Oh no. What have I gotten myself into 
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There is a replayable log though, that should help.
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Definitely!
That sounds pretty normal to me. Games take a certain amount of time (usually long), so you’d either have to be buy very little, or play many hours consistently, to keep up. And that’s before you take mood, level, etc into account
So we all say, lol. One thing that’s helped me get a bit better is that I realized I can watch playthroughs, for story purposes (which is my main interest in games rn anyway). The other thing is prioritizing physical things (which I’m strict about what I buy, and games are more expensive)
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Yep, that’s correct. The Drakengard games are like the definition of jank, though; if you ever play them you’ll be fighting more with the gameplay than the language, most likely. 
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Time for my overdue アンジェリーク update! This one’s a bit boring, since it’s an overview of the main game systems, but I should hopefully be moving on to the main game cycle next. This won’t be any sort of comprehensive tutorial or overview for those watching along at home; I’m probably going to forget quite a few details along the way. 
(Most of these details and pictures I’ll hide in dropdowns so I don’t spam the thread too much.)
So here’s our main home base island:
My Room
Starting at the very bottom building is where my room is located.
Here I’ll be able to save, pass time to the next day, listen to music, and one or two other things. Speaking of saving, I do it by talking to the 時の精霊; look at this little guy on the table. He’s apparently sealed in there, lol.
My progress will be judged on the 28th of each month; no screenshots of that, so moving on…
Northern Temple
We now head straight north to the temple, where the 守護聖’s and ディア’s (my pink-haired guide for this section) offices are located.
Inside we meet ランディ, the 風の守護聖。
I don’t fully understand what he can do quite yet, but it sounds like I can either have him disrupt my rival Rosalia (ロザリア) or benefit me in some way.
I believe these next few character introductions are all in the same building:
More 守護聖
Next up we’re introduced to クラヴィス、闇の守護聖, who gives me hot gameplay tips:
Here’s the 水の守護聖、リュミエール。I don’t have any screenshots for what he’s able to do for me, so, uh. Here’s a picture:
And finally, we meet the 鋼の守護聖、ゼフェル。
I also don’t remember if he specified his abilities here, but far more importantly:
You don’t say… 
And we’re off to the next building, the Royal Research Institution (王位研究院), on the western side of the island:
Royal Research Institute
Here we meet パスハ, who doesn’t appear to be a 守護聖 but is merely a fishman:
I’ll be able to check on the current state of the world here by physically flying down to take a look:
Or by having him check people’s hearts so I can get a better idea of what to develop to really increase their happiness.
The 光の守護聖、ジュリアス、is also hanging out here:
He also didn’t specify his duties, so I suppose he’s just eye candy for now.
Ah, and I don’t think he’s been introduced yet, but here’s my head priest down in the mortal world! Lol
We’ll be angling a bit to go visit the circus-looking tent in the southeast of the island, the House of Fortunes (占いの館).
House of Fortunes
占い師のサラ (who, uh, also appears to have fins) lets me see my current compatibility and affinity with the guys:
The 夢の守護聖、オリヴィエ, is also hanging out here. No clue what he’s (she’s?) able to do yet (am I just doing a terrible job taking screenshots? I’m starting to doubt myself…)
Smack in the center of our little island here is the park, a popular date spot.
Park
Hanging out here is the 緑の守護聖、マルセル。
According to the rules, only girls can ask boys out. Challenge accepted.
And finally! Our last area! @.@
The Forest Lake
Located at the lake at the northeast section of the island, where we meet ルヴァ、地の守護聖。
So all that’s left to do is head back home and finally save my game (thank goodness for emulator save states so I can break this up into whenever I’ve got time). But oh! One last 守護聖 to meet…
And thus the game begins!
It looks like a pretty involved setup: I have a certain amount of energy I can use (either per day or per week; not clear on that yet), and the days follow a calendar system, so presumably certain things only happen on certain days. I’m expecting this to have a bit of a learning curve and to be solidly flattened by ロザリア early on, so we’ll just take it slow for now.
Hopefully this’ll be my chunkiest update for a while; it was a lot of info-dumping this time around.
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I have played and completed Drakengard 1, I have Drakengard 2 but only played a little at the start. Mine were mostly ok, lot of button bashing and cursing at the camera angles iirc but I liked them. Only played in English though.
I used to play games a lot more than I do now. But I probably have enough games across different consoles to never be bored even if I never bought another game for the rest of my life (and we know that will never happen 
)
I usually buy when on sale and then they are stockpiled for later 
I like play throughs for seeing alternative play throughs or for seeing how to do certain things, but prefer to play through myself at least the first time. I do go back to older games at a later date though so it’s not wasted, it just depends on my mood and what I feel like playing at that time.
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Oooh, nice! I’d like to give Drakengard 1 another shot one of these days. I just got stuck on one of the stages years ago and gave up, haha.
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Decided I needed some actual reading but needed something I could focus on so decided to start Pokémon Violet (switch) from the start in Japanese.
Only played a little of it this time but it has full furigana and I’ve certainly improved my understanding of Japanese from when I tried to play it originally.
