... Hey, guys. Upon looking back over the Let's Play of Thousand Arms that Lantis and I did a while back, I thought I would like to start another of my infamous "talk life" threads, whereupon I reminisce over each of the nine lovely ladies you as the main character have the blessed (or not so much in some cases) chance of forging a pairbond with, and ultimately rate their overall desirability (assuming you yourself were an anime character, of course) to have as a girlfriend. How you view my use of the term desirability, whether physical or on a deeper affectionate level, I'll leave that to you. The main reason I thought to do this thread is the fact that a few choice girls among the nine just really get on my nerves, and I want to vent that frustration. Whatever.

If you haven't seen the LP, I'll save you the trouble of having to look through its many chapters to see what an in-game date with the girls are like. .... If you think this thread's purpose is weird and perverted, then congratulations on your innocence, sir or madame; you obviously have never heard of Record of Agarest War.

I'll start with the 4 girls who are actual members of your party, and then the 5 passive members you have to meet certain small requirements to be able to date as a distraction from the main quest.

1) Sodina Dawnfried


Sodina is our stereotypical sweet Southern Belle and main heroine of Thousand Arms, and it's sort of assumed that she is the decisive love interest of Meis (Thousand Arms' dorky main protagonist) in the game, despite the fact that Sodina is only one of nine girls you can date. Now, you know my general preferences in VG women by now. I like them cute over being an obvious sex object, and sweet over bitchy. And that's Sodina. She has a rather unique full name, a terrific voice actress, and that Aeris-Gainsborough-esque affinity for the spiritual realm that I've always loved in a VG heroine. All of the girls you can date in Thousand Arms have a certain innate element that the process of forging a sword with their help will add to said weapon, and Sodina's, of course, is Light. There's just so many things to adore about this girl, from her magnificent veil of auburn hair to the ginormous bows on her outfit to the cute lil' bells she wears around her neck. 'Girls got class.

And besides, how can you say no to a face like this one? If only more girls in real life were so modest as to blush this cutely ->



See, Lantis? I told you slinky was a real word!

And finally, this is what a date with Sodina is like. Keep in mind, her random moments of difficulty are certainly no more frequent than the other girls' are. It's part of the challenge of the game ->



Desirability: 9/10

Thanks for reading, guys. Soon, I'll tell you all about the second girl, Wyna.

I didn't know there was so much voice acting in the game.

That aside, if there were such a modest chick, I might talk to her. Otherwise, I like the more tomboyish, rough type with a heart of gold chicks.

Unattainable, Ix.

2) Wyna Grapple

Next up is Wyna, the second female to join the party in search of everything trivial you could think of as a reason for a character's joining you on a quest to save the world. She needs someone to fix her father's sword so Daddy won't punish her for careless bar fighting, by making her report to the judo range. Wyna is so grateful when Meis fixes it that she decides to help him in his fight against the Dianova empire. Of course, she's just looking for more butt to kick. Wyna isn't exactly meant to be a cookie cut-out of Sodina in the personality or motivations sense.

Wyna is, well, ... she's a man's man.



... And probably a ladies' man, too. From the looks of it. The woman has butch written all over her.

I'm sorry. Most people don't care about anything but raw sexuality when it comes to rating a woman's overall desirability, but I can't help but let other factors get in the way of determining even pure physical attractiveness. In other words, Wyna's militant brassiere-burning demeanor makes her innately unattractive to me. If Lantis will be so kind as to not freak out here, because I haven't brought this up near as many times as he's tried to slap me around with his Decisive Battle conceit. NO, I DO NOT NECESSARILY OBJECT TO A WOMAN BEING INDEPENDENT. NO, NOT EVERY GIRL'S DREAM NEEDS TO BE TO FIND A MAN TO DEPEND ON AND LIVE LIFE IN A MARRIAGE OF COMPLETE SUBSERVIENCE WHERE HE ALWAYS NEEDS TO COME HOME AND FIND HER IN THE KITCHEN AND IS GIVEN RIGHT TO SLAP HER FACE FOR EVERY TIME SHE LETS HIS SANDWICH GET COLD.

But okay, I can be fair and pay her some form of compliment: she's not Kyleen or Nelsha. And if I had pure 100% ethanol pulsing through my veins, I could be so coerced as to lightly kiss Wyna on the cheek. But she's kind of cool in the sense of being what we Magonians could only dream of life as: she's a pirate (in the seafaring sense, not Internet "thievery").

