FFIV – Part 18: Zeromus Returns?

 Onto the final push! Three more Floors of Remembrance, then the final boss.

1)Dollhouse floor. Except this time, imagine Eliza Dushku as a giant doll named “Death Puppet” who shoots literal laser beams. Yeah.

2)A short Lunar Cave.

3)Technically, the layout is like a Tower of Babil floor. In reality, I think of this as the “My Worst Fucking Nightmare” floor. It’s the opposite of the Pudding Floor in that all the mobs here are tough to fight with magic, because almost every mob pack include a Proto Deathmask. Reflects itself, and casts Holy and Flare on itself a bunch. These things hurt like hell. Even worse, I can’t use Cecil to attack because whenever his sword’s Holy spell gets reflected, it does like 6,000 damage.

And then the final boss. Zeromus EG. What does the EG stand for? No clue. It’s not even like Zeromus X or Zeromus Z, where even if it doesn’t stand for something specific it indicates another version. EG seems too specific. It must mean something.

The boss’s model is GREAT! Not just a recycled version of the original Zeromus either.

The fight was similar, with Big Bangs and Black Holes, but very doable. Finished the Lunar Ruins with my party around levels 74-77.

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Next up: My plan had been to move on to FFIV: Interlude, but I really want to see the other trials. I think I’ll go back through the Lunar Ruins with a new party if it lets me.

FFIV – Part 17: Just the Two of Us (Palom’s and Porom’s Door)

Another wonderfully creative entry in the epilogue. This time, the premise is that only Palom and Porom can do this trial. Cecil, Edge, and Yang just have to chill out.

Palom and Porom each take different paths, and we get a new mechanic where I can swap between the two of them! Like, I start with Palom, move him along his path and explore his cave, and then swap to Porom and explore the cave she’s in. You have to swap regularly because buttons in each character’s area unlock doors in the other character’s area.

There are random fights, but nothing really of significance. Occasional moths and toads, stuff the gets one or two shot with melee, even from these two. The real trick is a series of puzzles, like, Palom has to become “mini” to get through a hole in a wall with the button to unlock Porom’s next door. He doesn’t have a Mini spell, since it’s white magic, so he has to find a Mini-tile on the ground that’ll turn him mini.

The twins have to constantly swap forms, between their regular form, floating, mini, pig, and toad. Like previous puzzles, it’s not overwhelmingly hard. The game even acknowledges this!

POROM: Yes, yes, Palom, you were a great help. But I hardly think it required a prodigy to get through that challenge.

But it’s new and fun. And for me, that’s what counts here. The whole thing reminds me a bit of Dragon Age: Origins, from one of the dream sequences. If you played it, you probably know the part I mean.

At the end is Lunar Leviathan. He’s tough, but nothing too new. The rewards are two “Twin Star” armbands. When each twin wears this, their Twincast has the chance to cast “Twin Meteor.” This is not bad I guess, and each armband still has good stats, but it’s the worst of the trial rewards in my opinion.

a)There’s no guarantee it’ll cast “Twin Meteor.”
b)The cast time on Twincast is still way too long.
c)Using “Twincast” means the twins aren’t doing their own respective thing – heals for Porom and pretty great guaranteed nukes for Palom like “Flare.”

From a character perspective, I like how this continues to put Palom in his place. He’s indeed an awesome mage – after all, he helped destroy the Evilest Evil around, Zeromus! – but didn’t do it alone. Porom’s overall awesomeness continues to shine.

FFIV – Part 16: Long Memories

Before I hit this last trial for my current party, I passed Kain’s and Cid’s doors.

Floors of remembrance:
1)Started off with an Old Man who asked me a bunch of questions. Are you intellectual or athletic? To get attention, would you sing or do magic tricks? Etc. A little bit like one of those, “Which Hogwarts House do you belong to?” quizzes. (For the record, HUFFLEPUFF FOR LIFE!!!) They gave me “mage” as my quiz result, and gave me a Soma Drop – permanent MP add – and Dry Ether.

2)I call this floor “Cosby’s Revenge.” All pudding, all the time. My favorite was when I got packs of “Flan Princess,” pink pudding mobs that cast Berserk on my party members in the best way possible. They said, “Let’s dance!” and changed the combat music to the chocobo forest music.

3)An outdoor lake with sylphs. They healed me and gave me a Megalixir. No fights.

