Part 3: Summer/Autumn 1991

    



Welcome back to Linda³! Last time we made some effort to get up to level 3, but then it turned out that there was a strange incident in Minago which made everyone there disappear! The only survivor is, apparently, Linda, who was taken to the "medical town" Hospico, but she seems to have lost her memories, and therefore doesn't even know who Ken is! However, Ken was informed that there is a possibility to cure Linda's amnesia, however it will take some time to arrange, and so Ken was told to continue the task of animal gathering for now.

Also, Ken had a chat with a talking flower!

In this episode, Ken will be, among other things, heading to the North Pole!



Last time, when we left him, Ken was standing here in the entrance/exit area of Hospico. We really should go and collect a few more species, but there is something else we could check out first, and it also might yield quite a good reward if we're lucky!



So if we head slightly northeast from Hospico...



...passing by some animal species which don't look like anything we've met so far...



...we reach a place called Paraside, which we've heard about last time a bit.



Well, seems like an inviting place, but nevertheless, let's head inside!



Rusty metal shacks and stuff... yes that pretty much seems to be what it was described to us as. Let's talk to the person here!

The big building at the back is known as "Junk Palace". They built is so haphazardly that it's now like a maze in there, nobody can find their way in or out!

Luckily, this is not what we are here for today! So, we'll just head around the corner.



This is the place we're looking for!



The shack houses what I like to call the "animal dismantler". It's basically a guy who will turn some of your caught animals into random items. Well, the items are random out of a set of a few that a particular animal can yield. And even better, his services cost nothing! You just lose the animal you had in exchange for an item (or sometimes just nothing). This guy is also one easy way to earn basically infinite money right here at this spot where we are in the game! But more on that in just a minute, let's first talk to him.

If you want, I can even dismantle a rat without a tail or even a dog which talks too much! My speciality is to extract treasure from the belly of an animal without damaging it. Regardless if I find something or not, the cost is the same: the meat of the animal itself. Shall we get started?

Yes, let's. In particular I want to see what we get from male and female rats. First, let's start with a male rat I have from last time.



Here, I have highlighted the male rats and we can see that I have 3 of them. The fact that they are highlighed in yellow colour means that I haven't handed them in at the ark yet (that would be indicated by white). That means I can "spend" a maximum of 2 here, as I have to keep one for the ark, as always. So let's "dismantle" a male rat finally:

I found a champion's medal!

More on what this item is at a later date. Let's do one more male rat:

I found a golden nugget!

Well, this is definitely a good outcome. Golden nugget is one of those typical items that you can just sell for money! This one brings us a whole 6400 G! So we'll be making use of that soonish! It will also allow us to already repay our loan.

Anyway, I also have 3 female rats, so we can try to "dismantle" 2 of them and see what we get. The first one:

Hm, I thought I found a rare ring, but on second look there is nothing.

Ugh. Ok, the second one:

I found a swallow cutter!

Another decent outcome, actually. Swallow cutter is another weapon we can equip, and it's in fact very slightly better than the one I bought last time:



It brings Ken's attack from 131 to 134. Not really much, but why not, right?

Also, swallow cutter is the key to infinite money at this particular point in the game. You can head over to animal dealer and buy rats for however much money you have (they only cost 20 G apiece). Then you bring them here and hope to get as many swallow cutters as you can (of course it's random, but you'll get a few probably). Then you go to the equipment shop and sell the cutters for around 1400 G each! And voilà--as much money as you want, until you get bored of repeating the process. I should note that this is only really possible to do in the early game, since the animals that the dealer sells change to higher level ones as Ken's own level increases, but it's there at least if you need help to get started. For now, we have our golden nugget which we can sell, so we'll just be on our way.



Exiting back to the overworld, we find that it's still actually Summer. I mention this for two reasons. One reason is, if this is your first playthrough and you spend time wandering around the overworld, looking for different animals, here is typically where you might be caught with the season change. It seems that one season on normal difficulty (2) lasts around 15 minutes, but as mentioned, time stops in towns and during battle. The other thing which is interesting to note is that the season change timer is only checked on "screen change". This means, as long as you wander around the overworld, the game just scrolls around the map without an entirely new screen loading, and so the season change will not happen. It will only be actually checked when you enter/exit from a town or a tunnel or something like that. Therefore as long as we stay on the overworld, it will remain Summer and we can spend as much time as we like. Once we enter a town or cause a screen load in some other way, we can probably expect it to become Autumn soon. Anyway, there is one other piece of the puzzle regarding time passage which I haven't covered, and that is what happens with the time when you're in a dungeon. But, we'll talk about that when we actually are in one--as mentioned, only some of the species can be found like this on the overworld, but many can't and for those we need to dig deeper so to speak.

