and with everyone not rereading part 1or 2 we start our adventure where we left off with part 3...
With the adventures in the ice caverns finally being healed the party has split up in the peaceful village of Dali where the game will throw ATE clues at you to tell you where to go. Knowing the path regardless I stupidly head into the shop anyhow even though ill be going later to pick Zhurai up wasting a few minutes...
Ignore the ATE Ignore the ATE Ignore the ATE Ignore the ATE Ignore the ATE
For anyone who doesn't know this trick later in the game I will be able to synth all the wrists from Dali into cotton robes providing infinite money when you sell them (1200gil gain per robe or something) so using half the money from the sword fighting mini game it will basically take me up to 50,000 gil at Lindblum pretty much covering all gold issues until disc 3
ALL THE MONEY FOR ME!
Returning from exploits and back to the actual plot of the game SeeKeR meets up with me again and discuss chocobos and other things. SeeKeR leaves Drazerk who is shortly attacked by thousands of armed soldiers all wanting to capture him. Drazerk fights bravely but eventually loses. (The previous event may of just been one farmer)
Those bastards!
SeeKer returns to the shop (Taking a round about method to trigger the event) to talk to Zhurai. After around 10 minutes of non dialogue the two of them finally realize I HAVE BEEN KIDNAPPED and go off to search for me. Returning to the spot SeeKeR spoke with Drazerk earlier they hear his battle cries (The previous event may of been actual crying) from a pipe leading under ground and rush off to meet him by going under the mill.
Running down a few screens SeeKeR and Zhurai finally see Drazerk captured and being dragged off camera. There is something about the queen from earlier being behind this or something so I will kill the queen later to take my revenge. Even though there are like no random encounters in Dali it still managed to take SeeKeR and Zhurai a few years to rescue me from a crate the farmers had put me in. Wondering what is actually going on in this village the party continue down the dark corridors that actually has no monsters (yay!).
Now be honest who wouldn't want a personal army of me?
Drazerk Zhurai and SeeKeR end up discussing too long and end up running from the evil farmer who kidnapped Drazerk earlier however in their attempt to escape they all end up captured in a crate. Good going team LRR you all managed to get captured except for Mr Con who is too busy harassing old men for his air ships. Mr Con finds out about the air ship and ends up freeing the party from the crate just in time to be attacked by the second black waltz who spends its entire bad guy speech attacking Drazerk for being a bad mage.
Maybe me attacking in this fight was a bad idea after all...
Soooo yeah it turns out the boss will never attack Zhurai because he is a true gentlemen (Although he will cast sleep if she is the last person alive causing a game over screen) unfortunately I forgot that if drazerk does any action this black waltz reacts by wiping out the entire party with a level 2 spell leaving poor Mr Con and Zhurai to fend for them selves ( Luckily Zhurai is somewhat useful at this stage of the game and Mr Con is OPA ending the fight instantly )
With black waltz the second dead the party go to the inn to save and get a full heal before they board the air ship for an epic adventure that will take them to Lindblum.
Woot airship ride!
Getting on the airship as it is setting off Drazerk finds out it is being operated by the Drazerk clones from earlier who can't speak or react and just operate the ships. SeeKeR decides he needs to stop the airship going back to Alexandria and head towards Lindblum ending up meeting with Mr Con who thinks everyone is still stuck in Dali (which kind of serves him right for ditching everyone). Mr Con finds out about Zhurai giving SeeKeR a chance to turn the ship around...
oh look its hyping up a battle
Black waltz three the being that exists only to kill (Ha I said it) probably the more hyped up battle of the disc and the strongest of the three fights (Although everyone who has a weak Zidane or who doesn't wait for trance would argue for the first) any how shortly after the cut scene Drazerk and Zhurai are attacked by the black waltz causing the drazerk clones to come to their protection because apparently Mr Con and SeeKeR are just far too lazy to save the important characters starting up the third air ship cut scene.
NOOO NOT THE DRAZERK CLONES
Sacrificing themselves for me (Who wouldn't) the Drazerk clones all die causing Drazerk to go into a mad frenzy starting the boss music off long before the battle. Zhurai realizing just how useless she is in battle ends up flying the ship while SeeKeR and Mr Con try to catch up to Drazerk who is already killing the black waltz by himself.
Rule of life. Never piss Drazerk off.
Fight starts Drazerk goes into boss mode allowing double thunder. SeeKeR steals a linen cuirass which is useless and Mr Con is on spam potion duty as Zhurai is too lazy to avenge the Drazerk clones. Drazerk ends the fight just as his trance ends causing Zorn and Thorn to panic and jump off their air ship before black waltz goes into a mad frenzy and tries to destroy the cargo ship...
Now why couldn't I have done that in the battle...
