Part 125: Episode CXV: Our Face-Off

[Believe it, son! They've done it! It is happening!]
[That seemed... way too easy.]
[What are you talking about? We made it by the skin of our teeth.]
[What are YOU talking about? Our airship is completely undamaged. We took more hits crashing that wedding.]
[Well... I mean... You see... there was a lot of them Yevonite jerks that time and... Hmm... We did kinda come outta this unscathed for what a dumbass plan the whole thing was, huh?]

The party shuffles back onto the bridge...



"It's going to come back, isn't it?"
"I know."
"What? You're kidding me!"
"No! We have to beat the guy inside Sin."
”Wait up... what 'guy inside Sin'?”
“Yeah. There is some dude named Yu Yevon piloting Sin or... something...? I'm not 100% clear on how that works, either.”
*stink face* “Wha....?”
“It's a long story... We still have work to do.”
"The Crusaders would be out of a job if it was this easy."
"But it has weakened. I'm sure of it."
"Yeah! We're winning!"



Spoilers: He will do nothing. The main gun will remain broken and never be used again. It was nice while it lasted for that incredibly specific set of circumstances.



We're given another intermission to save our game and stock up before going another round against Sin. While everyone has a bit of new dialogue, it's just a single line saying some variation of “It's not over yet” or the like.





To progress, we once more need to run all the way back to the back of the ship and take the elevator to the deck. Yeah, Final Fantasy X. That three minute walk to hit the next plot trigger is getting a wee bit old.

By the way, in this upcoming scene they forgot to animate Tidus' lips moving. I think they figured they could get away with it given the low resolution and distance the camera is at. But, with the emulation cleaning up the scene, it's a lot easier to tell Tidus is surprisingly skilled at ventriloquism.



"Let's just end this... quickly. The fayth said they would help us, right?"
"It bothers me, the way they said that."
"Huh?"
"I mean, they've been fighting alongside us this whole time, but now they say they'll help?"
"I guess so..."
”Who knows. I can never get a read on Ghost Kid. Well other than the times he seems kinda pissed about that Trogdor rename...”
"Wait!”


Music: Daughter of the Great Summoner



“If I summon an aeon, Yu Yevon will join with it. But at first, it'll be small, won't it?"
"Yeah... Then, we might be able to defeat Sin without the Final Summoning."
"I don't know. What if Yu Yevon jumps again?"
"Then we'll take it down again! We'll fight him until there's no place left to run!"
”Ain't no boss rush long enough to stop us.”
"I never thought it would come down to this."
"Yeah, I know. Hey, the fayth, they're tired of this whole thing, too. Let's let them rest."
"The fayth said it's pointless to keep dreaming. The dream will disappear, he said. What did he mean? And what is it that Yu Yevon is summoning from within Sin?"
“...”
"The dream... of the fayth."



“Yeahhhhhhhh... ummmmmm... Of course... uhhhh...”
*over loudspeaker* "Yunie! Guys! Come look! Something's happening to Sin!"
_{”Phew. Nice timing!”}

Music ends...



Maybe it wasn't the best use of our time getting all introspective naval gazing while Sin was taking a breather on top of a neighborhood. We're never going to acknowledge we almost definitely got several hundred people killed there, are we?



Having lost its fins due to the overwhelming power of scavenged Al Bhed technology's potency during CGI sequences, Sin decides to spontaneously grow some wings to take their place.



Pictured: Sin's anus.



Sin decides to perch and peacock atop the Sky Vatican for a nice trailer shot. Good thing we've already murdered anyone who might hang out there these days. We already amassed enough casualties in this fight when Sin crushed that Bevelle borough.



Tidus and Yuna follow suit striking a pose for the final battle.





”Poor ol' Deusexmachina Cannon has given up the ghost.”
"Hey, just take us in. We'll do the rest."







Tidus looks around for support from the rest of the crew. Except for Auron, who we already know is committed and doesn't care enough to give an encouraging nod. And Kimahri, who seems not at all committed to being a team player now that the pilgrimage is over.



“No mistakes, or I'm gonna tear out that mop you call hair!"



”We are... like 50 feet away, yes? Already there.”
“Boy, where in tarnations didja even pick up that accent?”
“...”


Music: Attack



Shut UP, Tidus! You stopped saying lame blitzball related motivational crap ages ago. Why are you suddenly circling around to leaning into it hard now?



As a companion to the earlier Affection stat scene, here we get one last enthusiastic remark from whoever is at the top of our influence charts. Which, amazingly enough, is still Lulu 20 minutes later. Rather forward of you to say right in front of Yuna, eh?



