- Location
- the Republic
- Pronouns
- He/They
Probably my favorite JRPG of all time. Grandia 2's up there, too.
Let's Play Every Final Fantasy Game In Order Of Release [Now Finished: Final Fantasy Tactics]
- Thread starter Omicron
- Start date
- Let's Play
Probably my favorite JRPG of all time. Grandia 2's up there, too.
Mizu
Software Developer
- Location
- Victoria, Australia
Just ask us readers if you have gameplay queries, we'll probably be able to provide a non-spoiler answer.
Monsters can't hurt your friends if they've been cut into bleeding giblets.
Hmm, with that in mind would you mind if we chimed in with musical stuff to look out for? I personally won't have much to add 'till you get to VI, but others in the thread would have IV covered.
Also, I've only ever played Grandia II, and the two times I sat down to play through it I always got distracted by life 2/3 of the way in and never finished. >.<
Had a lot of fun with it, though.
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- Location
- Not your place of residence
I very much disagree with FFXIII having a bad ATB, as a matter of fact the ability to make decisions while the turn gauge charged and not once it filled was much more fun for me.
That Rydia picture is SO ADORABLE I JUST WANT TO HUG HER
That Rydia picture is SO ADORABLE I JUST WANT TO HUG HER
- Location
- Nunya, Arizona
Prayers of Ganbo (music from the volcano area!) has been on my main music playlist for somewhere over a decade, now. Grandia was pretty great, deffo one of the best of the PSX era RPGs.
... anyway, looking forward to the, uh. Next ones. IV is when they start picking up and a solid bit of early JRPG work, but V is probably my favorite progression system of the pre-PSX FF games, and VI is... VI is VI. 6 was my first FF and both the major reason I eventually went back and played the rest of them, and the primary reason I played any of the later ones at all, heh.
Also Strago's Theme is just flat out my favorite piece of FF music from the entire series, so, y'know.
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- Location
- USA
I love it.
Monsters can't hurt your friends if you don't have friends.
SolipsistSerpent
Endlessly Devouring
Yeah, as I mentioned you pretty much have to wait until you're fighting like Goblins or some other easy enemy, that's when you mess around with these unique commands and try to figure out what they do. If you're lucky it will be something intuitive.
Hey, at least you aren't playing Castlevania II, which is almost literally unbeatable without a guide, a game it took me over a decade to learn how to finish.
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In case you don't know, Sahagin are yet another Final Fantasy reference to Dungeons and Dragons; Sahuagin are evil ocean-dwelling fishpeople in D&D. For whatever reason some FF games have Desert Sahagin like this, which are kind of like...desert merpeople I guess. Or land sharks.
What in god's name are those and how do they even work.
- Location
- Spain
They got stranded in land when the world-covering ocean receded in FF III, and had to adapt.
Recolored ocean fauna in fantasy deserts does not strike me as weird at all, but maybe I just played enough JRPGs, and adjacent stuff like Monsterhunter, to fully integrate some niche trope into my being.
SolipsistSerpent
Endlessly Devouring
Something about dune-filled deserts does strike people as being a sea of sand.
Final Fantasy IV, Part 4
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Last time on Final Fantasy: Death! Wrath! Tragedy!
With Tellah on the loose and Edward inexplicably willing to help out the two people who just called him a pussy for crying about his dead lover (I can't believe Rydia is eight years old and already infected by toxic masculinity), it's time to use our new vehicle, the hovercraft, to find Antlion Cave. It, and the shallows it is meant to traverse, look like this:
From a quick look at the map, they seem mostly limited to the seas around Damcyan, and the hovercraft is a vehicle that we have to land, leave behind and enter again, so I doubt we'll be using it much later on.
Before we go on, let's take a look at our menu…
I really dig how Edward's sprite is visibly grief-stricken and sad. He's lv 5, so not quite as useless as Rydia started out, but still already behind her in progress. As a Bard, Edward uses Harps as weapons; his class commands are "Sing," which targets the whole enemy screen with a "turn against your own allies" effect that usually hits one or two enemies in large groups; "Heal," which heals everyone for a little HP, and "Hide," which causes him to leave the screen entirely and which he automatically uses if he gets too low on HP.
He's okay, I guess.
Before we head to our next destination, though…
There's a small door hidden on the side of the ruined Damcyan Castle leading to the Damcyan dungeons. It includes the first FF3-style hidden passage I've seen in the game, which is triggered by a button and leads to treasure.
I almost missed it entirely. I would say I'm going to try and be more observant from now on, but I'm just bad at spotting these.
Antlion Cave is, disappointingly, more of the same as Mist and Waterfall.
Nothing much to say about Antlion Cave, other than one of the enemies drops Goblin, an item which teaches Rydia the Goblin summon. This summons… a goblin, who hits like… a goblin, for sub-20 damage, less than Rydia does using her Rod's Magic Arrow attack. It's either a joke item, or has some special function I'm missing.
Anyway, we reach the end.
Everyone freaks out as the normally less-than-brave Edward just walking boldly into the antlion's embrace, but he explains that antlions are quite tame and do not attack people. As Sand Rubies are simply by products of their bodily functions, they don't even react aggressively to people taking them. He proceeds to demonstrate by picking up the ruby…
…and, as you and I have all predicted, is immediately grabbed and tossed about in the antlion's jaws.
This is a freaky-looking insect. It has ants and human eyes and teeth? Fucked up, man.
Incidentally, adult antlions (the ones who produce eggs) aren't the ones who build these cool sand traps to capture insects. That's antlion larvae. Antlion adults look like boring dragonflies, and lack any interesting feature. This was your science fact of the day!
This battle is unremarkable. The antlion's one notable feature is its "Counter Horn," which reacts to any physical attack with another physical attack on a random party member, meaning it basically goes twice a turn with a weak physical attack. With Edward in the party providing free… or "free"... healing every turn, I just bulldoze over the monster with Rydia's magic and Cecil's powerful attacks.
Upon victory, we claim the Sand Ruby, and Edward is genuinely sad that the antlion turned aggressive and we had to kill it. Cecil explains that monsters have not only been growing of late, but their behavior has changed as well, which he fears is some kind of omen.
You know, so far in the series, you could infer that some significant portion of 'monsters' were just wildlife that had gone out of control (and more, see my wild FFI speculation), but it wasn't text; the text was that monsters were bad and universally caused by a terrible world event (the Fiends taking over the Crystals, the Emperor being offered their servitude by Hell, Xande's manipulation of the Crystals). This is the first time monsters are talked about as just… part of the ecosystem of this world, with many of them being effectively just animals who used to live harmoniously in their environment before something went wrong and sent their behavior out of whack.
