Lurker > _stingers_

Kawaii~desu idea chan, Suzuki-kun!!!!

I never use anyone in that game besides the OGs because they start everyone out at level 1. I wish I could use Maria but I don't have it in me

Whoever voted for Fearow needs to be banned

Mario Kart 8

Yeah pokemon has basically become shovelware with their push for yearly releases. Kids will eat it up regardless but the franchise is a shell of it's former self

Tales of Symphonia

Xenogears

Phoenix wright ace attorney 2

Final fantasy 7

Dream Daddy: Dad Dating Simulator

Suikoden 2

Angry birds

The Bouncer

Xenosaga

13 sentinels

I started clapping at the end you go kid

Im halfway through the 27th. I wonder if I can beat it this week @@

Oh man I guess I have to watch them then

it gets better every time
should i finally watch those new movies ive only ever seen eoe but i feel like they would never live up

It looks like a big area, but the game pretty much blocks you from going anywhere except Jusis or Scarlets rooms. If you go to Jusus' you get a bonding scene where there's no voice acting, making my earlier point moot. I guess Alisa is just special today (and every day). Jusis takes Rean out horseback riding, but after you set out he ends up just immediately challenging Rean to a duel. Unfortunately you don't get a real fight, but a cutscene where they scrap for a bit and end in a draw, laying on a field out of breath. When you get back to Jusis' room the scene ends, but there's a magazine there that gives you a new color for the bike. I think that's the first one I've found all game, so I have to assume I've been missing these for awhile. I felt like I'd been exploring a lot but I suppose not lol.

I visit Scarlet's room after that, she's of course lying in bed, recovering. She talks about her past in the church and mentions that she was in the congregation for the sacraments. Wasn't that Kevin's schtick too? They handled the collection of all the sacred relics or whatever name they had for them? I don't know, it's been too long I don't remember a lot of this church stuff. Anyway, she ends up getting too sick to talk, and says we'll have to come and get the rest of the story from her some other time.

I do another lap around town but I don't find anything else to do so I head back tot he ship. When I do, Angie and Towa run up saying that we need to gather everyone because there's reports about something weird going on in Crossbell! Shit motherfucker is it giant tree time?! Let's start getting some action!

They give me some AP real quick, I get another S rank and only have 2 more ranks to go to max out. The next rank is a lot of points away though so it will be a bit of work it seems. The scene resumes, the gang is flying off to Crossbell to see what's going on. Navigation officer Vivi says she's getting some strange readings ahead, though our vision is blocked by clouds. Oh Vivi, you have no idea baby. Our gang is all on the deck of the ship eagerly awaiting a visual, when suddenly they burst through the cloud cover. Rean exclaims - What in the world is that? As we pan out to see that giant mothafuckin tree, glowing in the distance. Man, everyone who started with Cold Steel is definitely damn confused right now lol.

Even Celine is stumped, who says that she's never seen or heard of anything like it. We switch over to the Ouroboros ship and the evil gang is gathered staring at the tree as well, though since they're in the know they're throwing out terms like Phantasmal Blaze Plan (I still don't know what that is, should I?), Azure-Zero project (I got that one though) and Zero Child willy-nilly. The CS only kids are definitely confused now, there's been so little Ouroboros in these games so far compared to the past series. Vita let's loose a new lore nugget that they're planning on summoning the same tree over in Erebonia as well, but I can't think of any KeA analogues they could use on this side of the border. Is Millium that special? I really hope not.

The scene switches over to Rufus, who's meeting with generals Le Guin and Bardias. Haven't seen them in awhile! I thought they were going to be a much bigger part of this game when they were first introduced. I guess that's the downside of having such a big ensemble cast, it's tough to get to everyone. I guess they'll be more important next game. They came in to ask Rufus about the tree, and Rufus says that Duke Cayenne told him it's appearance was planned. I suppose that means Cayenne is actually in the know, which means he's way more connected then I originally thought. I thought he was going to be some crappy midboss for us to take down, but it turns out that was Jusis' father instead lol.

Rufus says that the imperial forces are going to be collapsing on Heimdallr in the next few days. I forgot about Heimdallr! Of course that's where their HQ is, I was thinking that it was the imperial town but they took it over and forced the imperials out, right. Kind of a weird strategy, but okay.

We get a scene change over to Cayenne and Altina, who are descending a massive elevator with Cedric, Olivier's younger brother. They're apparently underneath the Imperial castle...reminds me of Liberl! They eventually get to the bottom after Cedric finishes shitting his pants wondering where they're taking him, and Vita is there in the flesh for once. Cedric is like, Vita Clotilde, the famous opera singer? What are you doing here? Oh, my sweet summer child...

