Part 48: Winnable Boss Battles

Since the music in this update is changing constantly, I thought I'd just leave a few choices here at the start and you can pick.

Iconoclasm (Machina Arma boss theme)

Evidential Material (not Machina Arma boss theme)

The Borders of Wind and Earth (overworld theme)







Our first stop is the Cloudvents. How long has it been since we've been to Diadem, anyway? We'll be bouncing around old locales a lot in the upcoming updates.





This vent really screwed me over. I think it took me about five minutes to get past it. I'm hoping future events don't make me come back here (though I'm pretty sure they will).







Video: Nasca


The groundwork for promachination is all but complete. Only one step remains before the deed is done. Machina will dominate this continent. Diadem, Land of the Clouds? Hehehehehe. There won't be any clouds! Only machina, machina, machina! The same goes for Sadal Suud and Anuenue. The whole Sky will be under Tarazed's control!

Tarazed?! What's that?

Alfard's greatest achievement! A fortress that will change the world! Hehehehehehe.

The hell it will! This has to end, Nasca! Starting with you!





Sagi undergoes his Malideiter Power Up Sequence, and the boss fight begins.

(malideiter is really hard to spell, by the way).





All right, time to fight Nasca's arma again. This fight is really unusual and to be honest I still don't completely understand it. The closest I can come is to say that it's kind of like what the Holoholobird fight would be if it weren't a total nightmare.





First off, there are three constant targets; two cannons and the main arma. The cannons just pluck away 250-500 damage per turn, and honestly it's probably best to just ignore them, but I decided to be fancy and give Guillo its string of hit-all water specials to deal with the cannons while also dealing with the body. It was a good idea, although I think in practice it didn't really work that great.





Nasca can still nail us with a Plasma Cannon for about 800 damage, which is kind of lame compared to what it used to do (relative to our HP of course). It still knocks everyone over and that's annoying, and since the cannons pile on damage on top of it it's still sort of vaguely threatening, but honestly I didn't find it to be that bad.





The bizarre part of the fight occurs when Nasca opens the cockpit. This makes the cockpit a target...





...but when I had Milly attack it, her attacks simply did nothing. They didn't do zero damage – they simply did nothing at all. I don't really know what to make of that.

Anyway, when the cockpit is open it will spend turns healing/reviving the other parts. The heal is for a good 1600 HP so it can be a real problem if he heals the body, except that it's impossible to tell which part he's healing and I don't know if it even heals the body to begin with and aaaaaaaargh





Meanwhile, Guillo's specials DO hit the cockpit, which approximates the point where I stopped trying to make sense of this boss fight.

Anyway, I finally wizened up and just focused all of my offense on the main body.





(that's code for “I used The Apotheosis”)

Incidentally, The Godling's Rapture auto-crits against the Machina Vanguard crew. So that makes an already overpowered attack even more so.







One of my biggest gripes with this series (and to Gamecube JRPGs in general)is how clunky cutscene battles can be. Earlier events got by okay by having the Cutscene Damage dealt at the end of battles, but such is not the case this time; Sagi flies up to the tank, delivers one slash to it or perhaps to the air in front of it, and that's the extent of the action.





We did it, Sagi! We defeated the machina arma!

Huff, huff, huff...It's not over! Nasca's still in there!





It can't be! No, no, no! Machina arma are invincible! They can't be destroyed!

Sorry we had to break your toy. I suggest you run before we decide to break YOU.

I'm not r-running! If I ran...my brother would never let me live it down!





All right. If that's what you want...Get ready, Nasca!





The fight against vanilla Nasca is as easy as you might expect. I even decided to make The Apotheosis off-limits just to demonstrate how I can steamroll him without needing my superattack.





This is the most damage Nasca can do. That's simply unacceptable damage output for a boss. Of course, the whole point is to show that, while Nasca is a semi-competent fighter, he's totally outclassed by this point. Indeed, I'd say the entire point of this section/update is to demonstrate how Sagi, once constantly fighting one-sided battles where he was the loser, is now capable of absolutely devastating the very same enemies who humiliated him before. It's as cathartic as it sounds.





Anyway, I make up for lacking Apotheosis by having Guillo punch an iceberg into Nasca's face.





And our reward for killing Nasca is this piece of equipment for Guillo. It has some solid parameters and I might look into upgrading it, but let's set that aside for now and move on.







