Part 42: It's Only Gay if You Wear it On One Ear

Tetsuya Nomura ruins everything he so much as looks at

's Only Gay if You Wear it On One Ear






GEE YOU'RE REAL HELPFUL




Fun ecological explanations for a dumb puzzle mechanic.


Stiltzkin is also here.


He's selling us stuff on the cheap as usual.


YOU MAY HAVE ALREADY WON ONE MILLION GIL




Oh, I guess this is that Mogki asshole from earlier. He made it out alive, it seems.


So the idea is to call Gargants with those weird cactus-flower things


and ride them from area to area.


There are usually treasures at the dead ends, so it's always a good idea to check all the dead ends first.


Level Up is always a great ability. Plus, once you reach Level 99, you'll have an extra 7 Ability Crystals to redistribute elsewhere.


So there's a lot of going back and forth in this dungeon hitting these switches and going the right way. I won't show how much there actually is, but suffice to say, it's a lot.


It's actually a very straightforward and simple dungeon, but going back and forth in these caves can make them seem very huge and sprawling. Unfortunately, this is the bad kind of huge and sprawling, because while the music is chill and fun, running back and forth hitting switches isn't.


You can oneshot the Feather Circle monsters with Ramuh, or you can whittle their HP away and have Iz eat them to learn Lv4 Holy.


jesus tittyfuckin' christ what the hell is

These are Abominations.

obama nations


(nah i mean aside from not having any balls to make shit happen i ain't got much problems with obama's presidency

my problem with him is that he went to punahou)


FUN FACT:


--BLEAUGH--


punahou's school song is sung to the tune of "o christmas tree" and has been for decades and decades


so if you ever get the chance to, y'know, like shake obama's hand or something


make sure you hum it loud enough that he can hear ok


(We aren't gonna hit that switch yet btw)


The Gargant drops us off over here next to a pile of tools and crap, and a Survival Vest.


It teaches I think Body Temp (prevents Freeze and Heat)--which the Fairy Earrings also teach--and Mug, but we'll never actually use the latter ability. It's a terrible idea, because while I don't think Mug's damage formula is made to be able to kill a boss outright, you never know when you'll accidentally have someone with Counter equipped, or when the boss will cast a spell on a party member with Reflect on, before you get to steal that awesome new item.


On the next screen over, we run into that same miner as before. No, he doesn't have a Glasgow Smile, that's a wire with a lamp on it in the foreground.

He'll let us use his pickaxe in this area if we trade him a potion.



Oh look they took the time to give him an actual pickaxe, if this was FF7 or something Kilika would just smash the fucking wall with his Popeye arms.


So you can swing at those weird-looking rocks on the right side there.


Fantastic.


Oh boy we're gonna be holding onto this one for a while.


So the idea is that you can tap at the wall with your pickaxe trying to find treasures.


You usually end up with Ore or Potions, but sometimes you can find a Hi-Potion or even a Madain's Ring, though I've never actually seen that happen. I'm pretty sure it's just assholes on the internet saying that you can find one to get you to waste your time.


NOW we hit the switch to exit.

A quick Gargant ride later...





Since we're back on the world map, I figure I'll take the time now to share with you another track that was dropped from the game, but can be found on the Final Fantasy IX Plus CD.

My theory? It was probably an alternate world map theme that was forgone because, I dunno, maybe it was too brassy or driving, and they wanted something more floaty and ephemeral-sounding like what we ended up getting. Possibly it had too long of a lead-in. At any rate, they are essentially the same song.

Well, that works just fine for me. It's discernable as the FF9 theme, but it didn't appear in the game so it's a bit too obscure for just anyone to pick out; considering it's one of my favorite games ever, and guarantee has my favorite soundtrack ever, it's only fitting that I would use it for my ringtone. I love the adventurous feel it's got, even if the biggest adventure that ever came from hearing it was "brah The White Dragon we go tailgate in da park, go get all bus' with my friends" "wait, what the fuck are we tailgating in the park for? It's like nine at night" "I dunno, nothing, but it's more fun than tailgating over nothing at home"


hmm i wonder what that suspicious-looking place over there could be




"Artania Shipyards. O: True X: False"

This is FALSE. The Prima Vista was built in Zebolt Shipyards. You can read about it at the very beginning of the game.




this game is so good for my self-esteem


The next thing we run into is a Ladybug with like a lettuce for a body. I don't even




There is a marsh on this continent, too.


I accidentally caught all of the female frogs in this pond. That means coming back here will be completely out of the question for another ten hours or so; if you leave a male and a female, it will fully repopulate in two to three.


oh shit it's

what


Well it's a Cactuar. It burrows and un-burrows itself. While uprooted, it can run away. While burrowed, it counters all actions that target it with 1000 Needles, even if it dies.


The ubiquitous spell always does exactly 1000 damage to its target. It doesn't cost much MP to use, and most monsters don't quite have 2000 HP, so it's a very useful spell to have at this point in the game.


Goblin Punch, nobody ever uses it but by accident.

NEXT TIME

"ugh this place is full of frickin' immigrants"