Now, if one were to posit that this is, in fact, the world of Final Fantasy II many years after the fact, it would make sense for a significant population of monsters to remain after the Emperor is defeated and Pandaemonium has closed, and to, without some evil influence to egg them out, settle into their environment as part of the local ecosystem… Hmm.
Well, in any case, I'm not given a convenient way to teleport outside of the Antlion Cave, aside from one "emergency exit" item that seems wholly unnecessary. This is no emergency, right?
That is, until my next random encounter, where I tell Edward to Heal the group… and receive a message that I am out of healing items.
Which is when I finally understand that what his Heal command actually does is take a Potion item and divide its effects across all party members rather than give full effectiveness to a single one.
I have been unwittingly depleting my entire stock of potions think his ability was free. Because it was in FF3 and the game gave me no explanation of what was different this time around. And now I'm narrowly saving Rydia from death as a result of this miscalculation and have to use the Emergency Exit to escape the dungeon.
I hate that this game doesn't explain how its character mechanics work to you. This was a straight-up trap.
Anyway, back in Kaipo. We bathe Rosa in the glow of the Ruby…
It is kind of funny she's the one saying that, given the trouble we just went through to save her.
Cecil asks if she's alright, to which she says she's fine, but she thought she'd lost him. She was told Cecil had died in Mist when the earthquake hit - it's unclear if this was a deliberate lie or a mistaken assumption, but it does certainly make me raise an eyebrow at Kain, who would have been a direct witness. Did he really assume his best friend had died and not gone looking for him? Cecil, at least, has the excuse of having needed to urgently take Rydia to safety.
Cecil asks what Rosa knows about Golbez, and she starts by repeating what we already know - new Red Wings commander, appointed by the King - but then adds that the King has been acting strangely, and she suspects Golbez is manipulating him to collect the crystals for himself. Which would certainly explain the King's erratic and out-of-character behavior, but not how such influence came to begin with, when nobody knez Golbez five minutes ago.
Golbez now has his hands on two of the crystals, and only two remain: the Wind Crystal in Fabul, and the Earth Crystal in Troia. Cecil takes this opportunity to introduce Rosa to Edward and Rydia, and Rosa says Golbez's next target will be Fabul - and then she breaks into a fit of Ominous Coughing mid-sentence.
I sure hope this isn't Anime Blood-Coughing In A Handkerchief Disease, as there is no known cure to this illness once a female character is affected.
Edward explains that the trail to Fabul is blocked by ice; Rosa asks if Rydia, their resident omnimage, can cast Fire, and Rydia confesses that she can't - and indeed, her spell list so far has only contained Thunder and Blizzard as basic damage spells. Makes you think…
Rosa starts explaining that Fire is one of the elementary black magic spells that a summoner should easily master but is interrupted by more coughing. Cecil says she needs to stay in bed and rest, Rosa insists that she will not be a burden and they need a white mage, and Edward says that she clearly loves Cecil and wishes to be with him and he shouldn't refuse her, which, Edward, my dude, you don't have a great track record on Live Girlfriends so far, you know?
But Cecil complies, and Rosa joins the party.
That night…
Edward has this really sweet scene of sneaking out at night to go to the riverbank and play a mournful tune on his… lyre? I said harp but a harp would be way too big to carry. On his lyre. It's just really nice to see the Bard express himself through the medium of his music when words fail him, even when he's alone with no one to hear.
And then he gets attacked.
Now, a single Sahagin isn't a tough opponent… Unless you're underleveled, a support class, and a character who is, if not a coward, at least genuinely so afraid of violence that you literally have a 'Hide' command.
But then!
Anna's spirit appears!
When even your dead GF shows up to tells you to get a grip and start fighting…
Anyway, the Sahagin is promptly dealt with because let's be real here.
Anna's spirit slowly drifts back through the water before disappearing, telling Edward that Golbez must not be allowed to have the crystals, and that Edward must fight for his people as he did for. Edward swears to do so, but at the same time, is distraught that doesn't know how.
Well to start with it would help if you had FF3 Bard mechanics rather than whatever bullshit this game has cooked up for you-
It's interesting that the series has been using the trope of the spirits of the dead enduring for a while then rejoining the afterlife quite regularly without ever exploring what this actually means. Pandaemonium is Hell and some people go there when they die, but not everyone, and judging by the text of FF2 alone without the addition of Souls of Rebirth, it's not clear at all what happens to those other souls - what ultimate fate awaits Minwu and the other fallen companions. Unei says she is going ascend to the Heavens and be reunited with the spirits of those who've come before, but it's not clear if that is a universal fate? For a game where the fear of death features so prominently among villain motivations, and where the spirits of the dead keep showing up to help the living, it's very unclear what is the normal expectation of the afterlife, and I'm not sure if it's supposed to be a mystery in-character, considering things like what Anna just said.
Not sure what to make of it, at any rate.
A'ight, time to head out.
Rosa starts fairly experienced by the standards of new party members - she is as experienced as a White Mage as Cecil was as a Dark Knight - although she's fallen behind due to everyone going through all these dungeons while she was taking a nap.
We take the Hovercraft and head to Mt Hobbs, the mountain pass to Fabul.
YOU FUCKING IDIOTS
SHE'S NOT INCAPABLE OF CASTING FIRE BECAUSE SHE DOESN'T BELIEVE IN HERSELF
SHE CAN'T CAST FIRE BECAUSE FIRE MONSTERS BURNED DOWN HER ENTIRE VILLAGE AND KILLED EVERYONE SHE EVER KNEW AND LOVED
WHICH YOU WERE THERE FOR, CECIL
Flawless. Just, absolutely stellar integration of gameplay and storytelling. She never learned the Fire spells because she doesn't want to cast Fire because she hates Fire because Fire killed her parents.
No notes.
Anyway, here's where I would have the characters respect the child's issues and try not to blunt-force her way out of her trauma and find some alternative way around the ice, but we go a more conventional route that has the benefit of highlighting Rosa's character traits - while the two adult men are kind of standing around like 'oh right, the mass death event', Rosa approaches Rydia and frames the issue as one not just of necessity ("if we don't go to Fabul, more people will die"), but also of the party who so far have been protecting her now being the ones who need her in turn and this being her chance to rise to the occasion with her own unique gifts that she alone possesses ("You're the only one who can melt this ice" and "It's time to be brave"). Edward joins in with the cheers - Cecil, perhaps knowing that his responsibility in Rydia's trauma makes him poorly suited to such encouragements and admonishments, is the only one to stay silent.
Rydia has learned Fire!
Everyone is really proud of her and she herself is a lot happier about it than one might aspect, so all is well that ends well for now.
Mt Hobbs is home to three kinds of enemies: Bombs, undead, and flying opponents, mainly Gargoyles and Cockatrices. This has an… entertaining result.
You see, Rosa an Rydia are both equipped with bows. Not only that, but Rosa has a Holy Arrow, and there is another Holy Arrow in the area which goes to Rydia.
