If you stack them, they will fight: Let's Play World of Final Fantasy

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > If you stack them, they will fight: Let's Play World of Final Fantasy

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Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

Before we do absolutely anything, I want to get something out of the way.

Update 36 Highlights - Watch me suffer

This. This total garbage needs to be shown and then thrown out the window as soon as possible.

This stupid minigame comes to us courtesy of the Maxima add-on. During the post-game, if you go to the beach in Besaid and run to the end of the pier, you can find Noctis from FFXV sitting there. Examining him gives us the option to join him for some relaxing fishing.

gently caress this minigame. I made my displeasure with this known in the thread while I was wrapping up my first HOUR of playing this pile of poo poo.

At first glance, it doesn't seem too bad. It's just a matter of hitting the right buttons when they show up and sometimes the button will have to be hit more than once. You start with 35 seconds and gain 1 second for every shark you reel in.

It starts off easy enough. You're just hitting X/Y/B in different orders depending on when they show up. I actually breathed a little sigh of relief during the first 10 seconds or so. "Okay, this isn't so bad. It's going to get faster, obviously, but this seems doable." I thought to myself, clearly forgetting the torture that fishing minigames inflicted on my LP predecessors, like TheDarkID, who subjected themselves to playing them in order to complete everything in the game.

Once the timer has gotten down to about 20 seconds, the problems start to arise. For the first 20 or 30 seconds of real time the buttons are X for Lann, Y for Noctis, and B for Reynn. The only purpose of this is to establish a motor memory in you so that the minigame can proceed to gently caress with it later.

After the warm up, the game starts throwing the A button into the mix. This means that you need to constantly be fighting muscle memory, because the button could be an "A" when you were expecting an "X" for example. Your twitch reflexes will likely react before your brain even processes what the colour/letter it is. The early portion of the minigame establishes "Left button/X/Square is for Lann, Middle button/Y/Triangle is for Noctis, Right button/B/Circle is for Reynn." But then every now and again "A" will show up and throw a curve ball. You can't slow yourself down either, because if you take too long to press the button then it's a Miss.

It also brings in the "more than once" button press mechanic that it mentioned. Just as a note, when the game says "pressed more than once" it does NOT mean "mash the button you see". It just means that you press the button you see and you won't reel in a fish. The button or buttons that follow can be completely different from the one that showed up before it. You may need to hit 2 buttons before you get the fish or 3, depending on how big it is. Mega Sharquals and Mega Nightsquals take more to reel in but give more points.

What they do not do is give you more time corresponding to how long it takes to reel them in. You only ever get 1 second for reeling in a fish. So even if Lann has been trying to reel in one fish for 5 seconds, you only get 1 second when it gets pulled in. So if you gently caress up the last button in a 3 button reel then too bad! No points for you and you've wasted a poo poo ton of time that you cannot afford to waste.

But wait! There's more!

The buttons need to be pressed in the order they appear as well. If you gently caress up and hit the wrong one first, then you gently caress up ALL of the ones on screen.

So, how could this possibly get worse? There's a little bit of RNG involved! Yay!

You need 10,000 points to "beat" this minigame (in the sense that you get the main reward for it). You see the 9,600 I got in the screenshot above? I only hosed up twice in that attempt. 18 Sharquals, 12 Nightsquals, 16 Mega Sharquals, 2 Mega Nightsquals.

My successful attempt? 10,300 and the same number of gently caress ups. 22 Sharquals, 10 Nightsquals, 8 Mega Sharquals, and 7 Mega Nightsquals.

This is the Sharqual which got me to exactly 10,000 points. By the time that the 1 second was actually applied (the time bonus gets added to the clock once the "Time +1.00" notification disappears, not when it first pops up), I had exactly 2.00 seconds left on the clock.

I'm assuming the game will always have a minimum of 10,000 points available, but whether it's exactly 10,000 points or 10,600 seems to be left to to the whims of the game. Maybe you have some wiggle room of 2 or 3 misses, or maybe you need an absolutely flawless run. Who knows! Fun stuff.

If/when you manage to get 10,000 points, exclamation points will appear above everyone's heads. You are then given an extra 10 seconds to reel something in. Lann, Noctis, and Reynn are all pulling, so whatever it is must be huge.

The one mercy the game gives you is that you can mash buttons for this portion. Of course there's a good chance you won't figure this out right away because you've been conditioned not to mash buttons up to this point and there's no way you want to risk screwing up at this point. I tried to look up tips for beating this before I even came close to 10,000 points. If I hadn't, and I got to this moment and then failed because I didn't realize I could mash then I think there's a good chance I would have put my fist through my monitor.

It turns out to be Leviathan, which will tack 10,000 points on to your score for absolutely no reason because the score is meaningless.

And there you go. There's your true reward. The game gives you remedies or half-Mega Potions (restores a lot of HP) as pity prizes when you lose, but this is ultimately what it is you're aiming for.

Noctis is voiced by Ray Chase in English and Tatsuhisa Suzuki in Japanese. Not that it really matters, since the only voiced lines he has are a few words/noises during the fishing minigame.

Noctis is from FFXV. He's the Prince of Lucis, although that stops meaning a whole lot in the opening couple of minutes of the game since Lucis is quickly invaded and largely destroyed. XV revolves around his road trip to meet and marry his fiancee as well as learning how to be more kingly. He has the power to use Armiger, which allows him to summon 13 different weapons that were once used by former Lucian kings.

After heading out on his road trip, he and his travelling buddies (the other main characters of XV) learn that Lucis was invaded by the Niflheim Empire, who destroyed the place and swiped the Crystal. Noctis proceeds on a journey to collect all of the Royal Arms by visiting the tombs that house them. He also gathers the ability to summon various Astrals (summon monsters), such as Titan, Ramuh, Leviathan, and Shiva.

Unfortunately, Noctis' journey isn't all fun and good times. Over the course of the game, his fiancee is killed, his friend Ignis sacrifices his eyesight in order to protect him, he's tricked into shoving another friend (Prompto) off a moving train, and his kick rear end car gets destroyed. Oh, also he gets sealed with the Crystal for 10 years while the world goes to poo poo and then wakes up only to sacrifice himself to stop the villain.

But mostly the car thing. He is also very fond of fishing, but I refuse to go into detail about that because of the garbage I just had to go through. Just know that it is the explanation for that minigame and his ties to it. We'll talk more about Noctis once XIII's cast is complete, because XV was originally meant to be part of XIII's universe and the people in the thread have declared XIII to have an EU entry.

Noctis Champion Jewel Ability
Final Fantasy XV Music: Veiled in Black

And that's it! It took me 40 attempts at that stupid minigame, slightly over an hour, all for a Noctis Champion Jewel that I'm basically guaranteed to never use outside showing off his single special move.

You want to know what the biggest slap in the face is about this whole thing? I can learn to deal with the fact that the minigame is frustrating and garbage and that I'm bad at it because I don't have the reaction time of a caffeine addled teenager anymore. I did this to myself. I'm the one that accepted the request to LP this game and I'm the one that decided to do the Maxima version knowing full well that I'd have to do a bunch of completionist crap in order to show everything off. That's all on me.

No, the biggest slap in the face is the fact that after designing all those lovely minigames from the base game; after making a patch to one of the worst minigames with content locked behind it, specifically to try and make it just a tiny bit less bullshit; the developers went right ahead and made one that was just as frustrating as Sandstalker.

I'm done. I never have to play that minigame again. Let's just put this terrible nightmare behind us and move on to stuff that's at least interesting to look at, if nothing else.

We've got a lot of bonus stuff to get through before the Secret Ending, although it actually won't take very long in terms of updates. There are a few Mirages left to pick up, so let's quickly swing around and grab them before we move on.

The first one is hiding up behind the Crystal Tower, in a Murkrift that's new to Maxima.

You need to hop in the airship and fly up to Crystal Tower. It's level 65, but that's nothing at this point of the game. Make sure you have Mirages with good toppling abilities, though. We're going to need to knock down a stack to get this new one.

Ah, it's the regular Chocobo version of Mecha Chocobo. I'm guessing this was the end goal for Mecha Chocobo? Turning regular Chocobos into little Iron Man Chocobos?

Anyway, you just need to use Fire attacks to create a capture chance. Unfortunately, Mecha Choco is in a stack. The best course of action is to take out the two regular Chocobos first (they can use Cure). After that, focus on knocking the stack over. You can then try and take out Mecha Chocobo before capturing Mecha Choco, or you can just go right for Mecha Choco.

With that done, we need to take a quick trip back to Castle Exnine.

You'll start on the Chainroad right next to the entrance to the castle. When you get in, use the Dark Crystal on the far right to travel to the end of the dungeon.

You need to go all the way back here. This is the door we went through in the Bad Ending, where we fought Brandelis and Lann sacrificed himself.

Go to the left and out to the big deck. There is now a Dark Crystal in the distance.

Take the right path in the new area and you'll run into this Syldra looking thing.

Elasmos has the irritating capture condition of needing to be dealt a lot of damage at once to create a capture chance. As with Ultima Weapon, a basic Gravity spell won't be enough to trigger it. There are a bunch of ways to accomplish this, but honestly, I found it easier to just beat Elasmos here and then transfig into it later. With the leveling spots available to us, it would take less time than trying to set up buffs and debuffs to get this right.

Here's the generic Syldra. We can get actual Syldra from the Coliseum, but it's level 90, so I'll be saving that for the final cleanup.

There are some Mirages in the Coliseum that I want right away though.

These become available in the post-game. These four item rewards are needed to unlock two Mirajewel slots each for Lann and Reynn. The bottom two fights (plus another one that is currently out of frame) are special in a different way though.

Because we can get the Cranberry Knights from them!

Moogiepie needs to have magical enhancements used on it (so stuff like Reflect or Shell), Best Boy Cactaur Conductor needs to be inflicted with Evasion Down. The Werebats have a move that can do this called Ultrasonics, so there's an easy way to pull it off.

Tonbro is a bigger issue. He also has the "Deal a lot of damage at once" condition. However, at this point in my recording I had a way to make that happen.

OHHH YEAH!

Macho Man has an interesting combination of abilities once he's properly leveled. Revenge Blast is from the Behemoth line, but it's a skill that carries across all forms. It's power rises as HP falls.

He also has an ability called "Last Stand", which allows him to survive an otherwise fatal hit with 1 HP. You can see where this is going.

Snap into a Slim Jim!

This is more than enough to trigger the capture chance.

Unfortunately, the three Cranberry Knights are unique Mirages and therefore cannot be renamed, but they will still be a big help. Master Tonberry has an ability called Sharpened Knife which always deals a critical hit, when it manages to hit that is. You can make a build for him where you pour every blank space on his board into Accuracy Up++ to make the attack more likely to hit. By boosting Critical Damage, it is possible for Master Tonberry to somewhat reliably deal 20-30k damage every turn.

Meanwhile, Master Cactaur as an ability called Perfect Dodge, which is similar to a counterstance and allows for assured dodges of attacks. Master Moogle's special ability is Love Serenade, which boosts defence and magic and can take effect multiple times.

Anyway, with that done, it's time we get cracking on our completion checklist. First of all, we're going to get the EX Dungeons out of the way.

These were part of the base game. The dungeons are different areas of previous dungeons pieced together with super tough Mirages. The location is listed as ???, but online you'll probably see them referred to as (from right to left) EX Dungeons A, B, and C.

No matter how you plan to tackle these, make absolutely sure you enter EX Dungeon A first.

At the very start of EX Dungeon A, there's a chest with an EXP Boost mirajewel in it. You'll want to slap that on Lann or Reynn and never take it off, because you'll be doing a lot of grinding from here on out.

That's the most important item in these dungeons. The other items are helpful, but not nearly as important.

These dungeons are all mishmashes of previous dungeons, so I won't be going over them in detail. We're going to blow through these quickly since there are no new trash mob Mirages and no new locations.

One helpful tip about these dungeons: Get Death. A lot of the Mirage Stacks in these dungeons are very susceptible to Death, making them easy pickings.

Speaking of getting particular skills, Anamika will sell some of the best ones in the game (including Death) for Arma Gems once you have purchased everything from her (all Medals and all Jewels). You can also get stat seeds like Magic++ or Dark Resist Up.

Some of these skills cost a lot of Arma Gems, but enemies in the EX Dungeons will drop them fairly regularly. You can also sell Arma Gems for 50k each, which will provide you with all the money you need.

None of this was particularly necessary in the base game. However, with the addition of Maxima all of this will be a godsend for fine tuning your Mirages in preparation for the super bosses.

Back to EX Dungeon A. The second area of the dungeon is Windswept Mire. There is a treasure chest over by the sand bar where we went to fight Malboro Menace way back when.

Area 3 is Saronia Docks. You can see an Adamantoise lurking in the back there. He is an optional fight and one that I heavily suggest saving until you get to the best grinding spot.

If you do want to take him on immediately, then you just need to take that cannon in the foreground and then trigger the Weight Switch (Weight of 10 and Water Resistance of 100).

Adamantoise is a brick wall. Imprisming him is the better route, but you'll need an ability that inflicts Defence Down. If you plan to fight him head on, then it's best to spam Gravity until he gets to the point where you can chip away the last little bit. He has permanent Shell and Protect, so even hitting him with Ice Spells will only barely dent him (Reynn's Blizzara was only dealing out 455 damage).

In terms of offence, Adamantoise sticks to physical attacks to the tune of 3,000 damage a hit.

If you manage to beat him (or capture him), there are two chests behind him containing a remedy+ and a mega-ether.

Area 3 has a chest near the start (down the really long path to the right of the first clearing), but it turns out to be a Mimic.

Other than that, there is a chest with 3 X-Potions in it opposite the Mimic path. There's also a save point here which you should definitely take advantage of. Because the path south of the clearing has:

Dark Shiva, apparently.

None of the Shivver stack Mirages can be captured, so just focus entirely on beating them. You can either dump on the stack itself using Fire or Light, or you can knock it apart and pick off the Small and Medium Mirages to leave Shivver by herself.

Shivver stack hits for about 3k in damage with physical. Outside of that, she has the same selection of skills as the regular Shiva line. How dangerous that is to you depends on your Ice resistance.

Beating them gets us the mementos for all three forms.

We also get Girl's Diary Entry 11. This is the point where Reynn and Lann realised they hosed up royally and have lost complete control of the situation.

That is incredibly creepy looking...

Your warning is noted. Thanks description people.

On to EX Dungeon B.

Area 1 is the Mako Reactor and has a chest right next to the entrance with a mega-potion in it. Opposite of that is a chest with a mega-ether.

Area 2 is the bottom of the underground prison. The dead end (where the path to Mist Dragon was) has a phoenix pinion in a chest.

Two floors up there are a pair of chests with 3 flash bombs and 2 lightning spellstones. You have to keep running along the catwalk to the opposite side of the ring.

Going up the next set of stairs after those chests will lead to Area 3, which is the Train Graveyard.

When you get to the first clearing, go right and zap the machine, then run up the train car to another platform with two chests on it. They have a megalixir and an Arise mirajewel (Arise is better Rise/Phoenix Down).

After that, zap the machine for a shortcut back to the clearing. You eventually see two chests on a platform way in the background. One is a Mimic Jackpot and the other has 3 war gongs.

Area 4 is Crystal Tower. There's a save point right before the boss, so make use of it or else you'll have to go through this whole place again.

If you go all the way to the bottom of the staircase first, you'll find two chests with 4 haste stones and a mega phoenix.

The boss for EX B is a Rairamuh Stack. Same as with the Shivver Stack, you cannot catch these. Use Fire, Ice, Wind, or Light. They have a weakness to earth as well, but flying/floating enemies can't be hit by most earth attacks (since they are flying). Earth Spellstones are some of the only things that work (Earth is a terrible element in this game).

Once again, we get mementos for each of the three mirage forms. We also get Girl's Diary Entry 12.

I'm not sure where the strange place is that the twins' wound up. Besaid? That's the continent directly below Nine Wood Hills. It's not the fake Nine Wood Hills, since we'll see later that the twins' escape from this place. They also still have their memories here.

I kind of like this look for the Ramuh line.

EX Dungeon C, let's do this. We're almost to the best spot for grinding.

Area 1 is the Pyreglow Forest, but there are no chests here. To avoid needless dead ends, go down at the first path split, then keep going down as far as possible before taking a right. From that point on, just keep running down.

Area 2 is the Mountains.

Keep following the path down until you see a Flutter point off to the right. There is a chest over there with an Agility++ mirajewel in it.

Area 3 is Castle Exnine. There's a chest right near the start with dream powder in it. Shortly after that is a chest with 6 potions, which... really? Potions? At this stage of the game?

Then there is a chest with 3 hi-potions in it beyond that. Come on guys, this is all worthless at this stage.

Then there is a chest with 2 X-Potions after that. At least these are actually useful.