I can just picture Wyna standing before her pirate subordinates on the deck of the Langould, throwing up the hail-Hitler salute and shouting, "Death to giant pink bows and charming collar bells!"

A date with Wyna ->



Ah, it's not so bad. The "you suck!" line is used as a Windows exclamation sound on my PC, too. I just wish she'd dress a bit more modestly. I mean, dang.

Desirability: 4.5/10

I want Wyna. NO OTHER BLONDE LADY WILL DO

Well, thanks for not getting on to me for disliking her, then, Fay. ^_^


Ix wrote ->


If you tell me that you like Kyleen when I bring her up, I am going to slay you.

... And then capture your spirit inside the camera used in Fatal Frame.

3) Kyleen Nelphe

Nelphe .... Do you pronounce that with one syllable or two? Ah, who cares? Because you won't want to spend enough time with this chick to so much as learn her last name in the first place. Kyleen is the queen mother of evil old cow female protagonists in RPG's, surpassing even the likes of Jessica from Lunar:SSS. ... I used to not think that was possible.

A boy's hairstyle, a gnome's face, brusque mannerisms, and an unhealthy attachment to material things in complete disregard of basic humanistic ideals and sentiments, Kyleen ... just ain't feminine. She spits in the face of love and nobility! All hail the power of the gold coin!



But, you know, from this angle she actually looks ... somewhat demure.

But, hey, no need to take my word for it. Let her tell you herself just how proud she is of her utter lack of feminimity ->



@1:25 WHAT KIND OF FACE IS THAT?!


Desirability: 1.5/10 (She nauseates me. The only reason she has anything over a 1 is that her clothes are at least feminine.)

I don't know what your beef with Wyna is. You really need to look up what butch means. She very much looks like a woman. And an attractive one at that. Though we've had this conversations many times before. I've just chocked it up to your belief that a woman can only be submissive, polite, and soft spoken. ^_^

4) Nelsha Stylus

... And, finally, the fourth and last female to join the party is Nelsha. Oh, god.



Seriously, that's about the most unattractive facial expression you can find in a woman - the "duuuhhhhh", open-mouthed, dully-bubblegum-chewing, utter-lack-of-intelligent-life-in-the-eyes face. She's creeping me out!

So, yeah I hate Nelsha. You know, let's even leave out the obvious fact that she's there for the blatantly underage fanservice that the Japanese crowd seems to enjoy so much (again, see also Record of Agarest War, and it's all too clear). She's like, twelve! And yet, she's the character in the party who can assume the persona and physical appearance of exactly what Ratchet said about her in one of the game's cutscenes: a tranny prostitute in a cheap blonde wig. I mean, that's just gross.


Nelsha's dark half.


You know, I'd almost say that dating Kyleen is a less uncomfortable and undesirable experience. At least she doesn't stand there blank-stared with her mouth perpetually open like she's died in such a manner as for the explicit purpose of horrifying all who discover her corpse!



Oh, might I also mention here, she talks in third-person all the time. ... It's not cute.

One compliment for her? ... Hmmm. Well, I suppose she's got a fashionable last name.

Desirability: 1.5/10 (It's hard to say who's more hideous.)

Wyna + Kyleen sounds really good to me!

So your dialogue options for this game are to be a complete, insensitive jerk or be a lovey dovey puppy? It sounds like getting their elemental powers or whatever up is not that hard to do then.
I wanted to say something in favor of Nelsha (I think glasses can be cute) but.... nope, she seems like a retard. On the other hand, she seems to know you need to be nice to her which is kind of funny. XD

And Wyna doesn't seem bad...

I guess I chose Youtube vids of the dates where the date goes pretty smoothly, then. Because there are actually a lot of times that you get kind of screwed with a question where you know that both of the possible answers you can give are bad. Somehow, the girl's "mood", indicated by a Link's-heart-container-shaped icon next to her name when you select who to date, figures into how often you get the screw-you-over kinds of questions, I think.

Well, that was the four female party members for you. However, randomly arrayed throughout the Thousand Arms world are five more NPC ladies whom, for some reason after just one introductory conversation, don't mind going on a date with you, provided you don't mind exploring the world for them.