The result is that Rosa and Rydia are by far my biggest physical damage dealers. I think bows get bonus damage against flying enemies, it's the only way I can explain how they match or exceed Cecil's damage against flying opponents, and against undead opponents it's ridiculous - they hit for 700 to 900 damage, easily ten times the damage values involved in normal fight. The only fights that aren't easily trampled over by two archer girls are the Bomb fights (and those are extremely annoying).
Then we make our way to the top of the mountain, where we meet a new face.
This man, Yang, is Fabul's High Monk, and a powerful fighter. His Kick ability quickly dispatches these upgrades goblins, and his out-of-combat sprite does spinny kicks all over the place dispatching the monster sprites.
The big one, however, appears too much for him. Noting that the last monster is "no ordinary bomb," the party decides to step in and help the monk.
This is the messiest fight in the game so far and I kind of hated it.
Now, it's interesting that we're seeing another pure capability increase - we now have a party of five characters, rather than four, which I hadn't even realized was a possibility. The Mom Bomb has three phases; in the first phase it looks and acts like an upgraded normal Bomb. After taking enough damage, it turns into this hideous form, which is on an ATB timer - damage is irrelevant here, you want to heal everyone and shore up your defenses before it reaches its next action, where it explodes, hitting everyone for significant damage. After this, it splits into three Bombs and three Gray Bombs, and the fight proceeds as normal against six opponents.
I hate this fight.
The game just dumped a new character on me, Yang, whose abilities (Focus, Kick, and Gird) it doesn't explain. Focus appears to make Yang take more time before doing his next attack, then have that next attack do more damage, and I'm not sure what the benefit is supposed to be over just attacking twice? Gird is… some kind of defense? Kick is like a Darkness that doesn't cost HP?
I also have four separate Magic menus to navigate (Rosa's White Magic, Rydia's Everything), Rosa has an Aim ability the game hasn't explained and a Pray ability that is a weak free party-wide Heal with a chance to fail outright. Edward's Sing seems useless, his Heal uses a resource that I need to tab into a separate menu (losing ATB time) to check.
This entire fight is just pure chaos, I have no idea what I'm doing, several characters die, and when I win I just end up fast-forwarding through the next conversation, reloading my save, and grinding for half an hour because fuck that.
Thankfully, the second time around is much smoother now that I have a better handle on all my characters' abilities as they pertain to the fight at hand.
Yang expresses his gratitude and introduces himself.
On the one hand, a decapitated strike on Fabul's monk elite while they're out training in a remote place where no one can help is a pretty clever plan. On the other hand, if they died to a bunch of mid-tier monsters, maybe these monks kinda sucked?
The group warns Yang of Golbez and his plans, and Yang says the odds are against them - the only monks left in Fabul are students, and if Golbez is behind the assault on Yang and his men, then the attack is imminent. There seems to be little chance, but everyone is nonetheless set on doing their best with what they have. At first Yang tries to refuse their help, as this is a matter of no concern to them, but the party convinces him that they all have a stake in this, and together everyone heads to Fabul.
Now, Yang's name, hairstyle, and 'monk' title clearly draw from Chinese influences. But his broad physique, square face and moustache, combined with giving him the role of barehanded fighter, strongly recall FF2's Joseph. I am pretty sure this is intentional, and that Yang is drawing on Joseph as much as Edward is on Gordon, or Cecil on Leon.
Hopefully he doesn't meet the same tragic end.
I'm barely in Fabul for thirty seconds before I notice that the castle is arranged as a single corridor split into three screens, with two monks at the doors at the end of each screen, and a throne room at the end.
Yeah, I'm not gonna hold out much hope for them surviving the next cutscene.
Yang warns his king of the incoming invasion…
…and the king doesn't trust his warning. Not that he doesn't trust Yang, but the people warning Yang of this alleged attacks are Baron's Dark Knight, one of the Baron mages, and a literal child, so… He's extremely suspicious.
Which is when Edward steps in.
I like that these two have met before and the King immediately recognizes Edward when he steps forward. It's a nice way to make the connections between all these kingdoms feel more real, more rooted in personal interactions. Yeah, of course the minstrel-prince has been to the Court of Fabul before, probably singing them songs of his homeland and what not. It just makes sense.
Edward recounts the terrible tragedy of Damcyan (again, nice use of the Bard figure as the one telling the story and being convincing about it, even though in practice Edward's speech isn't particularly standout). The King immediately gets over his suspicion and orders the defense of the castle be prepared. Cecil and Edward agree to help with the defenses of the city, while Rydia and Rosa are asked to help the medics, and so our group temporarily separates. They have a sweet exchange where Rosa asks Cecil to come back safely, and Cecil in turn asks Rydia to keep Rosa safe for him.
So.
Remember the raid of Castle Fynn in FF2?
At the time, I mentioned that the game's narrative wanted there to be a huge coordinated assault on a fortified position, but was hopelessly limited by its presentation. The compromise it took worked well enough - the game spawned a war camp out of Fynn so you could see all the soldiers preparing for war, then the orders you were given were that the army would draw out the imperial soldiers and leave a path open for your small group to storm the castle, allowing all the war action to take place off-screen.
And sure, that worked decently enough.
But this is Final Fantasy IV, baby.
We're getting an actual siege.
This does not go well, for predictable reasons - the Red Wings attack.
Fabul, it appears, is a sturdier stronghold than Damcyan, and withdrawing inside its fortified walls allows the defenders to weather the bombardment - at the cost of abandoning the exterior ramparts. Things are not starting off so great. Yang says they are severely outnumbered, and regrets asking the outsider for help, as they are likely just as doomed as the rest of Fabul's defenders - but there is no time to dwell on that.
The Baron force appears to be made up of two components - soldiers, which appear in groups of two soldiers and a Captain, and monsters, which definitely make it clear there's something funky going on between Golbez, the Crystals, and the rise in monster aggression.
The forces of Baron are too numerous, however. Even with Cecil, Yang and Edward winning each individual encounters, they are pushed too hard, and the monk students fighting alongside them are getting wiped out one by one, forcing them to retreat deeper and deeper towards the throne room.
More enemy forces corner them there, and are defeated, but not without further costs. With only one monk remaining, the group retreats into the throne room, bolting the door behind them and preparing to make their last stand. Unfortunately…
…one of the monks was a shapeshifted monster, opening the way for the enemies and allowing them to overrun the throne room. With no further troop support and the throne room indefensible, the group has no choice but to withdraw to the crystal vault.
The monsters briefly catch up to Edward, and it looks like this might be a tragic loss, but thankfully Cecil and Yang backtrack and engage the monsters in battle, saving him before retreating to the vault.
