Part 35: Part Thirty-Five: The Rescue

Part Thirty-Five: The Rescue



: (...Stop grabbing my...leg. Let me sleep...)


He always seems to be bothering people while they sleep.

: (Shut up...)

Squall's not in the mood right now.

Voice: Laguna!
: (...Laguna?)
Voice: Laguna!!!
: (...Laguna!?)

I promise that exchange is contained within the game.


I guess those moombas are the Laguna fan club.



Well, they've set Squall free, so they're not all bad.

Moomba: Laguna.
: Laguna?


We'll get back to that scintillating conversation in a bit.


Fun fact about this scene: it ran at about 5 FPS. It was extremely annoying.

: Voila!



I think the slowdown has to do with this.


When a character gets their weapon back, you're treated to a zoomed-in display of their victory dance.



There's even one for the moomba.


Then you get a chance to junction. Actually doing the junctions is too exciting to be conveyed in screenshots, so we'll have to skip it.


Back to standin' around.



Mean Guy: Yes, this is it. Please give'em something to really complain about.
Man B: Should we be picking on prisoners so soon after gettin' transferred here?


I like everyone just standing there, listening and knowing that they're about to spring their trap.




Hey, it's our pals from the comm tower.


Everyone sort of looks at each other for a second while it sinks in.


Small world.

Biggs: S-So we meet again! Now we'll teach you the lesson we should have taught you earlier! I know it might seem cowardly to fight unarmed prisoners...


Hey, don't worry about it.


As soon as everyone pulls out their weapons, the mean guy legs it.

Biggs: W-WHAT!? H-Ho-How...


I like your attitude, Biggs.


Time for round two with these guys.

Biggs: I was demoted because of you! I'm only a lieutenant now! I'll get my revenge!


Even though she's not HP-critical, Quistis's limit comes up.


Being as I wanted to stick a specific status on these guys, I went with Bad Breath (which dumps a bunch of status effects on all enemies).


It does not hit them with the one I want (Confuse), but Biggs and Wedge are such a non-threat that Poison will handle this fight by itself.





It saves me the trouble of having to beat them up while I draw spells off 'em. Haste is the only real winner here. This isn't one of the FF games where Slow is indispensable, and Regen is kind of situational.

As Vil pointed out in the thread, I missed out on the value of Reflect and Regen: they're great for junctions. Regen is great on Vit, and Reflect is great on Spr. Reflect is also one of the few spells in the game that is easier to draw than to refine.


I think this comes up when he's at half HP. You might also notice that Selphie's slots have come up. I was trying to get her to cast Confuse.


Wedge also has a line for when his HP is low.



Selphie has some really good spells in her slots when her crisis level is way up.



I finally got Confuse to stick on Biggs so I could get this line. Biggs has one if you can get Wedge to hit him. Too bad, though, he died every time I got Wedge to hit him.



Eventually, I gave up on trying to get the one throw-away line and just ended things.


What an appropriate prize.


Elixirs aren't bad either, but I don't think I've ever actually used one in Final Fantasy VIII.


Vitality is a very important stat if you want to keep characters at low HP to spam limits.



Biggs and Wedge aren't as eloquent after the ass-whoopin'.


Biggs has one last trick up his sleeve, though.

Biggs: Ugh.

He's done now.



: You have any idea?
Moomba: Srrr...Srrr...




Don't start this shit again.

: I don't know why, but I feel kinda lucky!

At Level 100, Zell has the lowest Luck stat of anyone in the party.
If Squall lies to the Warden during the torture sequence, the moomba won't give you a hint to go upstairs here.

: Let's just go after them. OK?


At this point, an alarm goes off.

Announcement: Warning! Escapee alert! Monsters will be set loose on each floor. If escapee refuses to surrender, you have permission to kill. The anti-magic field will be lifted.

Fun fact: the anti-magic field never affects anything outside of that cutscene with Selphie. Any time you're actually playing the game, magic works just fine. I have no idea why it's ever mentioned, except as a throwaway answer to "why don't they just use magic to escape?" On the other hand, nobody is answering that question.

Anyway, it's gone now! See ya never, anti-magic field!

: Tch! The security alarm!


This is the first thing I do when I'm in the D-District Prison. I do not particularly care for the D-District Prison, and I do not want random encounters forcing me to spend more time here.


Off we go!

Now that we're free to roam the D-District Prison, here's the D-District Prison theme ("Jailed"):



Here's why I don't like this place: every floor looks the goddamn same. It's mind-numbingly tedious to run around here, and random encounters don't help any. I basically just sprint through whenever I play the game.


At least we still got paid. Squall's not even here and we got his cheque.

You can actually get paid at any time, except in the past.


The only thing to break up the monotony of prison is that some cells contain other people.


I think there's a line of dialogue missing here, but I'm not sure.

Bad Segue Man: Well, to tell you the truth, I'm also a Balamb Garden student. Oh, but I can't give you any info. I'm working for Galbadia right now. I'm not supposed to do this, but I wanted to see you all with my own eyes.


This guy plays the role of the item shop for the prison.


He has absolutely nothing special. But I wonder why Fuel is so expensive.


While I'm at the shop, I picked up a bunch of Tents.


Then I capped off everyone's Curaga stock.


Look at their max HP now! It's high!


Now it's back to runnin' around the floors.


Oh, here's an exciting thing: some of the doors? You can't go into them. What a lark!


Whatever, floor 9.



Berserk is a spell that can be sort of useful if you have a character who never does anything but attack. It's mostly upstaged by being able to spam limit breaks, but it's not the least useful spell in the game.


