A Tale of Two Scripts: Let's play FF3 US & FF6 RPGOne!

No way our party could survive the last-gasp attack.



♪♪ Victory ♪♪

Fortunately, they don't have to. Hooray for Reraise! We even got another Last Elixir. Because, you know, we TOTALLY needed another one.



♪♪ Edgar and Matias' Theme ♪♪

After a brief stop to heal up in Narche's training room, it's time to go underground! Strago will be replacing Edgar for this little excursion, just 'cause.



♪♪ Serpent Trench ♪♪

Ancient Castle Area
Enemies: Enuo, Satan, Figaro Lizard, Lunatic, Armored Weapon, Koko, Samurai, Raging Beast

(Technically Enuo is not mythological in reference, but rather a reference to Final Fantasy V.)

And of course, it's time to take on this bad boy.



♪♪ Decisive Battle ♪♪

Master Tonberry doesn't have a star over his head like his FF7 counterpart, but he can still hit fairly hard.



This is what we really wanted him to use. It hurts a lot since we've been walking around so much.



♪♪ Victory ♪♪

He doesn't last long.



Yes, it's a Gladius, not a Gradeus. Classical Roman sword, not space-themed shooter. I do wonder at errors like that, but then, I committed my fair share myself, so who am I to judge?



Has a much more sinister ring to it, huh?

Looks like we've arrived.



How dramatic!



Do tell, Tina. I'm not sure how you know the tale, but hey.



"Have your wounds healed?"
*The Chancellor turns around and takes a step down; the guards bow*
"We don't have any choice... We'l lhave to fight this last decisive battle with Odin's help."



The more I see artifacts of my ineptitude like "Great Demon War", the more I hate myself for not going back and doing a revised final version of this translation...



No matter the Final Fantasy, Odin's a show-off.



It's Mortal Kombat time! Round One! FIGHT!



Draw! Round Two! FIGHT!



Draw! Round Three! FIGHT!



Odin missed!



Clearly this wizard has been reading the FF5 LP. Clever use of Break!

Odin "You can't do it... I won't turn to stone......"

Ah, that's not how Break works, Odin. You don't have a lot of say in this one.



I still want to know how YOU know that, but whatever.

This easily-missed doorway leads to a Punisher rod, which uses MP to deal critical hits. Bannan had one equipped early in the game.



And in this box, a nasty boss enemy!



♪♪ Decisive Battle ♪♪

Don't you just love proper defenses?



Man, I wish *MY* Ninja could do that kind of damage with a Kunai!



I... don't even know what happened there.



But it was clearly !Zeninage. And it clearly hurt!



Oh boy, a new Katana for our Samurai!



That's not a good sign at all.



Actually, that doesn't seem to help him at all, since we mop up the floor with him easily.



♪♪ Victory ♪♪

Woot, !Rapid Fire acquire!

Looks like we've got a new summon!

Odin

The most popular one-eyed man-god from Norse mythology has returned once again! Dear old Odin has been with the series from the very start of the summoning legacy, and has gotten a plot role in almost every FF since then too. In fact, only FF7 and FFX give him no plot relevance, and that's only the case in FFX because he's not IN FFX (his replacement is a rather unimpressive Gilgamesh impersonator; I'll take Odin, thanks).



His attack is Zantetsuken, which is one of the few summon names that gets consistently left untranslated (it means Steel-Severing Sword). It causes instant death to all enemies, and works about as often as Break. That is to say it almost never works.

Spells Taught
Meteo x1

Level-Up Bonus: Agility +1

Man, that is the suckiest spell list yet. Meteo isn't a bad spell, but it's taught at a snail's pace! Surely the Norse all-father deserves better than THIS!



Hidden up here is a Gold Hairpin (1/2 MP costs) and the Storm Orb (gives Umaro a new battle command when equipped, Storm).



Oho, something glitters on this shelf!

There's a book with a jewel-covered front... "Princess's Diary"
"I have fallen in love with Odin... I know that such is not allowed... But, I don't care about the rules, I lvoe him and his noble heart beyond the bounds of species... They can't stop me... Once the battle is over... I will... I will reveal to him how I feel..."

Well well well. It seems Tina's not as unprecedented as first believed!



Quite.



Oh, I forgot to mention this new bit of dialogue at the castle. Here's the rest of it...

I don't know what this means, but... 'When the princess stands and takes five steps forward...'"

Clearly a hint! Let's try it!



Sure enough, there's a switch!



THAT wasn't there before!



