MARREND'S PROFILE

Well, the first screencap might have issues concerning wall heights and, perhaps, the screen width, but, I wouldn't call it badly cropped. Room for improvement, yes, but, this thread is not for that purpose. Though, for what it is worth, the guideline I would use in regards to screen width in this case might be the dialog box, as it's approximately the same width as the game content screen. Maybe a little wider, as there's a bit of a buffer.

The second screencap actually relays what I'm talking about in regards to the game's screen width, actually. Absolutely get rid of the Windows taskbar, and the menu bar there. Focus your images on the game content window, like the first screencap.

Even if a game has voiceovers, I expect at least something resembling subtitles. Which is what the screencaps of Final Fantasy 10 that Corfaisus is showing does. That it uses in medias res as a storytelling device... is saying that already a spoiler? It's hard to tell, when the game in question is over 20 years old.

At least people had fun with this event when it wasn't supposed to be public yet.

I mean, what? That never happened, what am I even talking about?

Right here, and also linked on my user profile. It's still rather new, but, if you liked my games, or reading my LPs, you can show your support!

Last time, Shion and Allen stole an ES unit. Though, let's be fair, KOS-MOS had to drop by to help them get past some U-TIC drones. So, this should mean we'll have a full compliment of party members pretty soon, right? Right? There's a scene on the bridge that where, surprise!

Shion: So, everyone's headed to Old Miltia.

Yeah, that pretty much sums things up quite succulency. However, if one expected the party to reform after this, one would be wrong. Captain Matthews prompts the player to poke around the Elsa's new interior, but, you know what? I simply have no desire to do so.

So, because of all the things that are happening, getting to Old Milita without being detected is going to be a problem. Though, wasn't that the entire reason MOMO is here? Maybe my memory is a bit bad. Either way, MOMO detects a possible path between the black holes, but, as one might imagine, it has it's own set of issues, as even the slightest mistake can make the Elsa careen right into the gravity well of one of those black holes. The mere mention of such a feat being impossible gets Tony to respond, ever wanting to show off his skills.

Neither Matthews nor Hammer are particularly excited about this plan, but, go along with it regardless. The Elsa blasts off. As they approach the black holes, radar and sonar sensors kick the bucket. Still, MOMO detects a massive ship gating out ahead of their position, and it turns out to be a ship from the Immigrant Fleet. Smaller fighters gate in afterwards, making this path even more a gamble than it already was. Since the ships are taking up the only viable space, the plan becomes to take the big one out from the inside, rather than fight ship-to-ship.

Matthews orders the weapons to fire, not particularly worried about accuracy, and to proceed at full speed. Naturally, the Immigrant Fleet respond with firing their own weapons. Tony avoids a good portion of the incoming attacks, but not even his skills are enough to dodge them all. The Elsa takes a hit, unbalancing the ship. The shock shakes the bridge, and Shion goes flying forward, the artificial gravity on board being temporarily disabled. KOS-MOS, however, stands firm on the ground, and holds onto Shion. Tony manages a landing on the big ship, which is going to be the setting for our next dungeon. After Jr does a quick rally, we can access to menu, and verify that, yes, all seven party-members are available now.

You know, it's been quite a while since the player has had access to ES, hasn't it? The game designers may have thought something similar, as it's specified during Jr's rally that the ship is huge, and that they should take the ES. Of note is the Zebulun, which is the only ES players have access to that can use Ethers. My best guess is that it inherits it's Ethers and skills from it's main pilot, MOMO. Not that it matters for this LP, as all my characters have all the skills and Ethers, but, it feels the most likely of scenarios. This also means that when it uses the Stock command, it will recharge a portion of it's EP. That's going to be part of our strategy going forward.

What I find a little eye-quirking is that you can only have two ES craft in the active party. The third goes on standby, because... reasons? I do not understand this decision. Could they not have all three active at the same time? Must there be at least one object in the standby zone when the party, be they characters or ES, is full?

That aside, our next dungeon...



...is called Ormus Stronghold. Now, to be fair, there was a Gnosis named Cathedral Ship last game (you can read about that here), which... isn't the most original name, but, it worked well enough. Maybe they wanted to do the same thing here, but, by all accounts, it should probably be called Immigrant Fleet Stronghold instead? We'll get back to this point eventually. For now, it's dungeon-delving time, and, well, there arguably isn't much of note for the initial ES section. Like, we get to an elevator, but, it's inactive. The button to activate it is in the same room, but, of course, it cannot be reached on ES. Gotta go around the long way to find a place to dismount them, and come at it from the other side on foot. This is a small detour, at best. Not even one encounter along that route. There was a save point in the area where I dismounted, and also one in the room with the elevator for the ES route. Which kinda suggests to me there is a boss soon?

Sure enough, after exiting at the top of the elevator, there's a cutscene and a reintroduction of the goon squad that is Richard and Hermann.

Richard: My name is Richard! I assume you remember? I'm sorry, but I have no time for games. Honestly, I grow weary of these encounters. I've had enough of you!

