Part 17: Mission 17 – Operation Autumn Thunder, September 19th, 2005

Siege of Farbanti

Mission 17: Operation Autumn Thunder – September 19th, 2005


Overview: One year to the day since the start of the ISAF countstrike operation, the Allied Forces press into Farbanti, the capital city of the Federal Republic of Erusea. Their primary target is the Erusean military GHQ, codenamed the Hexagon. ISAF intends to smash the remaining Erusean war assets defending the Hexagon and force the Erusean military leadership to surrender.

As the battle to end the war rages below, Mobius 1 and Yellow 13 face each other one final time.



Guest Commentator: I am joined by yet another new commentator for this mission; the Patriarch of the First Church of Captain Matthews' Boozer Hat, the wonderful ScurvyKip. Kip is currently in the midst of a massive marathon LP covering the entirety of the Xenosaga franchise along with Unpronounceable, Daeren and a host of rotating additional guests (including me, once they get to Episode III).

After completing both Episode I and Episode II, Kip has now moved on to LPing Xenosaga Freaks, the weirdass compilation demo/visual novel/fanservice bullshit game Namco put out between I and II, instead of just moving on to Episode III. I don’t know why.

Probably Stockholm Syndrome.





FARBANTI

The capital city of the Federal Republic of Erusea. Nestled on Erusea’s western coastline, it is the farthest westward city on the Usean mainland and the second largest city in Erusea after the port metropolis of Anchorhead.

Of all the inhabited areas on Usea, Farbanti suffered perhaps the greatest damage from the impact of the Ulysses 1994XF04 asteroid on July 3rd, 1999. A particularly large fragment, which Stonehenge failed to intercept, struck off the coast of Farbanti’s downtown Municipal District, killing or injuring thousands of peoples and permanently altering the landscape of the Erusean capital.

A full quarter of the city was left permanently flooded by the impact and rendered uninhabitable. The Erusean economy was crippled instantly as its major financial sectors were flooded out and its downtown core was evacuated. All efforts to erect a sea wall and drain the flooded districts have so far proved unsuccessful. The flooded crater left in asteroid fragment’s wake was officially named Ryker Crater and has become a tragically iconic fixture of Farbanti’s coastline.

The city is bifurcated by the Silver River, which drains out into the Spring Sea near the flooded Municipal District. The country’s de facto capital building, the Erusean Ministry of Defense Headquaters, informally referred to as the Hexagon, sits atop an artificial island, one of several carefully sculpted landfills that make up the city’s coastline. As ISAF advances into Farbanti, the Erusean military command, including its Supreme Commander, Field Marshal [NAME REDACTED] and his immediate family, have hunkered down within the Hexagon to await what appears to be the inevitable at this point.


Also, if you look at the cover art for the Ace Combat 04 Original Soundtrack down there below, you'll see clearly now that it depicts an aerial reconnaissance photograph of the flooded district of Farbanti and Ryker Crater. This mission has been prefigured all the way since the start of the LP as the photo on the soundtrack is clearly labeled "FARBANTI / ERUSEA - 19 SEPTEMBER 2005 - SIEGE OF FARBANTI" for anyone who was looking for it.



FARBAUTI

Ace Combat returns again to the realm of Norse mythology for the namesake of the city of Farbanti, the giant/god Fárbauti. Fárbauti is a jötunn (frost giant) and is the husband of Laufey and father of Loki. He is nicknamed the cruel striker, and is associated with lightning and wildfire, which is often sparked by lightning strikes.

In Shattered Skies Fárbauti is feminized into Farbanti by flipping the U into an N. Fárbauti doesn’t really appear all that often in Norse myth, and in the major published works is really just a character referenced by other characters and always in relation to Loki, never on his own.

One of Saturn’s moons (S/2004 S 9) is named Farbauti, and is a part of the “Norse Group”, a collection of moons named after Norse figures which fall in a certain distance range from Saturn itself. You’ll recall back in “Invincible Fleet” that one of these moons shares a name with Aegir. The largest moon in this group is actually Phoebe, named after the Greek titan. It was discovered, however, before the Norse Group naming convention was agreed upon by the scientific community.

In recent years, there’s been some slight confusion over Fárbauti’s gender, thanks in large part to of all things Marvel comics. In the Marvel universe (both in print and on screen), Laufey is presented as a male and is Loki’s biological father while Fárbauti (who only appears in the comics so far) is Loki’s biological mother.



