saku! His e-mails totally hadn't won her over and she'll only be adventuring with him cause Bo & Master En are hopeless, so Haseo should simply consider himself as an "extra" to them! He then logs out to find mail from Bo thanking him for talking to Saku for him and preventing her from vanishing. He catches Zelkova's mail to all players still able to connect for their support and many agreed to help! Once he returns to Netslum Zelkova announces the main areas Cubia's Gomora's are swarming, they're all Lost Grounds! Slowing the spawning of infinetely generating monsters is all they can do for now.
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The first stop was Morrigu Barrow where Kaede, Matsu, Hiiragi, and Sophora were fighting Gomora's! They handled the ones outside while Haseo & Co. took out the ones in the Outer Dungeon. Arche Koeln was next and the Gomora population was even heavier... but one girl shows up outta the blue to clear a path. Alkaid!! She gets a great big hug from Haseo which prolly embarrassed her infront of the other players there. Taihaku and Sirius! They said many arena competitors had responded to the call from Zelkova & Haseo to fight the monsters, meaning his reputation as a cheater had been forgiven! When that area and Outer Dungeon was secured Haseo moved on to Coite-Bodher where Gabi smashed through a buncha Gomora's! Bordeaux, Negimaru, Grein, IYOTEN, and Asta came to help out their guild master. Gabi declares "Die to live!" and they all start fighting! Haseo's group take their fight to the Outer Dungeon and clear the monsters outta it! The final place is Briona Gwydion and right away they encounter Piros the Third! He's taken it upon himself to join protect "The World" to! Silabus, Gaspard, and Antares as well! With all them Gomora's mopped up their spawn rates stabilized for now. Zelkova announces he's found the area Cubia's main body is located in and ya just gotta love how thick they're laying on area words lately! Aina asks Haseo to save "The World" the place she and her brother shared! "I'll never forget Ovan... And I'll fight to the end, with his memory in my head and his will in my heart!"


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- On the Boards
• Players whine about not being able to log on during the emergency maintenance, while others say their "friends" are logged in but in a weird town with weird PCs.
• Discussion about the e-mail from Zelkova occurs and some wonder just how he got ahold of their member addresses.


Your latest post brings up one of the few things about .hack that really makes me roll my eyes.

The network problems effect things in "real" world that it has no business effecting. Stuff like Nuclear power plants and lots of traffic stuff and other things that wouldn't be plugged into the net.

I know it's to increase the dramatic tension but it's so unrealistic since that stuff isn't part of the network in real life for a reason or part of a closed network with no connection to the outside world.
It is abit much huh? At least in the case of the space station it was mentioned it may have become infected by a personal computer a crew member had brought aboard. Even private networks & closed servers can have loopholes I guess.

I'm reminded of Mega Man Battle Network series and how just about everything in that world had a jack-in port for the little PET devices, from kitchen ovens to traffic lights.
Oh yeah! I'd forgotten all about that! I'll throw in an example to! The Pokémon universe totally revolves all around Pokémon! Tropes!
 

Psxphile

Member
Fuck yeah! Alkaid's back! :D
Fuck no! Level grinding to bring her up to speed. :(

I wonder why Aura "gave up" on The World and its players. Did she, at some point, think that her continued presence would be a detriment to network stability? That humanity would come to depend too much on her and be unable to work out their own problems by themselves? Is she secretly an altheist?

Or was Piros to blame? I bet it was...
 

Kincaido

Got 99 problems and only one of them is a waifu
Fuck yeah! Alkaid's back! :D
Fuck no! Level grinding to bring her up to speed. :(

I remember putting off the end of the game to grind her for a day or two because I wanted to use her in my final party no matter what lol. She was my favorite character.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Finally, the end of Mangod's nightmare hehe!


