Lurker > TMOG

Tsukasa1891 posted...

Although it's a bit of a pain, you can turn random encounters off to make a run back to the airship to heal.

hexa posted...

I turned encounters off, and walked back through the Ancients' Maze to the airship. I did it often. I got used to it

Yeah I don't want to do that, it feels kinda exploit-y

Alright, back to it.

Right away inside the Crystal Tower, I find a mirror that tells me it's the "door to the forbidden realm of Eureka, resting place of weapons deemed beyond mankind's power."

Sick, let's go.

A few levels down in Eureka, an orb challenges me in the form of the fabulously-dressed skeleton Amon, a palette swap of a boss I've definitely fought before but can't quite remember what his other name was. He's an HP juggernaut that can change his weakness mid-fight, but he only seems to use single-target magic for attacks, which is very easy to keep up on. The fight is a drawn-out slugfest, but pretty easy. I do start to wish I had a Magus instead of a Summoner, though; while summons are great for clearing random encounters quickly, they don't have a lot of punch against bosses.

With Amon dead (re-dead?) I get the first of the promised "weapons deemed beyond mankind's power". It's a boomerang.

There's another set of weapons on the next floor down -- smelling a boss fight, I swap J. Bowie from Summoner to Magus, and spend a couple Elixirs refilling the MP for both him and Melfi. I don't particularly like that I have to use such a valuable emergency item like this, but it's how the game wants to be played, I guess.

This boss is Kunoichi, and she looks exactly like you'd expect. Just like Amon, her fight is easy but drawn out, and the Masamune is mine.

The next weapon is Excalibur, defended by... General. He's just a red goblin-looking guy with a sword, shield, and golden underpants. He hits harder than the two bosses before him, but overall it's just the same thing but with Bio now. Also, he can cast Death. I guess that's a bit worse.

In the next screen I find the Elder Staff, guarded by Scylla, a horrible anthropomorphic dog-hydra with boobies. This is easily the hardest fight Eureka's put forth so far, but when I win I get not only the staff, but also the Ninja and Sage titles -- the last two of the game, and two that I already know to be very overpowered. Of course I'm going to swap everybody to these two jobs, which also necessitates redistributing spells between J. Bowie and Melfi so they both have a good mix of black magic, white magic, and summons.

And now it's time to give my new, final party formation a test drive by fighting Ragnarok's guardian, er... Guardian. Holy shit, this guy's a son of a bitch. Between occasionally using Reflect to bounce my own magic back at me, and using Quake to do about 1k damage to the full party almost every turn, I start to think I'm about to see another party wipe. But, nah, he loses and I win.

Past the final door is a nice healing spot and a few friendly Sages that sell level 8 magic, and also duplicates of the level 6-8 summons that I previously had to fight bosses to get, and another one hidden nearby that sells Crystal gear and more Shurikens for my Ninjas to throw. I buy fucking everything.

Now that I'm done in Eureka, I Teleport back to the world map. I'm gonna need to backtrack through the maze and resupply my curative items at the airship, but after that it feels like just a push to the end of the game at long last.

Play time is at just under 15 hours.

It's weird that FF3 is giving me FF14 nostalgia, right? Because I'm now in the Ancients' Maze (which I know better as the Labyrinth of the Ancients) and can see the Crystal Tower in the center.

Ahem, anyway.

Immediately upon entering I find the real Earth Crystal, But something attacks! You're surrounded! Xande has sent a group of Gastly after me that all unite into Titan, which is just a palette-swapped Hecatoncheir. It's not really a hard fight, just drawn out. After those three optional bosses I just fought this one is pretty weak.

Finally armed with the last crystal's jobs (Magus, Devout, and Summoner), I do a little restructuring on my party's back end. Melfi is finally able to switch jobs, becoming a Devout, which is just Better White Mage. She gets cat ears! :D I also make J. Bowie into a Summoner for now, because I was just starting to play with Summons and don't want to stop just yet.

Holy SHIT am I grateful that the Pixel Remasters added the map, because this maze is huge. I don't think I'd call it particularly confusing, but it's still pretty big. There is a nice break on the world map that serves as a checkpoint to save before entering the Syrcus Tower, but unfortunately in addition to lacking Ethers, this game doesn't have Tents either, so I can't refresh my party's HP or MP.

Unfortunately I do need to actually use the checkpoint as a checkpoint because I'm being told I need to run to the store so brb.

Was gonna play yesterday but there was some kind of holiday or something so I'm bumping now just to starve the purge monster in case I can't play today

Time for sidequests!

Following up on the leads given by the bards (and also just stuff I've seen/encountered/been spanked by while playing), I figure I've got three optional bosses to fight; Odin, Leviathan, and Bahamut. The easiest one to access right now would be Odin, so he's stop number one.

Before I fight him, I go ahead and switch Muuchi back to regular Knight. Dark Knight is fine, but the cover ability from the regular Knight is better for keeping party members from getting knocked out before they can be healed. The rest of the party remains in the standard formation; Black Belt, Black Mage, White Mage. I also want to note just how much of a disappointment it is that this game gives so many jobs to play, but most of them are entirely situational and you just typically fall back on what is essentially a Final Fantasy 1 party instead.

Round two against Odin! I'm a higher level this time, have better spells and gear, I'm feeling good. His Zantetsukens still hurt quite a bit, but Melfi's healing ability is in a much better place to handle it now; Doug and J. Bowie are also doing a shitload of damage every round, so it's not really much of a struggle at all to win this time.

My prize for defeating Odin is the "Catastro" summon, which has an incredible name. I head back to pick up my bigger and better airship, and then return to the floating continent I started on for the other two optional bosses. The closest stop when I arrive is the big lake with the big fish in it, so I mountain-hop onto it and sail my canoe (I completely forgot I had the canoe) over to my target, dropping down into the Lake Dohr dungeon.

At the bottom, I find Leviathan, who's admittedly a lot smaller than I expected. His Tsunami also hurts a LOT more than Odin's attack did, and Melfi struggles to keep everybody on their feet -- especially Doug, who's caught in a death loop almost immediately. My black magic is enough to burn the serpent down while my other two party members try to pick the fourth member up and keep him up, and the "Leviath" summon is mine.

One last stop to make -- Bahamut. I fly back to Dragon's Peak, the mountain where I was almost turned into baby dragon food at the beginning of the game. Only trouble is, Bahamut isn't there. I stop inside Canaan hoping that somebody will mention where the big dragon is, but they're all still talking about Desch and gnomes. So with no lead, I just start flying around, looking for something in the nearby area that looks unvisited.

Just to the south, near the gnome village, I find exactly what I'm looking for; a previously inaccessible cave over a hoppable mountain. It's even named "Bahamut's Lair". This might be the place.

At the top of the lair, I step outside to the world map, and Bahamut descends for (what I assume to be) the final optional boss fight. A little tougher than Leviathan, but not unmanageable; once again, Doug ends up in a death loop. If Black Belt didn't do such massive damage I'd really consider changing his job.

Anyway, the "Bahamur" summon is mine, and all the sidequests I can think of are finished. Back at the Invincible I sleep off the hunting I just did, and figure "you know what, I've got all the summons now, I'm gonna try Evoker." So J. Bowie gets a job change.

So, here we go. I still have no idea where the real Earth Crystal is, but my only lead is to go fight Xande now that I have all four fangs, so I'm gonna hope that it's on the way there. My airship isn't allowed through the Victory Road checkpoints so I have to go on foot to break through them, and then I can go back to fly through and hop over the mountain pass. I really, seriously dislike the way this game limits its airships so arbitrarily.

I'm now outside of Syrcus Tower, so while I wait for the Duty Finder to find me a full raid party, it's lunchtime. Playtime is at 13:10.

Okay, here we go! Back at it after far too long, let's see if I can remember what the fuck is happening.