They pan the camera and reveal what looks to be a very impressive looking mech, encased in some red energy in a demonic looking tree thing. It's pretty badass looking. Cedric gets one of those weird, heartbeat noise gray screen feelings when he looks at it that Rean gets sometimes. He keels over at this, but Cayenne looks at it and laughs maniacally, calling it a 'fragment of the great power' and gives it a name - Tessa Rosta. I think that was the name at least, it left the screen pretty quickly. It sounds nice though.

After that scene though, the day ends...next time on Cold Steel, figuring out what's going on with this tree, I guess? I don't remember Rean showing up at the end of Azure so I suppose we're not going to fly over there to investigate, but I suppose they'll do something related to it. It reminds me of when you learned that the only reason Crossbell wasn't destroyed halfway through the game was because Rean and co. stopped the terrorists from shooting the railgun at it. It's nice because they also hyped up and teased those railguns so often throughout Zero and Azure, so it didn't feel like it was written in for dramatic purposes but that it was properly foreshadowed, which was nice. So maybe they can find another fun way to tie the two games together here. Anyway we'll find out soon, so see you guys then!

12/26

Stopover day in Bareahard today. The first person I see is Machias, who buys some flowers to dedicate to his cousin (who I genuinely don't remember) and the market manager who just passed away. They have a custom in Nord to toss a bouquet of flowers into a river to honor their memory, and they do so for our fallen brethren while swearing to change Erebonia for the better. A nice scene to show Machias' more sentimental side.

Millium's in the bookstore upstairs, looking for a recipe to make a desert, in the hopes that it will cheer everyone up. That's oddly thoughtful for ol' Millium. After some coaching from chef Rean, they're able to complete it, and Millium talks about her (first time having) emotions. She's definitely the bubbliest emotionless character I've ever seen lol.

Laura's leaving town outside the shop, but when you approach her she seems to leave without noticing you. Rean follows her out of town and sees her in her swimsuit, about to jump off a bridge into the river below. Keep in mind, it's the day after Christmas, so Rean is concerned for her wellbeing. He gets her a towel and a warm drink and engage in some innocent PG flirtation for a bit...end scene.

Towa is chilling on a bench feeling down about herself, so Rean tries to cheer her up. She says she has doubts about her capabilities as captain, and her captains hat dramatically flies off her head. Rean catches it and puts it back on her head, saying that she's doing great and there's nobody that would do it better. That's enough to cheer her up - Towa is a simple girl to please.

I head over to the airport to find Alfin, staring out into space. She wants to go tot he Bareahard cathedral to offer prayers for the fallen, but something else seems to be weighing on her as well. During the mass, the priest says to have a moment to honor the fallen in Celdic, but we hear the nobles in the audience muttering about how they deserved what they get for fighting the alliance. Alfin has no patience for this, and stands up to shame them all with an impassioned speech. The crowd is silent at her remarks, and Rean escorts her out of the church to prevent any type of retaliation. As they leave, Rean comforts Alfin, and says that her speech hit home for him and he's sure that it did for some of the nobles there as well. He goes on to say that she made him proud to be a citizen of the empire. This was a damn well done scene, if only all the bonding events could be this high quality. Well done to Falcom.

Elliot is at the end of the road nearby, feeling down about himself like always. Rean takes him to the nearby caf to cheer up, and naturally there's a pianist playing a melody on the top floor. She sounds like she's playing the main theme from Trails in the Sky, so that's a nice touch. This inspires Elliot to go and play a song as well, though his wasn't as good. Rean, for some reason, doesn't tell him that.

Gaius is next, he's in church praying. Rean asks how they pray in Nord, and Gaius shows him - they kneel on the ground. Original. They have the most generic conversation of all time after that, you already know what it was you don't need to hear it from me.

Alisa is on a bench outside the church, she wants to go and see Valimar. For some reason, this scene is 100% voice acted which is a first for bonding events. Sure, why not? We arrive at the hangar and she says she wants to get inside Valimar to see what it's like. When Rean is figuring out if this is even possible, they use that 'secondary contractors' line again, so I guess that awkward translation is another that's gonna stick. Valimar answers in the affirmative, so Alisa and Rean are teleported inside. When they get in Alisa, naturally, is seated on Rean's lap. Valimar, you sly dog...robot is man's best friend after all. They call him out on the positioning and Valimar says it was the best he can do with the space available, to which Rean calls him a liar. Lmao, when even Rean knows what's going on then you know something is wrong. Respect to Valimar the homie though. Alisa and Rean have a nice conversation about how Rean fights all of his robot battles alone, but Rean's all like, I'm never alone Alisa, I got you. They get all close and start blushing and are basically about to start tearing each other's clothes off, but the T for teen interrupts them with Valimar saying he detects abnormal heart rates and inquires about their health. The classic robot cockblock, anime trope #7. They awkwardly brush that encounter off as the scene ends.