//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
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Okay. This is it. With the threat of nuclear meltdowns and a space station falling over Japan its time ta do this thing! Pi was hanging around by the Chaos Gate so I figured she wanted to come and Yata to because why not? They're a duo after all! Apparently the place they're headed will be too dangerous for non-Epitaph Users. Sorry Alkaid! The area &#931; Exciting Conflict's Fate was suffering due to Cubia's presence so everyone hurried their butts off towards the section of it with anamolus data and area hacked it. The Outer Dungeon there was full of the most powerful Outer Bugs yet, and a line of four Warp Points, of which only one would send ya forward. Guessing games! Don't ya love 'em? When they eventually found the right one everyone said some words then area hacked and warped to a pretty far out space.
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There, each of the Epitaph Users lent Haseo the power of their Epitaph's and he summoned Skeith to tackle Cubia head on. It wasn't that simple though! Cubia Alpha heads and swarms of Gomora's keep on spawning to attack him! Alone they weren't terribly tough, but fighting four on one health bar was dangerous and nearly fatal! Eventually a Cubia Beta head popped out and it had more defense, more attacks, and a crapton more Gomora to throw at ya! It was a close fight up 'til the end but finally it got hit with Protect Break! Charging up the Data Drain and firing it right at the giant beast was a piece of cake! The Cubia head didn't seem bothered by it meaning the Data Drain had no effect! Yata mentioned there must be a core somewhere within its giant body so Haseo flew everybody right on down Cubia Beta's throat!
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Everyone made peace with the fact that they're putting their lives on the line when a sphere of light descended upon them. "All I can do is connect thoughts to one another... Now, reach out and touch them. Touch the feelings of those who share your inner thoughts. Little children of Morganna... May you find happiness..." With the aid of Aura, Haseo was now able to instantly bring any of his friends into his party! He brought Alkaid & Antares onboard and soon ran into Doppelgangers of all three of them created by Cubia! A single Doppelganger is a difficult opponent to defeat so a whole party of them took alot more effort to take down, and when they were down... they instantly revived. Alkaid & Antares pushed Haseo to move ahead while they held back the enemy. Kaede & Zelkova were the next recruits which was prolly a bad idea cause Doppelganger + Scythe = ow. Just like before they revived when taken out and Haseo was allowed to press on while the others stayed behind. He invited Piros the 3rd & Matsu to beat on some more of the dark doubles and again had to move on without them.

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Finally Haseo reached the top and to face off against Cubia he brought... Silabus & Gaspard! Go Canard! Now not only were there multiple cores but also bunches of Gomora spawns to deal with! Things were under control for alil while until Cubia did a slam attack. Death & revivals became a somewhat regular occurence from then on. When the Right & Left Core's were taken out the Core Shield was available to attack. This enemy has a hard shell! Once it was broken through, the Central Core could be attacked! However Cubia wasn't taking a beating laying down! Its constant barrage of lasers smacked Team Canard around really hard. But through focused attacks & hefty item usage the final core fell! And then Cubia's body began splitting yet again!
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"Could it be aiming to destroy us too? Is it self-destructing?!" If that happened it'd be like the Rebirth all over again, so to try and stop yet another network crisis they all lent Haseo their Epitaph's power again... but the attack he threw at Cubia simply wasn't enough. His PC was becoming greatly damaged and it seemed that without Ovan's Epitaph they were boned. "Little Children of Morganna... Pray now, as hard as you can. Only a strong prayer can change the world." "...And now, you have them all." Ovan's spirit appeared and gave his power to Haseo. "Can we do it, Haseo?" "...Yeah, of course we can!!" The renewed attack pierced Cubia's final barrier and finished it off. Cubia's body fizzled out and Haseo was left alone with Ovan. "You've gotten quite strong... a lot stronger than you were back then. Haseo... This is goodbye."

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"Wait! I... I still haven't found a way to return your feelings! You're always like this! You always leave before I can tell you how I feel! And now you're leaving me again!" the bromance is strong in these two o.o; "One ending, you know, is really a new beginning... We are not finished. Our journey will still continue." Ovan fades away leaving a dismayed Haseo behind. And at long last, Aura makes a proper appearance. "Your wish, felt through so much anguish and pain, has awakened his heart. He heard your lament and the deepest wish of his heart was to answer you. The bonds between our souls are what drive the world. And it will be all of you who drive our new world."

"Finally... The confusion in the real world and the network is finally calming down. And I think we avoided the real danger of the Network Crisis. The World finally returned to its daily routine. But a daily routine different from any it had before."

