The Ruler of Time and Space! Let’s Play Final Fantasy Legend 3

Fighting enemies while travelling caused Cookie to gain a level, and she changed into a Snake when I fed her meat. Snakes have a paralyzing Gaze, but that’s all that’s noteworthy. BobSap gained that saddening level and turned into a Loki, losing his lovely StonGaze. He can still deal around 300 damage with his X-Kick, which is well ahead of how Darth and Cookie are doing.


Kilroy: But the city’s already sunk…
Ifram Tree: Dharm’s been moved to the east island. Check the 2nd tomb from the top and right.
Kilroy: How do you know?
Ifram Tree: My roots span a very large area.
Kilroy: OK, thanks.


This area is a graveyard, but following the Ifram Tree’s advice can get us to the secret town of New Dharm.


On one hand, that’s a shame. On the other hand, he built Dharm 30 years ago, after it was established the waters were rising, and didn’t build it on the highest possible ground. Not really a forward-thinker, him.


There’s a magic store and an item store in New Dharm, but neither has anything I need.


No, actually, against a flood, being underground is a terrible idea. A mountain town would be a perfect shelter. Or a tower. Or better yet, a floating island! Or a tower on a mountain on a floating island!

…I’m going to regret that suggestion, aren’t I?


Looks like the folks in charge have set up some swanky digs. They’ve got a lot of sophisticated technology here, though. I feel like most people don’t notice that there are computer monitors and similar items in houses in the Past and Present, and then think the time-jump is much more than 15 years when they see areas in the Future.


Monsters who know how to push gravestones?


Cookie: You’ve aged.
Myron: Fifteen years have passed! The City's sunk and Elder has passed away.
Kilroy: Sorry, but the Talon can only go to a specific era.
Myron: You’ve already achieved a lot. Everytime you defeat a monster, history changes.
Kilroy: Then can we now stop the Water Entity?
Myron: No, there's still Maitreya up in Floatland. And they took Faye! Go help Dion in Viper. Password is –ERAUQS-.

We’re on it!

Note, also: This is the last noteworthy thing Myron or Lara does in the game, and I think that’s Cookie’s only post-intro line.

Viper is an impressively technologically-advanced floating city with a high-speed tram and skyscrapers. This appears to be where the majority of humanity went to hide when all of the other towns had been swallowed by the sea.


Viper has a multi-level department store. I don’t buy anything from the weapon or armor stores. At the magic store, everyone who can use magic gets Heal (which cures all status ailments) and Darth and BobSap both get Exit (which warps us out of dungeons, and instant-kills enemies).


You’ll note that the stores in Viper are the third set I’ve encountered without needing to deal with a dungeon. There’s actually a fourth, too, which is what I’m saving my money for. In retrospect, I’m surprised there isn’t an underwater dungeon in the Future; it would seem to fit the pacing of the game better.


Foreshadowing!


Kilroy: ERAUQS.
Guard: Proceed!




There’s a bunch of new items here. The uBerth adds a free Inn to the Talon. I put the Laser Sword on Kilroy, but there’s not much point to it.


Speaking of free healing, we have Dr. Belski here. He’s not exaggerating.


Dion: Remember me? I was in Dharm when you left…
Kilroy: Dion?
Dion: Yes!
Kilroy: My, you've become a fine warrior!
Dion: Would you help me defeat Maitreya? We must hurry.
Kilroy: Of course! But why?
Dion: Sol and Faye were taken to the Pureland. Borgin went there in Talon2. We must follow them in Talon1.
Kilroy: Maitreya has a Unit, then.
Dion: Right, he has X-Plane. Talon1 is safe in Palace, but we can't use it.
Kilroy: I see. How shall we carry out our plan?
Dion: Dr. Pulcer has a plan. Take this and see him in a shelter at the bottom of the northern sea.


There’s a lot of infodump here, there the comments from townspeople have been hinting at it for some time. Apparently after Borgin sent us to the Past to live with the Elder, he came here and built a second Talon, which he used to go to Pureland. Also, we get some clearer details on the Sol plotline (apparently god was kidnapped by monsters while sleeping on the job?) and the Faye plotline (she’s able to draw a mystic sword called the Xcalbr, so the monsters have kidnapped her to get it) that townspeople have been giving us bits and pieces of for ages.


Dion joins our party, and he resembles a stronger version of Myron. I can deal with that. His attacks do around 380 damage, which is enough to OHKO most enemies around here.

There’s a new sunken ship next to one of the older ones, just north of Viper. The treasures aren’t anything special.


And there’s this strange building, the Undersea Lab.


Dr. Pulcer has cyborgs working for him! These are the first friendly non-human, non-waterhags that we’ve ever met!


He’s also got a Cure potion I can steal.


Kilroy: Yes, I came to hear the plan.
Pulcer: First take this.