I have to wonder why that was the only voice acted scene...it was a pretty good scene as they go, but it wasn't particularly important. If they had actually kissed I could see the value there but it seems a little weird.

Emma has a scene where Rean gets sleepy and passes out on a bench, so Emma lays him on her lap. He wakes up and freaks out and they just kinda end the scene lol. It was funny to watch this right after Alisa's well done 'romantic' scene. But Rean should really learn to take a hint. Emma's definitely the thirstiest of the harem girls, besides the actual adults who are "totally just pranking you bro, haha" when they flirt. Because that's definitely a thing that happens outside of anime.

Fie is sitting on a railing; apparently, one of her shoes broke so she's just sitting there with a foot out. Papa Rean says that this won't do, and gives her a piggyback ride to a clothing shop. Good guy Rean, always looking out for this squad. I think of all people though that Fie wouldn't have any problems walking barefoot lol. They end up getting her some new shoes though, and all is well.

Sara is at the bar as always. Rean talks to her about her past and she finally opens up a bit and talks about being in the jaeger corps. Doesn't really go into too much detail but it ends in her and Rean toasting each other which was cute to see.

I get a recipe in this bar as well which means I only need 3 more, but looking at it in the recipe list, there's one above it still with question marks so hopefully I didn't miss one. If I can't 100% this game I'll be a little sad cuz I've been trying to do everything.

Last but not least, I head over to Jusis' mansion to talk to him and see what all he's got going on. I'm sure this will be a good one. This one is also voice acted, which makes more sense because this should be required. Does that mean Alisa's scene was required too? Kind of a weird choice. Anyway, you get in the mansion and the RMP are inside. Jusis explains that they'll be watching over the mansion and keeping Duke Albarea under house arrest. Jusis leaves and, surprisingly, it's not just a scene; the game opens up and let's you explore around the mansion.

Online isn't that bad lol. When I was getting good at brawl I did it through playing online since none of my HS friends played and it worked for me. I still went to tournaments when I could, but playing good players online and studying your matches can get you very far

That's a bummer. And yeah, offline self selects for the players motivated enough to travel out just to play so they tend to be better than your average bear

I couldn't have said it better myself

Lopen posted...

Probably the worst possible winner for me. Figures!

What u got against banjo

Tifa 10

Good luck tifa

Tifa 9

Tifa 8

Tifa 7

Tifa 6

Peace___Frog posted...

How the fuck do you have 10+ but not 1

I don't want any liars here

Tifa 5

Hard shell
Sour cream
Beef or chicken
Lettuce
Tomato onion
Cheese/queso
Serrano peppers

Please no explanation

Tifa 4

Tifa 3

Tifa 2

Tifa 1

I'm an Aerith first voter that's a tifa voter so I'll buck the trend

Quick vote:
Silco
Jinx
Caitlyn
-

Arcane was great

Banjo

Tifa

Aerith

12/25

Christmas time! I wonder what Christmas festivities they will get up to today. Launching mortars instead of fireworks? Setting Christmas trees on fire as we destroy Duke Albarea's fortress? I can't wait! They let us bring 7 party members instead of 6, and make Jusis and Sara required. I would normally bring them anyway so I have 1 extra slot to play with. I decide on Millium because I don't think I'll need any extra firepower, and she seems like she has potential for interesting things to say since the political intrigue is ramping up.

No new quests today, looks like we're all main plot, all the way. Works for me! A quick lap around the ship results in nothing new to see, so lets attack this damn fort. After setting off we get a scene where McBurn and Duvalie are talking. It's been so long I almost forgot about them! Duvalie lectures Mick on how they aren't supposed to fight in this war, because they're supposed to be "in the shadows". I guess dealing with Trails protagonists doesn't count as being in the war for whatever reason. Mick says that she should be glad to relax since she just got back form Crossbell. At least they're consistent! And they have a good reason why Ouroboros hasn't been part of the plot for awhile lol.

Fast forward to Rean and co arriving at the fort, Scarlet shows up in her gear to stop us. She says that she doesn't care about life anymore since she has no reason to live past Crow "killing" Chancellor Osborne. Hopefully she does die here, like Vulcan, so she never has to learn the truth about that. I'm sure it would crush her. But really, I think the developers just had no clue what to do with the terrorists after CS1 lol. They could've just written them out and nobody would've been bothered by it I think, but no big deal.

After a robot fight which was somehow easier than the rest of them, she attempts to suicide herself but Rean rushes in and saves her. I guess the writers didn't want her to die yet since she has more "appeal". She's honestly ugly af because they just comically oversized her tits and it looks stupid, and I say that as a confessed tits > ass kinda guy. Anime can be silly as fuck sometimes lol. Anyway, Crow shows up to check on his girl and Angelica gives him shit for caring about Scarlet so much. Jealous? Crow reveals that he knows what we're doing with the ore and the sword, and says that we should keep doing the shrines if we're gonna take him on. Does anyone question how this kid our age knows all this shit? It's a little disconcerting.

