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 Legend of Legaia was a PSX RPG from the turn of the millennia. Whatever anyone’s thoughts on the game, it was considered a solid game at the time it was made. Some might even describe it as a classic, even if it’s not as well-known as something like the Final Fantasy games. This is not a Let’s Play of Legend of Legaia. Legaia 2: Duel Saga is what one would call a “sequel in name only”. It was released 3 odd years after Legend of Legaia in 2001 (in Japan). Due to some creative differences, the makers cut loose the writer from the first game and the result was something that not only barely resembled its predecessor but was also painfully mediocre. Some might even call it atrocious. I am firmly in the camp that calls Legaia 2 a bad game, but not an irredeemable game. There are moments of interesting content and genuine thought put into this game that mean it isn’t a total wash. Besides that, however, the gameplay is pedestrian, the plot is boring and bad, and there’s some content in this game that makes me want to puke. But hey, maybe we’ll have some fun doing a goofy Let’s Play of the game, eh? Why this game? Well, aside from the fact that I can find certain kinds of bad content entertaining.... I have a small history with this game and Legaia 1. Way back when I was a wee lad, I would frequently rent games from the local stores. I rented both of the Legaia games, but because I was a rock stupid kid, I was never able to complete them. I would keep renting them out in hopes of completing them, but never did. Legaia 1 I was only ever able to find in this one store when I lived out in this semi-rural community. When we moved into the nearby city, I wasn’t able to find it in any store. It wasn’t until high school that I would borrow the game from a friend and finally complete it. The game is hardly that special, but the journey of trying to complete it made it memorable. Legaia 2 I rented after moving to the city. I didn’t fully understand some of the things that were silly about the game and had a higher tolerance for tedious gameplay than I do now. I got a fair way through Legaia 2, but wouldn’t complete it until I was an adult. By then I’d realised it was a pretty dumb game, but it was still memorable as like Legaia 1 I’d gone through such an ordeal trying to complete it. As at least one other person has already LP’d Legaia 1, I figured I’d take up the mantle of LPing Legaia 2. It also has far more silly content to make light of than its predecessor. What about Legend of Legaia? As the games are barely connected to one another, you don’t need to know anything about Legaia 1 to understand Legaia 2, so don’t worry about that. I will be actively pointing out any links between the two games, but they’ll be minimal. What to expect of me This is the first Let’s Play I’ve ever done on this forum, so I’m hardly going to turn out a masterpiece on my first try. I may be awkward, I may be inept, but bear with me, and maybe we’ll at least have fun. I promise to improve as best I can. I am also a poor boy from a poor family, so I don’t have the money for fancy recording equipment and other tools. This is all gonna be whatever I can cobble together for free, so forgive any substandard presentation on my part. Finally, I am not a completionist even when I’m not detailing a game for other’s entertainment. If there is content in this game that is too arcane and complicated to reach, I will not seek it out. I will not make every item, nor fight every enemy. I will detail as much as possible, but mainly focus on putting out a piece of entertainment, not one of perfection. It’s not the actual gameplay that will be interesting anyway. No, I think people will come here to laugh at the game in spite of its best efforts. Also, no spoilers, naturally. I want people to be surprised by how dumb this game can be. Table of Contents Chapter 0 - Generically Humble Beginnings Chapter 1 - The Crabby Woods Chapter 2 - Lang meets his Dream Boy Chapter 3 - Grind Canyon Chapter 4 - The Fascist-Theocratic-Feudal Kingdom of Darakin Chapter 5 - Slowly Onwards to Mt. Gabel Chapter 6 - In the Hall of the Mountain Morg Chapter 7 - Two Sewers for the Price of One Chapter 8 - Storming the Castle Chapter 9 - The Day of Black Sun Chapter 10 - Lang's DESTINY Chapter 11 - My Sharon-a Chapter 12 - Chapter 8 Redux Chapter 13 - Meandering Aimlessly Chapter 14 - Pirates of Darek's Haunt Chapter 15 - Dull and Grey Chapter 16 - Questing on the side Chapter 17 - The Drokonia Fake Out Chapter 18 - Only a Sibling Elegy Chapter 19 - The Death of a Moustached Bean Bag Chapter 20 - Meander the World and the Seven Seas Chapter 21 - The Tournament Arc Chapter 22 - Raussicaä of the Tower of the Wind Chapter 23 - Sekuhara Ojii-san Chapter 24 - So near, yet so far Chapter 25 - Interdimensional Showdown Chapter 26 - Welcome to the Arena Chapter 27 - Arts, Cooking and Secrets, oh my! Chapter 28 - Hope Conquers All Chapter 29 - The End of Legaia LJN92 fucked around with this message at 23:11 on Jun 8, 2021 |
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Apr 6, 2021 01:00
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Chapter 0 – Generically Humble Beginnings Music Playing – Wasteland of Far Away Places The moment we hit “New Game”, we are treated to a scene of a glowing, blue jewel that feeds water into a small lake, and the name of our hometown is displayed…  The Japanese reads as “Kouya no Machi Nooru”, which is exactly what it is translated as, although I guess they figured “Nohl” really needed that H. The camera zooms in on the large house at the back, and we see a redheaded girl walk through the house and enter someone’s room.  Who could she be yelling at, you wonder?  Why, none other than our protagonist, of course!  She resorts to drastic measures to wake him up.  Here, we are presented with the first of many dialogue/action choices littered throughout the game. They’re mostly harmless and result in little meaningful changes to what is going on, but what is interesting is that the choices you make earlier will affect the choices you get later, and how the main character talks in certain scenes. For demonstration purposes, I choose “Leap out of bed in a panic”.  It’s not nearly as entertaining as you might think it would be.  “Have you forgotten that today is your first day on the job?!? You’re impossible!”She turns to leave. “Everyone’s waiting for you!” We are now free to move around inside the house. We can find a few trifling items, but one is rather important…  The “Point Card”. This item will gather points with every purchase we make at stores in the game. The card can then be used as an item in battle to deal damage according to the points on the card. Yes, this allows us to cheap shot any enemy, including bosses.  We talk to Hawke, whose Point Card we just stole. He knows us, clearly.  Nancy urges us outside, and so outside we go.  Outside, a bunch of blokes are swinging swords in front of another bloke. Who could they possibly be? The protagonist stands around watching, until….  He ends up standing next to…  The “Galvan” that Hawke mentioned.  “Good, stoooooop! That’s enough for today!”The swordsmen stop their wild swinging. “We have a new member starting today…” Yet another dialogue choice. We choose to introduce ourselves normally.  “I’ll be joining you from today…”We are then given the chance to name our character. The default name is “Lang”. This will be his name for the purposes of Chapter 0. “My name is Lang. I look forward to working with all of you.” Galvan smacks Lang upside the head. His casual abuse will be frequent in interactions with him. “While you were in dreamland, you missed all of today’s practice session!” “Moving along.”  Important places and things are often highlighted in blue in this game’s dialogue. Dein lets out a “Tsk!” in response to Galvan’s orders. Someone has an attitude problem, methinks. “Back to your quarters, and get ready!” “And you, Lang! You come to see me when you’re ready. Got that?” “That’s it! Now go!!”The cutscene ends, and we are given free rein to wander Nohl and talk to people.  Dein: “How lucky you are…I wish I could just eat and sleep, and not do anything else…” We get another choice. I’ll not screenshot all of them from now on. We choose to “confront Dein”. “I just overslept today. I’ll do better than you when it really counts.”Dein: “Hmph! If you’re gonna talk the talk, you’d best walk the walk. Show us what you’ve got.” Dein: “I’m not your typical Corps trainee! Keep that in mind!”  We get the first of this game’s “nicknames”. They’re little titles you get for doing stuff like sidequests or seeing certain cutscenes. They have absolutely no function, although getting all of Lang’s does earn you an item later. “Swordholder”, as described in game, is “A non-title for a swordsman who’s never seen battle”. Great. We get this one no matter what we say to Dein, so you know. Dein: “Hmph! Listen, KID! I’m older than you! Show some respect to your elders!” We move on from talking to Dein. Marcus:: “Late from Day One!! Lang!! Be on time tomorrow!” This game sure does love its multiple exclamation marks. Understand that in most cases, I’m transcribing these directly, excessive exclamations and all.  Boerto is here, chatting up Edouard. He offers us another dialogue choice. I choose “no big deal”. “The monsters around here? They’re nothing. Corps work is nothing special.”Boerto: “Don’t talk like that. The safety of the town is in your hands. What could be more important?” Boerto: “Judging from his looks, you might not think so, but the Captain is very skilled. One day you might take his place.” drat, wonder if Galvan knows Boerto thinks he looks like a moron? Edouard: “Lang, you overslept on your first day!? Get it together man!” Edouard: “I have faith in you, brother. Good luck!” We talk to Nancy, seen tending the wee garden above. “Why hello there, sleepyhead. I thought Father called for you. Maybe you should, um, go and see him?” “Or you could always make yourself useful and help me with some chores around here.”Another choice is offered. I offer to help Nancy. “Sure, I’ll help you.” “If you tried to help me, it would create even more work for me!”We just can’t win. “Did you go to see Father? He’s hopping mad.”Despite Nancy’s urging, we decide to goof off and visit the town.  Shaun here is an elderly man sitting inside a house/barn. Shaun: “Aha…You’re starting today in the Vigilance Corps.” Shaun: “Your job is very important to Nohl. Bless you, child. And good luck!” Shaun: “Hmm…it’s a beautiful day. A perfect day to go out and work.” Some of these dialogues are from the second time you talk to them, hence this relative non-sequitur from Shaun.  This ladder in the barn can be climbed, but goes nowhere. Could this be some kind of mystery? A late game secret you return for after beating the final boss? Nope.  Outside, we find Joanne, who stands around raking her little field. Joanne: “Hmph! Does that mean you won’t be helping out at my shop anymore, hmmm??” Joanne does not actually own a shop, unless she happens to be the proprietor of the ones we’ll see later. She probably means her farm. Joanne: “Sheep look quiet and peaceful, but they’re actually quite quick.” Speaking of sheep, we can “talk” to the one behind her, unlike all her other animals. “It looks so soft…Maybe if I got on it…”We are then presented with the choice to hop on or not.  Our protagonist, everyone. Sometimes this game is incredibly banal, othertimes zany and batshit insane. Joanne offers no commentary on our molestation of her sheep.  To the west of Joanne are these kids. Koko admits to her wrongdoing instantly. Elukk: “This is my area! Get out!!” The other kid just tells us to sod off. We oblige, if only because we are presented with no dialogue option to backhand this sassy child.  In the western most house, we find Monde. Monde: “Humans need to work. You have to work if you want to eat. Isn’t that right?” Monde: “Working hard, dripping sweat every day. This is what life is all about!!” Clearly, Monde must be a very hard worker himself, no?  Further into the village, we find these two housewives chatting away. Eva: “Make sure you don’t turn into a person like my Monde, Lang! He’s not half the man he says he is!” Good heavens, to think Monde lied to us about being an industrious man! What a terrible twist of fate! Eva: “I wish I could just lie around like Maxell…What does he do all day be the lake?” Now we talk to Jill… Jill: “The hunting trip yesterday was a big success. Boerto told me all about it, the silly man. Why hello there, Lang!” Jill: “You’re starting today? Vigilance Corps is tough work! You take care, you hear?” Jill: “Maybe I’ll whip up your favourite, a nice roast lamb!” For shame. This game gives you myriad dialogue options to tailor your character’s personality, but can’t even be bothered to let you pick your favourite food.  Here we meet the Maxell that Eva mentioned. Maxell: “I catch the fish from the lake…They’re very fresh.” Either Maxell is lying, or Eva doesn’t realise fishing involves a lot of sitting around waiting for fish.  Hildyn: “Has it already been a decade? 10 whole years since Galvan found you at the lake…” Hildyn has just clarified that we are the adopted child of Galvan, who found us mysteriously next to the lake. Can you see where the game might be going with this? Note that this also makes Nancy our adoptive sister. Can you see where the game might go with that? Hildyn: “What a fine young man you have become…” Hildyn: “Lang…Galvan must think of you as a son…”  Inside a nearby house is Hanna. Hanna: “You used to be a naughty little boy…Now look how you’ve grown…sob…” Yes, “sob” is part of the dialogue. Maybe she actually said “sob” as a word? Hanna: “Let’s hope nothing happens today.” What are the chances of something significant happening to the protagonist’s hometown?  