Summary:
Steiner and Dagger make for Alexandria. Death in the Popos Heights.
Exploration in the Daimes-Horse Basin outside Burmecia. Choco’s Dream
World.
Grand Citadel – South Gate
-Steiner at the South Gate about to enter Alexandrian territory.
With a sack over his shoulder. Probably trying to hide Dagger.
-He’s posing as a worker who wants to help rebuild the South Gate.
-well… crap lol. The guards have to check his back.
-Oh! Lol. He’s just carrying a sackful of Gysahl Pickles and the stench drives the guard away. Or maybe Dagger is in the bag with the pickles, counting on the smell to make the guard not look too closely.
-He’s inside. Yeah, the princess was inside the sack. Brilliant.
-Rumor of ghosts here.
-We find the guard who blocked us the first time, and Steiner gets FURIOUS XD XD XD
-I opt not to kill the guy. We don’t want to cause a ruckus.
-FFII callback alert! A guy here named Jobless Jeff used to run a shop named Altair, a town in FFII.
-The Chief Engineer here gives me a sense of why the world feels small to start with so far: because there’s more outside this “Mist Continent” that’s uncharted!
-uh oh. Are we caught?
-Phew. The guard just wants to give us a gate pass and is cautious about approaching due to the pickle stink.
-We reach a safe alley. Garnet gets out and changes. Steiner gets the option to “look around the corner,” but screw that. No way Steiner would disrespect the princess that way.
[Later edit: there was a treasure that I couldn’t reach as Steiner carrying the sack with Dagger, since it was up a ladder. I think I could’ve reached it if Steiner had looked and maybe been shoved into the prior screen, but not worth it. [Game of Thrones] Ab vagrerfg va frggvat hc n Wbenu/Qnrarelf qlanzvp vs V pna uryc vg.]
-They’re heading for Treno.
-We just crossed the Bohden Gate.
-We’ll be in Lindblum technically until we pass through the Aerbs Mountains into Treno, City of Nobles.
-Grimo the moogle asks us to give a letter to Nazna.
-I really like the look on the cable car that will take us through the Aerbs to Treno. It has this badass horse statue on one side.
---
Train to Treno
-Boarded the train. A woman who Steiner gave some good advice to, Part-Time Mary, boards as well.
-They have an exchange that I really like here. Steiner says how dangerous the path was to get to this point from Lindblum, and how he couldn’t have done it without Dagger’s white magic.
I like this for the same reason I liked when the party tried to use a Phoenix Down on Galuf in FFV. It acknowledges game mechanics in the story and dialogue. We often see lone characters cross huge distances that would kill a full party, just assuming that the individuals wouldn’t face random encounters.
But these two DID face random encounters! That was part of the challenge. How cool is that?
-Steiner says that Dagger’s fortitude helped them pass “those obnoxious moogles” in the Chocobo Forest. What? I thought there was only one moogle. Or perhaps they went to a different Chocobo Forest. Or maybe the honeymooners were in the Chocobo Forest when they ran into Steiner and Dagger and Steiner didn’t like them.
-Some talk about Zidane. Dagger learned a lot from him and likes him, but Steiner still sees him as a disrespectful peasant. Albeit one he respects more now than he did before. (Marginally.)
---
Gizamulake’s Grotto
-The party picks up where it left off in the boss room. The Burmecian soldier dies in Freya’s arms.
-This whole experience in the Grotto may have really swayed her from feeling Burmecia didn’t hold anything for her to a position of wanting to protect it.
-We exit automatically, but I’m backtracking. I want to see what’s at the top of those vines in the moogle room.
-LOLOLOL I just noticed that Gizamulake’s room has the ANGRIEST looking rubber (stone/sculpted) ducky I’ve ever seen. (Seen in the foreground of the picture above.)
Grand Citadel – South Gate
-Steiner at the South Gate about to enter Alexandrian territory.
With a sack over his shoulder. Probably trying to hide Dagger.
-He’s posing as a worker who wants to help rebuild the South Gate.
-well… crap lol. The guards have to check his back.
-Oh! Lol. He’s just carrying a sackful of Gysahl Pickles and the stench drives the guard away. Or maybe Dagger is in the bag with the pickles, counting on the smell to make the guard not look too closely.
-He’s inside. Yeah, the princess was inside the sack. Brilliant.
-Rumor of ghosts here.
-We find the guard who blocked us the first time, and Steiner gets FURIOUS XD XD XD
-I opt not to kill the guy. We don’t want to cause a ruckus.
-FFII callback alert! A guy here named Jobless Jeff used to run a shop named Altair, a town in FFII.
-The Chief Engineer here gives me a sense of why the world feels small to start with so far: because there’s more outside this “Mist Continent” that’s uncharted!
-uh oh. Are we caught?
-Phew. The guard just wants to give us a gate pass and is cautious about approaching due to the pickle stink.
-We reach a safe alley. Garnet gets out and changes. Steiner gets the option to “look around the corner,” but screw that. No way Steiner would disrespect the princess that way.