After that, a chest with a mega-potion. Then 5 ethers. Then 4 hi-ethers. 2 turbo ethers. A mega-ether. Elixir. Finally, a megalixir. This place has a ton of chests, only half of which are of any use. They are all on a linear path, so you can't miss any of them.

Area 4 is Valley 7. There is a Chill spot right near the start. It leads to a chest with 3 fire spellstones. Continue along the main path and keep going left when you get to a split. There's a chest at the bottom of the ramp that has a phoenix pinion in it. Then go back to the split and continue north.

Keep going North and you'll reach the Save Point along with the boss. You can probably guess what it will be.

You know the routine by now. Hit it with Ice or break up the stack first, it's up to you.

Girl's Diary Entry 13 shows Reynn quickly losing her mind at the realisation that the two of them are straight screwed.

And here is the Gleefrit line. I don't really have much to say about it.

Clearing EX Dungeons A, B, and C will cause EX Dungeon D to appear. Honestly, I recommend throwing on the Stealth Mirajewel or getting a Mirage with the Flee ability and just torching through this place as fast as humanly possible. The best grinding spot in the game lies at the end of it.

Area 1 is the Chainroad (inside the chain). There's nothing here, so just keep going south.

Area 2 is the top portion of Big Bridge (the area where we fought Gilgamesh). Once again, no treasure here. Just keep going south.

Area 3 is Phantom Sands. No treasure. Keep going south.

Area 4 is the Watchplains. Stay on the main path and don't take any of the side routes since there's no treasure.

Area 5 is Nether Nebula. Still no treasure.

Area 6 is the very first place we saw when we got to Grymoire. There is a chest in this area, although it's all the way at the end.

It's Girl's Diary Entry 14. Let's see what it has to say.

So the twins' go on the run, having realized that Mom and Dad were possessed by alternate dimension demons and aren't just cosplaying as part of an elaborate plan to teach them a lesson.

Head a little further south from that chest to arrive at:

The prime grinding location. There are three main mobs in this area which show up regularly and are easily dealt with for massive EXP payouts. One consists of six Chocochicks, another is a group of six Mu, and the other is a stack of Chocochick/Babyhemoth/Behemoth and 2 Mu. There are other mobs that consist of a mix of tougher enemies, but the three I just detailed are the important ones.

The stack mob is the toughest of the three to take out, but they still aren't a big threat (Death works on the stack). The Chocochick and Mu mobs can be dealt with through -aga spells or Ultima. The EXP payout for these groups (with the EXP boost on) is 170-200k and it can take only a few seconds to finish a fight.

If you slap on the Lure mirajewel and run in circles (while passing through the save point, thereby providing you with infinite AP restoration) you can easily go from level 60 to level 90 in about an hour or so. You can swap your Mirages from the save point, so this is also an amazing place to grind for the Legendary Caretaker trophy/achievement (if you care about that). Legendary Caretaker requires you to master 100 unique mirage boards.

Anyway, make liberal use of this spot. You have to be completely prepared for what's past that Dark Crystal.

You're going to need whatever help you can get. Remember that Gundam looking thing that almost got through the portal before the League of S showed up and pulled the summoners out? Well, it's here now.

Update 36 Highlights - XG Boss Fight

Whoooa! Don't say another word! This thing is RIGHT where it's supposed to be.

Um, sorry?

Reynn just stopped a world much the-bigger than this one from imploding.

Dude, really?!

XG is not a joke. It rocks about 140k in HP and doesn't have any elemental weaknesses to exploit.

It has an attack called Raigeki which deals about 2000 damage. I believe it's Ice based, since Reynn's Shivalry stack absorbs the damage.

Basic physical attacks can hit for over 3000 though.

I want to point out that my team that is pictured here is between levels 87 and 90. With the proper stacks focusing on resisting XG's attacks (Fire and Ice mostly), you could do this at level 80 or slightly lower.

Flaming Hell is a multi-target attack which will gently caress you up if you are weak to Fire (as Reynn's stack is).

XG also seems to be somewhat resistant to Gravity. I think Gravity only shaved off 1/8 of XG's health as opposed to 1/4. Gravity still helps (dealing about 7k-8k damage on the first cast), but it's not quite as effective as it normally is against really high HP/Defence bosses.

Then there's his special attack.

It hurts, even with resistance.

Don't be afraid to pop megalixirs in this fight. You can get more. X-Potions will do for health, but refilling AP at the same time is the major benefit. You could also use Elixirs if only one stack is in need of saving.

Kishin can critical as well, so that's fun.

Beating XG grants 200k, 2 Arma Gems, and a Megalixir. We also get Girl's Diary Entry 15 as well as XG's eldbox.

XG is a reference to Xenogears, a game that Squaresoft released in 1998 and has promptly thrown in the closet.

The game was pitched to be Final Fantasy VII by creators Tetsuya Takahashi and his wife Kaori Tanaka. It was rejected for that, proposed as a sequel to Chrono Trigger, but then ended up becoming it's own thing. It's a bit of a cult hit, but the second half suffers from severe time crunch and budget limitations. The second half of the game is basically just various characters recounting the plot in cutscenes.

Tetsuya would go on to co-found Monolith Soft and create the Xenosaga series as kind of a successor to Xenogears. Kaori Tanaka would later leave (or was let go, no reason was given for her departure) during the development of Xenosaga Episode II.

XG's design is based on Xenogears (the titular robot, not the game), which was the ultimate Gear in the game. All of XG's moves are based on Xenogears moves as well. Raigeki and Kishin are properly named, but Flaming Hell seems to be a renamed Kosho X. Kishin appears to be a combination of multiple moves though, since that axe kick to an explosion is similar to the Goten X ability and not part of Xenogears Kishin attack.

The "you-know-who" that the description is talking about is likely Kunihiko Tanaka, who was the character designer for Xenogears.

This is the final entry. It seems to recount what happened to Lann and Reynn to send them to fake Nine Wood Hills. From what I gather, Lusse used the weapons that Rorrick created to seal Brandelis in a pocket dimension (this is the place where we first saw him and is what the Four Keys/associated Pleiad were maintaining). Lusse then managed to use Rorrick's powers in combination with her own to create Fake Nine Wood Hills in a last ditch effort to save Lann and Reynn after getting taken over by Pellinore and Segwarides. Rorrick's powers weren't used correctly, so Nine Wood Hills was basically just a pocket world removed from time's flow with just Lann and Reynn existing in it.

Lusse and Rorrick apparently wanted help in saving the twins, but Enna Kros decided not to stick her nose into it and instead just let things be.

The question is, where did this log come from? It seems machine-like. It can't be Enna Kros, Lusse, or Rorrick, because they are referred to by code names and not in first-person. It isn't Segwarides or Pellinore, because it doesn't fit their speech patterns. It definitely isn't Brandelis, because he is also referred to be a code name (Subject 4). We also know that it isn't Hauyn, because she was sealed in the Prism and left in some kind of time stasis for a hundred years (she also calls Lusse "Lady Lusse", so it's doubtful she would have started calling her "Subject 2").

Questions and questions. Maybe we'll get some answers... in a future update. The next update will have us blasting through the hidden dungeon of Maxima, possibly doing the last Intervention Quests (the Maxima ones), and then getting to the bottom of whatever the hell that portal is in Crystal Tower.

Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 01:24 on Jul 2, 2019

# ? Apr 22, 2019 01:26

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# ? May 24, 2024 09:09

LiefKatano: Aug 31, 2018; I swear, by my sword and capote, that I will once again prove victorious!!

So there's gravity resistance... but they only bothered to do it halfway and for (thus far/in the base game? I haven't extensively checked but I somehow doubt there's good resources online for WoFF) one boss, it looks like. :psyduck:

# ? Apr 22, 2019 06:17

morallyobjected: Nov 3, 2012

LiefKatano posted:

So there's gravity resistance... but they only bothered to do it halfway and for (thus far/in the base game? I haven't extensively checked but I somehow doubt there's good resources online for WoFF) one boss, it looks like.

super bosses have always played by their own rules, both for attacks and resistances

# ? Apr 22, 2019 06:24

Scalding Coffee: Jun 26, 2006; You're already dead

The wait is over. Xenosaga tried to do its own version of a Xenogears boss fight and if you enjoy the sound of a child screaming every few turns, then you will love that battle. The ES fights were disappointing in that game. Why would they remind us of a better decade in games?

# ? Apr 22, 2019 07:21

LiefKatano: Aug 31, 2018; I swear, by my sword and capote, that I will once again prove victorious!!

morallyobjected posted:

super bosses have always played by their own rules, both for attacks and resistances

It's not "what the gently caress the super boss has resistance to gravity" it's "what the gently caress only the super boss has resistance to gravity and it only has resistance, not immunity". Gravity isn't often a defined element, only appearing in Final Fantasy VII and X-2, but in VII tons of bosses are immune to gravity, with a few more at least resistant to it - most of the ones that aren't are adds of some sort. Even in games where gravity doesn't have an element, it's usually tied to instant death resistance (or the "heavy" status, i.e. the "this is a boss" flag). And those are in games where damage is regularly capped at 9999; World of Final Fantasy (or, at least, the Maxima version) doesn't have that restraint.

It's just... incredibly weird, given series standards.

# ? Apr 22, 2019 13:54

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

Now that the EX Dungeons are finished, we've taken care of the stuff from the base game (with the exception of Coliseum matches anyway, but those are just Mirage catching).

I'm not completely sure how to best divide up the Maxima content. I have no idea what the secret ending involves or if it has any substance to it. It may just be a boss fight followed by some 30 second nonsense scene for all I know.

I decided to tackle everything else first, then fight the three super bosses in one update that includes the secret ending. That one could be a really short update, or it could be super long, who knows.

That means we're going to Crystal Tower to kick off this update. Something new has appeared there.

Not the creepy vortex thing. I mean, that is new as well, but it's not why we're here. We're going back to the top of the tower. Thankfully the crystals are still active, so we just need to use the red one to the right of the gate.

There's a strange purple gate here now, in the place where the Barrier used to be.

We have no idea where we're going or what we're getting into, but when has that ever stopped our heroes before?

Oh, awesome. One of these dungeons.

The Hidden Dungeon is a pain in the rear end. It's similar to the EX Dungeons in the sense that it's just a patchwork of previous dungeon areas tied together with high level Mirages scattered about.

You can find some items laying around, but they aren't in chests here. They are just points of light on the ground. The items are just standard battle items like hi-ethers and potions/elixirs.

The area we're in right now is kind of a hub. We need to run through the Watchplains until we track down some crystals.

The mobs here are not worth fighting. This Goblin Mob, for example, took about 2 minutes from battle start to getting back to the field screen. It only forked out 160k experience. You could have racked up over 500k in the same amount of time in EX D, easy. You also get Arma Gems there that you can use for sweet Seeds or to sell for insane cash.

When we reach this little clearing, we can spy a few deactivated crystals up the stairs. There is another one tucked away behind this cliff, but it just leads back to the beginning of the dungeon. It's simply a shortcut if you ever leave this area and want to pick it up again later.

Four crystals to choose from. Might as well just pick one at random (AKA the closest one to me because I'm lazy).

First area for the bottom right crystal is Sunken Temple. That reminds me that I need to pop back here at some point to catch story Quacho Queen. She's hanging around for battles the same way Undead Princess and Princess Goblin are (also I need to go back and get Princess Goblin). There's also an achievement tied to Quacho Queen which I normally wouldn't care about, but if I'm 100 percenting this game (which I apparently am at this point) I may as well go all the way with the achievements as well.

One thing at a time though. Run through the Sunken Temple portion, there's nothing here.

When you get to the room with all the columns, take the crystal on the left to proceed.

Second area is Saronia Docks. You can get Coreuls and Lesser Coreuls here if you didn't catch the one in the Murkrift (or transfig one).

You need some field abilities for this place, but thankfully they leave a Seraphone right next to this cannon for you in case you're an idiot like I was that one time long ago and didn't maintain a constant supply of them.

After getting blasted to the other side, the crystal to proceed is sitting on the back of the nearby ship.

Next area is further ahead in the Watchplains, near where Warrior of Light awakened to protect Princess Sarah from her own stupidity of wandering an active battlefield in full regalia.

See that crystal way off in the distance? Near the top left of the screen? That's where we want to go. We'll also be going there a lot because this area shows up repeatedly during this hidden dungeon (not just on this one route, I mean the entire hidden dungeon). You start all the way down in the canyon and it takes a good 75 seconds or so of pure running just to navigate to it. That doesn't include any potential battles you may encounter.

The last area of these routes will always be the end of the Nether Nebula. This is where you fight the route boss.

For the Water route, that means we are fighting this Kraken looking bastard. Oh, and by the way. No save points on these routes. Make sure you top up everything before you start the battle.

Oh, it is literally a Kraken. Huh.

Kraken is pretty fast, but none of his attacks hit especially hard. Not if you've done your grinding anyway. He'll use Dark magic, Evil Mist (multi-target Dark), and Waterga for anywhere between 1,100-3,000 damage depending on your resistances.

He has a slight vulnerability to Slow, but as with Brandelis I don't think it's really worth it. It wears off far too quickly and it will probably miss a few times.

Kraken also has the ability to inflict Poison, so make sure Esuna or Antidotes are present in your toolkit.

I decided to try out Sharpened Knife Master Tonberry during this fight. By casting Bravery and Focus you can up the damage further, bringing it up to---

devastating damage. Unfortunately Tonbro still needs some accuracy work, since it misses more than it hits. It has definite potential though and also inflicts Defence Down.

Given the damage it did, Kraken likely has about 90k-100k in health.

Beating Kraken clears the Water Route. The game will then inform us that we have 3 routes remaining. Take the crystal in the back to return to the hub area.

We'll take the bottom left crystal this time, which glows red, meaning that it must be the Fire Route.

The first area is Valley Seven. The crystal we want is way in the back, in the place where we chased Rydia to that time she bolted on us out of fear of fire.

Area 2 is Pyreglow Forest. There's only one path and one crystal, so take it.

This leads us back to Watchplains again. Oh boy. Another hike across half the Watchplains later, we get back to the crystal that takes us to Nether Nebula.

Where we're met with... something? That's definitely a new Mirage.

Marilith has about 100k in HP. The only elemental weakness is Water, which is kind of limiting, but at least she doesn't have a ton of resistances. She also has a slight vulnerability to Sleep.

She's basically just the counterpart to Kraken. She's fast and uses Fire element spells instead of water.

However, Marilith does have a special attack called Blade Dance. It hurts a little, but it's nothing I'm particularly worried about.

Honestly, the hardest part of this fight for me was the fact that Reynn's stack had Fire weakness. Marilith's speed allowed her to really punish Reynn's group with her fire spells.

Eventually I just bring Macho Man in to finish it.

Even with 14k health left, his Revenge Blast still hits like a Slim Jim truck.

Marilith first showed up as one of the Four Fiends in the original Final Fantasy. She's had spotty appearances in the rest of the franchise, popping up in III and IV, then disappearing until IX, sort of showing up in XII (it didn't have the swords in that one. It was just a snake monster) and later showing up in Brotherhood FFXV as part of Noctis' backstory.

That takes care of the fire route. Next up is the crystal on the top right, which is the Wind Route.

The first area is the mountains, and it's where we find the new trash mob Mirage.

Slyphine needs to be hit with earth attacks, which is tricky since she can fly. Earth Spellstones will do the job though, so just use one of those.

It's a mid-point between Sylph/Serafie and Siren/Diva Serafie. Not especially noteworthy as far as I'm concerned.

There are two crystals in the Mountain area. One is in a nest up a path. You have to pass by another crystal to reach it. Do not take the nest crystal, as this will lead you to the Desert, which then leads you back to the Hub. Take the first crystal you see, the one on the side path to the right.

The proper path leads to Crystal Tower. There is a crystal straight ahead which transports you to the one you can see way in the back near the staircase (top left of the screenshot).

Head down the staircase, left across the bridge, then down and to the right to the next staircase. Head down that one and then keep running south to find the next crystal. This transports you over to the big central staircase, so hook around north to get on to it and then head down. You'll wind up in the big open area where we battled the Dark Ramuh stack in EX Dungeon B. The crystal out of here is tucked in the back corner.

After that, you know the drill. It's back to Watchplains, then back to Nether Nebula for the boss.

Which is a boring old Tiamat in this case. It also has about 100k HP.

It uses wind attacks, it has Magic Counter, it's very unmemorable. One route remaining after we beat Tiamat.

The top left crystal in the hub is the Earth Route and it's the last one we need to clear.

Area 1 is the Nether Nebula, but it's the mid-point of the Nebula, not the end where the boss is.

Two crystals here. Hop down the ledge and take the one you see in the upper right of the screenshot.

Next area is Train Graveyard.

