let's have a last one dot hack thread to celebrate the new incoming game>thread theme: https://youtu.be/5b9JzKhhVZo?si=Zn66U0B_lpmESWEA
is this kinoslop worth gooning?
Best OST on the PS2.
>>733657275Best trackhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRl7frxqZ_M
Just beat Cubia, round 2 in Outbreak.I think i know why the very premise of GU pisses me off so fucking much.I spent 4 fucking games, and all this effort , interaction with people , fighting eldritch and primordial human homunculi data monsters, and playing this game to save/protect/fix/ and help it, and it just burns in a fucking fire outside any of the games and off-screen, in a masterful but of retarded writing.Brav-fucking-o.Chrono Cross does the same shit, but at least that game stuck to the themes and ideals that Trigger set forth to begin with, this situation infuriates me far more.
>>733657275I was listening to it again recently and it took me on a trip through memory lane. In the past 20 years, I just always relisted to a few of the 8 Phase themes since those moments imprinted on me the most, but the rest is rather well done as well.
Got Fuga 1&2 and it’s surprisingly fun and addicting, story is pretty solid too so far
>>733661356skip the sequels
>>733658571I mean Aura survives. Burning down The World can't destroy her since she's integrated into the network. The issue, I guess, is that The World itself is too transient. At the end of the day, even if you back it up, the AIs living in it are bound to the server they're. There are no backups for them. You can make copies of them, but it won't be them anymore. And to be honest, this was always bound to happen eventually. Servers don't last forever. Aura can last indefinitely so long as the network exists, but that's it. Mia could only live and die with The World.
>>733658571The goal was to wake up the people from their comas, which they did. Which is why Kite says fuck video games and never comes back to The World and continues his chad life
>>733662246no
if they remake IMOQ, will the price of the physical ps2 games drop?
>>733663027lol
>>733663060?
>>733663127physical game prices never drop, they just keep increasing.
>>733663197oh really thats why you mocked me :'( because I'm naive, you're right
>>733663261if anything I expect the physicals to increase if the new .hack game turns out to be popular
>made a 3d model of Rei to get the Evangelion artist on board for IMOQMatsuyama is based.
>>733657425https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Hjwmct9lKQI'm genuinely hopeful for the soundtrack.>>733663027The opposite, I think. The price of collectable stuff tends to go up when the franchise gets attention. I remember selling my PS2 Kingdom Hearts for 80 bucks when 3 was announced. Not an expert though.
>>733663197GU prices went down because of the remasters, but stillnot cheap because they still cost as much as a new retail game.
>>733664116I mean he wasn't wrong. At the time, most CG was pretty ugly, especially when trying to make humans. Of course, companies like Square Enix was making pretty impressive CGI cutscenes as early as 1999, but those took months to make and the actual game wouldn't look anywhere near that pretty.Still, as dated as .hack/s cutscenes were, they weren't bad by 2001 standards. That said, the majority of the characters Sadamoto would create for .hack, like Orca, Moonstone and Gardenia, wouldn't get high quality cutscene models like what Kite and BlackRose got.
>>733664981Moonstone and Gardenia are both literal whos though. Unlike important side characters like Terajima Ryoko who deserve their cutscene model.
Why does every game since .hack//G.U. Vol.1 have at least one vocal track about someone who misses someone else dearly and desperately wants to see them? I swear to God, half the vocal tracks for the games are basically identical in terms of themes.
>>733665881Because the basic premise of GU is Haseo wanting to save the bitch who constantly gaslit him.
>>733666073Yeah, but these kinds of songs are also present in .hack//Link, .hack//Versus and Guilty Dragon too.
>>733663027>>733663197The versus ps3 game was at 100$ and i found out it droped to 30 for whatever reason everywhere around 2 year ago, time to scalp i guess
I wonder why Bandai won't even release a basic digital port of the originals. I mean fucking Okage: Shadow King got a port, and that game's way worse than .hack.
anyone who played that fighting dot hack game? I forgot its name. is it a good fighting game? looks interesting (or its clunky?)
>>733666465Ever played a Naruto Ninja Storm game? Basically that. CC2 made all the Naruto Ninja Storms, and .hack//Versus reuses the engine.
>>733666605>Ever played a Naruto Ninja Storm game?yes>basically thatI see thanks
>>733666465it's really interesting (for an arena fighter with such low number of character)You can animation cancel but it cost ultimate charge, perfect dodge like dragon ball z, doing 10+ combo start to deal 10% of damagethere is a weird gimmick of getting good rating in story mode replay to unlock new equipment (yes you have to actualy go watch the replay in another menu lol)equipment reduce the number of quest requirement by 1/2/all if you are bad and want to make it easy for story
>>733666753Well it was a packaged deal with .hack//The Movie so I guess they couldn't go too crazy with it.
>>733656904Which games and what order do I play them in?
>>733667625Anime first, then the IMOQ games, start by release order.
>>733667625.hack Vol.1-4. Be sure to watch .hack//Liminality alongside them since they were packaged with the games.>>733667680.hack//SIGN didn't start airing until like four months after .hack Vol.1 came out. Of course, it's a prequel, but it's not actually required viewing. They did start shoving a shitton of references to the show starting from Vol.2, however.
