Zeltennia Castle and Delita

Now it's a gorgeous FMV with Delita and Ramza in the church, speaking of important things, of course. I think I would die of happiness to see a movie of Tactics in this form. Although I wonder why they still use Ramza's chapter 3 armor instead of his blue and white butt-pad armor in chapter 4.

My thoughts on the plot so far? Delita is still being vague in his words, but I believe he thinks more of Teta than of Ovelia while contemplating his quest. (Poor Ovelia.) And even though Ramza knows his life is forfeit at Delita's hands, even knowing what lengths Delita would take to bring down the dueling nobility and the corrupted church, he remains so very polite. They seem to trust each other even knowing that they may cross swords in the future, and when Balmafula gives Delita some apple-sass after the battle, I sense that Delita may have some regrets. But not enough for him to give up.

Of course the battle in which we finally kill Zalmour, that was a cinch. Now it's off to save/recruit Orlandeau and all that. Exciting!

"Dispose of Mustadio!"

Worker 7 get, yaaaay! Oh man, that cutscene always cracks me up! Ramza's panic is just so hilarious.

On another note, I also obtained the Tynar Rouge in the Agrias subquest. Mustadio is a darling. I do wonder if he actually has a crush on Agrias or something, it's adorable in either case. But you know, I think everyone loves Agrias.

Beowulf is hoss

On my way to get Beowulf!!! What a studly stud.

First, I fought the battle with 7 chemists. Easy enough with Beowulf in my party. I pretty much just rushed them, stole a couple of Lambent Hats (what were there original names?) I suppose. Chemists armed with guns are annoying, I must admit, but not so hard.

The second battle at Gollund, I decided to get Agrias, a summoner and an orator in my party. This made it extremely difficult when the chemist with the Glacial Gun dealt icy death from above while the Behemoth King rampaged below, but I struggled along, healing and often raising! At last I enticed the Behemoth King in (because I didn't get to with Luso's battle) and snatched the Glacial Gun away. With no help from Beowulf might I add, always raising his faith for some reason.

My brother has already fought the third battle and tells me it will be a challenge full of defending and enticing. Whooo?

Meliadoul, then Balthier! Hot!

That Meliadoul is a sassy girl, completely immune to Ramza's cuteness. But then again, most of the females in this story are. They're clearly not like me! Anyways, that battle at Bervenia kicked my butt all over the place and then kicked my face in as well. I decided to just gun for Meliadoul and to hell with stealing or whipping up on the other female soldiers. The rend ability in the hands of the enemy is so much more powerful than it is in your hands! I guess it wasn't a good idea having everyone on weak jobs for a story battle, hah. I keep thinking the AI will be dumber than it really is.

Then it was time to introduce the sexy "leading man," Balthier! His entrance FMV was super smooth, but I was really impressed by the animation of Ramza fighting the thugs. So pretty and elegant, if you can believe that. *cuddles Ramza some more*

And what can I say, Balthier certainly beats Mustadio on all counts of usefulness. Sorry, Mustadio! The battle was fairly easy and Ramza got to steal the 2 new items while Balthier blasted every enemy away into oblivion.

Poaching finally yielded a holy lance, which I use with much glee!!! But my behemoths are sterile and haven't breeded anymore, while my chocobos drop eggs every few days.

Chapter 3: The Valiant

At last, we find out why this chapter was called "The Valiant."

Second battle at Riovanes: defeating Wiegraf as Belias, the blue and white ram using the Aries stone. That was a while ago so I don't remember exactly what I did, but it included Ramza versus Wiegraf, mano e mano. Ramza had to keep running just out of reach of Wiegraf's wicked holy sword skills to heal, all that while dealing as much damage as possible. Then after Belias was summoned, my team had to deal with 4 arch demons as well. Again, I used Agrias and a monk to deal the damage, but with such power-houses, I was able to silence Belias (mwa hah!) and take down the demons quickly.

The scene where Isilud speaks with Alma about his regret was sad. Of course I'd feel pretty regretful after I've been gutted alive, I suppose. But then Alma gets kidnapped again! Wow, way to go, Alma, way to inconvenience your loving brother.

Third battle at Riovanes, now that was a challenge. I was wondering how the hell can I defeat all three of these undead bastards and keep Rapha alive when my brother reminded that all I had to do was bring one of the assassins down to critical before they would all teleport away like cowards. Duh. Anyways, the second try Agrias dealt the final blow while Ramza lay on the rooftops, dead. See how I keep depending on Agrias? She is pretty much my staunchest warrior, at least until Cid joins, I guess.

I was thinking that these zodiac stones are actually pretty evil for bringing Malak back to life. I mean, who wants him?!!! I know I don't! Why don't they bring Isilud back to life? He's way more useful.

But now we're in Chapter 4, where the action will be coming fast and furious! Quest to fill, characters to recruit, skins to poach! The shit will be hitting the windmill, that's for sure!

Malak and Rafa!!!

Note: READ PREVIOUS ENTRY if you haven't already!

