Transcript

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hello and welcome back to the Gaming Backlog Book club reminder. We do go into spoilers in this episode, so if you want to avoid that, start at one of our previous episodes, play along and come back to this one once you’re caught up. So, Alex, we are now in the world of ruin, as they call it. I gotta say, whatever it was that I was doing to avoid spoilers about this game for 30 years, it sure as hell worked, because I had zero clue that there was a completely different version of the world and a full second act of the game here.

Like, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a screenshot of the. This sort of desolate red world of ruin or anything at all.

[00:00:40] Speaker B: Same here. I mean, I’ve kept. Yeah, I.

I haven’t known anything about this. All I’ve known about six is like, Kefka being the bad guy and Terra being your main. And then just like that little intro and that was like it. And look, somehow I like, kept myself spoiler free from all the rest of the story for, yeah, like 30 years.

[00:01:00] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, I. On top of that, I knew about the suplexing, the train and the intro walking in the snow, and the Magitech armor, and the opera scene, as I mentioned before, the very vague description of the opera scene, that’s literally all that I knew about before this. Which is kind of wild, but I’m glad I managed to avoid that detail about this second half this whole time.

[00:01:25] Speaker B: Same.

[00:01:25] Speaker A: And at least it’s not missable either. Unlike a particular Metroidvania where I was spoiled on its world twist long before I played it. Still love that game to death as well. But anyway, in case anyone hasn’t played that or been spoiled by it, I won’t mention what it is, but. Yeah, so. So here we are as Celes, with our carefully gathered party from the last who knows how many hours, all fragmented and either dead or scattered around this disaster of a world that Kefka created. Thanks again, Kefka.

[00:01:59] Speaker B: Yeah, thanks, Kefka.

[00:02:01] Speaker A: We did mention that we found out at the end of last episode that Cid is Celeste’s grandpa. And I came back from the world map because that’s where I had to save. And I guess I didn’t give him his fish fast enough because he died in bed, despite the fact that he was walking around when I walked into the. Into his house. Like, I walked in, he ran straight to bed and then never got back up.

[00:02:23] Speaker B: Yeah, he just.

[00:02:24] Speaker A: I had. I had previously picked up the fish before saving last time and Now. Now he’s dead.

[00:02:32] Speaker B: Now he’s dead. Yeah. I will say he. He died for me, too.

But I did look it up. I guess supposedly he can live. It doesn’t have any. Doesn’t change anything. He just lives if you give him the right fish. I gave him fish, but I also didn’t realize that there’s supposedly, like, three different kinds of fish, so.

[00:02:52] Speaker A: Three different kinds of fish. See, I saw two fish in there.

[00:02:55] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:02:56] Speaker A: And then I walked back to his house and then walked back to the ocean, thinking there must be more fish, and there was no more fish.

[00:03:02] Speaker B: So I went back a couple times, and there were fish, and I just kept, like, just feeding it to him. And I guess maybe that was probably on me. I didn’t read close enough on if it was saying, like, if it’s a. A good fish, like a poisonous or bad fish. I don’t know. All right, well, maybe it didn’t. I don’t know. But she died for me as well. And then it’s just weird because then he’s just lying in the bed.

[00:03:23] Speaker A: Yeah. He’s just. He’s just dead in his bed. And she doesn’t do anything about it.

[00:03:26] Speaker B: Yeah.

Yeah.

[00:03:28] Speaker A: But he left a note and said, use the. What was it? In the basement?

[00:03:33] Speaker B: It’s like a raft.

[00:03:34] Speaker A: He used to rat in the basement. Well, okay. Before that, actually, Celest just kind of booked it all the way across the continent for the island to the north end to almost dive off the cliff and commit suicide like everyone else did.

[00:03:49] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.

[00:03:50] Speaker A: And she did that because she said nobody is here anymore, not even Locke. Yeah. So. So, yeah, she almost lost it and just. Just ended it all. Good thing she didn’t.