Personally, I don't like suggesting that .hack//SIGN MUST be watched in order to enjoy the games. Rather, if you enjoyed the games and you're up for watching a slow-paced 24-episode TV series, you should give it a watch. Because just because you like the PS2 games doesn't necessarily mean you're willing to sit through an entire show, and suggesting that it's mandatory to watch the show in order to enjoy the games might turn some people off. Nothing in .hack//SIGN is strictly necessary to understand what's happening in the games. You CAN glimpse some fragments of the show in the game as easter eggs, but it's not like Kite has any context for these scenes himself.
>>733658571Just beat Outbreak, first time in my life finally starting Quarantine.
>>733668459Honestly most of the franchise is standalone enough that if anything, watching SIGN is just kind of really awkward by itself since it expects you to go play the games to resolve it and even then most of the characters disappear besides small cameos and post-game bonuses. Same shit happened to Roots but worse since Roots straight up spoils entire major plot elements for the games, and yet G.U. covers enough on its own that Roots feels like a bunch of dumb fluff.
>>733668459Something you people don't seem to understand is that Media exists and ties BEYOND simple plot relevance and story telling.Tone, aesthetic, atmosphere, "vibe" energy, mindset, all of these are factors that are to be tempered by a piece of media. Sign sets a tone that you should learn very quickly, that tone is substantially important in understanding the themes and ideas that both went into the product/story/game, but also the level of information you are to expect going forward.It's precisely because of this that i scrutinize against GU so harshly because it betrays everything before it.
>>733668614Also, Roots isn't that interesting so I wouldn't recommend it regardless.
>>733668614>watching SIGN is just kind of really awkward by itself since it expects you to go play the games to resolve itGee wiz it's almost like it's a multi-media franchise. They intended you to take it all in, to ignore as such is to not fully immerse in the medium and content they're trying to convey to you.
>>733668541I hope you're having fun anon
>>733668717Yeah but, again, you shouldn't demand that someone MUST watch a 24-episode show in order to enjoy the games. These things work better as suggestions rather than some imposed rule. People should only watch .hack//SIGN if they WANT to, not because they feel they HAVE to.
>>733656904Wait there's a new .hack game coming? I live these games.
>>733668843Who is demanding anyone to? It's the wisest and intended way to take in the medium.If you don't, and you start complaining in gaps in the story, or not knowing things, or ignoring precedent then that's entirely on the ignorant viewer for choosing to be ignorant.
>>733662432What a hero
>>733668978Like I said, there's no particularly important gaps in .hack's story that .hack//SIGN is required to fill. You're just arrogant and self-righteously assuming that because you feel strongly about something, everyone else should feel just as strongly about it.
Infection > SIGN > MOQ is a better order. Change my mind.
>>733668837Loving every moment.>>733669080I literally watched Kite reference Harrold by just saying his name and not expanding on it beyond that at all. Again, if you want to be lazy ignorant and retarded, and ignore the chance to take in a multi-media franchise that was genuinely done because you choose to be ignorant then that's on you and the idiots who want to do it that way.Stop crying to people trying to steer you the correct and intended path because you feel "demanded" of, either you want to or you don't.
>>733669269Harald is mentioned in .hack//Liminality. In fact, Liminality explains Harald and his motivations to a far greater extent than .hack//SIGN ever did.
>>733667625
>>733669590Precisely the point.Put them all together and you get a full picture, Multi-media.~To ignore one is to miss a piece of the viewing puzzle.Again, there's a fairly defined way to take it all in for maximum information/enjoyment intake.
>>733669812Well the difference between Liminality and SIGN is that Liminality was packaged with the games. .hack//SIGN was something that you had to tune in weekly to watch. The games expected you to watch .hack//Liminality, while they couldn't exactly have that same expectation in regards to .hack//SIGN.
>>733667831Japan had Sign start airing 2 months prior to Infections release if Google is to go by.
>>733669950Well luckily we live in the accessibility age and all these resources are available in front of you at a minimum of a few clicks, unlike me who had to catch the show on tv (I did) find the games (only half), and enjoy them as intended.Why squander the opportunity?
>>733669950Nothing immediate in Liminality actually affects Kite and the party, the only thing it does it tie real world events/characters to things going on in the game, like how when shit started going fucky in Mutation, that's when all the systems collapsed during Vol 2 of Liminality and for the most part all you get from the game is the News blurb, and if you progress too far you might miss it. Bith the Black has no bearing on the story outside of him being a compatriot of Helba and doing IRL things for her, and giving context to what the fuck the Epitaph of Twilight even came from.
Why did .hack threads slow down? I thought we were .back
>>733670369the hype is slowly dying
>>733656904HARK YE OF FAIR EYESI AM PIROS THE 3RDMASTER OF ALL CREATIONTAMER OF THE POISON GRUNTY
>>733670369It was an announcement of a new project, some art and interviews and nothing else to go off of. I don't even expect anything new or major til maybe 2028.
>>733670369The hype needs rest. It's just a teaser reveal and a famitsu interview so far. We can still talk common dothack things though.
>>733670089Because some people aren't as interested in watching eight hours of TV show. It's really just the basic issue of difference in mediums. I, for one, don't really watch long TV shows much anymore these days. So I'd probably feel less inclined to watch a 2-cour anime now compared to back when I first watched through .hack//SIGN. Just because someone wants to play a video game doesn't necessarily mean they'd want to watch a show, or vice versa. It's sort of one of the big reasons why the media mix concept fell off so hard, since its fundamental principles demand that people should want to partake in every single form of media that's prepared. It's the inherent weakness of the media mix concept. Four thirty minute OVAs watched intermittently between each volume of the games is fundamentally less of an ask than expecting someone to sit through eight hours of a show.
