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The Hand of the King
-We disembark in Tenebrae, in desolate Cartanica, Cor calls. The next royal tomb is in Fodino Caestino. The tree place, right?
[Later edit: I thought this was Tenebrae but now I think it was somewhere else.]
-There’s a quarry there, closed off to an unexplained accident.
-The Empire drained this place dry of resources when pushing for magiteknology.
-I have the option to bring or leave Ignis. I’ll choose to bring him. I figure he knows his limits, and would say if even without eyesight he doesn’t want to come.
[Later edit: I regret this. Not so much because it slows the dungeon down – that I can deal with – but from a story perspective, it seems like he’d probably need more time to get used to not having eyesight before he’s ready to jump into full combat scenarios.
Yes, he could’ve said “no,” but the king asking him to come is almost coercive in how much pressure Ignis is under to say “yes.” Not that Noctis would threaten him, but Ignis is both his retainer and his friend.]
-He’s much slower. I have to go slowly so he can keep up or Gladiolus yells at me.
-This dungeon is like a quarry with a surprise Iifa Tree.
GRRRR WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME GAME??? One of the side quests in this dungeon is to take photos from different spots, but the first place I go to just gives me a repeated message saying, “Snap a picture of the broken machine in this area.”
Like. Okay. HOW? I click on the prompt in the quest zone repeatedly, with my whole party gathered nearby. Nothing.
-After trying a bunch of stuff, I just Googled it. This didn’t feel like cheating, more a mechanic button I didn’t know about. I was right. I’m apparently able to take photos as Noctis using R2 and swiping to a side menu.
-We camp that night in the dungeon. Gladiolus is still being grumpy at Noctis. Fine.
-This is my least favorite dungeon in the game so far. Mechanically it feels slow and clunky, with weird pathing and z-axis issues. The idea of slowing down for Ignis is fine theoretically. In practice, I’ll run a bit ahead and check Twitter while I wait for the group to catch up.
GLADIOLUS: “Is it too much to ask that the royal procession sticks together?”
NOCTIS: “Is it too much to ask you to shut it?”
COLDRUN: “I GOT TWO FRIGGING FEET AHEAD OF YOU SO CHILL”
Visually it feels like a dull, muddy mess. I get that it’s a run-down quarry so that’s sort of the point, but still not something I like.
To emphasize: just because I’m not enjoying it doesn’t mean I think it’s bad. It’s clearly going for an aesthetic where we’re fighting, at odds, slow and struggling. The game is effective at portraying this in both mechanics and visuals. Right down to camping and eating crappy tinned food because Ignis hasn’t adapted enough yet to cook.
But it’s not pleasant.
I always hate the internal-fighting-and-misunderstanding parts of these fellowship stories. My most hated, noxious example of this part of a story arc is “Dead Man’s Party” in Buffy, an episode I still cannot rewatch to this day. This isn’t that bad, but it’s playing in that ballpark.
-The smell gets worse deeper in, an issue that had been heralded even before we got to the dungeon. I fear malboros.
-YUP AND IT’S GROSS (though I’m overleveled)
[Later edit: If I were to make one change and one change only to FFXV, it’d be to add a “synched story mode.” A mode that you gives you the option to sync down to the appropriate level for the main story dungeons and quests and gives you bonus xp for doing so. I really would’ve loved to try this boss on-level.
I think this would absolutely increase the fun and challenge of the main game, rather than feeling like I’m locked into Steamroll God Mode because I did side stuff along the way. Final Fantasy XIV does this VERY well!]
-Worse are the egg sacs lying around with baby malboros. This place has XIV’s Aurum Vale written all over it.
-I like how Ignis finishes it with a tactic straight from Jaws, tossing a firebomb into the malboro’s mouth when it opens wide. He even gets a new attack, Libra Elementia, hitting an enemy with whatever it’s weak against. That sounds super useful at a cost of only one tech point!
[Non-rhetorical question: does this ability activate if an enemy is weak against only light, or is it useful just for fire, lightning and ice?]
-The malboro guarded the Tomb of the warrior. Yoink!
-As we’re about to leave, Ignis has had enough of the bickering. Gladiolus has to accept that Noctis will progress towards his role as king at his own pace. And Noctis has to accept that others will make sacrifices for him, both as a king and a friend.
THANK YOU IGNIS! You are truly best boy.
-Very interesting! I assumed that there’d be some magical healing thing where Ignis regains his sight (or regular healing). Seems like he’ll have lost the sight for a while.