The rest of the gang rushes inside while Rean's preoccupied out there. Some jaegers are inside ready to greet us, but Sara walks up to confront them first. Apparently, she's originally from North Ambria and was a part of this jaeger clan in her past. She says her loyalty now lies with Erebonia and her students however, and she challenges the jaegers to a duel. It starts a solo battle of her vs them and she immediately unlocks a new S craft that has 4S as its rank, which is the first time I've seen that I think. Naturally you use it right away but it doesn't even one shot their entire board, which kind of surprises me because the stragglers get pretty close to killing me on their turn. If your Sara wasn't as cracked as mine wouldn't this fight just be impossible? Like if she were 10 levels lower and not equipped I don't see how I would've won that ever.

After the fight ends they all kinda act like Sara lost though, so maybe you are supposed to lose it? Not sure why they'd make it winnable at all then. Or are they just doing that trails thing where they require you to win a fight but then act like you lost in the cutscene after anyway? I didn't get any bonus AP for winning it, so I'm guessing it's that. Anyway, the jaegers basically just look at her pitifully and say they don't get paid enough for this shit and walk out the door. The gang talks a bit about Sara's jaeger past and basically are just like, yeah whatever homie you're our teacher lets go. I guess that does explain the bit of a soft spot she's had for Fie all this time so that's a nice touch.

After this fight, Sara is just totally too injured to go on and is kicked out of your party. Super lame. I guess Millium might see some use after all then? Probably not. At least it explains the whole 7 party member thing. I guess we'll just tackle this dungeon without her, I decide on Machias to fill her spot but I'll probably switch in Jusis for the boss battle at the end.

The journey through the dungeon is pretty uneventful, mostly just grinding. There's another ex-boss for a random enemy which is cool. I also had to retry some fight against one of those and some soldiers, twice, because the solider would cast grim butterfly which would one shot my entire board. Thank god for retry. I'm playing SMT5 now and dying in that is always very frustrating.

Once you get to the top of the fortress, the gang of course tries to arrest ol' Duke Albarea, but Duvalie steps in "from the shadows" to prevent us. She gives a rousing speech about how we will go no further because Ouroboros will fulfill their mission...it's very beautiful...but Mick is just like "Nah I'm good" and teleports out. Ahhh...Mick is great lmao. I guess they need to save him for CS3 or 4 when we're level 250 and he would just shit on us now. In general though, Trails is at its best when Ouroboros is involved and I have felt their lack of presence over the last few war heavy chapters.

The fight itself vs. Duvalie begins and ends pretty quickly. She did get a full map S craft off which would normally be scary, but it was literally the turn after I casted the double your HP arte with Alisa, so it didn't really do anything...so sadly Duvalie wasn't able to KO even a single unit. I'm rooting for you next time though Duvalie, if anyone beats me I want it to be you. Laura mentions after the fight that she (Duvalie) seemed unusually tired, and then Duvalie mentions how she has now disgraced herself here and in Crossbell. Beautiful. This is all happening in a pretty short timespan after all! We are fast approaching Zero's epilogue...now I'm wondering how KeA and Millium will get along lol. They don't seem like a good fit.

Duvalie leaves though and Jusis formally arrests his father, as the scene fades to black. We resume showing the Imperial forces occupying Bareahard. I have to wonder why the Noble alliance gave up the Duke if it meant also surrendering Bareahard? I thought that was basically their HQ. I know Rufus said the bulk of their army is with him, wherever they are, but where the hell is that? Further out west in some town we haven't been to, I guess...but they need a lot of infrastructure to support their war effort, I can't imagine there's very many places they could be. Whatever, another thing we shouldn't worry about, I suppose.

After that though, we get a transition to the next day and it says Bareahard stopover day. I suppose we'll get some bonding events in tomorrow! I think it's a little weird nobody mentioned Christmas this entire time, but I suppose they were a little preoccupied. Perhaps tomorrow we'll get some festivities. See you guys then!

12/24

It's Christmas Eve! The day starts without any acknowledgement of this, as the gang gathers around the sword that George whipped up. They say it's barely better than a normal weapon, which makes me wonder, why are we wasting the ore we got into making it? Shouldn't we have gathered all of it first so we could make the super, Zemurian ore-only weapon we originally discussed? When did this new plan come into fruition? Maybe he can just melt this one down to reclaim the ore somehow...whatever. I'm not going to worry about it. Take me on your wild ride, Falcom.

Towa walks in in a hurry and interrupts us to give an emergency report - apparently, Celdic was lit aflame. Guess I was right about us getting sidetracked. Are we finally getting to the end bit of a trails game, when the real things with actual consequences start happening? Sign me up! The gang arrives in Celdic to check the damage and they decide to meet up with Otto the market manager.