>>733669739Stop this meme. Just play either IMOQ or GU.
Are there any decent youtube channels going over the story of the games that arent overly autistic? it can be a little autistic, there is a sweet spot, but most of what im finding is just retarded.I played the games, just want a refresher.
>>733670369Because we barely have any info. Plus, the threads would consistenly hit bump limit, so we've had a good run until the next info drop.
>>733670875No, those don't exist. But Zero is a reboot, so you don't need a refresher.
>>733670954Surely there must be something that isnt awful. I dont care if it's a reboot, I want to experience the story again and im not up to playing through. fuck virus cores
Play .hack
>>733671142>>733670875Oh i cant wait for all the shitty content creator crap videos that are gonna flood my small, nice .hack search engines just so they can get attention and clicks, feeding off fanbases.Fuck off.
>>733670875>>733671142Channels that cover .hack are 99% giga autist. There was one I liked but he disappeared. You're out of luck.
>>733669739You could cut down on a lot of this. AI Buster is kinda interesting, though I ultimately found it unnecessary. Albireo isn't a particularly engaging character. It gives greater insight into The World, but it's kinda whatever. Hokuto/Yeats is a little more interesting, and she does give some context in regards to the Descendents of Fiamma, but Albireo is does drag the novel down. AI Buster 2 was just a collection of short stories. Quality between each story varies, but I wouldn't really say it's necessary. I have both novels, btw.Unison is honestly just confusing if you plan to move onto .hack//G.U. Mind you, the games never explicitly reveal the big link between SIGN and G.U., so maybe it's not that big of a deal, but it clearly isn't canon anymore. Legend of the Twilight Bracelet was okay. Kinda cute. It was nice seeing how Balmung ended up after the events of the games. But I also feel like it's completely incapable of standing on its own and doesn't really have much worth in terms of story content. Like it's just sort of riding on the coattails of the games as sort of a nice little send-off, but not terribly engaging outside of that. Shugo and Rena don't have a whole lot of substance to them..hack//Roots is boring. .hack//SIGN was slow, but at least it had some insightful commentary and gave a nice glimpse into how normal players played The World. .hack//Roots is just a shittier .hack//SIGN and has no merits of its own beyond its link to .hack//G.U. .hack//Alcor and .hack//GnU don't have solid conclusions so they're not really worth reading. Apparently, the main character of Alcor became a total bitch faggot who ended up joining Moon Tree and using hacked swords to PK other characters and prevent them from logging into the game for a few hours, but again, the manga never reaches conclusion and the character ends up being utterly irrelevant in the games. .hack//CELL tried to be G.U.'s .hack//ZERO but it never goes anywhere.
>>733669739Realistically as someone new to the series should I just play the OG 4 games and then play GU?
>>733664981Youd think if you got someone that high profile youd have them design a main character and not some literally whos. Minus Orca I suppose but his character only shows up at the start.
>>733671450It is annoying to see all these random channels cover the Dot Hack teaser as if its just the latest slop, but surely there are more sincere ones that are actually passionate about the series. Thats what im looking for.
>>733671736Well he designed all the playable characters. He was the main designer, so he pretty much designed anyone with a name that debuted in the games.
>>733671783>surely there are more sincere ones that are actually passionate about the seriesIf they're sincere they wouldn't try to profit and get popular off it.Why don't anons discuss it here instead of needing some stranger try to sum and explain it instead. You're already diluting your own perspective and memory of it enough.
>>733671238Already did.>>733671719If you like the story/lore of the world from playing the 4 games, try out the expanded universe stuff. You don't have to watch/read everything.
>>733671783I'll take slop if it means we can get reinvigorated art of characters, or artists can finally come back and finish shit like this https://vidya.pics/post/view/100111
>>733672115>I'll take slop ifSpeak for yourself you fucking brain dead pig.
>>733671719-the 26 eps of the sign anime-IMOQ (and watch the bonus episode each game comes with)-watch the sign ova called unison-watch dot hack gift and blow a load to the subaru scene-GU
did someone played the card game, (.hack//enemy)?
Whenever I remember .hack, my mind always goes back to this render of Kite that was released sometime around when .hack//The Movie released. I'm 90% certain it's an official render, but it's also peculiar because he has Azure Kite's collar. I always wondered what this image was about.
>>733672239If you're the faggot who talked about just getting to Quarantine this thread, stop pretending your opinion matters any more than band-wagoners.
IMOQ dvd episodes have big secrets that explain the lore in secret menus.for years people thought it was something the localizers made up, as it explains huge things like the purpose of the 8 phases.turns out it was all fucking real and canon.
sign was so kino I remember staying up late to watch it anime was so good when you're young.
>>733672605So you're saying i should load up my episodes on my ps2 right now then.
>>733672740https://dothack.fandom.com/wiki/Liminality_Easter_Eggseverything is here if you're lazy, but seeing it on real hardware is better.
>>733672854neat
>>733658571>"Yep The World Version 1.00, those were the good old days"
>>733656904>gameNone of the .hack releases are games, they're just long cutscenes with utterly atrocious padding and they'd unironically greatly benefit from just being VNs.
