FFV – Part 7: Whomped in Walse

Summary: We fly south to Walse. Check out the town and the surrounding area, and explore the castle. The castle has a lot to explore, and two fights that destroy me at this point in the game: Jackanapes and Shiva. We try to get King Walse to shut down the amplification machines on his Water Crystal, but he says no. A meteor crashes near the Tower of Walse, where the Water Crystal is housed.

---

Overworld

-FLY!!! Perfect music.

-Walse is south. Let’s explore there.

-I see a tower… “Tower of Walse.” I need King Walse’s permission to enter though.

-Found a town and castle.

---

Town of Walse

-I think I’ll make Bartz a monk and keep “Find Passages” active.

-Garula? I thought it was a bird, but looks like a land creature. Apparently it’s shy. Hm. Can’t interact with it.

-New magic. Apparently, time magic includes Mute, dunno why though, as well as regen, on tp of stuff like slow and haste.

-Iron Helm: “Look out for magnets.”

-Went out to fight a bit to get more gil for armor, and HOLY CRAP!! Bartz as a monk hits like a barefisted freight train.

---

Castle Walse

-Nice music again.

-Warning to not steal castle treasure.

Real warning, or just flavor text? [Note: like most of my non-mechanics questions in these notes, this is rhetorical.]

-Warned also that if I meet “Jackanapes” I’ll be in a world of shit.

-!!! THE ICE GODDESS SHIVA LIVES IN THE PALACE??? Just hanging out? Wow.

-WTF

-OW

-Ok. I went to the basement. And I found Jackanapes as a random encounter.

Makes me wonder what he’s guarding…

-I now know what being in a world of shit feels like. He’s an imp-looking mob that 1-2 shots my party members. I’ll come back later to see what he’s protecting.

---

Overworld Wandering

-Found a wild Garula!

Hi, Snuffleuppagus! FFV crossover with Sesame Street ftw.

Looks like an elephant or wooly mammoth. Aw. He didn’t fight back. I feel bad about attacking.

-Next time I saw him, I didn’t attack, but he just fled eventually.

---

Back to Castle Walse

-Found another exit to the castle moat, but nothing yet of interest out here.

-Jail. A thief named Lone Wolf with an actual wolf head and a random other prisoner asked me to let them out but that seemed like a bad idea when new in town. Sorry, guys.

-Found the castle’s Water Tower.

-Elf toads = TRES CREEPY.

-Faris learned Two-Handed, a knight skill. I unequipped her shield and now she hits like a beast.

-Bartz learned “Focus.” An active monk ability that causes double his already massive damage for a bit of wind-up time.

-If I’m back-attacked, can one party member switch everyone’s row at once, or each party member just has to switch their own row?

-The FFIII monk was so much worse than this. He had retaliation, but instead of a passive that always hit back when attacked, he had to use it as his ability for a turn instead of attacking and hope that the monster attacked him. It sucked. This monk is wonderful.

-At the top of the water tower, I see an orb.

-SHIVA.

-Aaaaand…. She whomped us. Second mob that causes me to just give up and come back later so far. She had three trash mobs with her, but it took all my effort to even burn through one of them let alone heal through her Blizzara. This place is tough.

She said something interesting though: something like, “to command me, you must defeat me.” Does this mean I’ll get summoner as a class, like Rydia style? Probably. That was the case in FFIII, and this game seems very similar to that.

-Reload. Back to the castle. Don’t mess with Jackanapes or Shiva. Got it.

-West of here is the Library of the Ancients. Ok.

-Enough faffing around. Let’s see the king.

-We ask him to stop amplifying the water crystal, and he won’t. I’m confused – was it made clear at some point that the machines amplifying the crystals’ powers were the cause of their problems, or just a guess by our party?

-Another meteor crashes! It falls near the Tower of Walse. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men head there, and time for us to follow.

-I think I’m going to swap Galuf from Blue Mage to Black Mage while making Learning my equipped ability, since not much currently happening beyond Aero for blue magic.

---

Next time: Tower of Walse

FFV – Part 6: Take to the Sky

Summary: After heading to Carwen for information, we learn that no ships for Walse are available because of the dead wind. Rumor has King Tycoon's wind drake, Hiryu, is in the area though, so we head to the North Mountain where he was sighted. We fight off an ambush by wind drake poachers and help save the wounded Hiryu. Gonna fly now.

---

Overworld

-My blue mage still hasn’t learned any frelling blue magic. WTF.

-Wandering.

-Found a town, south and east of the graveyard.

---

Carwen

-Walse is south, beyond the sea. No ships since the wind slowed.

-Do I smell airship time on the horizon? Does Cid live in Carwen or something?

-Mama said FF dungeons are like a Pandora’s box of chocolates.

You never know what conditions you’re gonna get. So I stocked up on antidotes, mallets, about 10+ of everything.

