Part 20: Galbalan
We're finally here, this is the end.
We complete our descent into the core of Genos Island to finally take on the dark god said to bring total destruction to Felghana. Can we stop his resurrection in time? We're going to find out as we go face to face with the monster himself for the game's final climax!
Wow, I really didn't give myself enough time to adequately explain what's happening in this boss. A lot of stuff happens very quickly, almost too much to take in from a spectators perspective. I'm going to note it all here and leave any gaps for questions by you kind folks at home.
-Phase 1-
Galbalan has three attacks: a ring of fire, a series of pulse balls, and an ice shot that creates rising platforms. The first two of these attacks you need to avoid until he shoots the ice to make platforms. At this time you want to jump up on the ice platforms, and ride them up to the height where you can get a fire magic shot off at the weird jewel on his head. If Galbalan starts shooting pulse balls while you are on the ice platforms, jump off and repeat the steps previous.
Once you shoot him in the head with the fire magic (preferrably charged) he will reveal his eyeball at the lower section of his body. This is your chance to get on the floor and mash fireballs straight into his eyeball before his next attack.
He will pull two swords out from behind him and proceed with one of two attacks, swithcing between the two randomly three times: a series of downward strikes on the ground with the two blades combined (which you must run away from their impact) or he rakes the floor with the two swords (which you must jump over). Between these phases you get a small gap to shoot him in the eye a bit more, which speeds up this early section of the bossfight rather nicely.
Once you get him down far enough (to ~7000HP in Nightmare/Inferno) he proceeds to...
-Phase 2-
This is the most complicated phase and it's devastating in the variety of ways Galbalan can attack. First, he'll drain all your magic away into his two hands and bomb the floor with it. You can hit his hands while he charges for some low-risk chip damage, and the bomb tracks to your location just before he throws it, so try to direct the bomb off to the side so it doesn't get in your way while dodging the lasers.
The lasers will move in three patterns, sweeping left, sweeping right and 50/50 sweeping either direction. You must jump over these at the same time as dodging some moves from phase 1, a combination of moves from phase 1, another laser added into the mix from his hands and his hands slamming into the arena. The last two of the listed attacks are punishable and required to punish for the boss to progress. Once you've done enough damage to his hands he'll reel them back and divebomb the arena, covering it in lethal icicles. You must use the little bit of meter you have just recharged from destroying his hands to wind magic hop and hover until the ground clears, then you can unleash on his eye with melee/boost/fire magic (combination of these). As he is just pulling back it is possible (if you can change magic quick) to shoot him in the eye for about 400 damage as he's pulling away out of melee range. He will then repeat all these previous phase 2 steps. Take him down to 1000HP (Nightmare/Inferno) and he will move on to the final phase.
-Phase 3-
Galbalan is pissed, he removes your magic from you permanently as he demands you play his game of Demon's Badminton, shooting a ball of energy you must hit back and forth between each other until he eventually misses. This would be simple enough but the developers threw a little spanner in the works here as there are two obstacles employed during this rally.
In each rally, Galbalan will either make an emitter that shoots bullet hell-esque amounts of energy bullets at you (which you must avoid because taking a hit usually means you screw up the rally), or he'll summon a claw to try and pull you in and grab you. If the claw grabs you it's an instant kill (as demonstrated) but if my experimentation is correct the only way you can get totally pulled in is if your horizontal momentum slows from dashing. You'll just get pulled onto the perimeter of the attack's hitbox, but if you swing your sword you immediately get pulled. That's just from quick experimentation, don't take that last statement too seriously.
I think that's detailed enough, eh? Taking all questions if you're lost.
Ys: The Oath in Felghana OST
The Strongest Foe
Farewell
Departure at Sunrise
Wanderers from Ys
Radiant Key
Going to post the rest of the JDK arranges too, since I slacked off on that around the Chester 2 fight.
The Oath in Felghana: jdk Special (2010)
Chop!!
A Premonition
Beat of Destruction
Descendants of Genos
Wanderers from Ys
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That's it, the Inferno run is finally done! We cleared it in a total game time of a little over 8 hours 40 minutes, which accounting for all the screwing around I did was a good 100% time. We got every item, documented every enemy and NPC and we did it all on a difficulty designed to be near impossible - and the only button you needed to press was play!
Thank you all for watching and participating in what has been my most difficult to play, organize and record LP yet. It's been a long run and a lot has happened over the months but we finally pulled through in the end. Thanks for sticking with me even though it sometimes took me over a month between updates, you folks are awesome.
Though the meat of the LP is over, there is still some bonus content heading on its way in the next week or so, with one bonus update ready hopefully tomorrow! This LP ain't quite over yet, we're still kicking!