Part 26: Awesome Games Done Slowly

Fresh off the holidays and a cool Awesome Games Done Quick that I mostly missed, we're here to raid an ancient castle!



There were only three character votes so dealer's choice was Ukyo, as Tools is a good command.



We take a quick stop at the Solitary Island to grab Palidor, as I'm a dope and forgot it this whole time.



Cure 3 and Haste 2 are pretty good, actually! Only Sakura can equip it which is mostly fine. They have a low Magic stat but at least they have the Magic Command.

Also I ground out another 9 Cursed Shields into Paladin Shields so we have 10 of those now.

Also I didn't pay attention to who had what spells before I got into the cave. No one has any cure spells for Float. Oops.



It's honestly impressive that Edgar engineered a castle to take a predetermined path that works even in the apocalypse, with just a single lever pull.



There's also a single entrance and exit for all the underground places. Very impressive.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5txKx6bRbg
Secret of Mana - Leave Time For Love

We found a weird cave system!



Monster in a box! Nepher is supposed to be in the Final Dungeon and drops Fixed Dice though I didn't get any from this fight. Wrai are encountered in the Final Dungeon AND Hidon's Cave. They drop something pretty good.



It's their common AND rare drop!



I don't know if that purple thing is suppose to be a balloon they're riding or what.



Hidden underground castles with functioning moats are super cool.



Most of the monsters here are also in the Final Dungeon but they're not really that bad. So far.



Oh no! Not the nudist soldiers!



Kinda strange that the way the developers decided to explain this location was to have whatever character is in front of your party (assuming they can talk) explain the history of the castle. It was part of the War of the Magi, 1,000 years ago. Odin gets turned to stone by this person.



Wi has 1100~ HP and Yaki has 3900~ and they die to a stiff breeze. Not sure why they ended up in this area.



Finally, something with over 10k HP!



Vanilla KatanaSoul chest!




Bit of a chump though. Rein just Mimics the X-meteo from Popuko for massive damage.



Then it turns out KatanaSoul isn't even immune to confusion.

A Heal Rod? Lame as heck.



Another sub-4k HP monster. This place is a breeze.



I'm not sure if Odin can see that we're here and decided to turn into Magicite, or if we have special Magicite powers.



Very cool! Life 2 revives at full health. Learning it at x3 means I don't have to sit here forever grinding it out either.



We've seen High Fak before; they have 3 HP and replaced Cactuars. Pretty sure we've seen all these before, just not in the same formation.



The queen left some tears on the bookshelf. There's a hint somewhere to tell you to go seven steps south of the queen's chair and hit A.



Doing so opens this hidden path.



Hark! A dragon! Watch it here!



I'm not going to argue that a T-rex isn't a dragon. Normally this one is found in the Opera House and is pretty easy.



This one is still easy.



No reason not to buff myself though!



Air Anchor will kill an enemy if it hits, when they take their next turn. Being immune to Death makes you immune to Air Anchor.



Homura isn't exactly a bastion of defense and the attack still only did this much damage. Pal Petal is an Attack x5, even.



Dirt Dragon isn't even immune to Earth. Care to guess how the fight ends?



Flare hits reasonably hard, ignoring defense. Only single target and can be reflected.



X-meteo is way better.



This is the part of the battle where I remember that Paladin Shields null Earth.



What a chump.



Interacting with the stoned queen turns Odin into Raiden. In vanilla, Odin teaches Meteor and gives a +1 Speed bonus at level up, the only Esper to do so. Cactuar in FF6 Advance gives +2 Speed. Raiden teaches Quick and gives +2 Strength. Both spells are really good; in vanilla, you're likely to leave this place to teach everyone Meteor and give any Speed bonuses before coming back to get Quick. We don't have to do that, as I've already taught Odin's spells to the one person that can equip him!



Life 3 means Fanatics Tower is a relative gimme, unless everyone is mean enough to not vote Popuko in.



We're not done yet! Naru and Homura need to head back to Thamasa.



Naru's friend was attacked by a monster from their youth, and got hurt. His friend convinces Naru to hunt the monster down and extract revenge.



Ebot's Rock is just north of Thamasa and is a tiny dungeon.



Every room has: a switch, and either a treasure chest or a save point. The locations you are sent to are random. The goal of the dungeon is to collect Coral pieces (the only things in the treasure chests) to feed to this chest to get it to move. This is slightly harder in the Textless ROM because I have no idea how many Coral I have and just have to keep collecting until I think I have enough.



No, I don't want to read your blog post about vaccines.



Odomilyn has good skills: Bolt 3, Cure 2, Fire 3, Meteor, Pearl, Quick, Regen, Rflect, Stop, Warp

I'm lucky it didn't use Meteor as that would probably kill me.



Jeha has 138 HP. Why are you here, little one?



Infat is a big fat jerk.



It counters pretty much everything with Flare. I absorb a lot of them with Magic Block but several still get through, one shotting anyone they hit.



It also gets a boss death animation, despite not being THAT bad.



Yeah yeah, lemme through.



Yes, please, and thank you. I may come back to grab some more Genji Armors. They don't bet for much but I have six or so people that can wear them.



Hello, drab Chupon sprite. Time to die!



With some effort, I could figure out which Hidonites are which. I don't want to though.



Water does alright.



Who needs Ultima? Well, I will, when I find Floating monsters.



Your elements pose no threat to me!



Once all the Hidonites are dead, Hidon starts flashing. I forgot that this is the trigger I was looking for, and had to do this fight about five times before remembering. I kept killing Hidon before it used its ultimate spell.



It looks nice! A rotating triangle, which took a lot of computation for an SNES.



It really fucking hurts, too.



I'm only missing one Lore now. I forgot to check so it's either Pep Up or Sour Mouth.



Naru is smug as hell.



Bragging to your friend who almost died that you murdered the monster you've been chasing since you were a kid.

Hidon actually comes back if you wait long enough, in case you missed GrandTrain or want to farm it for drops. I did not and do not.



Turns out Homura had Gungho fake the attack, so they could motivate Naru to put in some god damned effort for once. Then they insult Gungho.

Tiny Moogles are harsh.

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ALL TREASURES
Stout Spear
Elixir
Doom Darts
Magicite
X-Potion
Air Anchor (also purchased one for 65k)
Crystal
Imp's Armor
Rising Sun

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Please VOTE for the four characters we will bring with us to the Fanatics Tower. I went in to check, and it looks like everyone that isn't a berserker will have their Magic command available. I would like to have Popuko at least, for Life 3, but if the votes don't go that way, so be it!

We have four dragons left; one at Narshe, one at Fanatics, two in the Final Dungeon. I'll snag the Narshe one in the next update as well. We're also missing two Espers; Ragnarok is at the top of Fanatics Tower (instead of Narshe) and Crusader from killing the final Dragon.