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Sometime later Haseo received a barrage of e-mails from his friends. Pi mentions that she'll be leaving CC Corp. after the mess is cleaned up, Matsu says he'll be graduating from online games, and Yata says G.U. is no longer needed and will likely be shutdown. However there was one that stuck out above all the others. It was from Shino! She asked him to meet her at Hulle Granz Cathedral. He logs in and scurries right on over there and finds her looking well. She explains that like Aina, her consciousness had all been faintly connected to the AIDA in Ovan's left arm and that she saw much of what Haseo had gone through to try and save her. Atoli shows up and sees the happy couple standing close to one another. Shino had invited her but for what purpose? To make her jealous? Atoli tried to make small talk before turning and leaving. "...let's start the Twilight Brigade again. With just the two of us... We'll go find Ovan." He doesn't quite know what to say to that so Shino guides him by telling him to be honest with himself. He understands, and dashes out of the cathedral having remembered all those campaigns he still has to complete! Really! There could be no other reason!
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- G.U. Vol.3: Redemption
Game Cleared: 32:24:10 (130:01:38)
Game Cleared 100%: tbd

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I wonder why Aura "gave up" on The World and its players. Did she, at some point, think that her continued presence would be a detriment to network stability? That humanity would come to depend too much on her and be unable to work out their own problems by themselves? Is she secretly an altheist?

Or was Piros to blame? I bet it was...
Maybe she was just mad at CC Corp. for all the screwing around all the time! Or as Zefie put it: "She integrated into the world. Abandoned the individual and became a god." I guess became the backbone of the game itself much like Morganna once was until she'd gained self awareness. Why'd Zefie have to go with her though? >.<;

Fuck yeah! Alkaid's back! :D
Fuck no! Level grinding to bring her up to speed. :(
I remember putting off the end of the game to grind her for a day or two because I wanted to use her in my final party no matter what lol. She was my favorite character.
I never did this previously but since ya all mentioned I went ahead and spent 2 1/2 hours getting her up to a reasonable level. Thank goodness for those +50% exp accessories!
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
This update concludes two more series. Kinda making me feel sad. Guess I'd better prepare more bonus stuff! Oh who am I kidding? Practically everything I've posted has been worked on down to the last minute before hitting reply lol. There is no prep time! btw I went back an edited older posts to note bonus content since they'll still be more to come! So anyway~ Lucky Animals, PKers, Ryu Books, blah blah blah. The usual stuff's all that's left ta wrap up right? Guess I'd better hop to it! Also: if ya look real closely at the stock ticker in the last Online Jack episode you can see a company named Liminality scroll by. Nice lil throwback!


//The End of "The World"
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file.12
: "To my little sister, I'm so sorry that my final gift to you ends like this. Right now, it is far too dangerous for me to see you in person. However, I can think of no one wiser than you to whom I can give this journal. I want you to use the character left on my computer. You must use it to access The World. I'm certain it will help to open up a new door for your life. The rest, I can only leave up to you. My wish is that you will walk this path of fate, for the sake of your beliefs, and for justice. You are a Chosen One. We are siblings with many years between us. I am sure you don't remember me, as you and I parted ways when you were still just a small child. But I remember you, the little girl you used to be... and I know what you've done with your life in the time since. My only regret is that I was unable to see you again. Please forgive me for being unable to watch over you. Reiko... even though our parents went their separate ways long ago, you and I are brother and sister, and that will never change. Ever. You will always be my darling sister." Thus Jun's story ends, while Pi's is soon to begin...

//Alcor ~ Chapter 6
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While in the game Nanase notices she'd lost the notes that nice lady Kaede had given her! She stumbles upon a Chimera and decides that with a whole day left she can get 'em all even without the notes! Later on with 12 hours until the title fight she's starting to get alil down, still needing 4 more Lucky Animals but tries not to let it get to her! Kaede had posted hints on the board but apparently Nanase has a one-track mind and never checked! Suddenly Silabus & Gaspard show up with one of the animals she needs! "Let us help you search for the Lucky Animals." "If you ever need help you can lean on us." The three of 'em find the remaining ones needed and in a forest full of Lucky Animals, Dr. Pao shows up to congratulate and give her the mystic dual swords! They deliver the weapon to Alkaid who understands why that girl was such a hurry in school yesterday "Thank you, Nanase. I'm sorry I doubted you. And also, sometime let's be sure...to go stargazing together." "Wha... What?!" Nanase comes to the shocking realization that the Kuramoto girl is Alkaid! As she helps finish packing up with her family to move, the player of Nanase decides that Nanase can graduate from "The World" now. Alkaid enters Canard's @HOME hoping to see Nanase. Its been a week since she moved and Alkaid was hoping to see her in the game, but no dice. She lost the title match but is already planning for a rematch! But she never did get to go stargazing with the girl...