*goes back a page, reads my last post*

Oh yeah

Turns out I saved the game right outside the Northern Ruins, so in I go. There are a bunch of rocks blocking the path, but Unei uses the power of dreaming to clear them. This dungeon is also filled with incredibly annoying enemies named Azrael, which are a Dugtrio of horrible worms that can endlessly multiply to fill the entire battle screen. Amazing experience and gold when they're finally defeated, but holy shit it takes a lot of work to get there. There's also the Eater, which has the exact same gimmick, and the Gaap, which also does the same thing, and holy shit I hate this place.

At the end of the deceptively short dungeon, I find my third or fourth airship of the game, which also comes with its own shops, bed, and Fat Chocobo summoning spot. It's not just a vehicle, it's a full hub! Very nice upgrade indeed.

Unei gives a guided tour of the ship and then leaves the party to find Doga, guiding me north of Amur to the Cave of Shadows so I can retrieve the Fang of Earth. Surprisingly (and annoyingly), even this enormous airship isn't able to fly over mountain tiles despite obviously being able to clear them, instead only making small jumps over single tiles at a time. It is cool, however, that when a random encounter breaks out while flying in the airship, it shoots the artillery cannons as fire support.

After a little consideration, I decide to swap J. Bowie back to Black Mage before entering the cave. I smell a boss fight coming up, and while Bard is unexpectedly good as party support, I think I'm gonna need the nuking power of magic a bit more than a 100-HP heal to the party and an attack power buff, even if it does mean he'll spend most fights on Defend/Item duty to conserve MP.

As soon as I enter I meet a pink dark knight from Falgabard, wherever the fuck that is. They warn me that the monsters in the cave multiply when attacked and ugh that Flee command is looking pretty sexy right now.

Another pink dark knight gives me the Kotetsu sword and then immediately dies. Hints are starting to be received and I try swapping Muuchi to Dark Knight, but apparently I'm not carrying enough compatible armor, so his defense would take a massive hit. Thankfully, as I go deeper, I find some Genji gear to help buff this new class up a bit. I also learn that the Bladeblitz command allows Dark Knights to attack the multiplying enemies in this cave without them duplicating themselves, which is... it's just... beautiful.

I reach the Fang of Earth and try to take it, but end up attacked by Hecatoncheir, another enemy that proves the creature designer for Final Fantasy 3 had a type. This fight turns out to be easy as hell; he takes a ton of damage and doesn't deal a lot in return.

With the final Fang in hand, I teleport the fuck out of there, sleep on my airship, and mountain-hop back to Doga's manor. And you know what, I think I'm gonna vent a bit about the airship travel in this game, because it's honestly the fucking worst. Not allowing the airships to fly freely over mountains like in the previous two games just makes navigation a complete pain in the ass, especially for areas like the approach to Doga's manor, where you can only approach via airship but the opening to the corridor is so narrow that you end up flying back and forth for far too long trying to properly line up and get through.

And for some reason, my big awesome airship isn't even able to access that passage anyway, so I have to fly all the way back to the Ancient Ruins and swap back to the smaller one what the actual fuck were you thinking with this, what's even the point?

As soon as I set foot inside the manor, Doga teleports me into his grotto, where he keeps his tentacle monsters and harem of giant cyclopean belly dancers -- er, I mean, random encounters. Also rooms that exist only to be mass graves. I'm starting to think Doga might not be the good guy he at first appeared to be.

At the bottom of the grotto, Doga reveals that before he and Unei can complete the Eureka Key, I must first defeat them both in battle, because they can only generate the energy needed to create the key in battle. The party objects to the idea, but the old people are insistent, and a boss fight starts against Doga, who transforms himself into some kind of weird ball monster with tentacles coming out of his tooth-lined anus.

I'm really starting to think that Doga might not be the good guy he at first appeared to be.

Next, Unei steps up before even giving me a chance to heal, shapeshifting into some kind of weird werewolf with an admittedly nice butt. She's kind of a bigger pain in the ass to fight; not only does she have Holy to do a load of damage, but also a pretty potent full-party AOE.

Now that I've murdered Doga and Unei, they give me the Eureka Key and Syrcus Key so I can enter the tower and fight Xande. But before I do that, I seem to remember that there are a couple sidequests the bards sang at me about -- also, I still haven't found the real Earth Crystal and claimed its jobs.

But before I do any of that, I think after three dungeons, I've earned a break. Playtime is at 12:07.

Feeling a LOT better, so I'm gonna try to play some tonight. The worst I have now is that my throat took such a beating from the coughing that my voice keeps dropping in volume or going really high-pitched, so it sounds like I'm going through a second puberty. Good thing this is a text-based LP lol

Thanks for the bump.

I haven't abandoned this playthrough, I've just been having complications from what I no longer think was strep alone. It's been sapping my energy a lot. :(

Tsukasa1891 posted...

I find it funny that they added eithers to FF1 and made it restore 1 charge for each level, but didn't do the same for FF3.

Yeah, I checked the shops hoping to find them, but nothing.

It's not even possible to keep everybody on a melee-focused class and swap to a spellcaster in the field when necessary, because all their spell charges start at 0 when you change job, and there's no way to replenish them other than an inn/mystic water.

hexa posted...

The game got it correct. You misread it

Yeah, I realized that in the very next sentence lol

I dive underwater south of Saronia, but instead of the Temple of Time, I accidentally end up in the Saronia Catacombs. It's a short dungeon but overall a worthwhile detour -- the loot's good, the gold is good, and the experience is great.

Then I arrive at the end and find the armored man in the castle's basement, who turns out to be Odin, who turns out to introduce me to every last inch of the inside of my own ass. Game Over #4. I'll... I'll come back at a better time, Mr. Odin, sir.

The actual Temple of Time turns out to be much farther south. The fights in here are considerably tougher than the Catacombs, almost forcing me to leave after a few floors and restock my supply of Hi-Potions, because I go through several between battles just to keep everybody above 50% -- especially once dragons start showing up as random encounters.

Just as I'm about to pull the Teleport Trigger, however, I find Noah's Lute, and it plays me a nice song before jumping into my inventory. I honestly would have been pretty mad at myself if I evacuated literally one door away from finishing the dungeon with no boss fight lol

Since I just got a musical instrument as a key item, I presume that the game is going to want me to use at least one Bard next, so I swap J. Bowie. He's honestly become a bit redundant as a Black Mage lately; his spells are great when they're useful, but during most fights I just have him Defend or play Item Boy since I don't want to waste his MP in a game where Ethers don't seem to exist.

I find Unei sleeping in a cave, talk to her parrot because of course I'm gonna talk to the parrot, and play the lute. She wakes up, puts her parrot on her shoulder, dances around the roof of her cave to some jaunty music, and then stands on a table to introduce herself. Unei then joins the party, gives me the Fang of Fire, and directs me to the ancient ruins in the north.

Heading to the northernmost tip of the continent, I find the village of Replito, where I can finally buy some Summons to make Evoker into a class worth having. I had just spent all of my gold, however; I'm able to buy the first three (Chocobo, Shiva, and Ramuh) but not Ifrit or Titan, so I'll have to either grind or come back here after my next dungeon crawl. A hidden Gulgan gives a small lore dump that the current flood of darkness threatening the world might be the result of some summoner summoning a summon, and I also get a tip about a hidden underwater treasure trove.

Sunken treasure seems like a pretty good side quest to me, so I detour to that triangular island and dive down. Sure enough, I walk out with some VERY worthwhile loot, a few extra levels, and a chance to properly test drive Bard -- and oh wow, I like this class a lot more than I expected to. It's not terribly weak, can attack from the back row and help the healer out, and the Lamia Harp even lets it confuse enemies incredibly consistently. All I need to do now is figure out how to get more songs for it and this class might actually end up as a keeper.

Play time is at ten hours, twenty minutes.

hexa posted...