>>733672854>fandomYou're telling me that this fanbase is so weak they're still relying on this garbage?
>>733673384The fandom has largely been propped up by 30/40-something losers who haven't been able to move on from a game they played twenty-five fucking years ago. The last games released in the west was .hack//G.U. .hack//Link wasn't translated until years after it released. No one here played Guilty Dragon or .hack//New World. So it's been kept alive exclusively by nostalgia.
>>733672854>>733673515>Move the cursor down to "Japanese TVCF". Press right on the d-pad and the cursor will disappear.Holy fucking shit it works, that's so god damn cool.DVD aren't this fun or interesting anymore are they.
>>733673515You could apply that to a lot of fanbases and they went on to make their own wikis instead of relying on fucking Fandom.
>>733674119.hack's old and also kinda niche. Like it's big enough to maintain decent-sized threads on /v/, but it was never as big as we'd like to think it was. It made a bit of a splash when it first came out, but it eventually fell to obscurity. It was probably less than half as popular in the west as in Japan.
>>733674119>make their own wikisThat's not any better.
>>733674232OLDER and MORE NICHE fanbases make their own wikis. Christ you're stupid.
>>733671937So basically you're just offended people are making money off of your special interest, got it, lol. There's a huge difference between typical slop and sincere content, but I don't think that matters to you. Open your heart, anon
>>733670875>>733670954they exist, and anyone saying otherwise is just up their own ass. the best content is the small channels doing it out of passion. maybe start your own
>>733672405>I always wondered what this image was about.Implication is that Kite still plays these games, but he plays them casually.
sorta exciting news, but if you're willing to do homebrew and custom memory card saves, pcsx2 supports actual dvds now.you kinda need this to do the menu secrets.
Hopefully it will reach a wider audience and become popular
>>733674805I've seen it happen dozens of times now and the worst offense is my online searches being diluted by complete irreparable garbage and shit.Enjoying One piece circa 2006 in small online community forums and IRC is a completely different world than todays tiktok/twitter/ polluted online web structure for one very quick comparison.So no, i won't be sorry when i say fuck them and fuck you and you reduction of individual investment in these "special interest" hobbies and media.
>>733676171careful there, you might trigger the mia avatarfag
>>733676229You and I grew up in the same era, likely in the same online places, probably far more in common than we'll ever know. Trying to lecture and insult me only shows how insecure you are. Take a deep breath - .hack doesn't belong to you. You can't control how people engage, you're just punching air.
>>733676854Then it'll come to pass again, the online space will become a cesspool of rot, any true discussion will be met with insincerity and brain-death or it'll wade away once again into obscurity once more, only those who carry the will and love of it to begin with moving forward even still. IMOQ and the early media exists in a time capsule, documented and secure. It won't go anywhere.Though I know which I'll prefer, but what happens happens. I'd be a limp faggot if i didn't at least spread the information and foreboding of such.
>>733672605I'm honestly surprised those turned out to be real. Not that I mind, they were always fun. Did we get a WoG on that? I always thought that the early .hack stuff had a right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing sort of problem with its canon.
>>733677112>I'd be a limp faggot if i didn't at least spread the information and foreboding of such.I'd argue the contrary, that you are far more of a faggot for acting the way you are. For example, you can't even engage with the things I say because you're already patting yourself on the back for being the biggest fan ever. Why should an insincere person like you be the arbiter of anything? I'm sorry you're like this.
>>733677569I'm not the biggest fan, i haven't done anything past the initial Media phase. But i have a great respect exactly for that initial media phase as there were few moments like it at all. The most recent "multi-media" franchise attempts were horrid shit in every avenue of the word that had no plan or true vision, let alone CC2's talent.If no one listens that's fine, i don't care if you personally think less of me either, but i'll rather these things be said at all than pissed away and forgotten in the wind, even if the result must be the same.I'm engaging with you now, but your judgement of my character seems far more important to you than my assessment of modern social media and it's users, in relation to it's affect on creative media as a whole.
OLD MENREPORT INMan who would have thought, huh? I pretty much had given up vut here we are.
>>733677856If all you ever do is antagonize people, then it makes them less inclined to listen to you. No one wants to listen to an asshole, especially a self-righteous one.
>just beat vol 2>about to work on book of ryu>didnt trade a weapon off alkaid is my save file bricked??
>>733676171>>733676239I want .hack to succeed, but I'm also afraid of the audience it'll attract. Aside from fargone hood weebs who unironically play anime arena fighters competitively, the general reaction from Naruto fans was positive. Unlike Fuga, it's already appealing to a large audience. But any series that gains a large fanbase tends to have a nasty fanbase. Look at Persona 5, E33, JJK, etc. All of them have awful fanbases.
>>733678142Boohoo.>>733678146I'm fairly certain the trades still carry over to the next games on your file if you didn't fulfill them. I definitely found at least one repeat in mine.
>>733678293I don't give a shit about how the fanbase turns out because my interactions with the "fanbase" are just through /v/ which is always different from the general fanbase.I don't go out of my way to watch shitty Youtube videos that are just going to enrage me.I just want the game to be good and for CC2 to do the smart thing and make it a single and complete game. If it does well then they can think about doing more.
>>733678146are you playing CVS too? after some battles, it's hard getting new cards
>>733678480>are just through /v/ which is always different from the general fanbase.You poor deluded fool.