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption - Overtime
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E-mail check! Ono of the arena team The Sweepstakers wishes for Team Haseo to challenge his team in the arena! They weren't able to enter the PK tournament, I guess cause they were good upstanding players, which bummed 'em out. They've trained long & hard and want Team Haseo to come prepared! Zelkova shoots Haseo a line saying he's been tampering again. Now he and his friends can go to Netslum whenever they like "Just so you'd come to Tartarga, Canard hasn't moved from it." why that little...! Shino thanks him again for all he did, including visiting her in real life, and knowing he'd lost everything gives him her Member Address again! Bordeaux says she'll take him down eventually but for now to take her Member Address! Who'da guessed? Aura's going back to sleep but before she does so, sent a message which gives Haseo the Member Addresses for Azure Kite, Orca, and Balmung!!! CC Corp. announces that the Forest of Pain will be re-opening! Finally, Tabby says she'll be logging in for a change and that if he wants, he can meet her at the Forest of Pain's entrance! After logging in, he sees that Canard isn't the only guild to have permenantly moved. The back room of Raven which held the Serpent of Lore is no more and Wise Grunty is gone.

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- In the News
• The search warrant for Masato Indou has been called off after an insider at CC Corp. leaked information of the companies data tampering.
• Online Jack is back in business! Charges over his intrusion of CC Corp. were dropped and many people are praising the show for having been the first to report on the AIDA virus.
• Haseo's been nominated as the ultimate player of "The World" due to his three rank arena sweep and past as the person who took down 100 PKers alone!

- On the Boards
• Kagari says its all over for CC Corp. R:1's data loss, the sham of a PK tournament, falsifying data... and not even sending out the companies president to apologize for anything! Former player Kyoragi wonders how people can keep giving their money to that company. Good question!
• Apparently despite all of the problems with the game, the billing system worked just fine! Some players are demanding compensation for being billed yet not being able to log on for so long!
• E-zou claims to have been PKed by a Chaotic PKer not on the current black list. Her nickname was "Eggmaniac" or something like that, so he claims. As an 8th Chaotic PKer is unheard of, the other posters claim he's trolling.

//Online Jack
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phase.09
: After the previous episode they were arrested and tossed in jail. "If Mr Sugai hadn't leaked information to the media they might not have rushed to the scene and we could have been disposed of to keep quiet." before they were taken away they believe they saw evidence of the truth. The six missing kids were allegedly found in an abandoned house near the school. When they got out of jail they went to the hospital treating them "None of the children had any memory of the incident." "And thus the only real link to the truth behind the Doll Syndrome had been severed." In the hospital, Salvador and Michiru conclude that their investigation of Doll Syndrome hadn't led them to any real answers about it, "The World", or AIDA. A young woman passes by muttering "Opposing mirrors of hope and despair. That's what AIDA is." as she enters an elevator, while a nurse pulls the nameplate of Shino Nanao from the wall outside the former inpatients room.

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And so, leaving many mysteries unsolved, our investigation of Doll Syndrome concluded. We were left with no clues to solve the remaining mysteries. However, we are not giving up. As soon as new information arrives, we will resume our pursuit of the truth and report to you, the viewers. See you next time!


So for the post game are you going to do the marriage event?
Yup! I'll prolly do 'em all! Maybe ya all can vote on who ya want to see headline the post while the others I'd just drop links to.
 

Psxphile

Member
Alkaid gets my vote.

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"W-w-what?"
Adorable.

Also, I just realized how much CC2 loves the brother-sister trope within the .hack series. Examples include:
-Blackrose and her quest to save her comatose younger brother Alf.
-Jun Bansoya's sacrifice (is he actually dead? I'm not too clear on that...) and Pi's player working to uncover the truth from within CC Corp.
-The unconventional sibling relationship between Saku and Bo (one who is merely an alternate personality of the other).
-Ovan's far-reaching gambit to restore his sister Aina.

