Part 12: [E/N] How do I avoid being Friend-Zoned?

Chapter 12 - [E/N] How do I avoid being friend-zoned?





Don Corneo's theme is fantastic. I urge you to listen to it.



We get the chance to explore Corneo's mansion a bit. The place has a very distinct and traditional oriental theme, very fitting. We go to the basement.



The name of this place is, unsurprisingly, torture room, if you check the menu. Don doesn't screw around.

Cloud sees Tifa and immediately gets shy.



"Tifa?"



"Cloud's told me a lot about you."





"Oh..."



"What do you mean, "don't worry"... about what? No, don't misunderstand."







Now that's just evil.



SURPRISE!



Aerith is my Mistrethth now, Tifa. She commands me. Now it's your turn.



Yes, time for plot exposition!

"Yea, umm..."
"Ahem!! I'll just plug my ears."

"I'm glad you're OK. When we got back from the Number 5 reactor there was this weird man. So Barret caught him and squeezed some information out of him."

Cloud: "That's when Don's name popped up."

"Right, Don Corneo. Barret told me to leave the lech alone..."





"Corneo is looking for a bride."











Yeah Aeris thanks for your help, I want you to go back now, as it is safer to escape this guarded mansion, cross alone through the Wall Market, cross the dangerous road with hell houses at night and get back to your house. Bye.







Cloud: "Me... right?"





Yes Cloud, you'll be a woman soon.



We get a chance to equip stuff. The most important thing here is the new weapon for Tifa. We also put a Titan Bangle in her.



God damn look at that hair.





I hope you still have the Urge Overkill music playing. If not, then get back to the Don Corneo's theme.



Yes, which girl, Don?



Go ahead, Cloud. Name him Pooch. Call him poo. Do it, and your fate will be complete.



There's something weird in this one. Uhh...
















































There's no turning back Cloud. Unless he wants it doggie-style.



Don Corneo: "You can have the other ones!"

-"Yes sir!"
-"Thank you sir!"



Don Corneo's Bedroom: Powered by Quake 2 Engine



Look at dat fukken dragon. Look at it.



There's a hyper behind the bed. Think what you will of that.









Alternatively if you say you don't like him, you can actually... say that.

But let's get back to the script.











You might want to go take another break in case this game is getting too surreal.





























Cockblocked at every turn!


Tifa: "Cloud..."



Hahahaha look at her disappointment.

Anyway, Cloud reveals his ~TRUE FORM~.











That order doesn't really make much sense.

Don: I made'em find out where the man with gun-arm was. But that's what I was ordered to do.

Tifa: By who?





So we got a new name - Heidegger, head of public safety maintenance. The reason why they didn't kill Tifa and Barret when they were leaving the reactor is because they wanted to follow him and find out where the HQ was.



So far, so good. For all we know, Shinra is like the Vs, so our protagonists are pretty safe.



Wait what do you mean literally, don't you know the meaning of the word li



Oh holy carp!



I can't think of a worse sound than PING.



Now witness the power of this fully operational self-destruction button.



And with that we leave to save the people from their inevitable doom.



What now





Don: "Woo-hoo! Right!"



ANOTHER STAR WARS THROWBACK SHAMELESSLY BROUGHT TO YOU BY SQUARESOFT




Oh shit, dramatic music starts.



Damn look at that place.





I don't know, that seems like the worst idea given what we've seen from them.



Reeve, whoever you are, stop using logic here! I want my sharks with lasers!

President: "What is the problem, Reeve? You want out?"
Reeve: "No..."





Very classy, Heidegger! We finally got a villain who's an asshole.





So yes, Midgar, in theory, has a Mayor.



In truth, Shinra de facto controls everything. So the mayor is just decorative.





Yes what a brilliant plan, it's not like you don't control the world and could have already killed the members of AVALANCHE, no. You need to destroy 1/8th of your city.



I don't know about you but last time I saw a movie and people fell into a trap like that, a giant monster appeared.



There's only one thing we can do. Hyper everybody.

Before you talk to both of them, you can engage in some random battles. We do so to get our limits up and running. You never know, right?






These are the 1-2 limits of each character. I farmed them in such a way that I got the three of them in the same battle, to avoid getting too much exp.