Mallory runs the item store. Mallory: “Ah! Starting with the Vigilance Corps today? I’m so proud of you!” The game obviously expected you to talk to her from the front first. Mallory: “This is the best item shop in town! Medicines, foods…you want it, we got it! Take a look around, my child!” It’s the only item shop in town, Mallory. The only other “shop” is for weapons and armour. Mallory has nothing special, just healing items, an instant retreat scroll, and one that lets you identify enemies. She gives us a pedometer as we leave. Naturally, it records all your in-game steps. You can get a nickname out of this pedometer, but I’m not sure what else.  Inside the weapon’s shop, we first find this little girl….swatting at the shelves with a….brush? It’s hard to make out even when you don’t take garbage quality screenshots like me. Anyway, we talk to the man at the counter. Haddam: “Ah, Lang! First day on the job, eh? Choose your weapons carefully!” Haddam sells only one weapon. It seems all the store keepers here have limited cognitive abilities. Joanne doesn’t even realise she doesn’t own an actual shop.  With Aston blocking the gate, the only thing left to do is to finally talk to Galvan.   More casual abuse. “…tsk! You pull something like that tomorrow, and there will be no supper for you!” “…Never thought I’d see the day that I’d be working with you.” “That little snot-nosed kid is now a little musketeer wannabe…you’re all grown up.”Small spoiler: we will never see anything akin to a musket in this game. “Nancy, on the other hand, has grown up rude and brusque…probably from living with all these fellas.” “She should act a little more ladylike…really…”You think Galvan became a big sexist from living with all these fellas? Hawke: “Lang, come here.”  Hawke: “Once you have a job, it means that you must be a responsible member of society.” I guess Monde never got a job.  Hawke: “The lake is always pure and fresh…Because that stone keeps it so.” Hawke: “The Aqualith…That miraculous rock sustains the life of this town.” Hmm, a magic rock/crystal associated with a specific element, that sounds awfully Hawke: “We must never forget our gratitude! Not just for the lake, but for Hunter’s Wood, the sky, everything!” “That’s right, Dad.” “So work hard, and don’t forget to be grateful!! That’s the point!” “Never forget that, Lang!” “Today we’re patrolling Hunter’s Wood! You’re coming with us, so get all your stuff ready!” “Once you’re ready, come to the town gates. Dein and Marcus: are already there, so look for them. What are you waiting for?” “Yes, I understand.”We are now free to leave. There’s little else to do in town, aside from see how the villagers have shuffled about.  With Maxell out of the way, we can now stare at the Aqualith.  Nancy is here to see us off at the gates, in an oddly cheerful fashion. “Gosh, hurry up!” “It’s your first day. Did you get everything you need?”You can say no, but that just means letting you go back into town. “Yeah, I’m ready to go.” “Are you sure? I bet you don’t have medicines and stuff on you!”She says this whether you have medicines or not, and gives you some. This prompts another dialogue choice: either be grateful, or get annoyed. We act grateful. “Hey, thanks for everything.” “Huh…What’s gotten into you?” “I’m just…making sure you don’t cause problems for everyone else!” There’s a word for this kind of behaviour in anime-related media. I think you all know the one. Galvan shows up after this.  Everyone turns to leave. “Oh, Lang? “Don’t overexert yourself! If you get hurt, come back and rest a bit, okay?....Now get going!” She shoves Lang out the gate. “Good luck, Lang!”We are automatically transported to “Hunter’s Wood”. Now Playing – Wind, Trees and Water (This track was lifted from Legaia 1)  The Japanese can be transcribed as “Kariba no Mori”. Technically referring to it as a place for hunting more than for people that hunt, but that’s just me being a pedant. “You’ve never been here before, have you, Lang?” “This is Hunter’s Wood.” “The people of Nohl depend on this forest and its living creatures for sustenance.” “But you’ve got to be careful…It may look peaceful, but there are monsters in this forest!” “And that’s where we come in.” “But relax. The monsters around here aren’t much of a threat. No need to get too worked up about it.” Dein: “A rookie like him might get eaten right away.”  An interesting trend begins here. Up till now, dialogue choices were all offered normally, but here, we get choices based on what we’ve said so far. Because I’ve been picking cocky answers, we get to say this to Dein; “Shut it, Dein! I can take care of myself!” “You just worry about you. And make sure you don’t hold the rest of us back.”Now, if you were a big wuss before coming to the woods…  You get a different option that amounts to pissing yourself with fear, and the confident answer isn’t even there (“modestly” is only slightly less pitiful than “I don’t want to die!”). Although this game is pretty bland overall, and the choices don’t matter too much in the long run, this is an interesting idea that must have taken a bit of effort to put in. The game will continue to offer little differences like this. Anyway, back to our confrontational response… Dein: “What?! Would you listen to this crap? Somebody hold me back before I beat him down!” “Leave him alone, Dein. Remember your first time? You were shaking in your boots.”Dein: “Me?! No way! Captain, come on! I wasn’t scared!” “Yeah, well…If you say so.”Dein: “drat right!” Dein: “Look, Captain. We’re going on up ahead.” Dein: “Come on, Marcus:. Let’s make this a quick trip – in and out!”  Marcus shrugs before leaving with Dein. “*sigh* What a guy.” “Well, follow me, Lang.” “I’ll give you a few pointers on what we do out here.” We are now free to explore the woods. However, this is where I will end this Chapter 0, as it’s long enough as is and we haven’t even made a few key choices. I want you guys to vote on two things; 1. What should the main character’s name be? “Lang” is the default name, but we can call him whatever we want. 2. What shall our personality be? This game has a whole slew of variations depending on the little dialogue choices you make. It would take a lifetime to play the game while getting you guys to vote on every possible choice, so you get a single vote now for a binding personality through the whole game. Option 1, a Nice Guy. No, not that Nice Guy. This will entail us being as polite, humble and kind as we possibly can in game. We will not do anything like threatening to hurt people who reject our advances. Option 2, a Cocky Hero. We take all the aggressive options in response to people we don’t like (Dein) and act like a nice guy to our allies. We might get a lot of opportunities to insult people real bad. Option 3, a Jerk. Basically like above but we’re mean to everyone. We might refrain from some of the creepier things we can do, though. Option 4, a Creepy Wimp. Meaning we’ll go through the game picking all the worst options. We’re cowardly in the face of danger, and creepy to everyone we can. We will have a cliché anime bathhouse scene in this game, and this option will have us peek. (No, there’s no actual nudity in this game that I’m aware of. There’s only one thing that comes close, and you’ll be hearing a lot from me about it when it comes up.) Choose wisely, for it will colour the tone of this whole Let’s Play. LJN92 fucked around with this message at 00:26 on May 8, 2021 |
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Apr 6, 2021 01:00
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Lang and Cocky Hero are my picks! I played this back in the day, but remember next to nothing about any of it, only getting stuck at some point and coming to the conclusion the game wanted me to grind for rare drops from enemies. So I'm curious to see just what it was I played.
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Apr 6, 2021 01:23
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The default name of Lang suits him well. I'm going to take the Paragon route and pick Nice Guy as well. I'm always up for seeing how people take a bit of a poke at an old RPG. I've heard of Legend of Legaia in passing a bit, never found out what it was like though. I certainly hadn't heard of the sequel, so new experiences.
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Apr 6, 2021 01:57
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Lang's good enough a name. And call me old fashion, but I like my heroes to be good people, so make him a Nice Lang. As for my thoughts on the game, eh, the plot wasn't bad enough for me to remember most of it. On the other hand, it didn't have the quality to actually make me remember most of it. Outside of the battle system and a couple of random things this game was incredibly forgettable. And what was memorable... well, I'd better wait on that.
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Apr 6, 2021 06:59
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Lang, Cocky
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Apr 6, 2021 15:16
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Lang, cocky The other options sound really annoying tbh
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Apr 6, 2021 16:24
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Lang is fine; let’s be nice. These screenshots do not look that crisp but they’re readable. Good luck, and I look forward to future updates.
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Apr 6, 2021 17:03
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Lang, cocky.
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Apr 6, 2021 17:24
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I feel like I'm one of the few that actually liked Legaia 2 - but it gets a lot better if you treat it like a campy B-movie plot, rather than anything special. Lang + Cocky gets my vote. I've been Nice too long, I want to see what the other options are like. That said, as mentioned before... Might do to poke at some of the options for rendering. I'm no wizard for suggestions, but just as a minor personal gripe... This picture right here? I've played the game, and even I had myself going "Are those letters s or x?".
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Apr 6, 2021 18:41
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Lang + Cocky gets my vote as well. I played this game long ago, but I don't remember anything other than some characters and that I had a bunch of fun with the battle system in the end-game. And yeah, might wanna look into getting the screenshots at least a bit clearer. It's readable, but some letters do seem to basically turn into mush.
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Apr 6, 2021 19:20
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Thank you everyone for your interest, I'll endeavour to keep you guys entertained.Magic Fanatic posted:This picture right here? I've played the game, and even I had myself going "Are those letters s or x?". Yeah, I was a little worried with how those screenshots turned out. Now, as I said, I'm a bit limited in how much I can do to boost quality here, but I tried something...  You think this will do? One thing I've noticed is the emulator tends to make the graphics shift depending on where I am in the game, so that could be a big problem for me going forward.
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Apr 6, 2021 21:21
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Nice Lang. I have very fond memories of the first Legaia. I've never seen this though. Barely related or not, I'm interested.
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Apr 7, 2021 03:54
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Chapter 1 – The Crabby Woods The majority has decided that our main character shall retain his default name, Lang. He will be a Cocky Hero, not afraid to brag and call his enemies names, but also not a complete rear end in a top hat to everyone he meets. This changes little about the choices I made in Chapter 0, so there’s no need to go over all that again. Where we left off last time, Galvan was just about to show us the ropes in Hunter’s Wood.  Galvan won’t even let us leave the woods until we’re done with the tutorial. So, on we go, but we don’t go far before…  Now Playing – Fragments of Soul We run into our first enemies. They’re called “Klaw Ants” but they should really be crabs. You’ll figure out why in due time.   And thus Galvan starts our tutorial. However, rather than simply detailing his tutorial, I am instead going to take the opportunity to detail the gameplay for you in my own way. Combat As this is an RPG in the style of Final Fantasy and others like it, most of the actual gameplay takes place in random battles. Like other RPGs, these battles play out in turns, where you pick what your characters do for said turn, and the enemies also pick their actions. Like most other RPGs (man I’m going to be saying this a lot), whether your characters act before the enemy is a matter of whether their statistics are higher than theirs. Sometimes this can mean the difference between killing and being killed. What’s not like other RPGs is how you preform attacks in Legaia 2.  Your primary means of attack is this system. You pick directional attacks (up, down, left, right), and the character will swing in that direction for their attacks. It’s difficult to adequately describe in text. You are probably wondering what the point of the different directions is. First and foremost, some enemies can only be hit with certain directional attacks. Encounter a flying enemy? Downwards strikes don’t connect. Encounter a particularly short enemy? Upwards swings go over their head. Some enemies are so short left and right swings won’t even hit. In Hunter’s Wood, this doesn’t matter because no enemies you encounter can’t be hit with all the attacks, so you won’t even realise this until you get later into the game. Galvan doesn’t explain the possibility either. You might think you can just constantly use whatever attacks hit the enemy in question, but you’d be wrong… Arts In the image above, you can see “Art Blocks” mentioned. That’s because the real purpose of these blocks is to let you perform “Arts”. They are essentially special attacks that do more damage than regular attacks. In the first tutorial, nobody even uses any Arts, and Lang doesn’t have enough Blocks to do them. However…  Lang gains a third Art Block upon levelling up. You can see the pattern here; you gain Art Blocks by levelling, and thus can perform more attacks in one turn. We are quickly given the chance to use our new abilities.  