LogFAQs > #962114543

NBIceman posted...

I must say I'm impressed that Kamoana's voice acting seemingly hasn't driven you insane yet.

It's Bonnie. She'd kill me. Okay, maybe not, but still.

REMEMBER: I met her at the first con at which she was a guest, and her autograph is still right here on my wall. Knowing it's her, her voice naturally doesn't drive me insane, even if Kamoana's meltdown was "Okay, can we get this part over with?" It felt like an unneeded distraction, but it's now clear it was included to segue into Medissa taking on a motherly role. Eagerly awaiting this.

Kamoana as a character fascinates me because of her relationship with the heartless monster that murdered her mother in front of her - a monster who realized she was heartless afterward - but it's pretty clear the intent was to create an annoying kid and make her compelling.

At any rate, playing off and on today. I feel like I'm falling behind. After another pointless torch-lighting (like... at least make it a puzzle, instead of just pressing A in four places), I meet Medissa. She doesn't like the idea of being rescued an refuses to believe that Artorius is a dirtbag, despite all her misery being traceable to him. She's a real charmer... a snake charmer. A bunch of serpents keep coming after us. They're weak, but they keep comin'. Eleanor keeps asking her why she'd still side with the Abbey after they forced her into this and murdered her daughter. This is kind of hilarious considering Eleanor's track record. Medissa says she became a therion by choice, because the exorcists told her the truth about malevolence causing her daughter's death... and she didn't want a repeat tragedy. This makes perfect sense and there's no arguing with that logic. There's also no arguing that she's being used.

We beat the crap out of her, and she starts spouting Abbey falsities about the "Age of Malevolence" and the "Lord of Calamity" and Velvet is evil because of her self-gratification. Uh, she's out for revenge, sure, but what she's doing is trying to save the world from an evil, manipulative man. The true Lord of Calamity is Artorius - he's leading the world to only to gratify himself, with no care for the people. Phi intervenes and Medissa listens to reason, especially the Kamoana card. Eleanor truly regrets her sins, so she's trying to repent. Medissa passes out and Magilou makes a snarky comment about the Abbey manipulating her, and Eleanor recognizes how cruel it is. Eizen cuffs her, and we're on our way.

After a near-death experience with a Dire Foe, I get out. Eleanor tells Phi he did the right thing, and Velvet wonders if Eleanor will become a daemon... Eizen says she won't because she's strong enough to confront her inconsistencies of character (i.e. being everything she hates) and very self-aware. Malevolence - the innate evil humans must learn to suppress - is just a fact of life; in reality, it manifests differently... and those people usually get their way, sadly. Anyway, I go to Beardsley to shun a bunch of this stuff (don't want to trigger a scene in Hellawes), then fight my way to the Code Red to the south. I get a "Perfalmost" winquote I hadn't seen before... Magilou being a gem, as always!

The Code Red (which I'd forgotten about before - useful potentite for enhancements) was weak. I also can't seem to get the next ingredient for the special elixir yet because the devs don't want me to. Strange. I ended outside Hellawes for the afternoon, to come back after I took care of 1) watching Jeopardy HOLY SHIT AMY LOST while using my stepper, .2) Survivor with my dad, and, most importantly, 3) an online watchalong with friends.

This last one was a documentary made by one of the filmmakers behind The Exorcist, called "The Devil and Father Amorth." This was about how humans see daemonblight, or did before The Opening. Absolutely fascinating, and I couldn't help but draw comparisons to Berseria. The rest of the watchalong crew had no clue what I was talking about. But you guys do! The real-life exorcist was fighting this daemon who was having convulsions, but she kept her form. There were theories thrown around about how people contract daemonblight that... the game pretty much already confirmed. The malevolence lies within us all. I suggest giving it a watch if you like occult religious stuff... or just got curious from me talking about it.

Back to our regularly scheduled programming...

I enter Hellawes knowing there might be bad news awaiting. There isn't any, but unfortunately I missed a sidequest - the Magilou/Velvet stand-up routine. Well shit, that sucks. At Titania, Medissa continues threatening us as we bring her here. Kamoana ambushes us, and Medissa is... stymied. She can't believe the Abbey would turn a 10 y/o girl into a therion. Kamoana is scared of Medissa's icy stare and turns around and trips on a brick. What a brick of a first meeting this was. Medissa's motherly instincts kick in and Eleanor, without prompt, severs her shackles and demands she talk to the girl. Eleanor isn't good at consoling kids... but Medissa had one about the same age, and they're both therions so they'll understand each other. And they do. Medissa says that Kamoana's dream is a load of hooey, and responds to "But how do you know?" in a MUCH better way than Eleanor had. No mother would ever think of their kid like that. Period. Medissa starts crying, and then Kamoana consoles her. This is as awesome and raw as it is ironic.

Velvet reminds us that her mom's been dead a long time... and calls herself as the "Grand Poobah of Calamity." XD, that's great! There are also several things that come up: 1) Rokurou's overbearing mother died a long time ago, 2) Magilou was born from a peach that floated down the river (not sure whether I believe it) and 3) that malakhim are born from untainted mana, sometimes from late humans who retain no memory of their previous lives. This last part is instrumental, because it lends credence to my theory that Phi and Laphi are one and the same. Eizen also says that his sister isn't biological, then throws shade at Magilou, who mentions unbreakable bonds with a dog, a monkey, a pheasant, and a Bienfu. Eizen explains that he and his sister were born from the same earthpulse point and gave each other similar pendants on the same day, and were thus family. Magilou then throws shade right back at him LOL

Grim says she's transcribed a second counting song about malevolence overflowing and... the scarlet moon from the opening of the game. Artorius may have wanted to summon Innominat to destroy the world, and Velvet is LIVID. If that's true, there was no reason for her brother to die. I agree that Artorius is out to immortalize himself and control everybody. He doesn't strike me as the type of megalomaniac who would want to destroy the universe. This book we have is a half-complete copy so Artorius must have the original.

The next morning, Kamoana is in good spirits, and asks Phi to join her and Medissa for a bath. Phi freaks out (cooties?) and Eleanor tells Kamoana Dyle's growing a new tail, so Kamoana forgets and goes off. Velvet is still mad and bullies Phi into finding the next earthpulse. Turns out that's in eastern Eastgand... aka where the game started: The ruins on the cliff, where "THAT" happened! There's a skit where Rokurou says he admires Grim's attitude followed by Eleanor trying to emulate it, and then another about interpreting the book, and Bienfu says there could've been errors in the transcription like the ones he made in copying Magilou's spell tomes because she gave him 3 days to do 100. When he says he took delight in a spell exploding in her face, she comes over to torture him. I'm laughing XD

We're off to Taliesin... it's finally time for the Wright stuff!