Oh man, the exploding frog always surprises me!

Anyways, fixing to get me the two most useless characters in the game, Malak and Rafa. I don't hate them, but man, it is difficult to justify keeping them in your battle party. Who here keeps Malak and Rafa? My brother always gets rid of Malak and keeps Rafa for treasure hunting purposes. I believe Squenix upped their heaven and hell abilities in the PSP version, though, so maybe they'll be more useful. Still, Rafa killed one of my warriors who was caught in the mantra range in the first battle against Malak. Ungrateful!

I do love how Ramza's super helpfulness. He always tries to save everyone, even complete strangers. I mean, that's how you get new members, am I right? I thought Rafa was especially insightful in how she says Ramza isn't just out to honor his family name, but to correct what's wrong in the world, to the best of his ability. That's the charisma of a true-born leader for you. Plus it doesn't hurt that my battle party has about 300k gold in their pockets.

Does anyone else think Orran and Malak and Rafa come from the same ethnicity? I haven't played the other games (namely XII or Vagrant Story), but I don't know the name of the darker-skinned ethnicity in Ivalice. Is that even significant? *shrugs shoulders* I mean, there are no numou or viera around...

Insanity at Orbonne Monastery pt. 1

Urgh, last night I started the first round at Orbonne Monastery and it was killer! I had to restart a couple of times because I stupidly left some characters equipped with random "optimize" items. Finally I forced myself to stick with the battle and eventually won with everyone intact.

First off, the 3 dragoons were seriously powered up with mythril spears and of course, my healers kept on dying in one blow even though we were several levels ahead. Not just that, but one of them kept charming Agrias and making her do Judgment Blade on us. Good thing Ramza knocked some sense back into her with some shurikens. And you know what, I never use time mages myself, but they have some irritating spells that almost always work on my team. Grah!!!

Slowly but steady, healing and reviving at every turn, I managed to get rid of the time mages and chemist. Ramza and my white mage successfully ganked some nice armor while Agrias went around and collected crystal abilities, hah hah. Overall, I admit the AI was a worthy challenger. Looking forward to fighting Isilude and Wiegraf in the next battles.


He looks pretty fabulous with his fur sleeves, hah hah. Good old Gaff, I liked his attitude, all full of sassafrass. But a failure in the end.

"She saved my life, you know..."

Tietra Heiral. I had originally intended this to be an artblog as well, so I am trying to memorialize as many of the characters as I can, in my own... unique... style. I clearly need to plan my pictures out better.

Celestial Stasis!

Just finished the battle at Gollund in which you have to protect Orran. I kinda botched this one up and missed stealing the orichalcum. At least I managed to get the mythril guns and avant gauche. My problem seems to be that Ramza as an Aries has terrible compatibility with every enemy in the entire game, ever. And I should have increased the jump of my team, since I knew it was going to be a roof battle. Oh well!

Story-wise, I like Orran (why did they change the spelling?!), but this battle always amused me for being kinda... pointless, at least at first. I guess it was important that Orran meet Ramza at least once, before the epilogue happened and all.

Chapter 1: The Meager

Finished chapter 1 last night. That battle with Argath was grueling, I still don't understand the utter and shameful weakness of my buffed up characters. But trying to steal items always makes an easy battle much more difficult.

The CG movie afterwards was lovely but rather anticlimactic. I seemed to recall the original explosion at Fort Zeakden having much more impact. But that may have just been a first impression and possibly a sound quality issue on the handheld console.

The dialogue throughout the battle was pretty damn heartbreaking. Argath's reasoning and constant barrage against Ramza and Delita sounded just as cold and callous as it did the first time I played the battle, especially when you consider he is only 16 or 17 years old and not even a knight. But then, he did have a shameful past to compensate for. And alas, Delita's anger with Ramza, TEARS.

Homage to Mileuda Folles, it was especially sad having to kill her.

Milleuda Folles

I like the translation of the two Milleuda battles, the exchange between Delita, Milleuda and Ramza flows a little better now. Do you think Milleuda and Wiegraf are low-born knights or high-born? They do talk so very posh, it seems out of place with their supposedly low-born background. Not that I'm expecting some Shakespearean-fool accents, but clearly some of the truly low-born characters have been speaking in a very rough dialect with contractions and rude epithets whatnot. I am inclined to think that the Folles siblings were middle class knights now thrust into poverty, clinging to some past dignity.

I don't know about you, but even at 5 levels past the enemies, my thieves and monks keep getting slaughtered. I only managed to steal a couple of things from Milleuda, it was that devastating. I also realized that a couple of my characters, the mages, had really crappy brave/faith stats (after I leveled them to 11) so I had to dismiss one male (I always hate that) and put the female down the crazy job class path. Cursed brave/faith and zodiac compatabilities! At least there aren't judges and laws, sheez.

Well, this isn't my perfect game, the only purpose was to go through the storyline and see all the new cutscenes, goodies and classes. That's what I keep telling myself, anyways...