-Oh, maybe not an airship! Rumor in town is that a wind dragon is sighted. Is King Tycoon’s drake flying around?

-Purple flowers on the north mountain are poisonous. Good to know.

-This game is just overloaded with flavor text that makes me smile.

-A wind drake (note to self: not a dragon) flew to the north mountain. I know where we’re headed next.

-Gotta take this time to say that yet again FFV’s music is awesome. I LOVE THE CARWEN THEME!



How do you hear this and not get up and dance a jig?

-There’s dragon grass and poison grass both on the north mountain.

-Lenna recognizes the drake’s description as her dad’s wind drake, Hiryu.

---

Overworld

-Booo!!! Tried using a “Frost Rod” I found as an item. It cast Blizzaga, but unlike any prior FF game, the weapon shattered after doing so. Not a fan of single-use items.

---

North Mountain

-GAELICAT! New enemy, and it’s a kitty with wings!

I THINK IT’S WEARING A BELL AROUND ITS NECK LOLOLOL

-Hee! “Headstones.”

GET IT?? *poke poke*

-Interesting. Higher on the mountain, I found the purple poison flowers, and when I walk over them, it poisons my party.

-King Tycoon’s helmet! Is he alive? Or is he dead, and Hiryu brought his body or something like that?

-A poisoned arrow hits Lenna?!? The earth somehow opens between the fallen Lenna and the party, and a person named Magissa appears. A wind drake poacher.

-Note: do NOT try to out-sass Faris.

New bucket list item: use this insult.

-Faris JUMPS ACROSS THE CHASM TO SAVE LENNA

-AND FALLS OFF

-AND CLIMBS BACK ON

-FARIS YOU ARE AWESOME AND CAPSLOCK WORTHY

-She proceeds to make a bridge for her party to cross with a rope. Aaaaand it’s BOSS TIME!

-Magissa is tough. She soon summons her husband, Forza.

The family that slays together stays together.

-Hey. Magissa and Forza. Stop killing Bartz. kthx

-Victory! And Galuf learned Aero, his first blue magic spell.

-Hiryu at the summit. Lenna walks over a bunch of poison flowers to get a dragon flower to heal him. She’s awesome too.

-LOL Galuf: “My stars and garters!”

-They use the dragon flower to cure Hiryu, who proceeds to return the favor by licking Lenna and somehow curing her of poison.

-And Bartz reports that he’s afraid of heights just as they’re about to hop on the wind drake.

The party is very supportive.

-Airships? Who needs airships? I got me a WIND DRAKE!

---

Next time: we fly the friendly skies to somewhere else. Walse perhaps.

FFV – Part 5: Graveyard of the Sea

Summary: We move east through the canal towards Walse. A whirlpool derails us, and the monster of the whirlpool, Karlabos. We win, but Syldra goes down and our ship gets damaged and set adrift.

---

Ship, East of Tule

-Britz and Lenna, discussing the crystals. Their loss means that the winds slow. Not too bad, but especially when you consider the loss of so much elemental harmony, the scene gets pretty apocalyptic pretty fast.

-Off to find fire, earth, and water.

Lest the world wither and die.

-Um… Faris thinks that King Tycoon is still alive. I assumed that was a ghost, but maybe it was a projection?

-Everyone is on board with protecting the world. Yay!

---
Canal

-Huzzah. Another way for games to exploit my fear of sea monsters. “Octokraken” and “Suckers.”

-We found the sealed monster I think. There’s a whirlpool here. Leviathan???? Can’t be, not this early.

-Save us, Syldra!

-The monster: Karlabos.

Never been felt up by a crustacean before.

Kind of looks like a lobster/scorpion lovechild boss. You, sir or madam, are no Leviathan.

-Many job level gains.

-Nooooo!!! Syldra got sucked into the whirlpool. She was a terrifying sea monster, but she was OUR terrifying sea monster.

Bye, Syldra.

-OH. FARIS IS APPARENTLY MALE. My bad for misunderstanding.

-The ship’s really slowed down now. Without Syldra to pull it, just kind of drifts. We wind up at…

---

The Graveyard of the Sea

-A ship graveyard!! Awesome!

-Haunted ships, with skeleton sailors. I especially like the model for a new mob called Calcruthl.

FFV’s version of Slimer.

-Resting on a ship.

-Well. I was right at first. Sort of. Faris is a woman. She grew up among the pirates and disguised herself as a man. Or maybe she’s didn’t disguise herself; maybe just acted like and dressed like as a man to help fit in and not get harassed, though the pirates knew she was female? Not sure. I tend to think the former.

-I could be wrong, and maybe Faris is a trans male, but I get the sense she was just hiding but considers herself a woman. I'm fairly ignorant of this kind of spectrum, so any corrections welcome.