The castle's defenses are overrun. The king and his family are in hiding. The monks have all been slain or otherwise defeated. There are only these three standing between an army and the crystal.
At this point, defeat is inevitable, but they ready to make a brave last stand. Which is, of course, the perfect point to twist the knife.
Uh-oh.
I can't say I'm surprised by this. I mean, our boys here are two foster brothers, both gigaknights using similar but different fighting styles, with conflicting loyalties towards their king, and they were dramatically separated at a key point in the narrative.
Also you can see them fight in the DS intro cinematic
Cecil, of course, hasn't read the script. His reaction to Kain showing up is one of joy - "Kain! You're alive!" - and he misses the obvious sinister cues in his replies - a flat "So it would seem." - and immediately assumes that Kain is here to help. They have some fighting to do, as he says.
Cecil is shocked and appalled, but Kain provides no explanation and quickly forces the issue.
This is not a scripted battle sequence, it's an actual fight. A simple one, mechanically; Cecil still only has Attack and Darkness, and Darkness is useless against a single opponent, while Kain only has Attack and Jump, and Jump is better against a single opponent. So Kain Jumps, Cecil Attacks, rinse and repeat. Mostly, these exchanges are only there to give rhythm to Cecil's repeated pleas and questions as to what happened to Kain and why he would do this, and Kain's increasingly angry refusals to tell him shit, until, eventually, Cecil goes down.
Lying defeated, Cecil asks Kain if Golbez has poisoned his mind as he did the king's, but Kain has no answer for him and does not acknowledge his question.
Damn, that's cold.
Yang and Edward attempt to intervene, and Kain is ready to face them, but before things can take a turn to the tragic Rydia and Rosa also appear.
Kain's "No, I…" response to Rosa's sad disappointment suggests that maybe he didn't fully think through the consequences of killing her boyfriend. He's clearly hesitating… which, is of course, the moment our real villain chooses to enter the stage.
Golbez tells Kain to "Never hesitate. Now, see how it is done!" and blasts through both Yang and Edward with a bolt of lightning, taking them both out instantly.
Kain moves out of the way a moment before Golbez fires it off, suggesting he knew exactly what was about to happen.
Right, so we're dealing with Emperor Darth Palpatine Vader. With everyone incapacitated except our two all-powerful female wizards have decided they were hapless damsels today, Golbez orders Kain to seize the Crystal, which he does. Rosa attempts to convince Kain not to do this, which proves a mistake, but not as much of a mistake as Cecil reflexively pleading her not to put herself at risk, which is what actually tips off Golbez.
And then he grabs Rosa, tells everyone 'Till we meet again!, and absconds with Kain.
"To raise the stakes."
Like, everyone is at his mercy, yeah? He could just have Kain finish off everyone. Or do it himself, if he doesn't trust his subordinate to overcome his old feelings. But no.
He just decides to let everyone live but abduct Rosa just to make things more dramatic. This guy is a drama bitch. Why else would he have specifically sent Kain to fight Cecil, his oldest friend?
Well, in any case.
What an entrance.
"Forced defeat" scenarios are tricky to handle, even if they can be important to a story, and the previous games weren't very graceful at using them when they did. This one, though is very carefully constructed. With a still-objectively small number of available sprites and animations, it uses a combination of its initial scenario (the trained monks were wiped out, there are only students left to defend the castle) and the architecture of Castle Fabul to sell the idea of an overwhelming army slowly breaking through every line of defense. The party wins every basic monster encounter, but the dwindling number of monk sprites surrounding them makes it clear that they are still suffering overwhelming attrition, which in turns sells the need to retreat further back. They make sensible tactical decisions - hide the king away, barricade the throne room - which are undone by counter-tactics they couldn't have anticipated - shapeshifting monsters. The final fight with Kain is the big climactic forced loss on which all this hinges but - coming on the back of the entire sequence so far - it works perfectly because we are at the tail end of a battle of attrition that the heroes have been losing in spite of their individual prowess dispatching every monster coming their individual way, and Cecil is cornered, tired, and up against his own friend that he doesn't want to fight.
Incidentally, it's interesting how FFIV is using a reverse structure from FF1 and FF3? In both these games, the crystals started out already corrupted, and the heroes are on a journey across the world to purify them one by one. It's inherently a 'rising' story - we start with the problem being as bad as it gets, and with every step we make it better. The motif here is reversed; Golbez is claiming the Crystals one by one, in a 'descending' motif that makes things increasingly desperate. I'm wondering if the Earth Crystal is the inflection point where things will start rising again.
Kain tells Cecil that "he won't be so lucky next time," and leaves with the Crystal. Edward, Yang, and Cecil, are all lying defeated through the empty crystal room.
The only one left… is Rydia.
It's really neat how magic is actually getting cutscene use this time around. It's no longer purely a gameplay conceit or the province of NPCs like Minwu at the door; Rydia is actively using summons, Fire, and Cure to make things happen within the text of the story.
As for Rydia's question…
…yeah, mood.
Our heroes have suffered a crushing defeat. They are no closer to finding out what Golbez's deal is, but they have seen first hand his enormous power. Kain, once a friend, is now an enemy. Fabul has been defeated, another Crystal stolen. Rosa was captured by the enemy.
So… what now?
Well, our heroes aren't going to stand around moping for long. But for now, I think this will suffice as an update.
With Tellah on the loose and Edward inexplicably willing to help out the two people who just called him a pussy for crying about his dead lover (I can't believe Rydia is eight years old and already infected by toxic masculinity), it's time to use our new vehicle, the hovercraft, to find Antlion Cave. It, and the shallows it is meant to traverse, look like this:
From a quick look at the map, they seem mostly limited to the seas around Damcyan, and the hovercraft is a vehicle that we have to land, leave behind and enter again, so I doubt we'll be using it much later on.
Before we go on, let's take a look at our menu…
I really dig how Edward's sprite is visibly grief-stricken and sad. He's lv 5, so not quite as useless as Rydia started out, but still already behind her in progress. As a Bard, Edward uses Harps as weapons; his class commands are "Sing," which targets the whole enemy screen with a "turn against your own allies" effect that usually hits one or two enemies in large groups; "Heal," which heals everyone for a little HP, and "Hide," which causes him to leave the screen entirely and which he automatically uses if he gets too low on HP.
He's okay, I guess.
Before we head to our next destination, though…
There's a small door hidden on the side of the ruined Damcyan Castle leading to the Damcyan dungeons. It includes the first FF3-style hidden passage I've seen in the game, which is triggered by a button and leads to treasure.
I almost missed it entirely. I would say I'm going to try and be more observant from now on, but I'm just bad at spotting these.
Antlion Cave is, disappointingly, more of the same as Mist and Waterfall.