Or you can be a soldier, and grind

I'm kind of glad I put the time in to grind because it was actually pretty funny watching him take over 2000 damage per hit three times and then immediately decompose

Level 27 provides me with enough raw attack power to kill Garuda in a single round of Jumps. I feel like I may have overcorrected a bit.

After the fight, the king dies, and Alus takes the throne. Before I leave, I spot a secret passage in the wall that leads to oodles of new gear, including a few sets of... Rusty Mail. Hype?

King Alus gives us his blessing to loot the entire kingdom, some bards sing a few more songs about sidequests, I'm directed to head to the south continent and fight three mages (sadly not the Magus Sisters), and given a brand new airship to replace my exploded one. I also get a peek at a guy in armor waiting in a secret room under the mages' quarters that I can't reach yet, so I guess I'll have to come back later to either talk to him, kill him, or both.

On the south continent, I arrive at Doga's Manor. I'm only three steps in before a trio of fearsome moogles arrives to defend the house, but Doga stops them, realizing that the party is the Warriors of Light. He gives a lore dump: The villain of this story is Xande, who's pissed off that his master Noah gave him the lame gift of mortality while Doga and Unei got magic and the power over dreams.

You know what? I'd be a little peeved too.

Doga also reveals that Goldor destroyed a fake Earth Crystal (I'm not sure if I misread earlier when I said it was the Fire Crystal, or if the game made an oopsy. I could swear it said Fire, though.) (Actually, now that I think about it, Gutsco/Pissed Barney was the Fire Crystal, right? Yeah, I probably misread.) (I still want to say the game was wrong though.) and that the real one is still hidden somewhere.

Doga then joins my party, telling me that I have to go to his bedroom, shrink down with Mini, and enter the Cave of the Circle i need an adult

I change my party to all Mages, and just for the sake of variety, decide that I'm going to see how Geomancer does with its Terrain ability while shrunken down. Seems like as good a time as any to field test it. It works out pretty god damn well, which is good, because I don't have to spread my spellbook out as thin between all four party members. If I had the extra gear for it, I'd probably go ahead and run three Geos and a healer for this part, but I sadly don't.

At the far end of the Cave of the Circle, Doga casts a spell that lets my new airship travel underwater, and then threatens to fucking die. He also directs me to go to the Temple of Time to obtain Noah's Lute, so I can enter the world of dreams and drag Unei back, while he goes to find Eureka's Key. After that he tells me we need to commandeer a battleship named the Invincible and for fuck's sake man can we just take this one step at a time please?

He then teleports us back outside of his house, and for the life of me, I can't figure out why I needed to have that shrunken escapade at all.

Anyway, it's time to go deep sea diving, but not tonight -- I've played enough today. Playtime is at 9 hours.

As my dedicated armor-wearing lad, I swap Muuchi to Dragoon as I head to the Dragon's Spire. Inside I find three full sets of Dragon Mail, four Dragon Helms, and three Thunder Spears, so it does seem like the game is trying to nudge me into doing a full party of Dragoons. Once again, FF3, hint received. Due to my shortage of full sets, however, I decide to keep Melfi as a White Mage -- it never hurts to have a healer anyway.

The king allows Alus and the Warriors of Light to enter the castle, and even hooks us up with a room to sleep in overnight. Like a bunch of idiots we all go immediately to sleep. Just as the WoLs try to reassure Alus that the king has to still love him, the king sneaks in and fucking attacks Alus in his sleep with a knife. Minister Gigamesh follows him in as a hype man for child murder, but the king stabs himself instead.

With his mind control over the king broken, Gigamesh reveals his true form as Garuda, the oddly sexual bird man. And holy fucking SHIT, Dragoon Jumps rock his entire world. Unfortunately, not hard enough to make up for how much his Lightning attack rocks my world, and I get my third Game Over. FF3 definitely doesn't fuck around compared to the first two games, huh?

So, this was a short update, because clearly some grinding in Dragon's Spire is necessary, brb

Funny thing happened while grinding that gold. I found a few hidden rooms in the sewers that I missed before that contained not only the daggers I needed, but also a Thorian Hammer, so let's go Viking let's go. While testing it out, I realize that Draw Attacks is a great thing for a tank class to have, so for now I think Muuchi may have found a permanent vocation until the next crystal. As an added bonus, I get to walk around looking like a dwarf.

South I go, because I've got a bone to pick with Goldor. And holy shit this house is gaudy as fuck. We're talking Trump levels of tastelessness here. Even the random encounters are made of gold. It's during these random encounters that I realize that Viking is kind of trash -- the tanking ability is nice, but the damage output is negligible at best. That "new permanent vocation" lasted all of one paragraph -- back to Knight.

At the top, I fight Goldor. And it's a good thing I picked my Black Mage to turn into a Thief; while he's immune to magic as initially promised, he's not immune to physical attacks, and in fact takes a shitload of damage from them. He goes down easy.

Being a little bitch, after his defeat Goldor smashes the Fire Crystal behind him, but drops the key to the airship's chains during his escape. I take a chocobo back to Amur to poke around for a lead, and a couple old people tell me to head for Saronia, where the king apparently owns the fastest airship ever made. Saronia, here I come, wherever you are!

During my search for Saronia, I find an island town called Duster populated by Geomancers, a guy searching for the dark blade, and bards that play their obvious-sidequest-hinting songs the very second somebody approaches them. This looks to be the place to buy gear for Geomancers and Bards if I ever need (or want) to use those jobs, so I make a note of it.

I fly over an absolutely enormous city that turns out to be Castle Saronia, which I learn because they shoot my airship out of the sky motherFUCKER. There are also two armies fighting each other in the square where I land, apparently being forced to fight each other despite being comrades. The guards refuse to let me into the castle to see the king, but that son of a bitch already has a lot to answer for, so I'm gonna find a way.

Saronia itself is split into four districts, each with a neat piece of information: to summarize, the prince is in exile, the king is fuckin' nuts, the minister might be Garuda (whom "only a dragoon can defeat"), there's a secret tunnel connecting Castle Saronia's dungeons to the bottom of the ocean, and the dragoons keep their prized treasure at the top of a tower named Dragon's Spire.

Inside a tavern, I find a young child claiming to be Prince Alus being hassled by some mohawk punks, so I step in and kick some ass. Alus joins the party in the hopes of talking some sense into his father. He begs the old man outside not to give him away, but Alus, you are walking around wearing a fucking crown.

Before returning to the castle, I stop at the only open weapon shop to sell my eleven useless Golden Swords that I found in Goldor's house and buy four spears for Dragoons, just in case the NPCs aren't being hyperbolic this time when they say only a Dragoon can kill Garuda. I also want to check out the Dragon's Spire first.

But before that, a break. Play time is at 7:36

Aria breaks the seal on the door and in I go to the Cave of Tides, where I learn to hate all over again thanks to a particularly annoying enemy named Agaliarept, which always appear in groups of 2-3, frequently from behind, and can cast a pretty strong version of Blizzard. The cave itself is a pretty slow (and treasureless) dungeon crawl and soon I'm at the Water Crystal's chamber. Just as I start to think there might not be a boss fight here, a pervert in a robe steps out from behind a pillar and attacks, shooting Aria dead with an arrow.

Okay fucker it's go time, I liked her. >:(

The attacker is Kraken, and in true pervert fashion, he's a being made up of a ball of tentacles from the waist down. He's got some strong ice magic, but thankfully isn't nearly as much of a hassle as Gustco was.

After the fight, Aria gives the Warriors of Light the Water Crystal's blessing before she dies, which gives me a ton of new jobs that all sound more exciting than the last batch: Geomancer, Dragoon, Viking, Black Belt, Dark Knight, Evoker, and Bard. I immediately want to try multiples of these out. But before I can change anybody, another earthquake rocks the world as the waters recede, the continents rise again, and all the stoned people at the bottom of the sea return to flesh.