But for now, we can still catch a few new species around the East area!



This flying thing we just saw on our way to Paraside, so let's see what it is!



Oh, it's just a bunch of rabbits! Of course!



They honestly don't have any exciting abilities so not too much to say here. I should however mention, that the nubers for level and HP that you can see on these info cards are just "average" and both level and HP can vary somewhat, both up and down. But you're not going to suddenly find a level 20 rabbit or anything like that.

Incidentally, rabbit is one of the species whose design has changed drastically in the remake. Here is what they used to look like in the PC Engine version originally:



I'm not really sure which version I prefer, they both are interesting in different ways.

Anyway, let's move on to our next species. For the record, Ken starts this update as level 4. Also, for now, I'm not going into a lot of detail because I'm still using just the simple attack with Ken. Once things start getting more complex in battles, I'll be sure to show that off.

As usual, I will catch typically a few more of each species as I wander around.

But soon enough, we run into something else new:





You can kind of already tell on the overworld, but yeah, it's a buch of crabs!



Also, nothing much to fear here either. The "lost" status effect just inverts your controls for a little while, but has no other detrimental effects. Luckily, also we're not fighting them on their native terrain (water) so that makes things easier here!

Here is number three on our shopping list today:





Some proper Neo-Kenyan moles!



Again a pretty simple enemy, so we can quickly move on to the next.



To find our next species, we'll have to step into the water.



It's a group of stonefish!



Unlike the stonefish we know in our world, these don't seem to be actually venomous. But they can definitely hit a bit hard so you may want to be careful with them anyway! As you can see, they are bit higher level than Ken is right now! It is manageable, however (but I did have to reload the save state because they nearly murdered me once!).

The final species on today's list is also around this area:





This time, it's a pair of monkeys.



They are less dangerous, although will chase you on the overworld, so if you're not ready... I hope you have some HP to use for sprinting to run away!

In any case, I fight a few more animals on the overworld in order to reach level 7, as we were instructed to do by the hospital director. And just as all that is going on, Ken again gets a notification that there is a phone message waiting for him.

So with that in mind, let's head back to the ark to first hand in our backpack content, and then we'll see about the message.



Since we're on the east side of East area, in order to reach the ark (and Hardia), we'll use again that tunnel which we previously used to reach Hospico.





As we exit on the west side, the game helpfully informs us that it's now Autumn 1991 and we only have 7 years and 3 seasons left to finish the task. It also mentions that we still have 27 species to collect, but of course that doesn't include ones in our backpack which we are about to hand in.



Not a fan of this weather, it's a bit too rainy for me.

As a matter of fact, as if it doesn't have enough unusual mechanics already, this game has changing/random weather too! So this rain is kind of coincidental, it's entirely possible for it to also be dry in Autumn, or even snowy in the more northerly parts. To help you out, one of the functions that you can invoke on the telephones is to check the satellite weather forecast for a particular area! This of course also has to do with which animals may or may not be out and about in which weather and so on.

Anyway, heading into the ark...



We have quite a bunch of species to hand in (all which are written in yellow): crab, rabbit, rat, dragonfly, monkey, mole and stonefish (this includes the ones from last time which I didn't hand in). This results in the usual stat increases, but also this time in some new abilities for our characters! Linda gets a start on her "crab" abilities with Armored skin and then also gains Escape Jump, while Ken gets Desperate attack from a rat and also Fire attack from a dragonfly. We'll try this out soon, especially now when Ken actually finally has some BP to use on this stuff.



Finally, the helpful robot here informs us that we have successfully collected 10 species so far out of 30 we need, so I guess you can say that we're a third of the way done, except that doesn't take into account that it's not always going to be this simple!

Anyway, while we're here, we can go and visit Ben, the ranger commander, to see what he thinks about the whole Linda situation.

