Part 65: Episode LXIII: Parasite Eve

Episode LXIII: Parasite Eve




New Music: Dependent Weakling (You should probably listen to the final boss theme.)



It’s funny to think about how Eve is doing all these dramatic scowls with his creeping skin condition and mugging for the camera, meanwhile 2B and 9S are like 40 feet away at a bad angle and can barely see or hear him.



Well, there’s no way this can be any worse than the last time I did a LP that had an endgame heavily involving a character named Eve. Even if it does still involve another female character whose cloths can explode off if they take enough damage...



RAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHH!!! I... I...!





So Eve has become a Magneto for this final battle. He now has gravity powers to call forth debris from the machine lifeform corpse whirlwind at will. The thing is, the shirtless wonder boy isn’t the most creative of fellows so he mostly utilizes his newfound powers to affix trash to his arms to do an extended double-fisted swipe or to pull a garbage man Zangief and do a spinning lariat with extendo arms. Or he can use his doom fists to perform a giant clap that shatters his enhanced arms on impact, creating a small AOE of damage. Or the hitbox for that one is way larger than the animation. It’s hard to tell. There’s a LOT of particle effects flying around for this fight.



The younger machineman brother is also rather unfocused and will shift the focus of his ire towards the first android he sees after completing any attack. Which means 9S’s AI gets clowned a lot during this battle by virtue of being the first in the line of sight against the boss. Which is fine. That just gives us more room to hack away at Eve.



At close range, Eve forgets about his buffed up trash arm powers and will just try to punch the shit out of any androids within punching distance. No fancy fighting game style axe kicks or flying uppercuts. Just clumsy angry haymakers all around.





Rounding out his attacks, if 2B or 9S aren’t within range for punching while he’s accumulated another pile of junk, he will instead opt to just toss a pile of shit in the androids direction. It ain’t fancy but it gets the job done.





Once Eve reaches around 50% health, he’ll switch tactics to a rather obnoxious phase. Eve leaps high into the air and uses his gravity powers to create a series of floating platforms. From high up, Eve begins just tossing trash at 2B from out of range.







So of course, our only course of action is to do some awkward platforming to reach Eve’s position and kick him in the head to get the jerk to knock it off with the potshots. This part sucks pretty hard because the platforms randomly raise and lower with little rhyme or reason and the camera is not at all cooperative in giving us a good view of the next platform as well as Eve to avoid his attacks. They were nice enough to put invisible guard rails on the platforms so Eve’s attacks don’t knock 2B to the ground. That’s one real design shitty pitfall far too many boss battles seem to neglect avoiding.





One we reach Eve’s platform, all he does is attempt to sucker punch 2B and yell a bunch in anger. As it turns out, it’s not the most effective way to deal with a combat android stabbing you repeatedly.





After a while of 2B getting up in his grill from his previously safe perch, Eve gives up on the platform tactic and returns to ground level. The rumble in the sky also took Eve to below 33% health. Which means it’s time for him to shift to the next phase of the fight.



What is it?
The energy seems to be coming from a large number of linked machine lifeforms.
He’s absorbing the lifeforce of whatever’s left on the network.



In other words, Eve is sucking the energy out of all the machines in the area and refilling his life bar. I kind of hate when bosses do something like this. I’d prefer just having a new phase with a separate health bar than the jerk going “nuh-uh I got a full heal and there’s nothing you can do” while blowing a raspberry like a schoolyard dick kid.



I’m going to try hacking into Eve and shutting him down! Back me up, 2B!
On it. Protecting unit 9S while he hacks the system!
The enemy is connected to a vast network. Analysis: The actions of unit 9S have an unacceptably low probability of success. Proposal: Unit 2B should abandon unit 9S and save—
Shut up! If 9S says he can do it, then he will!