We run into some “Bloody Wolves”. This is our second tutorial fight, where Galvan introduces us to the concept of Arts.  Our first Art is “Blue Moon Buster”. See, if we were attacking certain enemies, the attacks in that combination might not hit, but we’d still need to perform them to use the Art. I can’t remember if certain Arts can miss too, but we’ll find out. Blue Moon Buster Demonstration That video should give you a good idea of how attacks work in general, as well as how Arts work as a concept. Every time you learn a new one, you get the “New Art” cut-in.  Moving on, we are introduced to “Super Arts”. As expected, Super Arts do more damage, but also consume AP. No AP? No Super Arts. So the basic formula becomes performing regular Arts to build up AP, then executing Super Arts to deal more damage. Sandstorm Demonstration All this is really quite unique as far as RPG battles go. Of course, the whole system is lifted from Legaia 1 with a handful of touch-ups. At first, one might think it’s an interesting and innovative way to do battle, and you’re not wrong…at least at first. The problem lies in the fact that the novelty of the system wears off. Eventually, the flashy moves become repetitive and you just want to get through the battles faster. As you get stronger, you unlock more Art Blocks and perform more Arts as well as longer Arts. Right now, the enemies are easily dispatched, but as the game goes on the enemies will require more effort to beat. Not tactical effort, but sitting through long Art chains until they die. It’s even worse if you don’t know the right tricks to boost your damage output. All in all, the Legaia combat system has its moments, but in the scheme of things, it will start to bore you. Here’s a general video on what to expect from encounters. Now I want to take a minute to talk about something else… Voice Acting If you checked out those demonstration clips, you’ll have heard both of our current party’s voices. Everything in a battle instance is fully voiced in Legaia 2. The Arts, the grunts, you name it, it’s voiced. As you might have noticed, the characters also say things for certain actions, like; -At the start of a battle. -Defeating an enemy. -Delivering the final blow in a battle. -Getting knocked down. It’s impressive that they put this much voice work into the game, especially considering this is definitely a low budget title. As for the voice quality, however… -Lang’s is fine. The actor sometimes wavers between a more youthful sound and a deeper voice, but it’s certainly not bad. It just so happens it’s Cam Clarke that does his voice, and I can barely tell. -Galvan just sounds so goofy. I can’t even tell what the voice actor was going for with him. It’s hard to take the character seriously, imagining any of his lines with that voice attached. As in all things with Legaia 2, the quality will wildly vacillate from here on. Anyway, back to the game, maybe? The tutorial battles are easily won, but before going any further, we can actually leave the forest now.  In Legaia 1, you had a traditional world map to move over, with random battles as you went from one place to another. Legaia 2’s is much simpler, where you just automatically move between locations on the map. No encounters happen, you just move to the icon on the map and click to go in. For now, all we can do is go back to Nohl, where we can buy more items, maybe some new weapons and armour. Either way, one must eventually carry on with the game.  Galvan introduces us to our main mission: culling the local population of Klaw Ants.  We spot one down the trail. It runs away…  Leading us into a terrible ambush! I’m just kidding. These things don’t do anything unless you touch them. Each Ant represents a battle with 3 Klaw Ants, so we kill 9 total. When all the Klaw Ants are beaten, we are expected to go find another batch of them elsewhere. We decide to goof off a bit instead.  Along the way, we encounter the only enemy not to show up in a tutorial: the “Flytrap”. These things take more than one round to kill, and can poison you, so they present a mild stumbling block compared to Klaw Ants.  We find Dein standing around here. ”Well I don’t see YOU doing any work, Dein!”Dein: ”That’s because you’re too green to notice I’m keeping watch for Marcus. Hmph!”  ”drat, imagine Dein turning out to be full of it. What a surprise.”We leave Dein and Marcus be, and go find the rest of those Klaw Ants.  This time, we find 5 groups, meaning a total of 15. But no matter how many are present, we easily beat them all.  Galvan brings our adventure to an end for the day. As we all know, this is the point in any adventure where we calmly go home and nothing significant happens, right?  What a twist!  Marcus: “That thing…! Never seen…anything like it!” “Shh. Don’t talk now. He’s in bad shape.” “Lang! I’m going to bring Marcus back to town.” “We’ve got to get him some help right away. Or else…he isn’t going to make it.” “Dein’s still somewhere in the forest. You look for him. When you find him, bring him back to town.” ”Now hold on a minute. I know I’m pretty awesome, but this thing just took on two of our number and left them for dead. Isn’t it better if you, the supposedly most powerful here, go make sure Dein’s okay? I can take Marcus back.” ”That would make more sense, wouldn’t it?”  “Eh, whatever. I can probably take this thing. It’s not like beating DEIN is impressive.”We are left alone to go find Dein. At this point, we can still encounter enemies.  We must fight alone now, but it’s not too hard. The game tends to hand out healing items generously in Hunter’s Wood too.  Dein isn’t far away from where Marcus was found.  “Marcus is hurt really bad. Galvan took him back to town.”Dein: “So that’s it, huh? Went off and left me, did they? It figures…*cough*” “Dein!! Here, lean on me. Come on! I’ll help you back to town.”Dein: “Leave me alone! I don’t need your help! *groan* *cough*” ”What was that? I couldn’t hear you over the sound of your near death experience.”Dein: ”Shaddup! You’re so green, you can’t even tell I’m just faking it!” All of a sudden, something is watching Lang from the tree line. A cacophony of sounds erupt: shaking trees, birds chirping wildly.  ”Dein, that’s not true. You’d be holding me back even if you weren’t hurt.”Dein: ”HMPH!” Dein: “Save yourself, Lang. Get away while you still can!” Lang simply turns to face the noises. Dein: “Hey…! What are you…? What do you think you’re doing? Cut it out!”  At first, all we see is feet. Then it slowly advances on Lang.    Now Playing – Inevitable Fate We must now do battle with the mother of all crabs.  In this phase, it primarily attacks with its claws. Until…  Lang slices off its right claw with cutscene power. It is reduced to slapping us with one claw, but it’s far from toothless.  Venom can cause the poison status, of course. It’s pretty trivial here, and I don’t even cure it in my demonstration video.  Lang hacks off another claw. This is actually bad for us, because now the Gather Crab will only use Venom, hitting harder than its two claw combo. It will also start doing this…   When I called it the “mother of all crabs”, I wasn’t being metaphorical. See why the ants should be crabs now? They’re literally born from a crab! Not that I know what kind of crab this thing is meant to be. Eventually, Lang Sandstorms the Gather Crab into submission.  Click the image below to watch the Gather Crab Boss Fight Note that the above is an example of me playing very inefficiently. I needed to get fresh footage for the boss fight and neglected to prepare for it, resulting in a very long and difficult fight. It is possible to make it much easier, but this video proves you can win even if you rush into it. Moving on…  The game sees fit to remind us that the Gather Crab is dead.  ”drat, if I didn’t know any better, I’d think you needed my help, Dein.” Lang starts carrying Dein away. Dein: “But let’s get this straight, Lang…You listening? *cough*” Dein: “*groan*…Don’t go thinking I owe your or nothing!” Dein: “I could have taken that monster if I wanted to. Easy! *cough*” ”Sure, buddy. Now let’s get you back to Grandpa Hawke so he can fix all the new holes you made today….” We find ourselves at home with Dein and Galvan. “…First Marcus, and then even Dein…” “Hey Lang, that big monster you were talking about…did you really take it down yourself?”We can either answer “honestly” or brag. Of course, we really did take it down alone, so is it really bragging? We are cocky, so we choose to “brag”. “Leave it to me! I can handle a monster that size!” ”I didn’t even buy any of Haddam’s gear to do it! Am I awesome or-“ Galvan slaps Lang down for his arrogance. “Don’t let your ego get the better of you, you little punk!” “You were lucky this time, but one small mistake and you could be dead meat!” “But I’m glad you escaped with only minor injuries.” “Good work, Lang. Keep it up…now go to bed early. You have to do it again tomorrow.” ”drat right I’ll do it again….”We are now free to roam Galvan’s house. We can actually go outside, but nobody’s around at this time of night. All doors are locked.  Marcus” “Before I knew what was happening…How’s Dein?” ”He’ll live. But I won’t let him live this down.” Aston presents us with another opportunity to brag. “Yeah! That thing was huge!...No match for me, though.”Aston: “…Well, then…You should still be careful.” ”You all doubt me, but it’s a true story!” “Is it true you took down some huge monster?”We get to brag. Again. “Heh! Amazing, huh? I did it all by myself! Alone! Just me!” ”What!? No! He wasn’t even there! That bastard, trying to steal my thunder….” “Don’t get cocky, Lang. You’ll get hurt that way.” “…Now go to bed. If you oversleep again, I’m not going to help you!” ”Okay, whatever, I’ve had enough of you doubters. Lying bastard Galvan….”We finally go to bed. But we do not sleep soundly…  Could it be the effect of the Gather Crab’s toxin? Now Playing (Sorta) – Repressed Past (I swear the above track isn't quite the same as the one that plays in game)   Has Lang been transported somewhere?  A mob is gathered around someone. Someone they just killed. Mob: “Kill the Mystics! They’re monsters!!” Mob: “You Mystic!! You cursed creature! Foul monster!” Mob: “Everybody! There must be some still left somewhere!! Find them!!”   Lang sees a boy next to him. A boy with a mark on his hand. Mob: “Hey! Look at the mark on his chest!! He’s one of them! He’s a Mystic, too!!” They noticed the bo-wait, no, the boy’s mark is on his hand…  They’ve seen Lang. Mob: “Aaaah!! Get him! Kill him!!” ”Pfft, bring it! I killed almost 30 Klaw Ants, 5 Bloody Wolves, a Flytrap and a huge crab today! I can take you guys!” ”You guys can teleport? That might be a problem…”  And then everything goes black. “Lang!!” It was all just a dream. “What happened? You were thrashing around.” I think the game gave Lang a “jerk” response here because it interprets taking all the bragging answers as being an rear end in a top hat. This is despite picking all the options to be nice to Nancy. The dialogue choices are pretty arcane to work through, and you can’t be sure which response gives what outcomes. “Someone’s in a good mood!! You were probably remembering what happened today and cowering!” ”You mean today, where I killed a giant enemy crab all alone?” “Go to bed! If you oversleep tomorrow, you don’t get fed!”After Nancy leaves, Lang ruminates on what just happened to him.  He sees someone that we didn’t see in his dream….or did we? Lang tries to make sense of what he just experienced before passing out. And that is where I shall leave this update. Join me next time, where Lang’s dreams come to life. LJN92 fucked around with this message at 07:22 on Jun 3, 2021 |
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Apr 7, 2021 04:58
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First boss gives you one character, has a move that takes off 1/3 of your HP, makes adds and also poisons you? Kinda loving mean all told.
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Apr 7, 2021 11:26
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Seraphic Neoman posted:First boss gives you one character, has a move that takes off 1/3 of your HP, makes adds and also poisons you? Kinda loving mean all told. On one hand, I didn't prep for that fight properly, so it's not as bad as it seems. On the other, you do have to put in a bit of effort to make it more manageable. I remember getting destroyed by this boss as a dumb kid. But prepare yourselves, because it only gets meaner from here.
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Apr 7, 2021 11:41
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I have to admit that I actually liked this game better than Legaia. Well, okay, maybe I like some parts of the game better. Legaia had some really good creepy points and was interesting. Legaia 2 had better puzzles, imo, and I actually got to the end without being stuck on a certain boss in 1 who hated all life and people. Both are severely unknown.
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Apr 7, 2021 14:38
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LJN92 posted:All in all, the Legaia combat system has its moments, but in the scheme of things, it will start to bore you. Yeeeeah, that's one way to put it. While you're early on so the combos don't take too long and you're trying out new things to figure out what works best? Great system! Once you've got everything worked out for your standard moveset and the attacks animations just keep going and going? I was literally reading a book during the battles in the final dungeon.