Pulcer: Plan is this. Use Rocket at a pier near Palace to get to Floatland. Find uX-Plane and Remote and then call me using Radio. Then I’ll blow up the Palace. Come back by calling the Talon with Remote. Got it?
Kilroy: Yes.
Pulcer: Fate of Group 1 - Jupiah, Borgin, and Quacer lies in your hands!

You know, I would have probably suggested a) A plan for freeing the Talon that didn’t involve explosions, b) A plan for getting to Floatland that used our flying ship to get up there rather than strapping myself to this homemade rocket, or c) Just building a new uX-Plane since you’re a Talon expert and apparently built one for the Talon2. But hey, what do I know? I’m not a scientist from the future.

Question that remains unanswered: 15 years have passed, but Pulcer, Quacer, Belski and Jupiah are obviously older than that, and they’re nowhere to be found in the Past or Present. Where did they come from? (My theory is that there is a larger world than just the few towns we can access, and as flood waters rose elsewhere, these folks gathered in Viper.)




Afterwards, since I suspect I’ll be up in the clouds for a while, I head to the sea floor to hunt up the last few shipwrecks.


Along the way, I find some meat and parts. BobSap manages to become a Medusa again. Cookie becomes an Octopus, which has the oDamage defensive talent, but not much to recommend it offensively. Darth becomes a Terorist, whose Punch and Upper talents are on par with his previous form (165 damage).

The shipwrecks hold a couple more of those elemental crystals, a Magnum I’ll never use, and the Sandman helmet, which is a minor upgrade for Darth.

Next time: The crazy plan!

There's a time and a place for it.

Old 8-bit characters don't die they just start flashing then disappear.

What about a tower buried in the middle of a mountain which is on a floating island?

I'm more surprised they built Viper City in fifteen years.

I'd love to discuss the DS remake, but I'm not fluent enough to make any ongoing comments on story. From what I can tell there weren't many changes, but they did have more space for text, so the discussions are more fluid.

One thing that did change is the inclusion of side quests, here one is activated if you talk to Lara. She immediately runs from you characters, apparently becoming entirely antisocial after being displaced in time. From there you can return to the present and take her to see Granny, which leads to a boss battle to rescue Dion. When you return to the future Lara is friendlier and better adjusted. Sadly, this is probably the biggest story addition to the game, none of the others have have this much of an impact.

Hey, anything you can tell us is awesome. I'm glad to hear they made slightly better use of the time-travel mechanic in the remake; they do remarkably little with it here.

Part #9: Floatland


When we last left our heroes, they were about to strap on a homemade rocket and shoot up to the floating island in the sky. Nothing to do but bite the bullet…


That was surprisingly painless.


Floatland has a single town with another set of stores. Everything at the armor shop is worth getting, and I do for all of my armor-wearing characters. Cure3 in the magic store is also a must-have. If I had character who were actually attacking with their weapons, I’d want them to have X-Plane swords at this point. Note that they don’t sell robot capsules, so Kilroy is stuck where he is for the moment.


Apparently word didn’t make it up here that Sol was kidnapped back to the Pureland by the monsters. He’s not going to be stopping the entity any time soon. This does raise some interesting questions about the nature of Sol and the Pureland in relation to this world, given that he’s their creator-god. Another unanswered question: Where was Sol until he was kidnapped, i.e. during the past and present eras? Here in Floatland, maybe?


This is my single least-favorite line in the entire game. Seriously, it irritates me so much, because it makes no sense the way it’s written. It’s obviously meant to indicate to the player that there’s no point in trying to reach Floatland or Pureland from the Past or Present, because they’d just be the same. The time travel gimmick is limited to the main part of the home world. But saying it this way creates giant plot holes about causality and doesn’t really make any sense given the way humans perceive time. So, yeah, just pretend that townsperson told me “Time flows differently here and in Pureland, so time travel isn’t possible.”


The overworld of Floatland has cloud cover that peels back as we enter it, like the ceilings in some areas.


The enemies are the same types of creatures we currently are, and boast 400+ HP each. Kilroy’s Drop and Dion’s attacks can’t reliably OHKO these guys. The Medusa obviously has StonGaze and the Guard has Drop (though it’s nowhere near as powerful as Kilroy’s), and Beguilers are strong against physical damage.

Kilroy turns into a Bazooka, whose stats are a bit higher and whose Dash does almost as much damage as Drop; he also has a Twice attack that does around 300 damage, and the Selfix ability. Cookie turns back into a Snake. BobSap gains a level and turns into a Soarx; then makes an even more disappointing change into a Hermit (neither has particularly useful talents, and the Hermit does even less damage with X-Kick).


Here’s a look at my party after grinding enough to afford everything I wanted from these shops.


Our first destination in Floatland is this set of ruins north of town.