[00:04:00] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:04:01] Speaker A: And you find Sid’s note, and you go down the secret staircase behind the stove, which is just the weirdest place for a secret staircase. And there’s that log raft there just ready to use.

Gotta drag it up from the basement first.

Yep.

[00:04:17] Speaker B: And then you just take it and it. I forgot where it puts you out. It just puts you out somewhere randomly on, like, the whole world map.

[00:04:23] Speaker A: Well, yeah. You know, you ride a raft across a red ocean, like Tom Hanks in Castaway.

You know, she doesn’t have her own Wilson, but, you know, she’ll find one soon. And you end up on. I think it’s the southern continent, which means something different now, obviously. Everything kind of got broken in many, many pieces.

[00:04:46] Speaker B: Yeah. Notice. Yes. Stuff is like. I don’t know if it’s, like, just flipped or if it’s I haven’t taken.

[00:04:53] Speaker A: I don’t know if it’s flipped. It feels like. Because before it was like. Yeah, it was. Before it was, like, four sections.

I don’t recall. Like, now it’s like five or six or maybe more. But, like, the place where the.

There was that. What’s the name of the ghost town thing with the weird clock people? That place. The continent that had that and a bit of a desert. And then it also had the opera house and the auction town is, like, a really weird shape now.

[00:05:25] Speaker B: Mm.

[00:05:27] Speaker A: But, you know, it’s. This is a new adventure. So I guess we. We figured out. I’m glad we were able to get off our island.

Yeah.

[00:05:35] Speaker B: So am I.

[00:05:36] Speaker A: We land on the southern continent, and then the closest town is all brook where you. Once you land. Everyone just talks about Kefka being a God with the power of the warring triads. Right. Those statues we saw earlier, Kefka just roasts anyone who opposes him with magic, and he’s living in the giant tower that you can see in the distance. And now the world is in ruin, which I actually.

[00:06:01] Speaker B: I think not long after the raft, I walked up to the tower because I think you’re there, but I was like, why can’t I do anything? And then I realized, I don’t think. I don’t know if it came up, but it was like. It’s a point that obviously I just can’t get to yet.

[00:06:13] Speaker A: Right. I think it is.

[00:06:14] Speaker B: The tower just looks like a giant rectangle of cement sticking out just in, like, for the pixels. It’s just funny.

[00:06:27] Speaker A: Yeah, it’s kind of a.

Obviously, you know, with pixel art, you can display emotions, but then certain things like that are trickier to pull off.

So everyone’s kind of just half complaining, half giving you information. They also talk. There are a few people that talk about giant mythical beasts all over the world, including something called Death Gaze, which sounds scary, doesn’t sound good at all. And eight dragons.

Oh, did you. Did you talk to everyone in town? Yeah, there was.

[00:06:59] Speaker B: I did. I don’t remember the eight dragons part. I remember the death Gaze.

[00:07:02] Speaker A: They were mentioning that someone mentioned Humbaba, which is a boss that we fought a little bit later.

[00:07:08] Speaker B: Yeah, we fought. Yeah.

[00:07:10] Speaker A: Oh, you know, it’s full of monsters. The world of ruin is full of monsters. And, you know, obviously we found out later with Humbaba, but the fact that these are the things that the townspeople are mentioning makes it sound like they’ll be causing us some trouble as future boss fights.

[00:07:25] Speaker B: Oh, I’m sure.

I am definitely sure.

[00:07:30] Speaker A: I don’t know if there’s a. I mean you could kind of just wander around at your own according to your own desire. But I ended up finding Sabin first. Did you as well?

[00:07:41] Speaker B: Yes, I believe so.

[00:07:42] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:07:43] Speaker B: He’s like holding.

[00:07:44] Speaker A: He’s literally holding an entire house up. House up from the ground from collapsing completely. So he’s a single person holding a house. This does track with the fact that he was able to suplex the train.

[00:07:58] Speaker B: That’s true. Yeah.

[00:08:00] Speaker A: He’s a strong guy. I mean this makes me think he’s someone like you know, Kratos or insert other godly strength character from most video games here.

