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[R^2]

Celes: Aren't you... Edgar?




Gerad: I have no idea what you're talking about... I'll take this, too, kid!




Celes: Don't play dumb with me! Edgar? ...You didn't lose your memory, did you?
Gerad: Listen... It grieves me to have to disappoint such a beautiful lady, but I've been Gerad since the day I was born!
Celes: I've never met anyone else who'd flirt with a "lady" he was trying to shake off his tail...
Gerad: Being polite to ladies is common courtesy the world over!




Henchman: Ho-ho-ho, do we ever!
Gerad: Then lead the way. I'll take charge once we're in.


Sabin and Celes sneak aboard the boat by leaping off the dock and crouching down in what should be plain sight.

[R^2]

Music: Kids Run Through the City. Notably, South Figaro is the only place in the World of Ruin to use the World of Balance town music.










That doesn't make any sense.




...start? It's been a year. What have you been doing?




You'd think Sabin would react in some way to this happy news, but there's nothing scripted. He's an optional party member, after all -- you don't have to go into Tzen at any point.


The little girl is still giving out quest hints disguised as innocuous children's songs.

[R^2]

Celes: You are Edgar, aren't you?


Gerad: Case of mistaken identity, my dear. Give it up!




...you're not a server in this pub, are you.

...oh.

...ohhhhhhhhhh...






 

[R^2]

Guess what! You get to go through the Cave to South Figaro again!


I... what? Of all the people to have survived the globe-spanning cataclysm, Siegfried made it?


There are all sorts of monsters in the Cave, but only the Cruller is capable of using any magic. Usually one summon of Phantom is enough to make it through this next section almost unscathed, but in this playthrough those Crullers were a bit generous with their casting of Fira on the party. I had to keep reapplying Vanish to ward off the other monsters.


But like, this guy? Can't lay a finger on me.


Hey, question. If I'm invisible, how come we're still hiding?




Henchman: How about that, eh?
Gerad: Nice.
Henchman: Used to have me a pet turtle...


The Crimson Robber band hops over the turtle's shell and into the passage beyond its underground pond. Followed by... yes, Siegfried.




There would have been treasures to be had in this next section, except the robbers got them all already. They're thieves, what did you expect?

[R^2]

The tunnel leads to a collapsed wall behind one of the cells in the Figaro castle dungeon.


It's never an issue for the party, but the air in the castle is stale and deprived of oxygen. The castle's stuck underground for some reason, so no fresh air is getting in, and the residents are suffocating. This is... not really made clear in the SNES version.


The engineer who moves the castle around is too weak to stop you from going down to the engine room, so...




Whatever "it" is, it's jamming the engines Figaro uses to burrow through the sand. With the entire castle stuck in reverse -- or whatever -- they can't resurface.


Gerad: I'll keep this thing busy! You guys go get the treasure!
Henchman: But... boss! That's awfully dangerous!
Gerad: Just get moving!

The thieves run out of the room.


Edgar: What are you standing around for, Celes!?
Celes: Edgar! It is you!

Surprise, Gerad is actually Edgar. In Japanese, his name was "Geoff"; without the anagram it may have been a little less obvious that the person in question was Edgar after all. The Figaro twins might have had a long-lost triplet brother! You don't know!

[R^2]

Celes and Sabin join Edgar in cleaning out his clogged-up engines. Each Tentacle has different elemental absorbs and weaknesses, so this fight can be really drawn-out. Furthermore, the Tentacle's favorite tactic is to use Entwine or Stun on the party to inflict them with Slow status. If anyone is slowed, a Tentacle will then Grab them and remove them from the fight while draining their HP. It takes thirty seconds for anyone to be released from a Grab, making the battle even lengthier.


The trick is to equip Sabin and Celes with Hermes Sandals. Having auto-Haste makes the character immune to Slow, and anyone who can't be Slowed can't be Grabbed. You're then free to use magic or physical hits to take the Tentacles out one by one.

Edgar autoequips your best weapon, shield, and armor when the fight starts, but you can't access his Relic equip screen, so he tends to get Grabbed and drained and there's nothing you can do about it.

Two of the Tentacles (top-left and bottom-right) are vulnerable to Petrify, and the bottom-left one is vulnerable to instant death. Knowing that at any point in the last twenty years would have let teenage R^2 approach this battle with rather less apprehension.


It's a difficult battle, but if you can keep two party members from being Grabbed, it's winnable. Having all three party members in the Tentacles' grip is a good way to lose, though.


Edgar: I'd heard Figaro had run into some kind of trouble. I wanted to help, but how was I supposed to get here with the castle stuck beneath the sand? Then I caught wind of the rumor that those guys had escaped from the dungeon...
Celes: So you used them...
Edgar: Bingo. And obviously, I couldn't let them find out I was the king of Figaro...
Celes: ...Because they'd just escaped from your own jail.
Sabin: You could've told us.