Head straight ahead, through the open green container, then out the left side of it. This leads you to the ramp where you can get up on top of the containers. Keep going right along the red containers to get to the crystal. The south path along the green containers has nothing and will just waste your time.

After that, you're in the Watchplains again and then on to the Nether Nebula boss area.

Which has... I don't even know. The hell is that?

Oh, it's Lich.

...Oh, it's Lich. This is gonna be a pain the rear end, isn't it?

Yep. It sure is.

Lich loves using Death and Doom spells (30 second timer for Doom) for instant kills. He also has Reaper Lore, which means if he takes out your stack, he'll probably regain about 30k HP. He has 100k himself.

If you have high Death resistance, then this fight will be pretty easy. If you don't, then Lich is fortunately susceptible to Oblivion, which will lock down his ability to use skills for a while.

Or you can just huck X-Potions at him because he's undead and therefore takes damage from healing items. 2 X-Potions is enough to end him. Honestly, that's just funny.

I can think of a few more: Twitch, Pitch, Itch, Hitch, Bit--

Hm? Oh, right. We're talking about Lich lore. Right. Lich here is one of the Four Fiends from FFI. He also makes a few more appearances in the rest of the series, mostly in later entries.

With Lich out of the way, we've cleared all four routes. So what happens next? Some of you probably already have a feeling of what's to come.

When we get back to the Hub, a new crystal has appeared behind the gate. Let's check it out. You may want to quickly pop back to Nine Wood to save though. Just a suggestion.

The first area of the new route is Icicle Ridge.

Keep following the path and you'll eventually find yourself back at this sliding puzzle. Up, right, up, left, up, and right gets you to the top path. There's a point of light up there with 2 elixirs if you want them. If not, then go down, left, down, right, and down to get to the crystal forward.

Next area is the Underground Prison.

You need to keep running down staircases until you see the crystal hiding out at the top of one.

The next area is different than what we are used to. Take the left path to get to a save point and prepare for a major boss battle. When you're ready, head back to the start and take the right path to the platform.

The gently caress is that thing?

Okay, we'll deal with this massive gently caress you in a little bit.

But first, seriously, what the hell is that thing? I need a closer look.

Update 37 Highlights - Four Fiend Fight... Freeview, Freepreview... dammit

It's a chibi Garland! Look at his little doofy toothpick sword!

Focus time. Chibi Garland will be ours, but first we need to deal with the bullshit that is fighting all four bosses plus Garland at once.

You're going to get hammered in this fight. It's five on two and all five of them have just enough difference in speed to break up the grouping, meaning that turns are going to come up at different times (you can't just prep for one big onslaught of attacks).

I suggest cheesing Lich with X-Potions. He doesn't seem as Death/Doom happy as he was during the solo fight, but it's not something you really want him starting halfway through the battle. Reaper Lore will also heal him by 30k if any of your stacks are KO'ed. I didn't cheese him in the fight, but that's only because I try and drag battles out to try and lure special attacks out of enemies to show off.

Multi-target attacks are one way to go, although Kraken does enjoy casting Reflect, which could screw with your plans. Ultima can't be reflected though, so if you have that then go crazy with it. Balthier is a good choice for a champion summon here, as he can target all with water.

Everyone mostly sticks to their single boss fight MO, although they do work together fairly well (such as Kraken casting Reflect on others). Garland mostly hangs out and swipes at you with physical attacks for 5k-7k.

The fight is mostly about staying healed and looking for openings. Toppling is a major concern, so be sure to defend if you notice someone wobbling. A broken stack is a dead stack in this fight.

Every time you take out one of the bosses, Garland will pick up a weakness to the element that the boss represented. You can try exploiting this to get him out of the way quickly if you want. He's probably the least threatening of the bosses here, but that also makes him dangerous in some ways. He sort of hangs out in the back and picks off your stacks when they are weak, or weakens them to set up one of the other bosses. You don't pay him a lot of mind because he's so small in comparison to the others.

Winning the fight gets you Garland.

Garland is voiced by Christopher Sabat in English and Koji Ishii in Japanese.

Garland is the original antagonist of the FF series. He was a former Cornelian Knight that was the one responsible for kidnapping Princess Sarah. He gets beaten immediately, after which the Warriors of Light run around and battle the Four Fiends of Chaos that sucked the power out of the crystals. Said Four Fiends are the ones we just fought: Kraken, Lich, Marilith, and Tiamat. After they are defeated, the Warriors of Light find out that the power the Fiends had sucked out was diverted to the Dark Crystal and opened a portal to 2,000 years ago. Turns out that Garland basically creates a time loop that makes him functionally immortal by sending the Four Fiends of the past to the present. Of course the Warriors of Light proceed to defeat him and break the loop.

Those were simpler times.

And that's all she wrote for the Hidden Dungeon. Kind of boring, but I appreciate the call back to the Four Fiends of Chaos and I definitely like the inclusion of Garland as a Lilikin companion.

To finish the update, we're going to take a look at the Maxima Intervention Quests. You need to do these in order, so we have to start with Bloom in the Moonlight.

Update 37 Highlights - Night Queen Quest

I don't the-see it either...

Cecil is voiced by Yuri Lowenthal in English and Shiduma Hodoshima in Japanese.

Cecil is from FFIV, like Rydia. He is childhood friends with Rosa and Kain who unfortunately are only referenced in World of Final Fantasy, not actually seen. Cecil starts out as a Dark Knight and captain of the Red Wings, an airship fleet. At the start of the game, Cecil carries out a raid on Mysidia to try and swipe the Water Crystal. Everyone starts to suspect that something is wrong with the King, and sure enough he immediately orders Cecil and Kain to piss off and go hunt down Eidolons in Mist Valley. This leads to the unfortunate incident with Rydia that I mentioned in her introduction.

Cecil and Kain unintentionally kill Rydia's mom by killing her summon (Mist Dragon), the package they were told to deliver turns out to be a bomb that destroys the village, the two of them offer to "rescue" Rydia and get her to safety but she (rightfully) tells them to gently caress off by summoning Titan and causing an earthquake.

The King is obviously messed up in the head by this point, so Cecil ends up fighting off soldiers from Baron and basically turning his back on the country that raised him. However, Kain ends up sticking with Baron and the two eventually battle for control of Fabul's crystal. Kain ends up winning, Rosa gets kidnapped by Golbez, and then the ship attack happens where everyone gets separated (Rydia winds up in the Eidolons realm where the age-up happens). This leads into Cecil going on his journey to become a Paladin.

Then they go on to do Final Fantasy hero things and save the world by beating a giant robot that kind of looks like Alexander while Golbez goes to the moon to fight the actual big bad and then later the party flies to the moon in a giant airship that looks like a mechanical whale and is called the Lunar Whale...

Final Fantasy IV got weird.

Anyway, there's more to it than that (unfortunately), because FFIV had the noble honour of being granted the Extended Universe treatment. Look forward to that.

According to Edgar, it should be somewhere around here...

*Expository flashback time*

If I recall, there's a medicinal flower somewhere in this desert that is said to cure sunstroke. Are you familiar with it?

Mm, you speak of the Night Queen. Of course I am familiar. Unfortunately, it's a rather enigmatic flower that only blooms when it is truly needed. Which means it's rather hard to find.

That sounds like kind of an rear end in a top hat flower. How does it decide when it's "needed"? If it's so hard to find, then that must mean that it doesn't appear for everyone that goes looking for it.

In order to find the Night Queen... it will have to be Cecil, who needs it most, that searches the desert.

Hwooow... And where exactly in this big the-desert does he even begin to look?

The Night Queen is said to bloom where the moon's power is most prevalent. Sadly, the moon shines differently every night... I'm sorry, but I don't know the exact location.

Where the moon's power is strongest...? In that case, I may be able to find it. Edgar, where can I see the moon at its highest position tonight?

We're in a desert, so... anywhere? Not exactly a lot of stuff that can obstruct the view.

Hm? Oh, I believe it is... that way. Is that truly... all you need to know?

Yes, I am somewhat attuned to the moon's power. Thank you Edgar, I am in your debt!

No no, you owe me nothing. I just hope that you find the Night Queen.

Tama, you go and help Cecil.

Yup, you the-got it!

Hauyn, your help is appreciated.

Don't mention it.

Ahem... uh, so this person who is dear to you, is it fair to say... she is fair?

Hm...?

Ugh... goodness the-gracious...

Oh, Edgar. You and your character trait.

*Flashback over*

Forget flowers, there's not the-even a single weed!

Three days since the fever began... I must find the Night Queen... Bear through the pain just a little longer... Wait for me!

Cecil! There's something the-over there!

The moon's power... I feel it... Yes, the flower that blooms over yonder must be the Night Queen Edgar spoke of.

Huh, well that wasn't so hard. The Desert Caravan is like 20 feet behind us.

That might be a bigger problem, though.

The flower's guardian, I presume? Apologies, but I am in dire need of the Night Queen-- please move aside.

The guardian shakes his head "No" and then does a "pay up" motion with his hand.

Um, um... he just the-said that his name is Yojimbo, or at least I think so. And he the-says he wants all your money... right the-now, or the-else!

Oh, this bastard. I'm looking forward to kicking your rear end.

What? My money...?

*Cecil pats himself down, then looks to Tama who has this look on her face that says "I'm a Mirage, man. I don't have cash!"

He's sure as hell not getting my money. I don't care if I now have a functionally limitless supply of it. It's mine!

Apologies again, but I cannot comply. I'm on a quest for someone dear to me.

Yojimbo doesn't seem to appreciate that answer.

I see... then I have no choice! Accept my challenge... for the Night Queen!

We're up against Yojimbo, Gamit, and Daigoro. They are all pathetic and will serve no threat to us whatsoever. That's not because of my super boss grinding either. These stats are pathetic even by Postscript standards. I tried to goad some attacks out of him, but he just kept using Double Cut.

So to hell with him.

Suck it, you money grubbing douche.

He may also have had just cause or reason... But I needed the Night Queen... to save someone dear to me.

We the-did it! Now, let's the-go back to the town!

Yes, we should hurry. ...Though he is a dragoon, after all. It is highly doubtful that a week of fever would be the end of a man such as he.

Psych! It was actually Kain that was sick!

This is a call back to FFIV where Rosa is the one that gets Desert Fever. I mentioned this when we were in Figaro for the first time. Cecil had to go find an Ant-lion and grab a Desert Pearl in order to cure Rosa.

But Cecil! If we don't the-hurry, it might be the end of his caretaker!

His caretaker? Ah, Rosa...! You have a point-- let's make haste!

Hey! Wait the-for me!

And that's the end of that. Cecil's Champion Jewel becomes available for purchase. He doesn't get a flashy special move unfortunately. His Champion Jewel skills are SOS Regen and Guard (if his HP is high he'll sometimes take a hit for an ally that's in danger. It also reduces damage received).

We don't get Yojimbo, Gamit, or Daigoro here, so I'm guessing they are tucked away in the Vortex place in Crystal Tower.

Update 37 Highlights - The Price of Freedom

Moving on to Maxima Intervention 2.

...a dream?

A hero... It must feel... really good...

Zack is voiced by Rick Gomez in English and Kenichi Suzumura in Japanese.

Zack was mentioned previously during Cloud's introduction (and the EU entry). He was what Cloud wanted to be when he first left Nibelheim promising Tifa that he'd be SOLDIER 1st-Class. He reached SOLDIER 2nd-Class and is promoted to 1st-Class partway through Crisis Core.

At one point in the game, Zack falls into the Sector 5 Church, much the same way that Cloud would in VII. He meets Aerith, offers to repay her for her help with a date (a line that Aerith later uses in VII), suggests she sells flowers since they are a luxury in Midgar (which is how Aerith becomes a flower girl in VII), and he also buys her the pink ribbon she wears in her hair during VII.

Shortly after that, Zack meets Cloud and the two become good friends. Cloud looks up to Zack as a role model (Cloud is only an infantryman. He never made it to SOLDIER like he wanted), and after that comes the Nibelheim Incident (well, it comes after a bunch of EU bullshit anyway, but whatever).

The Nibelheim Incident results in Zack and Cloud being taken in by Shinra and used in Hojo's Jenova Reunion project experiments. This is how Cloud winds up infused with Mako and Jenova cells. The two are locked away in the Shinra Mansion for four years, but Zack eventually manages to break out and he escapes with Cloud. Zack was SOLDIER, so he manages to get out of the experimentation fairly okay, but Cloud is left as basically a vegetable from Mako poisoning since he was just a normal infantryman (SOLDIER's were already exposed to Mako during training).

Those wings... I want them too...

We'll pick this up in a second. No, Zack! Bad Zack! Get away from the wing imagery!

It's like...

Where am I...? Who am I...?

Come on, World of Final Fantasy. Don't do this to me...

This is a reference to Zack's Final Stand. It's the ending of Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII and an optional scene in FFVII (although the VII version is far less grand as we only see the last moment). Zack and Cloud go on the run and slowly make their way towards Midgar. Just outside of the city, the Shinra Army ambushes the pair and Zack hides Cloud behind some rocks while he goes to fight.

The sequence was playable in Crisis Core and it's heart-wrenching. The enemies are limitless and as the battle goes on, Zack's DMW reel (his special gauge that has faces of important people in his life) starts to break down. Zack winds up taking out almost the entire army sent to stop them, but eventually he reaches his limits and is killed. He passes the Buster Sword on to Cloud in his final moments.

Making it somehow even more heart-breaking, Tseng and the Turks tried to rescue Zack and Cloud, but by the time they got there via helicopter, the Shinra Army had already found them. Tseng was keeping several letters that Aerith tried to send to Zack during the four years he spent locked up in Shinra Mansion. Because of Aerith's connection to the planet, she can feel the moment that Zack "returns to the planet".

Anyway, moving on because I'm honestly choking up just recounting it. It's a very powerful scene that, to tell the truth, would make me hesitate if I had the power to erase the Compilation from history.

Zack has some flashbacks to the bird in the sky scene and the Lifestream, then collapses in pain.

I'm a... soldier... I'll protect my honor... as SOLDIER! Come and get it!

*And the scene cuts to black as Zack's darts in to fight the Cogna/machines*

Well now, it seems many strange things are afoot under our feet. Not the least being Bahamut suddenly returning and squatting down there. And with Vivi currently absent... Hmmm... I'm wary of going down there alone.

Chicken-wuss.

...!

*Edgar has some kind of epiphany and does this dramatic smirk to the camera*

Of course he would.

Yeah, the-sticky, the-gooey, the-viscous even! Is Bahamut the-responsible for this?

My guess... is that he finds all of this energy comforting. Tiababylo always has been a big eater...

You have control over the Mirages currently, correct? I'm counting on you!

What happened...?

Astonishing... The machines down here might be wiped out without us lifting a finger!

They the-might not be the only ones to get wiped out!

Ah, indeed... But was this the work of man, and not beast?

It appears so. They were all struck with a blade.

Oh, hey. Cecil is here too.

Ah! I'm glad you came to join us. It would have been gauche of me to only invite the ladies.

I do owe all of you a debt for helping me.

So all is well now? Has the maiden recovered?

The maiden...? No, the Night Queen was for...

*Zack outta nowhere!*

Aaah!

Is this the one...?

Something's the-wrong with him!

Could it be... mako poisoning?

Uraaahhh!

Hraaah!

*Cecil manages to knock him back*

I... I have to... protect him!

Him...?

We're thrown into battle with Zack, and while he is a little tougher than Yojimbo, he still isn't a threat to a post-game party. His basic physical attacks only hit our stacks for about 600.

He'll try to use Focus to boost damage for Double Cut on his next turn, but that still only amounts to about 2,400.

Unbelievable...

The sword, the clothes... is he a Shinra SOLDIER?

Yes, 1st Class I would guess... the very same class as Cloud.

Except SOLDIER 1st Class don't have a standard uniform. They basically wear whatever they want, although typically they are supposed to wear black. Cloud's clothing is also Blue, which is normally for SOLDIER 3rd Class.

C-Cloud...?

Hm?

You know him? You know Cloud? Then maybe we could...

Cloud... ngh! I am... not going to abandon you...! We're friends... right?

[Bahamut]: Rrrraaaah!

And then Bahamut just flies away into the... green ether? We're in an Underground Prison, how does he get in and out of here? Is it just a big pit in the middle of the desert or something?

What?

Wh-what in blazes...?!

So he was the-sleeping, but he woke up because we were being the-loud... And graaahhh! He got the-mad and flew away somewhere?

Thank you for summarizing, Tama.

Classic Tiababylo...

...? Where's our friend?

It the-looks like Bahamut took him along for the ride. What do we the-do?

Well, what can we the-do?

Uh... yes, well... It seemed like he knew Cloud, so... I should go look for him, I guess.

Good stuff. Zack's Champion Jewel is unlocked at this point. His special is Slash Fury.