Well, it's now three days later, so let's try some jobs out. I switch J. Bowie to Evoker (it feels like it might be an upgrade to Black Mage), and of course Doug goes from Monk to Black Belt. I want to have Muuchi give Dark Knight a go, but apparently none of my swords work with the class, so it's back to Vanilla Knight for him.

Talking to some people in the bar, I learn that Goldor -- apparently having gone solo after years as Rita Repulsa's henchman -- has chained up my ship like a bastard. I also learn that he's apparently invulnerable to everything (magic included), lives to the south beyond a bottomless swamp, and I need Levigrass Shoes from some old kook who lives in the sewers to pass through.

As I'm talking to the townspeople outside the inn, a quartet of balding clowns flash mobs their way onto the scene, surround me, and then fuck right back off. Intrigued (and admittedly, slightly turned on) I follow them, and while talking with an old man named Gill about entering the sewers, the four clowns hide in the walls and eavesdrop. They're pretty sure that they're the real Warriors of Light, and decide to beat the party to the sewers.

Gill opens the gate "sealing" the sewers, which was really just preventing me from taking a two-foot drop into a shallow canal. This really doesn't feel like a top-of-the-line security system, but whatever. I find a full set of Thief armor hidden nearby, and between that and the NPCs talking about how much Goldor loves locked doors, okay game, I get the hint. For now, Doug is the one I choose to take the hit once again, and he temporarily becomes a Thief.

In the sewers, I quickly learn that Evoker does not have access to Black Magic, and after the first random encounter in which J. Bowie can do absolutely nothing I decide to instead make him the Thief, and set Doug back to Black Belt so he can start kicking a proper amount of ass again. This is what we call trial-and-error, people.

One floor down I find the bald clowns surrounded by a cult of Sith Inquisitors. After I save them from the goblin "threat", they realize that they're not the Warriors of Light after all and retire to mill around pointlessly in the sewers. I find Delilah shortly after, and she tries to bamboozle the party with fake exploding shoes (what) before the clowns run in, vouch for us, and she then throws the real Levigrass Shoes at us.

This game is a weird one.

With that, I need to grind a bit of gil to buy better daggers for my Thief, so clicking Post New Message on this one. Play time is at 6:38

Heading back to Tokkul first since it's closer, all the citizens there tell me they're in my debt, but don't actually offer anything. I guess heroism is its own reward or something at least give me a goddamn Potion for my troubles you squalid fuck

So, Castle Argus is the next stop, but first I want to check out that Gysahl town that was hyped up by the Dwarves. There's not much there except for a few free Gysahl Greens, hints that I can find the "leader of the chocobos" by leaving them near the tree in the clearings, magic keys for 100 gold a pop (I buy a stock of 30), and level four spells for my mages. Not a bad detour.

Heading to Argus, I put my keys to use and end up grabbing a few extra Scholar books that I'm never going to use and some free Elixirs from the locked doors, and then the king gives me his favorite book series, the Wheel of Time. He tells me to bring the Wheel to Cid, and I do so, and Cid converts my pirate-viking ship into an airship! The catch is that it can only land on water, because Cid, the resident airship genius of Final Fantasy 3, "forgot how to make it land on the ground."

o...k

Now I have an airship, with easily the best airship theme of the NES games. Time to fly around until I find my next goal, but first I have a chocobo-shaped lead to follow, so I head to the nearest chocobo forest and offer up the Gysahl Greens. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a Fat Chocobo. I can use this big boi to store items that I don't need, but I'm honestly not hurting for inventory space (and like to keep a few redundant pieces of equipment in case of emergency class changes). Still cool to know he's there if I need him.

I return to Castle Argus for my next lead and the king tells me now that I can fly, I should get the fuck off the flying continent and see the rest of the world. I do so, a little impressed that this game has a second world map, even if it is mostly empty ocean. What few other landmasses there are in this "vast world" have a couple points of interest; there's a big chunk of ice in the middle of the ocean, a small island with a wrecked ship on it, one that's all mountain that I can't even fly over, and the biggest piece of land has a massive building and a cave. I think I'll start there first.

The building, the Temple of Water, sounds like a good place to score some new jobs, so I start exploring. But the building tells me that only Aria, the Priestess of Water, can touch the Water Crystal's shard. So I guess there's nothing to do here yet except drink some magic healing water -- cave time.

Cave time is a waste of time, because the only door I can reach is sealed shut and not even a magic key can open it. Shipwreck time?

In the shipwreck I find the Blood Sword (where the fuck were you during my FF2 playthrough), an old man, and an unconscious young girl. The old man tells me that they're the only two survivors after the entire world flooded, which certainly explains a lot, and the girl wakes up after I pour a Potion down her throat. She immediately recognizes that we're the Warriors of Light and introduces herself as Aria -- convenient that one of the only two survivors of a worldwide flood is exactly the girl I'm looking for. She further explains that prior to the flood, everyone in the world was turned to stone and sank to the bottom of the ocean, and despite her injuries insists on joining the party so she can try to help fix everything.

I like you, Aria. Scoring some early points for moxie and good priorities.

I fly back to the Temple of Water, Aria grabs the shard, and next stop is a return to the Cave of Tides. But first I need to save, eat breakfast, and take meds.

Playtime is 5:55

I grind up to a nice, round level 20 -- character 20, that is. I have no idea what the hell the job level contributes at this point, but it definitely increases far quicker.

This turns out to be exactly where I need to be in order to beat Gutsco, with full-party Cura casts providing just enough healing that Flame isn't a 2HKO on everybody anymore. The other three party members manage to win the fight just before I run out of MP for that spell level.

As my reward, I'm given four more jobs from the Fire Crystal -- Ranger, Knight, Thief, and Scholar. The only one that seems like an obvious upgrade is turning Muuchi from a Warrior into a Knight, but other than that, I'm gonna keep the rest of my party as-is (Monk, Black Mage, White Mage) for now until circumstances require otherwise. I'm not a man who likes to mess with success.

When I return to Dwarftown to give their previous horns back, a dying man follows me in to say that Tokkul is being burned to the ground, and also drops the hint that Hein (as I recall, the guy who made the flying tree castle) can "change his weakness on a whim" and I'd need a Scholar to "see through his tricks", so I guess I know what the circumstances shall imminently require.

The dwarves reward me with a Magic Key (and a hint to go to Gysahl for more) and one of them literally moonwalks me into the treasure vault. Lali-hee-hee. The treasure vault contains everything I need to set up a new Scholar, so now I need to decide who gets to become a nerd for the foreseeable future. It's a tough call, since everybody's bringing something to the table in their current setup, but I decide that J. Bowie can go from Black Mage to Scholar for a while. One issue I notice right away is that despite receiving three different elements of book, they can't be used as items to cast spells like my White Mage staves can -- this could be a problem.

It's a tough call to make, but it actually seems slightly more beneficial to sacrifice Doug's physical DPS from Monk if I'm going to be fighting somebody that can change weaknesses. Black Magic is just too versatile and powerful to give up for that kind of fight.

A quick boat ride to Tokkul and SON OF A BITCH IT'S A TRAP. The party is paralyzed and jumped by a bunch of soldiers from Castle Hein, and imprisoned along with King Argus. I beat up a demon next door and then quickly escape thanks to a soldier giving me a second Mini spell. The dungeon itself is pretty short and I'm soon fighting Hein, who's a giant, flashily dressed skeleton that I also know as Amon thanks to FF14.

The Scholar actually shows itself to be pretty powerful during this fight, since Alchemy doubles the power of curative / offensive items used, so Doug was doing around 1500 damage per item use -- more than J. Bowie did with his tier 3 spells. Still, I'm all too happy to switch immediately back out of Scholar after the fight is over.

The Elder Tree drops everybody off at its fairy orgy, and they give me the Fang of Wind to go with my Fang of Water. The tree then decides to close the woods to outsiders for a millennium while it heals, and kicks me out. If I try to walk back in I just get dizzily thrown out.

