Off we go into the Haunted Forest for a
ride on the Phantom Train, Samuel
L. Jackson style.
I'll say right now that I'm going to
use the original version of the line I linked to above when we get to
the boss fight in this segment. But that's a ways off yet. For now,
though, we've gotta get to the train's boarding platform in the
forest.
Getting through the forest is not
really that big a task. The path through is left, down, left, up,
left, and up, if memory serves. I've been through this part of the
game enough times I can do it without really thinking too much about
it. It doesn't help that I started dozing off and almost went to bed
before getting this part written. The good news is that the
background does change, and so long as it looks like the train we're
headed for is getting closer, we're going in the right direction. As
we enter the forest, we have our first encounter with a healing
spring. There are a few of these, mostly in the early part of the
game.
Once we get to the platform, we see
that there's a train there. Cyan and Sabin talk about how it's weird
because Doma's rail system was supposed to have been taken out by the
Empire. Cyan recognizes it as the Phantom Train, but can't convince
Sabin until they've already boarded and the train has started moving.
The only option for escape is to go to the engine and try to shut it
off.
The way to the train's engine is to the
left, but if we go right, there's a guy there who gives a little info
on the train and how to stop it. There's also the train's schedule
book on a table. It's empty, and the guy tells us that's because the
dead don't keep schedules.
An interesting thing about this part of
the game is that it's possible, on several occasions, to recruit
ghosts into the party. I can only have one, but it's possible to
have two at a time if you don't get Shadow, or if he leaves the party
along the way. The ghosts don't have much in the way of physical
attacks, and since they're undead, curative and poisonous items and
spells will have reversed effects. What makes up for that is that
the ghosts have a battle command called Possess, which allows them to
sacrifice themselves to kill one enemy. It's got a varying success
rate, and since I usually only have room for one Ghost at a time, I
try to save it for the mini-boss that comes up a little more than
halfway through the train.
At more or less the halfway point, the
party is surrounded by hostile ghosts that force them onto the roof
of one of the cars. Sabin tries another special technique to get his
allies away from the horde of ghosts. Fortunately, it works, and the
party gets away just quickly enough to detach the rear cars of the
train before the ghosts get them.
Also luckily for me, there was a save
point here, because I needed to use it and get some sleep before
continuing on. It's not so much that this is a particularly
difficult chapter or anything. It's just that, per usual, I'm doing
all this late at night, after what at least seems like a long day at
work.
What does make this second half of the
train a little more difficult is that there are no ghosts who sell
items in the cars, whereas there had been one in every car before.
One thing that makes it a little easier is that at about the
three-quarters point of the train is the dining car. Sabin sits down
and digs in when a ghost brings food. Cyan's worried, but Sabin
tells him it'll be OK because they still need to eat. There are
different animations for Cyan, Sabin, Shadow, if he's with the party,
and the ghosts who join, if there are any. They're only minor
differences, really, and since the first time refills everybody's
health, there's no real point unless you've got time to kill.
The ghost who brought the food has a
friend, and they're blocking the exit that leads to the next car.
There's a reward to going back out the original door. Behind the
ghosts is a treasure chest with a Hyper Wrist relic in it. This one
raises the vigor stat on whoever has it equipped, but I haven't yet
done that.
The next car is where the mini-boss is.
It's a guy named Sigfried. Or Ziegfried. Or Siegfried, I think. I
know there's at least two alternate spellings to the character's
name, and I just now thought about it. Continuity errors aside,
though, this isn't a particularly hard mini-boss. This man blusters
in to claim a treasure chest for himself, claiming to be the best
sword-fighter in the world, and promptly starts a fight so he can
demonstrate with a series of low-damage blows to the party. Of
course, this would wind up demonstrating something entirely
different. What happened this time around is something I don't think
I've ever seen happen before, but should have expected, I guess.
What I was kind of hoping to do was use the Possess command the ghost
has here, since I'd talked it up. Thing is, though, Shadow has this
dog that sometimes takes a hit for him, and when the dog does come in
for him, there's like a one in three chance of the dog doing a
special attack as well. I don't think I've ever seen that particular
scenario happen before, though I may have. Either way, though, it
would happen and cause a one-shot kill of a boss when I was really
sort of counting on a more dramatic “noble sacrifice” sort of
thing instead.
Having lost the fight, Sigfried steals
whatever's in the chest and escapes with whatever was in the box. I
think this is what we could call pointless, because if there was an
intended sub-plot here, it was either dropped or forgotten about
after this, as I don't think we ever see Sigfried again or find out
what was in that box. I may be wrong, of course. I'm familiar
enough with the game to be comfortable with and knowledgeable of
what's going on, but I'm nowhere nearly as familiar with this game as
I am with its immediate North American predecessor.
Moving to the next private room in this
car, there's another line of treasure chests, this time with a
monster in a box in the far left box in the row. This time, it's a
fight with a Spectre, for an Earrings relic. This enhances magical
abilities. It's intended for one of two female characters we'll have
in the very near future, since for the time being, only they can use
magic to any real effect. Anybody can equip it, though, since before
too terribly long, everybody will be able to use magic.
The next car after this is the last
save point before fighting the train's engine. Any ghosts in the
party leave here because they've gotta go on to the world of the
dead.
In the main engineer's cab, there are
three switches in a row. The first and third need to be pulled down
and the middle one should be left up. There's also a switch on the
outside of the locomotive that needs to be hit before the fight can
begin. The train acts surprised that the three meatbags that had
gotten aboard were the ones slowing it down. This isn't a hard
fight, either, though it is harder than Sigfried or the Spectre. I
didn't get the classic Sabin
Suplexes a train to death scenario, but it was still a quick
fight, all things considered, though Shadow did wind up dead by the
end. I guess this is what happens when our heroes decide that enough
is enough.
I suppose I could have stripped him of
his equipment without reviving him, but I needed him alive for any
battles I might encounter along the way to the next segment of the
game. We'll be needing his stuff, and even if he doesn't decide that
his services are no longer needed by the time we get where we're
going, he'll leave soon as we get there.
We'll get there next time, in Gau of
Baron Falls. Until then,
have fun, stay safe, keep gaming, and DFTBA!
No comments:
Post a Comment