4)A different “Village of the Moon,” with some really great weapons and armor to buy. The highlight of these weapons was a knife called “Assassin’s Blade” for Palom. It seems to auto-kill many humanoid mobs, which significantly impacted my tactics.

5)A cave with a sequence of locked doors for which I had to find the keys in each section. This could’ve been a pretty typical floor, where I hunt around, find a key, open a door, and move on. What makes it so much better is the imagery. Instead of just “Key,” I find, say, “Honey.” The door I have to unlock has an image of a bear. When I use the “Honey” on the door, the image of the bear eats the honey, goes to sleep, and unlocks the door. Other keys:

a.Purified water to open a “Dead tree” door. The dead tree image drinks the water and springs to life.
b.I find firewood and then use that with fire to turn the wood into a lit torch. The door has a picture of an unlit lamp, which lights up to unlock the door.
c.A doll I find in a room, and the door has an image of a sad little girl. When I use the doll on the door, the girl becomes happy, takes the doll, and opens the door.

6)A short Lunar Subterrane floor. Found a “Rainbow Robe,” but I assume it’s for Rydia or Rosa because neither Palom nor Porom can use it.

7)Feymarch floor.

8)Mount Ordeals floor. This makes me think I’m coming close to the end, because the specific floor of Mount Ordeals is the top one, where I encountered the initial Paladin Ordeal and Scarmiglione.

9)Giant of Babil floor. New sword for Edge – Mutsunokami.

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Next up: Palom’s and Porom’s door, and the final push.

FFIV – Part 15: Labyrinth (Edge’s Door)

After Cecil’s trial, it’s back to the floors of remembrance:

1)Sylph Cave
2)Tower of Babil
3)Mount Ordeals

Then Rosa’s door. No Rosa, so moving on…

4)SEALED CAVE GRRRRRR (at least no Trap Doors this time)
5)Octomamm’s Waterway
6)Cave of Eblana

Then Edge’s door.

This was awesome.

Edge’s trial is a castle, but one of the most fucked up and confusing castles around. It’s a maze. It has trap doors, key and unlocking sequences, invisible walkways, a fiery dungeon with some treasure, the works. It has random encounters too, and I could’ve done without them, but they’re not too intrusive.

Edge was having clearly enjoying this too, calling it a “ninja’s playground.”

I got to the top of the castle the first time around and found the king. He and Edge exchanged some fun/light banter, and then the king dropped us through a trapdoor into the depths of the castle. It was pretty challenging to find our way back up through the maze, but eventually made it, and the king was “Lunar Ifrit.”

Afterwards, before we were about to leave, Edge and Cecil had the best conversation. Edge was going on and on about how the much fun the maze was, how he wanted to remodel Eblana Castle to be like that, and Cecil was just like, “Can we please go?”

Their final conversation:

EDGE: Let’s go back inside! That place was cool!
CECIL: Let’s keep going.
EDGE: Aww…

Cecil and the party walk out, but Edge stays behind for a minute, looks back at the castle longingly, and again says, “Aww….”

This trial was not only fun, but it perfectly captured the character of Edge, the Dean Winchester of FFIV. A mixture of bad-ass, fighter, 12 year old boy, and sad puppy.

FFIV – Part 14: The Penitent Man Shall Pass (Cecil’s Door)

Okay, some time has passed. I can talk a bit rationally about how wonderful this is, but want to set the context first.

My expectations were low. The previous extra-goodies – FFII’s Souls of Rebirth and FFIV’s Cave of Trials – both had cool premises, but were fairly grindy in practice. I worried that the Lunar Ruins would be the same way: long, grindy, but with a fun and quirky story.

I get this instead. A trippy, hallucinogenic romp down memory lane that mixes combat challenges, good story, puzzles, mazes, humor, and mini-games.

Perhaps I’ll walk through what this path was like after Yang’s trial:

Start: Yang’s Cave
1)Giant of Babil floor?
2)Antlion Cave floor??
3)Underground waterway floor?!?

Wonderful changes of scenery, though all were basic combat stuff. Then hit Edward’s closed door, and kept moving to…
4)A Mysidian library
5)A sunny pig and chocobo farm
6)A maze-like waterfall floor

….
….
FUCK YES

The Mysidian library was a nice little puzzle where I had find a book in a maze of shelves. Got clues from the mages in the library (“It’s on a short shelf,” “The shelf is in sight of a clock”) and returned the book to the guy. No random enemies.