Anyway, here is everyone else's possible lines were they #1 in some alternate timeline:

"Our fathers' wishes... Let's make them come true!"
"My story must end as well."
"Don't worry. I'll cover you!"
"Time to show them what we're made of, ya?"
"You are Kimahri's friend."

Sadly, we remain only Kimahri's work associate in this timeline.



Once more, we have to run all the way to the back of the goddamn Fahrenheit. You couldn't just have made a hatch leading out from the bridge onto the deck, game?

Music ends...



Sup?





DRAMATIC ZOOM!







Sin... gonna be honest here. Your new winged look? Kinda goofy. Especially with the long tail just swinging around like a monster dick.



"Yeah! I'm coming for you... Dad!"




Music: Enemy Attack



And this is it! The final battle against Sin. Our plan is to just straight up punch this unstoppable avatar of death in the nose until beaten. As soon as the battle begins, we are Drawn to Sin.



Therein lies the primary gimmick of this fight: it is timed... sort of. Rather, we have to defeat Sin before its Overdrive meter can fill to maximum. That means burning through a healthy 140,000 HP in the process.







The airship distance rules are still in effect until Sin gets three turns, at which point the Drawn to Sin will reach the point that we are practically rubbing Sin's face with our airship. Everyone is free to attack at that point.





Sin itself, once it reaches the closest point to the party, only has a singular attack where it give the party the evil eldritch abomination eye, hitting everyone for several hundred damage and slightly charging it Overdrive meter. Sin's Gaze can possibly inflict Petrify, Confuse, or Zombie. There's actually four variations of the gaze, including a vanilla one, but the game makes no effort to say which one Sin is using until Rikku is suddenly turned to Stone or a confused Wakka is caving someone's face in with his spiked blitzball.







After a while, Sin will start burning turns by slowly opening its mouth and increasing its Overdrive meter drastically as it does so. If this is occurring, it's time to get the party's hustle on and finish the job. Otherwise things could go quite badly.



Should the party fail to defeat Sin before it fully charges its Overdrive meter, it will use Giga-Graviton on its next turn. At which point, the party is fuuuuuuucked!







We've seen Sin perform Giga-Graviton already. It was that attacked it used at the start of this whole boss rush. You know, the one where it carved up a large part of the continent and its effects could be seen from space? Only this time, it's not just showing off for a fancy CGI sequence. It is directly targeting our team while flying over the largest city in the world.







Which translates to bad news. Tidus, Yuna, the gang and everyone in the greater Bevelle region are fucking dead! It's an automatic Game Over if Sin can pop off its Overdrive. Good work!



Luckily, Sin is actually quite easy to take out prior to disintegrating the greater metropolitan area. Even without all our Endgame equipment, just casting Haste on everyone and pounding on Sin or using any of the better Aeons like Trogdor, Agnes, or the Magus Sisters will wreck Sin's day easily enough. It takes around 15-20 turns for Sin to fully charge its doom ray. More than enough time.





In any case, we've successfully run up and stabbed Spira's own Cthulhu in the eye. I cannot believe this whole half-assed plan worked.





So remember how we were just winging how we were going to take down Sin? Much less how the hell we were going to get inside it to go kill Yu Yevon. Crawling around in a creature the size of a small city's guts doesn't sound like any fun. Plus those monster innards dungeons are always garbage.





Yeah, don't worry about that. Turns out Sin conveniently has an airship accessible portal into its body open up when it is critically wounded. Naw. We're not even trying with the writing anymore, are we?



Okay, there's something very important I want you to take note of in this shot of the whole party's Asian Stunt Doubles...



Holy shit! CGI Wakka, what is going on with your faaaaaace?! Oh nononono! Take it away!







So welcome to Within Sin.



...It's a bit more spacious than I would have thought. What? You thought a Final Fantasy game wasn't going to have a surreal dreamspace final dungeon? It's like required by company mandate, as far as I know.





Oh gawd! CGI Rikku, you have got to stop making that face! Black Tidus, please make her stop making that face.



Oh, thank goodness!





“Hmm ha ha ha haaaa!”









What's wrong, folks? It's like you've never seen a cackling exploding giant space eyeball. They're all over the place inside Sin. Nothing to worry about, I'm sure. Definitely not going to be an all but forgotten reoccurring villain popped up for yet another fight. That would be just silly!

Tune in next time for our trek into the final dungeon of Final Fantasy X: Inside Sin!






Video: Episode 115 Highlight Reel





Sin Reference Model



Amano Sin Concept Art