[Guest]

Don't suffer my fate Emilio. I flunked math repeatedly because I loved to draw at school. lol.

[Ashe:]

I think for now 12 is as high as I'm playing. I confess ff 12 is almost my favorite in the entire series but that does not mean I cannot admit to its short-comings.

Really this is how it boiled down..

Ashe: The resourceful sharp tongued capable princess that should have been the lead but wasn't. Face it most of the plot revolved around  "her" not Van.

Basch: I actually liked his back story and the torture he  endured just because people thought he was his brother. There was depth to him even if he didn't say much. The tension Van felt around him was another good plot direction. But they resolved that issue way too fast with no effort.

Penelo: I just liked her. So helpful,kind hearted, and pretty. She's like that girl I wish I would have paid attention to in high school but didn't because I was stupid and horny.

Van: If you removed Van I doubt much of the plot  would have suffered. His personality was  great and I liked the "throw back" nostalgic factor of the bright eyed adventurous youth but as Lycan says no hardship EVER changes him or makes him mature. A lovable sap  but still a sap.

Fran: I hate to say this but though Fran has potential to be an awesome character she is simply eye candy for the fellas. Despite her intelligence and battle prowess all she is going to end up being known for is "Rpg slut desperate male gamers want to tap the most." Poor Tifa suffered a similar degrading rep. Still because I'm a guy...I liked having a nice ass to look at. I know I'm awful. This was  the type of girl I did pay attention to in HS. Sadly though they looked hot like Fran they weren't  as helpful or nice as Fran.

Balthier: Balthier is awesome for the same reason Han solo and James Bond are. He's that suave,calm, dashing rogue that gets by most things unscathed. Every guy wants to be Balthier admit it. Having an  air-ship would be cool too.

 It's obvious the character roster could have been better and I agree more demi-human heroes  would have fleshed out the party more.

Joachim wasn't exactly a fan favorite of mine either. I used Blanca a lot more. I understand your angst concerning the gay jokes. It's as if they made the  assumption there are no gay gamers thus no one would be offended when in reality a few people likely got their feelings hurt over the subject matter. Quite careless  on their part.

Don't try it again simply because I voiced liking it if you don't want to. I don't like putting peer pressure on others to do things that are about as pleasant to them as swallowing nails would be.

I thought the fencer girl seemed intriguing but the girl with the pink sweater (Yuka-Tan?) seems a bit snobby. I don't think she's a bad person par se, just not that girl you'd want to be around for fun or exploring open minded possibilities with. However since all I've seen are trailers and very brief character bios I'm unsure who I'll pursue and can't make a final judgement.

I do think it would be funny if you could indeed be a "male-slut" but as a result suffered the consequences of it and got mauled and hung by the flag pole by your under wear by your female compatriots. lol.

Or have two girls that are bi and wouldn't mind being with the main character together at once and with each other at  once! (Waits for the pervert police mental asylum people to take him away.)

I agree Van  didn't grow much. He went through so much but yet nothing changed him. I found  that a bit unrealistic. I thought the other characters were a hell of a lot more interesting. (including Penelo.) I confess Fran stayed in my party a lot. But that was more for kinky aesthetic value. lol. Not to say Fran didn't have depth. I thought the Viera were a great race even if it never explained why most if not all of them were female. I think it was because they were born from the forest itself.(Very Celtic/Druidic vibe going there.)

I see you modified Dante's costume a bit. Looks pretty cool. His choker collar looks as if it is made of metal. Useful against blood sucker demons to be sure. The Squall and Rinoa picture is neat too!

DMC 1-2 Dante is at his best. He has a bit of a wit and sense of  humor but doesn't take it over the top so I agree. A younger obnoxious loud mouth Dante (DMC 3) wouldn't have meshed with Nocturne that well.

I actually liked the humor in Covenant. A lot of people that enjoyed the first game focused just on the  slap stick and criticized the whole game for that sole  aspect though the rest of the actual story-line had grim,tragic,and very mature themes like the first one. Oh well everyone has different tastes and what not. lol.

The first SH wasn't light hearted. And SH does actually go into real mythology and real history. Of course in covenant you are right they added more humor. But even in SMT you have the Jack frost brothers and certain comedic moments. I''d call SMT mostly grim but not without its more light hearted areas. Dante fit in only because of his devil design. If you think hard on his personality though he does stand out like a sore thumb in the SMT  universe. Sure he is a demon-slayer but he also is that "unrealistically perfect pretty boy" stereotype. Dante is far more flash then substance. However at least they used mellowed out DMC 1 Dante and not overly obnoxious and full of himself DMC 3 Dante. Don't get  me wrong I love DMC and own all three games I just think Dante's world despite having demons in it is a far cry from SMT.

Sure Emilio! Surprised there isn't an art thread  actually but put up your art if you want. I might learn  a thing or two.

I heard about the game. Sorta a cute very mild soft core touch pad/dating sim excursion. I didn't think ill of it but then again it didn't fascinate me either.

It's weird because square/enix has the most scantily clad sexy females ever and yet they are all naive prudes whereas in SMT most main characters dress more conservative yet the  world they're in addresses sex and violence as real issues. I'd so bang Fran from FF 12 (drools). I mean, who would do a video game character! That's absurd! (awkward grin.)

I'll put up more art soon Enid and Emilio. Thanks for the feed-back! I got a lot more stuff but I know not to show anything that is overly erotic. When I do more "general audience" illustrations I'll update here.

Yeah and at least it was the older more mature Dante in Nocturne as he was in DMC 1 instead of the arrogant dog and pony  show complete with corny catch phrases "young Dante" from DMC 3. Yet I admire DMC in that they show Dante grow up and how he wasn't always the same. I still prefer his personality from DMC 1 though.

I never understood why Dante was put in Nocturne other then perhaps the main SMT artist did his devil design. Yuri from Shadow-hearts and shadow-hearts covenant likely would have been a better choice. The Shadowhearts mythos parallels that of the SMT universe quite closely IMO.

To me Van was a support character. He was the idealistic young man with big dreams tagging along with the grim and determined older characters that had seen a lot more hardship the he and Penilo did. He wasn't the leader or even the catalyst for change. However I did like him for that innocent hyper exuberent drive for life.

Squall was weird for me. I hated him at first because he was a conceited arrogant elitist snot but then as the game progressed further he grew past his pettiness and became a good person that gave a damn about others. It was an interesting metamorphosis from a negative extreme into a better opposite extreme.

Yeah, I mean the games Enid! It was a nostalgic fighter franchise I grew up with. I had the super rare Vampire Savior for the PS-1 but sadly after I moved home from college a lot of my  awesome stuff got misplaced. As for the "make out" scenes those are fun. I try to make my characters a bit warm blooded unlike  the ones in Final Fantasy where "holding hands and hugging" makes babies and is the FF way of having sex. That's not an attack on the franchise, I just wonder if it would really hurt Square/enix to make an FF with a "mature" label.