Aside from Durante, is anyone doing a magic-centric build at the moment? I wish Falcom had made it possible to do pure magic or physical runs, but magic's still viable for most of the game with some care (and knowing which stats to upgrade so you can Durendal the right weapons for the right skills).
I just beat the game in about 17 hours. The final dungeon was much bigger than I anticipated and I was impressed with its design. Any difficulty in the strength of the enemies was easily overcome once my attributes and equipment were upgraded, and I enjoyed trying out the various weapons to acquire their skills. However, I thought the guardians were kind of useless - I only used a main guardian for quick experience gain, another to get items cheaper, and another for extra HP if stuck at a boss. I did not like the fact that I had leveled up other guardians before realising that their bonuses do not remain once unequipped. Overall though, the game was simplistic but fun and very addicting!
Xananext becomes simple at times, but I don't think it's simplistic. Re: Guardians, most of the cards are useful depending on your playstyle. I tend to overlevel Zwerg even though you don't get too many rare drops in the game that you need other than area-specific weapons. Flugel, Bella Freude, and Cebelsk are ridiculous when rotated during the final dungeon and after. But there's a lot of use for Demonkatze and Sorcerian when focusing on magic, plus Sylphide for some bosses. What you're suggesting about residual effects from other maxed-out Guardians could have been interesting, but maybe hard to balance.
I'm most glad to hear you loved Castle Strangerock. To me it seems like the rest of the game's an (enormous) appetizer before the meal because the final dungeon's so beefy and well thought out. Sadly widescreen's exposed all the corners cut in order to render Strangerock's most advanced areas visually...not that I love them any less.
I was expecting the game to be longer than it actually is. I only have a few dungeons left, looks like.
(I want it to last forever.)
Final dungeon's the length of at least two (like if you smashed Eternal Maze and Eaglet Mountain together, but with a way different theme and progression), so it's not too bad. I wish Trechier Woods had more varied level design other than pillars, occasional hills around trees, and streams cutting you off.