He kind of is a show off though too if you think about it.

[00:08:19] Speaker B: Oh, he definitely is. He is most definitely a show off.

[00:08:24] Speaker A: I’m glad to have someone else along in the party again though, which was nice that it came along pretty quickly. I had neglected Sabin a bit in the more recent sections before the world blew up though. So I, you know, once again enjoyed his attack combo inputs.

[00:08:41] Speaker B: Yeah, I had as well.

[00:08:42] Speaker A: I had to.

[00:08:42] Speaker B: I just kind of. I think after getting him when I did a little bit of just XP farming, sort of basically just like in

[00:08:53] Speaker A: the desert and all that.

[00:08:54] Speaker B: Yeah. Just to sort of get him a little bit higher because I think I left with her, him and Selous. Selous for me was like I don’t know, 20, 21, like low, Low for where I should be in the game so. Because they could get him. So now I have them up.

I don’t know now they’re close to 30 after finishing.

[00:09:17] Speaker A: Okay. But I would say I’m about the same level I guess.

[00:09:21] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:09:24] Speaker A: And then after getting Saban I went back to Mobiles. I still don’t know what they call that which is. Oh yeah, way, way at the. At the eastern edge of that snake shaped part of the map.

Did you also return there?

Yeah, I’m.

[00:09:43] Speaker B: Yeah, I did that.

[00:09:44] Speaker A: I gotta say like based on where Mobiles was the first time around, I’m kind of bummed that the whole veldt seems to have disappeared since we’re fighting so many new enemies.

[00:09:53] Speaker B: Like yeah, I think would have been

[00:09:57] Speaker A: add more strong rages to Gal’s arsenal once we get him back because obviously that’s the only way he learns new things, you know, maybe it’s there somewhere. We just haven’t found it yet. But that’s where it was before, where it’s supposed to be now.

Yeah.

[00:10:12] Speaker B: Oh I will say just quickly though, before we Talk about Mobliz back in the town was because you have to go. He’s holding up the house and the chill. The child’s in there.

[00:10:20] Speaker A: Yes.

[00:10:21] Speaker B: You have to save the child.

[00:10:22] Speaker A: Yes, that’s right.

[00:10:23] Speaker B: I cut that very short on a time limit.

The time limit. Like I got out of the house.

And I will say this. I only got out of the house on the time limit because of the little.

I’ll say cheat.

[00:10:37] Speaker A: Sl.

[00:10:37] Speaker B: Not really cheat, but help that you can get on pixel remastered by turning Encounters off. So when I got the child, I turned Encounters off and I ran back through the house and I got out with like eight seconds left because if I had another encounter, I was not making it out.

[00:10:56] Speaker A: Is he the one that happened to be in the fireplace for some reason, that kid?

[00:11:01] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah, he was. Yeah, he was in.

[00:11:03] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:11:03] Speaker B: Like you had to go through the house, down the staircase, there’s a few rooms. It was like a monster in a box there. And. Yeah. Some other good things to pick up.

[00:11:11] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:11:11] Speaker B: Then he was like standing on top of like in a fireplace.

[00:11:15] Speaker A: So. So weird.

[00:11:17] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:11:19] Speaker A: So.

[00:11:19] Speaker B: But yeah, I just got out of that. That time.

[00:11:25] Speaker A: Yeah. These time limits are kind of iffy. Like you have to. You have to have be a good enough level or have the right loadout just by luck almost to be able to get it right to finish things in the time limit. I mean, at least that one, that banquet one where you’d have talked to all the soldiers wasn’t.

Doesn’t have too many fights in it, or else I would never have gotten anything out of it.

[00:11:48] Speaker B: No, same.

[00:11:53] Speaker A: But yeah. Okay, so that was. That was a fun bit of, you know, racing against the clock and then.

Then back in mobiles. Right. So Terra is now just the mother figure to a giant group of kids who were orphaned by Kefka’s Death Star Rey. Apparently Humbaba is the legendary beast that was mentioned before. He comes from the cracks in the earth and actually attacks the town.