ENDGAME

So we did it. The war’s over. So how come there’s still one more mission left?

Although the Erusean military has officially surrendered to ISAF, a complete cessation of hostilities has yet to be declared. Pockets of Erusean resistance remain scattered across Usea, and it may be some time yet before peace is fully restored to the continent. But that will be up to the rest of ISAF to put down in time.

From here, the FCU and Independent States begin the road to rebuilding and recovery from two years of Erusean occupation. Just as the reformation of the Allied Forces into ISAF helped keep Usea from falling apart into chaos under the threat of Erusean aggression, further safeguards must be enacted to ensure that war never engulfs the Usean continent ever again. And if it does, let it be limited to happening in a simulation that’s not even really canon any more, or against those fucking Osean bastards or something.

With the Erusean military commanders detained or dead and the Erusean Supreme Commander having committed suicide rather than face the consequences of Erusea’s invasion actions, rule of the Federal Republic will now be returned to its people. As the Erusean civilian leadership returns from exile to form a provisional government in preparation for a national plebiscite, ISAF hopes its operations within the Erusean homeland will be wrapped up by the end of 2005. Restoration of diplomatic relations between Erusea and the FCU will follow in due time. The more liberal-minded members of the FCU parliament have made rumblings of even welcoming the now-“free” Erusea into the ISAF alliance, a gesture currently derided in popular opinion as either too soon or too gauche for the current political climate with the lingering hostilities between the two super powers (replete with allegations of ISAF’s “occupation” or “subjugation” of Erusean territory already).

Regardless, the fate of Erusea now lies in the hands of its people. They will now choose their own way forward, free of any fear of repression from a tyrannical military that had grown out of control in the wake of catastrophe.

Let’s just hope they don’t do something stupid like elect a fucking monarchy. How dumb would that be?



THE ASSASINATION OF DAVE JORDAN BY THE COWARD [NAME REDACTED]

Now you know why I titled the thread “Mobius 1 Ruined My Childhood.” We have, in rapid succession as Mobius 1, basically killed the Storyteller Boy’s surrogate family. The Storyteller Boy and Mobius 1’s narratives are now inseparably linked at this point.

Why the Storyteller Boy (and the Barkeep’s Daughter, as revealed in the post-mission cutscene) followed Yellow 13 to Farbanti is ultimately a mystery, thanks to the game’s minimalistic storytelling. We can only paw at theories for his actions following his ill-fated final confrontation with 13 the night before the liberation of San Salvacion.

Was he trying to follow 13 in the hopes of reconciling with him, beyond all impossible odds? Had he come to sympathize with the Eruseans (or at least Yellow Squadron) so much that falling in with them as they retreated toward Farbanti just felt like the natural thing to do in the advance of the “enemy” ISAF? What reason did the Barkeep’s Daughter have in going with him? To protect him? To make amends with 13 herself? Out of loyalty or even love for the boy? We’ll never know.

The simplicity of the surface narrative over the swirling mass of complexity of the metanarrative of Shattered Skies is rife for interpretation and speculation. Because the story takes place from such a calculatedly narrow perspective, a lot of things that would give us a clearer picture of what “really” happened are simply out of reach to us as an audience because they happen outside the purview of the narrator. It’s a theme Project Aces likes to revisit (something we originally touched on in Ace Combat Zero), the idea of objective reality vs. biased perception, something that Ace Combat 7 is set to further explore. For example, there is the legitimate question of “Is Yellow 13 actually dead?” He could have easily ejected to safety before his plane exploded and the Storyteller Boy would never have seen it. We never actually get any real proof beyond a symbolic signifier (4’s fluttering handkerchief = a dead motherfucker).

Though regardless of whether 13 survived or not, this could be taken metaphorically in that either way, 13 is dead to the Storyteller Boy because by now he has matured to the point where he doesn’t need a figure in his life like 13 anymore. His character arc is complete, and thus his “journey” alongside Yellow 13 has come to an end with 13’s death, actual or inferred, in the skies over Farbanti.

Now, before I get any lip from anyone, I am not one of those “Everything is connected!” theory nuts. I may be welding parts of this franchise together with my own flesh as solder in some parts for dramatic effect, but even I have my limits on fanwanky bullshit. It’s a fine line.

Anyway, the takeaway from this penultimate vignette for now should be a single question. Now that Yellow 13 is dead… Who’s the Storyteller Boy narrating all this to?



