Working as Intended

We're finally free of the silly tutorial sections! Huzzah!

Maybe it's just me, but Final Fantasy XII seems a wee bit more difficult then most games in the series. I haven't been getting any Game Over stuff yet, but it's certainly been giving me a bit more of a fight then I'm used to! Nothing wrong with that, naturally, but maybe I'm just so used to steam-rolling through battles just by hitting Attack that my brain does a double-take when it comes to an actual challenge early on in an RPG.

In any case, we've got lots to go through today, so let's hop right to it!









When we last left our heroes, and Vaan, they had just been captured by Imperial soldiers for taking part in a very confusing series of events, which we didn't even witness the important half of. Luckily, Vaan has the local MacGuffin firmly wedged up his brownie-maker, so the evil Archadians didn't discover that!




Oh, please, when has Vaan ever gotten himself into trouble?

... Not including what lead him to being thrown into a dungeon. Which was everything.




Well this place seems like a total downer. What's over here?




. . . .

I'ma just going to turn around now, okay?





God damn it, Vaan! What was the one thing Balthier told you to do?!

If you're not going to take this seriously then we may as well just turn this entire game around and go back home!




"Can't even follow a single blasted instruction, can you, boy? I swear, I'm going to throw you into the background so damn fast it's not funny..."




Pig-related puns for all~!




JUDO-CHOP!




"Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!"

"I've got 20 gil that says the poor kid drops of starvation first. Just look at those ribs..."




Ah, I see the Nalbina Dungeon has officially hired Party Poopers. Spared no expense!




Nothing will ruin a good party like the friggin' blues showing up just before Ben can show everyone his new beer-bong.




I think this is meant to be the Ivalice, reptilian equivalent of Paine...




"I think I owe that guy a 20. Shit."




Yeah, but it's generally easier to just cast Escape and then run through town to reach Ronfaure, really.




"For the last time, stop staring at me, asshole!"




"Guns. Lots of guns."




Thankfully, Archadian soldiers and lizards are incapable of looking further than three feet away at any given time.




"Oh yeah, Mr. Smartenheimer? I'd like to see you turn 90 degrees and jog in a straight line for 20 feet without screwing it up. I've got the grace and serenity of a fucking jaguar, I do!"




"You'll just have to pick which hand he's in, won't ya? 5 gil if you guess correctly!"




Please don't let that be an euphemism....




Suddenly, someone who very clearly stole his coat design off DeviantArt enters the room!




You've gotta be committing some pretty awesome crimes if the judge feels the need to walk into the courthouse decked out in full-body armour and matching cape.




Law and Order being the name of the their fists.




The previously unknown fifth house of Hogwarts. They used to give everyone in Hufflepuff wedgies.




The shit-ruiners of Ivalice, if you will.




"huh? who said that? i'm a judge and i'll execute anyone who says otherwise!"




Company team-building exercises. All the day-camps were taken and, well, gotta have 'em somewhere, right?




We don't know what they're doing, but stuff it, we're following them anyway!




How do we know they're heading there? For all we know they're here to kick our arses.

Or pick flowers? Point is, we don't know!




PLEASE START MAKING SENSE




Running!




"You there! Stop reading this nonsense and help find us a way out, already!"




The toilet?





I think Balthier's just trying to break the poor lad's brain.




And so the group finds all their stuff. But, sadly, it's invisible, so I'm not entirely sure what the point of this scene is.




Well, this place seems awfully friendly. So glad we came by!




O SHI-

Hurry up, Vaan! The door's closin---




Ohhhhh, too late....




"WHOA NELLY"




Right. Time to commence Operation Why Are We Following That Jerk Again?




:3




Now, the game implies that it's best to sneak your way through this area, and while that's certainly possible by hiding in the right spots and waiting for the Imperials to move about, here's the twist.... It's actually not mandatory.

I know! A stealth section that can be easily be avoided if so desired. MADNESS!!




That said, we take the non-pansy route anyway!




It's a good thing the Judge and his buddies were going to the Oubliette afterall, otherwise this'd be kind of awkward.




"I swear if anyone's hiding my closet again I'm going to Judge them right in the bloody face."




Huh. I guess XII does copy X in one regard...




"Now we know how the caged Basch sings~!"

"Dude, not funny."




DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN!!

Oh, great, twins. That's going to make screenshots without named subtitles a riot, huh?




"You're nearing supermodel territory, my friend."

"Still looking better than Vaan, though, right?"

"Well, dude, that's a given."




"She kept screaming something about pants. We believe it to be some sort of rebel code!"




It's kind of hard not to cling when you've got him chained up. It's not nice to taunt!





I SMELL DRAMATIC BACKSTORY, FOLKS~




It's a good thing our Judge friend didn't decide to walk out the way he came, otherwise we'd be pretty screwed.




"You must be. You're not nearly wearing sensible enough clothes!"




Balthier is only willing to speak with official Zombie or Zombie-like certified undead. That's just the kind of classy guy he is.