And so Terra tries to fight him by herself, but doesn’t really last very long. I guess she’s out of practice and didn’t want to use her.

What was that? What is her move called?

Ruin? No, no, Runic is Selous.

I actually have forgotten.

[00:12:42] Speaker B: It’s.

Oh my gosh.

It’s not Transform. It’s.

Yeah, I’d forgotten too.

[00:12:51] Speaker A: Wow. Well, there you have it.

Yeah, whatever it is that. That turns her into the half esper version of herself.

[00:12:59] Speaker B: It’s good we haven’t used her in a while.

[00:13:01] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. So she doesn’t use that. And she gets beaten by Humbaba. Despite the, you know, in that fight, I was trying to survive because I didn’t know that the, you know, her losing was part of the story, the intended story. So I was healing every other turn. I was using a bunch of cura, using a bunch of potions. I swear it took me like two or three attempts to actually realize it was a scripted loss to the boss.

[00:13:29] Speaker B: Oh, okay.

[00:13:29] Speaker A: Because it doesn’t, it doesn’t tell you. Yeah, I mean it’s.

[00:13:32] Speaker B: No, I just, I didn’t even have a chance. So it like.

[00:13:36] Speaker A: Oh, it was like wiped you out.

[00:13:38] Speaker B: The second I got into the fight, he did like a thousand something plus damage attack on me. Just instantly died.

[00:13:43] Speaker A: Oh, Jesus.

[00:13:44] Speaker B: And then I was about to hit like restart and then it just kind of moved on and I was like, okay, yeah, all right. It just instantly took me out before I didn’t even have a chance.

[00:13:53] Speaker A: You had a more streamlined approach than I did. I was just wasting time.

[00:13:55] Speaker B: Oh, it’s called trance.

[00:13:56] Speaker A: It’s a trance.

[00:13:57] Speaker B: That’s trance.

[00:13:58] Speaker A: That’s probably it.

[00:13:59] Speaker B: Yep, I think it’s trance. Yeah.

[00:14:03] Speaker A: So since I’m usually pretty antsy to try to retry something when I’m about to lose, you know, the second I was hit for tons of damage, I was also resetting because there’s a quick like physical reset button on the Super Nintendo Classic.

But yeah, it was only that last time when I picked up my phone just in utter defeat yet again that the scene changed and the battle continued with Celes and Sabin.

[00:14:26] Speaker B: So.

[00:14:26] Speaker A: And of course, I don’t know if you had the same thought, but obviously expecting Terra to join the party at that point.

[00:14:35] Speaker B: Yeah, I thought so.

[00:14:36] Speaker A: I was ready to have Terra back in the party. It was gonna be great, but no, she feels too weak and wanted to continue learning about the changes that she’s feeling and stick with kids a bit longer.

I can’t imagine they just cut Tara out of this completely considering she was the first playable character in this game. So I’m going to guess we’ll have to re recruit her later.

Yeah, I’m sure it seems logical they could twist on us and not do that, but hopefully not.

And then. Okay, we’re leaving Terra behind. We’ll come back for her later on. To Nick Nikaya over there.

We meet a gang of thieves at the pub who all work for someone named Garad after they. After they all escape from Figaro Castle.

And he sure looks a lot like Edgar, huh?

Yes, he does Edgar in a disguise. Like, his hair was a little bit different color, his clothes a little bit, but it was still the same outfit, just in a different color.

[00:15:36] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.

[00:15:37] Speaker A: At this point, obviously, you know, we don’t know for sure for sure yet, but it’s pretty obvious. Just thinking, well, these guys are in for surprised when they find out because he’s the one that imprisoned them, supposedly.

[00:15:49] Speaker B: Well, just like that.

[00:15:50] Speaker A: You.

[00:15:50] Speaker B: Yeah. And you, like, follow him around in the town.