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Been playing Patrick’s Parabox. That game is SO FUN! The puzzles aren’t challenging… Per se. It’s just easy enough you want to keep playing, but hard enough you feel like your accomplishing something.
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An update on アンジェリーク: I’ve made it to my first monthly evaluation! It’s taken me a bit to get into the swing of the game, but I’m feeling more comfortable after going through a cycle and looking up some general tips online. (No pictures for the below, sorry. ;( I’ve got them, but haven’t had time to move them over to upload.) Some thoughts:
- Your relationship with your rivel ロザリア is pretty hilarious: after almost any action you take, you’ll see her pop up on the island overview map, offer some comment about how superior she is, then watch her move to a new location. This happens constantly; really makes her get on your nerves quickly, haha. I think I know why the devs chose to do this, though: according to info online you can befriend ロザリア, and one of the main ways is to talk to her. So they have her loudly announce her next plans so you can follow her, haha.
- The goal of the game appears to be a delicate balance: you need to sufficiently develop your side of the new world, but you also need the 守護聖 to like you so they can vouch for you to the Queen that they think you’d make a good replacement for her. This basically gives you incentive to decide how to make the best use of your time, given your limited energy per day: should you ask a 守護聖 for their help? Or on one of the days they randomly show up to your room, hang out and chat with them for the full day?
- If a majority of the 守護聖 vouch for you during your evaluation in front of the Queen, she gives you an extra heart of energy to use! (Or at least, she did this first time.) I am extremely psyched for this
- Apparently the extra heart will unlock more dating potential at the lake, though I still need to check that out.
- When going on dates with 守護聖, there ends up being quite a bit you need to keep in mind: which person prefers a date inside vs. outside, if you go outside whether they prefer going to the lake or the park, and if you go the park you have to answer questions to their liking, including one about which of the other 守護聖 they favor. (Hallelujah for game rewind, since I’m playing on the Nintendo Switch Online service; this would not be going as well as it has otherwise.)
- The game keeps track of all these evolving relationship, likes/dislikes, and what your land’s residents currently want, which is super nice. It’s taken me a while to fully read, comprehend, and understand how it chooses to present that information to you, but it’s pretty concise once you get the hang of it.
- Originally I was a bit concerned about the game getting repetitive, since your pool of actions is pretty limited so far. Keeping that pool of actions relatively limited keeps the game snappy once you know what you’re doing, at least.
- I mentioned it in another thread, but this SFC version of アンジェリーク did receive a manga adaption! I really want to read it, since the game is pretty light in terms of story, but was somehow adapted to 11 volumes of manga… (アンジェリーク | L24??)
- I’ve heard there are multiple endings, so assuming my interest in the game doesn’t wane, I’m hoping to go for a couple of them if possible.
That’s all I have for now; there’s still stuff in the game I haven’t seen yet (supposedly the 守護聖 will lend you their powers without you asking if they like you enough, but I’m not high enough affection level wise to confirm that yet), so I should be back again soon to update! Perhaps after my next Queen evaluation?
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Update on アンジェリーク: just passed my second evaluation; I’ve been absolutely smoking ロザリア lately. We compared continent populations; ロザリア had a measly 6 buildings compared to my 13! And I’ve found the trick for such good progress:
This is correct! I don’t know what the affection threshold needs to be for this to kick in, but it’s absolutely brutal. There’s a chance they’ll benefit your land with their power or remove their blessing from ロザリア’s land. And it becomes a nasty feedback loop as well: I date them to get them to like me so they help me without me asking, and once I don’t have to spend time asking people for help, I can spend more time dating.
ロザリア can presumably do the same thing to me if I let down my guard, though. 
I think I want to do my second playthrough on the PlayStation version, which has some extra features from what I’ve heard. The difficulty is going to be upped for me personally since I can’t revert a save state/rewind when I answer the 守護聖’s date questions wrong. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll be save scumming all over the place, but it’ll definitely take a bit longer.
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I discovered an Android app called Steam Link that lets you stream Steam games to your Android device. So it’s made it easier for me to play VNs like うそなつ, since I can play them in bed now 
Also gave in and finally purchased the JP version of ソードアート・オンライン アリシゼーション リコリス | My Nintendo Store（マイニンテンドーストア） on Switch. It’s the third time I’ve paid for this game 
1st was the English localization (JP audio), 2nd was the PC version (full JP), and now Switch JP. My computer is too wimpy to play the PC version without lots of stuttering and lag. Only bought the main game for now, cuz of budget - it will take me long enough to get through it anyway
Also realized I totally stopped midway w/ Fate/Stay Night… Steam Link will help there as well (I have it on Switch, but the bluetooth audio is crap, and the EN translation is useful, so I have the Switch on mute, and play the OG version alongside. Audio is fine when it’s not bluetooth, but I almost always play things w/ headphones)
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Oh, neat! I’ll need to check that out; I have a bunch of VNs on my Steam account I’ve been meaning to get to.
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Find of the century! Thank you!!
