"One to be born from a dragon..." -- Let's Play Final Fantasy II

Note to self: write some Clinton jokes.

I don't really care if I have to wait - Brick's allowed to do whatever he wants with his time and I understand that (My Rockin' Kats LP says hi) - but this is the single most true statement I've read ever.

Hey, check out some of these notes.
And remember folks, these aren't the only bugs that strip your criticals.

It seems weird that I never noticed the tendency for characters to lose their critical hits, but then, I never put two and two together in FFVI when my blinded characters attacked without missing a single time.

Funny thing, I actually think I might have figured it out in FFVI, because I distinctly remember my friend and I calling it "sunglasses" and not "blind," and I think that's because we never bothered healing it because we didn't think it actually did anything!

...Next time I sit down to make a game, I'm going to have to make a status effect that just gives the character some bitchin' shades.

Actually, I may as well just call the status effect "Bitchin' Shades." The effect can be gained by the character upon using the skill One Liner on anyone else. Effect dissipates automatically after battle.

I'm always excited to see new status effects in RPGS, as I'm tired of poison and paralysis. "Bitchin' Shades" could actually work really well: it makes a character "too cool" to follow orders during battle, and maybe if the monsters themselves are rad enough, he/she joins up with the enemy party to hang with a more subversive crowd. I suppose the cure for the malady would be... summoning the afflicted's parents to dote on their child? Bah, I don't think they sell that at item shops...

Sounds like you'd enjoy Kingdom of Loathing. Pretty much everything about that game is a loving spoof of RPG mechanics.

I liked Kingdom of Loathing until it turned into a typical MMO grind-fest. At least that's all I remember about it. I wonder if my log-in still works...

EDIT: NOPE! Maybe I'll try it again. Hahaha, the about page still says it's in "open beta."

Kain get's a shout-out in the FFXIV 2.0 promo pic:

what in the hell is even going on in that photo??

I'm not sure, but it cetainly involves a lot of numbers...

World of Warcraft.

Vivi, Guildenstern, Delita, Boco, Kain, Faris, Yuffi and Agrias are fighting a Chimera. Also I got these names from above their heads before I realized there was a party list on the side of the screen. orz

The abundance of FFT characters pleases me.

Wait, "Boco" is listed as a party member.

Can I be a battle chocobo? I want to be a battle chocobo.

Chocobos are character mounts, and they can also fight in combat.

What are you guys talking about?? This is just Final Fantasy 2. There's no way there will ever be 14 of them! WOW that's a big number. And who the hell is "Boco"?

Are they more useful than they were in FFT?

Finath River says, "I sure hope not."

It's the secret Chocobo party member you get if the Tellah misses 1,692 times during the "Spoony Bard" battle.

Yeah, sorry for the diversion, back to reality:



(lifted from timewalkgames)

No spiking the Kool-Aid on this thread! Take it somewhere else!

But I have to say, that site is awesome.

AND THEN AN UPDATE HAPPENED!

...but just a short one.

Interlude the Second: Meanwhile, in the Overworld...


♪♪ The Airship ♪♪

Cid told us to hit up his dudes back in Baron, so I suppose that's our next stop...


♪♪ Fight 1 ♪♪

Psyche. Our next stop is killin' some Imps, because 1) fuck Imps and 2) they have an extraordinarily small chance of dropping one of Rydia's so-called "hidden Call spells".


♪♪ Fanfare ♪♪

See? Don't worry, I didn't actually spend the last few months killing Imps waiting for this drop. (No, my absence can be better blamed on NetHack, and Skyrim, and Minecraft, and...) Rather, I plugged in a Game Genie code that guarantees I get drops from every fight. In regular play, it's astronomically unlikely two items will drop at once, let alone three items plus a rare-ass Call spell. Seriously, the chances of a given enemy dropping an item at all is something like 1/64. Chances that item is the enemy's rare one is, again, something like 1/64.

It simply does not happen in regular play. Ever. Do not drive yourself crazy trying to get these legitimately. Not only is it bone-grindingly dull, but...


♪♪ Fight 1 ♪♪

...they're not even particularly effective. They're novelties, pure and simple.

Imp is the only Call spell Rydia can learn as a child, outside of Chocb... and Chocb outclasses it quite handily. Even if you hit the jackpot and get this thing to drop in the Antlion's Nest, or somesuch, it's simply not worth casting.


The item that teaches the spell isn't even worth anything. Feh.

