[:plant:] Right. Let's talk guides.

So, I collect them. I know Skills' collects them. What about the rest of you?

What's your take on guides? Do you buy them like I do, largely for the art and second time through a game? Or are you a person who won't go through a game without a guide at your side to make sure you get that 101%? Or are you someone who views guides as an ungodly creation, a black spot on the history of gaming and gaming culture?

The reason this leaps to mind for me is that I spent the last 45 minutes making written in notes on my FF XII guide to make it actually, you know, useful. Hand written notes of when side quests become accessible and when certain places/people/things become available. It actually reminded me of having to go through my FF IX guide and make alterations galore thanks to the terrible, terrible idea that was PlayOnline. If anyone still has that guide, by the way, the common belief that it's useless because PlayOnline no longer hosts FF IX information is false. Square still has the information available, it's just at a different address.

That, for me, was the biggest joke of a guide I'd ever seen. It was worse than any of the old NES or SNES guides I'd used. Hell, even some of the unauthorized stuff from the early SNES days were better than the FF IX abortion. Myself, I find I generally know more than the BradyGames guides, though the boys at DoubleJump rarely let me down.

So, how bout it? Love 'em, hate 'em? Tell us why. Tell us who your favourites are in terms of publishers. Hell, tell us who your least favourite publishers are. What's your favourite book? Least favourite?

YOUR GUIDES. YOU SHOULD SHOW ME THEM.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Miles

I'm not so much into guides anymore but any hardcover guide I'll buy. I love collecting Working Designs guides. They're thick, some are hardbound, very detailed, and contain random bits of humor throughout. I still need to get a hold of a mint Lunar 2 guide though. The last guide I bought was for Super Mario Galaxy, and I only bought it because it was hardbound!

I've got a bunch of the Working Design guides. They're just gorgeous. You can hate Vic Ireland all you want, but the man put out some quality stuff.

How ya doing, buddy?

I think the single most useful guide I own is the Super Mario RPG guide. Actual pictures of the hidden chests are so much more accessible than text-based descriptions.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Megalith

Do Prima and Brady still dominate the guide industry? Because all they did was pump out rubbish back in the day.

Versus and Piggyback had the best guides, with fold-out posters and everything. Versus' FFVII guide was legendary.

Yeah, Prima and Brady are still the main names in the game. They're better, but still not as good as Versus, or DoubleJump.

Also, in an awesome aside, I had the FF VII guide from Versus and lost it in a move. But then, about two years ago, I see someone I buy from on ebay regularly has a no picture offering of "Versus Final Fantasy 8 guide." So I message him, asking if he meant FF 7. Turns out it's his wife, as he's off in the middle east somewhere, and he wants to sell off his game collection. So she's doing it. She's too lazy to alter the title, right? So I wind up buying a mint condition Versus FF 7 guide for 19 dollars. The other auction of the Versus FF 7 guide going at the time went for over 100. Score.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Well madame, your guide penis is larger than mine by several inches, I must admit. Very, very impressive.

Also, aren't those FFT figures just great? Mine are sitting in a glass cabinet under my Non HD-TV in the basement, wherein I play my Genesis, SNES and other such beauties.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Koudelka kicks ass. I have that guide for that. And for Suikoden II, actually.

What's my rarest guide? The Versus FF VII is up there. Persona I and II, definitely up there. Could be one of the WD guides. Lunar, maybe.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Actually, the Koudelka guide wasn't very helpful. It's fairly old school and sparse. However, it is a bloody monster of a game no matter how you slice it. Just fucking mean.

FELIPE NO

Yeah, I'll use GameFAQs if the guide sucks, or there is no guide. I'm a bit of a completionist freak.


Inernal: That's the most realest guide to a dog I've ever seen.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

In case anyone hasn't heard, apparently EB is dropping guides from their stores in order to make "more room" for their other products. That means we fanatics are going to have to get our fix by buying online.

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by Dhsu

At least they'll be on clearance.

Yeah, but they're all old guides that most of us already have. Go check it out sometime, basically all you're going to find now is like, FF XI guides.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by speculative

I purchased the game guide for Disgaea 2 a week after purchasing the game. I'll probably search on Ebay for the guide to Disgaea 1 and pick it up. Other than that, the only guide I own is for Asheron's Call 2. Lol; it wasn't much help but it was interesting reading.

Just buy the Disgaea 1 special edition guide from doublejumpbooks.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Muzza

Ah, yes, video game guides. Love 'em. But it's been ages since I bought one. I used to be mad in love with them. Mind you, the guides I have are basically Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts and Pokemon, all from when I was younger. All of my Pokemon guides are essentially torn to shreds. =P (The last guide I bought would have been my Ape Escape 2 one a few years ago~)

My authorised collection/piggyback interactive guides are probably my favourites. Never owned a Versus or Double Jump guide, but would definitely like to. I've also got some pretty lame ones; my Final Fantasy IX guide sucks ass (playonline?!), and I guess that sentiment is echoed throughout this thread. And rightly so.

Couple of questions: is there only one kind of Suikoden II strategy guide out there? (I wanna buy it, and I wanna know if there are any higher quality ones out there) Also, was a guide ever released for Suikoden? How about Chrono Trigger? (And Deni, or whoever, who published the Pesona I & 2 guides you mentioned?)

And is there a site for Working Designs? (Lunar etc) As you can say I really want to get a decent collection of quality guides; mine's pretty pathetic, and I enjoy them oh-so much. Not on the first playthrough though.

Only one authorized guide for both Suikoden and Suikoden II. CT has a player's guide, published by Nintendo. And I think both Persona and Persona II are Prima. But I haven't looked at the guide for I in a bit.

Unfortunately Working Designs folded, but you can find a lot of their guides in good quality on ebay.

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Originally Posted by Muzza

Great stuff, thanks for the info. ^.~

Any time, mate. If you can get a hold of the Versus FF VII guide, do so. It's amazing.

I was speaking idiomatically.