[Later edit: there was a treasure that I couldn’t reach as Steiner carrying the sack with Dagger, since it was up a ladder. I think I could’ve reached it if Steiner had looked and maybe been shoved into the prior screen, but not worth it. [Game of Thrones] Ab vagrerfg va frggvat hc n Wbenu/Qnrarelf qlanzvp vs V pna uryc vg.]
-They’re heading for Treno.
-We just crossed the Bohden Gate.
-We’ll be in Lindblum technically until we pass through the Aerbs Mountains into Treno, City of Nobles.
-Grimo the moogle asks us to give a letter to Nazna.
-I really like the look on the cable car that will take us through the Aerbs to Treno. It has this badass horse statue on one side.
---
Train to Treno
-Boarded the train. A woman who Steiner gave some good advice to, Part-Time Mary, boards as well.
-They have an exchange that I really like here. Steiner says how dangerous the path was to get to this point from Lindblum, and how he couldn’t have done it without Dagger’s white magic.
I like this for the same reason I liked when the party tried to use a Phoenix Down on Galuf in FFV. It acknowledges game mechanics in the story and dialogue. We often see lone characters cross huge distances that would kill a full party, just assuming that the individuals wouldn’t face random encounters.
But these two DID face random encounters! That was part of the challenge. How cool is that?
-Steiner says that Dagger’s fortitude helped them pass “those obnoxious moogles” in the Chocobo Forest. What? I thought there was only one moogle. Or perhaps they went to a different Chocobo Forest. Or maybe the honeymooners were in the Chocobo Forest when they ran into Steiner and Dagger and Steiner didn’t like them.
-Some talk about Zidane. Dagger learned a lot from him and likes him, but Steiner still sees him as a disrespectful peasant. Albeit one he respects more now than he did before. (Marginally.)
---
Gizamulake’s Grotto
-The party picks up where it left off in the boss room. The Burmecian soldier dies in Freya’s arms.
-This whole experience in the Grotto may have really swayed her from feeling Burmecia didn’t hold anything for her to a position of wanting to protect it.
-We exit automatically, but I’m backtracking. I want to see what’s at the top of those vines in the moogle room.
-LOLOLOL I just noticed that Gizamulake’s room has the ANGRIEST looking rubber (stone/sculpted) ducky I’ve ever seen. (Seen in the foreground of the picture above.)
---
Overworld – Popos Heights
-The ivy exit brings us to Popos Heights, a small plateau in the middle of the Mist continent.
-HOLY CRAP THIS WAS A BAD IDEA – one of the monsters I met (Garuda) here casts Stop and Firaga, obliterating me.
-Well. There’s my first Game Over.
-Trying again, just in case I ran into some rare monster and normally things were okay up here.
-DEFINITELY not supposed to be here yet. A Grand Dragon used Thundaga and melted my face.
---
Overworld
-Back to the Grotto and exited from the boss room.
-The Daines-Horse Basin waits outside the cave, and the Vube Desert a bit deeper in. There’s a huge sandstorm in the middle of the desert!
-Walking around the basin first to get the lay of the land.
-The beach to the northeast is the Eesistern Coast.
-Hope I can find a patch of ground with chocobo tracks. Some of this place looks familiar from chocograph images.
-success! Found tracks, summoned Choco, and found the spot from a chocograph.
-oh crap what’s happening – sleeping gas from the chest? Is Yuffie gonna steal my gil?
---
Choco’s Dream World
-uhhhhhhhh
-this is trippy af
-We see space, with a small planet/rock and choco on the bottom. Choco runs up a bit…
-Well, we did learn in the Chocobo Forest that Choco had his own personal quest, so maybe this is something along that road. A chocobo dream quest.
-It seems like this is a shrine with a bunch of different colored chocobos at various parts.
-A regal af big chocobo materialized at the center.
-so THAT’S choco’s wish, and it’s kind of heartbreaking? He seeks “a quiet life with other chocobos.”
BIG CHOCOBO: “Wanderer, we await your return.” This place may be a heaven of sorts, awaiting Choco at the end of his journeys.
-I’m stunned by this. Floored.
-I’ve talked before about how cool it is that FFIX is an ensemble cast giving the spotlight to a lot of side characters, and that even applies TO THE FRIGGING CHOCOBO!!!
-The Big Chocobo grants Choco the ability to cross rivers. This is amazing.
---
Overworld
-LOOK AT CHOCO GO!!! He’s blue now, wading into the water and majorly increasing my ability to explore.
-can’t get over the awesomeness of this chocobo progression system. Not just finding anonymous chocobos with different abilities, but the progression of this particular chocobo who’s befriended us.
---
Gate
-Came to the gate between Burmecia and Alexandria. There’s a battle on the other side, or was one.
-Freya expresses some concerns that I don’t quite grasp – something about wishing she had acted as instinctively as Quina as Quina smells the flowers. It’s clear she regrets not having helped Burmecia earlier somehow.
---
Overworld
-Let’s try heading into the sandstorm.
-I only just now noticed that I’ve been getting cards for killing monsters, not just from winning them in Tetra Master. I like this method a LOOOOOOOT more than the FFVIII method of obtaining cards. One of my chief complaints about FFVIII’s combat was that drawing and carding incentivized stalling combat out. That’s addressed directly here.
-Saving here, outside Burmecia.
---
Next time: into the city of Burmecia.