“YO BUDDY, YOU STILL ALIVE?”

This is one the spots where doing the Ace Combat games in chronological order has its advantages. We’ve now, barring a few exceptions, more or less caught up with the frame narrative half of Ace Combat Zero.

Osea, Sapin, Ustio, and Yuktobania have just finished marking the 10th anniversary of the end of the Belkan War and the era of international peace and cooperation it ushered in (Osea’s bullshit meddling in Usean politics notwithstanding). Belka also marks the anniversary though in a more solemn manner than its victorious neighbors.

In commemoration of the war, a young reporter from the Osean Broadcasting Company sets out to compile a documentary on the ace pilots who helped shape the course of that war and hopefully track down a certain pivotal pilot, the Ustian mercenary known only as Cipher, and reveal the hidden truth about the A World With No Boundaries terrorist attack on the city of Lumen on Christmas Day of 1995.

At this point in 04’s timeline, Brett Thompson has already met with and interviewed Erich Hillenberand (Schnee 1) and Rainer Altman (Gelb 2) in Jackson Hill, Osea, and Directus, Ustio, and is about to head back to Oured, Osea to interview Dominic Zubov (Schwarze 1) before heading across the Belkan border to meet with the majority of his interview subjects in Belka itself over the back half of September 2005 and into October 2005.

In the midst of these events, Larry “Solo Wing Pixy” Foulke, Cipher’s former wingman and former member of the A World With No Boundaries terrorist organization, is currently on the ground fighting as a member of the ISAF army’s volunteer foreign mercenary division. Foulke has been listed as “Missing, Presumed Deceased” by both the Ustian Air Force (his last official employer) and the Osean Air Defense Force for the last ten years following the aborted Osean Allied Forces Operation Ravage on June 6th, 1995—the day of the Seven Pillars nuclear strike by the Belkan army on its home soil.

Foulke’s involvement with AWWNB, his attempt to launch an SBMF V2 nuclear MIRV, and his clash with Cipher during the Allied Forces’ Operation Point Blank on December 31st, 1995, were stricken from all public records of the Avalon Dam assault mission by the OADF, UAF, and the Sapin and Yuktobanian Air Forces. As far as the Osean government believes, Lawrence Foulke died on December 31st, 1995 when his ADFX-02 Morgan exploded over Avalon.

Having actually survived his final encounter with Cipher, and walking away from Avalon with a new perspective on life and regret over his actions in AWWNB, Foulke assumed a new identity and returned to his old life as a mercenary vagabond, drifting from one battlefield to the next, only this time on a soul-searching mission, rather than in search of a cynical paycheck. He eventually landed on Usea, and joined the Independent States Allied Forces’ foreign legion under a set of forged credentials, electing to serve in its ground forces rather than as a pilot. He had sworn off ever returning to a cockpit after Avalon. And as ISAF pushed westward to retake the continent from Erusean occupation, Foulke advanced with them.

His ISAF peacekeeping unit is currently stationed in a city near the Delarus-Erusea border, charged with suppressing any hostile activity from the Erusean remnants now trapped behind ISAF’s frontlines.

67 days from now, his old life will catch up with him in Delarus, as Brett Thompson tracks him down one cold November day to ask him a few questions about his old “buddy”.



THREAD CHALLENGE: Come up with a theory on where the fuck Cipher is right now. You heard my theory of “Phoenix is actually Alberto Lopez who fled to Usea to get the fuck away from Marcella” from the last LP. Now it’s your turn! The best Cipher theory will win a brand new avatar paid for Sworn Enemy of Ace Combat Artix.



THE TERRIBLE SECRET OF LET’S PLAY

So, by now, nigh on four games into this grand experiment and with nearly 10 other LPs that I’ve either helmed or co-authored in my CV, you all know me by now. You know I’m not the kind of person to bitch about the difficulties of Let’s Playing games unless they’re too hilarious not to share or unless the future of the LP is impacted and I’m keeping you abreast of any potential changes to my workflow.

This is a special case, simply because of the utter dick-slapping nightmare hell that recording Farbanti degenerated into by the time I just finally gave up. So, settle in as I recount to you for the sake of my on catharsis a true LPing disaster scenario.

Round Zero: After finishing “Session 2” of my recording run through the game, I gave Farbanti a very effort before Yellow Squadron kicked my ass and decided it was time to call it a night. Because 04 does something that no other modern Ace Combat does, or rather it DOESN’T do something.