He's over here at his desk:



Looks like the gods have been a bit mischievous lately... but I think they've gone a bit overboard on that. I know it's hard, Ken, but you have to be tough!

Ok, now back to the entrace to finally listen to our message!



The message is from Dr. Chen, the hospital director over in Hospico:

This is Chen, the hospital director in Hospico! Please come see me as soon as you can, I have some good news! Meet me in front of Linda's room!

All right, well, let's do that! We really do need to sort out Linda's memory loss if we can.

We'll go through the tunnel back to Hospico and then, in front of Linda's room:



He means Ken's newly gained fame as the second crew member of the ark.

You need to go to Eterna immediately. You will meet there the company chairwoman, she asked to see you... I guess it's not easy being so famous. She has some unusual hobbies, but nevertheless she is very helpful to people in need! I'm sure she'll help you too if you ask her!
Anyway, the amnesia drug is called "Memorin Z", and you should go to Eterna and talk to the Green Pharmaceutial Co. chairwoman about it.

Well, that sounds awesome, but could it really be this easy? Somehow I'm not sure. Either way, we have no option but to head over to Eterna.

Although before we head over there, there is something I forgot to do last time, which is to visit the hotel:



It's just up here, not really even marked properly!



Our beds have a reputation for being very comfortable. After all, they are hospital surplus, so a lot of people have already slept in them!

Honestly, it's worth visiting places if for no other reason then because of funny lines like this.

After this, I visit the animal trader and sell all my extra animals for a bit of money which we will need shortly, and then let's check out our navigation device to figure out where we need to even go.



So here's where we are right now, at the eastern side of East area, in Hospico (pointed at by the black line).



And here is where Eterna is (the line is pointing at it), at the far north of the North area (which we haven't even visited yet).

It seems like quite a trek, and that's not even taking into account that Eterna is also behind a big mountain range and what appears to be a very large lake too.

So... what to do? Well, we can take the public transport to get there. It will cost us some money, but at least we don't have to walk, right? Because, of course this game has also a fast travel system, and it's even available from the very beginning of the game!

Therefore, let's go and sort out our tickets!



You might have noticed in every entrance/exit area these stairs in the corner, that we havent used so far. Well, now we'll finally go up to the second floor.



There we find the local service counter of the planet-wide Bird Line. Basically a form of public transport on this planet, but also our means of fast travel. So let's talk to them.

If I don't like a customer, usually I say to them, "Customer, you don't look so good today." Then they usually end up getting bird-sick. The power of suggestion is amazing!

That's pretty funny, but let's see about those tickets...



There are various destinations listed here along with the prices. The prices in the left hand column are for direct flights, whereas the ones on the right are for a flight with changeover(s). Changeovers are just a minor inconvenience, so there's no reason not to save money here. The flight to Eterna with changeovers costs 410 G (highlighted on the screen), which is not exactly cheap. Oh, if only there was a way to not have to pay for the flights... ah, well, there probably isn't.

The service agent gives us some last information:

The routing will be, Hospico -> Ozport -> Battle Park -> Eterna. Then, please stand on the red platfom now. Have a pleasant journey!

Let's see...



Whoa. Actually that's pretty cool!

Some time later, we arrive at Ozport



At every changeover point, you can have a chat with the people at the service desk!

The "Shot" service is convenient as you can be dropped off anywhere you want, but it can be a bit dangerous. Therefore we recommend to buy a set of rescue beacons and always have some with you in case of emergency.

Ah, yes, another game mechanic -- drop off and pick up anywhere on the overworld! We don't need it for now, though. Let's continue our trip.



Our last changeover point is Battle Park.

To reach the lake area north of coordinate 7, please use the east-west tunnels in the dome! For you safety, please verify the chances of snowfall before you set off.

There we go--I was wondering about this on the map of North area, but now she's explained it. Along with the weather situation, which I already mentioned. All right, let's hop on one more time and finally head to Eterna.



And here we are!



Before heading in, a quick chat with the Bird Line person:

Be careful of the weasels, they are said to disguise themsevels in a tree and wait for a year or two for a desirable prey to pass by!

Well good to know I guess! I'll try to remember it when we are looking for weasels.

Ok, enough of that, let's put on our Christmas cheer and head into town!