Some of the books in the library I found were pretty great too. My favorite: “Untoaded: Green and Back Again.”

The farm also had no random enemies. The farmer just told me to watch, and a bunch of pigs and girls and chocobos streamed into the farm. I had to count the number of chocobos that were in the pack, and once I got that, a chocobo blocking my path out of the room moved away.

The waterfall room was back to random enemies, but even there it was the puzzle of the room that was tricky. Each waterfall led to a couple of more choices, and at the end of each path was a door or treasure. If I took the wrong door, it sent me back to the start of the room to try a different path. LOVED IT!

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Rydia’s door was next. No Rydia in my party, so moving on…

7)A town where I hunted for (not kidding) “The Platinum Toad of Happiness”
8)Another town with pigs and frogs and mini people. “Village of the Moon”

The Village of the Moon was just a village with an inn and a chance to restock supplies. The first down (#7) was like “Where’s Waldo”. I wandered the town, and occasionally I would see a white toad flash on the screen and walk around a few seconds before fading away. It took a few tries, but I eventually caught him, gave him too some kid in the town, and moved on.

Then Cecil’s door.

Yang’s door fit a classic, archetypal martial arts movie challenge. The master (and his party) versus a horde of challengers. I expected Cecil’s section, “the Paladin’s Door,” to use the same template. Maybe fight off hordes of undead. Would’ve been okay I guess.

But no. The designers weren’t content. They pushed. They prodded. They created what really fit as trials of a paladin.


The Paladin’s Test:

Test #1: I started in the cottage of an old man. He told me of his favorite frying pan, made of gold, unlocked in the chest behind him. He then fell asleep. My first inclination was to go for the chest – after all, it’s a video game! You see a chest, you plunder it.***

I luckily remembered that Cecil was being tested as a paladin, so left the room with the frying pan in the chest. Not sure what would’ve happened if I took it, but probably nothing good.

Test #2: A sunny townscape with a lake. A person starts to drown, and we have to get to them in time before they drown to save them. Success!

Test #3: I stumble into a burglary in progress. The burglar offers to cut me in on the goods if I let him go. While I of course say no and stop him, I wonder what would’ve happened if I agreed to his terms.

Test #4: A cave. I cross the bridge in this cave, and a monster stops me – a goblin. Yeah, one of the dues with like four HP that I was one-shotting on my way from Baron to Mist back at the start of the game. It was so weird I just stared at the combat screen wondering wtf was up, before the goblin started talking.

“Please, don’t hurt me! I’ve been cursed! I’m human, but nobody believes me. You have to believe me…”

I do nothing. This has to be a test of faith. It was! After a few rounds of having all my party members defend, like the Ordeal, he transformed back into a human, thanking me for leaving him alone, for believing him when nobody else did.

That’s right. FFIV’s penultimate paladin trial required me to save someone who was essentially gaslighted with magic. (Sorta.)

Test #5: A farmer lost her chocobos! I have to go into the other room to round them up. As anyone who has tried to talk to chocobos in the Chocobo Forests, this is not as easy as it sounds. Those buggers are fast! But got them all eventually.

Final Test: I should add that the path from test to test in Cecil’s room hasn’t been direct. The path between rooms has been the same room each time, a carpeted walkway like in Baron’s castle before the throne room, with Baron’s music. It should be no surprise then that the final test is “Lunar Odin,” who’s hard as fuck. I just baaaaarely beat him. He got the “Zenketsu” (sp?) off on me, and only Yang survived. Before he could get another Zenketsu, Yang – low on HP – got in one last shot for the win.

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Bravo, Lunar Ruins develops. Bravo.

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***College Humor describes this phenomenon best.

 

FFIV – Part 13: Hall of the Mountain King (Yang’s Door)

A VERY solid start to this epilogue!

I should say first off that I’m confused as fuck. The Lunar Ruins seem to initially be constructed like a maze where I can’t backtrack. I’ll go through a door and be dropped into the middle of a new map, so it makes it really hard for me to keep an internal picture of the zone. Just gotta keep checking for side passages and keep pushing forward.

