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Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles

I use Blockbuster.com’s DVD-by-mail service, which gives me two free game or movie rentals at any Blockbuster location every month. This time around I rented FF:CC. I’ve played this before with Wei at one point and Jordan at another. This time I got to play with Joy.

Joy isn’t really into video games, TV or movies all that much, but she’s a sport and she likes to hang out with me so she gives most of the games that I get at least one try — even Halo 2! So, she tried out FF:CC.

At first she decided that it was “somewhat enjoyable,” which doesn’t sound that great to most people, but it is actually a compliment from Joy. Then we played another stage and another and another. Each time I’d make sure that we’d only play one stage at a time, because I definately don’t want to be fighting against the malaise of playing a game too much along with her discomfort with gaming in general.

Now, we’re on year two in the game, which is the farthest I’ve been in the game. She likes playing. She even let me buy a new memory card so we can save our progress.

Joy likes having to work together to get through a level. I can never run off with out her because there is a little circle around this chalice that one of us has to carry. I bet she wishes there was something like this in real life too. She also enjoys it a lot when I carry the chalice around. She can run hither and tither because the chalice bearer is so much slower than normal, but ultimately I am in charge of where we are going, because she can’t leave the chalice. The more I think about it the more I realize that Joy probably finds the chalice carrying element of the game to be one of the better parts of the game. It must hit her at some deeper level — we’re stuck together!

She also likes the Gameboy SP. I use my brother’s old-school GameBoy Advance, but she’s got the back-lighting, and she likes that she’s the only one who knows where the enemies are. That’s fun for her, because it plays to her worrying side and her affection for announcing potential trials before they arrive. I’m the guy with the map, so I have a neat ability, but that is the ability she’d want me to have. I’m always the one who knows where we’re going… she just knows where my directions are going to have problems. That’s just fun Fun FUN for her.

Finally, there is the fighting and the boss. When we fight the normal bad guys, I throw down the chalice, engage the baddie, and tell Joy to stay back and cast spells (if she has any yet.) I do the fighting, dodging, and healing if necessary. Joy casts spells, but she never does healing… EVER. I’m the healing guy in our relationship and that sorta spilled over into the game. Now, when it comes to the final boss guy… I stand back and heal Joy when she needs it or do distance attacks with spells/focus attacks depending on which is more effective. Joy dances around the boss, takes hits, deals damage, and generally just slams down with the boss — sometimes calling out with nervous delight if her life gets low and I haven’t healed her yet. This is always funny to me, because I can just bring her back with a Life spell, but still… it’s the principle of the thing.

So, yeah… I’ve found another game that Joy actually likes. Go me. I think that makes four — maybe five — games that Joy likes. She’s really looking forward to playing with Jordan (and Jaime?) or Wei in the future too, so that means that this could be future fun for us for some time.

Posted by David under Uncategorized |