"So Brick, what other rare-ass monster drops can you get?"

I'm glad you asked, Hypothetical Internet User.


♪♪ Into the Darkness ♪♪

The next two items on our checklist are both in Cave Magnes.


♪♪ Fanfare ♪♪

These ZOIDBERGs drop Rydia's next uber-rare summon, the Mage spell. I think, if your goal were to farm up two of these items legitimately, it would take something like 950 hours. And if you were trying to get both of them to drop together, you would probably fill your item screen up with stacks of 99 of them before you finally saw it happen.

On the plus side, if you started doing it when FF2 was still new, you'd be done just in time for FF58 to come out.


The Ogres in this cave drop the Zeus Gauntlets. This is the one and only rare item I can remember ever seeing on a normal, legit playthrough. That's how it's burned into my memory. It's also yet another indication of just how stupidly rare these items are. Remember, I've played this game about once a year since I was a wee tot, and this here Zeus Gauntlet is the only rare drop I've seen without going out of my way. Buddy of mine got the Imp spell once, which is how I knew about that. Everything else, we had to look up later.


Anywho, the Zeus Gauntlet is a totally decent offensive and defensive boost for any heavy-armor-wearing character. Unfortunately, it doesn't let you throw actual thunderbolts like in the original Final Fantasy.


♪♪ Fight 1 ♪♪

Here's the Mage spell in action. Much better than Imp and Chocb, of course, but it still only targets one enemy. So, like, what's the point? Why not cast Jinn or something and be rid of the whole pack at once? You break even in the MP, when you factor in multiple Mage casts per battle.

Rydia has one more rare summon to try out (not two more, you nutty goose), but it's not dropped by any currently accessible monsters. I'll show it off later. In the meantime I'll turn off this silly Game Genie code, more to keep my ivnentory from getting clogged up with bullcrap than anything.

♪♪ Fabul ♪♪

One of FF2's nice little touches is that NPCs across the world keep up with major story events. For example, Mrs. Yang outright rejects the idea that a tower-shattering explosion could possibly injure her husband.

I, ah, think I have to agree with her. KARATE is one of nature's most explosion-resistant materials.


♪♪ Toroian Beauty ♪♪

Edward, sadsack that he is, takes the news pretty badly. And yes, he's still bedridden. Never mind explosion-resistant... Edward isn't even "banged his head a little"-resistant.


The frogs living in Toroia's moat don't have any pithy remarks about current events. I just think it's cute you can have a conversation with them.


♪♪ Welcome to Our Town! ♪♪

Nope! He blew up! And then his exploded gibbets splattered all over the Underworld, which is a lava-blasted hellscape unreachable by mortal power!


There's actually a nice bit of backstory involving Rosa's mother, which is welcome considering most of FF2's secondary cast doesn't have a unique sprite, let alone a history or realistic motivations.

This also sheds some light on why Rosa might have fallen for such a whiny-butt DKnight in the first place. What is it they say about girls wanting to marry their fathers...?


♪♪ Long Way to Go ♪♪

Finally the Elder of Mysidia's response to the recent string of noble sacrifices is, "Cid? Yang? Who were they?"


♪♪ The Airship ♪♪

Well, okay, that's enough gallavanting around. Getting back on track puts us, why, right here where we started the udpate. See you guys in five months!

It's a nice touch being able to collect some monster summons, but it's a shame they're not actually any good. And that they're also so rare you'll likely never see them at that. The only one I remember seeing while actually playing is the one you can't show yet, and that was on a rental copy.

Back in the day, I was convinced that the random drop monster summons were school-yard lies. I mean, I played the hell out of that game and I'd never seen one. Summoning an Imp? Yeah, right.

Oh right, they pointlessly removed the Cockatrice summon from FF2US, didn't they? Oh well, that's one less pointless optional summon to get. I'd say those things are like the rare Grimoires in Vagrant Story, but even those are at least useful in theory... And also theoretically drop every once in a while...

True story: I got the Imp drop on my second playthrough. That convinced me that ALL monsters would drop summons if you fought enough of them. "So," I thought to myself, "I should go fight the hardest regular monster in the game [or at least what I thought was the hardest regular monster in the game] until I get its summon."

And that's the story of how I farmed Minds for twenty hours.

Damn you, Brick! I wanted to be able to brag about completing two entire LPs before you completed two updates! You ROBBED me of this!

You've RUINED CHRISTMAS!