Oh dear. She looks just like Maria too. Sprite recycling or symbolism? You be the judge!



"A tear......?"
*A blue glow*
The Magirock "Odin" gains a level...
...and becomes the Magirock "Raiden"!

Woot!

Raiden

Oho, they mixed their mythologies! Raiden is a combination of Raijin (Japanese god of thunder) and Odin (Norse god of... well, mankind, really). It's a bit of a nod to the FF series canon that Odin is always weak vs. lightning due to his usually upheld sword, thus by becoming the thunder god as well, he is overcoming his weaknesses. Or something.



Shin-Zantetsuken (True Steel-Severing Sword) is exactly like Zantetsuken, except it actually hits most of the time.

Spells Taught
Quick x1

Level-Up Bonus: Strength +2

The trade-off of no Agility boost is made up for in spades by the Quick spell. Much like its FF5 counterpart, Quick freezes time and gives the caster a free two turns in a row. Win win and more win.



Anyway, it's time to pwn another dragon.

♪♪ Decisive Battle ♪♪

Man, that Hero Shield is already paying off.



Hahahahahahaha! Magic Evasion saves the day and the dragon nerfs itself!



I hope you won't get sick of seeing Ultima by the time this LP is over...



That killing blow was just too awesome not to share. Transform for life!



♪♪ Victory ♪♪

Our reward is none other than Odin's trusty sword! (Scimitar, my ass.)



Movin' on up. Anyway, let's get out of here and back to the surface for our next mission!

♪♪ Spinach Rag ♪♪

What, did Maria break out into hives?



Yikes, way worse. Okay, dragon-slaying time!



Down we go! ...Why can't we enter from a less painful route, again?



Ah, whatever. It's dragon time!



♪♪ Decisive Battle ♪♪

This fight will be cake with Levitate on everyone.



Haha, I laugh at your attempts to damage me!



Realizing his stupidity, Earth Dragon hits us with his anti-Levitate move. That's all it does, removes Levitate.



Easily fixed.



♪♪ Victory ♪♪

That was a mercifully short fight.



Nice.

"Looks like you had to help out again, eh?"

Damn right we did. We'll send you our bill after we kill Kefka, capiche?

♪♪ Mt. Colts ♪♪

It's time to take out this bastard once and for all.



♪♪ Decisive Battle ♪♪

He's not so intimidating now.



As usual, a lot of this going around...



Behold the joys of proper elemental defenses!



♪♪ Victory ♪♪

And that's the fight. Went swimmingly well this time, it did!



Woot! And we're going to stop here for this time simply because if I don't I'll go a bit stir-crazy. BUT! There's going to be a mid-week update from me to catch up wtih Lucas' progress too! So keep your eyes peeled for another update come Tuesday tomorrow!

Bonus!

Back when we were first debugging the translation, some funny errors popped up. One of them was this:



We all had a good laugh at it. At one point down the line, someone commented that they hadn't checked ALL of the dialogue, like the Bloodstained Shield un-curse text, but unless that said "WILL YOU JUMP ON TEH CRAEN!?" or something, it was probably all good.



Naturally, I was obligated to insert that and take a shot of it, just for laughs. It became a bit of an insider meme amongst RPGOne staff and forum-goers before basically being forgotten. Anyway, a little fragment of history about this translation that not many know about or remember, that.

Wasn't that image used in an April Fool's joke at one point?

Probably. I'm sure the phrase itself was part of one of our April Fool's jokes on the site, anyway.

Supposedly in the SNES version there's a bug that Rippler always hits even when the game claims it misses. I've never gotten into the code of the game so I can't really make claims as to the truth of that myself, though.

(Said bug was fixed in the GBA version, but was replaced by another bug giving anything with immunity to Imp immunity to Rippler as well.)

I can confirm that's true when it misses. HOWEVER, when it's blocked (which is distinct from missing; they're computed separately), the spell does not work. That fight more or less proved it: Tina kept her Haste after that.

But that doesn't make sense, you... no, no, wait. It does make sense if you're using spells to give yourself Haste instead of relics. Never mind me, I'll just show myself out....

Part XXIX - Takin' the Soul Train to Eboshi Rock

The time has come to clear the World of Ruin's remaining sidequests! All that's left are Eboshi Rock and Doma Castle, so we'll be assembling the team and finishing this once and for all!



But first, some Memorized skills (or as they're known in most Final Fantasy games, Blue magic). As Lucas noted, FFVI has the easiest Blue magic to learn in the entire series: you just have to have Strago "see" it during battle and survive to the end and he'll learn it. This is in stark contrast to the rest of the series.



