The Beginner’s Forest
-The chocobo forest near Shumi Village. Have to find a spot where only one chocobo falls.
-Success! As the name implies, this was a pretty easy one. Aura Stone was the reward.
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The Basics Forest
-This forest is also in Trabia, the continent south of Winter Island. The Sorbald Snowfield.
- Clue: “You have to blow the whistle twice.” Now I suddenly have Flo Rida in my head.
-Success again! Had to blow a whistle to bring a few chocobos down, then blow it again nearby to make all but one leave.
-Flare Stone the reward here. I like the second part of the puzzle way more than the first part – I mean, I like the part where you have to find the spot to stand in for the big chocobo to dig. The reason is simple: audio doesn’t matter. I can watch the sonar in the bottom of the screen for when it goes to max. During the initial hunt for chickobos, I really have to strain to hear the pips. No visual signal.
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The Roaming Forest
-Found another one of these in Trabia’s Bika Snowfield.
-Started out with two chicobos down already. Hm.
-This is much trickier. There are three chicobos – two at either end, one in the middle. The clue, “Be careful where the Sonar reacts,” isn’t very helpful.
-Maybe it has to do with the way the chicobos are facing.
-Been at this 15 minutes. Come on, Coldrun. Trial and error isn’t working. Think clearly. What am I missing? There are three chicobos: A, B, and C. A and C are at opposite ends, and B in the middle.
If all three are down and I blow the ziner at:
1)A. A flies off, then C, then B.
2)B. B flies off alone.
3)C. C flies off, then A, then B.
If A and C are down, and I blow the ziner at:
1)A. A flies off, then C.
2)B. B flies down, then A and C simultaneously fly off, then B flies off.
3)C. C flies off, then A.
I don’t know what else there is to do. I’ve tried every permutation I can think of. How am I fucking this up?
-oh my god.
LOLOLOLOL THIS GAME IS SO TROLL
See, that whole set of permutations was taking place in the main area of the chocobo forest. On a “oh fuck this” kind of angry whim, I was leaving and blowing the whistle on path leading out of the forest, about to give up.
And there’s a chicobo there. A lone chicobo. The answer to the puzzle.
That whole puzzle in the middle I was wracking my brain over? The three chicobos that came down in a variety of patterns where I kept trying to isolate one? All an elaborate red herring. All I had to do was come down here when none of the chicobos in the middle were down, blow the whistle near the entrance to the forest, and bam. XD
-Final reward was a Shell Stone and Holy Stone.
-It’s weird. I thought I’d be angry at this, but I’m not. I’m amused and relieved. That’s kind of an awesome puzzle. It doesn’t feel like a cheat, like the game was playing by new rules it wasn’t telling me about. I just got so locked into focusing on one particular thing that I didn’t notice the key.
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Trabia Canyon
-Found a mountain pass. This is the place where Laguna and company were assaulted on set by Ruby Dragons.
-Walked all the way to the other side, but not much to see here beyond sight-seeing that scene from the Laguna Trio.
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Forest of Solitude
-Yup. Back here again.
We meet again… Chocoboy. *squints eyes menacingly*
-Probably for the last time. I tried to ride the momentum of chocobo forest success to give this place another shot. I knew exactly the sound I was looking for, and made sure to expand my range of where I looked to include the entrance area.
-15 minutes later, still no luck. I covered every possible unit, blowing the sonar literally everywhere. Nothing.
-Yeah, I’m done. Failure is okay! I don’t need to solve all the game’s secrets. But I’ve spent probably an hour, hour and 15-20 minutes maybe, total on this forest, and I simply give up. I look forward to learning what I missed about this place after I finish FFVIII.
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Overworld
-Doing a last pass before I return to Esthar and the Sorceress Memorial. Flying over each continent, looking for stuff I might have missed.
-Landed on a few different islands. Found draw points occasionally, but nothing beyond that.
-Went looking again for the White Ship but I’m either a terrible looker or it’s disappeared.
-A NEW THING!!
-Found a peninsula jutting out into a lake. It looked like there might be a draw point here, but I got the option to either throw a rock or hum a tune. I hummed. A black shadow rose to the surface. Same option. I hummed again. (Didn’t want to scare it away.)
-Now it’s talking to me. It’s a large shape. It wants me to find its friend, “Mr. Monkey.” Mr. Monkey is in a forest somewhere.
Ok! Now I’m hunting for Mr. Monkey on behalf of what’s probably some monstrous aquatic demon in Obel Lake.
-In the forest nearby. Found a Wendigo, which is… sort of monkeyish?
-No. The shadow doesn’t acknowledge it. Just says that he should be here if I walk around a forest. Also says he might have taken a train to Dollet. Though the shadow doesn’t say that DOllet line again so probably a joke.
-30 minutes later of wandering in the nearby forests running from fights, no luck. No “Mr. Monkey.” Let’s try Dollet we go.
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Dollet
-The city seems very wealthy. They were able to at least afford some mercenary protection before, so makes sense.
-A pleasant little town, when we’re not being chased by a giant killer robot.
-Beat a dude in Triple Triad. Lost in a game against him first (and failed to win his Siren card), but when I beat him in the next game he took me to a secret room.
-It’s a card room! Pretty neat. He tells us that only one person before us beat him.
That must be the “ace” of the CC club, whoever it is. (And I did win the Siren from him a bit later. )
-The room has a few books in them. One has a silly note about a dude who tried to take down a giant snake to make beer, but another has the tragic journal of about a woman who died heroically.
-Played some cards, and stared even having fun with it again. Before two games in a row lost me rare card (Sacred and… some other card? Already forgot) after I had almost full board control and got 100% combo’d on the opponent’s last play of the game.
This was to an old man who played coy, pretending like he sucked at the game and had bad cards. Lol. He didn’t.
I really believe that Random could be a fun thing if it didn’t require me to wager cards. But no. Random and Same/Plus just make me feel hopeless as I see my best cards get whittled away. There’s also a skill element I don’t possess. If I were better or put in more practice, I’d probably be able to turn some of these games that I’m losing around more consistently.
-A mini scavenger hunt involving a painting and a dog netted me an X-Potion.
-Ok, I’m done. No Mr. Monkey here. Maybe I’ll find him later.
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I probably sound frustrated, and I am. Spent way too much time looking for Mr. Monkey, working on the Forest of Solitude, and losing at Triple Triad to be feel really satisfied right now.
But as I said before, failure is okay. I don’t need to “beat” these games 100%. These are side-quests. Optional. It’s especially frustrating when I see these loose ends (Mr. Monkey, the CC Group Ace, that last chocobo forest) and simply don’t have the skill or intelligence to solve the puzzles.
I guess I just want to emphasize that amidst the frustration lies a deep appreciate that the game provides real challenges to struggle against. Even if I don’t overcome them on this first run.
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Next time: heading directly for the Sorceress Memorial. Time to move on.