[00:15:52] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:15:52] Speaker B: You can just keep talking to him and be like, hey, Edgar. Hey, Edgar. He’s like, what are you talking about?

[00:15:55] Speaker A: Stop. Like, that’s not. He’s ignoring you and playing it off.

[00:15:58] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.

[00:15:59] Speaker A: Like, instead of like giving you a wink or something. Like they could have animated a wink in there, but they went all in.

Yeah, they did. And especially extra funny because Saban’s standing there right next to you, like his literal brother is staring this guy in the face and not. Not saying anything either.

[00:16:17] Speaker B: And not saying anything.

[00:16:21] Speaker A: I did enjoy how Stella was able to sneak aboard the ship, though, and hitch a ride to South Figaro.

[00:16:31] Speaker B: Yeah, I like that. The little. Just jumping on the back. And then. Yeah.

[00:16:37] Speaker A: In the cave on the way to Figaro, we meet that turtle pal again, who before we just saw kind of floating in the water. And that was really it.

And I, you know, because there was the door in the distance in that cave, I always thought, okay, that, you know, we could go through there, but there was no way to interact with it beforehand. I thought you could walk in the water and nothing. And so now we realize why.

But the thieves and the disguised Edgar use it as a stepping stone to reach the other side. So we basically have right here the tiniest micro mini game of Frogger of all time.

[00:17:18] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:17:19] Speaker A: Which Frogger is a classic, obviously.

[00:17:21] Speaker B: I. Oh, yeah.

[00:17:22] Speaker A: Still enjoy. I don’t know when the last time I played it was probably 20 years ago. But it’s a great. It’s a great little mini arcade game.

Not much skill required in this one. You just got to hit.

Hit the button when it passes through. But still, still fun.

Shout out to Frogger. And then once you’re past there, there are the enemies on the way to fixing the engine room of the castle, which was kind of odd. I mean, obviously, because, yeah, you’re underground Right. In the castle at this point.

When I saw the tentacles in the gears in the engine room.

Did you also totally think to yourself, oh, here comes Ultra again, Ultros?

[00:17:59] Speaker B: I did for a second. Yeah.

[00:18:00] Speaker A: Like, that’s the only reasonable Thing to think.

[00:18:03] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:18:05] Speaker A: But it was not Ultros for the first time ever. And it turned out to be some other tentacle monster that actually didn’t even show itself. The even weirder part is that somehow every tentacle had a different weakness and resistance.

[00:18:20] Speaker B: Yeah, it’s. Yeah. If you used, like. Yeah, they all had their strength and weakness to certain elemental attacks.

[00:18:32] Speaker A: Yeah. Which, I mean, obviously it took me,

[00:18:35] Speaker B: I think, maybe three, four tries to get through this, because I didn’t.

[00:18:39] Speaker A: I mean, yeah, they don’t see how you.

There’s one.

[00:18:42] Speaker B: And then I realized, like, oh, okay,

[00:18:44] Speaker A: there’s the one skill that I forget the name of that you can use, which wastes a turn, of course, but you can see what their weaknesses are that I don’t use often enough because I just bang my head against the wall instead until something does do damage. But that probably would have been a good idea against this guy because. Yeah, each tentacle has its own. Own resistances, its own attacks, and its own, you know, attacks that will heal it.

But there went my. The strategy I’ve been using for so long up until this point was find the magic that does damage to all the enemies at once. And I had to just ditch that completely because not a single thing would not heal and damage different parts of the tentacles. But good to have the brothers back together again, though, afterwards, because Edgar joined up with us here.

[00:19:31] Speaker B: Yep. He comes out after the battle or whatever, but after. Before the battle, he’s like, oh, yeah, it’s me, Edgar.

It’s like, aha. We didn’t do it.

[00:19:39] Speaker A: It’s like, oh, really?

Are you sure? And, you know, from there, you move on to Kolingin, which is where Locke was from. Right? I believe that’s right. And we pick Setzer back up at the bar, and all he wants to do is play cards in his casino, and he’s lost all will to push forward.

