Well, I couldn't quite do it.
In order to fully 100% the game (as far as I know) I'd have needed to beat every minigame at the highest score in order to gain the materials to craft all the enhanced accessories, which is required to get to the highest crafting level in order to make the Genji armor pieces. Then, I'd have to beat the "Ultimate Party Animal's" high scores in all the games at the Gold Saucer (which may have gotten me the necessary materials).
I tried. I tried so damn hard. But oh well.
In fact, there are bouts at the Musclehead Coliseum at the Saucer that are designed for level 70 - my characters are level 49 at this point. This is clearly meant to be post New Game Plus in hard mode. (Indeed, some even don't unlock until you've finished the full game).
So, I'll take some consolation from the fact that I've done some very hard things - beating Gilgamesh was probably the biggest challenge the game has thrown at me (and that after the second, third, and fourth hardest). But it was time to progress the story, and that means hitting Rebirth's point of no return.
Spoilers ahead:
The Temple of the Ancients has been accessed by Shinra, and your first fight against their forces is actually comically enormous - a single combat encounter that starts with a couple elite troopers and 2nd class SOLDIERS (insane to me that Roche was 3rd class) and then has two other squads come in from flanking positions. Given how thoroughly I've quested here, of course, it was pretty simple to destroy them.
The temple is almost if not quite Escherian in design - one of the early parts of it requires you to flip gravity so that you'll walk on surfaces that were previously ceilings or walls. Cloud's final sword, the Slipstream Blade, is the only one I think you really stand a real risk of missing, but each of your remaining party members (Cait Sith having skedaddled) get a final weapon in this dungeon. I took a break after getting Red XIII's, so the only one I have left is Yuffie's.
Anyway, we finally face off against Reno again, who joins Rude in a classic two-Turk fight (I'd thought that he shared vulnerability to lightning with Elena, though given his use of stun batons that's kind of silly - his vulnerability is fire. When I inevitably fight Tseng I'll be sure to use ice damage).
The party gets separated for a good portion of the dungeon, with Cloud, Tifa, and Barret on one team and Aerith, Yuffie, and Red on the other. Aerith has a unique mechanic where she gathers up Lifestream energy that gives her buffs the more she holds, but she has to use it to... kind of make structures exist. Sadly you don't seem to get to keep enough for the higher-level buffs long enough to make use of them, but you get a Faith buff, which is nice.
Cloud, meanwhile, is not doing great. Like in Gongaga, we see him execute a Shinra trooper who is begging for his life. This is... I mean, in a grittier universe where we're definitely not just "knocking out" the bad guys, this would be kind of normal, but given how shocking it is to see blood spattered on Cloud's face it feels like Tifa and Barret kind of roll with it a little too easily. Clearly this is the influence of Sephiroth's connection to him. I'm curious to see where the party is left at the end of this game.
Speaking of which: I know that there are timeline shenanigans at play here, what with Zack's whole weird alternate universe experience, but given that he's not been plucked from his fate in this universe, but instead exists in one where Barret, Tifa, and Red are presumably dead, and Aerith and Cloud are catatonic, I'm feeling less confident that Aerith will miraculously survive where she died in the original game.
And damn if the game's writing and voice acting is making me dread that moment - Aerith manages to strike this impressive balance in which she is innocent without being naive. She knows about the darkness in the world, and seems to even know that her death is imminent, but her response to that is to try to squeeze out as much goodness and kindness she can out of the world in the limited time she has left. It's a remarkable feat of writing and performance.
Anyway, while I'll be sad to finish the game (though I'm expecting a multi-hour grand finale like Remake had - I think it was like five bosses in a row if you count the motorcycle sequence as one?) it's not like I haven't gotten real value out of it - I'm over 100 hours into it by this point. While I could imagine that the many sidequests and world intel stuff might drain the patience of other players, for some reason I haven't felt as fatigued by it as I did with XVI. That might be a function of more interesting gameplay, more interesting characters (though I do like Clive and Cid in XVI) and story, or some combination thereof.
I should probably go back and finish XVI at some point. And I've got until late June to wait for Shadow of the Erdtree, Elden Ring's DLC, to drop (which I'll probably only be able to scratch the surface of before traveling).
No comments:
Post a Comment