It's not especially impressive.

Update 37 Highlights - Seriously, this place doesn't exist anymore. What the hell?

Last intervention (other than A Bridge's Woes. I haven't forgotten), here we go.

Okay, here I come!

And we're immediately thrown into battle with Shiva-Ixion. As with the other bosses, this one no longer poses a threat.

She has a special called Icicle Drift, which is the move she does in Snow's Champion animation. She can also cast Slow and Haste. Neither of those will help her.

Whoa whoa whoa. How are we back here? This entire area was just an illusion that Ywain (or whatever the Carbuncle was named) was creating.

You guys seriously couldn't find another part of the world map that had flowers in it? Hell, copy the flower texture over a piece of the Watchplains.

The Icycle is... yeah, looking alright! Now I just have to get back and...

And Zack just comes plummeting out of the sky. We also see Bahamut flying through the sky overhead.

Wha... whaaaaa?! Who's this! He's not dead... is he...? Hellooo...

Hm... ngel...?

What? Oh no, my name is... Serah. Are you a little disoriented?

Serah is voiced by Laura Bailey in English and Minako Kotobuki in Japanese.

Serah is from FFXIII. She's Lightning's sister that got turned to crystal after doing her god chore. The look you're seeing in WoFF is her Time Traveler costume from XIII-2.

I don't have a lot to say about Serah right now. We already talked about the fact that she is Snow's fiancee, Lightning doesn't like that fact, and she is a crystal hood ornament for most of XIII. We also discussed that she becomes a time traveler in XIII-2 for... reasons. I guess because Toriyama couldn't find a way to make it so that Lightning was both a goddess warrior and also Time Cop at the same time.

The people have declared that XIII's sequels are EU, so we'll be hearing plenty about Serah in the upcoming EU entry.

Serah...? No, I'm... oh...! No, I was just having a bad dream. Hut!

*Zack springs up. Seems like he's feeling better, and no longer full of insane bloodlust*

So you saved my life, huh? Thank you! Now, how do I repay you...?

What? Oh no, I didn't do anything.

Hmm... I know! How about one date...

She's taken, man. You won't be getting anywhere with her.

There the-he is! Hweh? He the-looks completely normal now...

Friends of yours?

No, never seen 'em.

Oh that Tiababylo... Does he always have to fly so far?

Hm?

It seems like he absorbed all the bad mako energy out of you.

Huh? What's that now?

We haven't formally met. I'm Hauyn, and this is...

Lovely the-Tama!

Uh... hi.

Hello...

Oh? Wait, aren't you...

...?

So what can I do for you, miss?

Oh yes, well... I followed you here to ask you something, mister...

Oh, my name is Zack.

Zack, you have heard the name Cloud before, haven't you?

Did you say Cloud...? Hold on, is he here?

No Tama, he was unconsciously uttering it just to mess with you.

He is here...

Um, this Cloud person, could he be Snow's friend Cloud?

Uhhh, since when was Cloud, Snow's friend? The two have never been in the same scene together. Lightning spends more time with him and even she is more of a co-worker than a friend.

I've heard his name mentioned.

Yes, hehe... I knew it. You're Snow's fiancee, Serah, aren't you?

Hey! Snow's not a muscle-bound toad! Oh wait... physically he may be mostly muscle... But he has just as much kindness as he does muscle!

He's also kind of an idiot.

So you're the-saying he's equal parts muscle, kindness, and toad?

Nooo! Ugh! Who is Snow to you people anyway?

Hmm, let's just say he's our... he's our comrade-in-arms.

Even that is kind of a stretch.

Comrade?

Comrade-in-arms...

Oh, wonderful! You'll talk to us now? You're in the mood?

No, I'm sorry but if you guys are associated with Cloud... I'm outta here. The burden of Shinra's orders lies on my shoulders... and mine alone. I think Cloud... has been through enough already.

But...

Serah?

Snow told me once... Going on alone and making the people you leave behind cry isn't kindness. If you really care about someone, you should try to get through it together.

Get through it together...

So if this person is really important to you, Zack... Before you just go off on your own, I think you should meet with him and talk things through.

Well the-said, hear the-hear!

Serah... heh, alright then. Hauyn, I've reconsidered. Take me to my friend, 'kay?

Do you guys even know where he is at this point? He kind of had plans to wander around looking for Sephiroth.

Yes, of course! But I have to say...

Huh?

Does the world still need saving? I thought we already saved it.

Hehe... just idle talk. So, now that it's settled, let's get going, shall we?

Yes, we the-shall!

Well Serah, until next time.

HA! "Next time." This game is never getting a sequel, are you kidding me?

Oh yeah! I'll give you a rain check on that date, okay?

What?! I never agreed to a date!

Urgh... you know, you're just too happy-the-go-lucky for Shinra SOLDIER, Zack!

Quiet, you!

What a strange bunch... That girl said something about me saving the world? What was that all about?

*Serah looks to Shiva-Ixion, who just kind of cocks her head*

...Yeah, I don't get it either. I'll have to ask Snow when I get back... oh, no! I'm so behind on preparing for Snow's birthday!

Aaah! The flowers are going to get ruined! Go slower, slower...

They can't get ruined because they don't exist! This whole place is a lie!

Now Serah's Champion Jewel has been unlocked.

Update 37 Highlights - Slash Fury/Ultima Arrow

Her special is Ultima Arrow.

It's kind of just a basic "arrow rain" attack.

And that's all! Those were all the Intervention Quests that Maxima added. With those clear, we just have some cleaning up to do (and by that I mean that I have to go and catch all the remaining Mirages I'm missing) before we finally take down those--

What? Oh, dammit. Right. We still have two Extended Universe segments to get through before that grand finale.

Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 02:18 on Jul 2, 2019

# ? Apr 23, 2019 00:16

Leraika: Jun 14, 2015; Luckily, I *did* save your old avatar. Fucked around and found out indeed.

Wow, those were really disjointed even by WoFF standards. How disappointing.

# ? Apr 23, 2019 02:15

BisbyWorl: Jan 12, 2019; Knowledge is pain plus observation.

Leraika posted:

Wow, those were really disjointed even by WoFF standards. How disappointing.

You gotta shoehorn in more character reps somehow.

Although having Garland not say his iconic line is unforgivable. :colbert:

# ? Apr 23, 2019 05:07

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

Leraika posted:

Wow, those were really disjointed even by WoFF standards. How disappointing.

Maxima did not get much of a budget, that much is clear. I'll talk about it during the final update, but as things stand my position on Maxima is that it is not worth the $20 Square was asking for it. There just isn't enough content to justify it.

At the same I can't say I'm surprised.

BisbyWorl posted:

Although having Garland not say his iconic line is unforgivable.

I haven't checked his skills yet, but at the very least they make a sneaky reference to it in his Mirage description. I'll have to see if there are any other references or voice clips when I get back home. Currently out of town.

# ? Apr 24, 2019 02:21

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

~Final Fantasy Extended Universes Part 3: Final Fantasy XII and Final Fantasy IV~

Before we get started here, I want to talk about something that some people may be wondering during the first portion of this entry. Final Fantasy XII is part of a larger universe of games called the "Ivalice Alliance", which includes stuff like the Final Fantasy Tactics series and Vagrant Story. The reason I don't mention those in this update is because XII was added to the Ivalice Alliance, not the core of it. Unfortunately, Tactics is not represented here in WoFF (outside of references), so we're focusing solely on XII's EU here.

Not every Extended Universe turns out to be a horrible barn fire. Most of them do, but not always. Every so often Square will put out a diamond, or at the very least cubic zirconia.

Such was the case with Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings. Released for the DS in 2007, a year after XII, Revenent Wings follows Vaan and Penelo a year after the events of XII. There isn't much to say about the game itself, it was a solid experience and didn't really do anything to poo poo all over the world established in XII.

It was the kind of game that you wanted as a sequel (or at least the kind that I like), which is to say that it was the characters you had grown to know and/or love having further adventures. Vaan and Penelo trip other their own two feet while out treasure-hunting, stumble on an airship that takes them to a lost continent hidden in the clouds, meet a race of bird people, and then team up to help them save their land from assholes pirates (not the good kind like our heroes) and one rear end in a top hat bird person. It was written and directed by Motomu Toriyama. This is Toriyama pre-XIII, although development had started on XIII already.

The gameplay was real time strategy and took inspiration from stuff like Age of Empires. It was also kept free of clutter and needlessly complicated systems, likely due to the fact that the game was aiming for new fans that didn't have experience with FF games. The North American release was bumped in difficulty a bit though, because the developers assumed that western fans were more familiar with RTS games. Based on the change in gameplay, there is some speculation that the game was originally planned to be something else, only to be morphed into a FFXII follow up for better name recognition. I can't find anything on the original development, but it honestly wouldn't surprise me if it was the case.

Either way, the game was enjoyable and didn't rock the boat the way that other EU material would. It was just a nice solid side game for fans to get some more XII.

That's not to say that XII's EU was without its share of problems. As we talked about in Part 2 with Final Fantasy X, Square can't leave things alone.

In 2008, Swedish developer Grin had been doing some concept work on a project called Fortress. Square was one of the companies they pitched the project to and they considered making the game a spin-off title of FFXII.

The original idea was for an action role-playing game set in a magic fortress (as well as some areas in the vicinity). The fortress was needed to fight off the king of the sea who rose every 10,000 years to try and invade the world, as it was the only thing capable of doing the job. The heroes would have to fight the king of the sea and his forces from the fortress and stop it from being overtaken.

After Square expressed interest in making the game a XII spin-off, the story was reworked a little to involve Basch from XII being the main character and Ashe (also from XII) playing a major role as his biggest supporter and a fellow combatant. Other heroes from XII, such as Balthier, would gradually arrive to help defend the fortress as well. Scenario Writer Ulf Andersson stated that the story was going to be set a few years after the events of Revenant Wings.

So what happened to it? Well, Square started welshing on the deal and getting fussy.

The deal was that Square would pay Grin about $16 million in installments. The installments would be tied to milestones that the game reached, which I think is fair. Keep making progress and you keep getting paid.

Square apparently had other ideas about that deal. The first two months of development went by with no initial payment. I don't know if it's just a case of Swedes being too nice and easy going, but co-founder Bo Andersson wasn't particularly worried and brushed it off as late payments being a common industry thing (instead of, you know, telling Square to loving pay up). Then a few more months went by without Square coughing up the money. Grin was forced to start closing all of their other offices because they were bleeding money from this project and Sweden is apparently not overly tolerant of letting businesses run under unwise debt loads.

Square then started requesting Grin to send them (by fax) all of the game's assets, music, and code. That sure as hell wasn't going to fly (or in some cases, be possible), so then Square supposedly decided that they suddenly didn't like the Nordic art style of the game anymore. Grin rushed to try and "Final Fantasy" up the art, but they still weren't happy with it. Grin even claims that they once sent an image taken from FFXII itself to Square to see what they would say, and they responded that it didn't "look like Final Fantasy".

So at this point it was clear that nothing the developer did was going to please Square. Later in 2009, Square rang them up and told them that they weren't going to be getting any money, period. Grin thought about suing, but suing requires money that they simply didn't have. During Grin's bankruptcy filing, Square claimed the milestones hadn't been met, Grin claimed the opposite, one of the level designers at Grin said that the developer had been ignoring requests from Square for changes, it was a complete poo poo-show.

It's a lot of "he said, she said" kind of stuff, so the truth is probably somewhere in between (Grin had its share of accusations against it after all). Either way, Square basically hijacked the project (that they said they weren't interested in anymore) and passed it on to another developer to continue, but that failed too. During an interview at E3 2011, Motomu Toriyama said that the game was suspended, but that it also wasn't going to be seeing the light of day. That essentially put the headstone on Fortress' grave.

Regardless of what the real story was behind Fortress, it was definitely going to be XII's "X-2". Whether we would have looked back fondly on it or not is anyone's guess. Grin had wanted to revolutionize Final Fantasy, which is the kind of line that usually acts as a prelude of horrible things to come. On the other hand, maybe it could have been a fresh and interesting take on the Final Fantasy series, XII in particular, and the world of Ivalice as a whole. We will simply never know what could have been.

Fortress Tech Demo Footage

There is some tech demo footage out there, but that's not enough to judge one way or the other.

-Final Fantasy IV-

While FFXII was being released, getting a decent sequel, and being involved in the complete implosion of a developer halfway around the world, Square had been busy giving Final Fantasy IV its own sequel title.

Specifically this thing. Final Fantasy IV: The After Years was released in Japan in early 2008 for cellphones. Yes, cellphones. Square had a brief stint of publishing games for particular series of phones (namely the 900i series, which got product placement in Advent Children in the form of the P900iV as part of a brand deal).

The game was originally released in 13 chapters over the course of 2008. It was later released digitally on the Wii in 9 chapters, although you can no longer get it as the Wii Shop Channel was ended. In 2011 it was included in the Final Fantasy IV Complete Collection for PSP (along with Interlude, but we'll get to that later). It was also released for modern cellphones in 2013 and PC in 2015.

The game is set 17 years after the events of FFIV and jumps between many different characters. Original FFIV characters return and are involved in the plot, kids of those characters are involved (Cecil and Rosa's son Ceodore, Yang's daughter Ursula, Cid's grandson Mid), and some new faces are thrown in as well.

It wasn't great.

A few gameplay changes were made that people seemed to like. There was a system where certain attacks were stronger or weaker depending on the phase of the moon, there was a co-op tech system called "Bands" (think Chrono Trigger). Okay, so the Moon Phase thing is a little debatable and probably down to personal preference, but the Band System was definitely well received.

Unfortunately, there were also some gameplay elements that didn't go over so well. The encounter rate was ridiculous and the game heavily reused assets from IV. All the same items, abilities, equipment, dungeons, sprites, and spells were reused.

On top of that, the story was also heavily reused. Our old friend "bigger threat hiding in the bush" rears its ugly head again in the form of "The Creator". The Creator's thing is that he destroys races that don't evolve because he thinks the universe shouldn't be overrun with inferior species (it's a loving universe, dude. You aren't going to overrun that). As with Advent Children and -Will-, we also get the pointless return of a threat that had been dealt with in the original game, in this case it's a second moon only this time it's closer than it was before. A mysterious girl also starts hijacking Rydia's summons somehow, but this is pretty much glossed over. It's mostly an excuse to not allow Rydia access to all of her summons right away.

In Ceodore's story, he goes on a trip to become a member of the Red Wings by passing a trial to prove his Knighthood. He has the typical "son with famous parents" hangup of having expectations of greatness weighing on him. The Red Wing fleet gets attacked and Ceodore tries to return to Baron which has fallen under attack by monsters. Cecil, Rosa, and Cid try to defend the town, but the second moon appears and a mysterious girl that looks like Rydia comes down, summons Bahamut, and beats Cecil. Mysterious girl then heads into the Eidolon realm and takes Leviathan and Asura. Ceodore and "Hooded Man" travel through Devil's Road, the waterway under Baron Castle, Mist Cave, all those good places.

Rydia's chapter involves her attempt to find out what the hell is going on with her summons and why she can't call on any of them. She later gets beaten by said Mysterious Girl and the airship her party is using gets damaged. After repairing it, Titan attacks them but is defeated by a man in dark armor. He tells them to go to the Tower of Babil before "history repeats itself" (TAY really likes to point out that it's doing the exact same poo poo as in IV).

Yang's chapter involves him and his daughter running into Kain Highwind who once again appears to be evil and says he's totally acting of his own free will and is in no way under any outside control. Kain swipes the Crystal and bolts. Yang and his daughter eventually team up in a fight and Yang relents in her request to train her as a monk. They hop on their now refueled ship only to be sucked into a whirlpool by Leviathan.

Palom's story involves him training Leonora, getting attacked by Mysterious Girl who is after the crystal, and then Palom petrifying himself to stop the girl from taking the crystal. Mysterious Girl ends up getting the crystal anyway.

You get the idea. The focused on character finds something strange going down in a location from IV, battles Mysterious Girl, and then either loses to her or beats her just to have her turn around and get what she wanted anyway.

The story cycles through characters (there are like 20 of them that are playable in the game) without really moving the plot forward in any way. Once the game get to the final tale (split into two parts of course, because that means more money), the party fights through a legion of boss fights until finally reaching the Creator. The Creator is the last surviving member of a species that wiped out its own civilization and he thinks that qualifies him to decide on which races are inferior or evolutionary dead ends. The party beats him, he thanks them for some reason, and then everyone goes home on the Lunar Whale and goes back to what they were doing before.

You get characters fighting their "dark halves" including Cecil (who already did that in IV), as well as Kain being a bad guy and kidnapping Rosa/the Crystals only for it to later be revealed that it wasn't the "real" Kain. The party gets the Lunar Whale and goes to the moon to beat the big bad. It's all the same stuff.

