Massive Spoiler Thread

[Kouen]

 Oh yeah I forgot some details. To add on to the whole AI thing, Geist himself is an AI copy of Jyotaro and he seemed like a real player until he revealed himself to be so. Knowing this, it is even more likely the Twilight Knights are AIs who believe they are the real thing (I really hope Kite is the real thing, he's pretty epic).

The Pi from 2017 (G.U.) is aware of Tokio's time traveling adventures with the Akashic Records and his problems with Shicksal.

The Shicksal members use special "Shicksal PCs". They are basically rigged characters, however, the downside is whatever happens to these Shicksal PCs affects the real players themselves to an extent. Fluegel was seemingly hospitalized after Metronome backstabbed him in the game. There are real players behind the Shicksal members as shown in various of the manga panel cutscenes. Based on their real life appearances, they appear to be scientists, well atleast Fluegel seems to be one. They seem to be a closely knit group with Fluegel being the father figure.

Weird, I just started playing an extra mission in G.U. after all the main events. And it seems like Phyllo's still at the bridge, it's not part of the storyline so there's no voices. I'm assuming that it's just his character remaining logged on at the bridge. He uses the version of "here" that applies to inanimate objects. Of course since there should be no player behind him it shouldn't matter. However if the Akashic Records record generally what happens into its memory. Then it's possible that Phyllo, the character, stayed logged on at the bridge even after the events of G.U. Worst case scenario, they retconned his death for Link.

Oh that's quite hilarious. I should've played the extra missions before making that whole Haseo died thing. Apparently he's alive again in the G.U. storyline with both Atoli and Tokio shocked to see him. I guess his character data got repaired or something. The first thing they see upon his return is him managing the guild shop acting completely unlike himself.

[Tolby]

Ok, finally took the time to finish off the last couple of link chapters. A lot shorter than expect. Now to go back an properly spoil the hell out of myself.

Also

 Kite beasting on the Azure Knights was awesome.

Oh and yea, I was gonna tell you about Haseo, but I just figured you were right. Since I can't understand a thing that was going on.

[Kouen]

Just beat the game, had to play through it twice because it crashed whenever it switched to the Akashic Line cutscenes. I skipped all the cutscenes for now but I'll go back to check it out.

So uhhh yeah, Tokio is the next Goku with using the Sun as a Spirit Bomb?

[Advent_Winter]

Just beat the game, had to play through it twice because it crashed whenever it switched to the Akashic Line cutscenes. I skipped all the cutscenes for now but I'll go back to check it out.

So uhhh yeah, Tokio is the next Goku with using the Sun as a Spirit Bomb?

Yeah. So? Was it all speculation? Was he dreaming? Was it all real? The entire story that is.

[Kouen]

Just beat the game, had to play through it twice because it crashed whenever it switched to the Akashic Line cutscenes. I skipped all the cutscenes for now but I'll go back to check it out.

So uhhh yeah, Tokio is the next Goku with using the Sun as a Spirit Bomb?

Yeah. So? Was it all speculation? Was he dreaming? Was it all real? The entire story that is.

Give me a sec to watch all the cutscenes I skipped. It certainly does seem like the entire story is real.  Tokio returns back to the real world in the end, and after all the credits when you can play after completing the game. It reveals that Tokio has returned to playing R:X except this time he's playing normally.

[Advent_Winter]

Uh. Wow. Okay then. I guess I can accept that.

[Tolby]

 Aura's singing almost put me into a baby like state and drop my psp. She almost won by effecting the player playing the player playing The World. That was a mouthful.

[Kouen]

 So apparently the vaccine is ineffective against Aura. AIKA sacrifices herself to defeat Aura, I'm not sure if defeat is the right word, although they do both disappear. Tokio returns to the real world, finds Saika at Jyotaro's hospital and tells her that she's not alone and should accept what has happened instead of running away from it. So yeah, Jyotaro himself, the comatosed body, is not dead, well maybe he's brain dead enough to be considered dead anyways.

[TheSorrow]

 So apparently the vaccine is ineffective against Aura. AIKA sacrifices herself to defeat Aura, I'm not sure if defeat is the right word, although they do both disappear. Tokio returns to the real world, finds Saika at Jyotaro's hospital and tells her that she's not alone and should accept what has happened instead of running away from it. So yeah, Jyotaro himself, the comatosed body, is not dead, well maybe he's brain dead enough to be considered dead anyways.