[00:20:01] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:20:02] Speaker A: But we help him pick himself back up. We go through his love interest Daryl’s tomb, who. Who knows how long ago she had died. But we. With the explicit goal to reach the Falcon airship she made, which was the fastest ship ever. But for some reason, we have to work a heavily haunted tomb. Like, okay, yes, connect the dots of a tomb that’s haunted, but why this one in particular?

I guess if not, it would be too easy to go through there. Can’t have a dungeon without enemies. I will say, that last fight with Dullahan gave me some real trouble.

[00:20:42] Speaker B: Oh, that. Yeah. I mean, I texted you before we did that. I was Texting you.

I was having a lot of trouble and I had to. I just went out for a bit and just. I. The first one, the Angler Whelk, I think it took me two tries. I got through them pretty quick.

[00:20:57] Speaker A: Oh, the one in the boss in the chest.

[00:21:00] Speaker B: Yeah, the snail thing that drops the

[00:21:02] Speaker A: chest, which is the first boss we ever thought.

[00:21:06] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:21:07] Speaker A: It was a different, you know, a less experienced version of it, but considering how much Dullahan’s magics were scaling, it was rough. I will say thanks. Thank you. Sleeper from Discord for the tip on not having the coins number 01.

[00:21:28] Speaker B: Oh my.

[00:21:28] Speaker A: 0 or 1 so that his weird holy attack can instant kill.

That was fun.

[00:21:36] Speaker B: I didn’t. Yeah, I didn’t realize that for the first, like, couple, I think I had like a 01. And then I remembered that and I went back and spent some money and got it to a six because I was getting like on those. He was doing like, but anywhere between 600 to 900 damage on me.

[00:21:52] Speaker A: Yeah, that’s.

[00:21:53] Speaker B: That’s why in like that first attack and I was like, this is crazy.

[00:21:55] Speaker A: It. You know, it’s so weird to have a magic called Holy have anything to do with money as the reason why it does damage. It doesn’t make any logical sense to me here, but it makes me wonder, have we just been lucky enough to not have something like that happen with another magic attack in the past, or will there be more that are even worse? I guess we’ll find out.

[00:22:19] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:22:20] Speaker A: So the first.

So there was. That was the first time. I think the second time I made the mistake of using Runic to absorb all of his magic attacks. But then forgetting, not forgetting, I basically, I know what attack I want to use most of the time, so I’m quickly inputting it. But my speed was on. Most of my party was faster than Dullahan’s in this case. So I put up Runic first and then I would use something like Cura, but my person with Cura was too fast to use it, so Celes would absorb all of the Cura instead of giving it to my whole team. And then the Runic is gone. So Dullahan would hit me with his heavy hitting attacks and I got wiped.

Okay, that was annoying. On my third go around, I tried that rasp technique again, which last time was pretty effective, and was able to, you know, fortunately, slowly withstand everything and get past them. Also, side note, before hearing your experience, those giant Venus fly trap flower enemies in this dungeon did a lot of damage and Especially with the bad breath attacks. Those things were rough too.

[00:23:26] Speaker B: Yeah, they were.

[00:23:26] Speaker A: I think I’m going to do some grinding after this.

[00:23:29] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:23:31] Speaker A: Just to be able to survive longer, honestly. I mean, like the armors are useful, but I feel like you need a higher level just to be able to have more health.

[00:23:40] Speaker B: Yeah.

Yeah, I agree.

[00:23:44] Speaker A: So how did you get through Dullahan?

[00:23:46] Speaker B: So, yeah, so for Dullahan, I mean. Yeah, he was. The first few times I tried, I think the first, first few times I tried, I was on a plane and I was. Felt like I was close. Then I didn’t get it. And I didn’t want to get too frustrated on my flight. Like people watching me because I could tell, like, I was like.

[00:24:09] Speaker A: I was like, okay, you can’t pull your chucking the switch across the plane.

[00:24:16] Speaker B: No.

