Part 2: Prologue
Gather at the beginning...
SRW UX - ObeliskWe open up at the Frontier Fleet, where Sheryl Nome, the Galactic Fairy, has just kicked off her concert. Ranka (with the green hair), standing in the crowd, is so very excited, but Alto and Michel (glasses) are hard at work. They got hired to perform some flying acrobatics and Michel tells him to make it good – screw up, and being tagged as amateurs will be the least of their problems. Alto is insulted he even considered that a possibility.
Ranka spots the two of them flying up top and silently wishes her friends good luck as they begin their routine.
Outside, though, things are a lot worse: the Frontier’s New UN Spacy (NUNS) soldiers have been engaged and are getting wrecked by creatures IDed as Vajra. Howard Glass, president of the Frontier Fleet, was apparently expecting this to happen eventually.
Still, this attack, so soon after Sheryl’s arrival, doesn’t strike Howard as a coincidence. His aide, and totally not a bad guy, Leon Mishima, asks if he suspects foul play from the Galaxy Fleet.
Indeed, and Howard figures they should carry on with their investigation on both the Vajra and them as well.
Back inside, the crowd and Ranka are loving the acrobatics. Sheryl is decently impressed and decides to make things a bit more interesting – by jumping right off her flying stage. It falls on Alto to blast on over and catches her before she splatters against the ground.
Ranka’s blown away, but Alto is less than chipper: what the hell was Sheryl thinking?! “Can’t you tell? It’s called entertainment,” she quips. And what would have happened if he didn’t make it in time?! Not only would she be a red smear on the ground, she’d probably have fallen onto some of her audience as well!
Why, but wasn’t he the one who, at rehearsal, told her not to sell him and his crew short? Sheryl wanted to see for herself how well he could actually fly. Oh, and by the by, she had a Gas Jet Cluster (read: jetpack) hidden under her outfit the whole time. She wasn’t about to put her life in the hands of an amateur, of course!
Alto lies stunned and Sheryl prepares for her next act…
Or maybe not: an explosion rocks the Island and the PA starts yelling, telling all civilians to get to the nearest shelter immediately. Sheryl’s not amused – her show’s JUST started – but them’s the breaks.
As Alto wonders what the hell is going on, Michel tells Luca that the SMS has just sent an order for emergency scramble. Alto’s not in on the take, though, and looks on in confusion as his two schoolmates run off.
Outside again, the NUNS are getting trounced and the Frontier’s final defense perimeter has just been breached. Thankfully, the SMS Squadron is on the scene: Ozma Lee, the flight lead, tells the NUNS to break off and let them handle the enemy.
Canaria (headband) tags the enemy as Code Victor and is surprised at their appearance – still, they must find a way to stop the things here and now.
Klan Klang’s on hand as well, and not about to let these monsters get any of their claws on the Frontier Fleet. Time to go, then, as Ozma calls for Formation Seventh Moon!
“Code Victor… I won’t let that tragedy repeat itself…!”
The battle’s growing worse by the second, and Alto is about to grab Sheryl and take her to a shelter, when she stops him. “I hear something… Whose voice is that?” Sheryl wonders.
Alto yells at her to quit daydreaming and come with him quick – can’t he hear this voice? What voice?! “Gather… at the beginning…?”
Gather at the beginning...
*Tweeep.*
: …?! What was that I just felt…?! (Kazuki)
: Hrm! We’ve been found…?! (Makabe)
: General alert. All islanders are to evacuate to your assigned shelters. 
: (Huh? What’s going on…?) (Mamoru)
: Did it just tell us to evacuate…? (Sakura)
: This… isn’t a drill…? (Koyo)
Location: ALVIS – 1st CDC
: All systems online. Target is growing. (Yumiko)
: Give me an exact measure of its mass. Sound the red alert and switch us to level 3 battle stations! (Kozo)
: All hands, switch to level 3 battle stations! (Kaname)
: The Festum show themselves at long last…! (Cagalli): I am so very sorry, Rep. Athha. None of us expected this to happen precisely on the day of your inspection…: Pay it no mind, Cmdr. Minashiro. We’ve known for the past 30 years that the Festum would reappear eventually.: Was it not precisely in preparation for this day that we’ve our Mobile Suits and the Arcadian Project?: But your nation of Orb is…: We may have a policy of permanent neutrality, but that does not mean we’ll sit by when enemies of all mankind start attacking.: Alex, are Shinn and Lunamaria ready?