-Everyone basically agrees to not give Faris any shit.

Possibly because she wouldn’t take any shit.

-Hopping around from ship to ship…

-Whoa! Opened a treasure chest and triggered an ENTIRE SHIP resurfacing.

-Made it to shore.

-FFV has more terrible one-liners than any prior FF, and I love it dearly already for that level of silliness.

-...

-wut

-Stella appeared. Bartz’s mom.

-Uh-oh. Stella: “Bartz… come closer.” Yeah. I’m gonna say that’s not Stella.

-King Tycoon appears and pulls the same thing to lure both Lenna AND Faris, supporting my believe that they’re sisters.

-For Galuf, it’s his grand-daughter that appears. Then the visions EAT THEIR SOULS. Our party falls unconscious, and blue flames (their souls I think) go from them to the visions.

-A tall woman appears behind the visions. It’s a Siren.

-An addendum. Galuf actually didn’t fall for the trick. He’s safe. Why? Because of his amnesia, he doesn’t remember his granddaughter. This is the saddest possible thing to save someone’s life ever. Ever ever ever.

-Galuf wakes everyone up. The Siren offers him the chance to leave with his life.

<3 you, Galuf.

-BOSS TIME.

-She swaps beween alive form and undead form. Lenna’s cure works great for damage when the Siren’s undead.

-The party thanks Galuf very sincerely…

…and he gets super embarrassed LOLOL

---

Next time: wandering away from the shipwreck.

Nerd Fitness Academy - Interlude Note

This program started well, and I let it slip.  That's okay.  If I've learned anything from it, it's that long-term fitness can't be all or nothing.  I'm not giving up.

Larger update tonight.

FFV – Part 4: Tule

Note: Screenshots somehow got written over for this, except for the one at the end.

Summary: The party members each get an initial job, and head west. They find the town of Tule. Some tutorials, a brief Bartz flashback, and we meet Zok. Zok made the locked canal, and gives us the key.

---

Overworld

-Already so many options. How do I want my party to look? Let’s start with…

Faris: Knight
Galuf: Monk
Bartz: Blue (??) mage. Can learn monster skills somehow.
Lenna: White mage.

-Hee. The blue mage looks like a superhero. A bit like Super Teemo from League of Legends.

-Where to next? The guys in the Wind Shrine mentioned crystals in Walse and Karnak. Let’s explore.

-Heading west… found a town.

---

Tule

-LOL As soon as we enter, pirates swarm the town asking for grog. Shore leave is best leave! Faris goes to join them.

-Some dude wants to take me to the Greenhorn’s Club. Sounds like either a cabaret or tutorial.

-And it’s a tutorial.

-Thieves can see secret passages! Very convenient. Otherwise I’d be guessing, having to just push against every wall around.

-Will each character always have access to ALL their abilities, or just certain groups?

-Is there any value to the order of characters in a party? Does it affect who is most likely to get hit, like in FFI?

-Oh. I can use front and back row to help.

-FFII HAS AN AGING MECHANIC? Like, as a curable status, or as a permanent thing to make sure I don’t take too long to play?

-Leather armor: “Gets sticky in the summer.”

-Leather shoes: “Fashionable and comfy!” I really love all these little flavor tidbits.

-Is there any value in using Active mode for battle instead of Wait, or just extra challenge to make me hustle up?

-SPRINT! Here, it’s a thief-specific game mechanic. On the PSP, it was a system mechanic, a standard keybind.

-This helps me understand the blue mage better. I need to level up to get the “Learning” ability and set that on my blue mage as I’m hit with an attack. Is it guaranteed to learn an ability I’m hit with then, or just a chance?

-This was really helpful. Good to know. I’m actually going to turn Galuf into a blue mage and Bartz into a thief.

-Holy CRAP. Sprint is fast! It’s almost too fast. Tough to control.

Lol – kid running around a flower bed.

-East canal leads to Walse.

-Bah… back to buying magic, like FFI and II.

-BUT HUZZAH! I don’t have to buy magic for each party member. My whole party learns the spells, but have to use an ability slot for them.

-…..wait. This is really cool. In the magic window, there’s black, white, and TIME. TIME MAGIC. TIME MAGIC TIME MAGIC TIME MAGIC. It’s probably just another classification for stuff like Slow, Stop, Haste, but still cool.

-Random bard in the town. Sings about how a crystal trapped a canal beast. I have a feeling I’ll meet said beastie sooner rather than later.

-lol at everything in the pub. I love these pirates.

-A meteorite also fell in the mountains, west of Tule.

-The beast in the canal only targets women. Huh. Weird.

-Found house of Zok, who built the Torna Canal. Two problems he presents:

1) He lost the canal key.
2) Monsters are in the canal. Of course they are.

---

Night at Zok’s House

-Bartz wakes in the middle of night. Heads outside. Aaaaaand… FLASHBACK!

