115 hours and many Bombcasts later....

115 Hours and many bombcasts and podcasts later my journey in Ni No Kuni comes to a close. Good god.... it wasn't hard but the seemingly gargantuan task of catching 250 familiars and alchemizing 120 unique items almost did break me a few times. I think I'm going to write a proper blog up later but just got done making my last alchemy item. Going out with a friend now in a few minutes but I was pretty excited about this so I figured I'd shoot a quick post and post a screenshot before I left. Fun game. I absolutely got my 60$ worth out of this one. =)

Man you are crazy. I like Ni No Kuni a lot and enjoy being in that world, but I just can never see myself catching all the monsters and making everything. Congrats dude!

@noobsauceg7: Well that is just the thing that ISN'T nearly all the monsters there are around 440 listed enemy types although that includes bosses and other non-usable familiars so the actual amount of usable familiars still is near 350 I'd say. Plenty of leeway to skip over some of the harder to catch ones.

I didn't even bother going for the platinum. You deserve sex.

Congrats! I'm actually aiming for the same goal, only about 25 hours in and finished up with Hamelin see we'll so how long it takes me. Are you sure the number of capturable familiars is lower? I just popped open the official guide and the familiar section weighs in at 432 familiars which means there are actually 108 familiars plus three each for their evolution line. Slightly unrelated, but where is the best spot to farm Toko's? and am I in a position to begin doing so?

Do a guide. At least write the tricks you've found while playing so as to alleviate the task for other people.

I tip my hat to you, sir, you are truly a gentleman and a scholar of familiars. You are also certifiably insane, but then again, so are we all.

Wow man congrats I'm currently going for it right now too. I'm 78 hours in have 230 familiars and need 6 more alchemy recipes done before my plat. The thing that worries me is the awful drop/steal rate of the rarer items (kaleidostones, angel wings etc.) so right now i'm just trying to steal as much as I can. I sort of hope I can get a bit lucky and not play til 118 hours like yourself. Because while I did really enjoy my time with Ni No Kuni i'm ready to move on...as soon as I get that damned platinum. Once again CONGRATULATIONS.

@ducksworth: It was an off the top of my head estimate simply due to the fact the highest numbered familiar is 439 on my list. There are a ton of bosses and a few one off story enemies you fight as well as the fact some familiars like Snapdragon it is impossible to get all 4 forms. You get ONE golden ticket for a snap dragon at one point so you will end up with only one of the final two forms of it. Same with the Draggle DLC familiar and yes DLC familiars ARE counted in this. So It may actually be a tad closer to 400 but still.

As for farming Toko's that all depends on what part of the game your at (marked for spoilers)

Early game - Go to ugly duckling island which is a small island right next to swan island which is clustered to the north west of the spring lands.

Mid game - Once you get the dragon you can go to Billy Goats Bluff and fight TokoToko's worth 9k xp Billy goats bluff is the small strip on the western side of the autumn isles near Peridia

Late/Post Game - Ivory Tower where the White Witch resides you can occasionally find TokoCold's worth 29k regular groups of enemies give around 600-700xp by themselves best late game grinding spot by a landslide.

@d_bones: Well the good news is post game there is a boss you can fight repeatedly that has a guaranteed rare item drop every time.... bad news is.... he has about 5-6 different items he drops so getting exactly what you want might take a few tries.

Awesome I miscounted the number of alchemical recipes I had left....so I now have the PLATINUM!! I actually didn't do the crazy ass fighting the big boss over and over, was too random. So I just farmed the gold dudes I needed til I got everything. Whew. I'm sort of glad it's done.

Grats for the Platinum. It took me 80:37 hours to get it, but I don't regret the time I spent in the game. Despite some of the flaws of the game, for me mostly the combat system (I pretty much brute forced my way through it, by mostly being overleveled and rarely wasn't using any magic unless I was really forced to, example given: The last fight in the "Solosseum Series"), I just enjoyed being in this lovely crafted world.

Pretty much this, I did him 4 or 5 times never got the items I needed (probably related to my legendary drop luck, as seen in many MMOs) so I thought "Fuck him!" and was doing the "gold runs" in "Tombstone Trail" and the "Glittering Grotto".

I was mainly using this spot for leveling up, as I had the impression that this place had the highest spawn rates for the Toko's and the fights were pretty fast as I pretty much one-shoted everything there. And as I already was Level 99 with my party and their main familiars when I reached "Ivory Tower" there was no need for me to grind there, I just went there for some materials for alchemy in the end (and I didn't really liked the long corridors...)

You are crazy, man. Good job. I want to play this game so badly but I feel like to really get into it I just have to wait until summer to be able to really sink in the time.

You are literally crazy, good for you! There were a couple of familiars that I wanted that took way to long to capture, I'm talking hours, that just ruins the fun for me. I couldn't see myself doing this but I'm jealous nice one!

Teach me master!

So as I didn't want to create an extra thread for this, I just post it here.

My preordered (long time ago...) guide book has finally arrived after I finished the game so that I now have US promo code for a "Golden Hurly" for which I have no actual use. So if anybody is interested in this code send me a PM and I'll happily hand it over to you (first come, first serve... if the PM system doesn't screw it up).

The guide itself is pretty nice, with some interesting interviews and beautiful artworks, and a worthy addition to my wizard's companion.

P. S. A word of warning, to get the actual PSN code you have to register on www.primagames.com...