: Yes. They’re good to go on your order.: Ready to deploy the Welle Shield. Disabling mirror camouflage!: We’ll deploy our MSs as the camouflage goes down. Is that fine with you, Cmdr.?: Yes, and I thank you for the assistance!: Target is in visual range. The Festum’s materializing!
: …
: ?! Th-That’s… a Festum! (Soushi): A Sphinx type…!: It’s so pretty…: Indeed, but beauty does not mean it is a friend to mankind. : Destiny, Impulse! Launch and engage!
SRW UX - Life Goes On
: … Psh, so much for a walk around paradise. (
: We’re not here on tourism, you know. We’re supposed to be escorting the Representative during her inspection, remember? (Lunamaria): Fine, fine! We just need to drop that thing, right? I’m going in, Luna!
: I missed…! Did it anticipate my attack?!: … there?: ?! Wh-What voice was that?: Are you there…?: It’s speaking…?! Th-This is…!: Don’t answer! It’ll destroy your mind!: Wh-What…?!: Shinn, Lunamaria! The enemy can read your thoughts! Be careful before you attack or you’ll just be wearing yourselves down!: Hrm… Fine, no more holding anything back!
: Back me up, Luna!: O-Okay!
Take out the Sphinx A-Type, don’t lose anyone. Nice and easy, though, as Cagalli said, the Festum are actually rather dodgy and accurate due to their mind-reading abilities – even with Focus and SEED running, Shinn’ll be getting less-than-impressive numbers!
Destiny Gundam (Shinn Asuka)
Pilot Skills:
SEED - +10% damage dealt, +20% to dodge and hit rates. Activates at 130 morale.
Support Attack (援護攻撃) L1 – when an ally starts an attack adjacent to a unit with this skill, that unit can join in with a follow-up attack (range and ammo/EN limitations apply), with more accuracy but with less attack power.
Support Defense (援護防御) L1 – same, but the adjacent unit will come in and take the incoming enemy hit for the original target.
Spirit Commands:
Focus (集中) - +30% to hit and evasion rates for one turn.
Fighting Spirit (闘志) – the next attack is guaranteed to be a critical hit
Mech Features:
Sword
Gun
Beam Shield – when shield defense triggers, further reduce the damage of Beam attacks.
Variable Phase Shift (VPS) Armor – all damage, except from Beam weapons, reduced by 2000. Costs 10 EN per activation.
Hyper Deuterion Engine – restores 10% max EN at the start of every player phase
High Speed Evasion - upwards of 45% chance to outright dodge an incoming attack, determined by difference between pilot and enemy’s Skill stat. Activates over 130 morale.
Squad Bonus: Crit +10, Mobility +5 (Crit +20, Mobility +20, S rank in Space)
Voice Actor: Kenichi Suzumura (other roles: Demyx in KH, Eiji in Gravion, Cayenne in Aquarion EVOL, and a ton more.)
Shinn, as always, is quite the reliable unit. He’s got good stats where it matters and the Destiny’s pretty dang good (even if it cannot use its best trick right now); a bit EN hungry as you go for bigger moves, but that’s somewhat offset by its EN regen.
With the Destiny’s good firepower, survivability from all its abilities, and Shinn’s SEED-boosted piloting, you’ll be very well served for the entire game. He’ll even get better as we go along, so there’s objectively no major reason not to use him unless you simply don’t WANT to.
And FYI, the Squad Bonus is like that because I’m playing on NG++ (only way to get all secrets in a single run as secrets obtained in a previous game keep their flags raised in NG+). Unlike in L, where you only got two boosts to your bonus at 50% and 100% unit upgrade, UX allows for 3 boosts by upgrading to 50/100% and/or when the pilot has 100 and 200 kills.