The worst part about the rehashing is that the characters actually acknowledge it in the game by saying things like "This is just like the first time". There are even flashbacks to Final Fantasy IV, as if you would be playing this game without any prior knowledge of that game.

There was also a side game called Interlude which tied IV and TAY together that released with the Complete Collection, but the game didn't really show much that TAY didn't already establish. It takes place one year after IV. The original cast investigate monsters pouring out of the Sealed Cave, accompany Rydia through the Tower of Babil, find out that Rydia is a fake at which point real Rydia shows up, then we learn that Rosa is pregnant and the mysterious girl who was impersonating Rydia proceeds to sit on her hands for 16 years.

Unlike the other EU entries, I don't have much to say about Final Fantasy IV's Extended Universe. X and VII's are insultingly bad. There's a lot to discuss when it comes to those. But IV's? IV's Extended Universe is just IV told in a different order. You fight the same bosses, travel through the same dungeons, experience the same plot beats, and look at the same graphics. The plot doesn't do anything and drops anything that could prove interesting, for example nothing is explored with the "mind-controlling Eidolons" thing, and there's no connection established between Summoners and Lunarians even though a bunch of hints are dropped. On the one hand, at least TAY didn't commit any heinous offences towards the original IV (other than Ceodore being a pantywaist I guess). On the other hand, TAY didn't do anything. It just existed, and not in the way that Revenant Wings did. TAY was simply lazy, which I guess might be the point. The game was released in episodes for the cellphone. It was aimed at getting people to buy it so they could distract themselves on the train. No doubt in an effort to squeeze one more chapter out, the final dungeon of the game involves re-fighting basically every boss in existence, including ones from other FF titles, through 29 floors. Slog doesn't even begin to do it justice.

That's it, really. I didn't play through it myself, as I didn't have a Wii at the time of it's WiiWare release and I had read Mega64's LP by the time I had gotten around to replaying IV in the Complete Collection. I didn't suffer the tedious gameplay, but given how repetitious the story and dungeons were, I highly doubt I would have been able to hold on until the end.

TAY references IV so much that it winds up having no identity of its own. You aren't getting further adventures with your favorite FFIV characters. You're getting the same adventure, with the same dungeons, against the same bosses, using the same abilities, with a handful of new characters and a thinner story, for a higher price (As of writing, TAY is currently 4-5 dollars more expensive than IV on Steam).

Now that we've seen XII's failed attempt at a franchise and TAY taking cues from a recycling plant, there are two other games which follow in those same footsteps. Coming up next, The Fabula Nova Crystallis.

Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 23:21 on Jul 2, 2019

# ? Apr 26, 2019 00:10

LiefKatano: Aug 31, 2018; I swear, by my sword and capote, that I will once again prove victorious!!

"Sending a picture of FFXII only to be told it's not Final Fantasy enough" is hilarious despite how awful it is.

# ? Apr 26, 2019 02:36

AweStriker: Oct 6, 2014

Final Fantasy Tactics A2 is also an Ivalice Alliance game, though the most important thing that happens in it that pertains to regular FFXII characters is that Vaan put on a shirt for once.

You may have seen Solumin's ongoing... well almost finished LP of it.

# ? Apr 26, 2019 02:52

Regalingualius: Jan 7, 2012; We gazed into the eyes of madness... And all we found was horny.

Wasn�t there some kind of implication/speculation that the presence of �signature� bosses from FF1-6 in TAY�s loving massive final dungeon meant that those other worlds were canonically erased by the Creator for failing to live up to his bugfuck insane standards?

# ? Apr 26, 2019 03:47

NGDBSS: Dec 30, 2009

Protip: If you ever catch someone saying "Huh?" in relation to TAY, they're referencing Ceodore's dumb catchphrase. They're not confused, even if Ceodore perpetually was.

Regalingualius posted:

Wasn't there some kind of implication/speculation that the presence of "signature" bosses from FF1-6 in TAY's loving massive final dungeon meant that those other worlds were canonically erased by the Creator for failing to live up to his bugfuck insane standards?

I dunno if it went that far but there definitely was some kind of half-assed crossover implication.

# ? Apr 26, 2019 06:12

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

LiefKatano posted:

"Sending a picture of FFXII only to be told it's not Final Fantasy enough" is hilarious despite how awful it is.

It sounds too silly to be true, but this is Square we're dealing with. It wouldn't surprise me if they just directed whomever was in contact with Grin to just automatically reject everything that was sent without even looking at it. They wanted out of the deal, and if they had called Grin out on their image trick then Grin would probably start comparing their art side by side with XII's and going "How is what we're doing not good enough?"

AweStriker posted:

Final Fantasy Tactics A2 is also an Ivalice Alliance game, though the most important thing that happens in it that pertains to regular FFXII characters is that Vaan put on a shirt for once.

Yeah, as I mentioned, XII is part of that universe, but the Ivalice games didn't spring up from XII, XII just joined it. Tactics isn't an EU of XII. It's more like XII is an EU of Tactics. If Tactics had been represented in WoFF then I would have the chance to go into it.

Regalingualius posted:

Wasn’t there some kind of implication/speculation that the presence of “signature” bosses from FF1-6 in TAY’s loving massive final dungeon meant that those other worlds were canonically erased by the Creator for failing to live up to his bugfuck insane standards?

NGDBSS posted:

I dunno if it went that far but there definitely was some kind of half-assed crossover implication.

Like NGDBSS said, I don't think they went that far. If they did, then it was completely invalidated by other material. FF has this multiverse theory where every FF is set in its space with "The Void" separting them. The Void is kind of the link between the worlds of FF. It's how characters like Gilgamesh wind up appearing in different games with memories or knowledge of their original game.

It's also why that bullshit Nojima tried to pull linking X and VII is bullshit.

It wouldn't surprise me if they tried to go for that in TAY, but it just doesn't work considering already existing lore. I also personally hate it whenever this crap gets suggested by games. Pokemon Sun and Moon pulled some similar idea and it's just pointlessly stupid. It's a lazy attempt to try and make the antagonist seem more threatening and powerful.

I mean, there is no way that the heroes of I-VI would be defeated by this dude that gets beaten partially by loving Ceodore. That's an insult.

# ? Apr 26, 2019 09:56

Blaze Dragon: Aug 28, 2013; LOWTAX'S SPINE FUND

FFIV is one of my favourites of the franchise. It's definitely a great game even now, and I've played a bunch of versions of it without ever feeling it repetitive (though I'm not particularly fond of the DS version, but the PSP version is the best).

I cannot say the same of TAY. I tried playing it on the Complete Collection, I really did. I couldn't complete it. It's just...it's not even terrible, it's just BORING. It feels like nothing's ever happening and that's an issue when you're a RPG so your gameplay isn't that exciting in the first place. The Bands are great but if I wanted to play Chrono Trigger I'd play Chrono Trigger, because Chrono Trigger is a masterpiece of RPG design. TAY is not. It does some stuff I like - for all it's true that fighting your dark side is something FFIV already did, Kain deciding to actually accept said dark side instead of destroying it like Cecil did was a much greater ending to his growth in my opinion, and having a playable Golbez is never a bad thing. But that doesn't save just how same-y the whole thing gets, both because it's blatanly recycling FFIV and because the gameplay itself is not great. It's definitely a lesser game and another proof Square-Enix should just never make sequels.

I...actually did like Revenant Wings though! Admittedly, I really do not like FFXII, so that probably helps since I did not want anything similar to it and Revenant Wings is very much not similar to it. The gameplay's simplistic but fun, rather, the entire game seems to just want to be fun without being too complex. The art style, the story, everything fits the idea of it being a pretty casual game, something you play more for the sake of it than to dive into an hours-long epic (attempt) like your typical Final Fantasy. And it works, it's a fun little game and one I can appreciate.

Actually, saying that, all that I said about Revenant Wings is what I expected here too. It uhh...it did not meet that expectation, and I'm not sure why a game about super-deformed characters actually went into heavy themes like patricide/matricide, abuse of power, dooming your entire world twice, etc., but hey it gives me chances to point out how we have the two biggest gently caress-ups in history here so I guess I can't complain. It's not like I'm playing this! Plus you'll never have to talk about an EU here because god Square-Enix just did not care about this.

# ? Apr 27, 2019 03:12

Edvarius: Aug 23, 2013

Make no mistake, TAY was more than boring. It truly was terrible, at least in writing. Not only was there a lack of character development with the old cast in many ways, the huge amount of time between games made that even worse. Like, Edward being devastated by the loss of Anna? Fine. Edward's advisors begging the man to produce an heir 17 years later? Not so fine. Heck, I'm willing to believe he still misses her, but for a man shown to be the most intelligent of the cast you'd think he'd at least look at adoption or something so his kingdom would be a little more secure. And likewise, I can understand Kain not feeling comfortable with the others and wanting to find a way of purging himself of what made him vulnerable to influence from the darkness. But spending 17 years on top of Mt. Ordeals with absolutely nothing to show for it? What was he doing all of that time? And for that matter, why was his eventual turn to the light accomplish by accepting the darkness? I'm pretty sure that's the opposite of what shown to be necessary in the previous game. Heck, the fight with Cecil and Cecil in the original actually had an interesting theme, as the best way to win was to do just defend yourself and let the self-destructive nature of darkness play itself out. Actually I'd love to know why the test to become a paladin actually makes an evil duplicate that can apparently just leave and do whatever the heck it feels like. Or then there's even cases of character regression with Rydia and Porom, two headstrong and tough young ladies who apparently grew up to be passive bland waifus (and I still have no idea why Porom suddenly had pink hair). And there is nothing interesting about the new characters. Nothing. Every single one of them is either just an inferior version of a previous character, or a worthless waste of space with no abilities worth using. And then there's the story. Ooooooh how I despise the story. You know, you wanna have a game where everything is recurring and the characters are actively noticing that? Fine, just so long as you do something with that? If there had been some kind of time-based shenanigans going on to explain it at least that would have been a plot of some kind. but do you know what the reason was? Nothing! Absolutely nothing! Everything kept playing out the same way as before, with Edge even going so far as to be willing to jump out of the Tower of Babel because there was an airship last time so there should be one this time too! And there was! But there's no reason for any of it! Apparently it was just one big string of coincidences, because the writers were a bunch of hacks who should have been fired after the first draft was submitted for failing to rise above the standards of a fifth grader's fanfic. The inclusion of Bands was the only thing that game had going for it, and everything else was either just the same thing again or actively worse.

# ? Apr 27, 2019 04:22

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

~Final Fantasy Extended Universes Part 4: Final Fantasy XIII~

As we've seen in the first three parts of this miniseries, Square did everything they could in the 2000's to create a big shared universe sub-franchise. Sure, they had established the Ivalice Alliance and the Crystal series, but those were small collections of games that hardcore fans were in to. As good as the Final Fantasy Tactics series was, it didn't generate the same kind of buzz and sales as the mainline entries (Tactics sold about 2.5 million after being on the market over a decade, whereas XIII hit that number in basically the first half year).

In 2004, Square got our old friend Kazushige Nojima to start writing up a mythos that they could use to base a shared universe on. He wrote it in about a year as a book while getting some input from various directors and producers of the Final Fantasy series.

In 2006, the Fabula Nova Crystallis: Final Fantasy XIII was announced, although it was later shortened to just Fabula Nova Crystallis for.... reasons. Reasons we will get to shortly.

The idea was that Final Fantasy XIII was to serve as the central title in the series while a bunch of other games were developed using its universe as a base. Square assigned different directors to head up the development of the different games in the collection. Yoshinori Kitase and Motomu Toriyama would be in charge of Final Fantasy XIII. Hajime Tabata would head up the development of Final Fantasy Agito XIII. Finally, Tetsuya Nomura would direct Final Fantasy Versus XIII.

These three game series would form the Fabula Nova Crystallis, which supposedly means "New Tale of the Crystal" in Latin. It was described as such:

"One myth, countless stories. Final Fantasy XIII. The New Tale of the Crystal. Like the light that shines through the Crystal, the universe shines with multicolored content."

Square was going all in on this poo poo. They were priming for a complete overhaul of the Final Fantasy series, with its own legends and mythos behind it, that they could use to spin games off of for the next decade or more.

So how did it go?

The first title to be released was Final Fantasy XIII in 2009. This was the anchor that was going to hold everything together. As mentioned previously, the game was directed by Motomu Toriyama and starred his precious waifu Claire "Lightning" Farron, who was a character that Tetsuya Nomura apparently doodled on the back of a napkin as a starting point only for Toriyama to look at it and declare it to be perfection.

XIII involved a giant floating sphere where everything was futuristic and the people lived advanced comfortable lives in walled off cities. Cocoon, as it was called, was controlled by various gods called fal'Cie. The world outside of Cocoon had its own fal'Cie, but those gods just tooled around tending to the land and growing plants and poo poo. Basically, Cocoon=Civilized and Pulse(the outside world)=Savages. The surface dwellers tried to summon a big-rear end monster to destroy Cocoon, but only damaged it. Cocoon then kicked Pulse's collective rear end and wiped out most of the people living down there. This led to people in Cocoon being real antsy with any fal'Cie from the surface.

Which is where Lightning's sister, Serah, comes in. Serah was hanging around the wrong place at the wrong time, got turned into a l'Cie by a fal'Cie (remember, l'Cie were people branded by a god to do some inane poo poo for them. Otherwise they get turned into a monster or crystal depending on whether they failed or succeeded), and was made the target of a purge that Cocoon enacted to try and nip any possible problems in the bud.

Lightning and the random nobodies she meets along the way all congregate around Serah and the god that branded her, but Serah gets turned to crystal after telling them to save Cocoon. Lightning flips her poo poo and attacks the god, the god goes ahead and brands all of them as l'Cie, then shows them a vision of Cocoon being destroyed by ancient big-rear end monster.

Because the fal'Cie are idiots, no context is given for this vision. Lightning and company just have to do whatever it is that fal'Cie wants them to do. This leads to the obvious problem of everyone having their own interpretation of what the hell their purpose is. Lightning wants to go kill Cocoon's government and also all the gods, the little whiner kid named Hope goes with her because he's also on a vengeance mission. Designated black guy, Sazh, decides to peace out and just make a run for it. Vanille ends up going with him, because she's secretly one of the people that tried to destroy Cocoon hundreds of years ago and she knows how that poo poo turned out last time (her friend Fang later joins them). Meanwhile, Snow just decides to stand around and chase people away from Serah's crystal.

The group later join together and find out that the gods have just been punking them the entire time for... reasons? It's honestly kind of moronic. The fal'Cie want Cocoon to become a soul farm so that they can summon a super god called the Maker. Now that the group knows this, they all go to kill Orphan, who is the fal'Cie that is powering all the other fal'Cie in Cocoon. Orphan basically tells them that yes, the plan is to use Cocoon as summon fuel. The group doesn't like this for obvious reasons, so everyone just declares that their Focus is now to kill all the gods and save Cocoon, which is something they can just do now, I guess. Too bad all the other people that got turned into monsters and crystals didn't just think of shouting "Nope, my focus is now to get a sandwich. Suck it, fal'Cie!"

Anyway, the group kills all the gods, Vanille and Fang sacrifice themselves to summon big-rear end Cocoon destroying monster in order to create a crystal pillar to stop Cocoon from crashing into the ground. Serah comes back to life, Lightning partially pulls the stick out of her rear end, and everyone goes off to plan a happy wedding for Serah and Snow.

So, that was the grand first entry in the Fabula Nova Crystallis. Why have you never heard of any other games in the series? I think you know the answer to that.

That's right, Square loving up and causing a massive financial failure. In September 2010, Square shat out Final Fantasy XIV: Online. It was the follow-up to Final Fantasy XI, the MMORPG that was getting a little long in the tooth by this point in time.

To say that it received backlash would be an understatement. Final Fantasy XIV 1.0's negative reception is legendary, not just in Final Fantasy, but in gaming in general. The game was such a gigantic disappointment that Square started issuing apologies and replacing the entire development team in an effort to salvage something, anything, from this catastrophic release.

I worked at EBGames (Canadian Gamestop) at the time this game hit shelves. Within a few months, Collector's Editions were going for about $20. People still didn't buy them. It was downright sad to see a Final Fantasy game fail so spectacularly.

In a last ditch effort to turn things around, Square tip-toed over to the Dragon Quest offices while everyone was on lunch and kidnapped Naoki Yoshida. They proceeded to lock him in the room with XIV and a post-it note that read "For the love of god, FIX IT!" Appointed as the Producer and Director, Yoshida pulled off an absolute miracle and managed to relaunch XIV by literally nuking the old XIV world and starting fresh, turning the game into Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn. ARR is one of the best Final Fantasy games in the franchise, although unfortunately you have to put up with other people in order to actually enjoy the adventure.