[00:24:17] Speaker A: Like you would on your couch.

[00:24:19] Speaker B: No. So no, I didn’t get. And then I was texting with you being like, I just, like, I’ve tried a few times, I’m not sure. And you said, hey, just like. And I was. I will say at this point, I had.

Because who do you have in your party? You have Celes Selous seter, Sala sets or Sabin And Edgar.

And Edgar.

And I hadn’t used Edgar. Like those ones I had not used really. Like those were not my main party in the start for World of Balance.

So they were all like 20, 21, like low 20s.

So but by the time I got to there, they’re about 23, maybe 24, which still is not, I don’t think high enough. So I went out and like I went through and kind of did what you did. And again with the Pixel remaster. Yeah, People may think it’s a little bit of a cheat and not the right way to play it, but there is this thing where you can boost it, boost the XP grind. So I boosted it from 1 times to 2 times to just help me get.

But then also they call it a

[00:25:24] Speaker A: quality of life improvement or feature in the description of the game for the Pixel remasters anyway. So I.

Yeah, you know, some purists. There’s purists across all fandoms and especially in older video games, which.

Great. Everyone can play this their own way. So I don’t think it’s really all that big of a deal. It makes you enjoy it more instead of being frustrated.

[00:25:46] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. I did. And on Sabin already, I had. I picked up something that gave me double XP anyway. And I had it on him. One of the relics. I forget what it’s Called now.

[00:25:57] Speaker A: Okay. I picked up a relic that gave me double xp.

[00:25:59] Speaker B: So then Sabin was really going up a lot of XP for fights, but now I have, like. He’s, like, my highest now at like, 28 or 29 when I went to that fight. And then the rest are. Yeah, around 27. Like, around there, too. Then I went back in.

Still died a couple times. You had also told me to get rasp, which.

Yeah. Which I didn’t have on anybody. So during that grinding phase, I finally, like, got the little prompt that said Setzer forgot it. He learned it also. I didn’t realize too, like, in the menu, you can look and see, and you can see how close they are to learning an ability. Yeah, it gives you a percentage. Didn’t know that until that. And so I saw that, and it was at, like, 50%. But then after each battle, it went up good amount. And then all of a sudden, it finally said, he’s learned it. And I was like, okay, cool.

[00:26:45] Speaker A: Well, there you go.

[00:26:46] Speaker B: So, yeah, I went back to the battle with Celes. Every time I was using Runic to just get her to absorb everything. I use rasp A few times I used. Yeah. Was it meteor strike? No. Yeah, that’s the one way.

[00:27:00] Speaker A: Yeah, that’s jump in the air and hit him on their head. Yeah.

[00:27:02] Speaker B: And then. And then chainsaw with Edgar, and it was doing a good amount of damage.

[00:27:07] Speaker A: Oh, Chainsaw. Where’d you get a chainsaw from way

[00:27:11] Speaker B: earlier in the game. Somewhere. Jesus. Somewhere.

[00:27:13] Speaker A: I don’t think I have that. I use the drill.

[00:27:15] Speaker B: The town with. What’s the town. The town with ninjas.

What’s it called?

Zo. Zozo.

[00:27:23] Speaker A: Oh, you had. I think I got it. Chainsaw. Man, I should have done that.

[00:27:26] Speaker B: Yeah.

But I was doing a good amount of damage. Like, up to almost, like 2000 damage every time.

[00:27:33] Speaker A: Oh, wow. So that was solid.

[00:27:34] Speaker B: Doing a good amount. And then I had reflect ring on, like, two or three of them. So when sometimes it would just reflect back.

[00:27:41] Speaker A: Oh, that’s a good strategy. I should have tried that, too. I used reflect ring a lot, and then I took them off for this for some reason.

[00:27:47] Speaker B: Yeah. And then after it was a couple, and then I got to the end of it, and by the end, actually, I had just Edgar. Was it Edgar or Simon? I only had, like, two of my party members had died, and I was just like, there was no point in me trying because whenever I tried to bring them back, they always just got taken out the next turn.