Drazerk pretty much dead, the air ship about to crash and Mr Con basically doing nothing the group finally arrive in Lindblum meaning we have finally saved the princess... I think.
Why do I feel like I will end up visiting this place constantly for the next hour...
Lindblum is basically the only city in the entire game and the location of the synth shop unfortunately there is so many cut scenes on the first and second visits that prevent you from doing anything useful. Regardless Mr Con and Zhurai end up visiting the regent who turns out to be an Oglop ( Spoilers regarding how that happens inserted here ) causing Mr Con to attack the regent before Zhurai can stop him.
Oh so you will falcon punch an oglop but not the black watlzs?
On the other side of the city Seeker has been relegated to staying in a Inn while Drazerk is too busy wandering around to really care about the plot line any more. Anyway moving on to exploiting the synth system (Don't look at me like that if this was ff8 it would be the exact same with the junction system) using the wrists bought in dali and steeple hats bought in Lindblum to create cotton robes giving a 1400 gil profit each time (It takes sooooooooooooooo long to do this)
I really need to find a way to abuse this more without wasting time
I have broken the FF9 economy there is a lot of cut scenes and I think I may be out of sequence at this point but that is not really that important. Drazerk got a duku nut and found out about some animals being released in the city later. SeeKer was thrown out of the castle or something and ends up drinking in a bar where he ends up harassing the waitress and starting a brawl with everyone's favourite female rat...
Oh look its a dragon knight
Well with hassy being named it clearly shows he will eventually join the party at some point and possibly may save Drazerk during the hunt that keeps being mentioned by everyone. Regardless Seeker kills a guard, steals his clothes and then runs up the castle to meet Zhurai who was apparently missing or something.
Turns out Zhurai is actually snow white
SeeKer learns he isn't as good with women as he thinks he is and as a result enters the hunt to try and impress her and win a date. SeeKeR also ends up forcing Drazerk into the hunt for reasons I still don't understand.
Rewards for the hunt are basically
Hassy wins - Epic add on that absorbs thunder
SeeKer wins - Gold... which isn't needed any more
Drazerk wins - Card...... I just don't want to talk about this one (Its pretty impossible to have Drazerk or the nameless gourmet win the hunt so I have no idea what the card actually is)
With the stage set the game begins.
Who isn't rooting for me?
Drazerk starts in the shopping area
SeeKer in the theatre area
Hassy in the Industrial area
Unfortunately you have to play as SeeKeR even though we are rooting for Hassy to win however the event is one of two locations in the entire game where the following music takes place...
Best battle music ever
A hunter's chance started...
Take the tram to the theatre area...
Go to save old man from a Mu...
And then the Mu ruins it all
SeeKer's death to the mu allows the mu to kill Drazerk and everyone else taking part in the hunt causing Hassy to have the easiest win in the universe. Once the Mu is finally taken down the party get the Coral ring which Hassy will be using until later on in the game. It also turn out the fat queen murdered a bunch of rat people which basically moves the plot along enough for Zhurai to poison the entire party except for Mr con allowing them to escape to Treno meaning I don't have to use them again this disc!
With the party roster changing and Hassy joining the group the party set out to Gizamaluke's Grotto except I get side tracked with side quests at this point and decide to visit Qu's marsh which is where Drazerk's relative (Who was trying to eat Drazerk) was from. Upon entering the marsh we encounter two moogles I want to punch in the face for wasting my time before the Ice caverns as well as capturing a frog who we end up giving to a strange creature (Who we get to name!...)
Enter Yara Asha
Another character joining the party (You can actually skip having Asha in your party in disc 1 but that is pretty retarded considering she is the best character in the game) they end up leaving Qu's marsh in search of a freaking bridge I can never seem to find due to random encounters with Asha's damage out put is so random with her fork she is useless until we finally reach the Chocobo forest where the party obtain Choco a normal chocobo who can be called upon in the world map by feeding him Gysahl Greens ( Eats more than Asha does in the run )
Free chocobo!
Finally getting choco the party are able to ignore every random encounter on the mini map so the party decide the next logical course of action would be to go to some woods next to the bridge to the chocobo island place get off choco and get into a random encounter with some chestnut throwing plants. Drazerk and SeeKer meet their deaths to these vile creatures hassy kills two on his own while Asha spends her time eating one to learn the blue magic skill limit glove an ability that deals 9999 damage provided asha is on 1 hp which kind of sets the tone to how easy the next portion of the game is going to be.
Asha leveled up to level 5. Asha learned limit glove.
Asha obtaining the game break button our heroes run around aimlessly on Choco as they approach the Grotto laughing at all the random encounters that can no longer happen and realizing just how easy the game has now become.