Thief: That monster must've gotten him...
Henchman: Poor boss... didn't even last as long as the last boss...
Robber: Oh well... Let's go.


Edgar: I couldn't care less about treasure. What we need to worry about is Kefka. Those guys haven't done anything wrong... not really.
Celes: So... you'll come along?
Sabin: Let's go shake things up again!

And Edgar joins the party!


The thieves may have swiped everything from this vault, but they didn't notice that the sword stuck to this statue isn't purely decorative.


Hmm. Turns out Edgar wasn't ever in the party when I had espers equipped to people. He doesn't know a single spell.

[R^2]

Every citizen of Figaro breathes a sigh of relief, because sighing is once again an option.






An oblique poke at no small number of the Final Fantasy fandom, who insist on spelling his name "Cefca", the way it appears on Japanese-printed media.






The shop sells Debilitators now, but I don't need one. Locke managed to swipe one from Air Force's arm, remember? Used in battle, the Debilitator gives one enemy a new elemental weakness. It stacks with itself, so after enough time it's possible to have an enemy weak to all eight.

[R^2]

Everyone can breathe? Good! We're going back undergrou-- underwater!


After this random encounter, I can truly say I beat Cancer.




Kohlingen looks about the same, and is in about the same place as it was in the World of Balance.










Whoops.

[R^2]

Wow, the guy who worked on Setzer's airship doing this job sure didn't take the end of the world too well. You look thirty years older, sir!










Sure is, budd-- hey, who's that?

[R^2]

Setzer: So, you survived...
Celes: Come with us! We're going after Kefka.
Setzer: Hmph... I just don't have the drive to do that kind of stuff anymore.
Celes: What are you talking about!?
Setzer: I'm a gambler... My world has always been one where a man's spirit could soar free... Not anymore. I feel like the weight of this world is crushing me. It's just too much to bear... And on top of that, I've even lost my wings...
Celes: You fought with all your heart before the world was ruined! That couldn't have been easy either, but you seemed to bear that just fine!
Setzer: That was then... All my dreams are gone now.
Celes: If you need a dream to chase after, then why don't you find yourself a new one? Like taking back our world.


In the SNES version, this conversation was a bit too brief. "Hey Setzer, come on." "Don't wanna." "Please?" "Okay." The GBA script takes some heat for lacking some of Woolsey's original charm, but in this scene it certainly does a better job: Setzer is drinking himself to death out of sheer depression, and would have succeeded unless Celes had shown up with a few encouraging words.


Setzer: ...You'd chase after it with me, then? My new dream? Thanks...  ...I think it's time to pay a visit to Darill's tomb.




The tomb in question is just southwest of Kohlingen. There's a brief cut to the world map to show you.

[R^2]

Setzer: Yeah... She was really something. The world could've turned inside out and she'd never have even flinched.




Not just Darill's... there are two skellingtons in alcoves on either side of the entrance. And... they're about twice as tall as the party members' field sprites. Who the hell is buried here, giants?


Needless to say Sabin's Aura Cannon gets another heavy workout here.


Meanwhile, Setzer is stuck throwing dice. Take Setzer's level times two and multiply it by his die roll, and that's the damage output. It's luck-based, but still steadier than using Slots and cheaper than equipping him with Heiji's Jitte for Zeninage.


Well, it's a tombstone. That's only sensible.


Oh, this must be a puzzle.






Sure, I'll just take the inscriptions on those four other tombstones...


...and put them up so that they spell a reference to the developer's old company name in reverse! How intuitive!


...wait... who has? Didn't Setzer commission this tomb for his friend? Shouldn't he already know this?

[R^2]

Well, whatever. The Growth Egg is a relic that doubles the experience points its holder gains after battle.


Growth Egg sidequest aside, the tomb proper is a maze of switchbacks and... well, switches. First you flip the one at the bottom of this room to open a door, then you flip another one elsewhere to flood this room, then you jump on a turtle and ride it to the door opened previously. It's not as easy to work out as I make it sound, especially with other passages distracting you with tombstone-carving puzzles.




"Presenter" in the SNES version, and for his cameo in Bahamut Lagoon. The message indicating the monster ambush wasn't correct in this case: the monster wasn't in the box, the monster uses a treasure-chest-like protrusion off its body to lure in its prey: greedy adventurers!

Gary Gygax would be proud.


It's possible to instant-kill the Angler Whelk with petrification, but in this case, Catoblepas missed.


So Setzer fires away with Banish, trying to suck the creature into an interdimensional rift.


And after a few tries, manages to suck in... its shell!


I like to think the rift is stuck around the creature's neck, unable to close. While its body helplessly flails around in an interstellar vacuum, we're free to smack around the Angler Whelk's head.


Yep.


Why bother? Unlike Ymir, both the Angler Whelk's head and the Angler Whelk's shell drop the same item: new claws for Sabin. And unlike Ymir, it's possible to kill both in the same battle. And if you do, both parts drop a set of claws!