-KID BARTZ. He’s in bed, hearing his parents talking. His dad wants the crystals protected, and makes Stella (the mom) promise to not tell Bartz about the crystals. “They aren’t his burden to bear.” Apparently, the crystals think otherwise.

-Back to present. Zok hovers over Lenna’s bed. This look creepy at first, but he’s just checking on her. I think he cares about her. She sleep-talks about promising her dad to protect the crystals.

---

Morning in Tule

-Hm. Zok DID have the key to Walse. He gives it to Bartz. He was hiding it before to not put Lenna in danger.

-Bartz and Galuf go to wake Faris up, and each are stunned by finding her hot. They refer to Faris as “waking him up” – is Faris male? A bit confused.

-We leave the town. Faris tells the pirates she’s leaving (for now). They call Faris “sir,” so maybe Faris is male? Not sure.

-Aw. They’re said about their cap’n leaving.

---

Next time: to the Canal.

FFV – Part 3: Light Warriors Redux

Summary: Our party enters the Wind Shrine, and climbs to the top. King Tycoon is already dead and the Wind Crystal is shattered. The power of the Wind Crystal, and that of the other three crystals around the world, flow into our party members, turning them into Light Warriors 2.0. Tutorial on the job system and ability system.

---

Wind Shrine

-Sort of sad, eerie music in here.

-There are people here. They tell us that the wind stopped and now monsters are in the shrine. The king went to the top floor, and these folks locked themselves in to stay safe.

-Hee. FFI started when the king sent us to rescue the princess. FFV starts now with the princess joining us to rescue the king.

-“Consecrated Circle” I guess = FFV’s save point.

-New enemies here: Moldwind (gross) and a jester-looking thing named Mani Wizard. It uses an ability called “Magic Stick.” Ok, 50 Cent.

-Empty treasure room on the 3rd floor. Not this again. Had enough empty rooms in FFI and II.

-Looks like a griffon or sphinx guarding the fourth floor.

“Wing Raptor!” Cool model, but not too tough (as is to be expected with a first boss). Attack normally, and stop attacking when it covers up.

-Faris is my all-star so far in terms of damage.

-We’ve reached the crystal room, where we see crystal shards. No King Tycoon sightings.

-Flashing lights? Huh? Coming from…

-Ok, we zoom out to the world map to another town, another crystal room. The fire crystal.

-AND ITS POWER ZOOMS TO FARIS. “Courage the essence of flame.”

-Another to Lenna, from a crystal in another town. “Devotion, the essence of water.”

-From a crystal in a desert town to Galuf: “Hope, the essence of earth.”

-Bartz gets the remainder of power from the shattered wind crystal. “Passion, the essence of wind.”

We just need the power of Heart.

-King Tycoon’s ghost appears to the party. He announces that they are now the chosen Light Warriors. SO COOL to see this story mechanic back from FFI. I’m excited!

Is it shaped like a Cloud?

-Yeah. Sounds very FFIII-ish.

-Bye, King Tycoon. I literally hardly knew ye.

-The crystal fragments on the ground hover over to our party, empowering them.

-wait huh

-“KnightMonk” what

-“Blue MageThief” WAIT

-“Black MageWhite Mage” WAIT WAIT WAIT WHAT

-Are we returning to the FFIII style of class/job selection? YES!!!!!!!!!!

-p.s. wtf is a blue mage? Excited to try that out.

-Also, now Bartz’s weird line earlier makes sense about hearing the wind calling him. I guess it wasn’t (just) a FF-style pick-up line for Lenna.

---

Tutorial Screen

-LOL Boko is my tutor.

Professor Boko.

-Aright. Tell me what’s what, Boko.

-To my simultaneous relief and disappointment, he doesn’t just go “Kweh! Kweh kweh kweh, kwehkweh!” He speaks English.

-Ok. So the crystals grant job powers. I’m guessing that any party member can be one job at once, but can switch somehow like FFIII.

-There are “job commands” and “abilities.”

-PHEW. When I switch jobs on a party member, their gear gets optimized. That’ll probably save a lot of hassle later on.

-I get what jobs are now I think, but what about abilities?

-Looks like I gain ability points for a certain job as I win fights. So if a character is in White Mage form and learns some kind of heal, then that ability is theirs. If I switch jobs to a Thief, I’ll still be able to draw on that ability. VERY interesting.

-Wow.

-I’m just… the sheer number of possibilities and combinations must be ginormous if they have the same number of classes as FFIII. And if they’re introducing “blue mage” this early, I have to imagine that there are even MORE classes than FFIII.

-I really hope I get to be a Geomancer again. Easily my favorite FFIII class.

---

Next time: Not sure. Find some other town with news about the mysterious evil presence.