[00:28:04] Speaker A: Yeah. Sometimes offense is the best Defense, right? Yeah, Just get through the fight as fast as possible.

[00:28:09] Speaker B: Going. And I got. Yeah, I did finally get through it. It just took a few extra, but.

[00:28:12] Speaker A: Yeah, okay, okay. Yeah, solid.

[00:28:15] Speaker B: But he was compared to. Oh, and with the holy attack thing, I had a six for my number and it missed like every time.

[00:28:23] Speaker A: Oh, okay. Next time we see a weird holy attack, I’m gonna, you know, if I don’t power through, I’m gonna start finding six money.

[00:28:32] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.

[00:28:36] Speaker A: Anyway, so that was the kind of the trying fight of the week.

Yeah, it was.

And. But you know, our reward is that we now have another airship.

[00:28:46] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:28:47] Speaker A: And the game, for all intents and purposes, converts into an open world format from here on out.

So I. Yeah, I was just like reflecting a bit on this first segment of the World of Ruin. I think it was a great storytelling choice to have a start as Celes or really anyone other than Tara or Locke to like start this quest to reunite the party.

[00:29:12] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:29:13] Speaker A: You know, and at this point we still don’t have either Terra or Lock when we pick up the Falcon. So that’s. I don’t know what order we’re going to be able to do anything, but I suppose we can do it whatever order we want. The only thing is, the only hints we have to go off of are what people are saying in towns.

[00:29:29] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:29:31] Speaker A: But the natural thing I think for a lot of games would have been these are your primary protagonists, Terra and Locke. Let’s put you back in one of their shoes, one of those originals. And find the same party members more or less in the same order since they had the longest relationships and they’re who the player has been with the longest. But this feels so much more interesting to be Selas and kind of go through a bit more of her story and then kind of rejoin with everyone else from there.

So I’m excited to see what’s coming up.

[00:30:04] Speaker B: Yeah, so am I. I am too. I’m excited to get to hopefully find the rest of the part. I picked up like a few things too. Like weapons wise, not like bought, but just picked up that can’t be used on people I have now or don’t really help, so. Right.

[00:30:21] Speaker A: So the fact that shops are still selling weapons for people we’re now missing probably indicates that we’ll get them back.

[00:30:28] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:30:28] Speaker A: I hope we can read everyone.

[00:30:30] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, hopefully.

[00:30:34] Speaker A: So. Yeah, I mean, it was a bit of a shorter section here, but certainly action packed and we have some open world shenanigans to get to. But I think the primary purpose is to get our party back together and hope we don’t get crushed by too many dragons while we’re flying around.

[00:30:49] Speaker B: Hopefully not.

Hopefully not.

[00:30:52] Speaker A: So for next time, to keep this again as vague as possible, using sort of our spoiler free source of info that helped us break this into reasonable chunks. Our goal is to play until you gather up as many of your friends as you’d like from the first half of the game, do any side quests, any monster hunts and preparations before we approach Koepka’s tower.

So once you are ready, enter the tower, which is going to be the final dungeon of the game.

Save and quit and hang on for next time.

Yep.

Yep.

[00:31:26] Speaker B: Thank you everybody for listening and for following along. Hope you’re enjoying the game like we are, and hopefully maybe you had a bit of an easier fight against a Dolman than we did.

[00:31:35] Speaker A: Dullahan. Dullahan Sounds like a scotch.

[00:31:38] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly.

[00:31:39] Speaker A: Just enjoy your nice glass of ice Dullahan Scotch served to you by a zombie chariot.

[00:31:50] Speaker B: Exactly.

[00:31:51] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:31:52] Speaker B: Thanks everybody for listening and we’ll see you in the next episode.

If you want to follow along and discuss our playthrough of native games on the Gaming Backlog Book Club Podcast, please give us a follow on your podcast platform of choice, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Pandora, Amazon Music or Pocketcasts, as well as our Discord and Instagram under the same name. Thanks.