5) Cannon Priestess Palma

... No, seriously, that's how I recognize her, at least unnoficially. The game doesn't give her a last name or anything as far as I know. Palma is a priestess, and a sparsely dressed one at that, who's keeping company with five or so other ladies in white aboard the Grapples' ship Langould, and, far as I can tell, she calls upon the powers of Heaven solely to power up the giant trump card that is the ship's main cannon. Hence, I call her the cannon priestess. This is the extent of Palma's services to the gods. She becomes impressed with your heroism after Meis and company successfully protect the giant cannon from an intruder named Bolt, and after introducing herself, consents to date you. Apparently this one particular piece of weaponry is Palma's life.



Yeah, she's clearly trying to sway you with her partially exposed breasts.

She's our demure, spiritually sensitive type in the game, but the one thing about her is that she wears as little as Wyna does. And I can only assume this is because of that weird clash of purity and sexuality that the anime culture commonly tries to make on its female characters, where the innocent image of a holy woman is portrayed, while at the same time she appeals to the male senses of raw sexuality by wearing little clothing or something. ... 'Kind of like how in this one insane anime I owned as a child, Knights of Ramune, featured one of its lead female characters as what was called a "Holy Virgin", a title which basically screams purity at you, but for some reason (we all know what it is) she could only get in tune with the spirits and other such divine forces by getting naked for the occasion. ... Well, hey, I can't judge. As seemingly outlandish as such a mix is on any given woman, can't say it's never appealed to a small part of my heart - the sexy, sexy priestess girl. ^_-

Seriously, Palma seems to be entirely dressed in mummy wrappings when you see her. I don't think she's wearing anything at all beneath all of those white bandages.

Dating Palam is a pleasant experience, I would say, provided you do no say anything in your answers to her that causes her to be suspicious of your truthfulness, lest she threaten you with divine punishment at the hands of the gods she serves.

Minor point, but you might be surprised to find that one of the things I actually don't find all that attractive in Palma is her utter OCD with cleanliness, even for a priestess. I mean, it's at least something reminiscent of feminimity, unlike Wyna's love for barbells over Hello Kitty purses, but, when you bathe and wash your hands more times in a day than I do, ... seek help. Seriously, at one point in a date she'll ask how often you bathe, and when you answer correctly, she cheerfully agrees that THREE FREAKIN' TIMES A DAY is the proper habit of maintaining hygiene. I mean, dang.

Oh, and one last thing, you can't tell me from the picture above that she isn't actually Sodina in disguise. Therefore, technically in Thousand Arms you are only being an eight-timer instead of a nine-timer, because Sodina and Palma are the same person. Why the deceitfulness, Sodina? You don't have to play up that image to me.

And now, what a date with the good priestess is like ->



Well, that's an odd lead-off question, Palma.


Desirabilty: 7.5/10 (Any woman wearing the priestess robes is sure to melt my heart no matter what, ... unless her name is Jessica De'Alkirk.)

6) Gadgetmaster Marion

... And now we have our lovable goon sterotype, Marion the Gadgetmaster. ... I find myself strangely attracted to she whom I fondly refer to as "Crazy Mary". 'May be a little nuts myself, who knows.

Marion's the resident genius of Mounthand, revered by its people for her uncanny feat of having the converted the entire town to a train that runs on its rails day and night, never sleeping. Why she did this in the first place? I don't know. After knowing her for about thirty seconds in the game, you'll quickly find that not much makes sense at all when you are around her. Sporting fluffed-out twin ponytails, a sort of pseudo-feminine polka-dotted dress shirt and tie combination, a stuffed frog for a hat, rollerskates, and a jetpack (the latter two serving her no purpose as far as I can see but to enhance the ultra-nerd cuteness look), among the girls of Thousand Arms, Crazy Mary is our resident inventive genius who charms you with her repeated wacky hijinks trying to get her many and varied inventions to work as they should. Yeah, in Thousands Arms there's a well-known anime culture female stereotype for everyone.



Still, I wish she'd get rid of the frog hat. And I call it lazy design to make her eyes seemingly the exact same color as her hair. Brown in the eyes just doesn't seem to suit her type of character. ... More of a shiny green, maybe?