FFV – Part 2: Borne on a Pirate Ship

Warning: This post has been rated “Arrrr!” by the MPAA. Scurvy landlubbers require an adult guardian or a parrot to continue. Contains graphically bad piratic speech and jokes. If you are a not a landlubber, then do what you want because a pirate is free. You are a pirate.

Summary: Avast, me hearties! Our party be finding the pirate headquarters in a cave. They have the not-so-smart ideas to either ask for a ride from the pirates or steal their ship. They get captured, but the lead pirate, Faris, decides to adhere to Lenna’s request. They head off to the Wind Shrine together. Do we suspect there might be some kind of connection between Faris and Lenna?

---

Here Be a Cave! Aye, and Yo-Ho!

-This cave opened up from the earthquake. Will we pull a Bill the Pony and leave Boko beind? Looks like it, but he’s just going to chill outside. We’ll be back for him.

-Galuf is a puncher in this party, but whether that’s because it’s good or because we just don’t have weapons yet, I’m not sure.

-Standard cave monsters so far. Bats and crabs.

-Ooh, recovery spring! Glad for this mechanic. I liked it in FFIII.

-Cave pirate in the distance, opening a secret tunnel.

-Got a leather cap from a chest, with the helpful description: “100% cow leather.”

-Daylight! We see a pirate ship in the distance. The ship sails quickly even with not much wind. Hm. Magic or tech the cause?

-PIRATE MUSIC! I like it.

-We’ve found the pirate headquarters in this cave. Skull and crossbones flags.

-lol Lenna wants to ask them for a lift and Galuf wants to just steal their ship. I’m pretty sure Galuf’s idea is worse, but they both are pretty bad.

I get the sense that strategy is not my party’s strong suit.

-Found a hidden switch on the wall. It made a sound, but not sure what exactly it opened.

-All the pirate guards in the headquarters were asleep. Snuck onto the ship, and those were asleep too. One mutters about “Syldra” in her sleep. The captain?

Yar har, fiddle-de-dee! This can’t possibly go wrong.

-Aaaaand the pirates catch them. Like, immediately. Led by Faris, not Syldra.

-Lenna announces she’s the princess of Tycoon. To the pirates. Faris seems to basically see her as a big dollar sign now.

-Bartz, your retort to Faris is awesome. “You degenerate, lecherous, piratey… pirate!” Too bad for you Faris can sass with the best of them.

-Lenna flashes some pendant at Faris that inspires her to send us to the brig. What was that pendant?

---

Arrrr, Mateys! To the Brig!

-The banter between Bartz and Galuf here is amazing.

GALUF: What genius came up with the idea to steal a pirate ship, anyway?
BARTZ: Look in the mirror, Pops.
GALUF: …Ohh, my aching head! I can’t remember a thing!
BARTZ: And your amnesia oh-so-conveniently returns.

LOLOL

-Pan over to the next room, Faris. WHAT? She has the same pendant as Lenna. Long lost sisters?

-Faris orders them to set sail for the Wind Shrine. She seems a bit worried about King Tycoon.

-AHOY! (Yeah, just saying ahoy.)

(-Oh God, I FORGOT. What about Boko? Just chilling outside the cave?)

-Faris unties them. Set sail, me hearties!

-what

-AAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!! Real Monsters! Or at least one real monster. I asked before whether it was magic or tech propelling the ship in a windless environment, and the answer is neither. Syldra, a giant sea monster strapped to the ship pulls them along.

-She seems friendly, and Faris feels really closer to her. They were raised together, and they’re like siblings. Cool.

Don’t care how friendly she is. Large sea creatures terrify me.

---

Weigh Anchor, Scalawags! It’s the Open Sea!

-I get to control things again. Faris is in the party!

-Got a brief y/n option for them to sail me to the Wind Shrine. I foolishly said no, thinking I’d be able to have random ship dialogue, but no such luck. Basically up to me to find it now.

-Where is this place?

-Torna Canal? No, locked.

-Due north. Found it.

---

Next time: the Wind Shrine.

Nerd Fitness Academy - Part 6: Daily Food Log, 8/25/14

1:00pm: Diner omelet with hashbrowns.  Omelet had tomato, American cheese, green pepper.  Diet Coke.

2:45pm: Can of Sprite.

5:30pm: Chinese.  Wonton soup, chicken chow mein, white rice with soy sauce.  Bottle of diet Coke.

Later in the evening: Water bottle, some diet peach iced tea.

---

Going to try making two adjustments as I continue this quest:

1) Write down what I eat before I eat it rather than some time afterward.

2) Post my log once I'm done eating on the day of, instead of posting it the next day.  I have a tendency to fight mental battles longer than I have to, and it'll be good to finish a day and finish thinking about that day, to have it not hang over my head.