The gimmick here is that those squares full of glowy liquid will spin you around and force you along with their “current”, in various annoying directions. In some cases, this will involve these one-block “rivers” you need to jump over. There are also a number of hidden doors that use the “ceiling” effect, so it’s easy to miss treasures if you’re not trying to push up against every wall.


Cookie ate some meat and took on one of her most useless forms yet: Typhoon. She’s got a Gaze that causes Curse and Psych that lowers magic power (both useless), and Storm, her only actually damaging attack, does around 120 damage. On the other hand, Darth becomes a Samurai, which has a Quake attack that does similar damage…to every enemy on the screen. (Though BabyWyrms and Thanos are strong against it, and Snakes are weak to it.)


After the next level-up, I turn Cookie into a D.Bone, who is AMAZING. Now she has both the StoneGas and XPowder attacks, which means instant death all over the place. It’s going to be a while before I change her class again. BobSap turns into a Merman on the next level-up, who damage-dealing talents are pretty lame but does good damage with X-Kick…so I stupidly turn him back into a Hermit.






The treasures found here are a mixed bag. There are three more crystals, which will eventually be useful. There’s the Remote, which is a key item. There’s the ATM, which is as good as TearGas on Darth but otherwise useless. The SMG and Fire grenade do nothing for me. The X-Fire staff, on the other hand, is both a good weapon for Darth and it casts Erase when used as an item. The problem there, of course, is I had it in my head that Erase is an instant-death spell, when in fact, it seems to be a “dispel” sort of effect. So not terribly useful, really.

The little circle thing in the SMG screencap is a hole, incidentally. It leads to stairs on the next level, though the “upstairs/downstairs” geometry of this area isn’t really clear.

I stop back at town to heal up and sell off useless items, then head for the mountain. On the way, I install some parts and turn Kilroy into a Keeper, which gets him Drop back (along with Beam, Counter and Repair). I’ll miss Selfix, but the extra damage is better for now. I turn BobSap back into a Merman, too.


The clouded areas leading to the mountain include a few dead ends in blind corners, to make navigation more troublesome.


The mountain is pretty straightforward, with only two real paths and two chests, the Air crystal that’s pictured and an Ice Shield that isn’t. It also has two healing fountains, which you activate by stepping in.


At the top of the mountain…

…d’oh.


Maitreya’s Tower looks cool, but it’s basically the same floor layout eight times with occasional treasure chests. It’s not like you can get lost or anything.


Here we see the first new enemies in a while. The Octopus is weak to Tornado, so Drop does an absurd amount of damage to it. The Osiris is, also, and the Bazooka is weak to Quake.




The treasures are unremarkable. The extra copy of Exit goes to Cookie.

There’s no battle here, just a sprite-tussell that throws your characters off the balcony and leaves Dion alone.


Dion: BobSap! Cookie!



Maitreya: Hello, Dion!
Dion: Where is Faye?
Maitreya: Sol and the girl are already in the Pureland.
Dion: No…
Maitreya: And you’ll never see her again!


The party is dropped down a few floors and has to walk back up without their fifth member.


On the way back up, BobSap gains a level and becomes a Mage, who has no useful Talents at all, but can hit reasonably hard.


On the way back up, I meet a few more monsters. Loki are strong against Quake. Ronin like to Stab you. Valkyries can Paralyze your party members.


Going all the way to the top floor nets you another Cure potion and the Battle armor, which is a weaker cyborg upgrade, but boosts attack power instead of agility, so I put it on BobSap.


The correct path to the end is following Dion through the hidden door.


Maitreya doesn’t mess around. She’s flanked by Lamias, the next upgrade to Medusas. (They’re immune to Stone, in case you were wondering...but not immune to X-Powder!) She’ll hit you with Aero (200 damage) and Cyclone (140 damage to everybody, though BobSap’s current form is strong against it). Kilroy and BobSap, with Fast cast on them, are my big damage-dealers. Using Drop and X-Kick respectively, they do about 450 damage per strike. I wasn’t keep careful track, but I think she has about 6000 HP. With both Darth and Cookie on healing duty, I didn’t have any trouble.

Kilroy: Dion! I’ll take you to Belski, don’t give up!




Exit gets me out, then using the Radio continues the plot.


Pulcer: Pulcer here!
Kilroy: We found uX-Plane and Remote.
Pulcer: Good, I’ll radio when I’m done.


Pulcer: Now use Remote to bring the Talon there.


Note that we can’t get back to Floatland now, so if we’d missed anything, it’s gone for good. The Talon apparently can make it up there under remote control, but not with us aboard.


Belski: Hmm, he has some serious wounds.
Kilroy: Will he be OK?
Belski: Heh! With my bio-tech, just a piece of a tissue cell is enough! Wait there.
Dion: Ow! Ouch! Hey! Can’t you be more gentle?
Belski: Shut up and stay put.