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Apr 7, 2021 16:28
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Chapter 2 – Lang meets his Dream Boy Where we last left off, Lang had just had a strange nightmare. Lang wakes up the next day, seemingly no worse for wear.  Nancy is the only person we can talk to before things really kick into gear at Casa Galvan.  ”So yeah, Galvan, we need to talk about you're a big fat LIA-” Monde interrupts everyone before anything can happen. Now Playing – Decadence and Corruption (Considering both the name and where this track is used later on, this is a weird one to play for this scene)  We are immediately taken outside, where the whole village has gathered around an injured Boerto. Jill: “My husband…will my husband be all right?” “….This is…very severe. I’ll need to get Dad on this.” “…..What happened….? Monde…” Monde: “No…that was no….it was not a man, it was…a demon…” This section really highlights how much the game loves ellipsis. “Nancy!!” Nancy comes running with Aston in tow. “Nancy, Aston, you take care of the rest.” “Edouard!! Here we go!!”Edouard: “Go….where?” “Where do you think, eh?! Hunter’s Wood!!” As usual, this is a non-choice which only serves to flavour your response. We choose to assume we’re going. “Galvan!! I’m going too!” ”I mean why wouldn’t you take the guy that took down a huge beast single-handedly on a dangerous mission?” “I won’t be able to look after you today.” ”…yeaaaaah, not really a problem considering-“ “Be quiet, and do as I tell you. Stand by in town with Aston, got it?” ”Alright, whatever. It’s not like someone could die or something…”Edouard and Galvan then rush off out the gate.  “Come on, hold that!”Lang is conscripted into hauling Boerto back to Galvan’s house. Not that we see him do anything, as the scene ends here.  The next scene opens with Jill presumably awaiting her husband’s treatment. “Don’t worry about Mr. Boerto…He may not look it, but Grandpa Hawke was an excellent doctor once!” ”Yeah!! I did kill all those monsters in Hunter’s Wood yesterday.” “If you got all of them, how would this happen to Mr. Boerto?” “If you really did your job well, there should be no monsters in Hunter’s Wood.” ”Okay first of all, that place is a goddamn NEST. I could kill 100 Klaw Ants and they’d still be infesting the place. Second, Monde said it was a MAN. A demonic man, but a MAN. I don’t think even Monde is dumb enough to mistake a Klaw Ant for a dude…” Boerto: “As Vigilance Corps officers, we’re doing what we can…” ”Also Monde said it was a man. Maybe don’t forget it’s not my job to scour Hunter’s Wood for strange men?” “…I’m sorry. That was uncalled for. But…” “But this is too horrible….How could…” Hawke returns from treating Boerto. Jill: “Mr. Hawke!! My husband…Is my husband…” Hawke: “He’ll be fine, he’ll live….He should stay in bed for a while, but he should be okay.” Jill: “Sob….Mr. Hawke, thank you so much!” Yes, once again, “sob” is written like a word. It’s not even between asterisks like *COUGH*. Jill runs off to be by her husband’s side.  Hawke: “I see Galvan has gone out there…I hope that he is safe.” We are presented with a choice to either go after Galvan or wait. But as usual, this is a non-choice, because picking to wait just has Aston tell you to go. But cocky Lang does not wait for orders.  “Lang!! Weren’t you told to wait in town?” “Of course…I’m worried about Father and everyone else, but I won’t let you act selfishly!” ”Oh right, cause I’m being sooooo selfish by volunteering to risk my neck for Galvan and Edouard.”Aston: “…Fine. Lang, I’ll take care of things on this end. You go and help out the leader and the rest of them.” “Aston!!” Lang ends the conversation with naught but a pump of his fist. We are now free to move and talk to people. “Lang…Take care of yourself….”Aston: “…Don’t worry about the town…Just go and do what it is you must do….” Hawke: “Lang, you must be careful out there.” We can even talk to Dein, who is at least conscious now. Dein: “….Oh. It’s you….What’s up?” Dein: “….They got Boerto at Hunter’s Wood?.....this is a bad sign….” Dein: “I’m injured! What’s it got to do with me? I’m going to sleep!” ”Smooth, Dein. Watch out, or people might think you actually care about Boerto.”Marcus is also up. Marcus: “What in the world is going on…? What’s all the commotion about….” Marcus: “What?! At Hunter’s Wood again? What is going on?” Marcus: “I would go to Hunter’s Wood too, if I could stand.”  Jill and Boerto are in Hawke’s room. For obvious reasons, Boerto hasn’t got anything to say. Before you can leave the house, Nancy interrupts you.  “About Father….We’re counting on you.”Now nothing can stop us leaving. The townsfolk have all kinds of things to say now, but I’ll focus on a few key quotes.   As you might have guessed, it’s raining now in game. And as everyone is saying, it doesn’t rain much, if at all, in Nohl. That means there’s no way to replenish their water supply except via the Aqualith.  Despite rain being peculiar in Nohl, Maxell has apparently experienced enough of it to know how it makes him feel. Eventually, we must continue on to Hunter’s Wood Before we face the plot, however, let us discuss Arts once again. New Arts Obviously Blue Moon Buster and Sandstorm were not going to be the only Arts in the game. Other Arts can be performed with different combinations. How to learn what combinations do what, you ask? Trial and error. That is the only way other than using a walkthrough that you will learn new Arts, outside of a few NPCs that teach them. There are plenty of combinations that do nothing, so be prepared to waste a lot of time trying to learn them all naturally. With only 3 Art Blocks, Lang can currently learn only 3 new Arts: Hawk Stroke, Blade Dance, and Mountain Crusher. Click here for an Art Exhibition. Now, as I explained earlier, the general purpose of different directional attacks is to hit enemies in different positions, like flying ones or short ones. The kicker is you can get through this game without paying much thought to your attacks. After a certain point in the game, it was no longer necessary for me to worry if certain combos hit better than others, because you would usually do enough damage regardless. There are a lot of Arts in this game, and yet you will likely only use a handful of them. As for which are the best out of the ones we have? I’m really not sure. Damage output seems semi-random, so all the Arts appear to do the same damage. There’s little difference between using Hawk Stroke as opposed to Blue Moon Buster. So it comes down to which you prefer, or which fit better into long combos. But we don’t need to worry about long combos for a long time.  We find Edouard in basically the same place as Marcus. ”Wow, who would have thought that Galvan dragging someone else into this would get them as beat up as Dein and Marcus? Nobody could have seen this coming.” ”Hey Edouard, you at least conscious enough to lean on my shoulder…?” Unlike Marcus, Dein and Boerto, Edouard just straight up dies. Poor Edouard, we hardly knew ye. Right where we fought the Gather Crab, we find Galvan… Now Playing – The God of the Evil Ones   …suspended in the air, before an oddly familiar man.    Galvan gets chocked and slammed with telekinetic force.  Despite Galvan’s plea, Lang rushes in to save him.    The mysterious demon man blocks his path.  ”Alright, rear end in a top hat, let’s go! I’ll bury you right where we buried that crab!” I think you can all see where this is going.  Yes, this is an infamous unwinnable battle, common among JRPGs. After 3 rounds, we get a cutscene.        ^ Click the above image to see the Pure Embodiment of Power ^ I would like to take this moment to note that Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders, had been a manga for some time before this game was released, and the OVA series began release just a year and a half before. Make of that information what you will.   “You and I are of the same breed. You should know what that mark on your chest means!” “The same race?! You and me?”  If you hadn’t already figured it out, the game makes it very very clear for you. ”That mark! You’re the man of my dreams!” ”I think it’s a bit inappropriate to flirt with me, here and now.” ”No, rear end in a top hat, I saw you in my dreams last night!” ”Hmm? Oh, yes, I’ve been told I have that effect on other Mystics. Anyway….” “Have you seen a stone that looks like this?” “That stone…”Lang then thinks of the Aqualith.  “The lake…in town….is it? That’s quite near.” “To the town in your thoughts. There’s a sacred stone there that I’ve been looking for.” “When I get the final sacred stone, the old race will perish! And it will be the dawn of the new era at last!” “There’s no way I’m letting a guy like you…get anywhere near that town!” “You would protect the town…? But why?” “What possible meaning could that town and those people have to you? They’re utterly worthless. Surely, you agree?” “Agree?! With you? I’m not anything like the monster you are!!” “A monster? You call me…a monster?”  (My people! Killed mercilessly…Just because we have power…!)    “Exactly the same!”   Despite his outburst, it seems “Gold Eyes” didn’t mean to kill Lang.  “Galea…?”Igohl: “If you let him live, he’ll only get in your way.” “You think this man could get in my way?” “Nothing could be a threat to my power. Impossible.”“Gold Eyes” turns to leave. Lang struggles to get up.  But yet again, it all goes dark for Lang.  A strange, glowing thing urges Lang to awaken.   We get a vision of our dream man doing….something. “…Soon, it shall begin…!” Lang finally awakens, back home in bed.  Nancy enters, surprised to see Lang up.  “!! I have to get Father!”Nancy rushes out of the room, leaving Lang to ruminate on his fate once more. (…What happened? I thought…That monster!...My chest!...) (Not a scratch on me…Was it…Was I dreaming?....) “*sniff*…If you had died…I don’t know what we would have done…*sniff* I’m so glad!” “….Galvan..I…..”I just want to note that there are often more ellipsis in these scenes than I transcribe. “Aston got to Hunter’s Wood just in time. But too late for Edouard, unfortunately….” “I can’t believe you’ve been asleep for 5 days!” “We couldn’t find any wounds, but you wouldn’t wake up at all….You don’t know how worried we were!” “You must be starving, right? Of course you are, sleeping all this time! I’ll go make you something right now!”Nancy leaves again, and Lang tries to get up.  “You don’t look injured, but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing wrong with you. Take it easy and rest up.”Despite Galvan’s suggestion, Lang gets up and starts talking to everyone.  “I can’t believe it…Marcus, Dein, and now Edouard…” ”I know. I always thought Dein would be the first to go…” “The Corps is in shambles…*sigh*…” ”Nice to see you too, Dein.”Dein: “I was sure you were a goner!” “….The same goes for you, too.”Dein: “That’s too bad! If you died, I’d take some pretty flowers to your grave! *heh*” Dein: (From the looks of it, he probably just came to.) Dein: (That means he probably doesn’t know about the lake yet. Too bad, so sad…) Golly, what could he mean about the lake? “Wh, what’re you wandering around for!? You obviously have to take it easy! You were sleeping all this time!” “Are you hungry? I’ll whip up something nutritious for you.” “Hey, Lang….The lake…No, forget it.” ”How can you say something like that and expect me to ignore it!?” Marcus is outside, by a gravestone. Yes, Edouard’s gravestone. Marcus: “Edouard, dead…drat! I can’t believe it!! I’ll never forgive the bastard!!”  Either Shaun hasn’t been filled in, or he has mental issues. Maybe they just shove everyone with dementia in the barn…  Unlike all the other characters who danced around the issue, Monde comes right out and states the painfully obvious. Now Playing – Mist Capital   ”Monde kinda came right out and said it. Including who took it.” ”…I’m going to have to have a word with him.” Remember how everyone was talking about how it never rains in Nohl? Yeah. “The Corps is in shambles, the Aqualith’s gone…What’re we supposed to do now?” “The future isn’t looking too bright…”Lang returns to his room to ponder the situation.  Here, the game offers you a rare, genuine choice. If you choose “I don’t know…”, a non-standard game over plays, where Nohl slowly perishes of dehydration. Nah, who am I kidding? I made it very clear from the start that these choices don’t matter. If you choose to dither, Lang makes up his mind to go anyway. (But if I could only get the stone…!! I might be able to save the town!...But…Do I have any chance of winning? Against a man with such powers? Against that monster!?...) (Just…Just sitting here isn’t going to accomplish anything!....I’m going!!!!) And so our quest begins: retrieve our village’s sacred rock from a dastardly villain.  Everyone’s in their rooms, but we can’t go in. Every door is locked, including doors to houses outside. We have nothing to do but leave the village.  We are intercepted before we can leave. Cocky Lang comes right out and says it honestly. “I’m gonna get it back!...I’m going to track down that man and bring back the Aqualith!” “Finally, you wake up, and now…You really are a piece of work, boy!” “Father! Wait!!? I thought you were going to stop him!!” “And YOU!! He wasn’t…human! He was a monster!! How can you possibly hope to win!?” “Nancy…It’s not a matter of win or lose.” “There are times when a man just can’t back down. You must try and understand that.” “B-But…!” “Lang, take this sword with you.” “It’s old, but the blade still packs a punch! It’s not much of a parting gift for such an undertaking but I hope it proves useful.” “…You should also take this Wind Talisman with you.” “I heard from Aston that the man went towards Gale Canyon. You’ll need this to pass through there.”We get exactly what Galvan promised: the Wind Talisman, with a wee jingle to indicate it’s an important item. “Now don’t you worry about the town, you hear?...” “I might be in trouble, but leave it to me to hold down the fort while you’re gone!” “Father!!...*SIGH*….Men…” “Go do what you have to do! But…You’d better promise you’ll be back!” “If you…don’t come back…I’ll…I’ll NEVER forgive you…” “….I’ll be waiting for you, boy!! Godspeed!...” Finally, Lang leaves Nohl behind. That is where this chapter will end. Join me next time, where I explain why I said parts of this game make me want to puke! LJN92 fucked around with this message at 04:35 on May 8, 2021 |
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Apr 8, 2021 21:53
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why is everyone in this town such an rear end in a top hat
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Apr 8, 2021 22:10
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Dude is both a rip off of Jojos with his stand and of Raoh from Fist of the North Star.