Time to take on Heughes – this time without aid from Palolo's impossibly durable forearms.

(am I the only one who thinks it would have been cool to have an optional superboss battle against Palolo? Possibly with Gib and Kahn backing him up?)


Well...Is it just me? You look a little more fierce than the last time I saw you.







Video: Heughes


Forget your magic words. They can't save you now! Come, Sagi! Let's finish this for good!

Like you had to ask! You're on, Heughes!





In contrast to Nasca's bizarro battle, Promachina Heughes is pretty much the same as before.





He still hits like a truck with his super rocket punch of fiery death, but his standard attacks aren't quite as impressive. He also still has to charge said punch, so we have time to dig up healing/revival magnus before he uses it.





Moving on...





This animation is also quite silly. Sagi basically delivers three or four holy punches and Heughes reacts accordingly, namely by staggering about and getting knocked to the ground.


Eh heh heh...You must feel good...now that you've beat me. But it's too late. The Empire still has Tarazed! Even if you stop promachination of the islands, it won't mean a thing.

What? Why not??!

Agh! You'll soon...see.

Is he asking for another fight?!


Heughes pulls himself back up to his feet.





Fine. Let's put an end to this. Get ready, Heughes!







Heughes sans Promachina is pretty much just a nerfed version of the last fight. He is a bit more dangerous than his baby brother, but he still can't really stand up to us anymore.

Again, I decided against using Apotheosis. Instead, there's something else I've been wanting to do for several updates now, and I finally can...





FLY!





FLAIL!





AND SLAUGHTER!





Damn, that was fun. Anyway, this is our reward for killing Heughes. Again, it's a solid weapon for Milly that might be worth upgrading.





Ahh, everything's pretty again.

I'm sure you all can figure out where the road leads us next...







Whoops, detour. I just happened to remember this guy had something to share if we visited him later.

It was magna mix recipes. Not worth it. Moving on.







Well, hello again, ghost boy. Or should I start calling you wicked-god-boy now?





Video: Valara


This has to stop, Valara! First promachination, then you pull out the wings of innocent people! You think you can do all that right in front of me and I'll just let it slide?!

Ooh, such fire. But even if you keep machina from spreading in a couple of places, we still have Tarazed.


In case you didn't guess, you can do these fights in any order, and each one has to allow for the fact that you're learning about Tarazed for the first time. I think there's an extra snippet of dialogue for whichever one you do first that's removed from the other two.

Also, I don't think I made it clear, but these fights are all optional. Now then, back to the game.


You sure you want to waste your time stopping promachination?

Very sure!

Well, you've got nerve. I always liked that about you. Come on, then. If you're aching for a fight, I promise I won't let you down!







Valara's fight is also fairly similar to the previous battle with her. That said, it's also probably the hardest of the three.





I believe the correct response to this is “fucking ow”





Valara also can go into Hurricane Stance and use Hurricane punch for a few turns. Thankfully, in this fight she only used it twice.







It's juuuust strong enough to kill Guillo in one shot. Thankfully, Sagi is tough enough to survive the other hit.





I said in the last update that The Apotheosis is holy based, but I'm not actually sure that's true...it might change element according to the weapon Sagi has equipped. It has a fiery effect here, and when I was using the Siren Sword it had an ice effect. Regardless, it kills stuff dead.





What's going on?! It...It's like you're a different person!


This cutscene battle is significantly less silly. Sagi just uses his normal Godling's Rapture animation.





Valara manages to leap clear of the explosion, and a new cutscene begins.


So that's the wicked god's power. I...can't move my right hand.

Tell me, Valara. Why do you go along with promachination? When we were in the Dark Service together, you looked out for me. I thought you were a good person. What happened?

Work is work. I'd give up everything it means to be a woman to finish the job. That's just the life I've chosen. ...Got it? Now let's finish what we started.





All right. Let's finish it. Get ready, Valara!







Even without her arma, Valara can dish out some okay damage, and even on foot she's probably to most dangerous of the lot. But, as usual, she just doesn't pose a serious threat without her machina arma.





Rest in peace, Valara. You could be a real bitch, but I liked you anyway.





And our reward for killing Valara is the Arondite. Now to look into how to make this a superweapon to rival the Flameking...