The Shrine

<div style='font: 12pt Baskerville; text-align: left; '>...<i>but I always say that about every FF game, don't I? Oh well, I just dig these games. I can't wait to be called a graphics whore again...I miss those days...

...okay, how much do I like FFX? Well, I have Gran Turismo 3, Grand Theft Auto 3 and Metal Gear Solid 2 sitting on the floor next to my PS2, and they're still in the plastic. Nice to know I'm still an RPG guy...I wouldn't even be writing this if I wasn't stuck at work, with no work to do, at 7 in the morning, drinking really bad coffee...Jesus, I haven't been awake this early in almost a year...

...oh yeah, Blitzball (think hockey meets soccer in water) is the best mini-game they've come up with yet...thank god no more stupid card games that I suck at...I am a Blitzball God...if you want to rule at Blitzball like me, it's pretty easy if you haven't gone too far away from Luca yet...check the spoiler section...

...and yes, I know I said I'd never pay $300 for a console, but I was made a Christmas offer that I couldn't refuse; an offer made by some angry family members that hate buying Christmas presents for me since I'm notoriously hard to buy things for...if I want something I usually just go out and get it, even if it's a day before my birthday or Christmas...I get lots of socks and underwear...

...so, that's that...thought I'd check in, toss a few cents, and say Merry Christmas and Happy New Year y'all...

...later</i>

<b>Spoiler Message:<b>
<span style="background: black; color: black;">...okay, to be the Blitzball God, the two guys you need for your team are in Luca, the first big city you hit where the Blitzball tournaments are held...okay, the first guy you want is Wedge, he's one of the guards at the entrance to the Blitzball stadium (the other guard is Biggs, he also plays BBall so Biggs and Wedge are in the game if you were wondering). Anyway, Wedge will replace Datto as your other Wingman. He starts with about a 17 shot and he just gets better, so with him and Tidus on the wings you'll be scoring goals at a disgusting pace. Now you need a goalie, because Keepa sucks big time. Your goalie is in the plaza by the cafe, sitting on a bench with his wife and his little girl is running with a balloon. He has the second highest catch of any goalie in the league, and once he gets super goalie you can forget about anyone scoring on you. Now that you have a decent team (Letty is an awesome centerman, keep him...the defense guys are average, you can replace them if you want...there are some decent guys available in Luca, but I went for speed over power...and they're also cheap to keep under contract so I can afford the other guys). Now the final trick is that you can start everyone over from scratch. The reset option lowers every player in the league's stats to their beginning mark. You may not want to do this if you've levelled up your guys a lot, but your new guys wil be outmatched and will catch up very slowly if you don't. If you reset, the only team you'll have any trouble with is the Al Bhed Psyches who have the best goalie. Also, play an exhibition game against every other team to copy techniques...there is no experience gained in exhibition games so you can concentrate on getting techs without worrying about levelling everyone up or even winning games. Once Tidus and Wedge have scoring techs, don't be surprised to be winning games by 6 or 8 goals.</span></div>

<div style='font: 12pt ; text-align: left; '>FFX is the ONLY game I've for PS2. Might get Jex & Daxter later though.

One thing I didn't like about Blitzball is that it's hard to gauge how close someone is to you when you make an action. I thought I was clear to shoot one time only to find their whole team was defending against me. :( 

I thought Triple Triad was pretty interesting except when you have to play against the Plus rule. They didn't force you to get good at the game to play the game, though having good TT skills can help you get some powerful items/junctions early on (had 100 Holy on the first CD). Tetra Master, OTOH, just plain sucked. I'm not sure who's idea was to make a game where you don't know the stats of the cards you're using (the stats is only accurate to within the 2nd hexidecimal digit)</div>

<div style='font: 10pt "arial narrow"; text-align: left; padding: 0% 5% 0% 5%; '>Tru dat. FF9's card game yanked.</div>