The monster packs are tough again, but (mostly) doable. The only pack that I started running from was the golden dragon and deathmask. Deathmasks are brutal – they cast reflect on me and reflect on themselves, meaning that I can’t regularly heal my group. Adding a golden dragon to it is especially nasty because they temporarily paralyze many of my party members, but since I have reflect on me, I can’t Esuna the paralyzed members.

As soon as I hit Yang’s area, I knew it because they actually used the martial sounds of Kabul for that cave’s music. His cave is blessedly clear of random trash, leaving only a steady stream of monks, super monks, and monk instructors who we clear out.

The army of monks is portrayed in a really cool way. Each unit is graphically composed of three different units, that (like Octomamm) gradually disappear as their HP drops. It gives the sense that in each fight, I’m really taking on 24 monks. This makes Yang’s test remind me of the scene in “Kill Bill: Vol. I,” where the Bride takes on the C***y 88. Bad-fucking-ass!!!!

After fighting through the hordes of Moon Monks (HEE HEE HEE MOON MONKS I LOVE THIS GAME), we find their king, the Lunar Titan. It hit me just before he cast Earthquake that he was using the same model as Rydia’s Eidolon, Titan, and cast “Float” on my party just in the nick of time. It was a tough fight, but succeeded. He gave Yang a nice armband, and gave me a Lunar Titan book which makes me wish I had Rydia with me to summon the guy.

I reiterate: a very promising start to the Lunar Ruins!

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“His deep, dark eyes
Keep watch on his kingdom
And the mysteries that sleeps safe inside.
His hall, his towers of stone,
Shall not be overthrown for eternity.
It is guarded by the king!”
-Savatage, “Hall of the Mountain King”

(warning: includes ableist slurs)

FFIV – Part 12: Journey to the Center of the Moon

And… done! At least with the base game.

The finale of the Cave of Trials wasn’t too bad, and I discovered on my final way out after beating Edward’s boss that I was being a goofus and there actually was a warp platform next to the save point. I still don’t like the cave, but on that point, my bad.

Went back to Mysidia to swap my party around for the final push. Went with Yang, Cecil, Edge, Palom, and Porom. I would’ve preferred Rydia to Palom. Her character is way more interesting to me, and I like her summoning, but I wanted something different from my SNES experience and also felt bad splitting up Palom and Porom. Their Twincast seems to kind of suck, but for lore/roleplay, I like my party having both of them in it.

Then: the moon!!! Just such a cool idea, that you fight in moon caves against moon monsters led by an evil moon person. Like “Final Fantasy” meets “Flash Gordon.”

The Lunar Subterrane was a fantastic final dungeon. It had lots of hidden passages, similar to the Sylph Cave. It was challenging, with each kind of mob pack requiring a different strategy. The mini-bosses scattered throughout the place were fantastic, challenging, and pushed me to adjust my tactics.

I may have missed some, but the ones I fought were:

-Ogopogo
-Dark Bahamut
-White Dragon
-Lunasaurus(?) – the pair guarding the Ribbon that reflected themselves.
-Plague Bringer(?)

(I forgot to write down the names of these latter two)

Other stuff:

-Zemus/Zeromus was suitably fun, and I liked the look of “Big Bang.” Why did Zeromus refer to himself as “we”? I thought he was just a rogue Lunarian. Is his spirit like the spirit of hatred of all Lunarians, or maybe something bigger than that even?

-From the ending: “EDGE: My heart is filled with goodness all the way!”

-I like the emphasis on the brotherly stuff between Cecil and Golbez

-Kain reminds me of Angel. He likes brooding aloud on rooftops.

-How is Yang king? Not only is the old king still alive, but he’s standing right next to an enthroned Yang while he still has his crown and robe on. Maybe the kingship there is like a meritocracy, where whoever is the most badass monk gets to be king.

-What is the “Crystal” that Golbez and then Cecil use on Zeromus? Is it one of the light/dark crystals? Something else?

-Not sure if I was over-leveled or not, but ended up between 59-61 on all my characters by the time i beat Zeromus.

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So that was an awesome game, as awesome as I remember! From here on out, I’m almost fully unspoiled for the FF series. Stuff I do know:

-Kefka is a thing?
-Sephiroth is a thing?
-FFXI and FFXIV are MMOs.
-That weird-ass pompom-wearing teddy bear from FFII apparently comes back a lot

[EDIT: Two more things I remember being expectation-spoiled for:

-Many people apparently think FFVI is the best FF
-Many people apparently dislike FFXIII.]