Nothing much to say about Antlion Cave, other than one of the enemies drops Goblin, an item which teaches Rydia the Goblin summon. This summons… a goblin, who hits like… a goblin, for sub-20 damage, less than Rydia does using her Rod's Magic Arrow attack. It's either a joke item, or has some special function I'm missing.
Anyway, we reach the end.
Everyone freaks out as the normally less-than-brave Edward just walking boldly into the antlion's embrace, but he explains that antlions are quite tame and do not attack people. As Sand Rubies are simply by products of their bodily functions, they don't even react aggressively to people taking them. He proceeds to demonstrate by picking up the ruby…
…and, as you and I have all predicted, is immediately grabbed and tossed about in the antlion's jaws.
This is a freaky-looking insect. It has ants and human eyes and teeth? Fucked up, man.
Incidentally, adult antlions (the ones who produce eggs) aren't the ones who build these cool sand traps to capture insects. That's antlion larvae. Antlion adults look like boring dragonflies, and lack any interesting feature. This was your science fact of the day!
This battle is unremarkable. The antlion's one notable feature is its "Counter Horn," which reacts to any physical attack with another physical attack on a random party member, meaning it basically goes twice a turn with a weak physical attack. With Edward in the party providing free… or "free"... healing every turn, I just bulldoze over the monster with Rydia's magic and Cecil's powerful attacks.
Upon victory, we claim the Sand Ruby, and Edward is genuinely sad that the antlion turned aggressive and we had to kill it. Cecil explains that monsters have not only been growing of late, but their behavior has changed as well, which he fears is some kind of omen.
You know, so far in the series, you could infer that some significant portion of 'monsters' were just wildlife that had gone out of control (and more, see my wild FFI speculation), but it wasn't text; the text was that monsters were bad and universally caused by a terrible world event (the Fiends taking over the Crystals, the Emperor being offered their servitude by Hell, Xande's manipulation of the Crystals). This is the first time monsters are talked about as just… part of the ecosystem of this world, with many of them being effectively just animals who used to live harmoniously in their environment before something went wrong and sent their behavior out of whack.
Now, if one were to posit that this is, in fact, the world of Final Fantasy II many years after the fact, it would make sense for a significant population of monsters to remain after the Emperor is defeated and Pandaemonium has closed, and to, without some evil influence to egg them out, settle into their environment as part of the local ecosystem… Hmm.
Well, in any case, I'm not given a convenient way to teleport outside of the Antlion Cave, aside from one "emergency exit" item that seems wholly unnecessary. This is no emergency, right?
That is, until my next random encounter, where I tell Edward to Heal the group… and receive a message that I am out of healing items.
Which is when I finally understand that what his Heal command actually does is take a Potion item and divide its effects across all party members rather than give full effectiveness to a single one.
I have been unwittingly depleting my entire stock of potions think his ability was free. Because it was in FF3 and the game gave me no explanation of what was different this time around. And now I'm narrowly saving Rydia from death as a result of this miscalculation and have to use the Emergency Exit to escape the dungeon.
I hate that this game doesn't explain how its character mechanics work to you. This was a straight-up trap.
Anyway, back in Kaipo. We bathe Rosa in the glow of the Ruby…
It is kind of funny she's the one saying that, given the trouble we just went through to save her.
Cecil asks if she's alright, to which she says she's fine, but she thought she'd lost him. She was told Cecil had died in Mist when the earthquake hit - it's unclear if this was a deliberate lie or a mistaken assumption, but it does certainly make me raise an eyebrow at Kain, who would have been a direct witness. Did he really assume his best friend had died and not gone looking for him? Cecil, at least, has the excuse of having needed to urgently take Rydia to safety.
Cecil asks what Rosa knows about Golbez, and she starts by repeating what we already know - new Red Wings commander, appointed by the King - but then adds that the King has been acting strangely, and she suspects Golbez is manipulating him to collect the crystals for himself. Which would certainly explain the King's erratic and out-of-character behavior, but not how such influence came to begin with, when nobody knez Golbez five minutes ago.
Golbez now has his hands on two of the crystals, and only two remain: the Wind Crystal in Fabul, and the Earth Crystal in Troia. Cecil takes this opportunity to introduce Rosa to Edward and Rydia, and Rosa says Golbez's next target will be Fabul - and then she breaks into a fit of Ominous Coughing mid-sentence.
I sure hope this isn't Anime Blood-Coughing In A Handkerchief Disease, as there is no known cure to this illness once a female character is affected.
Edward explains that the trail to Fabul is blocked by ice; Rosa asks if Rydia, their resident omnimage, can cast Fire, and Rydia confesses that she can't - and indeed, her spell list so far has only contained Thunder and Blizzard as basic damage spells. Makes you think…
Rosa starts explaining that Fire is one of the elementary black magic spells that a summoner should easily master but is interrupted by more coughing. Cecil says she needs to stay in bed and rest, Rosa insists that she will not be a burden and they need a white mage, and Edward says that she clearly loves Cecil and wishes to be with him and he shouldn't refuse her, which, Edward, my dude, you don't have a great track record on Live Girlfriends so far, you know?
But Cecil complies, and Rosa joins the party.
That night…
Edward has this really sweet scene of sneaking out at night to go to the riverbank and play a mournful tune on his… lyre? I said harp but a harp would be way too big to carry. On his lyre. It's just really nice to see the Bard express himself through the medium of his music when words fail him, even when he's alone with no one to hear.
And then he gets attacked.
Now, a single Sahagin isn't a tough opponent… Unless you're underleveled, a support class, and a character who is, if not a coward, at least genuinely so afraid of violence that you literally have a 'Hide' command.
But then!
Anna's spirit appears!
When even your dead GF shows up to tells you to get a grip and start fighting…
Anyway, the Sahagin is promptly dealt with because let's be real here.
Anna's spirit slowly drifts back through the water before disappearing, telling Edward that Golbez must not be allowed to have the crystals, and that Edward must fight for his people as he did for. Edward swears to do so, but at the same time, is distraught that doesn't know how.
Well to start with it would help if you had FF3 Bard mechanics rather than whatever bullshit this game has cooked up for you-
It's interesting that the series has been using the trope of the spirits of the dead enduring for a while then rejoining the afterlife quite regularly without ever exploring what this actually means. Pandaemonium is Hell and some people go there when they die, but not everyone, and judging by the text of FF2 alone without the addition of Souls of Rebirth, it's not clear at all what happens to those other souls - what ultimate fate awaits Minwu and the other fallen companions. Unei says she is going ascend to the Heavens and be reunited with the spirits of those who've come before, but it's not clear if that is a universal fate? For a game where the fear of death features so prominently among villain motivations, and where the spirits of the dead keep showing up to help the living, it's very unclear what is the normal expectation of the afterlife, and I'm not sure if it's supposed to be a mystery in-character, considering things like what Anna just said.