Nerd Fitness Academy - Part 5: Daily Food Log, 8/24/14

12:00pm: Chipotle burrito bowl.  Half steak, half chicken.  Tomatoes, peppers and onions, cheese, guacamole.  Coke zero to drink.

3:30pm: Two clementines.  Some diet peach iced tea.

7:00pm: Footlong meatball sub with half American, half mozzerella, cucumbers, olives.  Small bottle of chocolate milk.  Doritos.  Can of diet and caffeine free Coke.

10:30pm: Bottle of orange juice.  Nut Goodie.

---

This is tough.  That is basically a normal day.  Hard to actually see this written out, plain as day.  Even harder to write it out and try keeping judgment and shaming out of it.

FFV – Part 1: Wheee!

Summary: The introduction to the game’s story, as well as its tone. The story seems like it’s going to be about pretty classic FF-style – crystals are in trouble, must be Tuesday. But I think that crystals are basically a MacGuffin. The games are more important and memorable for their characters, style, tone, and this one sets itself apart with its initial lightness. 

--- 

Introduction 

-We start out with the general game introduction, the one you get even before you pick a new game. The feel and the music is just so… I dunno, jaunty? Bouncy? 

-We see a crystal on a bed of turquoise pasta! 

Spoilers: it’s probably not pasta. 

The crystals are going to be big in this game. HI CREATOR AND MAENADS I SEE YOU LURKING. It’ll be elemental crystals specifically, that grant wisdom and peace. 

-FAST montage. Cliffside, a chocobo and a dude. Castle, with a pink-haired woman AND A DRAGON? Bearded dude in a cave! Pirates! 

-Apparently, “crystals hide secrets.” I know your secrets, crystals. Unless you hold other secrets in addition to the ones I just spent FFIV:TAY learning about. In which case your secrets are still secret. 

-An asteroid falls. 

--- 

Post-Game Creation Intro 

-Dawn. A castle. Peaceful music. 

-And a dragon. Being woken by the pink-haired girl Lenna and her dad with the unfortunate title/name of “King Tycoon.” Is he evil? 

-Oh, nm. He’s riding the dragon. He must be a dragoon. He senses something wrong in the wind and leaves to investigate. This castle looks high. 

King Tycoon leaving Lenna to investigate. 

--- 

Pirate Ship 

-Arrrr! 

-“Faris,” the lead pirate possibly (another pink-haired woman), senses something wrong. 

--- 

Cave 

-Beardy McBeardson, over a magical whatsit: “I’ve got to hurry!” 

--- 

Castle 

-Back to Lenna and the castle. 

-The wind stopped. Uh-oh. 

--- 

Pasta Crystal Cave 

-King Tycoon visits the crystal from the intro. It seems wrong. It shatters! 

--- 

Forest 

-Person (male?) and chocobo. An earthquake hits. 

-A meteor falls to earth. If it’s carrying an invading Maenad, I may well throw something. 

--- 

Overworld 

-Now I have control of the chocobo (and presumably the dude) for the first time. 

-Ok. My character doesn’t have a name. His class is “Freelancer.” That was the starting job in FFIII, no? 

-Hemmed in by mountains and water after exploring on the chocobo. Only one place to go: “Tycoon Meteorite.” I guess King Tycoon is a title on both ends, with Tycoon as the nation/area. 

---

Tycoon Meteorite 

-The chocobo is named Boko! Awww! I instantly like this guy. Boko’s staying behind as the guy goes to explore. 

-Some goblins try to carry off a pink-haired girl. Lenna? 

-REALLY hyper and jittery combat music. 

-Yes, it was Lenna. 

-……………………………………………….fdjkldahsfladsjfklads…………………………..siweryiowvnuin 

-HIS NAME IS BARTZ. The guy that Gilgamesh referred to as he died in the Depths. I’m guessing two things: Gilgamesh is in this game, and Gilgamesh will be a side character rather than a main evildoer or main boss. Our main bosses have been… I dunno, serious-face and kind of grim. Chaos, the Emperor, the Dark Cloud, Zeromus, the Creator. Not sure Gilgamesh fits the FF big bad tone. Probably a mini-boss though at some point. 

-Bartz seems to be just kind of a wanderer. Lenna’s portrait makes her looks really young, like 14-15, but it’s hard to tell. 

-They heard a voice: “help… me…” They join up to search. Lenna’s a Freelancer too. 

-It’s the “Old Man,” from the cave! He says he has to hurry. He too got knocked out. 

-Hee. He said “Sakes alive.” I like him. 

-His name is Galuf. My inclination is to pronounce this like “Gallop,” with an f instead of a p. 

-Other than his name, he has amnesia. >.> That’s convenient. 

-Lenna’s off to the Wind Shrine. Galuf remembers he was on his way there too. And it’s a party! 

-Wow. Bartz actually isn’t joining them. That really does surprise me. 

Um... 