>>733678293That happens to everything. I've liked Project Moon's games since Lobcorp, but some time in the middle of Ruina I just had to stop talking about it online. It's just because they eventually attract children, and I'm not even trying to be ironic or degrading. A lot of them don't even play the games or watch the shows, they just listen to their favorite content creators and repeat.It's the modern version of "Silent Hill Fan decides not to taint their perfect understanding of the series by actually playing the game." Eventually you just have to cut your losses and stop engaging online.
>>733677856We can agree that the initial phase was something special, that is undeniable, but the way you go about your passion is obnoxious and delusional. You act like you're protecting something, but it's just your ego. Even now, you downplay your poor behavior and expect a gold star for some obvious, surface level analysis. You say you're engaging with me but you're still just talking to yourself. I understand you're scared the fanbase will become "nasty," but that doesn't mean much when you're the one acting shitty. Dial the autism down and you'll have a lot more fun with the good ones.
>play infection>get to the faggot tank bowlcut and his quest>he got debuffed by kot and needs a potion>really dont wanna do it>probably have to to continue the story>go to his map>niggers can oneshot me>decide to not fuck around and reach the lowest parts of the dungeon>thanks to my decades long drpg experience i take the right turns and get to b4 pretty quickly>get the dungeon premium lootchest>"hmm, the potion the bowlcut needs is not here">check another room>has a potion but the wrong one>realize i probably have to go back and explore each part of the map on each floor to find the chest with his potion>b3 found chest with potion but wrong one>b2 found chest with potion but wrong one>arrive in b1>get into an unlucky altercation>get onesot>bowlcut and gardenia cant save it>game over and half an hour lost>close emulatorthis close. i am this close of just dropping the whole thing and going back to G.U.
>>733678828>"Silent Hill Fan decides not to taint their perfect understanding of the series by actually playing the game."It was Earthbound fans when i first encountered it, though they've almost all been absorbed into Undertale/ Deltarune and that whole spew of filth. (Thank fucking god for that.)
>>733679207>expect a gold starprojection>but your judgement of my character seems far more important to youVindicated.Get your mind of me and talk about the game or some of it's aftershocks/effects , you're getting weird about it. You've only focused on my person in every single one of your posts.
It's just another case of "someone on /v/ is upset that they are not the primary demographic of something". Talking about the "audience" is boring.
>>733656904Is this a good series to get into?A was a huge weeb back in the PS1/PS2 era, I had a shitload of JRPGs and this game somehow got under my radar.
>>733679903As long as you don't mind emulation o the original releases, and/or GU. Snagging copies now is exceedingly difficult. It plays like a unique ps1 rpg that looks like an early ps2 game.
Aura and her husband Kite.
Is fragment any fun online?
>>733680483There's a discord group that hosts it, i don't want to get chummy with any of them so i didn't play long. The message board system is really fucking cool, and there is no pausing like in IMOQ. So yeah it's awesome.
>>733680483It's just the normal game except you can't pause and you can play with other people. But it's really beholden to two core factors: do you enjoy .hack's gameplay enough to keep playing it without the story, and do you have other people to play it with?
>>733680802>>733680874Sucks that my friends are lame and would never try it out since it's not a braindead steam install.
>>733680362Sorry Cuckra, you lost
>>733679479>You've only focused on my person in every single one of your posts.Do you not realize how our conversation started? I asked for youtube recommendations and you started having a melty, repeatedly insulting me. I am just holding up a mirror - the same insincere content merely using .hack as a prop that so deeply triggered you is exactly how you are treating the series. That's all. If you want to call it "vindication" that you act retarded and get called retarded, then yeah, great job. We can go back to talking about .hack now, I've said my piece. I'm sure we'll meet again though, lol.
>>733657275God tier menu themehttps://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MsEWZMZStuI
>>733680362One thing I find underexplored is Aura's POV. Aura is usually a driving force of the plot, but she doesn't have much agency. We almost never really explore the story much, and she rarely speaks. In fact, the only characters she's ever shown having any sorts of conversations with are Kite, Shugo and Haseo that one time. Though in Kite's case, they're unable to directly communicate much given her situation, but he clearly made an impact on her given how she keeps trying to keep his memory alive in some form.In G.U., it's established that Aura never really wanted to be a god. She has little interest in the role. But then what DOES she want? In Legend of the Twilight Bracelet, she tried her hand at being a mother, although unfortunately that failed to last long. But I'd say the one thing that she truly enjoys, the one form of agency she always maintains, is that she likes to facilitate the role of heroes. In LoTB, after meeting Kite, she decided to grant him his wish of becoming a hero by giving him Kite's avatar. To Aura, "Hero" = "Kite". He was not only The World's hero, but her hero as well. In .hack//The Movie, she requires a certain factor to facilitate her growth so that she may become powerful enough to eradicate the new threat. She chose Sora because she deemed her to have the necessary qualities. Thus, she chose Sora as the new hero of The World. To that end, she prepared a custom character for her, and even went as far as to name it "Kite".It's often memed that Aura loves Kite, but I feel like it might be the truth. Unfortunately, Kite was a human boy and Aura is the Ultimate AI, so there's an inherent incompatibility between them. Nonetheless, .hack often carries themes of star-crossed lovers, unrequited love, or wishing to reunite with someone that's long gone. It's one of the fundamental foundations of the series as a whole, going all the way back to Harald and Emma. Aura truly is Harald's daughter, in that sense.