The mood in town is solemn, and the map has changed considerably with destroyed buildings and flame scorched ground. I stop by the church first and there's a mini scene there with Rosine. She is upset how powerless she was to stop the attack despite the months she spent in the military academy with us. I get it but you know, it's one girl vs an army, that's a tough one. It hits me here though, for all the complaints I have about this game, one thing I think Cold Steel as a series has excelled at over the others is in how it makes you care about the NPCs. I know Trails is notorious for their NPCs in general, but I think Cold Steel is a notch above the rest in this department. And I also know that it's a little easier when you're forced to interact with the same bunch of them a lot of the time since half of the first game took place in one location, I know that made their job easier. But they really took it and ran with it. The way they've been able to intersperse them all throughout the continent, and give them all stories and motivations is something you really don't see in any other franchises. So props to Falcom on that.

When you get to the market managers house, you learn that he's been injured in the attack and has passed away. And not in the trails way where they're totally fine after 30 minutes, apparently he's actually gone for good. RIP Otto, you were a brief part of this game but we will honor your memory real soon and fuck up some Alliance soldiers on your behalf. Neithardt, Craig, and Claire are off in the corner surveying the damage in town. When you speak with them they confirm that it was the Albarean forces who razed the town, despite it being their own territory. Dark stuff. They also repeat that line from earlier that I liked, about the psychological impact of the Soldats and how it's affecting the villagers. That's all they say though, and unfortunately Claire does not rejoin our team here now.

The gang gets ready to go back to the Courageous, but Becky and Hugo come down from the ship to investigate the damage. You'd think Becky would have come down with them originally, this being her hometown and all, but if you ain't Class VII you don't get to leave the ship I guess. Sorry, I don't make the rules. If you're not with us you're against us. Maybe the Courageous is secretly a prison ship for all Thors students that weren't in Class VII? Anyway, Becky is distraught over the occurrences of course but Hugo says he'll watch after her and make sure she makes it back to the ship. Good guy prison warden Hugo here to help.

You get back to the ship and they talk about the consequences of what happened, and prepare to make their formal foray into the war (because we TOTALLY haven't been huge players until now, and DEFINITELY haven't only supported the Imperial army, with the princess we rescued and use as a figurehead of morality for our actions, we've been 100% neutral until now. Wink wink). Suddenly we receive a radio call, and Rufus appears on the monitor. I didn't know you could transmit video with a Radio message. Erebonian technology really is advanced! Anyway, he says he's got a super confidential message for us. He let's us know that Duke Albarea carried out this attack on his own, and the rest of the noble alliance does not condone his actions. He also says he will not interfere with whatever we're planning to do. Millium, surprisingly the voice of reason, points out that he's clearly just using us to take his father out on his behalf so he can consolidate power. I guess she is a high ranking spy and all, but I'm not used to seeing that side of her so it's refreshing. Maybe Millium will grow on me more as the stakes ramp up and she gets more time to play that role, instead of annoying child.

Rufus shrugs off the accusation though, then calls out Jusis saying he's curious how Jusis will play this, it being such a family-centric affair. Jusis stammers and says nothing at this prodding. It's always fun to see how Jusis' confidence just shatters completely before his brother. Rufus does seem pretty capable so I can't blame Jusis too much, but it's still funny.

The call hangs up and then Laura, another voice of reason, points out that this could obviously be a trap. Rean puts on his monocle and top hat and says, "now we know the alliance wants something done about Duke Albarea as much as we do", as if to immediately make sure that you, the player, discounts any possibility that what Laura just said is true, and that we need to take Rufus at his word. Now, it's pretty obvious that Millium was right and that this is all a ploy by Rufus to consolidate power - well played to him - but from Rean's perspective, completely discounting Laura's idea that it's a trap does not make much sense. Rufus and the duke are still family after all, and ostensibly allied in this war effort. They could very well be lying to us and planning a joint ambush when we rush their fortress. It's very odd that Rean would ignore that possibility, even if in our world it's obvious that he's right and the Duke is being set up to fall.

Anyway, they finalize their plans to attack the fortress, and the day skips ahead...short day today!

There's also two trial chests here, one for Jusis/Sara and one for Fie/Millium. First one, "Fie and Millium are on a waiting list for a new product that will help them grow taller, but it's very in demand. Hopefully they'll get it sometime in the next Millennium." OK I actually liked that one. And then, "When Jusis and Rufus decide who will inherit the Albarea lands, will they have to DUKE it out?" That's the worst one yet omg. Also, unfortunately I don't have either Millium or Jusis in my party, so backtracking time...yay...good thing they stick this at the end of the dungeon.