And that’s really about it. Exciting!

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Next up: Going to try “Interlude,” the next part in the…

WTF? The Lunar Ruins opened? The doors of the mages, ninja, paladin, and monk? Do I get actually CHARACTER-SPECIFIC dungeons? I hope so. We’ll see.

FFIV – Part 11: Cave of Dash-of-Fun, Gallon-of-Boring – Part One

This must be new material – I have no memory of it from the original FF.

On the surface, this is a really cool idea. I get to revisit old party members and reuse them! I still think the idea of Palom and Porom returning to life really cheapens that sacrifice in the story, but I’ll deal. I was sure that my standard party – Kain, Cecil, Edge, Rosa, Rydia – would be my final party, but Mysidia and the Cave of Trials suggest some flexibility.

So why does the cave itself have to be so boring?

The ending fights are pretty fun. My favorite is the Flan Chef and her Pudding Pop bodyguards. Not overwhelmingly tough, but fun. The six frigging floors of trash? Not fun. Especially Marlboros and Mini Satanas.

It’s not just that the cave itself is nothing new, it’s that I kept having to walk through it. The first time I didn’t know I couldn’t do cool trial stuff without swapping party members, so I ran through it with my normal party, then COULDN’T EVEN TELEPORT OUT. WHY. So ran out.

Swapped in four members – everyone except Edward – and then ran it again. Did the bosses I could, ran out.

Just seems so poorly designed and overly grindy just for some weapons. Was really hoping there’d be some advancement of each individual character’s story. Disappointed.

Next time, I’ll finishing running out, swap in Edward, run back in, then run out again. My eyes are glazing over just thinking about it.

Sorry for the negativity.

FFIV – Part 10: Lair of the Father

I can apparently swap around characters in my party in Mysidia. I didn’t this session because I just cleared the Lair of the Father, but I’ll check it out next time. I can’t imagine it’ll be that useful to be honest, since my current party seems pretty ideal, but I’ll check it out next time.

Lair of the Father (Bahamut’s domain) wasn’t too exciting. The boss, Bahamut, was pretty easy. (Nothing negative about the boss. That countdown he has is nerve-wracking, but I remembered the Wall/Reflect trick.) What was exciting was the presence of some endgame mobs. The bone dragons, warlocks, and of course, behemoths.

I don’t know if there are any tricks to get around the behemoths. They retaliate to everything, and hit like a truck. Just gotta pace myself and keep all party members above 1100 hp. Poor Rydia just has to chill in the back and use potions or defend.

Popped by the Hummingway Cave – ahem, LOLOL – to pick up some potions.

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Next up: Return to Mysidia

FFIV – Part 9: Shadow of the Colossus

Today, picked up FuSoYa from the moon (felt comfortably leveled this time, in my mid-40s, not underleveled). Headed back to Earth, and….

Hooo Leeeee Shiiiiit….

See 1:25-2:10 from the "Let's Play" at the top of this post (not mine).

That cinematic. The Giant of Babil emerging. It was a thing of beauty.

It’s hard to describe why exactly. It was just awe-inspiring, the way certain monster movie titans done well can feel. Titanic, but cloaked enough to seem mysterious. Then the lasers. Gah! Just the whole thing. Only Godzilla can save us.

It also reminds me a bit of Shadow of the Colossus in terms of its art style. I mean this in the best way possible.

I also like the layout, how you journey through the mechanical anatomy (Head, throat, torso) rather than through anonymous floors.

Is this the first time in the Final Fantasy series we’ve gone high tech? Where we fought robots and laser beams and mechanical sentries? I seem to remember parts of FFI, like Tiamat’s castle, having some of it, but not sure it was ever this explicit. Whatever the case, it’s a cool addition to the purer fantasy elements, so I doubt it’ll be the last high-tech stuff in the FF series.

The Four Fiends and the CPU were both pushovers, but mostly because I got the gimmick. For Four Fiends, just pour on the counter elements to each, and for the CPU, kill the Defense first, then CPU, then Attack.

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Next up: Dunno? The moon and then the final moon cave I guess. We’ll see.

FFIV – Part 8: Gotta Catch ‘Em All

After Kain’s sudden but inevitable betrayal, I went back to the surface and the Mysidians prayed a giant space ship out of the ocean for me. That was nice of them.