>>733681629I feel like one thing that this new game could do very differently is giving the Not-Aura a more upfront role where she is more involved with Not-Kite and the rest of the cast.
>>733681184>I asked for youtube recommendationsWe talk about video games here, faggot.
>>733671719You could just play the games, but watching all of SIGN (just the 26 eps) before IMOQ is still a good idea. Just watch subbed if you do, as the dub is fucking terrible for SIGN. Given its a show all about characters talking and interacting with each other and action happens once in a blue moon and is over VERY quickly, it kind of matters that the VA's don't suck, and the dub VA's suck.For the games the dub is fine. Its not as big of a deal since you'll be, you know, playing a game.
what is the gist of .hack's story? I never got into it and I have never seen anyone here talking about it
I LOVE MISS GARDENIA
>>733681836I think the idea was to sort of make Aura as enigmatic as Harald, despite being alive. That's why we rarely ever get to directly hear her thoughts.
>>733681857I really hope you're someone else and not the same autist still beating a dead horse. Go take a walk, lmao
>>733681629>Anon casually drops a kino write-up.I read all of that. God, I love .hack fans.
>>733681931There's tons of great content on youtube that can catch you up with the plot, just ask the anons in this thread.
>>733682142I meant more like the general world building, is it a story told within a video game in the narrative or something like that? or something more like baldr sky where there's an internet that people can go on
>>733682238Basically there's a game and people playing the game, then stuff outside the game's systems happen so people have to uncover what's going on.
>>733682238kek, I was kidding, theres an ongoing debate right now between autists about whether people are allowed to watch youtube apparently?general story is that your playing a game for the first time, weird stuff starts happening, players are falling into comas, and thru circumstance you end up being given access to the same ability that is causing these widespread issues. it is a game within a game. you have a desktop, choose your wallpaper, email friends, login and play. simulated MMO.
>>733682583>>733682601got it thanks anons
What is the W on Azure Kite's hat supposed to be? The symbol on the original Kite's hat often comes up with him; it appeared behind the Azure Flame God, and its shape was also used for the coffin that he used to recover in. But then it's strange that the symbol on his hat is just a W.
>>733683537Wakite.
Honestly, I think .hack//G.U.+ is better put together than the games in terms of story and pacing.
You can experience the entire .hack// series on the Steam Deck.
Miyaya
bring back kazunori ito
>>733656904I hate these two bitches. They are the reason I'm not a big fan of Sign.
>>733684082
>>733684082>>733685205>Data drain is a boring beam
>>733685291It's just easier to draw that way.
>>733685205Honestly, I think it probably would have better if Kite had been the only knight recreated by Aura.
>>733685447Orca makes sense since he was originally supposed to receive the Twilight Bracelet
Any particularly fun classes for Fragment or does it even matter?
>>733685602Maybe, but I don't think she had a particular attachment to him. She chose him because he seemed to have the right qualities to handle the matter, but it was probably a purely clinical decision. Ultimately, Aura's only real knight was always Kite.
>>733657275Anon the PS2 has like 14 IIDX styles on it. Objectively wrong.
>>733685712Wavemaster is statistically the strongest class due to how broken magic is in the game. None of the other classes really come close except maybe Twin Blade, which is the second best class in the game. Still, since Twin Blade can't access he highest tier spells and also has a significantly lower magic stat, it's pretty objectively inferior.
>>733685875Oh, but Twin Blade's probably better if you're going solo. There are enemies in the game that negate magic or phys. So if you're playing as a Wavemaster and run into an enemy that negates magic, you're fucked.
>>733685875Not the other anon but I always wondered when playing IMOQ, what was the difference between all the physical classes? When playing the originals, classes like blademaster and heavy blade all seemed the same other than the weapon they used. Never played Fragment but it sounds like that game goes deeper into the classes.
>>733684383I have .hack last recode, is good?
>>733679229>this close. i am this close of just dropping the whole thing and going back to G.U.>close emulatorI think save states are more up your speed, bucko. Imagine getting filtered by shit most of us steamrolled through 20+ years ago as brats kek
>>733686394I got a sense of time, unlike your niggerbrain.
>>733686104Stat distribution and elemental skills. Heavy Axemen are more about tanking than raw damage, for instance, whereas Blademasters and Long Arms are just different balancing acts between physical and magic.The real difference is what physical skills you have available.>Twin Blade: Fire, Wood, Thunder, Darkness>Heavy Blade: Earth, Fire, Thunder, Wood>Blademaster: Fire, Water, Earth, Darkness>Heavy Axeman: Earth, Thunder, Water, Darkness>Long Arm: Fire, Thunder, Water, WoodTwin Blades have generally inferior physical stats to the other classes, but most of their attacks have large hit counts and they also have good accuracy. Overall, I feel like their elemental skills are actually somewhat more potent than the other classes due to poor balancing. They're also the second-best casters in the game.