FFV: The character with Learning MUST be hit AND affected by the skill to learn it, AND must survive the battle. Pretty strict requirements, but they can be dealt with at least. There are technically no missable Enemy Skills since you can cast Dark Shock on your allies repeatedly to halve their levels and learn the level-limited !Blue skills even at level 99.



FFVII: The character with the Enemy Skill Materia MUST be hit by the skill (but not necessarily affected). Each individual Enemy Skill Materia learns skills separately and you cannot cast the skills on your allies to teach them to your Enemy Skill Materia that lack those skills. Also, an Enemy Skill Materia with a particular skill paired on the same character with one that lacks that skill will PREVENT the other Enemy Skill from learning that skill even if it's used on the wielder in battle appropriately! All around nasty, though you can stack all 4 Enemy Skill on one character for learning skills that you don't have on any of them at once (which is the best way to do it). Another nice thing is that you instantly learn the Enemy Skill when it hits you instead of having to wait for the battle to end. You don't even have to survive the attack to learn it! (In fact, getting killed by the skill results in an amusing situation where the character pirouettes in victory over learning the skill before dropping dead.)



FFVIII: Blue magic is learned via items and limited to Quistis' Limit Break. Not as big a handicap as you might expect, since Limit Breaks in FF8 are ludicrously easy to get. What IS a big problem is that the really useful Blue magic items are rare as hell and often require difficult steals or tricky item/card modding to get. Good luck ever learning Shockwave Pulsar.



FFIX: Blue magic is learned via eating enemies at low HP and fuels Quina's usefulness. Unfortunately it also makes it very hard to learn certain skills, since the enemies that teach them have low HP, are rare, or are limited-availability. It helps that Quina's Trance move is to reduce the required HP remaining to consume the enemy from 1/8 to 1/2. Still, overall this is one of the less difficult FF games to learn Blue magic in.



FFX: Ronso Rages are learned via Kimahri using Lancet on certain enemies and using them as Overdrives. This method is the next-easiest after FF6, admittedly, and not one Ronso Rage is permanently missable (though you will hate yourself if you don't Lancet Omega Weapon since his skill is only available otherwise from a hell-ass-hard optional boss that takes hours upon hours of monster collecting and S.Lvl-grinding to fight).



FFXI: Just becoming a Blue Mage requires an expansion pack (Treasures of Aht Urhgan) and that you complete a particular quest (and not even a low-level one), which is in and of itself kind of annoying. Actually learning Blue magic, however, it's a lot more straightforward and familiar: be in the Blue Mage class (main, not sub), and then beat a monster that uses the skill you're after in a fight. The catch (and this is unbelievably stupid) is that you only have a CHANCE to learn a Blue skill this way; it's not guaranteed like every other game that features Blue magic. What a pain.

FFXII and XIII don't have Blue magic, for whatever reason.

So, back to this Final Fantasy! Here's an overview of the Memorized skills we alrady have:

Aqua Breath (22 MP) - Water-elemental attack to all enemies. FF5 introduced this one to the series, and FF6 carried on the tradition.

Revenge Blast (31 MP) - Deals damage equal to the difference between the caster's max HP and current HP. This attack is called ??? in every other FF it appears in.

Throwing Stones (22 MP) - Damages and confuses all enemies. Damage is boosted by 7.5x if the target is at the same level as the caster. Sort of like a multi-target Goblin Punch, and an FF6 exclusive thus far.

Rippler (66 MP) - Exchanges status with the caster and an enemy. This move is bugged to hell, as Lucas noted earlier.

Big Wave (30 MP) - Unleashes a tsunami to do water- and wind-elemental damage.

Step Count Damage (MP cost equals minutes played / 30; max of 199) - Deals damage equal to steps taken / 32. This can be made into an instant 9999-damage attack, but by then it'll also be exceptionally expensive.