And another that won't come into play until later.
 

Lindsay

Dot Hacked
Can't stop til you reach the top! Of a new page! The end of Alcor is here. A nice lil comic it was! Remember how great that Infection Demo was an how just one flaw kept it from true greatness? Well guess what! The Rebirth Demo is umm well just see below! ...why was I playing this instead of better preparing to challenge the Forest of Pain?


//G.U. Vol.1: Rebirth - Demo [Bonus #10]
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Following the lead of the previous demo, this one was included with the limited edition of .hack//Roots Vol.1. Unlike the game itself you can skip through the opening logos right to the loop demo and past that to the title screen! Pressing Start here will put ya in the game right away. No option configurations or optional promotional video to watch. There is a promo video included but that'll come later. &#916; Courageous Engaging Daydream. The very first area Haseo visited when he started the game, that's where this demo begins. What about the desktop? Or town? Its fair enough to start off on a tutorial so maybe we'll get to the out-of-game stuff in abit.

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The thing is, there is no tutorial! You're thrown right in there with Haseo (Form 2), Pi & Atoli and expected to know how to play, I guess? They do tell you about pressing Select to bring up the map but that's about it. Unlike in the full game pressing Start does nothing! Nope if ya don't like the way the camera controls or whatever tough luck there's no changing any settings here! In any case they do tell you the goal which is to collect the three Symbol Fragments and open the treasure box in the Beast Temple and if you can manage to do so you'll get to see the promo movie! Death is not an option here~ seriously I tried. I took away Pi & Atoli's healing items so Haseo did die in battle but not them, they were competent and guarded often. It prolly doesn't help that everyone is Level 20 in this Level 1 area. Oh but the monsters were upgraded. Instead of just Goblins everywhere the enemies here were Goblin Guards and three... yes three Crumple Trees both of which are in the 11~20 level range. Why emphasize the Crumple Trees? Cause having three of them in one area goes against what the real game does! They are "boss" class monsters so there's only one per area, and they're never in areas with Beast Temples, and yet here they are. Oh and ya fight all three at once! It coulda been a pretty cool battle had Haseo's party levels been alil lower but alas they go down far to easily.

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So you collected all the things and opened the temple door. Time to go collect the yummy treasure within! You do so... and that's the end of the demo. No visits to the desktop or town or any other place. No story. Nothing. I'll be generous and say it lasts all of five minutes if you know what you're doing. That's an enormous step down from what Infections demo offered! The promo video kinda sucks to. Instead of touching upon the series past its just a teaser for the end of Vol.1 and then blips of the Azure trio from early in Vol.2 to hype that game up. This same video is an extra on a later Roots dvd and just isn't special at all. It all feels so poorly thrown together an offers nothing to pull people into the series with, not even the combat cause you're all so overpowered. What the heck were they thinking?

//Alcor ~ Chapter 7
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Learning that Alkaid knows Nanase in real life, Silabus says Alkaid can find her easily but she sees no need to "For the first time since I've known her... She's started to move ahead on her own accord." Nanase's gotten used to her new school and the fact she'd quit "The World" when she overhears some other students talking about how that cheating Endrance defeated Alkaid! She wants to go see her but knows Nanase could do nothing to help... but could she the player do anything? Just then she notices an e-mail from Kaede who'd helped her with the Lucky Animals "Moon Tree..." She's decided. Nanase... or is it Sophora now? Goes over to Moon Tree's HQ where Zelkova & Kaede are "the star with a blade for a heart". "We've been expecting you. Welcome to Moon Tree."