The first trial chest was super easy, but the one with Fie and Millium was a bit of a pain. For one, I don't use either of them so their equipment and setups aren't great. Their autos were only doing 1 damage. The boss would cast earth pulse, which would heal him for 10k each turn, easily out-sustaining whatever pitiful damage I could put out with them. I ended up turning them both into casters, since the boss is 180% weak to earth. Pelting them with earth spells, even with their lackluster equipment still put out solid damage (about 5k for each cast), and Fie is really fast so she was able to put them out a good bit. I just had to do that about 6 times until I could get him down to 25k, while praying he didn't cast Earth Pulse. Then both of their 200cp s crafts would knock off the remaining HP to win the fight. That strategy ultimately worked out for me, but it was a pain just praying he wouldn't earth pulse himself to victory.

This dungeon is also another one where the "big" enemies you encounter sometimes are old bosses. This time it's the Spiritomb looking guys that were the end bosses of the shrines before. Nice touch! On one hand they save resources on not making more enemies, and on the other hand it's a nice bit of environmental storytelling. Win/win.

At the end you get a boss fight with another magic knight. So let me just tell you, I got my Laura to 50% boosted strength, then used her S craft, which crit...for 140,000 damage. The boss has 180,000 health. I think he got to move once maybe? They really needed to balance this game lol. And of course, of all the people, leave it to Laura to hit us with the, "That one certainly didn't go down without a fight." in the post battle cutscene. Ludonarrative dissonance is great guys. I wonder if the designers knew how bad she broke boss fights?

You get the ore and, surprisingly, you're able to make it back to the Courageous without some random bad guy stopping you and stealing the ore from you. When you do get back it says that George will need help to set up his workshop and begin processing it, which will end the day. I thought I was supposed to go to all 4 shrines? When I go to talk to Towa and look at the map I can't travel to the other shrines anymore, so...I guess we'll do that tomorrow? I can't find anything else to do, so I talk to George to end the day.

No students left to recruit now, and only one quest left which is a monster quest on the Kreuzen highway. The fight goes down easily, compared to the Cryptids we've been killing it wasn't even a challenge. Speaking of which, there are apparently two new Cryptid fights that have opened up as well. The Eisengard Range, where we just were, has one to tackle at the top of the mountain. It's always fun coming back to the starting area in RPGs late game. There's even some new standard enemies here so you don't get bored killing rabbits or whatever. Though they start you off this game at level 60 or something so they'd still be some pretty strong rabbits at this point. Anyway, there's a random trial chest here that wasn't here originally, between Laura and Fie. "Laura may usually win against Fie in a swimming race, but it's no contest when they're racing on land. After all, Fie's always been fast on her Fiet." I swear they're getting worse lol. Anyway, the actual fight is pretty easy. And by that I mean, Laura's 110cp s craft one shot it. I know this wasn't here originally because you only had Rean, but was I supposed to come back here at some other point to do this? I can't imagine this was balanced for this point of the game, even with how generally unchallenging the game is.

At the top of the mountain is the next cryptid fight, a cool looking white dragon thing. He doesn't have any crazy gimmicks in this fight, just does a bunch of damage randomly and can poison you, but it turns out to not be too tough of a fight. He did get one retry out of me so I'll give him some credit. You get some dragon gem for winning which when used gives your entire team +100 CP, as well as 30cp/turn for 3 turns. A utility one like this I doubt I'll get much use out of, but I'll give it to Laura so she can have something to do if she rolls a free arte turn. Maybe I can use it before a boss fight to get everyone to 200cp quickly? That sounds fun. I don't think it'll get used too much in battle proper though, but we'll see.

The other cryptid for us to fight is at the top of that mountain that Beryl was chilling at before. This one was actually disgustingly easy unfortunately, not only did he have no real gimmicks he also has some stupidly low accuracy for some reason. He missed probably half of his attacks on me. No other boss has had this happen so I feel like they did this intentionally for some reason. Were you supposed to fight this thing a long time ago or something? I feel like the difficulty curve of these has been backwards, the hardest one was by far the first one and they've gotten easier since then. I didn't even have a single character die, let alone a retry. Anyway, the reward for this is the Grail Burst spell, which casts instantly and lets you attack twice in a row while moving the rest of your party up in the turn order. So you're spending all of your EP for one additional attack and potentially your teammates moving up? That seems...pretty bad. Rean never uses his EP at all so I'll give it to him, but really it's just a way worse version of Machias' skill. To be fair, that skill is OP as hell and is really the only reason I bring him around with me most places, but still. Maybe a worse version of that will still be worthwhile.

I take some time to explore the ship to examine the fruits of my labor for the day and see what all my new kids will do for me. Klein (Laura's swimming coach) is our new navigation officer. Alfin randomly gives me a Medal of Strength for beating up so many cryptids, which gives 100 Str and 10 spd. My Sara, with that equipped, now has more strength than Laura (1890 vs 1868) while also having almost double her speed (125 vs. 71). So I think she's officially broken.

