T w e n t y S i d e d

Final Fantasy XII vainly serves two masters. It’s both a member of the so-called “Ivalice Alliance,” following Final Fantasy Tactics, Vagrant Story, and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance in the setting created by Yasumi Matsuno. At the same time, Final Fantasy XII folds this spin-off sub-series back into the main Final Fantasy series.

Like many Final Fantasy titles, the game follows a reliable narrative structure. We start out with what proves to be the B-plot: the Archadian occupation of Dalmasca. In time, this plot reveals and is supplanted by the A-plot: a timeless, inscrutable race has directed world events since ages unknown and now wages a schismatic proxy war via human champions. Similarly, fighting the Shinra in Final Fantasy VII opens up into the vendetta against Sephiroth. In Final Fantasy X, the Pilgrimage to ward away Sin expands into the unraveling of the entire Yevonite regime and the hidden thousand-year-long conflict that it propped up.

In other games, the B-plot eventually wraps up heading into the finale, or ends up entwined with it; the Shinra collapse just before Cloud and friends fly to the Northern Limits, but the quest to defeat Sin is recontextualized and expanded by the revelations of Spira’s last pilgrimage.

The Rocketeer is all aboard for the American tour! Maybe we'll make it to the top.

You know, I almost want to just thrash this thing and have done with this torture once and for all, but lets make it interesting, why don’t we? We’ve had an excuse to see almost every Esper in the game. Let’s bust out the rest, because I intend to dwell on them a bit in the aftermath.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “A Travelog of Ivalice, Part 19: The Wyrmking Descends”

The Rocketeer is all aboard for the American tour! Maybe we'll make it to the top.

Basch seems confused and annoyed that his dear sibling is still alive and employed. No, I don’t know how he’s alive, either. He probably got blown clear to Dorstonis by the Pharos explosion, and had to catch a charter airship here.

Gabranth tries to act tough, but he’s barely clinging to life at this point, lacking the strength to even stand straight without being wracked by pain. Gabranth throws himself a little pity party after nearly getting shitcanned, but Basch has no fucks. Gabranth loses his temper, asking Basch how he can still hold his head up after losing three (3) countries and, presumably, three kingsLandis was a republic; no clue what form their actual head of state took. in the process, but to Basch, it’s simple. He has someone more important to protect: the Lady Ashe.

Ashe says nothing, but it just now strikes her that she needs to keep this man as far away from her as humanly possible.

Basch tries to cheer him up a little bit by pointing out that he can take pride in being Lord Larsa’s bodyguard. Even Gabranth doesn’t buy that shit; Gabranth has never lifted a damned finger to serve Larsa.

NOT. ONE. TIME.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “A Travelog of Ivalice, Part 18: Brothers”

The Rocketeer is all aboard for the American tour! Maybe we'll make it to the top.

As is the standard of RPG’s, the Bahamut is headed straight for Dalmasca, but it will patiently check its speed so that it does not arrive until the party is done chopping off monster parts in a swamp to haggle for new boots. But Ashe & Co, LLC. already stocks the biggest boots in all Ivalice, so it’s time to get in the Strahl and set Ivalice right with a hearty bout of impassioned philosophical and ethical debate between heads of state, assuming we have time between the epic cyber-Saiyan showdown.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “A Travelog of Ivalice, Part 17: A New Hope”

The Rocketeer is all aboard for the American tour! Maybe we'll make it to the top.