Dion: Thank you. Now we have to hurry to Pureland…
Kilroy: We have X-Plane so we can leave at anytime.
Dion: It's only useable once. The only way back is through Dr. Quacer in Pureland. Will you still join me?
Kilroy: Of course!


Here’s our stats; and we now have full access to the Talon to fly around the world (though only in the future, because the Palace still exists in the other eras). I’ll explain more about it next time.

Next time: We take the fight to the other side of the sky.

I think they did the whole "Time does not pass in Floatland" simply so they didn't have to design three versions of it.

On clarification on what I said earlier is that the whole Lara adventure is the biggest story addition. They also added a ton of characterization for Dion and Faye where you can take them on adventures in the present or otherwise get them out of trouble. It doesn't specifically alter much in the main story, although there is newgame+ post-game boss that is only available if you make certain choices and I know at least one of them deals with Dion. This battle also goes into who or what Sol is, but it might be better to discuss that when we finally meet him.

I've been trying to avoid the urge to do an info-dump simply because it would feel disruptive to the LP, but they did in fact to far more with the time travel in side-quests. The first time you travel to the past a new character "The Wanderer" shows up to Arthur, and gives him the "time gear". This then shows up as a five point gauge in battle, where every action in battle starts filling it up. In battle you can use the "past" time gear to repeat an action in battle, the "present" time gear does an all out attack with all characters, and I believe the "future" inserts a future action in the past. This can be interesting as the remake added combo attacks, so if you use this correctly you can set long chains - which is generally overkill, but can be useful for some bosses. If anyone has played the SaGa 2 remake, this is like the "Threads of Fate" system there, but doesn't require any items.

If you fill up the gauge you can also use it during side quests. For example, when you meet the Elder in the past you tell him where to build the city. The only problem is that later you meet him again and he tells you the location was terrible, that it was overflowing with monsters. Now you have a choice, you can either head over and clear them out right now, or use 3 time gear points to travel back to before the Elder checked the area so that this time he'll show up and it will be perfect. In this particular example there isn't a huge change, but some side quests have interesting results depending on whether you use it or not. Although most of it is purely through text, I believe you still get better rewards for altering time than not.

Part #10: Another Dimension

Did you hear I have an awesome flying time-travelling ship? ‘Cause I do.


So, first, a look at the features of the Talon. The uBerth adds this Inn space to the interior. Stepping into one of the capsules fully recharges HP and MP for free.


The Rover engine allows travel on land, and the Hover engine allows proper flight, just not over mountains. (And it’s faster than Float magic.)


When you get into a fight while flying in the Talon, it gets an attack with the equipped weapon. Right now we have the Cannon, which does about 125 damage. That only works the first round, though, as then the enemies board the ship.


There’s nothing left to do in our world at this point, though, so it’s off to the Pureland!


Talon: Status Report uX-Plane uHover inoperable from Warp usage.
Kilroy: Can only move on land with uRover. Let’s get out.


Dion: Let’s split up. I will look for the advance party, and you look for Faye. We'll find Sol later!
Kilroy: OK, good luck.


When I first played through this, despite the fact that the in-game map mentions a lot of locations in Pureland as places to find key items, I didn’t realize how much of the game takes place here. The transition to Pureland is probably the halfway point of the game, in terms of play time and character levels.

In terms of towns and dungeons, Pureland is actually larger than the home world. This is mitigated by the fact you could visit several places in the home world multiple times, whereas the uPast and uFuture modules don’t function here. (Though, in retrospect, I think it would have made for a different and more interesting game if you could use oFloat, oDive, uPast and uFuture in Pureland, and sabotage the Water Entity before it was even created.)



Our first stop is the nearby town of Darius. The townspeople are happy to answer our questions about Units, Xcalibr, and the Talon crew members, despite these seeming like insanely dangerous things to ask about in enemy territory. Actually, people are shockingly friendly and helpful—could the denizens of Pureland not be the monsters we’d thought they were?

(Something you’ll notice about the NPCs roaming this town is that in Pureland there are virtually no humans and the towns are all populated by monsters and robots who, with one exception, don’t care that you have a party of humans.)


Townsperson: Nature’s going awry these days. We can’t use oDive and oFloat for traveling.

Hand-wavy excuse why these spells don’t work.


There are a couple of free items to be had, though everyone in my party already has Heal. I give it to Kilroy, though I’m 99% certain he’ll never use it.

Diamond shields, boots and helmets are a slight upgrade for all of my armor-using characters, and they provide some elemental immunities. I upgrade BobSap’s X-Kick to Smother, and switch Darth to a Psi gun so he can use his regular attacks again (it’s only a 10 HP hit from the TearGas, at this point).


The magic shop has some important spells, but I’ve already got them all at this point. The item shop once again doesn’t carry robot capsules, though the need for them is quickly diminishing as Kilroy’s stats approach the 99 cap.