And our newest skills:

Mighty Guard (80 MP) - Casts Protect and Shell on all allies. They removed Float from it after FF5 and never put it back, for some reason. (Sketched an Earth Protector)

White Wind (45 MP) - Restores HP equal to the caster's remaining HP to all allies. (Sketched a Peeping Bear)

Aeroga (41 MP) - Heavy wind-elemental damage. Not sure why they skipped Aero and Aerora, but hey. (Manipulated a Badb Catha)

Transfusion (1 MP) - Causes the caster to be removed from battle, fully healing their target. (Manipulated a Mousse)

1,000 Needles (50 MP) - Does exactly 1,000 damage to the target. (Manipulated a Sabotender)

Black Shock (68 MP) - Halves the target's level. (Learned from a Crawler)

Level 3 Confu (28 MP) - Confuses all targets whose level is a multiple of 3. (Learned from a Satan)

Level 4 Flare (42 MP) - Casts Flare on all targets whose level is a multiple of 4. (Learned from a Satan)

Level 5 Death (22 MP) - Instantly kills all targets whose level is a multiple of 5. (Learned from a Satan)

Bad Breath (32 MP) - Inflicts Darkness, Poison, Kappa, Silence, Confuse, and Sleep. This became a series-standard attack after FF6, much to the horror of all who fight Molbors/Malboros. (Manipulated a Molbor)

Self-Destruct (1 MP) - Sacrifices the caster to do the caster's remaining HP in damage to one enemy. (Manipulated a Balloon Beast)

That wraps it up for Memorized skills for now (we'll get a few more before this update's through), so onwards to Thamasa!

♪♪ Stragos' Theme ♪♪

Looks like someone's happy to be home.

*Relm runs off and Strago looks down*
Strago "It feels good to be back... Why don't we stay for a while?"
"Grandpa~!"
*Relm comes running back*
Relm "This is bad! Gunho is...!"
*Strago is shocked!*
Strago "G, Gunho!?"
*They both run into town*

I smell side-quests!



Stop doing that, Strago. It's annoying.

*Gunho looks over at Strago*
Strago "Who did this to you, who?"
Gunho "I was pursuing the legendary monster Hidun, and it was the one that did this to me... I was so close to defeating it, too."
*Strago is shocked!*
Strago "Against Hidun?"
*Gunho looks away*
Gunho "Urgh! *cough* *cough*"
*Strago waves his arms at Gunho*
Strago "G, Gunho!?"
*Gunho faces Strago*
Gunho "Strago... Please, you must avenge me..."
*Gunho faces away again*
Gunho "Urgh! *cough* *cough*"
*Strago looks down, then slowly takes a step away and looks down a bit more*
*Relm gets all in Strago's face*
Relm "Come on, grandpa. This is no time to hesitate!"
*Strago looks up*
Strago "Yes, but... I spent a good deal of my youth pursuing that monster to learn its special technique, and almost got myself killed, I did..."
*Strago faces Gunho*
Strago "Gunho, I shall do it for your sake, I shall!"
*Strago runs off downstairs; Relm follows*

Sounds like fun, only not.



Geez Relm don't you ever give up?

*Relm runs in and Strago faces her*
Relm "Hold on a minute. You're not going alone, are you?"
*Strago faces away*
Strago "......I have to face that monster myself again, and not turn and run like I did before. This is my obsession, and only I can resolve it, yes."
*Relm runs to Strago's side and he faces her*
Relm "But, grandpa. An obsession alone won't make you win. Relm doesn't want to lose her grandpa. If she does lose you, she won't be able to go on living."
*Strago looks off to the side and down for a second, then faces Relm again*
Strago "I'm sorry, Relm. I appreciate your concern, I certainly do. But as its name suggest, Hidun does not show itself to many, he doesn't. It would be impossible to get Hidun to show up if anybody but me were there, it would."
*Relm nods a few times*
Strago "Now, to Eboshi Rock!"
*Strago walks out, Relm watching him*
*Relm steps to where Stragos was and looks down*
Relm "Oi vey..."
*Relm gets shocked and runs after!*

Great, so Relm's Jewish now. Anyway, on to Eboshi Rock! Strago was fortunately wrong about fighting Hidun alone, as he'd get his butt kicked that way.



♪♪ Searching for Friends ♪♪

And here it is in all its glory. I mentioned this before, but Eboshi Rock (or Eboshi-iwa as some sites call it) is a real place in Japan. The story of how Woolsey got Ebots Rock out of it is actually kind of amusing: he misread shi (シ) as tsu (ツ), a common mistake amongst beginners of the Japanese language.



♪♪ Forest of Illusion ♪♪

Eboshi Rock
Enemies: Moonform, Aspidochelon, Creature, Mahadeva, Warlock, Slat, Chicken Medusa, Koroku

I hate this place so much. The dark circle to prevent you seeing anything, random teleportation when stepping on switches, annoying encounters...



...and this guy.

Hungry hungry hungry
hungry hungry hungry
hungry hungry hungry
hungry hungry hungry
hungry!! I want something to eat! If I don't get anything to eat, I won't let you pass."