We find our third trainer in Hibelle, he's in charge of artes training. I take care of all 3 levels pretty quick, they're not too hard. I decided to finish up ranged and melee 3 since I'm here, and man those were annoying. Not because the fights actually tough, but because they make you dodge and counterattack 3 times to count as a win. I guess they realized how easy their game was and needed to add some arbitrary "challenge" to these but really it just made me waste a bunch of time waiting for my guys to dodge. I could've probably set up Fie as an actual evasion tank and had her do it for me...whatever. Live and learn. The melee one was especially a pain because getting those guys to counterattack also requires them to be right next to the robots, I ended up just getting down to 1, cornering him and then skipping my turn over and over and over. But you can't use artes, so I had to use balms to heal when people got low, and my supply started getting kind of low actually lol. I guess it's good to finally get some use out of them, I almost never use items in this game.

Exploring the rest of the ship, Hugo does indeed have a nice shop for us, a high quality item shop with lots of expensive shit, but nothing I really need too much. There is a +20 spd accessory for 75k, but I have a bunch of money in the form of loose sepith so I can afford it if I want it. I decide to give it to Sara, she has a weaker +10 spd accessory on now and I think I want to make her Sara the hedgehog. Actually fuck it, lets just make her as fast as physically possible to see how hard we can push this. After some optimization with R orbments that give speed and changing around her equipment, I finally get her up to 155, now well over double Laura's measly 71. I did have to lose some strength in the process so now Laura is beating her by a massive gap of Laura's 1898 to Sara's 1890. Would you ever trade 8 strength for 80 speed? Laura says hell no.

Margarita is in the kitchen (of course) and wants peculiar dishes, which I have none of since I never cook. Without that jinzo shrine to give things too I've lost interest in cooking in cold steel, I know I made every dish at the very end of the game last time and I'll probably do the same thing here. I've got 4 recipes left to find so whenever I find those I'll go through and make everything. There's also Stefan in the computer room, who said he would give us battle stats but really just does a Noel and gives you U materials for however many unique monsters you've killed. Lame, I wanted to see cool data on how much overall damage I've done and things like that. It's weird they'd introduce Noel's role so late into the second game, but what can you do.

With all that done I believe I'm officially out of stuff to do so I head out to tackle one of these shrines. I'll just go from top down, so first one is the Nord shrine. They say that I need Emma if I'm going to explore, so I'm just like ??? Yeah? Like I said at the beginning? So I'm just required to use Fie and Emma I guess, which is a little lame but I doubt it will matter. But now my team is currently Alisa, Laura, Sara, Fie and Emma - girl power! Rean probably gets a +20% boost for harem buff.

My first battle in, my Sara attacked 4 times I believe before Laura attacked once, so I'm glad this speed optimization is working out lol. That trend didn't repeat itself in the other battles though, it's usually just 1 or 2 so not sure why the first one was so weird. She still attacks a shitton though but I think they must've rebalanced their speed algorithm between Sky and here. I remember Joshua or Richard getting like 8 turns in a row in those games when you'd cap their speed out lol.

There's a monster chest in here which gives the Zeus gem, which is 90% impede chance, as well as 15 strength. It also happens to be a wind orbment, and wouldn't you know it, the only somewhat useless orbment in Sara's arsenal was on a wind required slot, so that fits in perfectly. So not only am I now permanently impeding on a character who attacks all the time, I've also got her above Laura in the strength totals again! It's a good day to be Sara.

12/23

We start today off with Angelica at the helm of the ship, she walks up to Alan and kicks him off and says that she's the chief helmsman now. Lmao I was literally saying how that was too important of a job for that nobody NPC before so I guess the developers agreed with me this time. Anyway, they don't linger on that long and change topics over to the Zemurian ore they need to get, and ask resident loremaster Emma if she has any ideas. She doesn't, but mentions a clan of craftsmen called 'gnomes' that are rumored to have made the divine knights to begin with. Interesting! Getting a hint as to their origins finally. True Omega Loremaster Celine then chimes in and says she knows where we can find the ore...the spirit shrines. Of course those would have a purpose, what with the mysterious locked doors at the end of every one. Apparently, they were only created in order to grow Zemurian Ore to begin with. Well I'll be a monkey's uncle, that sure is convenient. But at least we have somewhere to look now.

It makes us include Fie in the party, which is a bit weird because I definitely would've assumed this would be an Emma chapter. Did we already have an Emma day? I forget. I like Fie though, so I'm cool with it. Not upgrading her shit this time though, this games too easy I won't need it. I get started making my rounds around the ship. We still have Vivi as our chief sexiness officer, thank you Vivi. I beat the 2nd levels for the ranged/melee training, which were pretty easy at this point in the game. I can't be bothered to do level 3 now though, we'll come back to you.