-We exit and hop aboard the train. Next stop: Tenebrae. (I’d thought we were already in Tenebrae, but my bad.)
-…and Ardyn is on the train too, singing happily to himself while watching the rest of the party. Crap. He’s really stealthy for a major political figure.
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Chapter 11: In the Dark
-On the train, Ignis remember seeing the chancellor approaching Leviathan on his craft just before he lost his sight. That must have been when Ardyn was on his way to kill Luna.
-Rumors on the train stir of the nights growing longer. Half the Six is dead, so maybe that has something to do with it.
-Outside, a giant snowdrift swells over a mountain.
-uhhhhhh then everything pauses in stasis and Ardyn comes by??? Oh, this is a dream.
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Express Train for Trouble
ARDYN: “Wait, is this for real?”
I’m legitimately not sure if Ardyn is fucking with Noctis and knows what’s going on or if he is legitimately confused. I’ll assume the former. Seems like a reasonably safe bet where Ardyn is concerned.
-Noctis chases Ardyn down the train. There are some really unexpected dialogue choices here, like any time Ardyn uses the word “dude.” He doesn’t seem like a “dude” guy.
-My guess is that this is a shared dream. Noctis chases Ardyn while Ardyn calmly pleads for Noctis to listen, that there’s more going on than just Ardyn as the driver of all the world’s ills.
-The stasis fades… and Noctis is at the end of the train where he chased down Ardyn, alone. So this was more than a dream.
-Something slams into the train. Imperial attack.
-There’s a wave defense outside then against this imperial attack to blow up the train. I feel like there’s a 70% chance the imperials are after me and a 30% chance the imperials are after Ardyn. Idk why – he’s the chancellor – but such a concerted surprise attack when we know he’s quietly on the train raises my eyebrows.
-Once the train gets rolling again, there’s an INCREDIBLY awesome section where I hop from shuttle to shuttle mid-air to take out troops before they can drop down.
There’s even a ship that looks like an imperial star destroyer from Star Wars, though I don’t get to hop aboard it.
-Warping back down aboard the train, Ardyn has a gun to Prompto’s head. BRO. I’M REALLY TRYING TO GET ABOARD THE “ARDYN IS SECRETLY NOT ABSOLUTE SHIT” TRAIN BUT THE TICKETS ARE EXPENSIVE
-Noctis intervenes enough to knock Prompto off the train to “safety” (as safe as you can be falling off a moving train). Ardyn bashes Noctis with his gun, knocking him out.
ARDYN: “How long were you in the dark?” This must refer to that stasis.
-wait that was chapter 11 in its entirety? Wow, things are moving fast.
-Btw, the loading screen here mentions something about Ardyn using a stitch in time to switch appearances with Prompto. Uh. What? That’s either spoilery as hell, or a terrible way to explain what just happened.
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Chapter 12: End of Days
No Turning Back
-Noctis wakes atop the still moving train. Ignis and Gladio are below, and the plan is to hold on until we reach Tenebrae, then circle back for Prompto. Sounds reasonable.
-The fight continues atop the train. Swarms of daemons, and eventually a few of those giant spider women.
NOT TO WORRY BECAUSE FLIPPING LEVIATHAN IS HERE TOO WTFFFFF
Luckily she’s on our side this time, washing off the daemons from the train. I’ll never get over just how cool she is in XV.
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Where She Lived
We settle down at the station in Tenebrae. The passengers seem shaken up. Not sure how many died.
-Hi Aranea! I mostly trust you and don’t suspect you’re behind the attack. She asks us to follow.
-At the train station, an issue of Cosmogony is here. [Later edit: I say “issue” because it looked like a magazine at first, but the more I read from it, the more it seems like the XV version of the Bible.]
The Six bequeathed a ring unto people before departing. “After some time, the ring was transferred to the hands of a man blessed with powers divine, ultimately developing the mark identifying one fit to rule.” That’s gotta be the line of Lucian kings, right?
But then, what role does the Empire play in this? They are using daemons, but are they also serving this mysterious cosmological antagonist or are they out for themselves? I feel like it’s probably the latter, but that they’re unintentionally also serving the divine antagonist’s ends.
-I explore the train station a bit. There’s an article describing the Ghovoras Rift, a frosty valley where the Glacian (Shiva I assume) was killed. The Empire lost half its fleet attacking her.
-Aranea is in the search-and-rescue business. Will help us out, with Biggs and Wedge as well. After all, her bae Prompto is in danger.
-Finally able to save
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Next time: My guide says it’s time to take a break from the main game and start Episode Prompto.