 Was Saika's objective in all of this was to free/save his brother, somehow? And well, that's kinda fitting in a way...the remaining of AIDA, and the (corrupt) goddess of The World disappearing at once, practically freeing The World from everything except players. Probably the best and most "meaningful" thing in LINK so far.

Not a bad ending...still, LINK as a whole is screwed and with many contradictions. And my "love" or hate to it would pretty much now depend on whether real The World past players are involved or not.

[Kouen]

 Was Saika's objective in all of this was to free/save his brother, somehow? And well, that's kinda fitting in a way...the remaining of AIDA, and the (corrupt) goddess of The World disappearing at once, practically freeing The World from everything except players. Probably the best and most "meaningful" thing in LINK so far.

Not a bad ending...still, LINK as a whole is screwed and with many contradictions. And my "love" or hate to it would pretty much now depend on whether real The World past players are involved or not.

 Yeah that was her objective, and then once the whole plot twist happened, she became a complete wreck. In a way it is, but AIKA was genuinely happy to be friends with Tokio and Saika. AIKA retained the original objectives of AIDA which was to learn more about humans. Tokio made a promise with her that when all this was over, they would meet in the real world (with AIKA in Saika's head) and eat hamburgers. Although it's unfortunate they couldn't keep that promise after what happened.

It's nice that Aura finally kicked the bucket but it's sad that AIKA had to go along with her. But I'm probably biased since I haven't touched .hack material in so long that I don't really care about Aura. Not that I had that much lingering affection for Aura in the first place.

[GyppyGirl2021]

My feelings are exactly opposite yours, Kouen.  I'd much rather just AIKA have died. XD

[tsukasa-kun]

From what I've seen so far, I think the manga had a better grasp of the plot. The re-enactment of scenes from SIGN (with Tsukasa) but done differently with Tokio and others seems a little like overkill. In Tsukasa's case, though, I'm not complaining since he's still my favorite character of the entire .hack universe.

One video I found on NicoVideo had Rachel and Nuke Usagimaru performing some kind of act with 100 quotes or jokes or something. That was possibly one of the longest and most tedious scenes in the game since he really did get to 100 (much to mine and Tokio's exasperation).

Aside from that, the game does seem as though it will have more characters than the manga, which might be a good thing, but some of the Cross Rengeki are a bit overacted, namely BlackRose's and Tabby's. And so far I don't quite get how Fluegel, Clarinette and Cello all somehow end up on your side, even though Fluegel (in the manga at least) has always expressed a certain liking for Tokio.

So overall, the game's pretty great, it's just the modified flashbacks that are a bit trying.

[GyppyGirl2021]

 It's already been said somewhere in this thread that the reason Schicksal allied with Tokio was because they no longer had reason to fight. It has to do with Aura going nuts, I think.

[Advent_Winter]

Sooo, just to clarify,  An AIDA fell in love with a human?

[zaseo]

I haven't post, or read much because I don't want to fine out too many spoilers, but how long is the game, and is it challenging?

[Advent_Winter]

Long? Yes. Challenging? Hell no.

[zaseo]

Well looks like we are going to have to come up with some ways to make it harder such as low lvls, low equipment etc.

[TheSorrow]

Well looks like we are going to have to come up with some ways to make it harder such as low lvls, low equipment etc.

The Break Combo is just CHEAP, SERIOUSLY CHEAP that it makes the Skill Trigger look ineffective.
And yet, without it, the game would be so boring and tedious, with nothing to do except with simple attacks and maybe depending too much in your partner's moves.
LINK is just meant to be an easy, fun game. It's going to be hard to make it challenging but without making it just long and tedious. And that's going to be even worse than it was with GU, where Low Level Challenges pretty much just meant using Awakenings and Counters...or actually being pro and managing to beat them without cheap strategies...but, that's a job for ZED and Ethereal only D: lol

[zaseo]

I play the demo, and from what I seen at least you take a good amount of damage. It seems you can recover it rather easy.

[Advent_Winter]

Forget what I said. The game is difficult, when you count trying to finds ways to make it difficult part of the challenge. Unison Combos and X-Rengeki's are the cheapest things ever created in .hack. More cheaper than Twilight Bracelets, Avatars, and Awakenings all together. :/