-Again, LOL. Galuf: “Godspeed, and all that whatnot!” Maybe you’re not so bad. 

-Back to Boko. Off and away! 

--- 

Overworld 

-lol. Boko threw off Bartz. Smart chocobo I imagine. 

-LOLOLOLOL BOKO’S PORTRAIT AND BARTZ’S ANNOYANCE LOLOL. Boko convinced him to go back. 

You make a persuasive argument. 

This is gonna be like a Han Solo/Chewbacca relationship in a way, right? Totally down with that. 

-Earthquake strikes! Off to help Lenna and Galuf. Fought off goblins, who are just as one-shottable as in prior games, and picked up the unconscious bodies of Lenna and Galuf. 

-The Wind Shrine (which I’m thankful I don’t have to keep calling the Crystal Pasta Cave) is in Tule. 

-Bartz joins up! It was his dad’s dying wish that he travel the world. That’s kind of a unique dying wish. “And the wind is calling me…” he says. 

-LOLOL Galuf 

I hope he sticks around to troll the shit out of Bartz. 

-And WE’RE OFF!!!!! 

-This game already feels SO much different from FFIV. That started out all dramatic, with something rotten in the state of Baron. Corruption, murder of innocents, a military leader whose orders from the one he considers as a father are to steal and acquire power for reasons unknown. 

-And FFV’s like “FUCK IT HERE’S A DUDE SQUABBLING WITH HIS CHOCOBO.” 

--- 

Next time: Towards the Wind Shrine of Tule.

FFIV After Years – Part 61: Final Thoughts on FFIV

Villains: The end of the world stuff from the base game was a bit standard. A monster that hates a race it sees as below it, unworthy of it, is a story as old as the Bible. The Interlude/After Years story was much more interesting and unpredictable to me.

I’ve heard it said that a superhero movie is only as good as its villains. I don’t know if I fully buy that, but I loved the Maenads. They were well-defined and built up gradually, especially with the Interlude serving to set the whole thing up.

I have a feeling that the Creator will stick with me. We weren’t explicitly told the scope of his involvement, whether he really created these worlds and races or just watched or tinkered with them or something in the middle. Whatever the case, there were SO MANY CRYSTALS just lying around the lower reaches of the Depths, and in the Creator’s room. I have to imagine that the rest of the Final Fantasy games were somehow watched, helped, or overseen by the Creator.

The Emperor from FFII seemed ambitious. He conquered the earth, heaven, and hell. But he’s got nothing on the Creator.

---

Primary Characters: This was the true strength of the base game, and “the After Years” built beautifully on that foundation. I love the relationships in this game deeply. Just as with FFII, the ostensible protagonists of each – Kain, Cecil, Rosa – were the least interesting to me. They felt a bit paint-by-numbers.

“The After Years” was so brilliant in bringing other characters to the forefront. Luca, Ursula, Ceodore, Edge and Rydia. Porom! Palom and Leonora! EDWARD EDWARD EDWARD. There was so much hidden potential in these stories, so much room to explore, and it took its time in exploring it.

They took many breaks from pure grinding to dive into this. All the different night cutscenes on Moon #2 are prime examples. Sometimes they add gameplay elements, like setting up new Band attacks, but that’s a side bonus. The relationships are intrinsically interesting to me.

The story set-up was great too, how you could pick which story to follow first. A nice change from the purely linear style of the FF games preceding it.

A negative: the story itself could feel grindy at times. They kept going back to the style of setting up a mystery in an individual story, coming close to telling us wtf was really happening, and then the story ended. It all sort of paid off when the stories came together on the moon, but they kept delaying it so often that it became a bit frustrating at times.

---

Length This absolutely felt like the longest game. And not just in terms of writing, but in terms of pure game time.

FFIV (base game + Lunar Ruins): 46 hours, 38 minutes
FFIV (Interlude): 3 hours, 12 minutes
FFIV (After Years): 52 hours, 23 minutes

TOTAL: 101 hours, 13 minutes

THAT’S A LONG FREAKING GAME. (I know, it’s basically like two separate games, but still.) Roger Ebert once said no really good movie is too long, and no really bad movie is too short. The same may generally be true for games, but this may be a case of a really good game that was a bit on the long side.

---

Gameplay: The on-rails class system wasn’t an entirely welcome shift from FFIII. I’m fine with the games switching it up a bit, but some variety and choice would’ve been nice.

Combat felt smooth and intuitive. The bosses were often like puzzles to solve rather than simply walls to climb with grinding and higher levels. I have no doubt I could’ve gone that route, but I like how smooth the natural leveling curve felt. Similar to FFIII.

Band attacks were a good system, and I wish I had taken more advantage of it.

The lunar phase seems like a nice idea, but again, I didn’t end up having to interact with it much. I found a Lunar Phase that was good for my composition, and tried to keep it up. It was maybe too easy to avoid interacting with this system just by stocking up on cabins and sleeping away the “bad” cycles.