Anyway, we aren't here to talk about Yoshida pulling out the Phoenix summon and reviving XIV from its death state. I only bring this up because XIV's original failure really messed with Square's plans for the rest of the franchise.

Even before XIV, Final Fantasy Versus XIII had been having a rough go of development. It was in pre-production for ages, the game engine that was created for the Fabula Nova Crystallis games was deemed incapable of handling Versus XIII, and the PS4 and XB1 would get shown off in 2011 which meant that Versus XIII was on track to be released for an "outdated" system (Versus XIII was going to be PS3-exclusive).

XIV's total collapse didn't help matters. Square had a lot of projects in the works and the latest game in their premiere franchise was burning so much that the smoke was filling the entire building. The decision was eventually made to scrap Versus XIII and turn it into XV instead.

The Fabula Nova Crystallis was quickly on its way to being dead in the water.

Final Fantasy Agito XIII wasn't faring any better while Versus was collapsing. It had drifted so far from XIII that it was instead renamed Type-0. It shifted away from its intended Mobile Phone release to instead release on Playstation Portable.

But Square still harboured dreams of a sub-franchise, so they trademarked Type-1, Type-2, and Type-3 as well. Nothing ever came of these. Type-0 itself only barely managed to avoid being scrapped. Square had pulled Tabata away from the project to focus on The 3rd Birthday: Parasite Eve. This almost killed Type-0 because he was trying to direct two games at once. Type-0's development was put on life-support for a while and it eventually did get finished, although it caused Tabata to swear off ever working on multiple large projects at the same time.

Final Fantasy XIII was therefore left alone. Type-0 is still considered part of the Fabula Nova Crystallis and a cell phone sequel to Type-0 called Final Fantasy Agito was eventually released, but Agito's Playstation Vita release died and the service for phones ended in 2015 (it also never saw an English release). As for Type-0, that game wouldn't see an English release until 2015 after fans practically begged Square to localise it. Square may label it as part of the same franchise, but it's so far removed from XIII that it's hard to see any connection.

The Fabula Nova Crystallis was not the grand shared universe of games that Square had envisioned. The Final Fantasy series had struck pot-hole number 2 and everything was going to hell. XIV would make a comeback, but that didn't start to materialise until 2013. Versus XIII was on its way back to school for a career change and wouldn't be seen again late 2016 when it returned as XV. Type-0 and Agito released to the fanfare of about slightly over a million copies (that includes the HD versions that were eventually released in the West), so barely anyone outside of die hard FF fans knew of its existence.

The whole FNC thing was a mess almost from the start. When XIV immediately tanked, Square was no doubt desperate for ideas to buy time in the hopes that the other projects would turn around. A Lightning hug pillow sitting in the boardroom next to Toriyama voiced the prospect of making a sequel to XIII. "Lightning hug-pillow that definitely wasn't puppeted by Toriyama" brought up the last time that Square had suffered a devastating financial failure. When Spirits Within bombed, they recycled some assets and popped out X-2. People loved it, right? So all they had to do was take the shitload of cut content from XIII and piece together a XIII-2. Boom! Done.

So in late 2011, Final Fantasy XIII-2 was released. Toriyama stated that he wanted to make a story where Lightning "ends up happy in the end." Which I guess she wasn't in XIII? No sure why, Serah was back and happy. Fang and Vanille were turned into a crystal pillar, but Lightning had known them for what, a few months? She was just going to go look for a way to free them.

Anyway, Nomura ended up fuelling this by sending an autographed postcard to Square-Enix members in Japan that read "She must not be forgotten." They brought on tri-Ace (developers of Star Ocean and Valkyrie Profile) to help them develop the game and it was announced in January 2011.

As I briefly mentioned in Lightning's character summary, XIII-2 involves Lightning getting randomly sucked into a time vortex that leads her to ~~Valkyrie Profile~~ Valhalla. She becomes the goddess Etro's chosen knight after Etro undid the crystallisation of everyone at the end of XIII as thanks for Lightning and company saving Cocoon.

While Lightning is busy fighting off a different Knight that Etro made immortal for some reason, Etro pulls in a kid named Noel and makes him a time traveler in order to assist Lightning. Lightning sends him off to find her sister Serah, who is basically the only one that remembers Lightning was alive due to Lightning being spliced out of the world, or time travel, or paradoxes, or some nonsense horseshit.

So Serah and Noel play time cops and travel through history solving paradoxes and trying to prevent the dystopian future that Noel comes from where Cocoon falls and somehow destroys the world. Also Serah gets the power to see the future but it's slowly killing her as they fix the paradoxes that Caius is causing in order to collapse time.

Serah and Noel succeed in killing Caius and saving the future, except they don't because it was Caius' plan all along and those two finishing him off kills Etro (Etro had given him her "heart", which made him immortal). Also, Caius is still alive. So he just flat out wins. Serah's future vision kills her, Hope manages to save the people in Cocoon, Noel pisses off somewhere feeling bad about having done the exact thing Caius wanted, and Lightning goes to crystal sleep because Serah assured her they would meet again someday and I guess Lightning just plans to sit around and wait for that to happen.

Square had already been planning for a XIII-3 at the time of XIII-2's release. Toriyama said that even though XIII-2 didn't give the happy ending for Lightning that he promised, he was looking forward to delivering on that promise by making more games in the Fabula Nova Crystallis. Even though Square had been cagey on development of a sequel in the lead up to XIII-2, development on the next game started almost immediately after XIII-2 released. The fact was Square needed to keep buying time for XV and Toriyama was more than eager to keep pimping Lightning, so there was no real doubt that a sequel would be on the way.

Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII was the result. It released in 2013 for the PS3 and 360 in Japan, and early in 2014 for the west. I already recounted what happens in this game during Lightning's introduction. Lightning wakes up five hundred years after XIII-2 to find that time has essentially stopped and everyone is immortal due to Caius destroying time. Super God picks Lightning to be the saviour of mankind's souls and gather them up in order to lead them to the new world, because this one is all kinds of hosed and Super God is just going to destroy it and start over. Super God promises to bring Lightning's sister back if she does him a solid. Lightning teams up with Hope to go about saving souls. At the end of each day, Lightning heads back to the Ark where Hope is and every soul she saved gives tree food for Yggdrasil which extends the life of the world to a maximum of 13 days.

Lightning tracks down Snow, who is depressed because Serah died again. Noel, who is depressed because he killed Caius which killed Serah and Etro and also hosed the world. Sazh, who is depressed because his son is in a coma. Vanille, who is now a saint that can hear the voices of the dead and Fang who is trying to save Vanille because she thinks she is being used. She also meets up with Caius, who is just kind of chilling since he won. Not-Serah also appears from time to time and has mind conversations with Lightning in order to try and mess with her mind because Super God is obviously evil.

At the end of it all, Lightning finds out that Super God is evil, because of course he is. He was planning on purging humanity of their emotions and free will for the new world which I personally can't stand as a motivation for evil god/antagonist with god ambitions. Super God also admits that he can't see human souls so he sure as hell doesn't know where real Serah's is.

Lightning then uses the powers that Super God gave her to defeat him (somehow) with the help of all her spirit friends. They all then go to the new world where humanity can be free of the dastardly machinations of gods. Except the new world they go to is implied to be our world (the real world) so instead of puppeteer gods controlling humanity they now get to live in a world with wars, genocide, and nuclear weapons, while having their strings pulled by the richest 1% of the world's population. I call that a win.

That's not the end of the Lightning Express though. Oh lord, no. In addition to two sequels, XIII received numerous novellas and CD dramas to fill in the gaps between entries. None of them are as disgustingly bad as X's added material, they are mostly just boring filler or sequel bait/explanation.

Final Fantasy XIII: Episode Zero: Promise was a series of web novellas that followed the 13 days leading up to the events of XIII. It explains what the main cast were up to just before the events of the game. If you've played XIII, then none of this should be new information. Lightning meets Snow and doesn't like that Serah is engaged to him, and she also gets turned into a l'Cie. Sazh's son becomes a l'Cie and is taken into custody, so Sazh tries to save him. Fang and Vanille wake up from crystal sleep and try to adjust to the future world. Hope is having fun and happy times with his mother who certainly isn't going to die anytime soon and lead to Hope's vengeance boner.

The next is Final Fantasy XIII Gaiden Shosetsu: Yumemiru Mayu, Akatsuki ni Otsu, which fans just call Final Fantasy XIII Side Story: A Dreaming Cocoon Falls into the Dawn (which is almost as long and cumbersome as the Japanese title).

Side Story was included in the XIII Ultimania Omega and is just a series of stories about random assholes that runs parallel to Lightning and company. One of the characters here, Aoede, would later become the main character of another piece of EU content. We'll get to that in a bit.

Then comes Final Fantasy XIII -Episode i-, which is an epilogue novel to XIII which shows what everyone is up to after the events of XIII. Namely, their goal of building a settlement on Pulse. It also attempts to set up XIII-2 by having Lightning get pulled into the time vortex.

Jesus Christ it just doesn't stop. Final Fantasy XIII-2 Fragments Before and Fragments After were released in December 2011 and June 2012 respectively. Fragments Before sets up the timeline after the events of XIII and also fills in some detail about the world post-fal'Cie. Regular people can use magic now. The people of Cocoon discover that people were already living on Pulse despite supposedly being wiped out hundreds of years ago. Serah discovers that she's a master archer, in an effort to explain why she's so good with a bow in XIII-2. It's a lot of world building fluff about life after the events of XIII.

Other than that, it also details how Noel wound up in XIII-2, which is to say that he lived in the dystopian future where everyone else died, and just before he died Etro decided to save him because he really really wanted to change the future.

Fragments After attempts to tie up loose ends from XIII-2, such as... I actually don't know. It mostly gives background detail on Lightning's meeting with Etro and how Etro/Valhalla work, detail on Caius and Yeul, stuff like that. I'll be honest, I do not know enough about the XIII trilogy's lore to tell you what "loose ends" this novella answers. XIII is already a clusterfuck of terms and names and proper nouns as it is. That gets worse when various dates spanning hundreds of years into the past and future get tossed into the mix.

Following that, we have the prequel novel to Lightning Returns. Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII Chronicle of Chaotic Era. This one was planned to have stories about characters like Snow, Noel, and Hope that details the five hundred years between XIII-2 and LR. It was supposed to be released along with LR, but was pushed back to the December following the game's launch. After that it was straight up cancelled when the author came down with an illness. The author was Benny Matsuyama, who writes various video game tie-in novels for different companies (such as Resident Evil for Capcom).

Some of the material from this novel would be incorporated into the final XIII side piece.

Final Fantasy XIII: Reminiscence -tracer of memories- takes place after the events of LR. It was released in batches throughout 2014 and covers the time between everyone arriving in the "new world" and the post-credits stinger of LR. We briefly talked about that during my rant on Toriyama's unsettling love for Lightning. It's the scene where Lightning gets off a train and looks directly into the camera before promising that she'll see someone soon.

The novella follows Aoede, the character from A Dreaming Cocoon Falls into the Dawn. She's a journalist who is following a lead on people having strange memories of "another world". Aoede interviews all the main characters as she tries to get to the bottom of the mystery, but gets the run around whenever she tries to get a chance to meet with Lightning.

Aoede eventually decides not to publish her findings because that would bring attention to the XIII cast and she doesn't want them hounded. Aoede then has a chance run-in with Lightning on the train, but Lightning dodges an interview because she's getting off the train. Aoede decides not to push her for the interview, but she does thank Lightning for saving the world and all of humanity and being the greatest thing to ever exist in the universe and being the best Final Fantasy character ever created, man or woman.

That last part was presumably cut when the author, Daisuke Watanabe, returned from his coffee break and found Toriyama furiously trying to squeeze in a few lines before Watanabe got back.

loving hell. I thought there was a lot of poo poo in the Compilation. As I said though, none of it was as bad as the Compilation stuff or X's hilarious decent into complete madness. It was just a lot of filler material.

Overall, XIII's Extended Universe isn't as insane or sickening as the others we've talked about. I personally think it's total dogshit of course, because it's all over the place in terms of tone and genre (going from "screw gods, we decide our fate" to "I have to defend the god while my sister travels through time and corrects paradoxes" to "I'm going to do what this god tells me to because he seems cool, but wait, now I'm going to kill him because he's suddenly evil for no apparent reason." It's a standard fantasy adventure one minute, then it's time travel and Norse symbolism the next, then it's Valkyrie Profile.

It's also an entire trilogy built to proclaim one man's love of Lightning and how she's the best ever despite being boring as sin. Keep in mind that I hate the entire XIII series, so go ahead and ignore everything I just said if you are a fan of it since you no doubt disagree. I'm not going to change my mind and you won't change yours, so don't go posting comments about how I'm just a moron that can't look below the surface to see the true depth and genius of the series.

I'm talking to you, Toriyama.

Now let's get this drat game finished. We've got super bosses to fight and a special secret ending to be no doubt disappointed by.

Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 00:29 on Jul 3, 2019

# ? Apr 28, 2019 00:34

Cooked Auto: Aug 4, 2007

Just to mention how hosed up the first version of FF14 was; barrels had a higher polygon count than player characters. This came up in a post-mortem around the time ARR came out as I recall.

# ? Apr 28, 2019 01:31

Mraagvpeine: Nov 4, 2014; I won this avatar on a technicality this thick.

EDIT: found my answer

# ? Apr 28, 2019 02:43

Robindaybird: Aug 21, 2007; Neat. Sweet. Petite.

and the 3rd Birthday was Another Project Nomura was involved with that Tabeta had to come in and help when Nomura's too busy shoving zippers up his rear end on it, KH3 AND what became FFXV - though Toriyama was the main scenario writer, it's Nomura who suggested all the gross sex poo poo in that game.

# ? Apr 28, 2019 16:48

morallyobjected: Nov 3, 2012

Robindaybird posted:

and the 3rd Birthday was Another Project Nomura was involved with that Tabeta had to come in and help when Nomura's too busy shoving zippers up his rear end on it, KH3 AND what became FFXV - though Toriyama was the main scenario writer, it's Nomura who suggested all the gross sex poo poo in that game.

Tabata was in there from the start. Nomura wanted to work on 3rd Birthday but was busy with a bunch of other things and asked Tabata to be appointed as director.

re: KH3, I'm not sure what that has to do with Tabata (who had no involvement, as far as I can tell, on the game) or Nomura, because a lot of KH3's development cycle is down to Square-Enix's inability to manage projects well--for example, they switched KH3 over to Unreal after a year of development, which caused a lot of delays and issues that had to be worked out. also actual development for KH3 didn't start in 2013 when they released the trailer--SE has a terrible habit of announcing projects long before anything is ever going to come of them. plus they wanted Nomura to somehow direct FFVersusXIII, KH3, and the FF7 remake almost all at once (and didn't tell him about the latter)

I don't know a ton about 3rd Birthday but apparently Nomura asked Tabata to make sure that Aya got weaker as she took damage so that players wouldn't just make her take damage to cause her clothes to fall off.

# ? Apr 28, 2019 23:00

Mraagvpeine: Nov 4, 2014; I won this avatar on a technicality this thick.

I sure hope Square doesn't develop a pattern of having a major crisis once a decade since the next one would in theory be happening in the next year or two.

# ? Apr 29, 2019 05:58

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

Time to end this LP. Before we go after the super special secret ending and all the poo poo that has to be done to unlock it, I want to clear out the remainder of the game first.

The Coliseum has a few special battles open. Most of them are just special battles against multiple bosses (like fighting all the Exnine Knights in a row). I won't bother going over those because they are just the same fights we've already seen.

There are a scattered few Mirages that haven't been obtained yet.

First, I pick up Omega Bane. It needed to be dealt a lot of damage at once, which I have Macho Man for.

Next is a Shiva-Ixion of our very own. She needs to be hit with ice attacks, which is a very simple capture condition that I really like. No fuss.

Then we get Syldra. Once again, dealing a lot of damage at once is the condition. Macho Man drops a flying elbow to trigger it.

After that, I go on a treasure hunt to track down the chests that I apparently missed. I didn't get the achievement for opening every chest, which means that I overlooked some.

When you use the Treasure Tracker from your item menu (it's under the Miscellany tab), it will give you a jingle and a notice telling you if there is an unopened chest somewhere in the dungeon. If it is responding faintly, that means the chest is in a different section of the dungeon.

When the tracker reacts strongly, it means there is a chest in this section of the dungeon. In my case...

It was in section 2 just out of frame from the main path.

I also missed two in Crystal Tower. They were behind two pillars that I didn't realize were smashable. Of course it had to be Crystal Tower, one of my least favourite dungeons.

Anyway, with that done, it's on to Sunken Temple. There is a very special achievement that can be obtained here (at least for the Steam version). I don't really care about achievements, but I do care about this one because I have a crush on Quacho Queen and this achievement makes Lann look like an rear end in a top hat, which is funny to me.

