In regards to skill points..how is everyone putting them into?

I am kind of confused to where I need to put the points!

You don't NEED to put them anywhere. Just put them into whichever skill sets you think you'd use.

You'll find that new towns with better weapons will change weapon type so you use the differnt skills (Ex. In one town the best weapon for Hero will be a sword, in the next there will be a spear which is even better...). When you start off, you won't really know which to put the points to, but once you play for a while and have a chance to try out the different weapon types, you'll decide which ones you want to use.

Try not to thin out your skill points, though. Maxing out a skill always gives you something really really good.

I'm putting them into Boomerang/Courage, Axe/Humanity, Whip/Sex Appeal.

One old-school throwback I would not mind this game *not* having....
beeping for dialog. That has always bugged me, when the game beeps for each letter a character speaks. I don't mind not having VA for everyone, but I've never liked the beeping thing.
Also, I think this has been said before, but I think the menu interface could be a little more cooperative. I'd like a 'jump out of menu from whereever' button, and I wish Circle were 'cancel' instead of Triangle.
Story/world-wise, I can see why the Inn and the Church have different functionality and both offer something, but gameplay-wise, I wish I could 'heal and save' at the same time. I do like the fact that you can't get a 'game over', although I know some people might think that's cheapening it.

I'm playing it, and I'm enjoying it, and I like a lot of the little touches [British voices, sense of humor, player-friendly features, original and fun/funny enemies, the Alchemy pot, etc], but I don't know if I'm seeing it as the 'best RPG of the year' yet. My party is around level 14, and admittedly I only have 3 characters, but I'm not seeing a lot of variety/challenge in most of the combat. The Psyche Up thing does add a little bit, but I'm just not feeling 'sparked' about it. Am I not to that point yet, am I missing something, or what? [I hope this doesn't count as a threadcrap, that is not my intention at all].

I really wish that there were a Zoom or Binocular feature that you can use on the world map. Sometimes I will see a treasure chest in the distance and it turns out to be a rock.

Yeah I found myself wishing for a pair of binoculars, too. I think it would've been cool.

dtcarson, the Square button will exit you from your menus no matter how many "layers" in you are.

Ugh..I made a bad mistake...I sold the battle fork . It was a weak weapon..but it fetched alot of gold.

I didnt know I had all the ingredients to make a demon spear!

damnit

Never ever sell anything unless it can be bought at a shop. I spent the rest of the game regretting my decision to sell Jessica's leather whip after buying a better one. All the alchemy-based whips are linked to it.

DAMNIT.

I knew I shouldnt have sold the crap when it says that I might never see it again.

Okay, I think I'm getting close to the end of the game. I just got to Tyran Gulley. Right now I'm concentrating on alchemy to get some new armor and stuff to sell. After that I'm going to spend some time on Slime Hill to level up a bit. I want to be at around 40 for everyone before I go any further with the story. Right now they're between 35-37.

Yup, you're pretty close. I'd suggest the plateaus of either the dragon's desert or dark ruins as opposed to "slime hill" for leveling up. While they don't have Metal Kings, during the night you'll fight 2-6 Liquid Metals every other fight while "slime hill" has a lot more non-metal battles and are mostly just Metal Slimes when you do get metal monsters.

Sounds good. When you say dark ruins, do you mean in the ruins or outside on the island?

Outside, on the plateau.. you can only get there by flying.
The same areas have a good amount of Gold Golems during the day.

Cool. I'll give it a try when I get home from work tonight.

What would you say is a better method for taking out metal slimes; either falcon blade with metal slash or liquid metal sword with falcon slash? Does it even make a difference?

In my experience they work out to be the same. I want to say I had both Hero and Angelo with Falcon blades and Metal Slash and Jessica had my Liquid Metal Sword while Yangus (with Meteorite Armband) would use the Timbrel. That sounds right.

I didn't have anything invested in Hero's Spear or Yangus' Axe for the quick-kill method. Whoops. I'll do that next time.

Falcon Blade and Metal Slash, NO CONTEST. That'll net 2-4 damage with no tension. Liquid Metal Sword does 2, period.. no Falcon Slash bonus. Do you have Multi-Fists for Yangus? If so that can be a potential 4 hits.. Jessica may use Liquid Metal Sword or Falcon Knife, the knife of course having crital hit bonus (critical hit with Liquid Metal Sword still does 2). If you cheat and look up the Timbrel of Tension recipe then have Jessica you that with a Meteorite Armband equipped (so she'll go first).. then your Falcon/Metal Slashes can net 4-8 damges.

I think I'm nearing the end of the game. I have 65 hours and level 43 right now, just got the liquid metal sword (kicks ass!). My real time is probably realistically around 55 hours. About to venture into the final dungeon now. I had maxed out the hero's boomerang but now that I have the sword I'm putting more points in sword, I have about 50 or so, want to get the +25 bonus or however high it goes for the sword. I found that Yangus' Axe skill Executioner is invaluable when fighting liquid metal slimes (metal babbles). I leveled up very quickly fighting these little guys. I'm not sure if its just me but do you guys feel really stressed out when fighting metal creatures, I know I am on the edge of my seat the entire battle and gripping my controller hoping they won't run away . When I beat one I almost clench my fist in victory.

You're NEAR the end of the game but the "final" dungeon is not the end.

So you'd say giving up the Sun Crown is worth it go get the Timbrel?

Well if you know the recipe, save, then make one.. and if you think the Sun Crown would be more useful you can reset.

Yeah, I broke down and looked at the alchemy list on gamefaqs. I figure this far into the game, why not try to get the best equipment I could. Turns out I missed a lot of good stuff. I'll have to try it out. I put the stuff in the pot to make the Sun Crown before I saved and turned it off last. I'll see which is better for me.

Well, the Timbrel recipe you get AFTER you beat the game and AFTER you beat the first bonus boss because It REALLY makes the game WAY too easy. I know my second time around after I made it made the rest of the game a joke.

I've heard so much about it being powerful, but I really don't see raising everyone's tension one level as being that good. I guess If I had two of them it would be different. I'll give it a try soon.