He wants a random amount of coral, which is found in random amounts in random chests that you randomly teleport to from random switches while random enemies randomly beat your ass in. Can you guess what the word of the day is? RANDOM!



Will you give me some 'Coral Fragments' to eat?" (Give it some to eat) / > (Don't give it any to eat)

Screw you, chest.



And he pushes us back.



He says this if you don't have any. And pushes you back, of course.



So basically it's just a lot of this: stepping on switches, opening chests, getting warped around, and hoping you get enough to satiate this chest who wants a totally unknown quantity of coral. And often getting warped to the same place you just teleported from if you're me. No joke, I warped to the save point location 3 times in a row during this run.



The only good thing about my Anti-Luck with randomizers is that I ended up getting warped around so much that I got enough coral to satisfy this damned thing in one go.



Haha you're nasty, chest.

*Tina waves her arms*
Treasure Chest "Oh, that's right. You wanted to get past here."
*The chest turns brown for some reason and hops off to the north*
Treasure Chest "Hey, thanks again!"



Awesome. Let's get dangerous.

♪♪ Decisive Battle ♪♪

Hidun has Erebus mini-mes with him, much like Dragon Pod in FF5 had its Dragon Flowers. And much like that fight, the Erebus enemies are the real threat here.



The easily Ultima'd to death threat, at that.



After taking a bit of a beating (he counters everything with Poison and loves Bio; makes him easy to deal with since a Ribbon nerfs him), Hidun starts to glow. And enemies glowing rarely means anything good for the party.



Aha, that must be Hidun's ultimate attack Strago was after!



Easily beaten.



♪♪ Victory ♪♪

Alright, new Memorized skill!

Grand Trine (64 MP) - Massive non-elemental attack. This attack later inspired Trine in FF7, a hard-to-get lightning-elemental Enemy Skill that has delayed the acquiring Leviathan for many a perfectionist 'til disc 2.



So you did, so you did. With a little help from your friends, of course.

*Strago laughs*
Strago "I have to tell Gunho about my victory."
*Strago runs off*

Hoo boy... Full of himself much?



♪♪ Kids Running Through the City Corner ♪♪

*Strago runs over to Gunho's bedside*
Strago "Gunho~!"
*Gunho gets up and Strago runs around to face him, arms flapping*
Gunho "What, what's going on!?"
Strago "Gunho, listen! I defeated Hidun, I did!"
*Gunho does a spin jump and hops in place!*
Gunho "What did you say!? Y, you defeated Hidun? No, you lie!"
*Relm walks in*
Relm "It's not a lie. Grandpa really defeated Hidun."
*Strago faces Relm, then starts laughing*
Strago "Ho ho ho. Indeed, I'm so skilled that a monster like Hidun could never stand a chance against me, he couldn't."
*Strago and Relm face Gunho, who finally stops hopping*
Gunho "Guh, I can't believe what I'm hearing here."
Strago "Ho ho ho..."
Strago "......By the way, Gunho, how are your injuries healing?"
*Gunho jumps backwards!*
Gunho "Heh? Oh, er......"

Did he pull the old "fake injuries to trick someone into doing something" routine? Duh. Haven't you read, like, anything written by any Japanese author ever? They love that trope.



Something tells me Strago's been talking the whole time...



Yep, he's been talking the whole time.

*Strago runs between Gunho and the stove and starts hopping*
Strago "So, bravely facing Hidun with my rod in one hand, I raised it, and... Smack! Wham! Thwack!"
*Strago starts running back and forth*
Strago "I showed it real good just what it means to be brave, I did."
*Strago stops and faces Gunho*
Strago "And then......"

And lying, too. You had the Gladius equipped, you old idiot, not a rod.



Gunho "Hmm? He finally talked himself to sleep."
*Gunho starts to walk away*
Gunho "But then...... How to say it? Let's let him have his delusions. Now then, about my injuries..."
*Relm hops between Gunho and her house*
Relm "First, thank you. You helped grandpa overcome something that's been bothering him his entire life. And because of that, he defeated that legendary monster."
*Gunho faces away*
Gunho "What an intelligent granddaughter he's raised. It seems like such a waste."
Relm "And you are a terrible actor."
*Gunho faces Relm, who wags a finger at him*
Relm "Only Strago could be deceived by such an amatuerish setup."
*Gunho looks away while Relm gets aggressive and runs off*
*Gunho hops up and down yelling after Relm!*
Gunho "How dare you!"