Thus, even with the Destiny’s at baseline upgrades, my Shinn’s at 380 kills, so he’s already at the tier 3 Squad Bonus. More power for me!
Force Impulse Gundam (Lunamaria Hawke)
Pilot Skills:
Support Attack L1
Support Defense L1
Spirit Commands:
Gain (努力) – doubles the exp earned from the next battle
Invincible (不屈) – damage taken from next attack reduced to 10.
Mech Features:
Sword
Gun
Anti-Beam Shield
VPS Armor
Squad Bonus: Mobility and Accuracy +5 (Mobility and accuracy +20, movement +2, A rank in Space)
Voice Actress: Maaya Sakamoto (other roles: Jeanne in Fate/GO, Lightning in FFXIII, Lal’c in Diebuster and so much more)
Same as Shinn and the Destiny, only worse in every way - the Impulse WAS Shinn’s old unit. Luna’s notoriously low accuracy seems to be absent in this game, as her stats are actually decent enough. She’s worse than Shinn on all accounts, but she can hold her own well enough (especially with the Squad Bonus boosting her mobility and accuracy).
Like the Destiny, the Impulse’s built as a jack-of-all-trades and despite the Minerva’s absence (Talia and Rey are long dead in this game), it can still use the Cerberus and Excalibur attacks just fine. As with Shinn, Luna’ll get better as the game goes along, but she’s certainly a lot closer to the bench than that one is.
Still, this might just be Luna’s strongest appearance and you can certainly deploy her if you’d like.
Two things to note when fighting Festum and they’re both related to their abilities. The first one, that Cagalli warned us about, is Mind Read: it goes up to L4 and what it does is correct the final hit/evasion numbers by X% depending on the skill level. L1 is 30%, L2 is 40%, then 50% and 80% at L4. This Sphinx, our very first enemy? It has L4. Luna is NOT going to hit this guy without some major save scumming or luck.
Secondly, and even more important, all Festum have the Assimilation skill. Have you played with Basara and the Vajra in the Z series? It works like that. If a Festum tags you with anything, the target’s morale will be reduced; and if that pushes it below a threshold, the Festum will assimilate that unit, restoring its HP and EN and taking the target off the field.
The threshold changes with the skill level, too: L1 is 90, L2 is 100, L3 is 120 (!). Be very careful when engaging Festum with your Super Robots, especially early in battles when they haven’t had a chance to build up morale.
Oh, and it also regens HP and EN at 20%, so have fun with that.
For those unfamiliar, the unit menu’s options are, in order: move unit, attack, land/fly/submerge (when applicable), spirit commands (spell that you cast for various effects, consuming a portion of your total SP), status.
Other options may appear as we progress, such as combine with another spot, retreat a unit, exchange squad members, etc.
After you’re done moving, you’ll usually on have two options available: attack, or stand by (in that order.
Now, for reasons you’ll see in a few turns, we’ll want to start wearing down the Sphinx ASAP. Since Luna’s not doing much with this one, it falls on Shinn to bust out his big move and get to work.
SRW UX - Life Goes On: What the hell kind of enemy is this?! How can it read my mind…?!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzA3B6RYXUw
I actually lucked out and triggered his High Speed Evasion. Very nice.
The RNG is on my side on the enemy phase, as while the Festum manages to connect (Luna support defends), Shinn get another good hit in.
The next turn over, however…
: Hrgh…!