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how well did it play through with the steam link?
I tried some of the visual novels I have and some didn’t work at all (needy streamer overload), some worked perfectly (doki doki literature, added the free version of this game just for the sake of trying the steam link) and some partially (phoenix wright, it’s kinda clumsy and I’m not sure if it’s a me problem, settings or game not fit for it)
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Perfectly fine, I just had to adjust the controls so it was touch-mouse, and disable the overlayed one (which worked ok for other games)
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Thanks! It helped me with the ace attorney 
I got the needy STREAMER to work too (though in that one the problem was with the window size )
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Okay, so I finally finished アンジェリーク over the weekend! Hard to say on how long my playthrough was; probably in the 10-15 hour range? I’m guesstimating a cool L23 for it, for those curious.
I ended up getting the canonical Queen ending, where I proved myself superior to ロザリア and took over from the old Queen. (I graciously allowed ロザリア to hang around as my new aide; she continually trash-talked me as I did so. ) I was hoping to get at least one of the 守護聖 to confess to me so I could have my pick of endings, but none of them ever did, despite me getting three or four up to what I believe was the max affection. 
It’s possible I also needed to max out our compatibility, but I wasn’t able to confirm that before winning.
The last building needed.
So speaking of which. As I played more and more through the game, I got to really wishing I had some hard numbers for things. How your actions influence the 守護聖’s relationship with you, how their affection does/does not affect the quality of help they give you, what the base affection given by each date spot is and each 守護聖’s preference for those, what your affection with ロザリア and your head priest changes, how exactly does the game decide to build a new building for you, etc. None of this knowledge is strictly necessary when playing the game, but I would have appreciated knowing.
There’s a lot of interconnecting factors, and I feel like you could really break the game if you knew how they all related. So for example, by the end there ロザリア might have reached the halfway point needed to win (which is like 70 buildings, I think? Not a hundred percent sure); maybe. I could do whatever I wanted by the end, and in fact couldn’t prevent my own success, as I had enough boyfriends goodwill from the 守護聖 that up to three or four were happy to step in when they felt like it to do my work for me. I’m pretty sure one factor for building buildings is having a variety of 守護聖 input, so even though ロザリア had two 守護聖 supporters of her own, and they helped her constantly, she had a relatively slower pace of building than I did because she simply wasn’t able to match the variety I was able to command.
Here were my final “stats”:
I never did figure out what 今の数 meant (so the top number under each guardian, beside the heart). I think it’s related to how much power the 守護聖 have contributed to your total housing amount, but I’m not sure if that’s true and, if it is, how that’s useful.
星の望み details your side of the world’s people’s current needs; so for example, they apparently really could’ve used a good dose of 美しさ (given by 夢) and 優しさ (given by 水). (And even more of 緑’s gift, looking at it now, though he stepped in to win it for me after this.) The higher the number, the better the chance 守護聖 with high affection values with you (not sure what that cutoff is…) will step in to lend their power for free.
And here’s my final relationship levels with everyone. 親密度 is their actual current friendship/relationship value (max of 200, I believe), and 相性 is their compatibility score with you, as determined by star sign and blood type (of course). Max for that latter is 100, I believe, and that’s the stat I’m wondering if I needed at max for a love confession. My friendship with ロザリア is at max; I continually stalked her throughout the game, hoping it would do something, haha. Still not sure what the benefits of that is, as well as cultivating a good relationship with your head priest (very bottom right).
You can see which 守護聖 ロザリア had claimed for herself by their horribly low affection for me. I think each 守護聖’s affection is a sliding scale, so if I were to suddenly start hanging out with ゼフェル, mister 10 親密度 up there, as he came to like me more he would accordingly start liking ロザリア less which is harsh when she’s trying to steal your men, which is why I don’t actually have a 200 for any of the guys up there, despite hitting it with several.
So did I enjoy the game overall? Yes! For sure! I’m super glad I tried it out and stuck with it after the initial confused start. I’m planning on playing the PlayStation port after this (it’s got voice acting!) and going for a romance ending, so I’m hoping that all my skills gained here will equate to a smooth experience, since I won’t have access to rewind anymore. (Not sure which boy I’ll pursue just yet. ) I’ve also got アンジェリーク 2 all lined up as well, which I’m looking forward to playing. I also found out about the existence of an アンジェリーク JRPG! Featuring the main character from 2! So I’m 100% going to be checking that out as well.
There’s a massive lack of アンジェリーク info on the English web, or at least as far as I’ve seen, so maybe one day this post will be helpful to others playing the game. I don’t even think this game has a complete English patch after all these years, which blows my mind. Just think: you all are on the cutting edge here with your Japanese knowledge!
Dunno if I’ll be able to post screenshots as I play the PS version of 1 or 2; they’d have to be crappy phone screenshots, so maybe just for special occasions…
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you made a really detailed post and I know it’s a different topic and all but would you mind if this was in the Wiki for Video Games with Natively Levels ?
this is so well detailed it honestly feels like a shame if I didn’t
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Sure, go right ahead!
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