.hack(tm) Part 3: Outbreak Official Strategy Guide (Official Strategy Guides (Bradygames)) (Pt. 3)

Comment: A very useful and decent guide for the .Hack (dotHack) Outbreak (Part 3) game in the series. Useful if you are playing the game for the first time or going back through and trying to get to places and things that you may have missed the first time through. Has a section for walkthrough and stats on not only the characters in the game at this stage of the game, plus info and stats on weapons, armor, and enemies in the game.

Comment: Generally, there's nothing to get particularly irritated about in a game guide, even this one. They fill out the story, provide maps and walkthroughs, catalogs of items, and explain the complicated bits if there are any. Many, like this guide come out pre-production of the US version of the game. Which means that small errors and differences are inevitable.

So what irritated me about this particular 'Strategy Guide'. Actually, it was several things, but the most glaring omission is any attempt at a weapons list. That doesn't sound like much, but this game has weapons galore, and they are often vital to solving a particular confrontation. When a guide tells you to select a weapon with good fire spells, and you have to paw through an entire collection of twin blades, it can get on your nerves.

This isn't what I would call a necessary guide - .hack//OUTBREAK is not a difficult game from the viewpoint of plot or monster slayage. If you play the game straight, you may miss some of the cooler weapons and armors and never get to beat the goblins, but you will win the game without anything unfathomable happening. In these circumstances a guide should amplify the experience, be something of a souvenir, and NOT forget to tell you some important things.

This guide falls a bit short. Not fatally, but just enough to be an irritant. Think twice before imbibing.

Comment: Sure, they added stuff like all the dvd keyword areas, and this time they got almost everything...

but they still didn't add a weapons list again.