This is going to be a trap isn't it...
Entering the scary dungeon and leaving Choco behind the group get into a rare random encounter which kills all the party bar hassy... Using the last of my phoenix downs because I am an idiot and never stock items the group is revived with Asha on 1 hp ( I may of exploited resetting the game to do that )
Going into the next room and returning to the first in order to steal two bells from a dead rat's corpse ( I can't even remember how your supposed to get the second bell normally any more ) the party meet Zorn and Thorn again who have sadly left their awesome music at home and forgotten about the party's existence. Regardless they send two black mages at the party which SeeKeR and hassy one shot because they are still overpowered. The party then play run away from the scary black mages while wondering why there are no longer any random encounters happening bumping into a moogle.
lol why on earth would I care about moogles
The moogle steals Drazerk's duku nut in order to free her husband leaving a bell to a room with a dead end except for some vines leading back onto the surface that any logical person would naturally assume is the way out of the dungeon and the fact that there is a save point means there is a boss the moment they get to the top of the vines...
What could possibly go wrong
Reaching the top of the vines the party get back onto the over world map and having no boss pop up the party naturally assume everything is ok and run out of the forest because the constant quiz master encounters are pretty annoying the party realize they are on a plateau and they should really open the map to find out where they are going when they get into a random encounter due to no Choco...
Look out its a dragon!
Grand dragons - level 60 generally hit for around 3000 - 5000 per hit and can wipe the entire party out in a single hit if unlucky. Luckily they are vulnerably to level 5 death unfortunately I couldn't be bothered getting it so Asha just uses limit glove twice (Which is really hard to pull off when the boss can basically one shot the party every turn) while Hassy protects Asha using cover from the linen cuirass obtained from black waltz 3 after getting a full heal from the grand dragon's thundaga thanks to the coral ring obtained after the hunt. Sadly SeeKeR and Drazerk both died and I have no more phoenix downs to revive them. On a much brighter note both Hassy and Asha levelled to 25 so I decided to tempt the RNG gods one last time and kill another grand dragon. This time Hassy died getting Asha up to level 30 which is basically useless apart from the endless amounts of MP on the bright side the party got 1 phoenix down to revive Hassy to cover Asha while she uses limit glove.
Moving literally 5 paces to the left once leaving the moogle room the party encounter a boss that Asha has to deal with using her limit glove killing it instantly before it even has time to react...
Limit glove OPA
The boss dies and the party magically gets a full heal (This is actually the worst part of the game as it means no limit glove going into Burmecia) while the game pans out and moves back to the southern gate Zhurai blew up with her awful airship driving.
We take a break from your regular broadcast to bring you a boring scene with MR con and Zhurai
There is basically a small break in the game at this point to just move Zhurai's plot line along showing the player that she and Con are in fact not heading towards Burmecia but to Alexandria to negotiate with the crazy queen to stop the invasion of the rat peoples land.
Buying phoenix downs for the other party...
The game is far too lazy to give separate inventories for different parties allowing me to restock on supplies from the shop before the cable cart cut scene where the game actually returns to being a game and not a soap opera about how useless Zhurai is.
The land of eternal random encounters
Burmecia the land of eternal rage quit. Seriously this place sucks with constant random encounters happening every step you make each one basically enough to kill your entire party if you haven't been exploiting grand dragons. Luckily they are all weak to blizzard magic and you get slow from a moogle shop further in the city once you get past Zorn and Thorn who insist on throwing Drazerk clones at the party even though hassy and SeeKeR one shot them while Asha and Drazerk AFK on the trip to the boss.
Just before heading to the Beatrix fight Hassy steals a new lance and Drazerk gets a magical hat that gives him super abusive slow magic (Name a single game where slow/haste isn't imbalanced) after this there is some plot development for hassy which is irrelevant since it doesn't even matter once you reach Cleyra (which apparently the king has fled to and you have to visit in disc 2) after all the cut scenes end the Beatrix fight starts.
The fight ended in three turns because she is an idiot and spammed thunder slash / shock on Hassy constantly healing and then damaging him causing Beatrix to get frustrated and send everyone to 1 hp because apparently that is the same as dying regardless of how I have been playing the game since leaving Lindblum...
QUICK ASHA USE LIMIT GLOVE
Oh look its a rushed character design!
With the cut scene ending disc one ends and this part of the story...
Final disc 1 notes:
Asha level 30
Hassy level 25
Drazerk level 9
Seeker level 5
Mrcon level 7
Zhurai level 3
Time taken to beat disc 1: 3:10
Final disc 1 notes:
Asha level 30
Hassy level 25
Drazerk level 9
Seeker level 5
Mrcon level 7
Zhurai level 3
Time taken to beat disc 1: 3:10