Also on the tenth floor, we can find this guy.

He'll Upgrade Our Battle Meter if We Beat Him at Cards: If you win this game I'll add something special to that thing for you. But I charge 300 Gil per game.


I have a lot of Gil.


I also got an Abyss Worm card out of the deal. That's 20 free Tornado spells!



We Beat Him at Cards So He's Upgraded Our Battle Meter: There you go. Now you can look at even more detailed records.


You may remember the completely useless Battle Report.




Well, now we have the equally useless Character Report! Who could possibly give a fuck!


There's also a save point on this floor.


Floor 11!


Highlights: an empty room! (There's actually an invisible Thundaga draw point in here, but that's not as funny.)


Another highlight: a guy who likes to play cards but lives in a prison!

Likes to Play Cards but Lives in a Prison: I'll give ya something if you win. But I'll have to charge you for the game. Only fair, right? How about 200 Gil per game?

I have a lot of Gil, so why not?


Like he said, you get an item if you beat this guy at cards.


Some of the items are pretty good. He only has one HP Up, and you have a 1/32 (3.125%) chance to win it.



Most of his prizes suck. These two are the most common by far.


This still isn't great, but it's neat: you can get upgraded potions in this game. Usually you have to make these yourself with GF abilities. I never bother, to be honest.


The Rosetta Stone is the guy's real prize here. It took me something like a dozen games of cards to win one (3/256 chance; ~1.17%).


Like the screen says, Rosetta Stones teach GFs the Abilityx4 ability. It's handy when you have GFs with a lot of useful passive abilities, but it's not essential. Some people will play game after game of cards with this guy to get three Rosetta Stones (to put Abilityx4 on the whole party) but Christ, what a hassle.


Floor 12!


We want to follow those moombas up. As you can see, though, we have to go around the whole floor to do so because the stairs are separated. This is the case on most floors, and I don't know why I waited until now to point it out.

Before we check out those moombas, though, let's check out shit I originally forgot to do. It's all very exciting, I promise.


See, in the D-District Prison, you can also go down the stairs. This bit, where you're controlling Zell, is actually the only time that you have a full run of the place and can go all the way down. I normally forget to do this, because it's not the way you need to go to get the plot moving.


Specifically, you can go down to the third floor.


This is one of the few places in the game that you can find an item just lying on the ground that isn't a magazine. When they made FFVIII, they weren't really feeling treasure chests, so they replaced them with Draw Points.


So, we find a Pet House in a box. A Pet House is like a Tent, but for GFs. I've never had any reason to use one.


On the second floor, there's a Pet Nametag. This lets you rename Rinoa's dog, Angelo.


Also on the second floor: a Str Up. It raises Str by 1! Later on in the game, you can actually make these through refine abilities to get your natural Str up to 255, one point at a time! It's way more trouble than it's worth!


With Zell leading the party, you can actually go all the way down to the first floor.


Here, you can find a magazine lying on the floor.



Combat King is a magazine that teaches new moves for Zell's Limit. Unfortunately, due to the fact that Zell's Limit is easily exploited and I can't remember combos, we'll probably never see this in action. I've certainly never used any of Zell's special moves.

In the other room on the first floor, there's an invisible save point, but I don't have the GF ability you need to use it, so I couldn't show it off. Sorry.

Anyway, that's been "shit I missed the first time"! Let's get back to our regularly-scheduled program!


On floor 12, both doors are locked. There's nothing to find.


I did figure out that you can go into these little alcoves. It doesn't do jack shit!


Whee!


Floor 13 has, at long last, a change in scenery.


Another thing it has is a closed hatch. Classic floor 13.


It's also got a fuckin' lot of moombas.





And they all fuckin' love Laguna. Moombas are crazy for that motherfucker.



Oh, it is not. Don't lie to him.



: You OK!?
: It was hell...
: Let's just get the hell outta here!


ZELL DO NOT THROW A GUNBLADE.


Jesus Christ those things are so dangerous.



By the way, we're Squall now. Junctions &c.





Since we held out during the torture, these three moombas will make shortcuts for us. Also, as long as you stand near them, moombas will constantly yell "Laguna! Laguna! Laguna". It's great, I love it.


I just make these shortcuts randomly because I don't actually give a fuck about them. There's no specific floors that really improve your quality of life by having a shortcut.


I'm sure he's just fine. I don't know of any long-term effects torture might have.


Yes, let's.


Okay.


Well, it's more that I know of him.


Outside the torture chamber, everyone is just milling about.

: Didn't you come here as Laguna in the 'dream world'?
: ......No.
: So Squall doesn't know how to get out, either.


This shot included because of Selphie's idle animation playing.

: It'd be a pain to go down every floor. The alarm alerted monsters and security guards are everywhere.
: By the way, how the hell did they carry you up here, Squall?



Probably more trouble than it's worth.

: It's like a crane that can carry a detachable cell from downstairs.

How do you think they came up with that as their system for moving prisoners?


Also, I just realised that Squall's cell had a toilet but nobody else's did.


Well, yes, but not for the reason you want.

: Go ahead if you want to be squashed like a pancake.

Some of the dialogue in this game is very fun.


Zell's just remembered where the cafeteria is. He wants pancakes.

: We can move this arm by using the panel above and the control room. I remember Ward doing this. But we need to operate them both at the same time. Someone needs to stay upstairs and control the panel...



There really are some great animations in this game.

: ...Me?


Jeez, don't act so excited.



Next time on Final Fantasy VIII: we finally escape the D-District Prison!