It’s at this point that the game seems to be off-rails a bit. I tried pushing on at first to the moon, where the plot told me to go, but got pretty well wrecked by basically everything. I wish I had done a bunch of side stuff before the Sealed Cave so that I would have a full party, but no such luck. I even tried running from fights to get FuSoYa and back to earth, but Babil destroyed me, so I went back to a previous pre-Moon save point to build my party up a bit. I was in my mid 30s at the time, between 34 and 37.

So with my little party of Cecil, Rosa, Rydia, and Edge, I went adventuring.

First stop was the Feymarch. Really cool zone, and not too tough. Glad I had “Float,” because of not just the poison but those arachnids that spammed Earthquake. I love the village of the Eidolons. All my desire from previous games to see monster civilizations and societies was at least given some life here. Beat Asura (I did remember the Reflect trick thankfully) and then Leviathan, who was tougher.

I have to give MAJOR credit to the game’s graphics for Edge’s Flood and Leviathan’s Tsunami. It is starting to get hot as heck here in Minnesota, and the graphics for those spells made me sad I wasn’t swimming in them. It looked really refreshing, and I’m not kidding. I mean, aside from the fact that the raw force of the spells would’ve killed me.

Since I got the Rat Tail in that city, I used it to complete my Excalibur. What the fuck is up with Rat Tails anyway? I don’t remember it from FFII or FFIII, but it was definitely used in FFI as proof of my worth to Bahamut, the token that proved I could grow from warrior to knight, mages to wizards, etc. What a weird and random token to carry over.

After that, I took out Odin in Baron. That was easier than I remember, especially given just the four of us. Edge’s Blitz and Rydia’s Ramuh fucked him up pretty good.

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Then the Sylph Cave.

Okay, some mixed feelings here, but mostly good. I really enjoyed its layout. It was like a maze, a puzzle, that was enjoyable to explore. When I finally found the Sylph Stash in the very end, it was pretty satisfying.

The Bog Witch and Bog Toad mob packs were not too bad. They were annoying sometimes, but even when they “toaded” me fully they un-toaded me pretty soon after. They weren’t a real threat.

So what was a threat?

Malboros.

Yeah, those assholes from prior games. I think they were in FFII also, probably others. When I got ambushed by them, I was basically fucked. Not in a “Chaos-Knight-from-FFII-SoR” kind of way either. Those Chaos Knights would ambush me and just destroy me with massive and draining melee attacks. These Malboros instead cast Bad Breath (seriously) my characters, afflicting them with every condition available. If my Esuna-casters were Bad Breathed, game over. I mean, I could run and use a precious “Remedy,” but that was it. If my non-Esuna-casters were Bad Breathed, the best I could do was cast Esuna on them and then get Bad Breathed again and Esuna them and… Yeah. I won often, but it was a slog.

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I heard there was new content in the game from FFII on SNES, aside from Interlude and After Years, but I haven’t found it yet.

Next up: FuSoYa and the Giant of Babil.

FFIV – Part 7: It’s a Trap!

The Sealed Cave.

Sealed. Fucking. Cave.

God I hate this place. Our party came here to secure the final crystal, but of course we only ended up giving it to Golbez after Kain goes back into mind-bent mode. The trash is easy, bats and vampires who don’t really do much damage.

But every goddam door is a “Trap Door.” Each fight goes like this: Do a bunch of damage, get one of my party members one-shot by the Trap Door’s “Ninth Dimension” spell, watch as the door transforms into a Chimera, get burned, eventually win. There are just so many doors!

The final boss was pretty fun. A “Demon Wall.” Took a lot of damage, and got close to killing me, but made it!

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Next up: Monsterlands. (Sylph Cave and Summoned Monsters.)

FFIV – Part 6: Return to Babil

Explored Eblana Castle – and by “explored” I mean “plundered of its loot” – and wandered through the Caves of Eblana to pick up Edge. Trudged through the ANNOYING AS FUCK Tower of Babil. Why annoying as fuck, you might ask?

Coerls and Lamias.

The coerls, panther mobs, constantly cast “Blaster,” which either paralyze me (best case) or one shot me. Lamias constantly cast “Entice,” which charm my characters. When they group up, it’s not necessarily too tough, but it is annoying as fuck.