Ahahaha, that lovable scamp. With a heart of gold and a tongue to shame a sailor, to boot. Well, glad that's over with. Never have to deal with Hidun ever again!



D'oh! (They did this in case you missed getting Grand Train before, admittedly, but it cheapens the victory a little.)

Next stop: Doma Castle! Time to take our errant knight home.



Sure, why not sleep in a castle where everyone died horribly of poison vapors? Sounds like a party!



The party wakes up to find that Cayene is sleeping in.



He won't wake up, either.



♪♪ Unknown ♪♪

Suddenly three weird boys jump into the room!



For those who are curious, that's French, Italian, and Spanish for "sleep".



Hence their monicker here.



Yeah yeah, all three say it.



And then they all jump in bed with Cayene. Um, kinky?



And then Mog jumps in bed with Cayene too. Little interspecies romance going on here, eh?



♪♪ Forest of Illusion ♪♪

Cayene's Soul
Enemies: Al-Jabr, Samurai, Raging Beast, Pandora, Parasite, Koko, Charmy Rider, Weird Dragon, Pluto Armor, Summit, Io


Strago wakes up alone in a bad place. If he can just reach Mog before any fights happen...



Damn it random encounters!

And then he vanishes. Suits me fine. Charm us up, Mog!



Oh you fucker.



This idiot Charmy Rider Death Roulettes herself while Strago tries Level 3 Confu.



The fight's a lot easier with no threat of instakill.



Alright, new skill!

Death Roulette (10 MP) - Kills a random target (for real this time; it's not abusable like FF5's Roulette).



And now we get our thief back! Mog takes off his charm to celebrate.



And ANOTHER new skill!

Level ? Holy (50 MP) - Deals massive holy damage to all enemies whose level is a multiple of the last digit of the party's Gil.



Oh hey, ANOTHER new skill! We're on a roll here.

Death Sentence (20 MP) - Places a death timer ranging from 15 to 60 seconds on an enemy.



Opening the door forward kicks us out!



Oh it's these guys again.



Uh, no thanks?

♪♪ Decisive Battle ♪♪

Oh joy, a boss fight. Sorry for the iffy letters there; it's hard to make a decent font with only 8x8 pixels to work with!



They're a trio, so it only makes sense to hit them with a triangular attack like Grand Train!



And Ultima. Can't forget Ultima.



Delta Attack? Don't make me laugh. We all have Ribbons, bitch!



Always kill Reve first. Otherwise he just casts Araise on any of his fallen brothers. After that it's cake, though.



♪♪ Victory ♪♪

See?



And so we enter the next part of the dream, the train.



We even get a flashback of when Cayene took on the Spirit Train!



Even his less proud moments.



And then it's on to a puzzle section. I do so hate puzzle sections...



This damned chest follows us to block us from entering this little cubby-hole.



Just what we need to tame a wily chest!



Will do, mysterious book!



Suck it, chest!



Ugh, MORE puzzles...

That configuration proved useful very soon indeed.



Oh not this again... Let's just get out of here.



What... the... fu...?



My sentiments exactly, Mog.



I don't know what Cayene is doing here, but...



...Apparently he's not supposed to be here.



Only chance to fight Pluto Armor, Io, and Summit enemies here, so take that charm off, Moglies! And yes, all the fights here use Majick Armor. Meaning you can only shoot Beams, use items, and fire off magic spells.



The caves here repeat forever if you keep going forward. The solution is to go backwards, oddly enough. And here we can see Cayene crossing a bridge.



Way too heavy armor we're in for that, though!



Wow, we're back already? That was a trip!



What the heezey?

♪♪ The Mines of Narche ♪♪

"Please...... My husband...... Help Cayene......"
*Mog turns to face these two people*
"Where are we!?"
"This is...... The inside of Cayene's heart......"
*Mog goes ? again*
"My husband... Cayene still blames himself for what has happened... He failed to protect Doma...... The world couldn't be saved..... And then, there's us......"
*The kid jumps down*
"A monster called Awreck Soul is taking advantage of his weakness."
*Mog turns around and blinks a bit, then faces the two again*
"Awreck Soul... A spirit form composed by the many who died fighting 1,000 years ago..."*The kid starts jumping*
"They're causing much of the pain... Please, help papa!!"
*Mog nods twice*
*The screen mosaics up twice, and a save point appears as the other two vanish*
"Help Cayene... Please....."
"Protect papa for us......!"

Well that explains a lot. Okay, let's go save that Samurai in need!