: Mobile Suits and the Burg #3 are under fire! The hangar’s been damaged!: Things aren’t looking good… Those may be aces from the Second Alliance-PLANTs War, but a Festum is no ordinary enemy…: Awakening the giant may be the only way we’ll survive this…!: You don’t mean the Fafner?! But piloting that thing—: I’m well aware of what one boarding the Fafner means, representative.: Cmdr. Minashiro…!: Father, I’ll do it! I’ll deploy the Fafner!: Soushi… you already have a job to do, no? Something no one else can.: ?! The Siegfried System…?!: Are you ready for it, Soushi…?: …Yes, sir!: Recent analysis has deemed Kazuki Makabe as the one most suited to receive the Fafner… it’s your son, Fumihiko. May we proceed…?: …: Ready the Fafner. Stand by for activation!: …: Alex, I need you to contact them…: ?! Cagalli, are you…!: We don’t have any other choice if we want to get through this one…: But are you sure? If word gets out that you contacted them neither the Federation nor the Big Three nations will take it sitting down.: That doesn’t matter. Order UX-E9… commissioned by Cagalli Yula Athha. : Understood…!
Back outside, we’re still trading blows with the Festum. By the end of its turn, the thing’s on its last legs, which is perfect.
Location: ALVIS – Fafner’s Burg
: That’s…!: The Fafner.: “Fafner”…?: In legends, it was a giant who turned into a dragon to guard his treasure. Its name was now inherited by the machine we built to face the Festum.: Piloting it is the only way to fight without them reading your mind. And we want you to protect this island with it.: …?! What are you, crazy?! I can’t do something like that!: Yes, you can! Your body can merge with the Fafner… and I’m sure you realize that!: …! : I’d do it myself if I could, but…!: …: You…: Hm…?: You really think I can do this…?: … Yes. Trust me.: Okay…
SRW UX - Shangri-LaI really like Angela…
: Kazuki, are you standing by? I’m engaging the Nibelung. 
: Nibelung…?*Stabbed everywhere!*
: GWAAAAARGH! Wh-What’re these plugs?!: They’re what give you a direct link to the Fafner. Nibelung activation confirmed engaged…: Siegfried System, connected!*Soushi materializes next to Kazuki.*
: Huh…?! Soushi, what’re you doing here…?!
: Our visual and auditory cortexes have been crossed. While you’re inside the Fafner and I’m in the Siegfried System, our neurons are directly interlinked. Now try opening your eyes.: My eyes…?: Right. The Fafner’s eyes are your eyes. I want you to focus only on merging yourself together with the Fafner. : Hmm… I-I can see!: Let’s get going, then…! Open the 11th Gate of Neidhöhle! Fafner Mark Elf, launching!
: That’s…!: The Fafner… the giant christened with a name of legend!
: Wh… Just what is going on?! (Shouko)
: We can think about it later! Come on! We gotta get to the shelter! (Maya): R-Right…*Kazuki moves forward.*
: The Fafner Mark Elf has reached the surface!: Wait, is it unarmed?! Why isn’t it equipped with any weapons?!*Beep*
: This is Burg #3 speaking. The enemy’s bombardment struck the container storing its weapons! (Tamotsu): We can’t get the hatch to open without someone controlling it manually!: Understood. I’ll go and deploy the weapons! Fumihiko, take care of things here!*Runs off.*
: H-Hey! Kozo!: Urgh! My… my body isn’t moving the way I want…!: What the hell is that guy doing?!: Kazuki, watch out! The Festum’s incoming!*The Sphinx gets right on the Fafner’s face!*
: ?! U-UWAAAAAAAAH!!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwFicOGSo5Y
Soushi: “Remember the way you felt just now, Kazuki!”
: …!: Haah… haah… it moved…!: Yes, very good. Feel the Fafner itself! Make it part of you!
: What…?!: Grendel types…?! Did the Fafner’s activation attract them?!: Wh-What should I…?: Calm down, Kazuki! The Grendel types by themselves shouldn’t be all that powerful!: Work together with the MSs and take them down one by one. Can you do that?!: Y-Yeah, got it! I’ll get it done!
Fafner Mark Elf (Kazuki Makabe)
Pilot Skills:
Synergetic Code (シナジェティック・コード) L3 – increases hit and evasion %.