Dispatched Edge’s parents, who are really well drawn. Or we knocked sense into their heads and they left? Not sure.

Made it to Rubicante, and found the same problems as I’ve seen before. I love his character. He’s kind of noble, fights fair, and is a nice change of pace from the other Fiends. But he’s just super easy. Edge cast Flood, Rydia called Shiva, and (this is the worst) Rubicante himself CAST BLIZZARA ON HIMSELF. WHY? Fighting fair is one thing, with everyone at full strength. But trying to hurt yourself? And how the hell does Rubicante know ice magic anyway, however masochistic he might be feeling?

Or maybe it was a bug. Either way, pretty weird.

FFIV – Part 5: The Two Towers

Today, pushed through the Towers of Zot and Babil. Killed the Delta Sisters and Barbariccia. Got back Kain, lost Tellah, and got Rydia. That moment where an adult Rydia swoops in to save the day against Golbez is AWESOME! And with the same summon that we Cecil killed to start Rydia on her path. Kind of a neat poetry there. Onto the Tower of Babil with the sadistic Dr. Lugae (who my kid-self called “Dr. Luigi”). Cid sacrificed himself (mostly) to save us from the Red Wings, and back to the surface.

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-I’m still seeing a pronounced change from the SNES where the bosses are much easier than I remember (Delta Sisters, Barbariccia, and Lugae too). For the Delta Sisters I just attribute that to somehow remembering the strategy to kill the middle one first, then the tall one, then the short one. The others? Just didn’t cast as much, hit as hard, hit as often.

Barbariccia I remember casting some spell that reduced everyone to like one hp, but she didn’t cast that here.

-In the opposite way, the trash is harder than I remember. I must’ve blown threw a few ethers and a stack and a half of potions in the Tower of Zot.

-Again with the names! Valvanus became Barbariccia! Why?? (And again, one’s not worse, just not sure what the purpose was.)

-And yet, Rubicante was changed from Rubicant. That’s the closest they’ve been.

-Some name changes I actually like are regarding the summons. “Summoned Monsters” is now “Eidolons,” and the unwieldy “Land of the Summoned Monsters” is now “Feymarch.”

-Ok, the Developers’ Room. HOW DID I NOT SEE THIS BEFORE????? This must’ve been in the SNES version and I just missed it. It’s amazing. The porn mag, “Lustful Lali-Ho”?

-“I’ll be the only female once my graphics partner leaves. *sigh* I hope I don’t choke on all the testosterone.” LOL

-So many inside jokes there that I didn’t get, but appreciate their presence anyway.

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Next up: Eblana.

FFIV – Part 4: Fucking Magnets, How Do They Work?

Short session today. Got back the Earth Crystal from the cave of the Dark Elf. Part of the joy of this series playthrough is that I get to see parallels between the games, and this Dark Elf definitely reminds me of the Dark Elf in FFI.

The cave itself was a pain in the ass. The magnetic thing turned Cecil into an archer, and one-shot kill mobs in the dungeon like panthers were a bit rough, but not too bad. The Dark Elf was not nearly as bad as I remember in his second form. I remember on the SNES that Dark Breath destroyed me, but was pretty weak here.

Is this a trend?

I really liked Toroia. The whole matriarchal thing was done pretty well and fun.

FFIV – Part 3: Palom and Porom Protect their Pal, the Paladin

After setting sail from Kabul, we got eaten by the (recurring) Leviathan. I think he was in both FFII and III, but not I – or was he in FFI too? Wound up in Mysidia, where the locals took all manner of pretty funny revenge on me in terms of pigging me, toading me, sleeping me, poisoning me, and sassing me. The Elder sent the SUPER AWESOME Palom and Porom with me to Mount Ordeals, where we met up with Tellah.

On Mount Ordeals, beat the Fiend of Earth twice and pacified my way to paladinhood. Continued on to Baron, beat Baigan (tough!), and Cagnazzo, and… lost Palom and Porom :(

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-Edward’s sprite cracks me up, with the jaunty little hat thing. Not sure how it stays on. Now that I think about it…

Edward and Simon Adebisi: SEPARATED AT BIRTH!

-The fiends names seem different. I don’t remember what the SNES Earth fiend was called, but it was definitely not Scarmiglione. Why the change? And why the Italian-sounding theme? Not that it’s a bad thing, just that it seems like a conscious choice and I’m not sure on the reasoning.