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Apr 8, 2021 23:03
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Chapter 3 –Grind Canyon Where we last left off, Lang had set out from Nohl in the direction of Gale Canyon. Now Playing – Advancing to Far Away Places (Technically could have been heard a few times by now but I chose to plonk it here)  We could go there right now. Or we could just go back to Nohl.  Aston doesn’t mind that we left without saying a word.  Dein is naturally less than pleased to see us again.  Maxell introduces us to the first of a number of minigames in Legaia 2: Side Jumping.  He gives us a tutorial. It is….strange. To sidejump, you must first move the opposite analog stick from the direction you want to jump in the direction you want to jump. Then you move the other analog stick in the same direction. Then you have to release the opposite analog stick, and finally the same direction analog stick. Sounds like fun? Rather than following the game’s directions, however, I just decide to mash the keys.  I destroy Boerto at sidejumping. For winning, we get the “Sidejumper” nickname. What’s a bet you forgot those were a thing by now? We also get “Boost Oil”, an item that boosts all statistics by 10% for one battle. This is actually useful for boss fights and stuff.  Turns out Shaun really does have dementia. I must have been right about the barn.  Talking to Nancy initiates a small scene. “I was so worried about you! Are you all right? You’re not hurt, are you?” “And….The Aqualith…Did you find it?”We can either answer honestly or “pretend to have a lead”. Pretending is just pathetic, so Cocky Lang chooses honesty. “Uh…Actually I haven’t found much of anything…” ”I know I’m great and all, but even I’m not going to catch up to that demon guy on foot. Probably no harm in letting him go back to his base and THEN finding him.” “I see….Father sent you off with such confidence…” “But are you really going to get the Aqualith back from that terrible man? You might be killed, Lang…” “That’s true…But I can’t just sit here and do nothing about it!” ”Also he said he didn’t want to kill me before I passed out, so I might be safer than you think.” “…You’re right! You’ll never achieve anything if you’ve already given up in the first place! Uh-huh!” Galvan’s here too, but he doesn’t warrant a scene. “Did you find the bastard? And the Aqualith? Did you get it back?” “I’m sorry…I, I haven’t got it back yet…” “Oh!...N, no, it’s all right. I should be the one apologizing. I’m just a little edgy right now.” “There’s no need to feel bad about it, boy! I know you’re doing the best you can. What matters most that is you’re safe.” Basically, every time you get through a major plot event or dungeon or what have you, you can go back to Nohl (and other towns) and see optional scenes like this. As we get more party members there will be more scenes involving them too. This kind of stuff is my jam. Games that take the time to let you get to know the characters you’re playing as always earn points in my book. But we shall see exactly how well Legaia 2 handles this in the future. Anyway, it’s time to finally go to Gale Canyon.  The moment we step inside, we find a chest with a charm item. Equipment in Legaia 2 is pretty standard stuff for the most part. You have armour to equip for different parts of your body: the chest, the arms, and the legs. You also get slots for extra items, such as this Pickpocket Charm.  As you can see here, equipping certain stuff increases your “Weight”. If equipping something would take you over your weight limit, then the game won’t let you. It adds a small measure of strategy to what equipment you use, but it doesn’t matter much in the long run. As I will show you when we reach a certain point in the game, it’s not so hard to trivialise your equipment worries. As you might expect, the Pickpocket Charm lets us steal from enemies. But it doesn’t do so merely by equipping it.  Skills must be equipped. You have Offense Skills, that activate upon attacking, and Defense Skills, which are passive. You can only equip one of each. There are other kinds of skills that don’t need to be equipped, and instead enhance the character wearing the accessory, but we don’t have any of these yet. Now enough about items and skills: let’s get into the canyon.  Lang stands in the middle of the big tunnel of wind we saw coming in.   (It did make that sparkly effect, and Galvan told me I’d need it…..but then again, correlation does not equal causation, right?)Now we are free to traverse Gale Canyon.  Or not. Our attention is called to a scene elsewhere in the canyon. Now Playing – Eri and Mari   “Yes. That’s the only place we haven’t searched yet. What’s the matter, Bubba?” “Don’t tell me you’re scared? For a big, brawly guy, you sure are a wuss sometimes. Hee hee hee!” “It’s not his fault, Marienne. After all, he’s not a Mystic like us.” “Hee hee hee hee! You’re right of course, my brother.” “He may be big, but he’s just a regular human!” This is it. This is what makes me want to puke. If it wasn’t obvious, if I had not slapped my avatar there, you would be able to see Marienne’s underpants. “Panty shots” are rather ubiquitous in certain types of anime-related media. They’re often used as a cheap form of soft-core pornography under the assumption their viewers will enjoy such things. For anyone that doesn’t, they can be especially uncomfortable, not just because they’re examples of gratuitous sexual content, but because those getting their panties shown aren’t necessarily adults. Take Rosario Vampire: it’s all about high-schoolers that start at age 15, and it doesn’t once shy away from showing you their underpants. Marienne’s age is not explicitly stated, but she sure doesn’t look 15 (not that it would make this better). Lang is canonically 17, and Marienne will barely come up to his waist. One could make some argument about how she could just be exceptionally short and totally of a reasonable age, but that’s opening a whole new can of worms I don’t want to get into. I will fully admit that I don’t think the developer’s intention here was to fetishize a little girl (but I won’t rule it out entirely). My best guess is this is meant to be a joke. Like “Haha, she’s fat and ugly, her underpants are showing, and you have to look!” In the Simpsons movie, there is a scene where you see Bart’s penis. I didn’t find it very funny personally, but I can at least see the comedic elements: it occurs in the midst of a long scene where they go to lengths not to show you, only to casually reveal it as a shock. But we had no reason to expect to see a little girl’s underpants today. There’s no timing or exceptional circumstances here. The game just presents fat little Marienne’s underpants like it’s no big deal. And Marienne’s underpants will be shown far more than in just this one scene. The best I can say about this is it’s a really tasteless and stupid joke. The worst I can say, well… I think I’ve ranted about a little girl’s underpants long enough now. Let us move on to less creepy things. “And that nasty, little pet of yours! What do you call it? Elfa…Elfin?” (Pet!? Elfin’s not just a pet! Oh, now you crossed the line!) (You’re gonna get it, you little pig! I’ll make you pay someday!) “Hmm? You’ve got something you want to say, Bubba? I didn’t think so. Well, go on! Start searching!” “My sister and I are tired. If you find a Mystic, come back here and get us, OK?” “Didn’t you hear my brother?! I certainly hope you haven’t forgotten who saved you from a life in the dungeons, hmm?”  Bubba and Elfin head into the canyon.  And so does Lang. The translation is accurate as far as I can tell. Now Playing: Inaccessible Road  The most common enemies here are these “Baki”. They’re quick little things that can steal from you. But you can just get your item back by killing the Baki that took it. Interestingly, Baki come with different weapons. Some have clubs and swords, like the ones pictures above.  Others come with axes, like this one. Let me briefly explain a small game mechanic: blocking. While many games have blocking in some form, in Legaia 2 every attack in a chain can potentially be blocked. This includes Art attacks, so even if you hit every other attack, the Art can be blocked and you’ll do significantly less damage. Baki have a high chance to block attacks, but have such low health it’s not terribly annoying. They also hit like wimps.  Vultures hit a lot harder than Baki and can poison you.  Rock Golems are the meanest of the bunch. They take a lot of damage and hit hard. If there’s a generic enemy in this canyon that could give you a game over, it’s these assholes.  Curious. But we have no way of interacting with this right now.  This thing runs away from us as we approach.  But when we cross the gap, it suddenly wants to fight.   Or not. Lyps is a monster from Legaia 1, originally called a “Lippian”. Even if you’ve played Legaia 1, the Lippian was so insignificant it’s unlikely you’d remember it. Lyps will occasionally show up in Legaia 2 as random encounters. If you kill them, you get a valuable item, but as demonstrated they run away ASAP, so you have to be fast enough. It is nigh impossible to kill one here without grinding, so beats me why they made whole scene for one. Maybe they just felt it was that important you understood what a Lyps was all about? Eventually, we move on to the end of the canyon.   Now Playing – Elfin Elfin, Bubba’s “pet”, blocks the way. If you look up anything about this game, you will discover Elfin is notorious. She is the whole reason this chapter is named “Grind Canyon”. In a nutshell, Elfin will destroy you unless you grind to a certain level or get really drat lucky. Even if you buy all the armour you can at this point in the game, Elfin will still commonly deal 100-150 damage with every regular attack. Note I said regular attack.  You best guard every time Elfin uses this, or you’ll probably be destroyed in one hit. Even while guarding, Elfin can deal close to 300 points of damage with Maiden Passion.  This one takes away your AP, meaning you can’t use Super Arts until you get more.  Try as I might, I cannot defeat Elfin without grinding, and so grinding I go.  This area right here is burned into my memory. I spent so long as a kid, running between these two trees, trying to reach the level I needed.  That’s the sweet spot. With 4 Art Blocks, we can now preform a whole new slew of Arts. The best thing about these Arts is they give you two hits, meaning you actually hit the enemy 5 times total. This includes a bunch of new Super Arts, some of which can cause status effects, but I don’t recall ever getting them to work. Click here for the 4 Block Art Exhibition. With our new abilities, we manage to take down Elfin. Click below to see Elfin’s defeat.    “It just attacked me. It’s not my fault.” “…Elfin….” “Why you…I’m gonna…I’m gonna…”   “Ohoooo…? I never expected to find a Mystic way out here…” “How fortunate we are, Marienne!” “So true, my brother, so very true! What’s the matter Bubba? What happened to your little beasty?” “Ha ha ha! Don’t tell me it’s dead? That’s why you’re crying?! Ha ha ha ha! Bubba, you’re such a wuss!” “AARRGGGH! I can’t take it anymore! You little pig! I ought to…!” “I don’t think you understand your position. You don’t ever, ever, talk to me like that…” Marienne laughs and the siblings turn to Lang.  “But enough of him…That mark on your chest…You’re a Mystic, aren’t you, young man?” “You’re just like Marienne and I! Surely you can see that we’re nothing like that lowly human cowering over there, can’t you?” ”Yeah, you guys are definitely nothing like him…” “We’re looking for…people like us.” “People worthy of living in the paradise we’re going to turn this dirty world into.” “What do you say? You’re welcome to join us if you want. You’re very lucky we found you.” “That’s right! We treat our slav…I mean, subordinates very well!” I vaguely remember once getting the option to accept here, but I tried recreating it once before making the LP and failed. But as in all choices in Legaia 2, even if you accept, they just say something about how Lang looks weak and they need to test him in a fight. Anyway, we know which option Cocky Lang is picking.  ”First off, you, Purple Pants Boy? If you were to come out as gay, this game would have been cancelled for perpetuating homophobic stereotypes.” ”And you, fatty? I’d tell you to put on some pants, but I’m afraid they’d rip and I’d see MORE of your nasty underpants.” “Oh my! Hmm…Someone needs to learn some manners…” “Indubitably, Marienne. Don’t try to apologize now, young man, it’s too late!”  “You better be ready too, little man…”  As this battle is laden with opportunities to look up Marienne’s skirt, I am going to be showing as little of this battle as possible. There will be no full video of it to be sure. I will, however, show you this one cut scene that plays on the first turn. No panties there. Click below to cower and the power.        This battle is technically unwinnable. While Elliott and Marienne don’t hit that hard in general, they have special attacks that can easily destroy Lang if you’re not lucky. They also block a lot, so you’ll be doing very little damage to them.  Elliott and Marienne also introduce us to the fact that “Hyper Arts” are a thing.  Funnily enough, they’ll give you the impression these Arts aren’t very special. When we get some, however, they’ll hit for a lot more than this.      This is our introduction to Origin attacks. There’s no warning that they’re coming, unlike Elfin’s Maiden Passion, and they easily hit for 350-400 damage. This is over half Lang’s current health here. It’s very easy to get wiped out by these attacks. This here is Elliott’s Origin attack.      However, I decided to use All you have to do is take down either Elliott or Marienne. I pick Elliott because, as you might expect, taking down Marienne shows you more of her goddamn underpants.   “He’s just playing with us.” “He’s not even using the Origin.” “…You’re asking for it!”  “Don’t look at me. I can’t stop her.”   The last cut scene plays regardless of how you end the battle. Defeat Elliott, defeat Marienne, or just lose, and you get to see this.         I choose to just lose to them ASAP, as you gain nothing from any technical “win” you manage, and will waste a lot of healing items.  “He was certainly no match for us.” “Huh…?” “I think…I think he’s still alive!”  “He’s…mine! Let me finish him off! Let me avenge Elfin’s death!” “Oh, shut up. There’s nothing left for you to do, Bubba. Just be quiet and behave.” “Why don’t you bury your ugly little pet? I can’t stand the sight of it! Ha ha ha ha ha!”  “Hah! A lot of good it did him! He probably had it tattooed on!”Marienne starts stomping on Lang’s chest. Once again, we see far too much of her underpants.   “We’re going to break his spirit and turn him into a loyal subordinate!” “Absolutely! We’ll turn him into our loyal slav…subordinate!”   And there the scene ends. We had a hell of a time. First we had to grind to beat Elfin, then we got cut scene’d to death by the siblings, and the whole time we had to be exposed to Marienne’s undercarriage. Join me next time, where we finally get a new party member. LJN92 fucked around with this message at 04:41 on May 8, 2021 |
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Apr 10, 2021 01:25
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I remember hearing about legaia 2 years ago. Looking forward to seeing how much of a wreck it is.
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Apr 10, 2021 03:12
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Elfin... Is not indicative of the game as a whole, at the very least. I get the feeling either that when they were scaling this boss, they were expecting the player to just be a higher level naturally, or something happened in development that made them have to lower the EXP gained here, but they forgot to scale down the boss appropriately.
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Apr 10, 2021 08:12
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Well not a strong start to say the least.