//G.U. Vol.3: Redemption - Overtime
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Now that the overtimes underway the first thing ta do was finish handing out fliers for Bikman! Getting that Flyer Radar outta the inventory is a good start and the Bikman's Model campaign is done. Next up is battling it out with Chaotic PKers! One of which was a player from the R:1 days. With the aid of dual guns only the seventh one of them was tough... tough enough to serve Haseo's team a game over! They then ran into an eighth chaotic - Natsume the Edgemaniac! She wants Tri-Edge and will take it from people by force! She was real energetic but no match for Haseo's PK hunting squad. Back on the boards other people noted seeing her and apologized for calling another poster a liar and one of 'em mentioned seeing her on the back streets of Breg Epona with a big gold guy so off to check out the scene! "Aren't you Natsume the Chaotic PK?" Piros couldn't believe she'd be involved in such nasty business! Natsume denies it saying she gets the shivers just hearing about PK! Haseo wonders if she has multiple personalities but nah... that couldn't be it. Piros properly introduces her as his dear old friend, who's been stalking "a certain dashing man for seven years." He then forces Natsume to hand her Member Address over to Haseo, citing the age old saying that "men must be charming and women must be bold"! This development leaves Haseo saying "Man, I just picked up another weirdo..." After that they finished taking down the target of 50 PKers and cleared the Chase the Bounty campaign!
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Next came the Stray Mecha Grunty campaign! After refueling the lil guy for the 30th time he blasted off into the sky as his theme song played through to completion for once! After doing that a CC Corp e-mail arrived stating a new quest was added to Breg Epona's quest shop called Farewell Mecha Grunty! Someone kidnapped Mecha Grunty?! Dr. Kepel wants the help of adventures to save the lil guy but hurries off the the field before they do! They soon run into a large robot named Proto Gurah who said he just wanted to hang out with his little brother. Kepel calls him a thug he thought he'd scrapped long ago! Proto Gurah sends some metal minions of his out to "scrap the fleshies" and Kepel but Haseo/Natsume/Piros defeat 'em. Proto then disses Kepel "Just as the fleshies so callously created the Vital Vista as slaves... As a Vital Vista slave, you callously created the Mecha Grunty Tribe!" Later on when they caught up to him, he installed the Gear of Malice into Mecha Grunty, turning him into the evil Black Gurah! He says the Mecha Grunty Tribe cannot create, so instead they will destroy!

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The two brothers fought side by side for a short while but Dr. Kepel was able to get through to Mecha Grunty "The weak are exploited. It's the same all over the world. That's why, if nothing else... I wanted the Mecha Grunty I'd built... Too be even stronger." Mecha removed the evil gear himself much to Proto's surprise. He attacked the group solo and lost, but he still had a trump card. A super steam bomb in his body!! He was gonna take himself, the island, and everyone with him! "Good-bye, Dr. Kepel." Mecha Grunty clung to Proto Gurah's back and rocketed them both high into the sky! Proto can't fathom why Mecha would sacrifice himself like this but the lil guy had good reason "You were always alone in this *oink*. It would be too sad if you had nobody to be with you at the end *oink*." This touches Proto but he plays it off nice and cool "I'll be damned if I going have a rusted tin plate bastard like you share my fate! Farewell, Mecha Grunty!" he shakes Mecha Grunty off and soars up even higher, then explodes. Mecha Grunty crashes to the ground badly damaged, but his memory is intact so he can be repaired eventually. Kepel notes that Proto Gurah had made the gear, metal dragons, and recovery device he'd used, meaning the Mecha Grunty Tribe are able to create. The quest ends with Kepel having learned a lesson the hard way, so hard that both Natsume & Piros had felt "moved" by the whole scenario!
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The next thing cleared up was the Lucky Data Collection campaign. The Animal Radar was very useful but sadly it had to be returned. That's another slot in the inventory cleared up though. The Chim's Kicker campaign was fully cleared without the need to grind for a Chim Crown this time cause one just happened to drop by chance while stocking back up on Chim Spheres. Fighting the seven Sealed Beasts to finish fully upgrading the Lost Weapons was on the list so they went & did that. After the last one was finished off Haseo got mail from Zelkova asking him to give him any leftover Virus Cores hey may have or come across. What will he do with 'em? Its a secret! But in exchange, Haseo can choose from a variety of permenant stat enhancing items from Wise Grunty's little shop in Netslum. Canard hit Rank 9! The final tier they'll reach... in this era! For 1.5 million GP the Platform Heal can be upgraded to Platform Full Heal allowing 'em to cure negative status effects in addition to full HP/SP. Pretty useless imo since status effects in G.U. aren't nearly as pervasive or problematic outta battles as they were in the first series. And now with this condition fulfilled, it may just be time to go and see Tabby...


Alkaid gets my vote.
k! The vote list begins!

And another that won't come into play until later.
Can we count Proto Gurah & Mecha Grunty's strange sibling relationship? NPCs have lives too!
 
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