Support Attack L1
Support Defense L1
Spirit Commands:
Focus
Sense (直感) – casts Strike and Alert once (respectively, 100% hit rate for one turn, and 100% chance to dodge the next attack)
Mech Features:
Gun
Siegfried System – sets Soushi as a subpilot for all Fafner units with this (current spirit list: Accelerate (加速), Alert (ひらめき), Strike (必中))
Squad Bonus: Mobility +5, Crit rate +10 (mobility +20, crit +20, movement +2)
Kazuki’s Voice Actor: Makoto Ishii (other roles: Crash Bandicoot (!), Masumi in Future Diary and a few others)
Soushi’s Voice Actor: Kohei Kiyasu (Kaoru in Prince of Tennis, Ippo in Hajime no Ippo and some others)
Shinn’s twin brother is, as a protagonist, a great unit who’ll only get better and better as the game progresses. The Mark Elf doesn’t have a lot going right now but it’ll get there.
And Kazuki’s stats good enough all around, and having Soushi provide all those nice spirits will certainly make him able to take care of himself, which is great news because Kazuki’s kill count is tied to two whole secrets.
But that’s not all you have to do, of course:
Secret Alert Fafner Secret #1 - 1st Step: have Kazuki shoot down the Sphinx Festum (this has to be done by turn 5)
Did you think L had too few secrets? Someone at BP obviously did because UX has a ton of them, and we’ll be getting them all (just shoot me now).
This first one is simple enough, provided you knew it was coming and made sure Shinn got the Festum all nice and weakened. The Mark Elf, at most, will do around 2300 damage on the thing with its best weapon, so get to work.
NG++ means I never need to worry about cash, so we’ll just use Shinn and Luna to drop a couple of Grendels and move to kill the Sphinx before it has a chance to regen.
: It’ll be alright, just stay calm…! This one’s gonna be a bull’s eye – and that’s a promise!
Good work, Luna.
And that’s step one done!
SRW UX - The Gate of Neidhöhle OpensThe Mark Elf has a different battle BGM, but I’m so changing it to Shangri-La.
: Can… Can I actually beat something like this?!: Yes, you’ll be fine. You… rather, we can beat them!: ! Soushi…!: Let’s go, Kazuki!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnicOstGyq0
Bam.
*Wooommmm.*
: I-It’s—!: Damn, it wants to assimilate the Fafner!: Shinn, get that thing away from him!: I’m on it! Haaaaaaah!*Shinn blasts towards the Sphinx.*
: Are you there…?: What…?!*Crick, crack.*
: U-UWAAAAAAAAAH!: Shinn…?!: Th-The Destiny’s… breaking apart?!: Shinn! Hang in there!: Damn it, what do I do now, Soushi?!*Beep!*
: Kazuki, use the railgun!: ?! You’re Soushi’s dad!: I’m launching the weapon over to you! Time it right and take out the Festum with a single shot!
: Rrrgh…!: Father!: It’s in your hands… Kazuki… Soushi!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwMoc_FfT9E
: Is it done…?!*Alarm*
: No, target’s alive and still growing in mass!: What…?!
: Are you there?: Damn it, it’s not moving! What’s going on, Soushi?!: I don’t know! Your monitors just cut off! Retreat, Kazuki!: I-It’s not that easy…! GAAAAAAAAAH!: KAZUKIIII!
: …?!: Wh-Who…?!
SRW UX - Roaring Deathblow
: Target sighted. Beginning operation.
: What… What unit is that…?!
: We’ll end him in one fell swoop. Ready the Hell Stringer!: ?! But that’s…!: We’re dealing with a Festum here. You understand that, don’t you…?: … Roger that. Lepton Vectrers, synchro-overdrive engaged. (No, it’s not Lepton Vector. It’s written as ベクトラー, whereas Vector would be ベクター): Synchronization coefficient 97, 98… Pressure set, safety lock released! Eat this!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBgCoPQupz0
Captions are available.
The OGs this time around are all about making Hissatsu Shigotonin references, and we already have three in here: Roaring Deathblow's a remix of the main theme, Richard's final line is one of the MC's most famous quotes, and Hell Stringer's a recreation of a move from the series.