Second stop is the town to the west, Eitar.


Eitar: I see. I’m Eitar. I saw her taken to the North Maze by Fenrir, but it turned townsmen into stone.... No one here can oppose them.
Kilroy: We'll defeat it then.
Eitar: Really! Then take some Catnip from the tree. Guards will fall asleep.


The townspeople, as Eitar noted, have all been petrified. You can actually push them around, if you’re feeling cruel. This fellow has a special message, a unique sprite, and is blocking a chest. I’m sure he’s not important.


Like the WaterHags, the BlackCats roaming the town will attack you if you talk to them. You can’t Morph into them, though. They attack with Kick and counter physical attacks with P-Skin, and have about 600 HP each. (They’re normal monsters, though, and can drop monster meat. And Stone works just fine on them.)


You need to go through the broken piece of fence here and retrieve the Catnip from the tree. This is the second game where I’ve need to retrieve catnip from a tree!


Just north of town are a set of ruins. You can see BlackCat guards when you come in.


Using the Catnip makes them all fall asleep, so you can push them around or jump over them, like the petrified townsfolk.

Enemies here include, as we’ve seen a lot, creatures that have recently been members of our party. Typhoon uses mostly weak status effects and are only annoying because they’re strong against Drop. (Hermits are, too.) 500-600 HP is now the standard. Darth’s Quake is become less and less useful, and his Psi gun only does around 200 damage, compared to 400+ for Kilroy’s Drop and BobSap’s Smother.

I get a lot of drops of BlackCat monster meat and Soarx beast meat, but no cyborg parts, which are what I really want. Darth is my highest-leveled character, and my least useful in most situations.


A neat gimmick here is that this dungeon has depth—you can walk under those grates or on top of them, depending on which level you’re on.


A level-up turns BobSap into a Liz Duke. Liz Dukes are good for Smothering things.


The Fur armor is weaker than both the Speed and Battle armor, and makes me wonder why it’s here.


Fenrir: Jupiah! You came back to life!?
Kilroy: What!?
Fenrir: You'll be gone for good this time!


Fenrir got a free turn on me and use Riddle to confuse Cookie, which I had to immediately heal or risk her instant-kill wrath. Fenrir’s single-target Kick does about 350 damage. If you’re lucky, he uses Lit2 against the party, which does 50 damage to anyone wearing Diamond armor and 100+ to Cookie. If you’re unlucky, he uses Flood, which does 150 to those wearing armor and 350 to poor Cookie. It sucks to be Cookie.

As you might have guessed, Cookie died a few rounds in, and the battle became Darth handling healing while I fed Fenrir a steady diet of Drop and Smother.


Obvious North American censorship—and pretty obviously a last-minute change from “killed” by a non-English speaker.


Key item get!


After the battle, BobSap turns into a Mephisto, which hits a little harder with Smother but is otherwise unremarkable.


The Wizard armor, while still not as good on cyborgs as the Speed armor, does carry better defensive stats. I give it to Kilroy for irony value.


I’ll just shove this guy out of my way…


Here’s the locked door we need the Prison key for.


Kilroy: Yeah we came to help you.
Faye: Thank you. But Dion... didn't he come with you?
Kilroy: We split up to search for you.
Faye: I see. The masters want to conquer our world. Their only concern is about Talon, with its 4 crew members and the 4 mystic swords. They needed me to get one of the Mystic Swords.
Kilroy: Let’s go look for the crew members first.


Faye is a pretty decent 5th member, basically an advanced version of Dion.

Incidentally, I don’t usually link to the maps of these dungeons, but this one is too good to miss.

Back in Eitar, Fenrir's curse has been lifted.


Eitar: You removed the curse Fenrir cast upon us. I'll give you some advice in return. Go find Buzi in Mt. Hasid. He was an Talon chief crew and can help you gather other members.


Juba: I’m making armor for King Clamin. Visit me when you come to Cirrus. I can be of help.

Of course, Juba here is one of the crew members, but he’s going to play coy for now.


His chest is actually rather appropriate—he’ll be able to make good use of these crystals.


Gratitude, and a pointer towards my next destination.

This was a bit shorter that the last two updates, but this is a decent stopping point for now.

Next time: Shopping, mountains, and maybe that Buzi fellow.

I like Fenrirs sprite. He's a big ol' wolfman with a dozen skulls, four arms and no eyeballs.

That is not the design you would think of when you are told you are fighting Fenrir.

Mages don't work that way!

But are you still hungry afterwards?

I'm playing through this again right now! I'm going with a Human/Mutant/Mutant/Beast party. The Beast tends not to be a powerhouse, but is very versatile - usually she has the highest AGI, damage at or almost at the Human's level, and tons of HP/MP, so she can spam Stone even when she doesn't have it as a talent.