>>733681629>Unfortunately, Kite was a human boy and Aura is the Ultimate AI, so there's an inherent incompatibility between them. Nonetheless, .hack often carries themes of star-crossed lovers, unrequited love, or wishing to reunite with someone that's long gone.I agree with >>733681836What is interesting about Z.E.R.O is that Aura is exerting agency, particularly over Not-Kite. This is delineated in both the promotional art which evokes possession and control over him, in conjunction with some hints in the trailer.>1. Not-Kite is strongly hinted to be the hospital patient when you read the messages he receives eg "It feels good visiting you in the hospital. Stay quiet like that forever.">2. Not-Kite receives a message from totally Not-Aura telling him that he has no choice but to remain wandering in the world and to just give up trying to leave. Neither of them could become "Wandering AI" (whatever the fuck that means) or Data Bugs, so the world fits them. "This world is at 'Dusk', it matches with us so well." A game master knows when they're beaten, so she urges him to just give up like a good boy.Basically, he can't leave her if he can't log out :)
>>733687369This is just Mia and Elk with much more, but less tragic steps.
>>733686753>I got a sense of time,>Not using save states>I-I have a sense of time, n-n-igger!!!
>>733685875Ah, that makes sense. Shame though as I was hoping one of the other classes may be unique, but in reality, it doesn't change that the most op thing in the game is elemental magic.
>>733687509>People often joke about AI waifus>Z.E.R.O. goes the other way around and takes the idea of Aura's implied feelings for Kite to its most extreme conclusion, and has the AI be the one to fall in love but in an incredibly toxic way and harmful wayWould be pretty interesting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnSUxWuofAYReminder that Swaying Emotions, the second ending theme for all the G.U. volumes, is a fusion of Kite and Aura's leitmotifs.
>>733687878I feel like it would also be a good reflection of the current era of the internet: a toxic sludge pool.
Sign was a cool, atmospheric anime that led into the games, with that included DVD adding more context. All in all a fun piece of heady multi media. Then GU came out and it was like some edgy Naruto shit. New game looks just as lame with sexy waifu Ada or whatever they're going for. Sign and the games are the original spark of originality for this franchise and everything after is some lame shonen anime shit.
>>733656904>>733657275>>733657425https://youtu.be/LwhWgUm6HEk?t=4m7sDoes anyone know where the song from this scene is from? I have for the life of myself never been able to find it and I love the music from this scene.
>>733687878One thing that puzzles me though is why this Aura would feel anything at all towards Not-Kite since their first meeting is presumably when she gives him the Bracelet as the teaser suggests. But she seems to be stalking him and probably staged the situation where he needed to be "saved" from Twilight.exe, so maybe he did something to make her curious.
>>733688436Corpo is trying to draw out AuraThey realize she likes Kite Host a tournament where one lucky user gets a unique skinDude gets the Kite avatarPlays gameAura intriguedAura gives him the braceletCorpo tracks and stalks NuKite as a way to get closer to Aura
>>733687994Kazunori was behind the atmosphere of Sign and IMOQ, he's gone now. We are shonen now. Accept trans deku data drain blast.
>>733688631This would be a fairly solid theory if Matsuyama wasn't so adamant about this having no ties to the previous games. If it was a soft reboot/sequel like G.U., it'd work perfectly. Maybe even explain why Aura fucked off and deserted the network, only to return corrupted. Who knows, maybe they'll still go a similar route.
>>733689040I really don't have an issue with them doing essentially a fresh slate especially since it sounds like things got really damn messy after G.U.
.hack was a story that didn't really have much room for expansion. After resolving everything within Harald's framework, the only possible sources of conflict would have been from outside The World. Randomly sprouting volatile AI, rogue engineers from CC Corp, hackers... And then eventually they resorted to fucking ecoterrorists who were actually behind everything from the start.
>>733688664>>733689171I only just started LINK, so I do not know what went wrong. But the tone is shounen supreme. In the worst way, because Tokio is "I wanna be a hero" faggot and I already do not care for him. Apparently this is where CC2 drops the ball completely, but I'll see t through till the end. But Matsuyama also said that this game is going to start off like IMOQ before becoming G.U. by the end, so I'll be cautiously optimistic.
>>733689394>IMOQ before becoming G.U. by the endTo me that honestly sounds quite promising. IMOQ was more about the mystery while G.U was more or less Haseo's journey. The new game being balanced around Not-Kite trying to figure things out while also under-going his own development seems like a good plan on paper.
I just hope the protagonist isn't as helpless as Haseo. Haseo was basically a blind person with a bazooka. He had the power to achieve anything, but he had no idea what direction he was supposed to be shooting or even what he was supposed to be shooting at. With no one to point him in the right direction, he was functionally worthless. So from start to finish, the entirety of .hack//G.U. could be described as various parties trying to guide a blind Haseo in the right direction and Haseo just following, well, blindly. It was kind of irritating just how useless he was when he couldn't use his Avatar to just blow the opposition away with brute force.
>>733689630>Rewatching Sign and Sora is pretty damn crafty and manipulativeWhat the fuck happen, did Skeith eat his brain cells?
>>733689394I want to believe that they're at least self-aware of it now.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PeS0TZDDMzI
>>733689984What the hell was with the cutscene framerate in all the new scenes in Recode
>>733689505Yeah, it strikes me as a nice balance. The sense of mystery (heavily accentuated by the ambiance, mind you) was part of the appeal to me as well. There was always a subtle flicker of anxiety or bleakness in the dungeon design and soundtrack. For me, it locked in a soon as Skeith killed Orca. I always felt "danger" because I was dealing with unknown forces.But by G.U, I was weaponizing those very forces and got a power trip doing it, mystery be damned. I AM Skeith now, bitch. Mysteries have long since been solved so we can go all out now: like the climax of a horror flick.