There's a letter in the study from Phantom Thief B! He has a challenge for us, he says he kidnapped one of our teammates and we need to figure out which one it is. The lights suddenly go out, and we all meet up in the conference room to discuss the incident. Everyone appears to be accounted for, but apparently Bleublanc is impersonating one of us! Spicy. I like this quest already. We have to figure out who it is by quizzing our teammates on what they did today and looking for any inconsistencies. I was wondering when Phoenix Wright: Erebonia would be released. One thing that was pretty funny happened to me when Millium talks about needing to find her lost teddy bear, but I had a teddy bear attachment on her arm so it just made that scene hit different.

My gut said it was Machias, but I looked up the answer to be sure and turns out I was right. For correctly guessing you get the Phantom Thief's Cape as an accessory, which gives 10% evasion and some drop rate increases. I don't have a real evasion tank but I'll put it on Fie, she can do in a pinch I suppose. Maybe there will be a real challenge that actually requires one at some point? Probably not. Also, just like how everyone's S Craft is an AOE in this game, most bosses also have giant AOE attacks unlike the old games so evasion tanks kind of lose some of their appeal in this series as well.

I check out the list of students to recruit on the computer on the bridge, seems like it will be a busy day because there's a lot here. No time like the present, so I set out and when you open the flight menu, there's a ton of new places to go to. Well, "new" since it's all places we've already been, but now I have the quick travel option so that's nice. It says the story advances as soon as you complete one shrine, so we'll save those for the end. First place I go to is Roer to check back in on them, and look into this airship hijacking quest we've got. At least, I thought this was where it was but after walking around town I didn't find anything to do with that. However, there was a student here - Hugo, Becky's friend/rival. He wants me to settle some of his business contracts for him, then he says he'll join us. There's also some random quest here to find some kid out on the highway. I think this was a hidden quest? I don't remember seeing anything about this. At the very least, there were things to do in Roer, even if this hijacked airship is mysteriously missing.

When I go out onto the highway to look for this kid I find another cryptid boss fight. He's got 360k health and an ultimate that one shots everyone in an AOE, so that's fun. I manage to take him out on my third attempt which isn't too bad, compared to the first one that I did that took me 10+ retries and an hour and a half. I had to tech in Emma for god sakes, that's a real tough fight. These cryptids do redeem the game's battle system for me though since I do actually have to retry and think about things. The reward for this one is a Searing Sun Gem, which is a huge map-wide fire attack that seems like it'll instantly win me fights on free arte turns but doubt it'll get too much use in boss battles (besides those free arte turns). But if you ask me, the real reward was overcoming the fight to begin with.

That student is also nearby, getting attacked by some monsters. After you rescue him he says he'll give you battle data, which could be fun to read up on. After that, Kenneth is just further down the byroad, you only have to catch a fish for him and he joins the ship. I'm not sure what else I can do here so I tackle the sidequest Hugo gave me, to deliver some contracts for him. Pretty straightforward A->B thing so that takes a minute and then Hugo joins the ship. I'm sure he'll have a nice shop for us to look through! Looking through the sidequests again now, it says that my missing airship is in Eisengard Range. Not sure why I thought it was Roer but alright, to the range we go!

The Courageous lets you fast travel straight there, but it gives you a warning that says you can't come back until you're done. I'm pretty sure earlier it said you have to do a shrine for the plot to progress, so I'm assuming I'll still be able to do more sidequests after this. When you arrive and board the airship, there's a treasure chest that's already been opened, so I guess we've been here before? The ship does look familiar but I can't place when exactly we were here. Was it when Mick showed up outside looking all edgy? I vaguely remember that. Anyway, the sidequest here is really easy, just beat some standard jaeger fights. The last fight is an ambush but they all get one shot by Sara's S craft, which wasn't even 200 cp lol.

After ending that event you can find Ricky and Anton outside, finally reunited! But tragedy strikes when Ricky's amnesia prevents him from remembering Anton. Oh, the humanity! Also, Norton (the journalist from last game) gives you another black record book, so hopefully we can get those fully decoded soon. If it's really plot heavy stuff maybe it will have to wait for the final dungeon? We also recruit two more students during that sidequest, leaving only one left - the lovely Margarita. She's at the Schwarz Drache Barrier so I head over there to see what she needs us to do. Turns out not much, just have Millium in your party and she joins after Millium gives her a pep talk. They seem like they'd get along well. I was kind of hoping there was something funny we'd have to do for her, but oh well. I blame budget cuts.

Omg that meme lmao thank you shine

Oh yeah that's right, I forgot you played CS1 first. That makes more sense then. And yeah, this is the only franchise I'll ever go out of my way to talk to people in so I get it