I just passed the Future / Floatland shopping spree, and there are a few neat items in the Future shops too - Speed- and Magic-boosting boots, Speed-boosting helmets, and the out-of-place Iron gloves.

I checked some online item lists to see what the various armors do, and there doesn't seem to be a good resource. Like, I'll find out that the Fast staff boosts magic, but it looks like the X-Fire staff boosts magic AND agility, and that doesn't seem to be listed anywhere.

Anyway, keep up the good work. This game is a fond memory from my RPG-starved childhood, and I'm delighted to see some of the depths of the meatparts nonsense I largely avoided at the time.

The best I've found is the "game lists FAQ" on GameFaqs.

Yeah...some of the monster names are a bit odd. According to the Translation Differences FAQ, those were the original Japanese games, though. I suppose the Mages are like the Ice Cave Mages in FF1, who I recall having an instant-death attack but no spells.

Part #11: Mountains Are For Climbing


This is the party starting off this update. As I mentioned last time, Faye is basically an upgraded Dion, and her Rune Axe will deal about 450 damage, in the same ballpark as Drop and Smother at this point.


Cookie’s lovely D.Bone form? Yeah, it’s a common enemy on the overworld. They need to die quickly when you meet them, because as previously noted, they have a selection of instant-kill attacks. (I’ll note, however, that despite being outdated, the instant-kill attacks make this form seriously overpowered and make it very useful in random battles.)


Terorist parts allow me to upgrade Darth into a Hamamoto, which is essentially a stronger version of his previous form. It even uses the same icon.


Time to get on the boat to Knaya, our next destination. (Had we tried earlier, we’d have been told the boat was “waiting for the seas to clear.”)



And this is very true—Knaya has another department store setup like Viper did, but theirs is even bigger, because there’s a full set of stores here, and then a flea market with three of each type of store elsewhere in town. (Which include the full inventory from Darius as well as upgraded items.) There’s no point in upgrading halfway in Knaya; grind up your money and go all out.


Armor: Everybody except Cookie gets Mirror Shields, Mirrors Helms, Hecate Boots, Diamond Gloves and Scarfs (protection from petrification) to replace their Shades.


Weapons: BobSap gets a Jyudo. After some deliberation, I decide to give Darth a Rune Axe. Kilroy is doing fine with talents and Cookie has never needed a weapon upgrade.

Magic: Everyone who can use magic gets a copy of CureA, because it restores 30% of HP to the entire party. Darth gets Weak (an upgraded Aero spell) and Wall (defensive buff) to play with. BobSap gets Lit2 on the very odd chance we need to deal elemental damage.

Items: The stores here finally sell robot capsules again. Kilroy gets 7 HP capsules and 2 Speed capsules, so his HP and Attack are maxed out, and his Defense is nearly there.


I need to grind a bit to get the cash for all of these upgrades, which means I also get a few meat/parts drops to upgrade folks. Kilroy turns into a 105mm, another in the series of robots with Twice, Dash and Selfix. Dash remains moderately weaker than Drop. BobSap is doing 600+ damage with Jyudo, enough to OHKO most overworld enemies. Then he becomes a Naga, which does similar damage but also has StonGaze, which is truly the best of combinations.




Townsperson: Shar was a crew member of Talon. He’s living on Cape Frost now.


Townsperson: Buzi was the chief crew member of Talon. Ask him to join you.

Let’s get a quick update on plot threads while we’re in town. There’s a dock with a ship to Porle, incidentally, but it’s also “waiting for the sea to clear” and we can’t ride it.


And you know what would be nice after all that grinding? A flying ship with a free inn.


Done. We can’t fly the Talon over water, but it can fly itself here via the Remote. Science!


This is Mt. Hasid, which has a lovely waterfall theme going. You need to walk through the water to proceed, but you can’t fall down the waterfalls and there’s nothing hidden in them. It’s a short and sweet dungeon.


Enemies here include the BlackCats from the previous dungeon, and these 75mm, which are weaker versions of Kilroy’s current form.

Treasure: Another crystal, which are really starting to pile up. The uMissile, which is an upgrade to the Cannon for the Talon. And the Cool accessory, which isn’t a notable cyborg upgrade from what I have, but protects from fire and casts Ice2 when used as an item. If I was smart, I’d have equipped it ahead of the boss battle.


The scene at the summit actually begins when you reach the top of the ladder, rather than when you talk to anyone.


Buzi: Tell me. Why destroy other worlds?
Guha: It's not an issue that you can decide. It's up to Master Xagor. If you oppose him, I must stop you.


Guha: What? People here can’t oppose us masters!
Kilroy: You’re masters only in your own minds!