Ooh, snarky~




This is gonna be awkward....




"BITCH, WHAT YOU SAY?!"




Vaan tries to amuse our friend by doing his best chimpanzee impersonation.




"WHY CAN'T I BE AN IMPORTANT CHARACTER FOR ONCE? HUH?"




"He... he didn't even get passed the tutorial, for crying out loud. What sort of role does that leave me?!"




More importantly, we could do without the hissy-fits as well.




Fran's had enough of this bullcrap.




Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee~!!




"Huh. A switch that instantly drops a highly-important prisoner 100 feet and right out of the dungeon.
.... Not one of our better ideas."




Ah, I do ever so enjoy happy landings.




Vaan's not done with the hissy-fits yet, however...





"Translation: Shut up, bitchshitter."




D:<




Yay!




Welcome to the first dungeon of Final Fantasy XII

As is required by the RPG Dungeon Law Act of 1987, every hole, dungeon, prison or indoors fighting area must have at least one gimmick. In XII, it's the use of fuses and power supplies!




As our fourth-wall breaking friend here is kind enough to explain, the power supply of the dungeon is shown on the right side of the screen. Opening cages throughout our trip will lower the amount of power left. Normally this isn't too bad, but once it gets underneath 50% an awful lot of Undead start spawning, and they can be a real pain in the butt if you're very far between Home Save Points.

So how do we keep above 50%?




As you run through the dungeon, you'll enocunter Mimics, who drain the power from wires in the wall. On the plus side, however, once you kill one they'll somehow put about 20-30% power right back into the wall.




They can be pains in the butt to kill, though, and they'll heal themselves off the exposed electricity if they're near enough to it. Oh, and you may encounter of them sometimes as Treasure Caskets, seeing as how these are Mimics we're dealing with here, people.




Right, with all that said, let's roll out!




"My word, you're the upstart knickerbockers who dared inflict harm upon my compatriots. Well, have at thee, you motley-brained harpies!"




"I'M TELLING THE QUEEN!"




Bombs!

Sadly these ones don't seem to self-destruct. They do, however, have a perpetual >:D face, which is just as spiffy.




It's a good thing I'm not showing screenshots of every room I've been in while down here, otherwise we'd already be at 300 images. When XII does dungeons, it really does dungeons.




Don't worry, Fran, we left the Mist way back in IX. We're safe from its passive-aggressive rage here.





Stealing from the dead is not smiled upon in this group!

Unless it's from fallen monsters. Or soldiers. Or people we don't like. Then it's A-OK~!





"By the twelve circles of Dalmasca, you've somehow become even more poncier!"




"Which'd now make you his age. Perfect ;) "




Yeah, I'd be pretty disappointed as well.




If it was Basch, you'd think that'd be something he would remember, wouldn't ya?




"And I'll give you my blade through your torso if you bring it up again!"




And then we get a very brief (10 secondish) flashback about how the soldiers ambushed Basch, hid him in the corner and his twin then took his place to stab Reks and get caught by the Imperials. I'd screenshot it, but it makes no sense, even if you do watch it.




"Yeah, it was totally the guy who looked exactly like me. Yup. All him. If you could hate him now, that'd be super."




Nobody cares, Vaan. Sorry.




"Don't believe in yourself - believe in ME! Who believes in YOU!"




Actually he was betrayed and stabbed in the gut to the last, as part of a ploy to sell Dalmasca off to Archadia apparently, but we get your point. Kind of. The whole reason for your twin doing that is still kind of iffy, y'know?




Shut up, Vaan.




Gotta love Balthier.




Just after the Cutscene of DRAMA Room, there's a really nifty spot to level up. If you let the Mimics drain the power to underneath 50% and let them live, countless Undead will spawn around the following two rooms. However, since there's a Save Point right next door, you don't have to worry about dying horribly so much.

With the power low, you can just run laps around the rooms here and rack up some very quick kills and 50 EXP a pop, which is quite a lot at this point. Oh, and also you'll get Bone Fragments from Skeleton mobs, which can sell for quite the nice sum of gil, ya?

Whenever you wanna get out of here with minimal fuss, just kill the mimics and they'll give back all the power!




"Ding! 10"

"omg congrts"

"Congratulations!"

"thx :)"

"<Config> Ah, crap..."




Phew! Almost out of the dungeon, now.

Thankfully, as everyone knows, there are no bosses at the end of dungeons. I mean, that's just common knowledge!




There are, however, giant flamboyant robot queens.

Doesn't she just look fabulous?




The Mimic Queen can pack a pretty nasty punch if you're not prepared for her. For some reason, the tiny Mimics during the battle run off to deplete the Charge gauge, despite there being no Undead spawns in this chamber. Oh well!

Anyway, it's best to manually walk Balthier and Fran as far away from the Queen as you can, so they can avoid her powerful AoE strikes. If you have Blizzard unlocked for anyone, she's weak to that as well.




Shazam!