It doesn’t Checkpoint Save.

So faced with the prospect of having to rerun an already 20+-minute long mission several times at the end of a what was by then a 3 hour recording session at 1:00 AM, I decided to put the game up for the night, end the recording, and come at it again fresh in a day or two. Had I only known…

Round One: Now here’s where everything starts going off the rails. After a few buggered runs, I finally get what I considered to be a near-perfect run of Farbanti in the can, plus a fairly decent run at the final level. I breathe a massive sigh of relief as I put the controller down and let the credits role. Barring the bits and bobs for the finale, I am DONE with Ace Combat 04.

Well, hold on there, motherfucker.

Turns out, and this is literally the only time this has ever happened to me in my 3, going on 4 years of LPing; the footage for “Session 3” was completely corrupted. Dropped frames, stuttering audio, just a mess of garbage. Not only was the output footage fucked, but the actual source footage captured by the Elgato was ruined too.

Round Two: Now, going back and recording both Farbanti and Mission 18 via Free Mission seems easy on its head, only the ending cutscene, end credits, and special briefing for Mission 18 don’t play in Free Mission mode.

So what I ultimately had to do was replay through the whole game in New Game+ to get these specific pieces of footage for these two videos, going through and taking out all the Named Aces along the way. This footage turned out fine. –Keep this part in mind—

Round Three: So because there were certain things I recorded during the NG+ run that I wanted to save for the Finale videos, I wanted to go back and redo Farbanti and Mission 18 in Free Mission mode and then sandwich the actual “clean” missions into the interstitial footage. I’ve done this before in other games. I’m generally quite good at covering my tracks when it comes to stitching footage together so I don’t come across like a total incompetent fuckup.

Again, I get another damn-near perfect run of Farbanti on video. The problem this time? OBS fucked around with the sound settings on the Elgato when I was recording Forza Horizon, so the game audio was recorded at such a high volume that there was not one second of usable audio in the video. Everything was clipping.

I’m starting to lose my patience at this point.

Round Four: Time to redo Farbanti again.

I boot up game, and my PS3 crashes and Yellow Light of Deaths in the middle of the briefing screen for Farbanti. Not only is the console functionally dead, but the Ace Combat 04 disc is stuck inside it now too.

Off to the repair shop!

Round Five: Three days later, the PS3 is fixed and is working fine (it YLOD’d again yesterday but I’m done recording footage on it, the remainder of the bonus material for 04 and the entirety of 5 will be done on the PS2 again, unless it magically unfucks itself or I find another cheap backwards compatible PS3 out there to burn through).

Time to redo Farbanti again.

4 runs, can’t beat Yellow Squadron, like at all.

Fuck it. I’m done.




Aircraft featured in Mission 17: Operation Autumn Thunder


V-22 Osprey
Manufacturer: Bell Helicopter & Boeing
Role: VTOL troop transport
Manufactured: 1988–present
Status: In service
Primary Operators: United States
Quick Facts:

• Appears exclusively in Ace Combat 04, in this mission and this mission only.
  
• Designed after the failed rescue attempt of the US Embassy hostages from Iran in 1980. (see the Canadian Caper write up from Escort)
  
• Designed specifically to be a quick action VTOL troop transport platform.
  
• As a tiltrotor aircraft it can perform both vertical and short take-offs and landings (V/STOL).
  
• Operated by both the US Air Force and Marine Corps.
  
• Officially entered service in 2007.
  
• Saw a similar production boondoggle as the F-35 did over its cost, capabilities, and operational safety.
  
• So far seven Ospreys have crashed resulting in 36 total fatalities.
  
• Has nearly 3x the operational radius of the Boeing Vertol CH-46 Sea Knight, a Chinook variant (which it ultimately replaced).
  
• While only operated by the United States at the moment, India, Israel, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates have considered orders for V-22s. Japan currently has 5 VTOLs under order.
  
• Named after the Osprey, a member of the raptor family also known as the sea hawk, among other names.
  

Halley

• Plane: F-15S/MTD
  
• Mission 17
  
• Spawn conditions: Appears along the Farbanti coastline in the north-west portion of the map. Disappears after the mission update.

Tracks featured in Mission 17:

DISC 2

• 9. Farbanti
  

Farbanti, during and after Ulysses Day:



And from the ACES AT WAR artbook:



Yellow 13's Su-37 Flanker on the ground in San Salvacion.