Guha is…disturbing. The Water Entity monsters in the home world are a bit cartoony, but the Masters of Pureland are actually really creepy. He can use FireX, which does 250 to everyone (and double to Cookie, because she’s weak to fire, one-shotting her). He can do 400 damage to a single target with WindUp, and attempt to Poison the entire party with Fluid. (This may inflict Mute or Petrify also, but everyone was immune.) Darth kept a pretty good handle on healing with CureA and Cure2, as necessary. BobSap was again the big damage-dealer after a shot of Fast (690 per hit), with Faye and Kilroy helping out (450 per hit). He had something like 10,000 HP, but I haven’t been keeping good track.


Kilroy: We're from the other world that you talked about. We're here to save it.
Buzi: I see. How can I help?
Kilroy: Join us on the Talon.
Buzi: Oh! You say you have Talon? I'll gladly join you. Go visit Shar due north Cape of Frost. Check that box before you go.
Kilroy: Talon is at the foot of the mountain. We'll be back.
Buzi: I'll wait inside.


First crew member collected!


The Durend is the first of the Mystic Swords, which are their own special super-element that cuts through boss resistances. They also belong to their own weapon class that every species gets a bonus with, so when I equip it on Kilroy, his regular attack damage jumps to 500 per hit. (What he’d be doing as a Human with similar stats and a non-Mystic sword.)


After the boss battle, BobSap becomes a Succubus, with a bunch of unexciting low-damage talents and status effect talents.


On the way out, I ran into this familiar group, and made a discovery when the Samurai used Dispel on me: I had though it removed buffs, but it apparently is an attack that can sometimes cause an instant-kill! I could have been using that with Darth this whole time!


Buzi has taken his place on the Talon as the item-shop master. He sells a standard selection of healing potions that we probably will never use.


And here’s my party at the end of this update.

Next time: Shar! More waterfalls!

Wait, so the party is currently represented by a mobile artillery piece? I think this game may have reached its zenith.

It's kinda weird when a Game Boy RPG starts bringing out the palette swapped monsters, isn't it?

And as far as I can tell, "dispel" is a character limit compromise for "disintegrate."

This is awesome. Every other list on the internet is full of horrible lies.

A mobile artillery piece that fights with a magical sword, accompanied by a half-lion "succubus" that can do more damage with martial arts than the artillery can do with missiles.

I think that "The Best Legend" tag is actually appropriate, upon reflection.

At least in rpgs they have different names.

I just had the sudden thought: I played the Wonderswan remake of FFL, but I have no idea if the palette-swap monsters were actually swapped!

I have provided something of value with my LP!

Part #12: The Temple of the Pushable Block


So, our next lead on members of the Talon’s crew is Cape Frost, where Shar is supposed to be hanging out. Let’s head over there—it’s just north of Mt. Hasid.


Shar: Correct.
Kilroy: Please join us on the Talon.
Shar: Hmm. Then go get the Tablet from the Ruins south-west of here. It holds a key to why people here must serve those evil beings as masters.


It seems that Shar has a fetch-quest for us.


Shar intends to release us from our bonds with Tablet.

This is actually a decent explanation of why the WaterHag had said Pureland sucked and people wanted to leave, and why people in towns have generally been friendly and helpful to our cause: Xagor and his buddies have a magical effect that keeps everyone in line, but that doesn’t mean they like it. So if we can deal with this curse and get rid of the Masters, Pureland won’t be a threat to the home world any more.


This is why we’ve been collecting all of those crystals—the Lost Magic Shar can make is some of the best attack magic in the game.


The ruins are just south-west of Cape Frost, next to a river that Rover can’t cross.


There’s a dragon guarding the way.


Kilroy: Let me through.
Dahak: Then defeat me!


Dahak can use Shake against the party, which is a Quake spell that’ll do 250 damage to most characters, but 50 to BobSap (he’s resistant) and 500+ to Kilroy (he’s weak to it). He also has the hit-all attack Swallow, which does 75 damage each (and can crit for double damage) and seems to restore some of his HP. The Nail hits a single character for about 370. The Durend on a Fast-assisted Kilroy is my main mode of attack, deal over 1000 damage per swing; BobSap’s 670-damage Jyudo and Faye’s 450-damage Rune Axe also help out here. He’s got 15,000 HP or thereabouts; and I manage to have everyone survive through liberal use of CureA.


Dahak: No use. Only my image is here by due to Xagor's powers. Only a sage can remove me.
Kilroy: We’ll remove your image.

You can come here and fight Dahak before going to Mt. Hasid, but his “image” will remain to block your passage until you find a convenient sage to remove it.


Dahak: Sage Buzi!
Buzi: That’s right. Now hold tight! Nekuh garzagun, there!
Dahak: Finally! Buzi, appreciate it. Hey, kid! Close off the three water gates in here to go to the desert. Don't underestimate the powers of the masters!

Dahak didn’t seem terribly happy about being bound to this spot, in retrospect, and was grateful to Buzi for freeing him. Is Xagor even a mind-controlling dick to the other Masters?