My next stop seems to be either Tokkul or Castle Argus, but before that, time to save and try to get some sleep. Play time is at 5:15.

"A little bit" I see what you did there

It's really only annoying because you have to use a spell slot to cast it. The Mini part was actually kind of fun because it forced me to change my party comp to all mages, but the Toad gates were kind of pointless wasted of MP since you could just cure it right after walking through.

Oh, the bout with strep is ongoing, and in fact a little worse than yesterday. I'm just playing because I can't lay down to sleep without coughing and need to take my mind off the fact that it hurts to breathe. :(

(Yes, I am taking antibiotics)

I (very temporarily) turn my party into toads and dive down into the Tower of Owen, then start climbing up about ten floors. Along the way, Desch starts to regain his memory, eventually remembering that he's an Ancient. At the top floor I fight Medusa, who says her plan is to destroy the tower so the continent falls under Xande's orders. After killing her, Desch's full memory returns -- he was tasked to guard the tower, and only awaken if he needs to fix it, which takes the form of burning himself alive inside a furnace.

Harsh.

With Desch dead, the whirlpool blocking the outer sea calms the fuck down, and I'm able to sail to the Island of the Dwarves. Immediately I'm told that some dick named Gutsco stole a Horn of Ice, which is important because

I get froggy again for a second and dive into the underground lake, finding a very ominous amount of Gold Needles that ultimately amount to nothing trying to petrify me, and fight Gutsco at the end of the path to reclaim the Horn. After Teleporting out, I notice that I'm now being followed by some form of worm, or stick, or cigarette or something.

The dwarves ask me to put the Horn of Ice back on its pedestal, and I do so, only to find out that the cigarette following me was actually Gutsco waiting for the magic barrier to drop so he could steal the second Horn as well. Why didn't he just steal both horns the first time if he got through the barrier anyway to steal the first? Well, that's because

So the party follows Gutsco to the northern cave which houses the Fire Crystal, and oh god it's the unavoidable lava floors again. Somebody in the NES days of Squaresoft really liked these things. This time, however, they're no trouble at all since Muuchi is wearing Flame Mail, which provides an immunity to their damage.

Arriving at the Fire Crystal's room, Gutsco fills himself with its power and attacks in the form of a big purple dragon with polka dots on it, and holy shit am I underleveled and unprepared for this fight. His signature attack does nearly 200 damage to my entire party, whose HP totals are a little over 300 each right now, so Melfi's healing isn't able to keep up. I get killed for the second time this playthrough, and it's time to grind a few extra levels before fighting Pissed Barney again.

Playtime is at 4 hours.

I'm off work for a week because I caught strep again so as soon as the antibiotics make me cough less and I'm able to stay awake longer, I'm going to marathon the shit out of this playthrough

But right now I'm not physically up to it :(

I re-shrink and re-mage my party and enter the eye socket, inside which I find that a giant rat has stolen the Nepto Dragon's eye and makes the adorable threat to nibble me if I try to take it back. Risking a nibbling, I fight the rat and take the eye. Returning it to its rightful place, the Nepto Dragon speaks to me through the statue to thank me, promise to calm its shit down, and give me the Fang of Water. The pirat--er--vikings also give me their ship.

I make a short sail along the coast and arrive at the town of Tokkul, where old men flee, children hide in fireplaces, and everything's gone to shit because soldiers from Castle Argus attacked and destroyed the place. I'm also told that there's a giant tree moving around the desert -- sure enough, yep, there it is. A bit north of the desert I find a clearing in the woods where an orgy of buxom fairies tells me that the tree is their forest's elder, cursed to become a living palace by Argus, and if it's not returned the forest and fairies will die.

West of the desert I arrive at a chocobo forest (hell yeah) and the Village of the Ancients, and oh yeah, have we mentioned that the world is flat and I just found the edge? One of the Ancient children challenges me to circle the whole continent on a chocobo, so... challenge accepted. brb village. My prize for this incredible act is... a loaf of Gnomish Bread, which I already have tons of in my inventory. Thanks, kid.

The adults in the village provide more of a lore dump, talking about how there were Warriors of Dark years ago that saved the world from a flood of light after the previous Warriors of Light did too good a job, which is very familiar to me as somebody who previously played FF14. They also tell me that the continent is kept floating in the air by the Tower of Owen, which I haven't seen yet. There's some new weapons, armor, and magic in their shop, but it's all too expensive for me right now and I don't feel like grinding too much at the moment, so I just buy some new spells for Melfi the White Mage and make a note to come back later when I have more cash.

Anyway, my run around the continent did show me that there's nothing else for me here now (I can't seem to enter the flying tree at this point), so I hop back in my pirate ship and cross the water again. Immediately upon disembarking I see Castle Argus, and hop in to ask what the fuck's up. Oddly, the entire place is empty, without so much as a single random encounter to stop me from looting their carefully-hidden treasury of so much gold that I'm about to go back and spend at the Ancients. There are two locked tower doors that prompt me to use an item, but since I don't have any keys and bomb fragments don't work, I have no idea how to open them just yet. Desch is no help either, only offering up that the ship we have will allow us to "visit all the ladies of the land", horny bastard.

However, this does remind me that there are people in Canaan who are angry at his bang-and-dash, so I decide to head back there and see what they have to say to him. This amounts to absolutely nothing. Desch, I'm starting to feel like you're absolutely useless.

So, it's back to Castle Argus I go. North of it I find the Tower of Owen, filled with frogs and intense music. I can't actually go any deeper than the entrance without becoming a frog myself, so I guess I'm not supposed to be here yet, either. West of Argus is another chocobo forest, a large lake where I can see a giant fish swimming around beneath the surface, and Gulgan Gulch, filled with bald men with no eyes who like to stand in a circle around crystal balls.

They mostly talk about the crystals, and how they can see the future but don't want to do jack shit about it, but one of them in the lower level tells Desch that his destiny awaits him in the Tower of Owen and gives the party the Toad spell. Now finally armed with a destination and a goal, I save the game and take off for a lunch break.

Play time is 3:15.

I played a bit today while waiting for D&D but didn't have anything up to type my exploits, so here's a quick summary from memory.

Went back to Castle Sasune and spoke to the king's chalk outline, he told me Sara's gone missing and has the mythril ring. So I flew over to the Djinn's cavern and played with a skull to open the secret passageway, meeting her inside, and she joined the party. The Djinn said he was unstoppable because he joined with the darkness but I stopped him in two rounds of combat.

Sara sealed him away and then she yeeted the ring into a pool of water before yeeting herself from the party. Returning to Kazus, Cid joined the party (officially becoming the first Cid in the series to do so, even if he's not actually playable), so I can take him back to Canaan, then we put a mythril prow on the airship, then blew the fucker up along with a giant boulder. In Canaan, Cid immediately left the party and I got my next lead, to go find some jerk named Desch who went south.

I go south to a mountain where a giant dragon scoops me up and drops it into an oddly bird-like nest where the baby dragons are already hatched and hungry. Desch is hiding in the nest with his amnesia and joins the party just as the dragon, fucking Bahamut, swoops down to kill me so the babies can eat. We run away and jump out of the nest, somehow landing half a continent away withouht a single broken leg -- if anything, we're healthier for the fall, even reviving Doug the Monk from his state of death while fleeing from Bahamut.

Desch gives me Mini and I shrink the party up so we can enter the Gnome village of Tozus, stuffing one of my many Antidotes into a sickly Gnome who shows me that he's the sole owner of the passage out of there. I turn my entire party into Mages of various colors (two Black, one Red, one White) and crawl through, finding myself in the company of vikings that look and act an awful lot like pirates. They're all grounded because a sea dragon attacks every ship that hits the water, and if I defeat the sea dragon they'll give me their ship, because

After taking the time to embiggen my entire party, I restore their original jobs, and head north to the Nepto Temple. Inside is a statue of the sea dragon (I assume) with one eye missing, and the game tells me that I need to cast Mini to climb inside. I sigh heavily, realize what time it is, and save and quit.