♪♪ Cayene's Theme ♪♪

But first, some more backstory for the guy.

*Cayene and Shyun duel for a bit*
*They stop and Cayene nods a bit*
"Excellent focus there, young sir! If you continue to practice, you could become the finest swordsman in Doma!"
*Shyun jumps off happily*
"Yaaaaay!! I was praised! I'm gonna go tell mama!"
*Shyun runs off and the screen mosaics as both vanish*



And more backstory!

*Cayene is shocked!*
"Think of what you're asking... A samurai's mouth should not utter such things!"
*Shyun appears in bed for some reason*
*Mina walks up to Cayene's side*
*Cayene rubs his head and steps down*
"I... love... you, dear. I do love you, dear."
*Mina steps down to Cayene's side again*
*Shyun jumps out of bed and hops up and down!*
*Cayene and Mina are freaking out!*
"Whee, I heard that, I heard that! I love you, I love you! Papa loves mama!"
*Mina steps down to Shyun*
"Shyun! Stop that!"
*Shyun jumps out of the room*
"I heard that~!"
*Cayene and Mina face one another before the screen mosaics again and both vanish*



And one last backstory bit!

"This is a part of your training, young sir. It is important that you develop patience."
*Shyun stops jumping and hops beside his father*
"I love fishing!"
*The screen mosaics up again and both vanish*

Okay, let's go save Cayene.

Ahh, there he is. If you're wondering, Awreck Soul is one of those delightfully impossible-to-translate-properly bits of the game. In Japanese, L and R are the same sound, thus Alex Soul and Awreck Soul are not only spelled the same, but can have a dual meaning by being joined like that as well. Alex/Awreck Soul is the Soul of Alexander, as well as a monster who wrecks the souls of others (and is a wrecked soul itself). Anyway!

"Ah, but you're too late! He can no longer oppose me, his heart is so full of self-blame for all his flaws. His sadness, anger, and hate are beyond any other man's. And now, you shall also become a part of me!"



♪♪ Decisive Battle ♪♪

This boss fight has an annoying gimmick, as is typical of annoying boss fights. And yes, you can insta-win by casting Degen on the Soul Sabers Savers, but then you don't get your reward for beating Alex/Awreck Soul.



I don't know why I called it that, but that's his Possession move...



Fortunately he was in Mog all along, who I targeted first, so this will go fast.



Fun Fact: Awreck/Alex Soul is Holy-elemental! Much like the best weapons that Strago and Mog can equip! (Damn it...)



Also Fun Fact: This is the only way to get a third Memento Ring! Even though only 2 characters can equip it and the effects don't stack!



The idiot ended up killing himself because Mog's Pitfall Trap killed both Soul Savers. Sadly this means no reward for me, though. Oh well!

♪♪ Victory ♪♪



Better believe it. You owe us one, Cayene.

*Cayene looks down*
Cayene "I heard my wife and sone calling out to me in my heart, sirs. Somehow, I was able to reach out to their voices and came here, sirs."
*Everyone surrounds Cayene*



♪♪ The Mines of Narche ♪♪

Oh snap, his family!

*Cayene runs up, shocked!*
Cayene "Mina!"
Cayene "Shyun..."
*Everyone else looks up at Cayene*
"Thank you... Dearest......"
*Shyun hops up and down*
"Yeah, papa is so strong!"
*Cayene looks down*
Cayene "No...... I didn't do anything at all. I couldn't before...... And, I can't now...... I am a man without any honor."
*Mina steps down*
"That's not true... You have far too much honor..."
*Shyun hops down to his father's side, and Cayene looks down at him*
*Mina walks down to her husband's side, and Cayene looks at her*
*Cayene faces away from his family and looks down*
*Mina and Shyun start to float away*
"You and I...... We will always be together......"
*Cayene faces them again*
"Papa...... You're the best."
*The screen mosaics up*
Cayene "Wait!"
*The screen mosaics again and Mina and Shyun become points of light*
*They fly off and the screen flashes*



And Cayene takes the sword. How sad and symbolic...



I cannot keep looking back no the past and hoping for the best. Yes, I can only move forward by believing in myself, sirs."
*Cayene takes a step down and raises his arm*
Cayene's illusions disappeared from his heart.
Cayene has mastered all of his special sword skills.

Woot! And one last prize awaits us, too.



Alex/Awreck Soul has become Magicite! And you know what that means... Synopsis time!

