H'OKAY, SO.
Chapter Eight
Zidane and Garnet, and Vivi and Quina. Is there even any other way to do that?
See chapter title. I actually seem to get this on every playthrough but it can be phenomenally hard to get it from Hilgigars - did you?
Nooooooope. The steal success rate in this game is ridiculous. Well, for the good items, anyway. I can't think of any recent battles in which we've been able to steal what we most wanted from anyone
What do you think about Madain Sari and the Iifa Tree? I love the story in Madain Sari.
I like Madain Sari, and I like Eiko. She's so over the top and persistent and matter of fact, which I guess would come from being raised by moogles in the ruins of your home. But I've always liked the mix of seriousness in getting the hints of Garnet's past and silliness in Eiko's determination to make the perfect dinner to impress Zidane
Madain Sari is the kind of place that I would love to explore - ruins of a once proud city filled with secrets of magic and summoning - I'd love to see that Eidolon Wall up close, you know?
I've always found the Iifa Tree to be a bit creepy, to be honest. I do like, however, that Eiko is the only one who can hear the eidolon calling out to her. I've always thought that it was because she's been so much more in touch with the old summon magic that Garnet, and because her summoner horn is still intact. It just seemed to make sense to me.
We meet our final party member in this chapter. What do you think of him?
Ah, Amarant. Completely unnecessary and forgettable as a character. He has some really cool abilities that can make him a really good party member if you play him right and use him, but I just don't care about him. It's like the writers tried too hard to make him the brooding mysterious bad boy, hoping to intrigue the players, but I find it more annoying than anything. I know that he comes into your party when all you have is Zidane and a bunch of magic users who can't do a lot of physical damage, but honestly, you could get through the battles here without Amarant if you want to. Or heck, the developers could have just catered the enemies to the strengths of your current magical party and have eliminated whatever need they thought they had that Amarant was filling. Smeh.
What do you think about the story events that transpire in this chapter? Specifically towards the end?
I love it. I love that everything that we've been seeing escalate comes to a head here - Brahne thinks that she is in control, and wants to utilize ultimate power to continue her spree of destruction and control, and has everything flipped on her. Honestly, though, I've always thought I'd like it better if Brahne would have just died when Bahamut blasts apart her ship. Seriously, when does she have time to use her escape pod? The FMV certainly makes it look like she'd be toast. But I'd rather that happen than her pitiful "I see clearly now/remorse" moment with Garnet just before she dies. For me, I never see Brahne as the good mother that Garnet claims she was. The game starts off with her being batshit crazy, and so in my mind, she always has been. Her character design does nothing to help that perception of her. She's terribly ugly, terribly repulsive, so it's hard to imagine her as anything other than a terrible person. I'd rather believe that Garnet has always had a little bit of a Stockholm Syndrome thing going on concerning her "mother".
How are you finding the combat? Do you feel prepared enough level, equipment and ability-wise for the battles?
Yeah, I'm not having any troubles with combat. I feel like this game's ridiculously high encounter rate keeps your levels up where they need to be without having to go out of your way to grind. Now, if only the steal success rate were higher....
Chapter Nine
Alexandria is now stocked up with all the latest gear. How are you playing the equipment side of things? Focusing on power and defense or learning abilities?
Abilities definitely come first. Once someone has learned all of the abilities they have available to them in a certain item category, then we'll go on power/defense stats.
There's a great deal of character development going on in Alexandria - what do you make of Zidane's general attitude?
We see a different side to Zidane now, one which makes me feel bad for him, but at the same time, frustrates me. So you like her. So you miss her. So you want to talk things out with her. So you're conflicted. Get off your butt and go do it, stupid! I know that feeling these kinds of emotions must be a new thing for Zidane, but he's never seemed this cautious throughout the rest of the game. He's always kind of just pushed ahead, damn the consequences. Now he pauses? Guff.
Treno provides an opportunity to return to Dali and get the Mayor's Key, and the final coffee beans. This can only be done while the card tournament is happening, did you return?
Yes! Got the key and the coffee beans. I have to be honest, when the old man you give the coffee to said "I am ready to join my dearly departed wife now." I was incredibly afraid he was going to go jump off the cliff or something :X
There's a special scene with Vivi if you encourage him to visit home during his ATE and visit Quan's Dwelling, although doing this forfeits the opportunity for a rare Namingway Card - what did you tell him to do?
As we care more about Vivi's story than Tetra Master, we told him to go visit his old home
The weapon store fight club has a new monster - did you fight it?
Yup. Killed it in two hits, I believe
The second visit to Alexandria in this chapter is the very last opportunity to fight Tantarion in the castle library (He's a book sitting on top of one of the shelves) - You can steal a Demon's Mail from him and get the Running Shoes for winning the battle, which teaches you Auto-Haste. Did you do this?
We did! Of course, as I've previously mentioned, we had no luck stealing the Demon's Mail, and eventually just gave up and defeated him.
This chapter contains (IMO) one of the best FMV/story sequences in the game. What did you think of Alexander?
This is also one of my favorite FMVs in this game. Alexander is so freaking bitching, and I love the way he takes out Bahamut. I get really mad when he's defeated by Garland, though
thanks to Freya i could use regen on my team, which was really usefull sometimes. i teached her Chemistry, so she's now my second official healer (the first is Eiko). since i used a lot of potions and i hate being without a way to heal my party at one point I bought 30 or more hi potion, so i had 80 hi potions with me 