-My impatient kid self got so frustrated with the Paladin trial. I didn’t get it, and just kept attacking.

-Scarmiglione was much easier in his second form than I remember. I remember him being a nightmare, constantly poisoning and sleeping my characters, and barely beating him. This time, he just spammed “Slow” on me, which I think is binary (either slowed or not) rather than being cumulative where I keep getting slower and slower. Fire made quick work of him.

-Why did Golbez capture Rosa in the first place? I get that he later uses her to blackmail Cecil into getting the crystal, but it seems like he only thought of it when Kain brought it up much later.

-Palom and Porom’s sprite animations are awesome. I especially like Porom (the girl, right?) with her cry, and Palom’s victory dance.

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Next time: Toroia

FFIV – Part 2: Kaipo to Kabul

-The portraits in this game are great. I especially like how open and happy Rydia looks. The portraits don’t change expressions the way they did in FFII, but that’s not a big deal.

-Use the A button on the fire: “Ow ow ow!” Hee!

-Do enemies have rows? Like if an enemy is in the back of their formation, do they take and deal less damage? If so, does that bonus go away for them once I kill the enemies in front of them?

-When I played this as a kid, I took the magic system for granted. Coming from FFI-III, I appreciate it more and how naturally it flows. Was NOT a fan of having to buy magic in shops.

-FUCK TINY MAGES

-Interesting to see mobs that carry over. Adamantoise was a nasty boss in FFII, and here it’s trash in the Antlion Cave.

-Another example: the pudding mobs changed their weaknesses! In FFII, the yellow pudding was resistant to lightning. In FFIV, the yellow pudding is weak to lightning.

-Major LOL at Rydia’s Chocobo summon. The Chocobo launches out of nowhere and kicks the living shit out of the mob with feet of fury, leaving little chicken footprints on the target.

-I reiterate: fuck tiny mages. It's like the game designers thought, "You know what's annoying? Mobs immune to magic. Ooh, also one that cast paralyze/hold! And let's add mana drain for good measure."

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Made it past the (really weak) Octomom, through the Antlion Cave, through Mount Hobbs, and survived the siege on Kabul.

Next up: sailing out from Kabul.

EDIT: One more thing: what's the deal with the spell naming system? One of the few things so far I liked more in the SNES version was that my spells were name X 1, X 2, X 3, X 4. Here, I have Cure, Cura, and I assume it'll go to Curaga and Curaja. Why? Is there some cultural or linguistic hing that makes those names intuitive in Japanese?

FFIV – Part 1: Introduction/Mist

This is the only game in this series that’s a replay for me. I loved it deeply on SNES growing up. Well… the main game. The PSP emulated version I’m using has two more mini-games in it apparently, “Interlude” and “After Years.” Those will be 100% blind/fresh.

For the main game at least, I’ll make two main changes from how I’ve been doing this “Plays” so far.

First: This may be more bullet-pointy. I’ll talk about little things I remember and how this version of the game jumps out at me compared to what I remember.

Second: I tend to have longer play sessions, so both to work with that and simultaneously combat it, I’m going to write up my notes after smaller game blocks rather than personal play session. For FFIII, when I had a really long session, I wanted to say too much, and it got overwhelming, so I didn’t say anything and kept playing. Posting after major game segments may help slow down, even if it means a few posts in a day.

Aaaaand…. HERE WE GO!

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-Hee. Cecil says “damnation.”

-I never saw PSP graphics before, but these are beautiful. I especially like the fire graphic.

-OMG OMG OMG. Kain gets backstory. He talked about his father who passed away when he was young. HI RICARD. Not actual Ricard, but still. This is some Dark Tower “nineteen” bullshit right here.

-“I love thinking about dark knights. They’re scary. And by “scary,” I mean totally awesome!” You’re totally awesome, kid.

-I really like the meter that tells me which character attacks next and when their ability/jump is about to cast. Massive improvement, from FFI-III, and I don’t remember it from the SNES version.

-I don’t remember “Darkness” from SNES either, and have to be really careful about using this sparingly.

-Monsters seem really weak so far, even for the intro phase of a game. And not just weak, but slow. It’s not uncommon for Cecil and Kain to get in two full rounds before any of them attack. I both hope and imagine that will change.

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Currently through the bombing of Mist. Next up: Kaipo.