It should be noted, as you’ll see in this video, that while Citra can run the game just fine 90% of the time, it’s still not perfect. On occasion, we may see a slight slowdown for a split second at the start of the video (possibly while it loads all the dialogue).
The rest plays well, though, so it didn’t seem enough reason to cut out videos altogether.
: Target’s destruction confirmed. Lepton Vectrers’ output is stable. Major…!: Haah… haah… I-I’m fine. And we shouldn’t stay any more than we need to…!: Y-Yes, sir. Retreating from the frontlines!
: All targets have been destroyed…: What units were those…?!: (Right in the nick of time, Unknown Xtrikers…!) SRW UX - Prologue This BGM isn’t accessible on the sound selector, so I don’t think it has an official name. It’s still a pretty nice tune!
: Hrgh…! Th-They saved us…?: Kazuki! Are you alright?!
(Kazuki): …: Kazuki, hang in there!
Life… It is doubt. It is joy. And it is confusion.
When people become wise to all, they realize that the world has limits. That their powers are limited... That they must someday awaken from their dream.
: MWAHAHAHA! I have you now, Princess Romina! Now you get to die like the fool you are for opposing Emperor Annex! (Grathan)
: Gaaaaaah! E-Engine output dropping! We’re not gonna make it…! (Gameran)
: Hrm…! Damn you, The Boom Army! ((Ylbora.)I understand that Zaboom is also a widely used translation for the Tobikage baddies but, one, the JP Wiki has it written as The Boom, two, I saw a couple of English sites writing it like that as well, and, three, I really, REALLY want it to be The Boom. I’m going for it and you can’t stop me!
: We are left with no choice… Ylbora, ready a warp towards Earth! (Romina): Your Highness! Going through a warp hole in the middle of battle is insane! : And even if we successfully make it across, there’s no guarantee we’ll find the legendary ninja on Earth…: No… I believe in the words of my father, Ladorio VII!: Please, let us warp to Earth!: Very well, Your Highness… if you are that certain, then…: Gameran, give me full power on the engine!: B-But… the amount of kylhasium we’ve left is-!: Is irrelevant! Do it!: R-Roger that!
: That light…! They’re actually going to try warping away?!: Kch, you’re not escaping! After them! We’ll hunt them to the rim of the galaxy and back if we have to!
: (?! Is that… a voice…?)
Gather at the beginning...
: ?! The Dunbine?! 
: Prepare yourself, Shot Weapon! (Marvel. And I swear that, yes, that’s the guy’s name.)
: Guh…! B-Blast you…!: I-I did it! I got him…!: …?! That was… Musy?! No, it wasn’t… whose voice is that?!
: Marvel, are you alright?! (Shou): Shou… Was that voice…? Cham…?
: What are you talking about?! I’m right here with him!: Marvel, you need to stay strong!: Hah…hahah… Jeez… You can’t even tell when someone just wants to be comforted…?
: MARVEEEEEEL!!
: Ahahaha! There you are, Shou Zama!: Burn Bunnings!*Burn charges after Shou.*
: What have you ever gained from wallowing in all that hate?!: Power and cunning! And with those, victory shall be mine…!: I will not kill another man! Rather, what I’ll kill is that hate…!
: Urgh…!: Shou…?! What was that voice…?!
: Hrk…! Ci-Ciela Lapana…!: PURIFY US!!
Gather at the beginning…
: Hah… I see. You two covet the heavens as well! (Cao Cao.)
: Nay! It is only the will of the people who commands the heavens! (Liu Bei): The will of the people…?
: Aye! The prayers of all those who desire peace! (Sun Quan): The will of those who call Mirisha their home compels even the very heavens!
: I acknowledge the strength and conviction you possess!: However, I shan’t bow before them!
: We cannot allow him to prevail…! In the name…!: Of all life in Mirisha!
: RAAAAAAAAAARGH!!
*Craaaash.*
If there is a tomorrow, what will it grant us?
For the sake of all who dwell in this universe…
Oh, possibilities, gather at the beginning that will lead to the future.
Act 1 – In the End of Wilds