>>733689984KEK. Yeah, they're definitely self aware at how retarded the premise was. Hope they steer clear of anything like it in Z.E.R.O. Integrating real physical bodies into the game + time travel is fucking absurd. I don't know what they were smoking.
>>733689895Part of it's his personality. He's impatient, abrasive, yet also incredibly fixated on specific details. He also easily falls prey to misdirection. When Shino fell into a coma, instead of launching a more thorough investigation, he hyper-fixated on hunting down "Tri-Edge". Compare to Kite. Kite saw Orca get Data Drained by Skeith, but he never totally fixated on just that. Kite realized that whatever caused Orca's coma, it couldn't be attributed to just entity. There was something wrong with the game itself. So instead of obsessively searching for monsters that fit Skeith's description, he followed every single lead he could find, no matter how relevant, and formed numerous connections to better aid his search. There's also his relationship with Lios and Helba. With Haseo, he just gets led around by people smarter than himself from start to finish. But Kite wasn't subordinate to Lios and Helba, he was their equal. He even challenged Lios and won.
>>733681857Finish Quarantine before spouting off more, please.
>>733690557I wasn't comparing him to Kite, i was comparing him to himself but younger, who somehow is more intelligent and cunning than he is in every way.
>>733690757It's because he didn't have these issues when he was a kid.
>>733690757I think it was implied that going into a coma massively changed him since he lost all memories of the time he spent as Sora. I think he also generally had a bad family life which is probably why stuff like anger and all of that came to the forefront as he got older.
>>733690208The trendy thing in 3D animation these days is to have that sort of choppy framerate. The Spider-Man Spiderverse animated movies popularized it though Last Recode predates that by a year.
Was that .hack movie any good?
>>733692045It's alright, cool world, fun spectacle. The Main character is pretty lame, and the "villain" lacks and and all weight to be interesting at all.Worth the watch for the style and The World at the very least.
>>733692045Which one?
SKEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEIIIIIIIIIIIIIITH!!!!!!!
>>733692408Pretty sure he's referring to the "The World" with a newbie girl named Sora roleplaying in a Kite skin and a not-Balmung and not-Orca.with friends is impeccable LieN; Tomoyo Mitani still sounds like an angelhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOdMGcudW8c
>>733691365Fire Emblem Echoes did that before it.It's just harkening to (then) CG anime of the time. Or even imitating Guilty Gear Xrd.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RfJjSEO9eg
Liminality vol 2/outbreak spoilersWas it Cubia's screech or us killing Magus that caused the blackout?
>>733683537It's not a W but a lower case omega ω. The symbol on regular Kite's hat is a capital omega Ω.
>>733693429beautiful anoni
>>733686334I like it. The only problem is that it's too easy to be overleveled if you do side content as you play. But a Steam Deck can play the PS2 versions of GU, IMOQ, LINK, VERSUS, you watch all the anime through it, and you can read all the novels and anime on a Steam Deck.
>>733692045It's kino. Easily the best piece of .hack// media because Kazunori Ito wrote it, and he's responsible for .hack// like >733688664 said. He made .hack// like Tomokazu Fukushima made MGS. Ignore that the majority of the original team responsible for .hack// is involved with ZERO. Yup, we spout Jap names like boomers in GameFAQs who argue about Final Fantasy, and we LOVE accrediting a team effort to one guy.But in all seriousness, it's ok. Better than Roots.
post your wallpaper and music for your OS ingame>pic related: >music related:https://youtu.be/CCMkh8MRMNQ?si=xxM2j2i60TLC3Lxj [Open](shit forgot pic)
>>733694550>Better than Roots.Anything is better than Roots. If LINK ended up getting a shill anime, even it would've probably had better than that stiff and jankass animation in Roots.
>>733694670https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNSNIvFRUvsI liked the background of Kite and Blackrose laying on their backs side by side.
>>733694756Roots is just boring. People mention how SIGN is boring but Roots is even more boring than that and was a completely unnecessary prequel. The only nice thing about Roots is Tabby's breasts.
>>733675881Finally, I can play movies on my computer
>>733694756>>733694843The problem with Roots is nothing consequential happens until the very ending and at least explains why everyone is shocked at how Haseo was at the level cap supposedly so quickly as the Forest of Pain has almost no relevance until Vol 3 in the game.
>replaying Infection>get to into casual grinding>now massively overleveledMaybe I should just run Fragment on the side for my grinding desires...
>>733695248>SkeithYou're going to need all the help you can get for that fight.
I hope levels in .hack//ZERO will be more diverse
>Ended up grinding in Infection years back>Kind of forgot about it>I have no idea where the fuck I am in the story or how to continue now that I want to start playing againOh Fugg :DD
I remember when people back in the day used the character portraits from the games as avatars on forums, like the people who used the ones from FF7 and FF8 for the same purpose.Who were the biggest assholes? I remember a really mean Gardenia.
>>733695648You'll have a checkmark on keywords that need to be done. Check any mails in your email. It is insanely easy to pick up again and go in this game.
>>733694756>Anything is better than RootsBullshit, Roots is better than Zero because Ito was the supervisor of Roots. Zero is bad because it has no Ito as proven by >733688664.
>>733671238Hard Passionate Sweaty Baby Making Missionary Sex with Pi
>>733696219>Haseo lives with Pi because of CC2 work easeGIWTWM
