Overworld
-I don’t know what I want to try first. Let’s try… Locke. I’d like Strago so I can do the Veldt, but I don’t really have any leads on Strago at the moment, though I do on Locke. Going to fly around to look for a star-shaped mountain range.
-Found it! Northern tip of the southern continent.
Makes sense that it would be in former Imperial lands, given that Gestahl was the one who hid the treasure.
-We have to form two parties. Let’s try Relm, Edgar, Gau, and Cyan for the first, and Celes, Shadow, Sabin, Gogo for the second. Sorry, Setzer.
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Phoenix Cave
-At the start, there’s a cave entrance and a hook. Aha! The two teams have to work together to unlock each other’s doors. Like Palom and Porom’s trial in FFIV’s Lunar Ruins.
-Oops. Lol. Yeah, I was wrong about the hook. That’s to get back to the ship.
-Seriously nasty monsters here. Lots of Zombie statuses.
-And lots of empty chests, too. What gives? If I see Lone Wolf lurking, I’m going to flip my desk.
-Oh, right! We’re hunting after Locke. These are chests. He’s a treasure hunter. That’s more likely.
-This place is pretty confusing. I know there are combinations and panels I’m missing, just not sure how to get them.
Hurray for teamwork:
-Timing is tricky to get right on Gogo.
-Another dragon? Yes.
The legendary Red Dragon.
It’s pretty classic – lobs fireballs and flare at us. Luckily, flare can’t hit since our levels aren’t currently multiples of 4. (Still a weird mechanics imo.) Success! Won “Murakamo” and “Dragon Horn.” Three down, five to go.
”The sword to its rightful owner.” (A BOX OF INTERNET CUPCAKES to anyone who spots that quote.)
-“Dragon Horn” makes “Jump” continuous. Not sure what this means, since when I use it on Shadow, he doesn’t have the Jump ability. Maybe I have to use it in conjunction with Dragoon Boots only?
-Hi, Locke! He opens the chest and gets the Phoenix magicite. It’s for Rachel. “Until I do what I said I’d do, I’m nothing but a no-good liar.”
-We’re off to Kohlingen.
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Kohlingen
-He tries it on Rachel, but it doesn’t work. The old man taking care of her thinks the magicite is too cracked.
-Wait, it starts to work! And we get this AWESOME overlay of a phoenix briefly. She wakes up! And by “wakes up,” I mean “becomes living instead of a corpse.”
-And of course it’s temporary. The phoenix is giving her power to live for only a minute. She tells him he made her happy. She tries to absolve him of any guilt he might feel.
Rachel: “Please, let go of the chains that bind your heart… I release you…” Weigh anchor, mateys. Even Rachel ships Celes and Locke. She dies.
Rachel, I’m sorry we didn’t get to see more of you. This feels a bit like a double-fridging, and I think you probably would’ve been a cool character to see more developed.
Who knows? Maybe we’ll get “Final Fantasy VI: Soul of Rebirth.” Where we follow the adventures of Rachel, Darril, and Cid as they try to stop Gestahl from becoming emperor of the afterlife. Hey, it worked for FFII.
-He takes the Phoenix magicite, and tells Celes he’s ready to move on.
Yes, I know Rachel just died. Sorry. (Not sorry.)
-Outside the house, he pauses briefly.
-LOLOL YES! We get a string of “Obtained x,” “Obtained y,” “Obtained z.” A bunch of items and a Flame Shield and Valiant Knife. Locke DID take them on his way through the Phoenix Cave.
-The Phoenix magicite is phenomenal. Raise, Arise, Reraise, Curaga, Firaga. Reraise is especially interesting, since it’s a new spell. I don’t remember seeing it in any prior FF. It revives the target next time he or she is KO’d. If I run into a boss with a nasty deathrattle, that may save my ass.
-Not much new in Kohlingen, but that Narshe refugee changed his dialog now. He encourages us to head to Narshe to try to wake up the frozen esper. Sounds as good as anything right now.
-A few people in town are like that. They’re starting to feel renewed hope. Yay for hope!
-I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again: I LOVE HOW OPEN THIS PART OF THE GAME IS!! It’s such a major advancement in the style of the FF series, and I wonder if this mixture of on-rails with open world will become the norm or if they’ll go back to more purely on-rails in the future.
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Next time: I don’t know. Isn’t that amazing? (Yet another “if you spot this reference you get an internet high five” thing, though I expect someone who follows MW will.)