Man, it's full of Santas and Christmas trees! What is even going on here? Let's head over to the inn and see what's up.



Talking to the Santa:

When you have a problem, just go and talk to chairwoman Elizabeth. Her soothing voice will make your troubles not seem so big any more.

And the girl:

My father works as a guard in front of Madam Elizabeth's office. My mother works as a receptionist at the refugee centre. We sometimes talk about how the four of us would also like to have a nice house like that some day.



There's another person upstairs:

I've heard that Green Pharmaceutical Co. used to be a small-time cosmetics company. In just ten years, they've reached the top of the business world! Now it's one of the best and most profitable companies in the Federation!



On the other side of the path is another house, somehow also an inn.



Chairwoman Elizabeth is like a saint. Her heart is as warm as sun and her beauty is as eternal as stars.

Wow. Apart from some weird Christmas obsession, there seems to be also a massive personality cult going on here!

Upstairs:



Green Pharmaceutial Co. is one of the fastest growing companies in the Federation. Using the animals of this planet as raw materials, they have developed thousands of new drugs over the course of last 50 years, which nobody else has been able to copy!

And the other person...

The driving force behind the tremendous expansion of Green Pharmaceuticals has been the genius of Dr. Panheim--he is able to create unique drugs one after another! Also, the three generations of chairwomen who have ensured the continuity in the company management.



There are also two Santas hanging around here, so let's talk to them too, as usual.

Merry Christmas! If you are in a money trouble, please go to the job office in Lina Valley, the town next door to us. If you are hungry, then please head to the chairwoman's mansion!

And the other one:

Merry Christmas! If you don't have a bed in an inn for toninght, you can stay in any house. There is no fee!



But... all houses seem to be inns, even this one here right next to you? Kind of a touristy place? Let's go inside.



I don't hate this outfit... but it gets quite hot in the summer, you know.

I guess we could also stay over in this one, Ken does need to have his HP replenished after all that hunting and leveling up.

There's no accomodation fee, but please instead make a donation for the refugees.

This is a real inn with HP replenish and everything, but you can pay whatever amount you choose! Let's pay a few G so that Ken can rest.

And well, might as well show an update where Ken is currently stat-wise:



He is level 7 and his strength is crab-level (148), his defence is rabbit-level (112) and his speed is squid-level (122). Oh well, I'm sure we'll improve soon.

Before we leave this house, let's check upstairs.



If you work hard for a couple of years in Lina Valley next door, you can earn good money. The question is only whether you will then have any strength left to actually spend it.

Interesting. I'm sure we'll be checking out Lina Valley at some point, so we'll see what that's all about.



The house on the other side is somehow not an inn!



Instead, it houses the animal trader and the butcher for some reason! Talking to the animal trader, we get some good advice:

If you like your dog, be careful of snakes and octopuses. Dogs are their favourite food.

And the butcher...

There's this guy who comes here and sells pork sausages. I buy them for 1G and sell them to the mansion for 2G. I guess that's business.

Checking out his inventory...



...he does indeed sell a pork sausage for 2G, in addition to dolphin roast for a whole 32G. Well, you know what, let's try the sausage. I buy a sausage and eat it.

* Ken ate a pork sausage *
* Ken's HP is fully recovered. Also, it tasted like rusted metal. *

So HP recovery is kind of a default result for eating meat. But depending on the kind of a meat, there could be other, good or bad. Also this game sometimes gives really funny messages!

There is also a girl upstairs in this house:



The big bro in the mansion always wears a Santa mask. He has burn marks on his face, but I like him because he gives me sweets without telling my mum!

I don't know where to even start with this one, so I guess I won't!



Over here there's three more Santas, so let's finish our tour before going in the big mansion (which actually you can't see because it's a bit further down the path).

Merry Christmas! The town of Eterna is run by Green Pharmaceuticals, a company which serves the best interests of everyone's health. Also, if you go in the mansion, you can get a pork sausage for free!

The second one:

Merry Christmas... I guess. I know it's the boss's hobby, but having it be Christmas all year round gets a bit tiresome after a while, you know?

Yeah, I see what you mean. Ok, the last one:

Half the people who have to leave this planet have no idea where they're going to end up or what they're going to do. Your goodwill can give them more hope for life! Please donate! Many of them have no idea what they'll do about jobs, housing, food, etc. after they leave the planet.