---

Music: It’s hard for me not to be biased. This was defining game music of my childhood, especially the combat music. Not sure how much time my brother and I spent imitating it and trying to transliterate it: “ZZZZHHHHWOMP! Dununununununu…” So many great themes.

My two favorite, from the After Years:

The Mysterious Girl music, for the Maenads, nee Evil Moon Girl:


Master of Creation, from the Creator’s montage. See 2:43 of the following:

(see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcdogxuswhI)

Graphics: I never had played PSP before, and this was so clean and crisp. Wonderful upgrade from SNES. Style-wise, WAAAAAY better than FFIII on the DS in my opinion. I get that it’s a style thing and a matter of taste, but the whole “kawaii” thing just isn’t my favorite.

Many monsters were creepy and creative and horrifying. Some favorites:

---

Replayability: YES YES YES. I don’t want to replay it now, but there are so many party compositions and stories and things I missed. I remember now that I forgot to go back to the Challengingway Dungeons, and though I won’t do that (feel free to spoil for me if you’d like and have cool stuff to share from those), this is the first game that felt like I could play it a lot of different ways.

---

So that’s that. A fun game with great characters and combat, and a clear step forward in many ways from FFIII, but holy hell is it long.

---

Next time: Final Fantasy V.

Nerd Fitness Academy – Part 4: Nutrition for Beginners

This section of the program, the "intro to nutrition" section, begins with five tenets.

More like guidelines than actual rules.

#1) “Lifelong changes.” 

Initial response to this: “of course!”  What program would say that it’s intending anything other than lifelong changes?  (Although I suppose there are rapid detox-type programs out there.)  But beyond that, it’s not something I just have to know intellectually.  Rather, it’s a constant reminder to take it slow and make it lasting.

#2) “Practice mindful eating.” 

This is really, really, really tough for me.  Why?  Because I NEVER DO IT.  I occasionally bike, I occasionally drink water, I occasionally go out walking, but I pretty much never eat mindfully now.  When I eat, I read, watch TV, game, etc.   

I also totally believe that this is important, that distracted eating leads to over-eating.  This will be tough.

#3) “Focus on real food.”

This is one of those things that doesn’t seem too important to me – my first impression is that calories are calories – but I’ll trust the system.  “Real” here seems to mean the fewer ingredients, the better.  It really does help that the program’s not telling me to stop eating anything it doesn’t count as “real,” and rather sets this up as a longer goal.  Paleo is the goal.

Lifelong changes, right?

#4) “Sugar is the enemy, and so are liquid calories.” 

Yeah.  No problem in the least buying this.  This isn’t a huge problem for me, but non-“real” liquids are.  I drink a fair bit of diet soda and diet iced tea.  Well, tell the truth and shame the devil.  I drink a METRIC TON of diet soda and diet iced tea.  These aren’t liquid calories, but still stuff to cut I imagine.

I eat lots of sugar though through junk food. 

#5) “No ‘cheat days.’”

This doesn’t mean that straying at all from the NFA nutrition guidelines isn’t allowed.  It means instead that you want to be mindful at all times, even if you’re mindfully choosing to eat bad food at times.  It helps take away the all-or-nothing feel these things can have. 

---

So that’s the endgame!  How do we get there?

Next section: Level Up on the NF Diet

The program provides ten levels to the diet.  (I use diet here to mean “what and how you eat,” not “go on a diet.”)  I have a habit of looking ahead and fighting battles mentally before I need to, so I’m going to work to avoid that now. 

I wish I could say I could start at a high level, but I’m really trying to be honest.  I’m at level 1, helpfully labeled “Help, I’m Clueless.”  LOL.  This is where I know what healthy eating is supposed to be, which, I suppose I do intellectually, but don’t do it at all.

The quest: Spend two weeks tracking my food.  No changes, but track EVERYTHING and be aware of what I eat.  This is basically a long baseline.  Watch.  Both carefully and non-judgmentally.   

There are two related quests here.  The first is to track my eating accurately for 7 days.  The second is to track it for 30 days.  My plan is to post the log on this site every night.  If I miss a day (which is not, like, out of the realm of possibility), post it the next day.

I’m actually really nervous about this part.  Weight loss isn’t a simple scientific matter of cutting calories, exercising, and solving it.  That’s certain part of it, even the main part, but for me at least there’s a tremendous amount of raw shame and embarrassment.  The idea of actually looking at what I really eat on a regular basis and posting it for all to see literally raises my heart-rate and temperature, even thinking about it now.  

It would be much more comfortable for the program to just ask me to cut out x, y, and z foods, and track the healthy diet I eat going forward.  Maybe that’s why I have to start with a reflective and honest look at my personal “level one.”