Positives: Well, she's obviously very cute, for one, and has a superior intelligence that, when blended with an oddly killer body that Marion herself hides behind a conservative amount of clothing and may herself not even be conscious of, depending on the person, tends to drive a Protector such as myself wild with an unnerving amount of physical desire. Hey, I can admit it. I mean, she's not showing a lot of flesh like, say, Wyna or Palam does, but, come on, you can tell there's something to be desired there, anyway. I just ... sense it. Maybe it's the tightly woven dress shirt accentuating her breasts by pulling so tight against the delicate flesh of Marion's upper bodice?

Okay, now I'm just spouting off to be amusing and creepy at the same time.

And lastly, I must say, Marion has recorded a truly classic collection of f-you sounds into the workings of her resident dungeon to begrudge our heroes as they traverse it, containing such amusing auditory machinations as the prim "DOING!" and the classy "eeh-errrgn-eeeh-errrgn-EEH-ERRRRRRRNNNNGGG!!!" Yes, I find this one minute detail having nothing to do with traits of physical desirability except by extension of very specific and personal liking to be a positive, also.

Negatives: There are still quite a few, actually. First and foremost, Marion shares voice actresses with the lone female member of the villainous Evil mecha Five in the game, Ratchet, so basically Marion's voice can oftentimes be as intrusive to the human ear as is a cheese grater wielded by E.Honda to the back of one's skull. There's that, and a number of more minute details such as Marion's tendency to look creepy as she trails behind the party with hands outstretched, trying only to keep balanced on the rollerskates she could just, you know, take off and start wearing regular shoes anytime she pleases, but instead looking as though she's icily crawling up behind the party going "boogey boogey boogey!" with her hands to illustrate. It reminds me too much of Rikku's similar display to the rest of the party at times in Final Fantasy X, where she would just wave her hands as such to demonstrate the direness of the point she was trying to make. And also, I failed to mention this before in my first post, but there is a mini-game unique to each of the girls in Thousand Arms that you can play with them as part of the dating experience (don't ask), and Marion's is by far the stupidest; you play a quick round of rock-paper-scissors with a Marionbot (as her robots are called), and then have to one-up the bot in glancing to the same direction as it does on an audio cue in order to score a point for yourself. she calls it "SUPER rock-paper-scissors!" I call it pre-school-age crap.

But enough of that. Here's a date with Marion. I just adore the pitiable face she gives in a display of thoughtfulness or hurt as a response to Meis' more careless answers ->



And, it would seem from the above video, Marion's not such a bad kisser, either.

Desirability: 6.5/10

7) Kyoka the Loli

For more pedorific implication, we also have Kyoka, she of highly questionable age. Assuming I too were 15 or 16 like Meis, though, hey, I'd go for it and ask her out, much unlike Nelsha.
Shortly after disembarking Mounthand where you meet Marion (by now this would make Meis a four-timer), you find Kyoka being harrassed by a few possessed samurai or something, rescue her, and then her brother Soushi (who joins your party) shows up and threatens that he'll run you through if you do not unhand his little sister this instant. ... Were the setting of which this exchange takes place just a little different, this could be a very disturbing thing to hear. Eesh.

After leaving Kyoka and Sodina behind with some perverted old man who's Soushi's swordmaster or something in a hut near the shore, Meis and crew go exploring the rest of the island, only to come back and discover Sodina kidnapped and taken away in an airship by enemy forces. Where Kyoka or the perverted old man went after this, I still don't know. But a little later in the game somehow you find Kyoka hanging about Sodina's hometown where the game pretty much starts. I don't know why she's alone or if anyone's looking after her at all (she's definitely young enough to still need a guardian), but she's fine with dating you by that time.

Kyoka's okay. She's fairly prim and proper like Sodina, but seemingly easy-going, also. Her outfit is among the cutest of the bunch, consisting of beautiful kimono, hair ribbons, and a bow tied to her back that put's Sodina's shoulder ribbons to shame. Love the earrings, too. I think aside from Mil Wind's glare face during dating, Kyoka's is the next most precious and amusing. Again, I call lazy design on her eyes also being brown like her hair. I think a nice blue with a dull sheen would work here, but then, maybe I'm just prejudiced against the color brown. Basically, the only way I can describe Kyoka is that she's pretty much just the kind of girl I'd be happy to protect (and protect only, I mean), so long as her girlish-looking brother Soushi wasn't there to misunderstand my intentions at just the wrong moment. I don't know what much else there is to say.