Oh, so that's what they mean by refugees! Well it makes sense, I guess. You in fact can actually donate money in game, if you want. I'm pretty sure it doesn't actually do anything (except taking your money!).

Ok, it's time to go in the mansion!





Here there is a Santa who seems to be like a... receptionist? I don't know.

We provide free food here. Go left for women, right for men and please follow the instructions of the volunteers!

Luckily we can go anywhere we like, so let's go right first.



Yes! Pork sausages! If one is not enough, you're welcome to have another! Please only eat in the dining room. No eating while walking around the house!

* Ken receives a pork sausage! *

That was the Santa, and now the other person, presumably one of the refugees?

This is like a fairy tale, so if Madam Elizabeth is a wicked witch, then I'm about to get eaten! I've put on 10 kg since I've been here! Well, I guess I wouldn't mind getting eaten by such a beautiful woman.

There's also this other person over by the shelves:

You can walk freely around the mansion. Although the door in the back of ground floor always seems to be locked, so you can't even see inside. I think that's where all the adult toys are kept, because I've heard someone has heard a woman scream from inside... Well, I mean, that guy likes always to tell stories, but...



On the left side, there's also three people, another Santa and two refugees. Let's start with Santa.

Men can eat in the dining room on the right. Please head over there.

Well, we already got out food, so we're fine. Now the two refugees:

Dr. Panheim is the director of development here. He's some kind of a genius, but I don't like him. He has a horrible laugh and he has bad breath. Also his nails are dirty.
I'm not going to complain about free food... but when you eat sausages every day, even your body starts to smell like a sausage, you know?



And then there's this other person by the desk...

They say that when you smell Madam Elizabeth's perfume, it's like honey was poured on your head. It's kind of a weird feeling...

This is all getting weirder by the minute...



There are definitely two chests in that room, but there's also a locked door. So nothing can be done for now. Therefore we continue around the mansion.



Madam Elizabeth is always in the room upstairs. She's happy to meet everyone, but if you have a request it may be rude to show up empty handed.

Sure, let's head up, maybe we can also meet her. I mean, she's supposed to be expecting us, right?



Merry Christmas! Are you here to see chairwoman Elizabeth?
[Yes] / No.
Please wait a moment.

And finally, we can go inside.





Well, I can recognise you just by looking at you. You're quite a hot topic these days, aren't you? Signing up for the ark... that took a lot of courage! It's amazing!
So, what is it that you need from me? For a celebrity like you, I'd do almost anything!
[Request Memorin Z] / Ask for food / Leave

We start by requesting Memorin Z which was promised to us (sort of).

Ah, that is a bit of a problem... You see, we don't make it any more. Memory loss is quite rare, you know... so it wasn't profitable.
But, not to worry. There are still people here who know how to make it. A person named Panheim will contact you later, would that be ok? In the meantime, please continue with your task of collecting animals.
Was there anything else?

Here you can definitely choose to ask about food, but she just tells you to go down to the ground floor where we've already been. So I guess let's leave.

I've enjoyed your visit here today, Ken! If there is anything you need, please don't hesitate come and see me!

I guess that's that for here. We now have to wait to get a call from this Panheim guy, who apparently is able to make the amnesia medication for Linda. However, things do seem to get weirder by the minute, so we'll have to see what that's all about. There seem to be a lot of things about Green Pharmaceuticals and its chairwoman and employees which can be qualified under varying degrees of "odd", that's for sure.

If we go back down the stairs, there is also this dude in the garden, whom I forgot previously:



The dead trees here in the garden are actually cherry trees. I used to come here with my late grandmother back in the day to watch the cherry blossoms when the chairwoman wasn't looking. Those were the good times... there's no point to live this long.

Cheery. But for us, it's time to head out.





Well, that's it for today. But a question poses itself... where shall we head next then?

That's definitely something to think about, but for now I will tell you, although the game didn't specify, that the call from Panheim will arrive around the time Ken reaches level 9, so not too far in the future! Whether that will get us any closer to the medicine, remains to be seen!

For now, enjoy some more illustrations!




For today, we have a first a full drawing of Elizabeth and then also another silly one from the PC Engine era!