Quacho Queen hangs out in her Throne Room where we can catch her story version (another reason I'm doing this, because it's needed for completion). You actually can't talk to her with Hauyn.

You also can't challenge her with Lann. You have to speak to her with Reynn as the lead character.

So, uh, Reynn, what brings you here today?

Is that so? How very... courageous... Challenge accepted! Ho ho ho! I've been waiting for a chance... to let my quachos and I hone our battle prowess. The two of you... should make for worthy opponents! Now! Quachos, attack!

Miney and Mo can't be imprismed in this fight (you have to do the Coliseum battle for them), but story Quacho Queen just needs to be healed. They are tougher than they were when we first met them, but we've far outclassed them by this point.

If you do fight them, be careful of Rage Bomber/Extreme Bomber. It's a type of counter that gets stronger when more damage is dealt. Hit them with a super powerful attack and they might turn it around on you.

And with that, QQ falls to the ground and conks out for a while. You actually need to leave the Sunken Temple and run all the way back here in order to challenge her again.

She has some sleepy dialogue if you try talking to her with different characters while she's knocked out, though.

Anyway, the achievement in question requires you to defeat QQ with Lann. Not Lann's stack. Just Lann. Take out Miney and Mo first, then keep an eye out for how much damage your different attacks are doing. This will let you whittle her HP down as low as possible. Remember that Elemental Attack items can deal flat damage (as long as the element is neutral against the enemy).

This is a little tricky to pull off. Unstacked Lann, even at a very high level, does not hit very hard. He also doesn't have the AP necessary to pull off a lot of his abilities. Quacho Queen is also capable of healing herself for a few thousand HP. If you have Haste, then casting it on Lann is a good way to set up the finisher.

The Achievement is "Accursed Man-thing!", but unfortunately it doesn't get any special dialogue or anything to go along with it.

Anyway, that's all that's needed here.

With that, the Mirage Manual is 100% complete (sort of). The other Mirages that I was missing were all ones we've already seen. However, in order for them to count you actually have to transfig into them (it's not enough to just unlock the Mirage board). Because of that, you didn't miss any new ones that I haven't previously shown off (unless I forgot to show the description for one over the course of the game). It was just a lot of boring grinding and transfigging.

Speaking of boring grinding, I also spent several hours on the Legendary Caretaker Achievement. Legendary Caretaker requires 100 mastered Mirage Boards. That was fun. Even more fun was me seeing that one of the achievements for a full completion was "do every Coliseum Battle Time Attack". I already had Legendary Caretaker at that point, but seeing that as one of the achievements just caused me to throw my hands up and go "Fuuuuck that."

Achievements don't tie in to 100% completion for this game. I had just decided that if I was in fact going to completionist after all, then I may as well go all the way and nab all the achievements. I changed my mind upon seeing that Coliseum one. I'm not battling through the same 50+ fights again while also under a level cap and time limit, all for the sake of a digital sticker.

With that done, here is a look at the final party that I finished the rest of the end game content with.

Lann and Reynn's stacks are still the workhorses, largely because I need them to summon Macho Man (who is my boss breaker).

Finally, it's time we take a look at the DLC quest "A Bridge's Woes". I have been saving this the entire time because it relates to Enna Kros, who disappeared for 99% of the game.

Update 38 Highlights - A Bridge's Woes

*Big Bridge Alexander lets out a whale noise or something*

Ohhh. So then you are from the same place as me. Whooooa, wait, I know you! Come to think of it, even back then you used to tower over everyone else.

*Big Bridge Alexander lets out a whale noise or something*

You don't remember? You came and challenged me so you could be next in line for the throne.

What a state we left that part of the palace in! They were cleaning that mess up for quite a while.

*Big Bridge Alexander lets out a whale noise or something*

Haha! Well, don't sound so surprised. You know, this world you're in is a part of me. Oh, now I see. The summoner who brought you here so long ago was similar to Lann and Reynn-- someone who had inherited some of my power. The bloodline of Grymoire's first summoner has been so busy. Those Farnas! There are so many like you in this world now.

It's only mentioned in Edgar's Who's Who entry, but the Midgardian Ormr is actually the Mako Reactor/Underground Prison. The Who's Who entry says that Edgar watches over it, but there's also evidence that points to nobody being aware that it is an Eidolon (except for Enna Kros anyway). Edgar certainly never makes mention of it, and he isn't a summoner like Eiko, so it's hard to know how/if he is really aware.

There's you, of course. And who else...

*Big Bridge Alexander lets out a whale noise or something*

Hm? What do I want with you?

There is a fifth Eidolon (the Who's Who entry and this Intervention hint at its existence), but it isn't named at any point of this game. There are a few places it could be, (assuming the theme of Eidolons being structures holds true for all of them) like Tometown, but nothing is confirmed or hinted at. It could also be the Coliseum, as that is said to be an Eidolon as well, but whether or not the Coliseum counts as part of "this world" or not is a little questionable.

Actually, I'm not here to see you. I'm here for the one hiding in you... You there. Show yourself!

The hell is this thing doing here?

Oh well. Champions will show up there in due time. Just like they have here in Grymoire...

Huh?!

D'ah! Wh-wh-wh-what the?!

'Kay! It's all yours now.

Wait, all of what is?

It's the-good to see you again!

Hi there, Tama! So, it feels like it's been a long time for you?

It sure the-does!

You ditched us within the first hour of gameplay and only showed up again 40 hours later. You bet your rear end it's been a long time.

E...Enna Kros?! But, how can... When did you...

I like how the giant Gundam/Gurren Lagan thing is just standing around back there. Not in a rush or anything, just patiently waiting for someone to fight.

I guess it must be the most powerful Cogna in Grymoire right now.

You don't even know?!

This world looks to the two of you as its saviors now. Go make us proud. Okay Tama! You can go ahead and take it from here.

Roger the-dodger that! See you the-real soon!

*And then Enna Kros just poofs away*

But what are we doing?!

Hey! L-Lann, heads up!

E-Enna Kros! Don't just leave us here! Tell us! What is going on?!

Update 38 Highlights - Blade Dance, Atomic Impact, Soul of Chaos

Omega God is fairly powerful if you try and take it on before the post-game. After that, it's kind of a pushover.

It's especially a pushover when I'm hitting it with Thundaja backed by Garland's "Ultimate Focus" magic buff.

Atomic Impact is its special move. It grows super large--

Extends the big hand over the little hand.

And then just punches you really hard.

Also, I can confirm that Garland does not say his infamous line "I, Garland, will knock you all down!" For shame, Maxima developers. For shame. Sure, you made reference to it in the description by making him a master of toppling, but that's not good enough. You got Christopher Sabat/Koji Ishii in to voice some attack lines and yet you didn't do the most important one of all.

I was wondering about all the ruckus. What are you up to now?

Eiko?

Whoa whoa whoa. It's not like it's our fault! We didn't cause any ruckus.

Well, someone must have woken Alexander up, 'cause I could hear him making all kinds of noise and--

Some pest was bothering him. He said he was in pain until you showed up, or something like that. Hmm, I don't know what that's about. But, I guess I'd better thank you too. Rescuing Alexander like that was very brave!

And that's all! We just get an Omega God for completing the quest. No need to imprism. I'm unsure of whether or not Omega God is a reference to another game.

Oh, and because Enna Kros is a dick, we get dumped off at the base of Big Bridge after this quest is done. The problem with that is it takes a good 30 seconds to a minute to get to the nearest return gate (there is no return gate at the bottom of Big Bridge). You either need to climb up the side of the bridge to where the elevator stopped during the story, or you need to head back along the desert path to the Phantom Sands.

Anyway, that takes care of all Interventions. So why was I saving that one for so long?

Because of this guy. If you haven't picked up on it yet, Enna Kros is actually Alexander. Well, she's an Alexander anyway. Alexander is the greater god in the World of Final Fantasy universe. It is the creator of the A-Worlds and takes various forms.

So back before the "Realms of Fantasy", a woman named Roksanne (which Enna Kros is an anagram of) caught the attention of Alexander and it decided to merge with her. Alexander (as Enna Kros) would go on to meet Anamika, who had powers over time and fantasy. By using their powers together, the "Realms of Fantasy" were created.

Enna Kros is just one of many forms that Alexander takes. She isn't so much "God" as she is an avatar of one (although some people may just consider these to technically be the same thing). As mentioned above, there is a guy named Aris that used to be Serafie's master and was also an avatar of Alexander, although I think it is implied that Aris was killed off or vanished or something.

Speaking of Anamika, she is actually Neon Tsukiyumi sometime after the events of that Sigma Harmonics. I won't go into details about what happens, ~~in case people want to read through that LP on their own.~~ find an LP of it themselves because Youtube is a dick that got rid of annotations which means the Sigma Harmonics LP on the Archive is ruined now.

Good stuff. With all of this knowledge under our belt, it's time we go beat the crap out of Enna Kros.

Enna Kros hangs out in Nine Bean Coffee, which lies at the end of North Promenade. Before starting the battle with her, here are a few tips to keep in mind:

-Have Dispel
-Be fully stocked on healing/AP items
-Have Ice or Dark attacks. Blizzaga is a good choice
-Reflect is useless

I can't give you a particular strategy, just because there are so many approaches to this fight. Everyone has their preference based on what Mirages they've trained up (I'm operating with a random assortment, because I'm mainly using ones that the thread decided to nickname). Either way, you need to be ready for a very long war of attrition when it comes to this fight.

You can't use Champions first of all. Serafie and Tama will also be fighting alongside her.

All three of them have about 40-50k HP, which isn't too bad for a super boss. Serafie is the only one with a elemental weaknesses (resists Wind, weak to Dark and Ice).

Serafie can use Loud Whisperwind, which damages you and heals her. It's not a lot of HP, though. Overall, Serafie isn't a major threat in this fight. The one thing she can do that you need to be careful of is Rumor Radar. Rumor Radar is basically "Libra". She'll use it on one of your stacks and it will tell Enna Kros what Elemental Weakness that stack has. Enna Kros will then use that information to hit your stack with a -ja spell on her next turn (of the element the stack is weak to).

Tama is the support character. She can cast stuff like Haste, Faith, Regen, and Focus to buff Enna Kros' attacks. This is why you need Dispel. Tama also has Foxfire, which can be a problem if you have a heavy fire weakness (which Reynn's stack actually had in this fight).

Meanwhile, Enna Kros has permanent Shell/Protect (which works against Gravity), and she can also pierce Reflect.

Overall, it seems pretty manageable. Just knock out the support, then Enna Kros, and pick off Serafie (the weak link) last. So what's the big "war of attrition" thing I mentioned?

Tama has an automatic ability called Timewalk. Timewalk triggers immediately upon any one of the three getting KO'ed and restores them to full health. It's essentially an Auto-Mega Phoenix.

So how are you supposed to deal with this garbage? No, taking Tama out first won't do it. Timewalk still triggers. However, if you remember correctly, Tama has to sacrifice one of her lives in order to reverse time. That means she has a limited number of uses before she needs to rest and restore her lives.

That means the goal of this fight is all about repeatedly KO'ing EK/Tama/Serafie until Tama runs out of Timewalks. She has about 7 or 8 uses of it. I don't know for sure, but I would guess that 8 is the maximum since Tama only has 9 lives. Be careful about multi-target attacks, though. If you knock out two or more of them in the same turn, then Tama only has to use 1 Timewalk to bring everyone back. You want to stagger the KO's so that Tama keeps using Timewalk to restore individual characters.

Enna Kros also has a multi-target Holy spell with Topple that hurts like a bitch. She doesn't seem to use it very often, but it's quite potent if your HP is running a little low (or if you are unlucky enough to be unstacked).

Outside of that, the fight is just a slow grind towards stopping Tama. Once Tama's lives are used up, the three of them should start to fall relatively quickly. If you've been hammering them with Blizzaga (or other multi-target abilities) then they may be only a few hits away.

It's not exactly an exciting fight to be honest. My strategy involved doing the back and forth dance until Tama only had 1 or 2 Timewalks left, then tagging Macho Man in and letting him take a beating before Revenge Blasting everyone into dust.

He ended up seriously overkilling her. That would have one-shot her at full HP.

The rewards are a joke, but everything is a joke at this point because we have access to EX Dungeon D.

We also get an Initial Regen mirajewel, which is... kind of terrible. It grants Regen at the start of battle, except the start of battle is when your HP is already going to be full (and if it isn't, then just pop an X-Potion/Elixir). Lann and Reynn's turn also usually comes up first, so if you really wanted Regen then just equip a Regen mirajewel. At least with a Regen mirajewel you can keep casting it throughout the battle, whereas Initial Regen becomes worthless after it wears off.

Moving on. Time to check out the creepy vortex in Crystal Tower.

It leads to the not real Ultima Gate location. Going up to the big tablet gives us this note.

We need to break six seals before we can fight this super boss. This is incredibly boring and kind of time consuming.

The seals are found by flying around in the airship. There is no icon or anything that points to where they are, you just have to fly near them and look for ??? prompts.

There are six of these that correspond to six elements. Each one has a switch that has to be activated. The Fire switch needs a weight of 15 and a Fire Resistance of 150 or greater. This will more than likely involve a bunch of rooting through your Mirage case to track down the exact combination of Mirages you need, because these switch conditions are pretty difficult to meet.

For the fire switch, I use Flammantoise, Bihydra, and Ghildra.

The Water switch is near Besaid. It requires a Weight of 14 and a Water Resistance of 150 or greater.

Stack I used: Water Toad, Sea Snake, Sea Worm.

Wind switch in the Windswept Mire. Weight 14/Wind Resistance 175.

Stack I used: Wind Toad, Dualizard, Shiva-Ixion.

Earth switch in Pyreglow. Weight 14/Earth Resist 200.

Stack I used: Flammantoise, Sistertaur, Titan.

Ice switch near Saronia. Weight 14/Ice Resist 150.

Stack I used: Death Searcher, Master Tonberry, Shiva-Ixion.

Thunder switch at the tip of the mountain near Nibelheim. Weight 14/Thunder Resist 175.

Stack I used: Sandicore, Master Tonberry, Syldra.

After activating all six switches and returning to the vortex, we find someone waiting for us.

Update 38 Highlights - The Immortal Dark Dragon
World of Final Fantasy Music: The Immortal Dark Dragon

I'm not sure if The Immortal Dark Dragon is a reference to something. He kind of looks like a Dragoon, but he's using some kind of rifle with a bayonet. I'm unaware of any character that "Tristan" could be a reference to.

Oh well. He's kind of a disappointment either way. He mostly uses Slash, which hits for about 3000 damage. He has about 100k in HP. He has Magic Counter, Counterstance, Focus, and Bravery. That's... kind of it.

Oh, he also does this. The replicas only have a fraction of his HP and will sometimes just stand around and do nothing. I think they mimic whatever actions the real IDD does.

Update 38 Highlights - Dragon Dive

His special move "Dragon Dive" hits like a drat truck if he uses Focus and/or Bravery the turn before. Thankfully, the replicas don't seem to be capable of doing Dragon Dive. They proceed to just attack with basic physicals.

Oh, and just as a final "gently caress You", when you KO Immortal Dark Dragon, he will automatically attack and then follow it up with Dragon Dive. Dragon Dive is a single target move though, so unless you only had one stack standing and it was badly injured, there isn't really anything it can do to screw this up for you.

After the battle, you can approach the tablet to get an Initial Haste mirajewel. This is just as useless as Initial Regen. Again, just equip a Haste mirajewel. Or use a Haste seed on one of your Mirages.

That was the last stumbling block to the secret ending. When we return to Nine Wood Hills, a new Rumor Radar rumor will be added.

The door that (I assume) Anamika is talking about is just to the right of where we are now.

Specifically this shiny door on the right side of Plaza 99. Be prepared for a tough 2-stage battle.

Entering the door restarts the "Good Ending" events, beginning right at the moment that Brandelis explodes onto the scene after Segwarides and Pellinore get taken out.

Everything proceeds as normal from this point on.

The difference is that Exnine Bahamut is quite a bit stronger than he was before. His HP for Stage 1 is boosted to about 160k. He also has new abilities, such as Dread Spikes (Dark element counter attack that drains a little bit of HP), Dispelga (multi-Dispel), and--

Update 38 Highlights - Brandelis' New Attack

It's pretty powerful (if it hits. You rock, Optimus). If you fought him in the Coliseum Boss Rush he has a chance of using this attack as well. There are different variants of this attack where he chooses a different trio of weapons that I believe changes the elemental type of the attack.

He also gets Haste after using this attack, although you can Dispel it.

Other than a bump in stats and that fancy new attack, he's the same boss as before. He still prefers to just spam Double Cut most of the time. He also still has Slow, Meteor, and Doom as well (Doom is a 30 second timer).