Play time is somewhere around two hours I think, I wasn't paying attention.

Tsukasa1891 posted...

Bump so topic doesn't purge.

Thank ye

I might end up getting off work early tomorrow, if so I'm going to get a few hours in after I get home. Otherwise it will have to be Sunday like planned since I have D&D all day Saturday.

My work schedule is pretty full this week so I don't know how much I'll actually be able to play until Sunday. :(

Time to start Final Fantasy 3. I decided not to go with the DS version names, just in case I get ahold of a copy of that remake and decide to play it as part of this marathon -- not likely, but hey, you never know. So that means the Onion Knights are named Muuchi, Doug, J. Bowie, and Melfi.

Going into this one, I know far less than I did for 2, which did have a few things spoiled for me in advance (the party, Josef's death, Leon's role, the Emperor dying and coming back from Hell) but for this game I know nothing except that it's the first iteration of the job system and the final boss, thanks to stuff like Dissidia and Theatrhythm. So if I was blind in 2, I'm blinder for 3.

The story begins with four orphans dropping into a hole and getting ambushed by goblins, and right away the battle music for this game slaps. It does kind of bother me that even though the Onion Knights themselves are color coded and speak to each other, their dialogue is not color coded to match them or even give any indication which is talking. Kind of gives the weird impression that rather than four distinct characters having a conversation, it's more of a Smeagol/Gollum situation.

A few rooms in, after drinking some suspicious water, they're attacked by a Land Turtle in a crystal chamber. The Wind Crystal then gives them their "save the world" destiny and their first five jobs, which are all the jobs from FF1 except Thief. I decide the best setup for now is Warrior, Monk, Black Mage (which the game decides needs to dual wield Knives), and White Mage. I might swap one of the latter two to Red Mage, however, depending on how things play out.

Back at the town of Ur, I'm told that the village elders have some words of wisdom for me, which are literally just "get out there and kick some ass". And so, after supplying up, out there to kick some ass I get. I arrive at Kazus and immediately spook the shit out of some guy at a campfire, who tells me this town is accursed and he thought the party were ghosts, which the inn is full of. Turns out that a Djinn turned everybody in town into a 2D chalk outline so they couldn't forge a mythril ring to defeat him. One of the chalk outlines, Cid, tells me that if we promise to use it to save the town, he'll let us use his airship holy shit we're getting that early, aren't we?

There's nothing left to do is Kazus right now except get my ass kicked by skeletons in the mine, so let's not do that. Instead, let's get our airship within the first 30 minutes of gameplay, and fly over to Castle Sasune. This castle is full of zombies, and a griffon jumps out of a chest and wipes my entire party, so I guess I need to reload my save file and grind up more. This game really throws you into the shit right away.

I'm also realizing that it doesn't look like I'm getting any actual offensive black magic spells just yet (the only one I have is Sleep, and the only magic shop I can access doesn't sell any), so until I find some I'm switching my Black Mage to a Red Mage. At least then he can use slightly better equipment.

Based on how effortlessly the griffon kicked my ass, I probably need to get my characters up to level 6 or 7 before trying again, so cue the montage music and I'll be back after my training session and some lunch.

hexa posted...

you mentioned that there is no save point in between Jade Passage and Pandaemonium. In the main menu, above the option Save, there is another option named Quick Save. The ordinary Save option doesn't work in dungeons or cities, but the Quick Save option works everywhere! You can Quick Save anywhere in Jade Passage or Pandaemonium. And you can load a Quick Save just like any other save, by pressing up from your File 1 save. Quick Save is your friend!

Yeah, but I was hoping there would be someplace that I can use Cottages so I didn't completely deplete my stock of Ethers and Hi-Potions on the way

hexa posted...

Osmose isn't the only move that is overpowered on the Emperor. There is a sword named the Blood Sword. The Blood Sword isn't that good of a sword, but if you equip it on a character, and attack the Emperor with it, it does 1,300 damage to 2,100 damage on him

I knew about the Blood Sword but didn't find it :(
I know where it is now because somebody in my LUE topic told me, so when I play FF2 again at some point I can get it

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/3/3/4/AABrRdAAEbh2.jpg

For being a game with such a bad reputation, often called the worst in the series, I really liked this one. I can definitely see how the stat growth system would feel clumsy and offputting to people, but the Pixel Remaster version really fixed that up and made it a lot easier to deal with.

As the first "proper-feeling" story for a Final Fantasy game, it wasn't too bad. There are a few plot holes (why was Hilda on the airship to be captured?) and a few things happened off screen that really shouldn't have, but eh, it was the late 80s. They were still figuring themselves out.

Overall, I'd rank it a bit above the first game. Having a more involved storyline really helped, and a few of the party members that joined you were a lot of fun. Speaking of the party...

Firion, Maria, and Guy I'm going to review as one unit, because they stick around for the whole game. In my playthrough, Firion wound up as a Fighter/White Mage hybrid; Maria was my dedicated mage; and Guy carried all my party buffs. It worked pretty well, and all three became pretty overpowered by the end compared to everybody else that joined. Sadly, as actual characters, they were all pretty flat. Firion didn't really do anything to justify being the main character, Guy speak beaver once and then didn't really speak at all, but Maria did have some direct and continued plot relevance due to being Leon (the Dark Knight)'s sister. I guess she's my favorite of the trio.

Minwu was a great choice for the "first fourth" of the party members. A powerful White Mage was exactly what was needed to help the player train the trio at the beginning of the game, since he could easily keep them alive while never being in any threat of death himself. He was also a pretty cool guy, and managed to keep doing stuff right up until his death.

I wish I had more time with Josef in the party. He had a bit of potential as a strong monk-type character, but he was only with the trio for about an hour at most before he died. If there was more time to get to know him, it would have hit the player a little harder. He does, however, get the distinction of being the first Final Fantasy party member to actually die during the course of his game's story, so take that as you will.

Gordon had a nice arc. I'm a pretty big fan of the coward-to-hero trope, and he pulled it off well. His stats weren't even that bad upon joining the party (except his HP), so he never felt like a detriment to have around. And I liked how after rescuing the real Hilda, he became a very competent general to lead the army. Nice job, Gordon.

But Leila definitely gets the top marks for being a party member. There was nothing about her I disliked -- she had nice stats, a very fun personality, did her best to stay involved with the story, and stuck around long enough that I was able to train her stats and magic up to be on par with the trio. I actually cared when I thought she died after Leviathan's attack; she's easily my favorite playable character in this game.

Ricard, however, might have been my least favorite. I didn't like the circumstances he was introduced under, and it felt like his swap with Leila was the direct result of the developers knowing that she was going to be too strong moving forward. He also had a pretty weak personal storyline, only really existing so the party could ride a Wyvern to get into the tornado and out of Palamecia, both things that could have easily been done just by saying that Firion became a Dragoon. He just felt like an overall nerf compared to Leila. :(

Finally, Leon joined the party too late in the game to really develop past a physical brute. His stats were too low (or maybe the trio's were too high), he had no magic or MP, literally all he could do was swing his weapons around. I feel like if I tried to do anything else with him, he wouldn't have been able to reach his full late-game potential.

And of course, The Emperor himself. I'd already grown to like this character due to games like Dissidia and Theatrhythm, both of which he's one of my favorites to play as or include in my team, and this game really didn't disappoint as a proper introduction. Due to the Empire's actions, I hated this guy before I even saw him, but it was definitely a "love to hate" situation. I just wish his final battle wasn't so easily broken with Osmose.