You're goddamn right Genji Glove. The Dragon Claws are holy-elemental, so Sabin now does around 3000-4000 damage per turn to the undead monsters in the tomb. There's no kill like overkill!

[R^2]

For no reason other than we've reached the end of a dungeon, there's a boss fight. Dullahan always opens with Level ? Holy... which is a Lore that's hard to find elsewhere. Dammit, where's Strago when you need him?

The multiplier for this spell filling in the "?" is the last digit of the party's current gil, so it's likely to change every battle.


In this case, it's not a useful spell to have used.


Northern Cross, though, which has a chance of freezing the entire party solid? That's a useful spell to cast. The status can be removed by hitting the frozen character with a fire-elemental attack, but Sabin's only slightly better with magic than Edgar... and doesn't have any fire spells. He could equip the Burning Knuckle, but given his FIGHTIN' POWER I'm pretty sure it'd just KO whoever he tried to thaw out.


Oh. Um. Hmm.

That's not good.


Thankfully it doesn't take long before Celes and Edgar thaw naturally. They revive Sabin and hit Setzer with a basic Fire spell, everyone heals up with Cura and Chakra, and we turn the tables on Dullahan. That was a pretty close call!

[R^2]

Music: Epitaph. Just as Locke gets a slow, sad version of his theme song for scenes with his lost love, Setzer gets a slow, sad version of his theme for this scene with his lost best friend/rival/maybe-not-entirely-platonic life partner.




Setzer: What are you trying to prove by pushing your ship to its limits? It's pointless!




Setzer: You can't be serious! When I take the Falcon from you, it'll be because I left you a mile behind in a race! Until then, I'm not letting you out of my sight!
Darill: Ha! Good luck with that!


Whoooooosh! There's really nothing like flying!








whooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooosh

[R^2]

Darill: I'll fly past the clouds and see the stars closer than anyone ever has before!
Setzer: Be back by sunset! I'll be waiting for you on our hill!


Away she goes!
















Sploosh! I'm not sure how you hide a zeppelin underwater, but that's where it comes out.

[R^2]

You don't enter Kefka's tower and initiate endgame by walking in from the ground. You land on top of the tower and infiltrate from what can generously be called its roof!






A carrier pigeon flies by!






Good question.




The pigeon flies us to Maranda, which as a woman in Kohlingen hinted, is the first step to re-recruiting Cyan. But judging from the polling throughout the World of Balance, nobody likes Cyan. And I have an airship, with the world at my beck and call! I have better things to do than chase down overly-guilty technophobic samurai.

Hmm. Should I open polling for where to go next?

...

...nah.

[Rico]

An oblique poke at no small number of the Final Fantasy fandom, who insist on spelling his name "Cefca", the way it appears on Japanese-printed media.

Nevermind that they still want to pronounce it Kefka, even though the Italian pronunciation would be more along the lines of Chefka.

[Roger]

Oh, so she didn't spend the entire last year pregnant with... (four... five...) octuplets? Who develop really fast for at-most-three-month-olds?

Not in your fan fics, any way.

[R^2]

Music: Dark World


So rather than go to Maranda and look for Cyan, we're going to Narshe. Inasfar as there's "sequence" to the World of Ruin, I no longer care about it.


Lone Wolf: Nothing left in this town anyway, 'cept for that one lousy moogle... Doors are all locked, and you'd have to be some kinda treasure hunter to get 'em open...

Um... how is this a problem for you, exactly? Meh, whatever...


There are monsters roaming the streets... now? Again? I mean, technically the game opened with Narshe being deserted and hostile.

Also: those Lukhavi are a lot less dangerous than they were in Final Fantasy Tactics.


Most of the doors are locked, it's true.


Arvis's house is still open, though. Arvis himself does not appear in the game anymore, his dramatic role as an ally of the Returners against the evil Empire now obsolete. It's safe to assume he died in the cataclysm.


Through the mines we go, to the now-empty Moogle village.


Mog: I'll help you fight, kupo!


Mog is so overjoyed to see the party that he dances around for a while. In this instance, it doesn't involve bursts of flame or falling rock or razor-sharp winds.


Mog: He can be a little... wild... though, kupo. He should be here in the mines somewhere! He'll help if I order him to! Let's look for him... kupo!

And Mog joins the party. Hooray!

[R^2]

Molulu? This was just "Moogle Charm" on the SNES... who's Molulu?


...oh. Molulu was the one immediately after Mog in the ranks of the moogles who helped rescue Terra. According to the developers, she was Mog's girlfriend... or whatever moogles have in mated pairs. So lest it escape your attention, the game hints heavily that you found Mog in the deserted cave where his friends used to live except they all died horribly and now all he does is sob over the one keepsake he has to remember his significant other by.

Even the comic relief characters can hint heavily at how screwed up the world has gotten.


Anyway, Molulu's Charm is something only Mog can equip. It prevents all random encounters for the party he's in.