For this next phase we need to draw Eve’s aggro while 9S fills that circle meter that has appeared over Eve. Turns out hacking is like casting a spell in NieR: Automata and requires an extended period of raising your arm and concentrating on the attack. Eve doesn’t gain any new attacks in this phase. Nor can we kill him. His health can be depleted back down to the bare minimum. But Eve will just summon another swarm of machine lifeforms to suck out their energy to boost himself to max HP again.





In any case, after a couple minutes of holding off Eve’s assault, 9S is successful in VAC banning Eve from the machine network. Eve is now in Ironman Mode like his brother was prior to his death. There are no continues here, pal.







Eve doesn’t take kindly to having his internet access revoked and releases a Cutscene Brand™ burst of energy in protest which knocks back and stuns 2B.



Eve immediately follows up with an attempt at a finishing blow on the android. But...



EEEEEEEEEEVVVVVEEEEEEEEE!!



Pfft. Hahaha. 9S, when did you get the coveted Trash Fist power? Don’t tell me you duct taped that shit to your arm or something. We’re not helping if that limb explodes on impact.





The rare anger fist bump.



AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!



Loving this shit RRRRRRAAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGHHHH!!





Nobody wins! At least, that would be the case if it were just 9S vs. Eve. But...







You showed up to a tag-team match flying solo. This ain’t gonna end your way, guy.







With a bit of effort, 2B managed to shatter Eve’s trash augmented arm which promptly explodes for no good reason.



Music: ENDS



The explosion sends 2B flying and both breaks her sword and knocks off her blindfold advanced combat goggles.



2B is not quite out of the fight yet and still has all of her limbs intact, even if her weapon has seen better days.



The same cannot be said of Eve, who is going to have to start learning to write left handed from here on out. Assuming he’s literate, of course. We don’t have much in the way of Eve’s capabilities beyond leather pants and anger issues.


Music: The Sound of the End



AAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!





We’re not quite done here yet. There’s one final phase to the final fight against Eve.







Hey, remember the Shadowlord and his fondness for flying around the arena at rapid speeds and launching huge walls of energy orbs? Guess what tactic Eve is bring back in style for this last round of the fight!



Kill... Kill! KIIIIIIIILL!! RAAAAARRRRGGGH!! Nothing matters anymoooooooore!!





The only tactic for this fight is to always be firing with the Pod and try to rush Eve since he can be completely stunlocked with physical attacks at close range for a time. He’ll eventually zoom off to the other side of the arena and resume the orb bombardment. But that’s about it. However, after falling below 50% health...



I’ll k-kill... you all... I’ll... My brother... ARGGGGHHH! I’ll erase you... I’ll ERASE EVERYTHING!!



Alert: NFCS (Near Field Combat System) destroyed. Close-range combat no longer operable.



Eve unleashes an unavoidable burst of energy which severely fucks up 2B and 9S. Now 2B can only move at a limping walk, the HUD is all kinds of jacked up and melee attacks have been disabled. As has the Pod Program system.





For this last stretch, all we can do is keep our distance and continue primary Pod fire on Eve while avoiding orbs or face tanking them and healing up accordingly. It’s not the easiest stuff to avoid when 2B only has a wounded shuffle. Poor 9S’s AI just takes everything on the nose for this pitiful conclusion to the fight.


Music: The Sound of the End (Quiet)





Once Eve’s HP is completely depleted, he immediately sheds his black painted skin makeover and drops to the ground like a rock. At the same time, all of 2B’s in-game attacks become busted. Good timing we took him out just then. That would have been awkward if our Pod busted a minute earlier.



Tune in next time when we figure out what to do with this beaten crazed shirtless machineman and we reach NieR: Automata’s first proper ending.






Video: Eve Boss Battle (It’s the final boss of the first ending. You should probably watch it.)





Eve Final Boss Concept Art - For some reason his beefy trash arms just reminds me of the angry dipshit from Prototype 2.



Eve Final Phase Concept Art – Originally he was going to be more blatantly Shadowlord-esque with energy wings and such.