So, next up is Final Fantasy 3, which I know even less about than I did about 2 going in. This playthrough is going to be even blinder. Before I start (probably tomorrow), I need to decide which name set to go with: the names from the DS version (Luneth, Arc, Refia, Ingus) or the names from the NES manual. (Muuchi, Doug, J. Bowie, Melfi)

First off, I absolutely love how they used the tile sets to create a 3D effect for the Jade Passage's entrance.

And holy shit, have I mentioned how long the dungeons are in this game yet? Because some of them are obnoxiously long treks, made worse by doors that tempt you to open them and take a peek inside only to find that it's a completely empty room that just wasted your time, often by making you take a detour off the main path for literally no reward. That's just bad level design imo

At the end of the path, I find a teleporter directly into the next dungeon, Pandaemonium, with no save point in between. I can only hope that the next boss I fight doesn't wipe my party out, otherwise there's a very long walk back in store for me. That's the kind of thing that would have just made me give up on an RPG as a kid, and I'm not eager to see if I'm still that pissy about lost time as an adult.

I also really wish there was a save point so I could use Cottages, because things here drop Ribbons and I would love to grind four of them out. But hey, supplies are limited and whatnot, so I can't spare the Ethers -- I've already used up 1/3 of my stack refilling Firion and Guy after the first dungeon (thankfully, Maria can take care of herself with Osmose).

There are a few fun miniboss fights in the chests here, including Zombie Borghen and Tiamat, but they're all pretty easily dealt with -- especially after Maria shuts them down with Osmose on the first turn (well, except the zombie). By the time I reach the end, I have three of the four Ribbons I wanted, which isn't bad.

So, now it's time to fight the Emperor again. Final boss of the game, let's go in fully loaded. Maria's Ultima is at level 9, Firion has Cure 11, all of Guy's buffs are at 6. I decided not to bother having Leon improve his magic at all and just be a physical threat, and it's paying off, because he's doing 2k damage per round between both his weapons before the Berserk/Haste buffs kick in.

But before I can talk to the Emperor and start the battle -- and I have no idea if this is scripted or coincidence -- a King Behemoth blocks my path one tile away. Oh well, kill it like the rest, my party's leveled to the point where it's not even close to a threat anymore. Three rounds of combat and it's dead.

As for the Emperor fight itself, it's definitely a drawn-out battle, but overall easier than I anticipated. It feels like it was a huge oversight to allow Osmose to drain his MP, because just like all the miniboss fights leading up to him, Maria shut him down in one turn and all he could do was physically attack; and the regen he got from that was countered by the poison put in place by either Guy or Leon, which did a solid 1000 damage per tick. Other than that, business as usual. Firion keeps everybody on their feet, Maria blasts the piss out of him with Ultima, Guy sets up all his buffs and then switches to swinging his axe, and Leon is also there.

The Emperor is dead, so it's back to Fynn so all the surviving NPCs and former party members can give me their congratulations. Hilda and Gordon are going to marry and unite their kingdoms, Great Thief Paul is going to steal from me, Leila wants to fuck Firion and make him a pirate, even Josef's daughter Nelly is there -- and a few ghosts, too. Leon leaves, declaring that there "can be no going back" for him, and Firion announces that "this is just the beginning", teasing a direct sequel that will never happen.

My final thoughts on the game, and final playtime, coming in my next post while I watch the credits.

hexa posted...

Leon stays with you until the end. He doesn't begin with good magic or statistics, but if you invest in him, he can become just as good as Firion

Appreciated but please don't spoil plot stuff like if a character sticks around to the end or if they come back to life, even if it's in a different version to the one I'm playing, lol

Many of the games on this list are first-time playthroughs for me or games that I only made it halfway through, so I'm enjoying going into them blind to plot and mechanics

At Paul's house, Cid "loans" me his airship and then dies, because FF2 is not fucking around with the body count. Picking it up from the ruins of Paloom, I fly over to Palamecia with the goal of kicking some sense into Emperor Leon's ass.

After airdropping into the top floor, I trap-door-drop down to the ground floor and have to work my way back up. Thankfully, the Palamecia castle is incredibly linear compared to other dungeons in this game, so it's not a very long trek. It is, however, at this point that I realize I forgot to put my Switch to sleep when I went to go make lunch, so my total play time is now going to be off by at least an hour or so. >.>

In the throne room, the party is about to throw down with Leon -- who's actually mad about all the lives the "weak" rebels threw away resisting the Empire -- when the Emperor returns from Hell in a giant, shiny new body. Ricard sacrifices himself to stall the Emperor while Firion, Maria, Guy, and Leon all escape on the Wyvern, and a new palace rises up to replace the Palamecian palace.

Princess Hilda allows Leon to join the rebellion, and by extension my party. This son of a bitch is dual wielding swords and axes, nice. Like everybody else who's joined my party, he has no spells and his HP/MP are very low by comparison, so I'm gonna go ahead and throw a few of my extra tomes on him -- it doesn't feel like he'll be leaving, and even if he does, oh well. I've got a VERY huge stockpile now.

Hilda, Gordon, and Leila all tell me to find the Jade Passage near Mysidia, so off I go in my flying mach -- wait, how did the airship get back here? Oh well, I'm not gonna argue with convenience. Off I go in my flying machine towards the Jade Passage.

Play time is at (give or take) 18 hours, 27 minutes.

With Ultima in hand, Minwu dead, Leila either dead or now living in Leviathan's stomach, and Ricard still in the party for some reason, I head back to Castle Fynn to see what I'm doing next. I immediately notice that all the low-level enemies that had previously populated the world map are now replaced by much stronger stuff, so if the past two hours of gameplay weren't a sign that I'm in the endgame now, that is.

Also, as I walk past that small town outside of Fynn, I notice that it's been destroyed and I can't even enter it anymore. A few other towns also seem to have vanished as points on my minimap, such as Altair, which I wander down to find has also become a crumbling ruin.

Huh. Wonder when that happened.

The town of Fynn is now empty except for a small child, a soldier, and Great Thief Paul, all of whom tell me that everybody's dead because a "cyclone with a will of its own" blew through the area. And when I exit and return to the minimap, I see a giant tornado swirling just behind the castle.

OH.

I head into the audience chamber to speak with Hilda and Gordon, and Leila's standing right next to them -- fuck yeah, you go pirate girl! Sadly, she doesn't rejoin the party. :( The two royal leaders drop some big hints that I need to ride a wyvern to enter the cyclone, using the pendant in my inventory and the mirror a few rooms over. The wyvern egg I dropped in the water days ago hatches, and the newborn dragon flies over to partner up with Ricard. It then flies us inside the cyclone as it grows absolutely fucking enormous, and apparently there's a castle or something in here too, because now I'm in a stone hallway.

At the top of the cyclone, the Emperor is waiting, and this time we fight... his royal guards. And then the Emperor himself gets invoolved, albeit still hiding behind some guards and golems. I almost feel bad about shutting him down so easily by stealing his MP with Osmose, but eh, he's been a dick the entire game.

With the emperor dead, the party leaves the cyclone and reports back to Princess Hilda, because that was obviously way too easy to be the final boss. There's a pretty bitchin' dance party (that Guy and Ricard obviously chose to skip out on), but a dying soldier interrupts to announce that the Dark Knight, Leon, has declared himself to be the new Emperor!

Yeah, Leon's the Dark Knight, which I kind of caught on to when Maria recognized his voice and also already knew about thanks to stuff like Theatrhythm.

Leila gives me a tip that I should ask Great Thief Paul about how to get into Palamecia, so I head for his house in town... after a short break, because god damn do I need to stand up and move around a bit.

Play time is at 16:39.

I set sail for the Tower of Mysidia, but just before I arrive, a whirlpool grabs my pirate ship and I wake up inside a giant sea beast named Leviathan, sans Leila. The goddamn unavoidable lava floors from Mt. Gulg are back, though :(

Surprisingly, I find a thriving community of people inside the stomach, with their own furniture and bedrooms and everything. If not for the imminent threat of digestion, it would be kind of cute. One of those community members I meet is Ricard, who was mentioned a while back as being the last of the Deist dragoons. He joins the party so we can find a boat to get out (I don't think I want to know through which end), and aside from a high Strength and a good score with spears, he... doesn't really seem like he offers too much. I miss Leila already.

