Sadly the thing Piros was talking about was probably The World RX wich I belive is not really liked by the fandom.

I did not know about Volume 4; I only know about the OVA, Returner. It continues off the Volume 3 storyline into a different ending from volume 4 where Ovan manages to return on his own as a completely untold and separate story from the OVA itself, which is just a reunion of old and new characters. While the OVA has less agency about Haseo (and you the player) about getting Ovan back, I like how the story is just a revisit on the character dynamics and just having Ovan back is just a nice treat on top of the characters being celebratory and content with what they already have. In comparison, Volume 4 does come off as more self-indulgent, but there is more content, and that new form looks like fun gameplay (after all of that grind).

And so with G.U. finished we can all start looking forward to the superior story (and unfortunately clunky controls) of IMOQ... Aka the .hack// game series that SHOULD have been remastered in the first place.

Awesome video John. Totally worth the wait.

And then, at the very last moment of The World R2, a new hero rose up to give fans a glimmer of hope. Piros really is the hero he said he was.

God I forgot how choppy the vol.4 cutscenes are.

So you are saying the Forest of Pain lives up to its' name.

It was so cool seeing my name in the Patreon credits, keep up the good work brother 💪

I can’t remember if this is what I asked you for, now I am forever in stasis of perhaps longing and perhaps satiety

This took forever to come out wow

I wouldnt take the Piros comment so literally Piros works for the ingame CCcorp and after the World R2 is the World RX

Did you tease a .Hack Link retrospective?

2:56 That's Bo-BoBo!

I remember playing this game to death as a kid, I adored the different mix of genres they put in the same, some of the best music in gaming too. I always looked back on this game as a classic, hearing that it didn't sell well makes me understand why a physical copy is nearly a thousand bucks now... Still a great game :)

Lets GOOOOO!!

A few things... As funny as it is that Sakaki is a 10 year old in the real world, his story kinda mirrors Haseo's in the previous series The chaotic PKs show up in all 3 volumes, its just relevant in the third one because you get Natsume if you bother to beat them You can use the area word "BBQ Plate" to find the Chim Chim God, if you kick it you get a boost to the party members affection Piros's line in volume 4 isn't forshadowing a new project, its a reference to the PSP sequel .hack//LINK where CC Corp released "The World R:X" about 2 years after the end of R:2, in 2020 Those aside, great conclusion to the review series

The movie was made to cover up the fact that Alkaid is Haseo's true love interest! And Im so happy you acknowledged that with the Promise Card! Also, with the Forest of Pain, the best way to deal with things is with the Demon Safe Shoes, to not only boost movement speed (plus by either using Speed Charm or Ap Do, you boost your movement speed even further) but make sneak attacks easier, use only the DGX at farthest range for combo purposes as well as Rengekis, Only have the level 1 Skill Triggers like Gale Blade, and have Atoli and Zelkova, set to Life, in your party because their constant healing (along with Zelkova's infinite items) will allow the Moral Gauge to fill faster, not only that, but give everyone Battle Cosmetics to boost the Morale Guage charge rate. Ultimately, it's best to look up a guide to see the rewards for every floor, because on a few you get Infinite Use items for Health, SP, Fairy Orb, Smokescreen and Return Feathers, as well as some other useful things. But, as John said...the game is over, so there are really no reason to have them outside of 100% completion

"But remember that Alkaid is still objectively the correct choice" JOHN IS BASED

Honestly .Hack GU Trilogy would have probably worked a lot better as a short OVA Series, cause condensing that game whole plot into an hour and a half, is ludicrously short sited! Certainly even just giving each Volume an hour *might* not work either, but it would have more than likely calmed the pacing down a fair bit.

Boutta bing everything now.

John gaming

I can't remember if you mentioned this in a previous video (or this one, as I just started watching it) but is there any chance a .hack (as in not GU) review is on the table? Even if it's not, looking forward to whatevers next 🙂

I remember back when I was young playing the original on PS2. I still have the first 3 vols. The only games alongside the original PS2 series that I had ever 100%. But here I was sitting at home on my old laptop reading up online that Japan got a Vol 4!! But we were never going to get it or it wasn't coming to Canada. I remember being so sad and also so excited trying to think about how amazing Vol 4 must be. All the crazy and cool stuff that must happen in it. How it will probably be even longer than the 3rd volume. Smash cut to with the PS4 remake came out and IT HAS VOL 4 oh my god I'm so excited!!!! I waited since my childhood for this! But before I play it I want to play though the rest of the games and 100% them again. So I did. Then it was time to boot up vol 4.... And I swear... In the length of time it took my wife to have a shower, dry her hair and make coffee for us both... It was over. What was maybe 2 hours at most. I was so disappointed in vol 4 that it actually almost ruined my love for the series. Recently a friend of mine started playing the .hack games and my only response was they are amazing, great story lots of fun. Don't play the last volume.

Back at it

Amazing I liked the video without even watching it after watching it I so wish for more

39:30 Omnimon They created Omnimon

Natsume is a character from the first Quadrilogy.