Arcarmament 3-11-12 is Fire element. I want to say these weapons are a reference to something, but I can't pinpoint what. At first I assumed it was a reference to each FF title, but I'm not sure if that matches up. The long Katana seems like a Sephiroth/FFVII reference, but everything else just kind of looks like a regular weapon.

~~Maybe it's just referencing the different jobs? Katana=Samurai, Bow=Archer, Lance=Dragoon, etc, etc.~~

User Leraika correctly identified Brandelis' weapon wheel as the Sealed Weapons from FFV. The 12 weapons were used to defeat Enuo, a wizard who gained control of the Void. The FFV heroes unseal the weapons late in the game in order to stop Exdeath/the Void. The weapons consist of a Dagger, Sword (Excalibur), Harp, Whip, Katana (Masamune), Bell, Lance, Rod, Axe, Staff, Short Sword/Ninja Blade/Katana, and a Bow. I am once again ashamed that I had trouble recognising that.

After beating Stage 1, we have to fight a powered up Stage 2. I personally found Stage 2 a bit easier. He still has his crippling elemental weakness while charging his Megaflare Cannon. He seems to have about 160-180k HP. Not much different here.

Oh, he also still has his bullshit "speed up as HP drops" crap.

Maybe I just found it easier because I was using Macho Man.

Megaflare Cannon doesn't really hit any harder.

But as I said, crippling weakness to an element while charging is still a sore spot for him.

After beating the powered up Exnine Bahamut, the rest of the ending proceeds exactly the same as in the Good Ending.

That includes the credits... which you can't skip.

World of Final Fantasy: Maxima Finale - The Secret Ending

Finally, the post-credits stinger is where things change. Let's see what this "Secret Ending" is all about.

*Hauyn sees something and starts slowly walking towards it*

Huh... that looks familiar. Doesn't--

Yeah. Him.

*Diablos goes after Hauyn but Tamamohime loving wrecks him*

Uhh, okay? Looks like whatever world he is tied to wants him back.

What is this...? What is going on?!

[???]: Ngh... stop...

*Looks like there's someone on the other side of that portal*

Huh?!

[???]: Please help me... Sis...

...! ...ann! Is that you?!

A voice...?

Hold on! I've got this!

The camera is slowly rotating around edgy Lann while these voices and the sounds of a battle are heard from somewhere.

[Diablos]: Heh. Ha ha ha ha ha! So, does this mean I can let loose?

[Odin]: As you command it...

[Diablos]: Despair.

End it!

[Odin]: Shin Zantetsuken.

[Diablos]: As if you could ever hope to defeat me.

[Odin]: Hardly worth cutting down in the end.

[Tamamohime]: Whew... Another bridge crossed.

Lann! Are you alright?! Hey! Lann!

...?!

...Whew... Now, onto the next world.

Wow... you guys are really loving optimistic about a sequel to this, aren't you?

Fat chance of that happening. Well, there you go. That's the end of World of Final Fantasy Maxima. It all culminated in a gigantic sequel hook that I highly doubt will ever come.

I will admit though, that was definitely very interesting. I'd like to know what the hell is going on with the real Lann (the Reynn and Lann following Hauyn around are Champions, not the real deals). Also, what in god's name happened to Reynn that resulted in her gauntlet getting on to Lann's arm? Too bad we'll probably never find out.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this 120+ hour investment of my time. That's not sarcastic, I had fun too. Got a lot of good moments out of this LP, like Dutch Oven, and Macho Man, and Basil, and--

NO! gently caress YOU! We're not going out on another god drat cute kiddy dance number! I was already forced to watch that poo poo twice, I will not end this LP by watching it again!

Theatrhythm did it better, so we're going out on that.

Theatrhythm Final Fantasy - Curtain Call: Special Arrange Medley

Granted I do wish they would have done a higher resolution version for non-3DS purposes, but whatever. Also, XV isn't there, but that's because it hadn't come out at the time.

Still better than the dance ending.

Brings a tear to my eye every time.

Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 22:54 on Jul 2, 2019

# ? Apr 30, 2019 02:33

morallyobjected: Nov 3, 2012

I didn't do any of the Maxima stuff, but WoFF is probably my favourite FF game since the PS2 era (which is not to say I didn't like the PS3/PS4 ones. I just like WoFF a lot). The sequel for WoFF is apparently already written, according to Hiroki Chiba, but SE is tied up in like three different major projects right now so who knows if/when they'll find the manpower to get it done. I really hope they do, though.

another funny note:

Hiroki Chiba posted:

Some people wondered if Lann�s puns were really necessary, so we considered an option to turn them off, and it was practically finished, but then we felt bad for him so we thought better of it.

e: also thanks for the LP! you did a great job with it.

# ? Apr 30, 2019 02:57

Mraagvpeine: Nov 4, 2014; I won this avatar on a technicality this thick.

Thanks for the LP.

# ? Apr 30, 2019 03:44

BisbyWorl: Jan 12, 2019; Knowledge is pain plus observation.

Farewell Maxima, you were fairly :effort:

from start to finish.

Thanks for the LP, Psycho Knight! :toot:

# ? Apr 30, 2019 05:12

Miz Kriss: Mar 17, 2009; It's only an avatar if the Cubs get swept.

This has been a fun read. Thanks for the LP :toot:

# ? Apr 30, 2019 05:54

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

morallyobjected posted:

I didn't do any of the Maxima stuff, but WoFF is probably my favourite FF game since the PS2 era (which is not to say I didn't like the PS3/PS4 ones. I just like WoFF a lot). The sequel for WoFF is apparently already written, according to Hiroki Chiba, but SE is tied up in like three different major projects right now so who knows if/when they'll find the manpower to get it done. I really hope they do, though.

I liked it, personally. There was a definite problem with tone shift in the later half of the game, but the game on its own was enjoyable. It's a good starting point for a sequel to build on, if a sequel ever actually materializes. It would be great if that bit about it already being written means that Square is seriously planning on it, but we've all seen how they tend to periodically gently caress up and screw their entire lineup. As Mraagvpeine said, Square seems to be in the process of creating a routine where they suffer a meltdown every decade that brings them to the edge of ruin. Will that gently caress up be VII: Remake this time? Or maybe XVI? Who knows. History has shown that it will likely be something Final Fantasy related that blows up in their face.

Also, you're all welcome. I'm glad that there was an audience following along and I hope you all enjoyed this look at a Final Fantasy entry that is pretty regularly overlooked. Some final thoughts on what the game did right and wrong, in my opinion:

~Good~
-Mixing up FF characters into pairs based on common traits or goofy coincidences they have

-The remixes of FF music. I liked more of them than I disliked. I think they did a good job overall.

-The Mirage descriptions. Seriously, the person/people behind those is amazing. So many references to FF games, ranging from common to completely obscure. The jokes were also fun, even if some of them were just bad puns.

-The Mirage designs. I like their take on Bahamut, the Nine-Tailed Fox, and the opposite gender Shiva. I also love Cactuar Conductor and Quacho Queen especially.

-The sheer number of references. They had very obvious ones as well as very sneaky ones littered everywhere throughout the game. The good part is that despite these references, the game wasn't just a total repeat of every major FF moment (like The After Years was). They were familiar to fans, but different enough that it didn't feel like a total rehash.

-Stack building. Some people might not like this, but I enjoyed building teams out of various FF critters like I was a Pokemon trainer.

-Cactuar Conductor.

~Mixed~

-The voicework. It was great that they managed to bring in all the typical VAs in both English and Japanese, and their performances were well done, but dear god was there a major problem with lines getting cut off early. It happened way too frequently and during all kinds of moments. Small side scenes are one thing, but it really pulls you out of the experience when it happens during a major antagonist monologue or otherwise serious scene.

-Character choice. They got a good mix of characters from different games, and generally brought in all the important ones, but the lack of representation from II, XII, XIV, and XV is a major problem, especially when they had a chance to correct that in Maxima. No, Champion Jewels are not an acceptable substitute.

-Maxima as a whole. I like a lot of the additions and changes they made, the extra Interventions were nice, and the additional Mirages were well made. On the other hand, I don't consider this add-on to be worth the $20 price tag. A lot of the changes or additions are only worthy of a patch at best. The Champion Jewel system is just a character skin swap that is pure novelty (none of the jewels are worth using in actual gameplay), and seems designed only so that Square could deceivingly trumpet "x new characters" in the description. The extra super bosses are also lazily implemented. None of them have any additional scenes or dialogue, they just show up, fight, and disappear without a word. Enna Kros is barely even animated for her fight. She just stands there, nearly motionless, and repeats the same canned animation that seems to have been pulled straight out of the True End stinger. The secret ending was definitely intriguing, but unless a sequel actually comes out then all it is is a frustrating pile of questions to speculate on.

~Bad~

-Tone. The game starts as a goofy journey through FF inspired worlds and lore, clearly aimed at a younger audience of new fans. Then, about 3/4's through the game, it takes a hard right turn into the death of parents, broken homes, manipulation, imprisoning friends, and the concept of the heroes actually being the cause of all the problems due to their bratty and irresponsible nature. Then there are goofy moments like Reynn "beating" Cactuar Conductor and being proud of herself while the world is being torn to pieces as a direct result of her and her brother. Ultima Weapon wipes a village off the map on arrival and yet we get scenes immediately after where we laugh at Lann being stupid and Reynn making fun of him for it.

-Lann being dumb. Speaking of, Lann's stupidity isn't funny. I do like his quirk of misinterpreting a word and thinking it's a different word that sounds similar, but having him as a complete moron isn't entertaining. There are parts of this game where I seriously doubt his ability to be able to put pants on in the morning. Also, the "Idiot Hero" and "Boy dumb/Girl smart" trope has been worn out for ages.

-Reynn. Reynn is sooooo dull. Her character quirks are annoying and not funny. She constantly pretends like she's thinking everything through logically, but never acts on any of her suspicions until she travels back in time and literally knows what will happen. She isn't an interesting character. At the very least Lann has a strong sense of responsibility and atoning for past mistakes, as well as a desire to help out and do the right thing. Reynn is lost in pointless thought most of the time and is usually dragged along by her brother.

-Difficulty. I know it's aimed at a younger audience, but you could have given older fans some kind of harder difficulty mode. The game is very easy, especially when every boss is susceptible to Gravity. Maxima added a Nightmare difficulty mode, but that is only for New Game+, and all it does is jack up the enemy stats to end game levels.

-The minigames. Every one of these is pure garbage that should never have passed quality control. They are not fun, not interesting, and rely far too much on RNG rather than skill. The Cactuar Conductor one even seems downright broken. Personally, I don't consider any one of these minigames worth saving. They add nothing. I'd prefer it if they were all patched out.

Psycho Knight fucked around with this message at 10:53 on Apr 30, 2019

# ? Apr 30, 2019 10:46

Leraika: Jun 14, 2015; Luckily, I *did* save your old avatar. Fucked around and found out indeed.

I love how 90% of FF games these days take a hard turn into DEEP LORE in ways that don't really help the project or make it more interesting.

e: when I played, I assumed the weapons with Brandelis were a reference to FF5's sealed weapons.

# ? Apr 30, 2019 14:02

Blaze Dragon: Aug 28, 2013; LOWTAX'S SPINE FUND

Thanks for the LP! I was always interested in this game but not enough to get it myself. Having gone through all of this...yeah, I don't think I missed much. It's clearly got some issues, though it seems overall to be a fine game, just not enough to interest me into buying and playing it, especially with Maxima's extra price on top of it. But still, it was neat going through it in LP form, so thanks for showing all of the game.

The sequel stinger just feels sad because it's clear it won't happen, and even if it did, we went through several posts showing why Square-Enix should never make a Final Fantasy sequel. This is still a Final Fantasy.

# ? Apr 30, 2019 15:37

MayOrMayNotBeACat: Jul 22, 2017

Psycho Knight posted:

Sigma Harmonics

I tried to go through the LP of that, until the LPer started using YouTube annotations.

Which Google removed.

So now the LP is incomplete. :sigh:

Sorry to be such a downer, this was a good LP. Thanks, Psycho Knight.

# ? Apr 30, 2019 17:25

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

MayOrMayNotBeACat posted:

I tried to go through the LP of that, until the LPer started using YouTube annotations.

Which Google removed.

So now the LP is incomplete.

Sorry to be such a downer, this was a good LP. Thanks, Psycho Knight.

drat, I forgot about that. Wasn't there a workaround, though? I thought I remembered someone in the Sandcastle talking about it, or maybe it was a different feature.

Leraika posted:

I love how 90% of FF games these days take a hard turn into DEEP LORE in ways that don't really help the project or make it more interesting.

e: when I played, I assumed the weapons with Brandelis were a reference to FF5's sealed weapons.

Dammit, that's it! It had to be something, but I didn't think about the Sealed Weapons because I didn't notice the whip. I'll edit that in when I get the chance. I also need to edit in the Crystal Tower. The Special Arrange Medley reminded me that I didn't mention that the Crystal Tower is from III.

Blaze Dragon posted:

The sequel stinger just feels sad because it's clear it won't happen, and even if it did, we went through several posts showing why Square-Enix should never make a Final Fantasy sequel. This is still a Final Fantasy.

There might be a chance that it isn't total garbage. Square's bad sequels seem mostly confined to main entries. Either way, I don't think we'll see it, just because we're closing in on a new decade and that means Square is due for a major failure and the resulting scramble to rebuild.

# ? Apr 30, 2019 22:20

Mraagvpeine: Nov 4, 2014; I won this avatar on a technicality this thick.

MayOrMayNotBeACat posted:

I tried to go through the LP of that, until the LPer started using YouTube annotations.

Which Google removed.

So now the LP is incomplete.

Sorry to be such a downer, this was a good LP. Thanks, Psycho Knight.

drat, that's a shame. I helped a little with that LP too.

# ? Apr 30, 2019 22:59

Leraika: Jun 14, 2015; Luckily, I *did* save your old avatar. Fucked around and found out indeed.

I'm helping!

Thanks for the LP. It was a ride, to be sure.

# ? May 1, 2019 00:22

Glazius: Jul 22, 2007; Hail all those who are able,
any mouse can,
any mouse will,
but the Guard prevail.; Clapping Larry

I think a lot of this game's downsides are kind of attributable to there not really being a good through-line for the Final Fantasy games.

Something like Super Robot Wars is, admittedly, a lot more spoiled for choice in its source material, but there are also some common throughlines - mad science, the horrors of war, egad bad dad, mid-season upgrades, all that. And you can come up with an original game storyline and original game characters that can plot a course among them and have the crossovers relate to one or another.

And, I mean, they tried to relate the games to the central plot they were putting together? But I can't recall a clear time anyone really related to Lann and Reynn.

# ? May 1, 2019 04:26

Regalingualius: Jan 7, 2012; We gazed into the eyes of madness... And all we found was horny.

Come to think of it, yeah, pretty much all of the characters from the mainline games were basically �oh, you guys are the subject of the prophecy? You�ll want to go here next� with the twins. The only one I can really remember them building something of a rapport with was Refia.

# ? May 1, 2019 17:01

morallyobjected: Nov 3, 2012

Regalingualius posted:

Come to think of it, yeah, pretty much all of the characters from the mainline games were basically �oh, you guys are the subject of the prophecy? You�ll want to go here next� with the twins. The only one I can really remember them building something of a rapport with was Refia.

probably because they all know how the prophecy ended.

# ? May 2, 2019 00:58

Nyaa: Jan 7, 2010; Like, Nyaa.

Someone emailed me about the annotation nuke, so I will be re-translating Sigma Harmonics. I can sum up the plot if anyone just want to know what happened in that universe with Neon/Nene/Anamika.

# ? Jul 31, 2019 00:20

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# ? May 24, 2024 09:09

Psycho Knight: Jan 19, 2017; "Being a fangame and not bound to a rating, Pokemon Reborn is able to expand more on topics such as death and the extreme dangers Pokemon could pose. These topics...are treated with the respect such a subject deserves."

Let's throw a Medicham into a volcano and make it give the T2 thumbs up!

Nyaa posted:

Someone emailed me about the annotation nuke, so I will be re-translating Sigma Harmonics. I can sum up the plot if anyone just want to know what happened in that universe with Neon/Nene/Anamika.

That would be great if you could. If the LP becomes readable/watchable again then I'd correct that part in the LP about it being ruined by Youtube. Unfortunately the WoFF LP is up on the archive now, so I can't correct it by saying that it's fixed in that version of the LP (although the link to your LP is still in there).

If you want to pop in a brief summary then just stick it in some spoiler tags. If your LP gets patched up then people from this thread might want to check it out, and the only thing I've said in this thread on the matter of Neon is that Anamika is her sometime after the events of Sigma Harmonics.

# ? Jul 31, 2019 11:50

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > If you stack them, they will fight: Let's Play World of Final Fantasy

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