What are you even talking about, this is only the second time we've meet! Their moves didn't change at all since last time we faced them, and my ES were dodging like mad. What hits could connect were maybe in the 400s. Though, for full disclosure, my ES were max level, thanks to the codes. If they were not, maybe it would be a slightly different story, but, here we are.

That aside, there's another button to push that raises a bridge. This bridge is only accessible by characters, so, looks like we have to go back and dismount again. As a point of clarification, we didn't have access to that bridge before, as the path was blocked by ES-only destructible objects that we cleared while the elevator was going up.

Further in is a weight-based elevator. The similarities to how this works versus the one in Song of Nephilim is that instead of removing weight to be able to climb higher, you remove weight to be able to climb lower. Also, there's only two relevant depths that we need. There's an exit on depth 7, the idea being that you send the lift down to depth 8 by pushing weights onto it, then remove weight to go back up to depth 7. Both pushing weights onto the lift and destroying them both use the Square button, which generally activates the vaporizer plugin. The actual action taken seems contextual based on how you face the blocks on the base-level floor.

Next is a frictionless cube puzzle. The concept is similar to an ice-sliding puzzle, if one is more familiar with those, except it's the cubes that slide around, not the character. There is an optional push-block puzzle portion to get to Segment Address #13, should one care about such things.

The next section is...



...an elevator maze. I never really liked this part. That aside, there is a bit of observation and logic in what the optimal path is. Past this is a boss fight against...



...this character, who was introduced to us early in session 2 along with the Immigrant Fleet's cardinal/spokesperson. Except she's had even less screen-time than him. While we might learn her name by virtue of this boss fight, we never hear about her, or see her, again.

The fight, itself isn't too bad, but, then again, my characters are max level. Under normal conditions, she switches her stance at various times during the fight, which also switches her break zone. However, she only switched stance once during my fight with her, and none of her attacks landed. I double-checked my characters stats, and, yeah, the party I took to that fight all had a 80 evasion. If I can remember, I'll have to look at ES stats too, next time I get to ride them, but, the evasion values there are probably also high.

Anyway, we still have not done the whole "blow them up from the inside" thing yet. Which is now our next task. The boss arena has some destructible objects that end up releasing a structure to plummet into the water below. This structure contains the self-destruct mechanism we're looking for, and presents a small puzzle for the player to solve. When it is, the game gives the player 30 minutes to evacuate, and cues up...



...an escape tune to go along with the situation. The 30-minute timer includes combat, putting additional pressure on the player. If there was ever a desire to escape from battles, it's now. Except that, even if you do manage to escape, the encounter isn't removed from the map. The elevator area and a set of ramps upwards two rooms preceding it don't exactly leave room for maneuvering, so, you're pretty much stuck fighting everything that happens to get in your way in those rooms. Oh, and the gamedevs hope you didn't have chaos and Ziggy in the active party. As a quick reminder, they can't even target aerial enemies, and there are a few to be fought here. While you might only need to switch characters once, that's time either spent in-menu, or in combat to do it. Having a 30-minute countdown is stressful enough, but, having two of my party members be a liability because they simply cannot act, and have to be switched out is what pisses me off the most about this dungeon, though, that's an issue I have with the game's combat as a whole.

The party manages to get back to the ES, but, you know what's between then and their escape route now? Pellegri. The player might expect this confrontation, since they know/suspect the Immigrant Fleet and U-TIC are aligned in some way, thanks to the various cutscenes between the cardinal guy (WHAT IS IS NAME!? The game has not given him one yet, I swear!) and Marguils. The party? Maybe not so much. They don't really react to her presence here, so I dunno if they are just shocked momentarily, only to snap out of it to fight, or what. Either way, Pelligri whips out the aerods, but, my ES are significantly stronger than the last time, and take minimal damage. One might also note the lack of the countdown timer during this fight, which is certainly something of a relief.

After her kinda-sorta defeat, Pelligri leaves, mentioning that the fortress is careening towards the Abyss, and that we should use what time we have left to pray, or some-such. Yeah, no. This party contains men and women of action. They will not simply stand idly by.

Back on the bridge of the Elsa, thrust is down by 40%, and dropping, even as they speak. Even if it was steady, that might not be enough to get us outta here. Hammer and Tony bicker a bit, but, Captain Matthews will have none of it. He wants a solution yesterday.

The scene switches to an external view, with Immigrant Fleet ships spiraling out of control, and into the gravity pull of one of the black hole, or the other. The Elsa refuses to respond, and it looks like they might not make it. At least until...



...the Durandal shows up to tractor them in. The exchange between Jr and Mary is kinda funny.

Jr: Hey, Mary.
Mary: Oh! Littler Master! Thank goodness you're okay.
Jr: What the heck are you guys doing out here anyway?
Mary: What? We came here to rescue you!
Jr: Yeah, and I'm grateful for that, but, don't you think your timimg was a little too perfect?

Though, the look on Mary's face when Jr asks her what she's doing here, and Hammer dancing with Tony is what makes it funnier. After this is a cutscene of the Durandal ditching this popsicle stand, then the black holes fizzle from view, and perhaps take Old Miltia with them was well? There's an end-of-chapter save at this point, so, we won't know what exactly happened until later. How much later? Find out next time on the Xenosaga Episode 2 LP!