Not sure what to make of it, at any rate.
A'ight, time to head out.
Rosa starts fairly experienced by the standards of new party members - she is as experienced as a White Mage as Cecil was as a Dark Knight - although she's fallen behind due to everyone going through all these dungeons while she was taking a nap.
We take the Hovercraft and head to Mt Hobbs, the mountain pass to Fabul.
YOU FUCKING IDIOTS
SHE'S NOT INCAPABLE OF CASTING FIRE BECAUSE SHE DOESN'T BELIEVE IN HERSELF
SHE CAN'T CAST FIRE BECAUSE FIRE MONSTERS BURNED DOWN HER ENTIRE VILLAGE AND KILLED EVERYONE SHE EVER KNEW AND LOVED
WHICH YOU WERE THERE FOR, CECIL
Flawless. Just, absolutely stellar integration of gameplay and storytelling. She never learned the Fire spells because she doesn't want to cast Fire because she hates Fire because Fire killed her parents.
No notes.
Anyway, here's where I would have the characters respect the child's issues and try not to blunt-force her way out of her trauma and find some alternative way around the ice, but we go a more conventional route that has the benefit of highlighting Rosa's character traits - while the two adult men are kind of standing around like 'oh right, the mass death event', Rosa approaches Rydia and frames the issue as one not just of necessity ("if we don't go to Fabul, more people will die"), but also of the party who so far have been protecting her now being the ones who need her in turn and this being her chance to rise to the occasion with her own unique gifts that she alone possesses ("You're the only one who can melt this ice" and "It's time to be brave"). Edward joins in with the cheers - Cecil, perhaps knowing that his responsibility in Rydia's trauma makes him poorly suited to such encouragements and admonishments, is the only one to stay silent.
Rydia has learned Fire!
Everyone is really proud of her and she herself is a lot happier about it than one might aspect, so all is well that ends well for now.
Mt Hobbs is home to three kinds of enemies: Bombs, undead, and flying opponents, mainly Gargoyles and Cockatrices. This has an… entertaining result.
You see, Rosa an Rydia are both equipped with bows. Not only that, but Rosa has a Holy Arrow, and there is another Holy Arrow in the area which goes to Rydia.
The result is that Rosa and Rydia are by far my biggest physical damage dealers. I think bows get bonus damage against flying enemies, it's the only way I can explain how they match or exceed Cecil's damage against flying opponents, and against undead opponents it's ridiculous - they hit for 700 to 900 damage, easily ten times the damage values involved in normal fight. The only fights that aren't easily trampled over by two archer girls are the Bomb fights (and those are extremely annoying).
Then we make our way to the top of the mountain, where we meet a new face.
This man, Yang, is Fabul's High Monk, and a powerful fighter. His Kick ability quickly dispatches these upgrades goblins, and his out-of-combat sprite does spinny kicks all over the place dispatching the monster sprites.
The big one, however, appears too much for him. Noting that the last monster is "no ordinary bomb," the party decides to step in and help the monk.
This is the messiest fight in the game so far and I kind of hated it.
Now, it's interesting that we're seeing another pure capability increase - we now have a party of five characters, rather than four, which I hadn't even realized was a possibility. The Mom Bomb has three phases; in the first phase it looks and acts like an upgraded normal Bomb. After taking enough damage, it turns into this hideous form, which is on an ATB timer - damage is irrelevant here, you want to heal everyone and shore up your defenses before it reaches its next action, where it explodes, hitting everyone for significant damage. After this, it splits into three Bombs and three Gray Bombs, and the fight proceeds as normal against six opponents.
I hate this fight.
The game just dumped a new character on me, Yang, whose abilities (Focus, Kick, and Gird) it doesn't explain. Focus appears to make Yang take more time before doing his next attack, then have that next attack do more damage, and I'm not sure what the benefit is supposed to be over just attacking twice? Gird is… some kind of defense? Kick is like a Darkness that doesn't cost HP?
I also have four separate Magic menus to navigate (Rosa's White Magic, Rydia's Everything), Rosa has an Aim ability the game hasn't explained and a Pray ability that is a weak free party-wide Heal with a chance to fail outright. Edward's Sing seems useless, his Heal uses a resource that I need to tab into a separate menu (losing ATB time) to check.
This entire fight is just pure chaos, I have no idea what I'm doing, several characters die, and when I win I just end up fast-forwarding through the next conversation, reloading my save, and grinding for half an hour because fuck that.
Thankfully, the second time around is much smoother now that I have a better handle on all my characters' abilities as they pertain to the fight at hand.
Yang expresses his gratitude and introduces himself.
On the one hand, a decapitated strike on Fabul's monk elite while they're out training in a remote place where no one can help is a pretty clever plan. On the other hand, if they died to a bunch of mid-tier monsters, maybe these monks kinda sucked?
The group warns Yang of Golbez and his plans, and Yang says the odds are against them - the only monks left in Fabul are students, and if Golbez is behind the assault on Yang and his men, then the attack is imminent. There seems to be little chance, but everyone is nonetheless set on doing their best with what they have. At first Yang tries to refuse their help, as this is a matter of no concern to them, but the party convinces him that they all have a stake in this, and together everyone heads to Fabul.
Now, Yang's name, hairstyle, and 'monk' title clearly draw from Chinese influences. But his broad physique, square face and moustache, combined with giving him the role of barehanded fighter, strongly recall FF2's Joseph. I am pretty sure this is intentional, and that Yang is drawing on Joseph as much as Edward is on Gordon, or Cecil on Leon.
Hopefully he doesn't meet the same tragic end.
I'm barely in Fabul for thirty seconds before I notice that the castle is arranged as a single corridor split into three screens, with two monks at the doors at the end of each screen, and a throne room at the end.
Yeah, I'm not gonna hold out much hope for them surviving the next cutscene.
Yang warns his king of the incoming invasion…
…and the king doesn't trust his warning. Not that he doesn't trust Yang, but the people warning Yang of this alleged attacks are Baron's Dark Knight, one of the Baron mages, and a literal child, so… He's extremely suspicious.
Which is when Edward steps in.
I like that these two have met before and the King immediately recognizes Edward when he steps forward. It's a nice way to make the connections between all these kingdoms feel more real, more rooted in personal interactions. Yeah, of course the minstrel-prince has been to the Court of Fabul before, probably singing them songs of his homeland and what not. It just makes sense.
Edward recounts the terrible tragedy of Damcyan (again, nice use of the Bard figure as the one telling the story and being convincing about it, even though in practice Edward's speech isn't particularly standout). The King immediately gets over his suspicion and orders the defense of the castle be prepared. Cecil and Edward agree to help with the defenses of the city, while Rydia and Rosa are asked to help the medics, and so our group temporarily separates. They have a sweet exchange where Rosa asks Cecil to come back safely, and Cecil in turn asks Rydia to keep Rosa safe for him.
