Part 34: In Which We See a Lot of Incompetence

I guess the bestiary is a sort of flavor text. However, I don't even read the codex entries in games I like; I guess my game design philosophy is very much in-tune with FF9 in that if you want flavor or lore or any of that, you fashion it into the game world rather than binding it up in a digital pretend-encyclopedia.

In the codex format, the lore becomes cheapened and the illusion is shattered. When the game shits its backstory in your mouth whether you like it or not--like RPG Maker games made my teenagers who are so obsessed with their world that they think everyone needs to know about it--it becomes obtrusive. When it is crafted into the world, when you could care less about a war that happened seventy years ago because it has no bearing on the present day, but can learn all about it because there are a couple of scattered monuments and plaques that you can examine, or a couple of ancient NPCs in a couple pockets of the country who remember it, or even small things like being able to learn how certain pointless NPCs are related to each other, then it presents itself like a person with a very small voice who has very important things to say.




You tell 'em, Kilika.






"... Don't you know what happens once they hit 40"
"Uh not really no"
"Look Hawaiians and Keanu Reeves are gonna look the exact same until they're 70, at which point they'll look the exact same except with white hair and age spots. White people do not age quite so gracefully, especially when they have fat mothers"


So here's our useless-ass Gold Helm. We won't be giving it to 'Iole because I want to save Mental Break to give to Huihui.







I want you to remember that you said this, 'Iole.

I want you to say it three times to yourself so you don't forget.


oh great of all things for the monsters to not attack


Alexandrian Soldiers are kinda pussies so you have to hit them extra-hard, otherwise they run away once they hit a certain HP range. Makakao can one-shot them with a target-all Bio spell.


Man I gotta find the Enc-None armor these hos are wearing, I don't care if it has a thong

huihui is gonna be the one wearing it anyway




I chose this response because Puck shows up and calls you a dumb fuck if you don't and I don't need that shit






I can't tell you how many times I played this game while thinking that Puck was like some kind of sleeper agent for the Alexandrians all because of this line.




I never liked you anyway, Dan. I heard about that rat chick you knocked up with a brainless baby and left her high and dry while she went nuts




THIS IS WHAT I THINK OF YOU AND YOUR FREE LOVE AND YOUR MARIJUANA


"No"




I just got this shot because I thought he looked pretty pimpin'.


If you head back over to the Antlion area, you'll find Stiltzkin and a Save Moogle. I think he has a letter for you to deliver now or something, but mostly you just want to buy these.


"yeah sorry guys i'll deal with your impending doom tomorrow"


"That's where these bums are hiding! If you hurry, you can still catch them!"


"Good."




This whole sequence here is about leading the Burmecians away from the direction they just came from. These guys came from the stairs, so head right.


I mean I pretty much hate the Burmecians, no idea why, but they give you free stuff if you help them.

I knew this total asshole from Brazil who would play the same not-beat on the bongo drums for ten hours straight thanks to his love of the post-lab coca plant. He lived right above me for half a year and would acquire his coke by talking to his dealer on the sidewalk through his window, it was really quite fantastic. He was thoroughly convinced that he had the makings of a Professional Bongo Musician, even though he only had the drugs part down. He possibly had the sex avenue covered as well but the only thing I ever heard him doing to some chick was shouting at her in Portuguese as she cursed at him in Spanish; with floors that thin, you could hear a dime drop, to say little of the telltale bed-rocking.

I'd give even him a bucket of spit if he was on fire if I knew I was getting a free Mercedes out of it.


So you head left here


Then head right here across the bridge because these rats can't think for themselves


Then you have to say that you aren't safe yet


so these two chicks who are way too chill in the middle of an imminent attack to not be smoking the pakalolo are like "duuuuuude what? we aren't safe? bummer"


Kilika goes on about how this town is a nice place and shit and I knew he was a pansy


I dunno if there are any other people that you can save, but this is what I got. If you don't save them, you get to see some Black Mages blast them with magic, but the items are totally worth it.



when suddenly

three more mages, who i could easily take out with one bio-all, teleport in


IT'S KIKAIDA!!!!!






Okay so Kikaida. It was pretty much the best show in Hawaii. Apparently a lot of kids got totally into Power Rangers back in the day in the continental US, and admittedly it sort of happened here too, but when it came down to it, Tommy and the crew could never stand up to Jiro and his Trusty Sidecar.

It, along with a couple of other 1970/80s Japanese "henshin" shows, came to us courtesy of our local independent broadcasting station, KIKU. It was run by Really Japanese people, and was basically broadcasting for Really Japanese people, which Hawaii has a lot of, and is different from the continental US, which has a lot of Really Japanese white people.

Kikaida was fifty-something episodes long and actually had a real and conclusive ending, though I was far too young to really enjoy it when it first ran in the late 80s/early 90s. It got a rebroadcast about eight years ago on the same channel. I just ate it up.

I was in boarding school at the time, and a mere sophomore, so who was I to have television privileges? Boarding school--especially the strict sort that doesn't allow you to have your own televisions--is all about the law of the jungle, and when the giraffe wants to watch Crank Yankers, the lion watches Golden Girls just to assert his dominance.

This never happened with Kikaida because, well, it was Kikaida. To turn the station was blasphemy.






"Who?"
"Man you and me both, who would wanna remember her?"
"*bro high five*"




Back to a place he has never been to. Because he grew up in Burmecia. When Burmecians hated Cleyrans because they thought that the Cleyrans were assholes for preferring Atlus localizations to Working Designs'.

Well, that clinches it, then. Selective amnesia is the best amnesia.




"But nobody has THAT much money to give over child support. He didn't have any other choice."




"Forget it, your majesty. I mean look at him, he doesn't even look anything like you. The queen probably banged a sewer rat, you should just write him out of the will"
"The queen was a sewer rat, boy"
"Oh ew"


"To find the man about whom I have dreamt endlessly...
... only to discover that he cannot even remember who I am!"

Is... did FF9's translators know what irony even is? No wonder I had trouble getting that concept through my head in high school, public schools don't teach you about that so the only thing you have to go on is whatever you're exposed to it through popular media and by then the wrong definition has been forever engraved on your brain.




oh when the fuck did you--










THANKS LADY

NEXT TIME