But perhaps you'll see for yourself in the below video ->



I know I played bad cop for Nelsha, but in this case, I'll say that, hey, nothing wrong with liking them a little young. ^_^ j/k


Desirability: 7.25/10 (That is, were she closer to my age. Until then, hands freakin' off.)

8) Metalia

Eighth up on our list is Metalia, the beautiful-dignified-mature-older-woman type of our little harem.



I really like this one. Normally the younger the better (well, younger to an extent; I'm not a pedophile or anything, although this game can certainly make you feel like one), but Metalia has a regality about her, and at least she's not dressed absurdly like Wyna, Palma, or Marion. She may be old enough to be your Mom, but there's nothing wrong with a Mom being beautiful to look at, right? Even kajak would agree; he's the one sporting the shirt that says "I love hot Moms".

Metalia, naturally, is the holy woman being confined to the signature little-known-but-much-talked-about area of the world in Thousand Arms, called Myscatonia. She helps you in the final stages of the game, having for ages been awaiting the arrival of a heroic Spirit Blacksmith such as Meis who could challenge the evil Emperor. She has a very quiet way about her, as you would expect, and is always attractive to a guy like myself, but she can show a side that's nearly as irritatingly thankless and demanding as Kyleen should you give the wrong gift to her during a date, as Lantis and I were shocked to find out during our LP. Also, her name could use a little working on, in my opinion. There's just something not very becoming about it.

I really like the heavy use of ornamentation to her queenly outfit, and the deep onyx-colored orbs that represent eyes, but they don't seem to really penetrate to your inmost thoughts as you might expect. That can be a good thing during a date with her.

For some reason, I keep hearing the song "Earth Angel" playing in my mind whenever I see Metalia.


Here's a typical date with Metalia ->



Desirability: 7.0/10

9) The Mysterious Miss Mil Wind

And finally I bring this thread to a close with my personal favorite, Mil Wind (although she's not the highest on the desirability scale).

There's already something to love about her there; it's such a musically-inclined-sounding name, so mellifluous.



But Mil Wind's not all about the woodwinds, no no no. Her mind is a steel trap of complex algebra, ergonomics, and astral physics. ... Now I'm pretty sure astral physics doesn't even exist as an applicable science (whoops, just looked it up; it is), but if it did, it'd be Mil Wind's thing for sure. She probably tends to scare off more men than attract them with the astounding intelligence she possesses. And she carries around a large notebook to write down every observation she makes about the world around her as well as to record everything you say to her during dating as if it were worthy of note for a future research topic, like she's Harriet the Spy or something.

When you as Meis make a chance visit back to your hometown late in the game, you find Mil Wind 'neath a large tree pondering - no kidding - an accurate method of measuring the planet's volume and circumfrence. ... Wow. If Mil Wind were a character in the X-Files, she'd have Dana Scully - arguably the smartest female character in 90's television - totally one-upped on array of prestigious career prospects. She'd be a doctor, an astrologist, a space rocket engineer, ... and an FBI agent. ... And all before she even turned twenty years old.

May I temporarily direct your attention to a poem I once wrote about Mil Wind as a high school English assignment. I'm very proud of it.
http://rpgmmag.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=4442

Aside from Kyoka's, I really love Mil Wind's outfit, too. A sort of pink shawl tied by a blue ribbon with a high-collar blouse underneath. A very dignified choice of attire. And the cute brunette braids complete the fashionable yet adorable look. Her mini-game (playing arithmetic with various shapes) is by far the most amusing one of the bunch.


A date with Mil Wind ->



She has such a winning smile.

Desirability: 8.75/10

Well, if you've stayed interested enough in this thread, who might some of your favorites and dislikes be? Although if you haven't played Thousand Arms yourself (and you're not missing much in that case), you have but the short dating videos above and my opinion to go off of.

I'm seriously all about that Kyleen and Wyna. And maybe mix in a little bit of Marion, too. I like tomboy-types and the cute nerdy ones. Everyone else I could take or leave. I've never been a fan of Shinto Priestesses, though, so that's kinda aight. It's been a good topic, SK.

This was a good read! Much better than my silly Arthur LP

... Or a fan of having that guy from Dateline NBC paying you a visit with his camera crew, in Kyoka's case. ^_^

Me, though? There's nothing I love more than a woman in white robes who throws little magic slips of paper at demons to exorcise them.


And, Duel, your Arthur LP was great. No need to sell yourself short.