So.
Remember the raid of Castle Fynn in FF2?
At the time, I mentioned that the game's narrative wanted there to be a huge coordinated assault on a fortified position, but was hopelessly limited by its presentation. The compromise it took worked well enough - the game spawned a war camp out of Fynn so you could see all the soldiers preparing for war, then the orders you were given were that the army would draw out the imperial soldiers and leave a path open for your small group to storm the castle, allowing all the war action to take place off-screen.
And sure, that worked decently enough.
But this is Final Fantasy IV, baby.
We're getting an actual siege.
This does not go well, for predictable reasons - the Red Wings attack.
Fabul, it appears, is a sturdier stronghold than Damcyan, and withdrawing inside its fortified walls allows the defenders to weather the bombardment - at the cost of abandoning the exterior ramparts. Things are not starting off so great. Yang says they are severely outnumbered, and regrets asking the outsider for help, as they are likely just as doomed as the rest of Fabul's defenders - but there is no time to dwell on that.
The Baron force appears to be made up of two components - soldiers, which appear in groups of two soldiers and a Captain, and monsters, which definitely make it clear there's something funky going on between Golbez, the Crystals, and the rise in monster aggression.
The forces of Baron are too numerous, however. Even with Cecil, Yang and Edward winning each individual encounters, they are pushed too hard, and the monk students fighting alongside them are getting wiped out one by one, forcing them to retreat deeper and deeper towards the throne room.
More enemy forces corner them there, and are defeated, but not without further costs. With only one monk remaining, the group retreats into the throne room, bolting the door behind them and preparing to make their last stand. Unfortunately…
…one of the monks was a shapeshifted monster, opening the way for the enemies and allowing them to overrun the throne room. With no further troop support and the throne room indefensible, the group has no choice but to withdraw to the crystal vault.
The monsters briefly catch up to Edward, and it looks like this might be a tragic loss, but thankfully Cecil and Yang backtrack and engage the monsters in battle, saving him before retreating to the vault.
The castle's defenses are overrun. The king and his family are in hiding. The monks have all been slain or otherwise defeated. There are only these three standing between an army and the crystal.
At this point, defeat is inevitable, but they ready to make a brave last stand. Which is, of course, the perfect point to twist the knife.
Uh-oh.
I can't say I'm surprised by this. I mean, our boys here are two foster brothers, both gigaknights using similar but different fighting styles, with conflicting loyalties towards their king, and they were dramatically separated at a key point in the narrative.
Cecil, of course, hasn't read the script. His reaction to Kain showing up is one of joy - "Kain! You're alive!" - and he misses the obvious sinister cues in his replies - a flat "So it would seem." - and immediately assumes that Kain is here to help. They have some fighting to do, as he says.
Cecil is shocked and appalled, but Kain provides no explanation and quickly forces the issue.
This is not a scripted battle sequence, it's an actual fight. A simple one, mechanically; Cecil still only has Attack and Darkness, and Darkness is useless against a single opponent, while Kain only has Attack and Jump, and Jump is better against a single opponent. So Kain Jumps, Cecil Attacks, rinse and repeat. Mostly, these exchanges are only there to give rhythm to Cecil's repeated pleas and questions as to what happened to Kain and why he would do this, and Kain's increasingly angry refusals to tell him shit, until, eventually, Cecil goes down.
Lying defeated, Cecil asks Kain if Golbez has poisoned his mind as he did the king's, but Kain has no answer for him and does not acknowledge his question.
Damn, that's cold.
Yang and Edward attempt to intervene, and Kain is ready to face them, but before things can take a turn to the tragic Rydia and Rosa also appear.
Kain's "No, I…" response to Rosa's sad disappointment suggests that maybe he didn't fully think through the consequences of killing her boyfriend. He's clearly hesitating… which, is of course, the moment our real villain chooses to enter the stage.
Golbez tells Kain to "Never hesitate. Now, see how it is done!" and blasts through both Yang and Edward with a bolt of lightning, taking them both out instantly.
Kain moves out of the way a moment before Golbez fires it off, suggesting he knew exactly what was about to happen.
Right, so we're dealing with Emperor Darth Palpatine Vader. With everyone incapacitated except our two all-powerful female wizards have decided they were hapless damsels today, Golbez orders Kain to seize the Crystal, which he does. Rosa attempts to convince Kain not to do this, which proves a mistake, but not as much of a mistake as Cecil reflexively pleading her not to put herself at risk, which is what actually tips off Golbez.
And then he grabs Rosa, tells everyone 'Till we meet again!, and absconds with Kain.
"To raise the stakes."
Like, everyone is at his mercy, yeah? He could just have Kain finish off everyone. Or do it himself, if he doesn't trust his subordinate to overcome his old feelings. But no.
He just decides to let everyone live but abduct Rosa just to make things more dramatic. This guy is a drama bitch. Why else would he have specifically sent Kain to fight Cecil, his oldest friend?
Well, in any case.
What an entrance.
"Forced defeat" scenarios are tricky to handle, even if they can be important to a story, and the previous games weren't very graceful at using them when they did. This one, though is very carefully constructed. With a still-objectively small number of available sprites and animations, it uses a combination of its initial scenario (the trained monks were wiped out, there are only students left to defend the castle) and the architecture of Castle Fabul to sell the idea of an overwhelming army slowly breaking through every line of defense. The party wins every basic monster encounter, but the dwindling number of monk sprites surrounding them makes it clear that they are still suffering overwhelming attrition, which in turns sells the need to retreat further back. They make sensible tactical decisions - hide the king away, barricade the throne room - which are undone by counter-tactics they couldn't have anticipated - shapeshifting monsters. The final fight with Kain is the big climactic forced loss on which all this hinges but - coming on the back of the entire sequence so far - it works perfectly because we are at the tail end of a battle of attrition that the heroes have been losing in spite of their individual prowess dispatching every monster coming their individual way, and Cecil is cornered, tired, and up against his own friend that he doesn't want to fight.
Incidentally, it's interesting how FFIV is using a reverse structure from FF1 and FF3? In both these games, the crystals started out already corrupted, and the heroes are on a journey across the world to purify them one by one. It's inherently a 'rising' story - we start with the problem being as bad as it gets, and with every step we make it better. The motif here is reversed; Golbez is claiming the Crystals one by one, in a 'descending' motif that makes things increasingly desperate. I'm wondering if the Earth Crystal is the inflection point where things will start rising again.
Kain tells Cecil that "he won't be so lucky next time," and leaves with the Crystal. Edward, Yang, and Cecil, are all lying defeated through the empty crystal room.
The only one left… is Rydia.