Aeris' Seal Evil causes Silence and Stop on all opponents. Silence is pretty much useless, but Stop isn't.

Tifa's Somersault is a second attack added to Tifa limit's Slot Machine. It's just another attack that deals slightly more damage than normal.

Cloud's Cross-Slash deals more damage than Braver, and also inflicts Paralysis on one opponent.

It's worth mentioning something - Paralysis and Stop have the same effect, but are two different status. Basically, Stop lasts MUCH longer than Paralysis, giving Aeris' Seal Evil an edge when it comes to that.

You can talk to either of them in the order that you want, but you need to talk to the two of them.




BOSS TIME





Aps is Don Corneo's Rancor. It's not a particularly hard boss (specially since the last Save Point is a bit far away).

Aps' signature attack is Sewer Tsunami, an attack that hits everyone in the screen - including him. Sewer Tsunami comes either from your back or his back, and does back damage.

Like the last boss, Aps has a back attack modifier - this time it's 4x instead of 2x. Naturally, the gimmick here is making Aps kill himself. Aps will always use Sewer Tsunami as his first attack and will take 180 (out of his 1800 health points) damage out of that. Then, Aps will counter every spell you cast on him with Sewer Tsunami. Aps is weak to Fire, so spamming magic on him makes this a very, very quick battle.

Of course we're not gonna kill him the way the developers intended because that would be boring, but I want to show you all of his attacks, so we're gonna do it Solo-Tifa style.



As you can see, a fairly standard fight, but because he takes so much damage from the Tsunami he has a lot of HP. And his first action is Sewer Tsunami. So what can we do about that?

The answer is here:



Bosses who have managed to execute their gimmicks before we kill them: 0/3

Remember how I said we now have two limits with Stop and Paralysis. Well, Aps is vulnerable to both. What we do here is open the battle with Seal Evil before he can cast his first Sewer Tsunami, and perform our highest damage moves against him before it wears off. The rest, as they say, is history.

This is also our "continuity" for the next chapter, but we're not done here.



If you click on the above link you might see something unusual. Something... that shouldn't be there. Something different.

That's correct, we start the battle in ambush formation. The boss is facing his back to us.

This is because there are five bosses in the game whom, due to oversight in their coding, have the same chances (around 6%) as any random battle to start the fight ambushed.

Naturally, because Aps takes 4x damage from behind, that also applies here. Anyway, hope you've had fun.


NEXT-TIME

Turks! Being Zidane! Tragic Events! New exciting Materia!


Chapter 12 Bugs & Bytes

Dressing Mechanics Part 2

So yeah, the mechanics are pretty simple.

There are three possible results - Tifa, Aeris or Cloud. Tifa is the standard result and the one you'll always get if you go just with a dress and a wig.

Each item can add +1, +3 or +5 to your prettiness score. The tier 1 items add +1 (for example, Cologne, Wig), the tier 2 items add +3 (Flower Cologne, Dyed Wig etc) and the tier 3 items add +5 (Silk Dress, Blonde Wig, etc).

There are six types of items: Dress, Wig, Cologne, Tiara, Lingerie and Make-Up. Alas, Lingerie is bugged and doesn't affect you at all.

The make-up is one that very few people know, because it requires you to talk to the bee girl AFTER you've picked up your room. The effect is random, and can be either +1, +3 or +5 (rare), and your only indication is the sound effect it makes when she puts it.

Between 12 and 18 points you get Aeris. 19 and above, you get Cloud. The maximum amount you can get this way is 25.

If you're not chosen, you have to fight Corneo's lackeys in his room, who are trying to molest Cloud. It's nothing special, really. Well I mean, I suppose it is, but we saw the best event anyway.

Aps Back-Attack

So yeah, that was a little weird, uh?

Like I said, there are five bosses in the game who can start under a back-attack. It requires a very specific situation.

First the boss must have a specific flag turned on, a flag that allows him to be back-attacked, but not allow you to escape. It's suspected that the bosses that have that flag are just a programmer's oversight.

The thing is that you can only be back-attacked if you're in a place where random attacks occur. Not all bosses are in such places. As such, there are many other bosses with that flag turned on but, alas, you can't ambush them.

As you saw, we can fight enemies in this area before triggering Aps. The result - a ~6% chance of back-attacking him.