I rewatched every .hack of yours literally yesterday just to make sure I was caught up for when you drop this! Can't wait to watch it.

I’m really hoping Cyber Connect gets to have another chance. Because world 3, maybe with a bit more self-containment, would be nice.

I love how this game is more focused on the megaman mythos than the rest of Battle Network, like, we got Light, Alpha is literally one of the Color Devils, I love this

I find it funny that literally yesterday I was wondering when we would get this vid. BTW John, if you want any help with the IMOQ series feel free to ask, been deeply invested in the whole dot hack series since Sign first aired on Toonamia over 20 years ago and I started my 4th full playthrough of IMOQ recently so the info will be fresh in my head.

imagine not playing through forest of pain 3 times to get duplicates of all the items to make all characters godlike broken

it's finalee tim

the music in these games always hits the feels so strong 😭 I need a remake of the original 4 ASAP!

I never caught the Piros bit at the end of Vol.4! That definitely gives me hope for the future of the series, and Last Recode is coming on seven years old. Hopefully we hear something soon.

As someone from brazil i have to make my dislike towards the trash parody made in this game.. it was very clear they didnt know how brazil works, no violence, no one getting mugged, no football or loud music and most important no nudity.. clearly underwhelming didnt represent us, he didnt even stole a cellphone..

And so it ends... For now. Good job John

thanks John for this wild ride on Haseo's Journey and happy Holidays

You know knowing who Sakai truly is actually elevates every scene with him for me. Because now all I can see him as is a spoiled foul mouth brat in a cod lobby.

Be me: Clicks the notification bell after watching the series from day 1 * Awaits every part and checks out a few other videos * KZbin every single time: I'm gonna pretend i didn't see that * Never notified me and i always found out randomly scrolling my subscribed feed *

I remember in the forest if pain there was one boss on the top floors I couldnt damage but luckly I had the poison weapons that was given to you from some side boss or side content and with that I was able to kill them otherwise I would have to repeat the 50 something floors

Not fun fact. Vol4 was so short due to losing the programmer that made the area Keyword system and dungeon generator... He was a Rockstar type dev so even with the source the system was so foreign and robust no one could reverse engineer it in time for Vol4 to be worth a damn... hence the WEIRD lack of content and over abundance of linear story. and Of course the SAO money holes took a Fton of time away from last recode in general.

Ayyy the corn man returns🔥🔥🔥🔥

The original dot hack games next year finally

this was objectively not a great game, but since i was in 4th grade, grammar and story hardly mattered, and since only one person in my class owned BN4, we would just pass that shit around so subsequent playthroughs did not matter as much lmao

Fun fact, there's an item I believe you get from the Gold Goblins that lets you sneak past any enemy. So get those boots and skip the entire Forest of Pain in like 20-30 minutes

If you decide to tackle IMOQ as well I'm look forward to it. I also highly recommend checking out Solatorobo and Fuga from their Little Tail Bronx series. Tail Concerto isn't as important lore wise as a lot of things were retconned, but it's a charming and short experience. There's been vague hints throughout these games that they might be connected to .hack in some form. Fuga in particular is being advertised with .hack's A in C major tone and glitches, and there's been some not so subtle .hack like stuff happening with that series. I also agree that .hack isn't dead and if Bandai says no to continuing the series under them I can definitely see CC2 pulling a Fuga and doing a possibly canon spiritual successor through their self publishing eventually. I do hope that they can convince Bandai to let them remake Tail Concerto, Silent Bomber, Solatorobo, and .hack IMOQ someday though as I think these all deserve remakes. Maybe a remaster for IMOQ if that's all they can get for it, I hope they don't nerf the difficulty as badly as they did with G.U. though. I'm glad CC2 is self publishing now and with how well their anime games are doing it looks like they can pretty much do whatever they want with their original games going forward without Bandai or any other publishers holding them back. I'm hoping once they're done with Fuga and they've got their Osaka studio completely set up that the flood gates on their original games open up. I'm really looking forward to what they're going to do with Tokyo Ogre Gate and Cecile. Also I recommend .hack The Movie/Beyond the World it's a much more competent movie than G.U. Trilogy was and it was a nice endcap to the series, it's pretty standalone too. Unfortunately it was a Japan only release so you're going to have to find a subbed copy somewhere online.

NEW PART?, LETS BETTER RE WATCH ALL PREVIOUS ONES FIRST!!

Aww, thanks for the Christmas present. I'm referring to the dunking on Sakaki's background bit. Been waiting for so long for that and it was worth it. Jokes aside, I'm glad to see the final part and it turned out well. A little surprised to see no mention of the terminal disc, but I assume you didn't cover it since it basically leads with a whole recap of IMOQ and spends a good chunk covering other side material. That said, I'd definitely love to see your takes on IMOQ eventually. Of all the retrospectives I've seen on .hack in general, yours is definitely my fave since you really try to discuss what the creators intended to impart to players. A lot of others I find tend to be a lot more surface level take. It's been refreshing, and I'd love to see that energy with an IMOQ retrospective. Thanks for all the great vids!

the mad man finished it