It's really neat how magic is actually getting cutscene use this time around. It's no longer purely a gameplay conceit or the province of NPCs like Minwu at the door; Rydia is actively using summons, Fire, and Cure to make things happen within the text of the story.
As for Rydia's question…
Our heroes have suffered a crushing defeat. They are no closer to finding out what Golbez's deal is, but they have seen first hand his enormous power. Kain, once a friend, is now an enemy. Fabul has been defeated, another Crystal stolen. Rosa was captured by the enemy.
So… what now?
Well, our heroes aren't going to stand around moping for long. But for now, I think this will suffice as an update.
Zap Rowsdower
Ex-cultist vagrant
- Location
- Bright lights, big city
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Another version difference here - the GBA and DS versions increased the usefulness of the sing command. Specifically, GBA increased sing command success rate (and added an accessory that changes it to a defensive buff to the party), DS let you select the effects and gave it party buffs as well as enemy debuffs.
Also, the DS version translated "heal" as "salve", making it clearer its item based.
Also, the DS version translated "heal" as "salve", making it clearer its item based.
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- Location
- USA
Golbez is up to some A+ archvillainy here. He stomps effortlessly from objective to objective, taking everything from the heroes, while they scramble about trying to scrape together any kind of a hope.
A+, no notes. If you are writing an antag you could do a lot worse than 'he takes your place because you weren't evil enough and then he does with glee the stuff that your scruples prevented you from doing.'
A+, no notes. If you are writing an antag you could do a lot worse than 'he takes your place because you weren't evil enough and then he does with glee the stuff that your scruples prevented you from doing.'
I'm pretty sure the Pixel Remaster kept the success rate buff, although it still only debuffs enemies. Pixel Remaster Edward is, in fact, a spoony bard.
deadcrystal
Slaaneshi Cultist
- Location
- The Warp
Well it's not explained but if you use it too many times in a row Yang will damage himself and possibly die!
...
Wait you wanted a benefit didn't you?
Focus has appeared as a Monk/Black Belt ability in a few games and yeah...it's mostly useless. 'Charge for a turn to do double damage on the second turn' inherently asks the question, why not just attack twice? That way you'd also retain flexibility in case you need to swap the second action for an emergency item use.
It has some corner case use, either against countering enemies so by focus-attacking you attack less often overall for the same damage and get countered less, or for enemies with mechanics where you can't/don't want to attack them part of the time and this way you at least get to do something.
Like against the mist dragon! Focus would have been useful then!...and really only then. It makes sense theme-wise, but godsdamn this ability is fucking useless.
cB557
voOOP
When did you get a hovercraft?
ZerbanDaGreat
Daemon Noble of D E M O G R A P H I C S
- Pronouns
- They/them
GOTTEM. FELL FOR THE OL' POTION SWITCHEROO
I suffered the exact same thing you did and I like to think it's that obfuscated in-universe. Like Edward doesn't know Paeon but he pretends to so he just sings something and then very quickly throws a potion at the back of your head.
This was an unexpected yet cute scene. The idea of Edward getting caught unawares and having to fight to save himself, only to find out he's stronger than he gave himself credit for, helped endear him to me.That night…
Edward has this really sweet scene of sneaking out at night to go to the riverbank and play a mournful tune on his… lyre? I said harp but a harp would be way too big to carry. On his lyre. It's just really nice to see the Bard express himself through the medium of his music when words fail him, even when he's alone with no one to hear.
And then he gets attacked.
Now, a single Sahagin isn't a tough opponent… Unless you're underleveled, a support class, and a character who is, if not a coward, at least genuinely so afraid of violence that you literally have a 'Hide' command.
But then!
Anna's spirit appears!
When even your dead GF shows up to tells you to get a grip and start fighting…
to be fair, to be fair
it's Rosa doing all the pushing for Rydia to learn and cast Fire.
Cecil, who is responsible for her trauma, is in the background silently tugging on his collar and looking for the nearest exit.
Yeah that was one of my big downturns on the game too for exactly the same reasons. The Mom Bomb plunges you into a Hell Dimension and then drugs you for good measure so you're just frantically spinning in circles flailing at the Ketamine Spirits in the dark. FF4 introducing ATB to increase the pressure on you to perform during battles, and then also increasing max party size from 4 to 5, is one of its trademark Funny Moments.
From a quick look at the wiki, Kick is a slightly weaker Attack that hits all enemies, Focus delays his attack to deal double damage (so presumably if his turn comes up but you don't want him to attack quite yet) and Gird is a better version of the Defend command - subsequent remakes added a Yang-exclusive accessory to upgrade Focus to deal triple damage so it was mathematically viable, but Pixel Remaster reverted almost all additions so no dice there. But really all you want Yang doing eventually is autoattacking because he uses dual Claws and whips ass at it.
Incidentally you should know that the Formation function in this game has been reduced to a binary toggle - the default is 3 front 2 back, the toggle flips it - so you may have to manually shuffle the party around eventually. I tell you this now because if you leave it default and you let a squishy caster get shunted into a frontline spot you will have a fucking bad time.
Big agree here too. The defence of Castle Fabul manages to feel genuinely harrowing, just barely scraping past by the skin of my teeth with Edward my only salvation for healing and sustain (I probably bought 99 fucking potions before the setpiece because I'd grown wise to his shit). And it is objectively pretty funny that after all that drama and loss, Rydia simply waddles centrestage, casts Cure and goes 'that was fucked up huh'.
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Kadmus
Dragon's teeth are surprisingly hard to sow
- Location
- Devon
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Golbez is literally Palpatine, isn't he? Lightning, deliberate acts of petty cruelty to fuck with people, a knight-turned-dark as his second in command... Yeah, Golbez is Palpatine.
Though Cecil doesn't really slot into Luke or Han, Rosa's not Leia - I think Rydia might be the best fit there - Obi Wan is a hyperwizard with anger issues and dementia, and Edward is a spoony bard who's just kind of there. Luke maybe but he's kind of shit so not really?
IV isn't very Star Wars, is what I'm getting at, I guess, except for having a Sith Lord as the villain.
Though Cecil doesn't really slot into Luke or Han, Rosa's not Leia - I think Rydia might be the best fit there - Obi Wan is a hyperwizard with anger issues and dementia, and Edward is a spoony bard who's just kind of there. Luke maybe but he's kind of shit so not really?
IV isn't very Star Wars, is what I'm getting at, I guess, except for having a Sith Lord as the villain.
Personally I kind of like that more of the fights in FF4 are messy as hell if you're not aggressively grinding. It's more challenging and forces the player to make use of the whole party and their toolkits. FF1 and 2 weren't very hard (especially FF2 post Blood Sword) and most of FF3's challenge comes in figuring out what to bring to the fight, World of Darkness notwithstanding.
Edward is pretty useless though.
Edward is pretty useless though.
- Location
- Phoenix