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Apr 10, 2021 18:20
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Chapter 4 – The Fascist-Theocratic-Feudal Kingdom of Darakin Where we last left off, Lang had been captured by the dastardly Elliott and Marienne.  We awake here.  There’s nothing to do in this cell except save the game or interact with the door.  “Now, now, Marienne. She is a Mystic too after all…”We see Elliott and Marienne pass by the door’s window.  And someone else. Is this the “ugly little witch”? Unlikely, since they’re trailing behind the siblings. “Grr! You’re too soft-hearted, Elliott! Ugly!...little!....witch…!” Lang suddenly leaps back after something smacks against the door. “What? What’s going on…?” “What the…!! It’s you!!”  “I got permission, you know…Permission to get revenge…” “Revenge on you for killing my poor Elfin! You’ll taste my wrath!”   You wouldn’t know it, but this is actually a plot point.  We transition to Bubba beating up a Lang, who is doing his best Jesus impression.  “That’s just about enough, Bubba. He’s unconscious already.” “We’re going to make him our slave…um, I mean, servant, so we don’t want you to kill him.” “Are you really so upset over losing a pet?” “If you want, I could buy you a new one.” “El-Elfin wasn’t…just a pet…” “Elfin and I…were tied by the bonds of true live…! Elfin…! My poor Elfiiiiinnn!!” “*Sob!* *Blubber!!* You could never understand! How we felt about each other…!”This is the first time the game remembers to treat “sob” like a onomatopoeia. Bubba continues to beat on Lang, until…      “I understand how you feel, but that man is a Mystic. And you know I’ve told you time and again…” “…that Mystics are the messengers of the gods…” “Beings sent by the gods to bring eternal paradise to this world.” “A Mystic’s life is far more important than yours, let alone an animal’s life. Learn your place!!” “*Grr!*”Bubba backs off.  “You poor thing! What have they done to you?” “Well, are you awake now? Here, I’ll have your chains undone.” “You’re in the town I rule, Darakin. This is my castle, Doplin Castle.”This guy is called “Bishop Doplin” and his castle is “Doplin Castle”. It’s unclear if Doplin is his first or last name. If the former, he’s gone and named a castle after himself, which is very fitting considering what we’ll learn. If the latter, it implies Darakin is some kind of hereditary theocracy. What a place. “I’ll have to keep you prisoner for a while.” “Huh? Prisoner…?”     “We’re now going to train you to be our faithful slave…um, I mean, servant!”We get to respond. If we were a big wimp, we could cower and beg them not to hurt us. But Cocky Lang is no wimp.  “Is that any kind of way to talk to me?! You’re nothing but a monkey! Chee chee chee!” “It certainly is a fine mark he’s got there! I bet he holds quite an amazing Origin!” “That’s the thing, Bishop Doplin…He won’t show us his Origin.” “Maybe we should have gone a little easier on him…? Ha ha ha!” “Elliott, you’re too soft-hearted for your own good!!” “He’s just trying to make fools of us!!” “If I really got serious, I could make him do anything I wanted! You! Take that!!”Marienne starts poking Lang. With her underpants showing, as this game delights in ensuring.  “If he gets damaged before we show him to Avalon, he’ll be mad at me! Can’t have that!” “Avalon…?” “Yes, the greatest Mystic of all, chosen by the Supreme Origin.” “He is our leader! He’ll turn this chaotic, impure world into a true utopia!” “You’ll understand when you meet him. You’ll see his absolute power for yourself!” “Undo his chains and let him rest in the prison. He’ll be one of us in the future. Treat him well, do you hear?”Sure, Doplin, just leave it to the people who’ve been torturing Lang in front of you this whole time to treat him well.   “Oh, Velna! Ho h oho! Yes, I imagine Avalon will be pleased!” “Yes, I’m sure. I’ve made preparations for a celebration in the central building.” “Oh! A celebration, you say? How delightful! And you lot, come along!” The game ominously focuses on Velna’s face as Doplin and the siblings walk away.  Guard 1: “Great job, Mr. Bubba! And to think you were once a prisoner under a life sentence!” Bubba suddenly stops. Guard 1: “I-I’m sorry! That was rude of me! Please forgive me!”  Bubba dumps Lang on the ground.   “drat you!! You son of…!! I’ll kill you! Kill you!!”Guard 2: “Stop, please, Mr. Bubba! If you kill him, we’ll be blamed…!” “drat! I can’t stand this!! Can’t take it anymore! You guys take care of him!” This is also a critical plot point. Guard 1: “Whew! Mr. Bubba sure is in a bad mood today!”  Guard 2: “Are Mystics really worth all this fuss?” Guard 1: “Yeah, I wonder. Mr. Bubba broke the door to this room, so we can’t use it.” Guard 2: “Well, what’re you gonna do? Let’s put him in the room over there.” Lang is then dumped inside a nearby cell. But he is not alone…  Everything fades to black.     The girl makes some odd movements, as if troubled by something. Then she starts moving her finger on the ground…. Now Playing - Maya  This is our opportunity to name our new party member. Every party member in this game can be named, just like the protagonist. As everyone firmly decided on the default name for Lang, I’m going to go ahead and stick with the default name for Maya.   “My name’s Lang.” “You…? Can’t you talk?” *Nods* “Hey! That power…That power you just showed me! What exactly was that…?”   “Do not be frightened.” “You, too, are a….Mystic, are you not?”We’re given a choice of dialogue. We can deny it, ask what a Mystic is, or sort of confirm it. We choose to ask, because who wouldn’t want to know more? “Please tell me! Just what in the world is a Mystic anyway?!” “It is a being that holds an Origin, and embodiment of power, and the mark that binds that Origin to him.”Strangely gendered language, considering Rivas’ Mystic is Maya. “Embodiment of power? What are you talking about? Can’t you explain it any simpler?” “It is difficult, I agree. But even if you do not understand with your mind, I am sure your body knows…” “That mark on your chest…It is a symbol of your Origin.” “This mark is just a plain old birthmark! It’s not what you say it is! I’m no Mystic!!” “Stop saying that!! I’m NOT a Mystic, I tell you!!” “I do understand what you are feeling now. But all the same, you ARE a Mystic…” “Nobody can change that simple truth. Please accept…” “Shut up!! Go away!! Just disappear, why don’t you?!”  Rivas fades away at Maya’s behest, and they leave Lang to sulk about how he doesn’t want to be like THEM.  Maya goes to sleep, and sometime later, Lang decides he’s had enough.   He notices the wall. Specifically, where Bubba punched it.  (Hey! Maybe I can break it…!)Lang rears up to charge into the door…  (I think I’ll give it another try…)This whole segment makes you repeatedly click on the door. First just to find out it’s wobbly, again to charge at it, and you do that twice more just to break the door open. You’d think they could just make it one big scene?   (Not even Maya noticed and she’s-) (Oh, there she goes.) (Now, what should I do…about her…?) (It’s not my problem!! She’s a Mystic just like they are, anyway!) (I’ve got to get out of here…fast!!) (I bet they treat her pretty badly…Just like they treated me…) Maya seems to hesitate. “Come on. I’m not gonna leave you here.” Two gruelling boss battles into the game and we finally have our second character. We are now free to explore Dolpin Castle. Now Playing – Decadence and Corruption (This track first played when Boerto was injured. Odd overlap, don’t you think?)  Or at least whatever isn’t blocked off for now. Our only option right now is to go into this area’s basement.  ”So I figure you wanna hear how I got into this mess.” ”?” ”It’s a pretty epic story, so brace yourself. Anyway, it all starts when I slept in on my first day…” If we hang around near this cage, this thing jumpscares Lang.  ”I sure have been dealing with a lot of weird beasts and pets lately, Maya, let me tell you. First there was this giant crab, but it didn’t look like a crab…” We get our items back here. The game is kind enough to not force us to re-equip anything.  We find these weird vats in this lab. I’m reasonably sure the one in the centre is a Legaia 1 reference, specifically the first Seru beast you encounter.  You can drink all these coloured vials. The blue one restores MP but damages HP. The yellow one damages HP sevrely. The green one heals everything. The vials respawn upon re-entry, so they exist to let you heal in this dungeon. We head back upstairs.  ”…and Nancy tells me GALVAN claimed to have beaten it up first! Isn’t that the biggest load of bull you ever heard!?” ”…” ”Good talk.”  Welcome to every encounter in Doplin Castle save the boss fight. If you were thinking these fights would be far easier now that we have a second character, you’d be dead wrong.  Maya cannot attack. ”Quick, Maya! Use your wacky magic to blast the guards!” ”I am a Life Origin. I only give life.” ”Pure embodiment of power my rear end….”Fortunately, the enemies here are no threat whatsoever, so Maya can just guard all day while Lang does the work. Speaking of these enemies, they’re the first human enemies we’ve faced outside of boss fights. This means they have something more than grunting to do when they die. Commonly, you’ll hear them scream “LORD DOPLIN!” as Lang kills them. The only logical conclusion is that Doplin has enforced a Fascistic cult of personality around himself and inspired his mean to fanaticism. Makes sense, seeing how up his own rear end he is. Click here to have the words “LORD DOPLIN” burned into your memory. After defeating those guards, we move on and find these two chilling out in a side room.  Guard 2: “That Mystic we found in The Forest Maze? Yeah, she sure has some willpower!” Guard 1: “Capturing her was one thing, but would she ever really join our side? And how about that guy Elliott and Marienne brought in?” They then notice Lang is there.  Guard 1: “Hey, you!! How long have you been there?!” A fight ensues. They are easily beaten, like any other encounter here.  Here we find the first of this game’s readable items. You can access it through the menu, like so…  Darakin Rag: Established to weed out those so-called messengers of God, the unit has succeeded in identifying 2 Mystics this year! You know, Doplin himself said “the gods”, whereas this Rag says “God” singular. Darakin Rag: Bravo to Lord Elliott! Lady Marienne is also pleased with her bother. Oh, what a rosy future for our great kingdom!” Darakin, the kingdom without a king.  We begin a short, crude stealth segment.  The obvious idea here is to dash between hedges until you get to the other side. Getting caught just starts a fight with two guards. You are then forced back to the start of the maze. At first it seems like fighting accomplishes nothing…  But then, you will see less guards about. Eventually, there will be no guards at all. I have no idea if this is intended to be a crutch for people who can’t figure out how to stealth, or just recognition of you butchering your way through the castle. Eventually, we make it through to the central building. There’s a few rooms to explore there, but not much to do other than try to leave.   This lever lowers the drawbridge and enables our escape.  Ladies and gentlemen, it is time for the best part of this game so far. Now Playing - Knight's Kingdom   The man…  The myth….    The legend…     The MIGHTY Balken!  “If you consider yourself a real man…” This is the first and possibly the last time we’ll get to have a genuine duel with anybody in this saga. Title! Also, this is the first time your choice will have a meaningful impact on the gameplay. If you accept, you’ll actually fight the MIGHTY Balken alone. If you ignore him, Maya joins you as usual. Here’s what he says when you ignore him: “Alternate MIGHTY Balken” posted:
But Cocky Lang won’t wimp out on this challenge.   “If we had met under different circumstances, maybe we could have been friends, shared a drink or two…” “However! As you know…there can be no mercy when it comes to battles…Here I come!!” Maya is there only as a piece of the background. Unfortunately, as entertaining as the MIGHTY Balken is, this boss fight is piss easy compared to anything before it. It’s even easier if you have Maya to heal you. Every round, a cut scene plays, with the drawbridge closing, and the MIGHTY Balken chewing the scenery.  “However! Time keeps slipping away…” “Hmm?? Hurry! Hurry, I said!”It takes five rounds for me to defeat him with Lang alone. This lets us enjoy all of the MIGHTY Balken’s scenes.     The MIGHTY Balken is a MIGHTY ham and it is delightful to listen to.   The MIGHTY Balken hits us with this on the third round. Fortunately for us, the MIGHTY Balken is too slow to capitalise on this kind of damage.  “Ever since I was born to the Mesai clan as one of 3 boys…” If the MIGHTY Balken were a party member in this game, it would have been vastly improved, as far as I’m concerned.  “Have not the young nobles understood? You draw closer to your fated end…” “I shall speak of this battle, this encounter with the young nobles, for years to come.” “And now! As the crest of Saint Joprian is my witness…chivalry thrives within this body!”I could have ended the fight here, but there’s one more scene to see.  “Once the drawbridge is closed, there is nowhere to go!” “Embark on your journey to death!” Unfortunately, the MIGHTY Balken will have to tell the dead of himself personally…      As a parting gift to the young nobles, the MIGHTY Balken flattens the drawbridge with his MIGHTY body. A recognition of their feat of bravery and might. If we were to defeat Balken before the drawbridge closes, however, we get an alternative scene… ”Alternate MIGHTY Balken” posted:
Click the below image to see the young noble duel the MIGHTY Balken.  Guard: “Don’t let them get away! Raise the drawbridge!!”    Lang and Maya escape by jumping onto the top of the gate from the rising drawbridge. They can now escape across the rooftops.  “What is it? What an awful lot of noise! Do you have any idea what time it is?”Guard: “Yes, Highness! Apologies, Your Majesty! But the Mystics locked up in the annex escaped…I thought you’d want to know…” “Wh…what did you say?! You fools!!” “*Sputter!* What happened to Balken?! The Mighty Balken?!” “Looks like somebody escaped, Marienne. Maybe it’s that young man we captured today.” “*snort* A feeble boy like that? Escape? Ha! The guards or the Knights would just catch him and put him right back in prison!” “Ha ha ha! Yes, I’m sure you’re right, Marienne…”We cut back to Lang escaping. Eventually, he finds he has nowhere else to go…  Lang and Maya don’t get far inside before…      Sabrina: “Hey, you two…” Sabrina: ”Stay right here!” Sabrina and Nils go downstairs. We have no choice but to follow them.  Guard: “And I say they’re here! We’re searching the place!” Sabrina: “Hey! Stop! You’re going to scare off all my customers!” Sabrina: “You’re interfering with my business! Now get out of here, now!” Guard: “Dammit…! Oh, all right! But you haven’t heard the end of this!” The totalitarian police state guards give up in the face of potentially damaging commerce. Sabrina: “Nothing but a bunch of cowards! But they think they can lord it over people, anyway! Hmph!” Lang and Maya are now free to come out of hiding. Now Playing – Trust Tomorrow to the Wind  Lang and Maya seem uncertain. Sabrina: “Honey! Make us some of your specialty, would you?” The man at the stove signals affirmation.  Lang and Maya still seem uncertain. Sabrina: “Come on, now! Eat up! There isn’t any poison in it!” Maya starts eating. Lang follows suit shortly after. “Wow! This is great!!”Sabrina: “Ha ha ha! No need to wolf it down! There’s plenty more where that came from. Eat as much as you want!” The screen fades to black and transitions to a new scene.  “My name is Lang. And she’s Maya.” “We, um, well, you see…”Sabrina: “That’s okay. I know. You escaped from the castle, right?” Sabrina: “The only time those men come around like that is when that Doplin has given them some stupid order or other!” Sabrina: “What in the world are they doing in that castle, I wonder? Those idiots…!” Sabrina: “Not too long ago, a whole bunch of young people were conscripted up to the castle! Grr!! It makes me so mad!!” ???: “Yeah, you said it!”  Norton: “That guy took away my job, my house..! He even took my Sandy away from me!! *Sob!* My sweet Sandy…!!” (Wait, if a bunch of people got conscripted, and this Sandy was one of them, and I killed my way….uh oh…)Sabrina: “Everybody here hates the jerks up at the castle!” Sabrina: “I don’t know if they’re royalty or nobles or what, but they think they can do whatever they please! There’s no excuse for it!!” Not even this game’s NPCs are sure of the nature of Darakin’s government. Sabrina: “I knew as soon as I saw you two you weren’t like those people up at the castle!” Sabrina: “Now then! I’m sure they were rough on you up there…Why don’t you stay here tonight? It’s not much, but you can feel at home!” Sabrina: “Can’t use the room in the back. The door is broken. You’ll have to share a room. But you two look like you could get along okay!”  Basically, get embarrassed at sharing a room with a girl, or just get on with it. Cocky Lang gets on with it. “Thank you, Sabrina! We would like to stay!”Sabrina: “That’s the spirit! You’re young! Why hesitate? Seize the opportunity! And have a good rest!” Sabrina: “Your room is the first one up the stairs. Make yourselves at home!” Before we go to bed, there’s one last important conversation to be had.  Lang seems concerned. Eye-Patch Man: “Now, now! Don’t look so scared! I’m not going to give you away to those men outside!” Joe: “My name is Joe. I’m a kind of information source in this town. If you ever need to know anything, just ask me.” “Please tell me! Just what exactly is a Mystic?!”Joe: “Well, I’d usually get paid for this kind of service. But tell you what. I’ll let you try me out for free this once…” Joe: “A Mystic is a person that can use the power of an Origin.” ”I already knew that much. Do you know anything meaningful about them? Like why they exist?”Joe: ”Sorry kid, not many know about them at all. Only the people at the castle would know more.” The conversation is actually a lot different from this, but it retreads information everyone already told Lang (who acts like he didn’t hear it from a ruddy Origin himself), and this update is long enough as it is. And on the note of this being too long, I’m going to call it here. I generally aim to get between story beats, but the rest will have to wait. Join me next time, where we will probably do a lot of side stuff, since the game opens up here. LJN92 fucked around with this message at 06:45 on Apr 17, 2021 |
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Apr 13, 2021 00:46
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Not a strong start so far tbh. Especially with the 2nd party member being effectively an extra load.
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Apr 13, 2021 01:28
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Seraphic Neoman posted:Not a strong start so far tbh. Especially with the 2nd party member being effectively an extra load. Yeah, the start of this game is by far the weakest part of it in my opinion. It will get a bit better from here, however.
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Apr 13, 2021 01:42
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I haven't hit any of the updates yet, but... this was my Blockbuster game. I rented this game like 15 times on weekend rentals and had 2 corrupted save cards that made me start over. I really, really liked this game. Eventually I just stopped renting because I could never progress due to a lovely PS2. I'm looking forward to this LP because I did really love the game, but starting this game over and just getting through the sewer level is a slog. The arts system is fun, especially if you haven't looked up the best possible combination on GameFAQs. I guess, uh, I'll have to take off the rose tinted glasses and see what I liked so much E: And, funnily enough, I was actually considering LPing this game to force myself to play through the game in its entirety. Thank you for playing it so I don't have to bawk fucked around with this message at 02:30 on Apr 13, 2021 |
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Apr 13, 2021 02:27
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Fifteen years since I played this game, and the only thing I remember from it is THE MIGHTY BALKEN!
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Apr 13, 2021 06:25
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Curious what the headline on this newspaper is supposed to be because it's clearly (something) Kingdom except the something isn't Darakin or any other word we've heard. Maybe they renamed something in development but it was after someone already drew up the graphic (which is the same in the Japanese version).
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Apr 13, 2021 12:47
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Polsy posted:Curious what the headline on this newspaper is supposed to be because it's clearly (something) Kingdom except the something isn't Darakin or any other word we've heard. Maybe they renamed something in development but it was after someone already drew up the graphic (which is the same in the Japanese version). You know, I never noticed that. Tried having a look for info, but it's hard enough to find basic information about this game, let alone design trivia.
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Apr 13, 2021 22:22
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It looks like a fancy handwriting-type font rather than replacement characters. I'm pretty sure it ends with 'og', based on the same letters in Kingdom (could be an F), though it's hard to tell whether it starts with a M or N, the 'I' doesn't match the one in Kingdom, and I'm not sure if that's an H or a B, either.
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Apr 14, 2021 14:19
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I loving love Legend of Legaia. I never finished Legaia 2, though I didn't completely hate it and in fact there were some neat ideas in it that I liked, but I won't talk about them until they're revealed. That said since nobody's really mentioned it, even though it's not entirely relevant to this game, I wanted to talk about some neat things about Legend of Legaia's combat system they didn't use or changed here. The first thing that disappointed me is that in the original Legaia, equipping armor changed your characters' appearances. It's basically the only JRPG to ever do that, and it was cool seeing what the new armor you got looked like. The Ra-Seru partners you had also changed appearance to get larger and more ornate as you awakened more Genesis Trees (neither of which are a thing in this game obviously). And much like this game, there was a lot of voice acting in combat, though none of it was dubbed. What's really interesting is that Vahn in the original is a silent protagonist, but still talks during combat. Wild Arms Alter Code F did the same thing, with Rudy not having any text (he had two text boxes in the original Wild Arms though!) but still having spoken lines in combat...well, in the Japanese version anyway, the voice acting was cut from the English release of Alter Code F. There's also a weird connection between Wild Arms and Legend of Legaia since the battle music from Wild Arms is in Legend of Legaia's sound test! Combat is mostly the same in the first as it is in this game except for a couple of small things. For one thing, all arts in the original Legaia used AP, even regular arts. If you didn't have enough AP, if you tried to do an Art, it just would do the individual attacks. AP was gained through regular attacks but also through Spirit, which isn't a thing in this game I don't think. Spirit was the game's "Defend" command but it also did two other things for you: give you a bunch of AP, and extend your Arts Block so you could do more commands. I actually kind of like the "regular arts give AP, Super/Hyper consume them" balance that Legaia 2 does. Two other things, one of which I'm pretty sure isn't in this game, the other might be. The first is that while every character had their own preferred weapon, there were certain weapons that every character could equip, but only one character was proficient with. Gala shows up with one when he first joins your party, and what it does is it causes the attack block for your weapon hand to be twice as big as it is for other blocks. Meaning, you can't fit as many attacks in your Arts Block if you choose to attack with your weapon. So it was kind of up to you if the boost in attack power from the weapon was worth having less space to input arts into (usually it wasn't). The second thing that I'm not sure is in this game or not is linking arts. Since Lang only has four art blocks at the moment, he wouldn't have enough blocks to link arts anyway (he'd need at least five) but the idea of linking arts is that you end an art with an attack direction that another art starts with. A good example is Vahn can link Charging Scorch (down, right, up) with Somersault (up, down up) by entering down, right, up, down up. This is in fact how you get Super Arts in the first game. Super Arts are special and don't actually show up on the command list, but you use Super Arts by linking multiple arts together, which causes them to finish in a Super Art. One of Vahn's Super Arts is linking Charging Scorch, Somersault, and Slash Kick, which ends with the Super Art Power Slash. Since Legaia 2 makes a distinction between regular arts and Super Arts, I don't know if you could link them together like that, though I'd be surprised if you couldn't at least link regular arts in the same way. I ultimately remember very little about Legaia 2. The only things I honestly remember are one other party member the pirate lady, how Maya eventually fights, and the campfire scenes where I think you could cook food.
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Apr 14, 2021 20:16
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Please tell me that the first boss' "Barse" skill that spawns a Klaw Ant isn't an incredibly bastardised "Birth".
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Apr 14, 2021 20:46
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MarquiseMindfang posted:Please tell me that the first boss' "Barse" skill that spawns a Klaw Ant isn't an incredibly bastardised "Birth". It definitely is, it's written バース (baasu) which is exactly how you would render the English word birth. Neither of the options of 'they didn't realise this' or 'they wanted to pretend it wasn't actually "birth"' feel terribly convincing so I have no idea.
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Apr 14, 2021 22:10
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Twelve by Pies posted:There's also a weird connection between Wild Arms and Legend of Legaia since the battle music from Wild Arms is in Legend of Legaia's sound test! That's easily explained: Contrail developed (partly?) Wild Arms 1 (and 2), so they probably just used songs from Wild Arms to test the sound before Legaia 1's soundtrack was actually created. Contrail wasn't involved in the creation of Legaia 2, as I mentioned in the OP.