The Tablet is right at the entrance to the Ruins, but we need to open these floodgates, so I might as well do everything in one trip.


The upper level of the ruins keeps the temple theme, but the basement is different. The “snake-skeleton” theme to this area may look familiar to some of you—it was also used for the Earth Dungeon in Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest.

The monsters in here look like many monster sets we’ve seen before, though they have a lot of status ailment attacks—things like sleep, paralyze, confuse, and agility down which aren’t useful when my character have them, but are annoying when used against me. Also, they come in very large groups. And Liz Dukes are resistant to damage, so Stone is the best way to take them down. (Stone and XPowder are great for a lot of these guys—most of them have 700 HP or more.)


Darth installs some parts and becomes a Daimyo, yet another upgraded version of the same monster, with the same Talent list. At level-up, BobSap becomes a Scylla, which is the latest in the Medusa line and can once again use StonGaze.



The treasures include a few more crystals, some totally outdated items, the Warm accessory (counterpart to the Cool, it protects against ice and casts Fire2 in battle), and the Drain sword, which is also too weak to be particularly useful at this point.


The gimmick to this place are these stone-pushing waterfall puzzles. This isn’t much of a secret, but I love block-pushing puzzles. They’re some of my favorites. (I actually played Wild ARMS: Alter Code F for the Millennium Puzzle sidequest!) What makes them special in this game is that while you can’t make “facing” moves, you can jump over stones, which is the key to maneuvering them all into place.

When you place the last stone in the third room, the ground begins to shake.

And that river we couldn’t cross dries up.


Shar: Then I’ll examine it. You should go to Talonburg due north across the Jorgandr-desert while I do so. You'll need Talon to get there...

We bring the Tablet back to Shar, but he makes excuses and tells us to fly across the desert while he works.


Before we head into the desert, I turn Cookie into a MummyCat, preserving StoneGas but giving her a much-needed survivability upgrade.


The desert itself is a bit of a puzzle, if you enter from anywhere but the exact correct spot, the whirlwind will just spit you right out. What you need to do is fly straight into the center.


Of course, doing this crashes the Talon.


Buzi: Yea, but look! The Sandstorm master, Jorgandr!
Kilroy: What?!


Oh, boy. Jorgandr is another of the particularly horrifying boss designs. He can do 400-500 damage to a single character with Crash. He’s strong against damage, so BobSap’s attacks are nowhere near as useful as usual, doing maybe 250 each. Kilroy’s attacks with the Durend do about 1000. I actually tried using Stench to lower his defense and Blitz to lower his agility, because I had them available, but didn’t notice any real change. He’s also strong against Tornado, Lightning, Fire, and Poison. He only seems to have around 6,000 HP, though.


Buzi: Take what’s left and go to Talonburg. I'll be at Shar's place.

Buzi doesn’t actually want to travel with us when we don’t have a cool ship.


BobSap turned into a Sphinx after the Jorgandr battle, which is an upgraded Soarx with a lot of status-effect talents I’ll never use.

Talonburg is less of a “burg” and more of a lab.


Looks like we’ve caught up to the advance party!


Kilroy: How’d you know…
Quacer: Um, never mind. I see you walked here. Where is the Talon?!
Kilroy: We ran into a sandstorm…
Quacer: Jorgandr! So did you retrieve any Units?
Kilroy: Yes, we have them all.
Quacer: Good, then I’ll attach them to the Talon2.


My screenshot prowess was less than stellar, here. The wall blows open and Talon2 emerges.

Even when you’re playing the game normally rather than reading an LP, there is only a momentary burst of terror from losing the Talon in the sandstorm—you have one boss battle and a 10-second walk before you get a replacement for it. I had briefly considered ending the update right after the Jorgandr battle, but that doesn’t actually match the pacing of the game at all.


A new Hover unit that replaces the broken one, and the Shield unit, which prevents random encounters.


…I’m sure that isn’t something that will matter at all in the future.

(There’s also a bit of fridge horror here when you realize that the Talon’s human mind was just blown to pieces, but it had also spent 30+ years locked up in the Palace on the home world before that. I suppose it’s also possible, though, that only the Talon2 had a human mind; that it was either an innovation on the later ship or a last-minute addition because they were missing some farther-future technology.)


Buzi: Shar’s research worked. Tablet had a curse on the people. Let us hurry now.



Shar opens a magic store on the Talon, and can also mix the elemental crystals to make lost magic.


I’ll show more of that next time. For now, the three magic users get copies of Life, and Darth (since he’s been my primary healer) gets the extremely-expensive CureB. I’ll want CureB for my other characters when I can afford it, because it restores 60% of HP to the entire party.


Here’s a shot of my current stats. I’m going to need another round of upgrades, soon.

Next time: Lots of cities! And some caves!