Unfortunately, she also happened to be one of those dreaded Load-Bearing Bosses.




Why do the caverns always collapse at the end?




Freedom!!







Then it probably isn't wise to be standing directly in the middle of one of the major entrances to the city then, eh?




"We'll blow up that accursed Death Star, even if it kills us!"




"I would, but he was a stupid weenie who I knew for about ten minutes. So, yeah, fuck that noise."




"... Still up the old corn-shooter, you know. I have to say, it's starting to get comfortable..."




Probably smells of death by now anyway.




That's a rather pretentious way of saying, "Keep that nasty shit to yoself, slice," Fran, but accurate.




Please don't.




"Mine? Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine? Mine! Mine!"




That's an excellent question.




Good. You're not ditching Vaan on me, missy!




I don't know. Why don't you ask it?




Huh.




Wasn't she getting pissy at you because you went and stole something, and got in an arse-load of trouble?

I don't think showing your butt-rock off is going to especially move her.




Oh, shit, Migelo! Man, he's going to be pissed.




Probably going to make us wear lead shoes at the bottom of the Estersand river or something.

Oh well, better face the music...




Well, hello, dollface!





Migelo and Penelo are mysteriously absent, eh?

I guess he really does take choking his disobedient hos when they skip work seriously then.




"HAY EVERYONE I'M AN ESCAPED FELON NOW CAN I GET SOME HUGS HERE :D"




Trust me, Kytes, considering that he has a pile of nubile, male kids in the corner, you don't want to go there.





Which will be your mindset for the next 80% of the game, really.




:)




"You just had to escape, didn't ya, boy? I had a great celebration and everything planned too..."




Dude! Put that back in the toilet where it belongs! I mean, jeez, unsanitary!




No... No, not really.




"Pull my finger!"




"It's the main character torch, you see. I need you pass it to someone else."




"Dude, trust me, I know the owner of the club. Me and him go way back. It's cool."




HOW THE HELL DID YOU MANAGE THAT?




"You'll also be acting as that sword's sheath, if you know what I mean."




"Done. She's currently at the bottom of the Estersand river."

"But.. is she.. dea--"

"What am I, a doctor? NEXT!"




HA HA HOW DRAMATIC




ELSEWHERE: Basch finds some borderline appropriate clothes to wear. In Ivalice, this is really pushing it!




"I remember well now. Mmmmm... >;) "




What the hell is up with that dude on the left's hair?




A simple, "Hey, I know you!" would have sufficed as well.




Well, yes, but that's because you're not an idiot.




:O




"Depends. Does she put out?"




Well at least someone knew what would going on that night.




"I'd like to abettor your Empire, baby."

"What?"

"Nuttin'"




Kinky!




OVER THE STOP ANIME CAMERA DIRECTION!!




"Does this outfit make my arse look big?"




Again, a simple, "We don't know if we can really trust you again yet" would be far less dramatic.




Especially ones that inexplicably make you fall out of a prison.




Well, I think it's safe to say everyone in that room had various lengths of poles jammed up their rear-ends.




Yes, Vaan, that's been well established by now.




It's hard to forget an outfit that ridiculous.




"Were I any crazier, I'd swear we were characters in an established video game franchise or something. Insanity!"




"You're clearly not the main character of this piece, so the least you could do is take me to someone important."




Damn straight he does!




Along the way, Vaan seemingly feels the need to state the obvious trials of war to Basch, a long-time soldier.




Before he leaves the spotlight, Vaan's going to play it for all it's worth.




Well of course you didn't, silly.




The family we never see, and then presumably dropped dead, hence the whole 'orphan' thing in Part 1  





"They killed Uncle Owen, too!"




OH SHI-

Hide, Vaan! Hide!




And nothing of value was lost~




She's trapped down the well. Quick, Vaan, dive in and rescue her!




Of course. Them! Those guys! I hate them so...

WHO EXACTLY?





Ah, I see. The plot kidnapped her then.




Ah, yes, Velociraptor!Paine.




Migelo lays down the law of tha street, word.




It's a battle of the pimps, ladies and gentlemen!




I do!

Now.




I bet the heart of the Empire herself does shake at the meer thought of it.




Good enough for me. Let's go!




Not going to lie. I had to scour a dictionary to find out what the hell a Marquis was.

But, hey, at least it's an actual word. Unlike Maester.




That's it, Vaan. Give up the one thing that's really tying you to the overall story right now!




You don't know the half of it, lady.




"God, the shit I put up with...."




While we can't really use it now, this is the airship port~

Traveling between cities, once the option opens up, is surprisingly spiffy. You can either take the cheaper way there, which basically plonks you inside the ship and you can run around and chat to NPCs before finally arriving, or you can take the Express Route. It's is more expensive, but you reach your destination within about 5 seconds.

The later option, again, being something a certain flippin' MMO could learn from!




Balthier looks justifiably less than impressed.




Hahaha




And so the Millennium Falcon Strahl takes off for Alderan Bhujerba~!

See you next time, folks!