Alexander

The holy Greek emperor and his egotistically named megalopolis Alexandria have been made into a summon! Alexander is definitely the odd summon out in FF6, being one of the only source of player-usable holy-elemental magic attacks (besides Holy Rods, obviously). He does feature in later FF games, however, and is even a critical story element in FF9. Though he kinda went AWOL after that.



Holy Judgment is a group Holy attack, basically. It does pretty good damage against enemies weak vs. holy, but otherwise isn't anything too impressive.

Spells Taught
Holy x2
Protect x10
Shell x10
Dispel x10
Esuna x15

Level-Up Bonus: None

Along with being the odd summon out for being holy-elemental, Alexander is the odd summon out for teaching stuff too. He has great learn rates for all of his spells... and all of those spells are taught as fast or faster by other summons. Though he is the only way to learn Holy.

And now we're all caught up with Lucas! Come back next time as we re-convene together to conquer none other than Kefka's Tower! See you Friday!

Awrecksoul? hm.

Also, doesn't Alexander hit your party as well when summoned?

Also, you just got the other Holy available, L? holy.

Nope, you're thinking of the last summon, which we'll get next time. And yes, I often forget Level ? Holy, since it basically never works for me when I want it to.

What a shock Woolsey mixed up the shi and tsu. Who could miss the many obvious and varied differences between those two?

(On a completely unrelated note, I just hung up a National Sarcasm Society plaque on my wall like fifteen minutes before reading this update.)

Gunho: No, don't do that, it hurts.
Yoshinori Kitasa: Cut! ...Cut!
Gunho: The director said 'cut.' You should stop that now.
Strago: Yeah, I'm aware of that. I'm rehearsing. You know, aaahhh... rehearse.

As I said, it's a very common beginner's mistake. The two characters are very similar, as are so (ソ) and n (ン). To a new reader of Japanese or someone not familiar with the syllabary, they really are hard to distinguish. After you've been reading Japanese for a while, though, you recognize the differences right away. This was Woolsey's second game translation (his first being Secret of Mana, which he himself has acknowledged before was not a good one thanks in part to the pointless limits placed upon him), and on top of that Eboshi Rock wasn't well-known at all outside of Japan (it still isn't), so it's not really that surprising he made that mistake.

Well, color me shocked and amazed by the Wrexsoul/Alex Soul/Alexander connection. Now I just wish I knew what Alexander was doing possessing the dreams of remorseful widower samurai.

That's simple enough: he's one of the vengeful spirits sealed away during the Great Magic War that broke loose when Kefka took control. Of course, being an incorporeal spirit that survives by possessing men and consuming their souls, it's not surprising that nobody in any town knows what it's called. You can point at horrors like Humbaba, Deathgaze, and the Dragons and clearly identify them, but how do you point out something like Awreck Soul, who can't even be seen unless he's possessing someone?

As for what happened to Awreck Soul, the implication is that after being defeated by the party it was purified by the cleansing of Cayene's heart/soul and took the form of Alexander.

In the interest of ease of readability, I've double-sized all of the screenshots for this LP and re-uploaded them. All 2,228 of them. You're welcome. And yes, I will be double-sizing them all from now on so I don't have to do this again, thanks for asking.

The SNES release called this 'Atom Edge'. I think I've seen zantetsuken translated as iron-cutting sword or metal-cutting blade in other places. Also, the SNES action-RPG Soul Blazer had a zantetsuken weapon (Zantetsu Sword) in it.

And this was called 'True Edge'. I have a certain personal fondness for that name. Also, Japan, how many freaking meanings does 'shin' have?

Don't you mean a gil-ionaire?

Geez. This reminds me of the Final Fantasy Tactics Advance LP at the LP Archive. But FF3/6 Ultima and FFTA Ultima * (except for Blow) are crazy powerful so I understand.

Final Fantasy Tactics Advance has Blue Magic of the "take it like man, survive and win battle to learn" variety. But, unfortunately, it doesn't have a shared blue spell list - learned blue spells are per character. And you need another job and race to control enemies to learn the healing/buff-type skills (or to learn the other skills when enemies aren't cooperating [stupid enemies]).

In Final Fantasy Tactics some summoning spells, high-level black magic and Ultima can be learned blue-magic style by the 'hit, live and win' mechanic. (I think the FFT Ultima doesn't live up to its pedigree.)

Actually, from now on the Ultima spam will be dramatically decreased from here on out. For one thing, it's not a !Win button so much when your party's all level 30ish. For another, it does get annoying fast. Expect more varied tactics from now on.

I was selling stuff for GP. What's a "gil"?