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Apr 15, 2021 01:16
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Chapter 5 – Slowly Onwards to Mt. Gabel Where we last left off, Sabrina had offered Lang and Maya a room at her inn, sheltering them from the evil Doplin soldiers we had just escaped. We awake the next day, and head downstairs.  ”I might have a bit of a sleeping problem.”Sabrina: “Things have finally calmed down quite a bit outside.” Sabrina: “So…What do you plan on doing now?” “I don’t…I don’t really know…” “I have to find that guy, the one that stole the Aqualith from my town…But I haven’t gotten any leads!”Sabrina: “What kind of man was he? This guy you’re looking for?” “He’s no human ‘man,’ that’s for sure! He had gold eyes…”Someone reacts upon hearing that.     Joe: “It’s no place for people to get anywhere near…” Sabrina: “So maybe…Maybe Maya is trying to tell us that a mountain has something to do with the fellow you’re looking for…?” Joe: “Hey, wait just a minute! Don’t tell me you’re planning on going there!!” You get a dialogue choice, but as usual, it amounts to “dither like a moron” or “just loving do it”. “I don’t know if there’s any connection, but I’ll find out when I get there. I’m going!” Joe: “Hmph! It’s not like going on a picnic, you know! It’s dangerous, I tell you!” The scene ends there. We are now free to go. But first, let’s chat with the inn people, I guess?  Sabrina gives us a Heal Leaf and a Venom Cure. We get a dialogue choice where we can be pointlessly suspicious of the woman who helped us a great deal up till now, and is even helping us more for free. That’s stupid, so we just thank her plainly. “Thank you, Sabrina.”Sabrina: “Think nothing of it. Just make sure you look out for that sweet girl, lover boy!” I just want to take this moment to point out that Maya is canonically 14 here. With Lang at 17, hanky-panky would only be legal in very specific countries (or US states with Romeo and Juliet laws). That won’t stop the game from shipping them, however. Whether they can actually be a couple, well, you’ll find out…  Cocky Lang has no interest in being a “bad guy”. “No, no. I’m a good guy.” ”The best of guys, you might say.”Nils: “I think people are usually more…What’s that word? Hum…humble.” ”Only because they didn’t take down the MIGHTIEST knight in the kingdom!”The others don’t have anything particularly interesting to say, so we decide to head out. The castle will still be looking for us, so we’re bound to need to be stealthy. Perhaps we should acquire some hooded robes, or maybe scale the walls…  Now Playing – Difference of Social Status Or we could just walk outside unmolested. The Japanese comes out to “Jousai toshi Darakin”, or “Fortified City Darakin”. Citadel is perfectly fitting here.  This dude isn’t even trying to capture us. Also he missed the memo that two Mystics escaped the castle.  This guy serves as a tutorial for the game’s combat functions. Probably would have been more useful if he was in Nohl. He can also teach you an Art, but you can easily learn said Art long before you meet him, so it’s only useful if you’ve been playing without looking up all the Art combinations. If you already know it, he is impressed, but you get nothing else.  Darakin’s shops introduce us to a new function: combining items. You can “combine” just about any type of item in the game. Weapons, armour, accessories, even healing items. For weapons and armour, you use materials you get from random encounters to strengthen them. We’ve been getting item drops marked with a jewel symbol occasionally, and these are what you use to improve your gear. Eventually, combining will let you get the best weapons and armour in the game. Accessories are unique insofar as combining them will create a new accessory with some of the skills of the accessories used to make them, as well as some new ones, potentially. This will let us break the game later on. Items are far simpler. You can just make stronger ones by combining lesser healing items, like using 2 Heal Powders to make a Heal Leaf.  Miura: “It’s called the Forest Maze, and no one who entered has ever made it out.” We heard earlier that Maya was found near said Forest Maze. Miura: “But someday, I’m going to try it! Because I’m the world’s greatest adventurer!” Miura: “Oh, and before I forget, here’s my book! Don’t worry, it’s already signed!” We get another readable item, like the Darakin Rag.  On the road again: I have made many attempts, yet have failed each time. Here, I will record the paths I have traversed so far. On the road again: To overcome all obstacles, that is the essence of an explorer!! Give up? Never! Not I!! (I do like this guy’s moxy.) You wouldn’t know it, but this woman tucked away in the back of the town is critical to the plot. Seeing as she mentioned nobility, why don’t we go have a look at the rich district?  As you might expect, it’s full of obnoxious jackasses. There isn’t a single person here that doesn’t look down on you. And yes, that’s a statue of our favourite Fascist-Theocratic monarch Doplin in the fountain.  Not even the rich rear end in a top hat guards actually realise we’re the ones they’re looking for.  Not even the ones who bring up that they’re looking for us.  Will we ever learn what the Holy Order of Banderas is actually about?  ”You poor, poor boy.” Barton: “Maybe I should bring a little ray of sunshine into your drab existence. It’s just a cheap card, but it’s yours!” Barton gives us the VIP Card. This is an extremely useful item that makes a whole bunch of stores in the game give us access to better gear. Barton might be a rich jackass, but at least he’s good for something.  Cocky Lang doesn’t take this poo poo. “Are you really a clerk?! Ever hear of customer service?!”Shank: “Shaddup! Anyone without money is no customer of mine! In this store, I’m God! You got that?” ”Well ‘God’, me and my thousands of gold made from killing Golems in Gale Canyon are walking out the door.”We’ve had enough of the rich assholes for a day.  Interestingly, Veska has moved out of her house to come here and look wistfully at where she used to live. It’s a point in this games favour that it puts an uncommon amount of effort into random NPCs (even if some are relevant later on). We decide to leave Darakin.  The Forest Maze we’ve heard so much about can now be visited. Why not?  This is the first translation that’s a bit off, or at least deliberately changed. It comes out to “Mayoi no mori Warudo”, or “Lost Forest Wald”. Forest Maze isn’t a bad translation, but it’s clear “Wald” seems placed here like a name. It’s also the German word for forest, so it’s either a name or a tautology.  (Something’s holding her back…Is she scared of this forest?)The game is clearly making it sound like a bad idea to go further. But what’s the worst that can happen?   Ah. That’s what. Obviously we are very definitely not supposed to try going through the Forest Maze. We decide to head somewhere nicer. Maybe Nohl?  Or maybe Gale Canyon. Here, we see Bubba really did bury Elfin. We are also given the opportunity to place the Friendship Ring we got as loot on Elfin’s grave. It’s a sellable item, but we choose to place it here. Because we’re a nice guy?  We return to Nohl, and a short cut scene greets us as the gates. “Uhhh…One thing led to another…and we ended up travelling together.” ”Also she gave me a lead on the Aqualith, so that’s good, right?” Dein’s still here, and still a massive douche. We give him sass. “Oh, and what have YOU been doing? Must be tough work getting a tan all day then getting your beauty sleep at night.”Dein: “…Shut up! I’ve been working on something that will…drat it! You’re still a loser!”  We find Maya in town, communing with barnyard animals. By the way, remember how we rode a sheep in Chapter 0?  We can do it in front of Maya.  And she judges us.  Friendly reminder that Nancy is our adoptive sister. If you try to claim you’re intimate, Nancy straight up laughs at Lang. It’s the most pathetic thing. Fortunately, we didn’t vote to make Lang a creep, and choose to say we’re just friends. “Wha…? We became friends, and it just worked out that way. It’s nothing.” “…Oh really?” “Are you sure?” “I swear!” “…Something seems fishy…Whatever! I’ll believe you this time! But if you’re hiding something from me, you’re gonna get it later!” ”Hey wait a minute, why the hell is it any of your business what my relationship is with her anyway!?” ”Because of very important reasons that you wouldn’t understand.”If we talk to Nancy again, she says: “So what if I’m a bossy loudmouth! *hmph!!* What?! What’re YOU looking at?!!!!”Lang never called her that, so who did?  We have apprehended the culprit. “If only Nancy were a little more feminine…Then men wouldn’t be able to get enough of her, right?”We get to choose to agree, say “It’s no use”, or say Nancy’s fine as is. Can you guess what we’re choosing? “Really? I think Nancy’s fine just the way she is. At least, that’s my opinion.” “Huh? What’s the matter with you, boy? Did she knock a screw loose, jolting you awake every morning?” ”No, you misunderstand me. I don’t mean that I like and enjoy how rough she is with me or anything. But that’s who Nancy is. I’m not going to say she should change to suit my preferences. I wouldn’t want anyone to tell me I’m NOT awesome.” ”Also, maybe remember you’re her dad, and refrain from commenting on her attractiveness to men? Also also, maybe don’t idolise women for being INCAPABLE OF SPEECH.” ”….maybe I should be more like Maya for a bit…”We decide to leave Nohl and its crazy residents behind. Now you might think we have nowhere to go but Mt. Gabel, but we’re gonna go back to Darakin very quickly.  What’s this?  Goodness gracious, one of Doplin’s guards is actually doing his job! Guard: “This girl looks like the Mystic that escaped from the castle. I’m trying to question her, but she won’t say a word!” We then get a choice: lie to the guard, or lie to the guard. I’m only kidding as much as the other option than lying is “bluffing” where we just tell him a different lie. “Haven’t you heard…? The one that escaped from the castle was a big, strong soldier!”Guard: “What?! What are you talking about?” “If you think I’m lying, ask at the castle yourself! I’ll watch this girl until you get back.”Guard: “Hmph! Of all the darnedest…Okay, I’ll go ask!” ”Good thing the guards around here a rock stupid, eh Maya?”   Lang sequesters Maya in the inn for the duration of their visit to Darakin, but we’ll never have to deal with guards doing their jobs again. Now we’re going to Mt. Gabel!  Apparently a “Gabel” can be either an archaic form of English taxation or a fork in Middle High German. No, I have no idea what the devs were going for here.  It’s only been one dungeon since Baki were a thing, and they’re already re-using them. For shame, game.  Mt. Gabel’s answer to Golems. They hit like trucks, but they’re great for EXP.  Now Playing – Everyday Tranquility We arrive at this shack, and Maya goes running up to find out if anyone’s there.  She decides to check around back when no one answers the door, and finds this guy.    “Kid?! I’m not a kid!” “Hmm, is that a fact…? So…What’s your name?” “Lang. And you?” “Me? My name is…” Yes, this is our third main character, but he won’t be officially joining us for a wee bit yet. “Kazan. I’m just an old man living alone in these remote mountains.”Now Playing – Beast of Darkness  “It’s only a matter of time before this place starts dying too.” Another Origin. Lang steps back at the sight of it.  “I’ve been trying to use my Origin to breath some life into the earth, but…”   “Rivas…It’s good to see you again.” “Anyone can see that something’s wrong. All it takes is one look at the mountains…” “Well then…Are you also aware that this change is the work of just one Mystic?” “What?! That’s impossible…No one has an Origin that strong!” “This Mystic does. He holds the Supreme Origin…As the name implies, his Origin has seemingly unlimited power…”We heard Doplin mention someone having a Supreme Origin last time. It stands to reason Rivas means the same person.  Dun dun duuuuuuun! “You know about that gold-eyed man?! Where is he?!” “What’s your connection to this man, kid?” “He…He stole the Aqualith from my village!” “In order to get the Aqualith back…” “You’ve got to find him. That’s why you’re after him.” I choose “I don’t know” because we really don’t beyond “Mystics have Origins and marks”. “I don’t know…Everyone keeps calling me a Mystic, but I don’t know what that means…” “I guess it’s safe to say that your Origin hasn’t awoken yet.” “Hmm…Okay, listen up, kid. I’ll explain it to you.”  “Origins are sentient manifestations of the forces of nature.” “Origins have a soul that lives inside with the soul of the human host. Those of us with two souls are called…Mystics.” “The man you’re chasing, Gold Eyes, is a Mystic for sure.” “And one that appears to have infinite power. Or at least strong enough to affect the entire world.” “He’s not just another human. He’s something else entirely. Do you see that now?” “I knew that! That may all be true, but I’m still going to get the Aqualith back from him!” “Tell me where he is! Please!” “Jeez, you don’t get it yet, do you? Don’t go charging off right now. You’ll get killed for sure.” ”But when I charged off from Nohl, I ended up killing the MIGHTIEST knight in Darakin!” “It’s okay. I just washed the sheets and my cooking has really improved. Ha ha ha!” “Hey, wait! I still need information!” “Slow down, kid. You’re staying here tonight too.” “There’s still a lot you don’t understand.”Everyone heads inside, the scene ends, and a new one begins on the dawn of the next day.  We find Kazan practising his punches, overlooking the mountains. “So you’re up. Morning, kid.” “You know, there’s a reason I train like this every morning.” “I have to be ready to fulfil my mission in life when the time comes.” “Your mission in life…?” “Perhaps destiny would be a better word.” “About what it means to have this power…And why I was entrusted with it.” “I finally decided that Origins…And Mystics were put here to protect the world. At least that’s what I’ve come to believe.” “Maybe that’s hard for you to understand since your Origin hasn’t awoken yet.” “A destiny for me to fulfill…?”Suddenly, there’s a loud roar.       While Kazan takes mummy, we fight bubby.  For the first time, we actually cause a status effect with Red Whirlwind. Bubby Galduke doesn’t even get a single attack in. Click below to see Kazan’s Origin in action.    Deva blasts Mummy Galduke off the mountain.  “What were they doing here…?” Rivas tries and fails to restore the now trampled plants. “Look, they smashed everything. There’s nothing left…” “I may be able to rip open the earth, but I can’t make a single flower bloom…I can only help the healing process.” “This power we share with Origins…It’s tied to the will of the host.” “It can be used to destroy, or it can be used to help the wounded and those in pain. It all depends on the host.” “Well, kid…As far as I can tell, you’ve got a good heart. And you’re also a Mystic.” “If you’re planning to go up against Gold Eyes and his Supreme Origin to get that Aqualith back…Your only chance is that other spirit inside of you. You’ve got to wake it up.” “The other spirit…?” “That power is lying dormant inside you. Free your mind and call to it. It will awaken. I’m sure of it.” “Power..? Inside of me?” “In your present condition, you won’t get that rock back and you’ll end up dead.” “Then what should I do?! How can I tap the power inside of me?!” “There is only one way…You must stare into the very face of death. You must push yourself to the brink.” ”Pretty sure I’ve done that a lot. First Gold Eyes’ demon fingered my chest, then the nauseating siblings beat my rear end, and there was a few times against those Golems in Gale Canyon…” ”Eh, well, you know, you need a certain power level, purity of heart, yada yada…” Cocky Lang is no wuss. “If that’s the only way to awaken the power inside of me then…I’ll do it! I’m ready to try. I have to!” “Okay! Follow me.” “You’ll find a cave at the summit. There’s a spirit called the Mountain Morg that lives there.” “He’s usually very gentle, but he’ll try to kill anything that attacks him.” “I know it’s sounds a bit barbaric, but you’re going to attack him.” “You will find yourself fighting for your life. I’m sure of it. I’ll wait here with Maya.”We are now free to go on. Alone once again. We shall leave things here for now. Join me next time, where we finally get our Stand, our third party member, and finally leave Mt. Gabel.
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Apr 16, 2021 00:03
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If you could take on the forest encounters is it worthwhile for the EXP or nah?
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Apr 16, 2021 01:59
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Seraphic Neoman posted:If you could take on the forest encounters is it worthwhile for the EXP or nah? The Forest Maze encounters are definitely worth the EXP, but taking them on before completing Mt. Gabel is virtually impossible. You'd have to grind for hours, even days to match them, and by that point, the EXP from the ecounters wouldn't be half as useful.
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Apr 16, 2021 03:09
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