I added 26 characters to my wonderful hall of fame, most of whom I had cruelly subtracted in the past. I'm feeling in an expansionist mood and don't feel the need to be so strict in terms of who gets in, so these characters are getting a second chance: Petra and Ingrid from Fire Emblem, Giyu, Tengen and Daki/Gyutaro from Demon Slayer, Hiromi from Minami Kamakura Kōkō Joshi Jitensha-Bu, Zack and Kelly from Saved by the Bell, Raphael from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Nasa and Tsukasa from Tonikaku Kawaii, Mei, Himari and Hazuki from Dal Segno, Yang and Setzer from Final Fantasy, Anne from Tearmoon Empire, Reptile from Mortal Kombat, Marie from DanMachi, Michiru from KoiChoco, Celia from Rave Master, Mizuki from Guyver, Misaki from Ren'ai 0 Km, Kohaku from Onii-chan Dakeshimete, Chie from Heaven Burns Red and Shin from Prism Rondo.
Shin wasn't in my wonderful playlist before, but I wanted to honor Prism Rondo because it's an amazing anime, and Shin is the best character in the show.
This let me add 25 songs to my wonderful playlist, many of whom also had appeared in the past in my wonderful playlist but were bumped out. Now they're back where they belong -- ebullient future (English), Trial of the Genealogy, People of the Marketplace, City Theme - Sylvan, Sunday, Akeboshi, Asa ga Kuru, Shine in the Cruel Night, painful battle, battle of hope, Autumn Howl, Debate Soldier, Evening, Avenger, GIFT(ShortVer), Two Silhouettes(ShortVer), Fei Long Theme, The Spy, National anthem of MACROSS, Treasure, Underground Sewer, In a Prison of Peace and Regret, [The Sky, the Clouds, and You], [Solaris, Celestial Paradise] and One Who Bares Fangs at God, .
The reason I added Chie to my wonderful hall of fame is because today's Heaven Burns Red new event was all about Chie. I didn't like her in the past because she seemed unreasonable -- she would constantly get angry and start yelling out of nowhere, and was obsessed with her frilly fashion. But during this event I discovered the reason behind her 'irrationality.' She was literally raised by wolves and had to learn how to be human much later than everyone else. Her fixation on fashion is a fixation on clothing, i.e., her new human way of life. It keeps her rooted. And her lack of social skills is because she literally doesn't have them. Not only was she adopted late, but she was then mistreated by the government as some sort of research experiment after that, with only one human being treating her well in her entire life, whom she was separated from while still a preteen. That's all she had to work with. The fact that she's as civilized as she is, is a testament to her incredible soul. And the one person who treated her well? She dived into a prison compound to free her and fought as a rear guard to let her escape. Whenever Chie is given a chance to be good, she becomes a legendary hero. Just as she is now, today, fighting the Cancer from outer space for the sake of the humanity that mistreated her. She's so heroic she forgives them for the sake of her adoptive mother, and her new comrades who fight by her side and accept her.
Chie also showed a new wild side to her fighting. When she goes on all fours and reverts to beast mode, she goes beast mode. She's a terror on the battlefield who rips Cancer to shreds. Like they're not even there, she's so much faster than them. The plot actually established that she's faster than Hisame, the swordsman who can hit a Cancer with 31 strikes in a single attack. I've always respected Chie's strength, she's in my tank squad and my dark squad, with max level limit break. But wow. I didn't know she was that strong when she goes berserk.
So basically there's a lot of reasons to invite Chie to my fictional character hall of fame. There's also a lot of reasons to love Heaven Burns Red, which keeps churning out amazing story after amazing story.
The new HBR update had a mountain of loot to work through, as well as a ton of gameplay updates. There's a lot of interface and quality of life improvements, some gameplay balance (overly weak abilities and classes were buffed), a new Anachrony boss I'll have to see if I can beat next team I get an anachrony pass, a new Operation Perseus event as well as the new Chie event and new score challenge. The game straight out gave me 10 Protean Shards and 3 Eternal Daphnes, something I would have to work months to get on my own. It also gave me 10 Rainbow Shards which don't currently have a use yet, because no rainbow rarity Memorias have appeared yet. But those are obviously super valuable too. I had so much to do in HBR I've been up for something like 48 hours, just playing nonstop. There were new floors to the clock tower, which allowed me to get two more skill evolutions. I got a bunch of additional seraphs to level 5 reversion, which gives them an extra skill slot. I got the new kimono Muua SS Memoria, I got admiral Aoi to level 3 limit break, I got base Erika to level 3.5, swimsuit Adelheid to level 2.5, and waitress Kozue to level 3. These are all genuinely useful SS Memorias so this is great progress. And all for free. They're just handing me loot hand over fist.
There's a new feature in the game, that allows you to pair your active squad with a 'support squad.' The support squad gives whichever seraph it's matched with 1/10 of its own native stats. So the stronger you made your random, not-in-your-top-squad characters, the better off your top squad is now. Since I spent madly collecting almost every SS Memoria in the game, this new support function especially helps me. Suddenly my whole collection has a purpose and is helping me win fights. Like I planned it all along.
Swimsuit Adelheid, waitress Kozue and hot springs Isuzu are the seraphs I gave my free eternal daphnes to. I also leveled them so they'll be useful in high-end content. In a great new feature, you can fight enemies with whatever squad you want, and the enemies will drop 'up to experience' items as a reward. Then you can give your lower-level characters the items. This lets you farm the strongest enemies in the game with your strongest party while still benefitting your weakest characters. It's a huge step up from before, where the only people who could get experience were the max level characters who no longer could benefit from it.
I have nothing but praise for this game, the best game ever made. I've spent thousands of dollars on it and it was all money well spent. Wow. So fun! And this is my second year playing it. We're celebrating the 500 day anniversary of the release and it's still this fun.