After teaching him an assortment of spells from the extra tomes in my inventory and gearing him up a little better, we're off. Talking with the NPCs before I go informs me that Leviathan attacked/ate because we have a Crystal Rod, so you know, nice trap. On literally the very next screen, which appears to be Leviathan's mouth, I see the boat with a big monster in front of it. Somehow I expected this dungeon to be a lot longer.

We get on the boat and escape, leaving everybody else inside Leviathan to die a slow and horrible death, just like heroes do. For some reason it doesn't attack again even though I still have the Crystal Rod in my inventory, but I can enter the Tower now.

I'm actually really upset that it seems like literally the only reason Leviathan exists is so I would lose Leila, who's awesome and kicks ass, and have to instead use Ricard, who's a pretty clear nerf to my team by comparison. He can't even Jump. :(

After a long-as-fuck climb up the Tower, during which I find Flare for Maria and fight several elemental Gigas, I find Minwu at the top, who somehow managed to get past all the Gigas fights by himself. He fires a Kamehameha at the final door to open the seal, but the effort kills him. That's two badass team members down in a single sitting.

Inside the door are five orbs. Four of them give my entire party a boost to several stats, and the final one gives me the Ultima Tome, the spell that's been hyped up for literally the entire game. I teach it to Maria, step outside the room to give it a test cast, and... okay, yeah, this son of a bitch is pretty potent. At level one, it does over 300 damage to a single target.

Satisfied customer, right here.

Play time is at 15:40.

I arrive at Mysidia and buy a few new spells (Holy for Firion since he's kind of become my permanent White Mage, and Wall/Barrier for Guy since he's still my party buffer), place the White Mask on the statue, and head east to the Cave of Mysidia. Inside I find a doppelganger of Firion, place the Black Mask on it (for some reason), and it vanishes.

(Should also note that I got very sidetracked by letting autobattle grind some magic up in this cave. It's another fantastic grinding spot and this game makes me VERY greedy for spell levels lol)

There are a few chests in the Cave that I couldn't figure out how to get to, so I'll come back for those later when I want to grind more. For now, I got Osmose for Maria and the Crystal Rod, which I'm willing to call "good enough" because I want to progress the goddamn story.

Before I actually enter the tower, however, that grinding I did took up a bit more time than I had hoped, and now I need food. So I'm gonna go get food, and afterward just no-life the shit out of the rest of this game.

Probably not playing any today. Work went on a bit too long and I don't have the energy left to do anything more mentally demanding than eating a pizza and watching Futurama.

masterpug53 posted...

I doubt I'll stir up any controversy by suggesting that Quistis is the best party member from 8. She also has the best / most unique design.

She's definitely up there. I'll always give a Blue Mage a vote and a spot on my team.

I'd probably want to put Zell as my third party member because his Limit Break fucking hurts things, but Rinoa or Selphie are probably more useful overall for the party support they can provide (especially once Rinoa gets her second Limit Break).

Bump

Last bump

Morning bump

Gremlynn posted...

Video games dramatically accelerated my reading level as a kid, and I usually alternated between text heavy adventure games and actual books for reading out loud to my son when he was that age.

Same. I grew up playing SNES/PS1 RPG games that required a ton of reading, and loved it to the extent that I remember I was actually a little upset when I learned that FF10 was going to have voice acting in it because I enjoyed deciding what voices the characters had.

Also because FF10's voice acting killed the ability to name your party members in RPG games. :(

Since TC decided they only wanted to make half a topic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIgZ7gMze7A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPUmE-tne5U

Rise_Makaveli posted...

bundle is digital download only, no disc.

And just like that, I don't give a fuck.

Bobby kills Hank with a sword and then Bill reveals that he's Bobby's father and then Dale "needs to talk about our son" while in bed with Bill

I think about this comic a lot but can't seem to figure out the right Google search terms that don't just come up with a lot of shit that isn't the comic I'm looking for

It's only a costume until a lot of people start wearing it, then it becomes fashion

1NfamousACE_2 posted...

I dont think well ever have another GOP President

Yeah I remember when everyone said this after W as well.

Last bump

pinky0926 posted...

"There is not firm evidence to support X" =/= "X does not exist"

Wild that we are at a point where that's a flagrant take

"We didn't find anything at all to support this theory, but I guess that doesn't mean it's been proven wrong" is a really dumb thought process.

If the evidence to support something doesn't exist or is incredibly flimsy at best, then that doesn't mean "it just hasn't been proven wrong yet." It's not capable of proving itself right because reality is reality.

You're literally trying to force somebody to prove your own point for you even they've already done all the heavy lifting to support their own side of the argument.

After a short boat ride and trek across the desert, I arrive at the Coliseum, where it's an obvious trap. The Emperor finally makes an appearance to release the Rancor -- er, Behemoth, declaring that the winner gets Hilda. After I easily defeat it (thankfully it doesn't seem like Meteors are a part of its DNA just yet), he goes back on his word and has me thrown in a prison cell instead, because of course he does.

The party is only in the cell for a grand total of about three seconds before Great Thief Paul shows up to bust them out, and then Princess Hilda (possibly even the real one) is found nearby. Gordon leaves the party and leads her out, with Firion suggesting that the other three will cause a distraction so they can escape, that distraction apparently being "we'll walk out right behind you"? Or maybe I missed doing something. I don't know. The Coliseum is a very small place compared to every other dungeon in the game, so I'm pretty sure I didn't.

Back at Altair, a rebel soldier tells me that Hilda and Gordon have already set up camp to retake Castle Fynn, and when I get there they've already broken the gates and are ready for me to charge in and kill the castellian. Leila rejoins my party as soon as I'm inside, which is great, because she's easily the best fourth I've had in the entire game so far.

While I'm in the castle, I take the opportunity to try and grind up some spells that have been sitting at level 1 or 2 for far too long. While everybody's doing pretty good at their chosen roles (except Guy, who's doing good at all roles), I've been relying on spamming Attack for too long to get me through random encounters -- Maria, my chosen dedicated mage character, is becoming a bit too deadly as an archer because her Strength is getting pretty high, especially now that I've given her a Flame Bow. Not that that's necessarily a BAD thing, but I do want her to be a mage, so I need to start re-focusing her on that now that I have plenty of disposable income to spend on Ethers.

Holy shit does Gottos hurt to fight, even through Guy's casting of Protect 5 and Blink 4 he's still able to do 500-600 damage per hit thanks to his own buffs. But I manage to beat him no problem, and everybody gets a nice health buff after the fight thanks to the savage beating they took.

Castle Fynn is once again free, and now I have my next task: Minwu is missing in Mysidia, the city of mages. I'm also told that he's looking for the Ultima Tome in Mysidia Tower, which requires two masks to enter: one of them is somewhere in the castle, and the other one is conveniently already in my inventory. Neither Hilda nor Gordon know how to get beneath the castle to claim the White Mask, but Gordon suggests that Great Thief Paul might, since he's a Great Thief.

Sure enough, Paul knows where the secret entrance is, and I retrieve the White Mask. I also hang out in the basement for a little while to grind a few spells up since it's a good place to do it and conveniently located near an inn.

After all that, it's time for a lunch break. Play time is 12 hours.

pinky0926 posted...

There is no firm basis available in evidence to indicate that trans women have a consistent and measurable overall performance benefit after 12 months of testosterone suppression.

In other words, we have found a lack of positive evidence confirming the difference, which is very wildly not the same thing as saying that all the evidence shows that there is no difference

Okay yeah I'll just go ahead and apply a tag to you so I know never to mistakenly take anything you say seriously.