Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, Chapter 6: Mystic Confluence

For your listening pleasure: The Mystic Quest OST, starting with a stirring medley.

I won't even try to make excuses for how long it's been since I've made a post. Is that passively making an excuse? It's like a coach of mine once said "Excuses are like assholes... if you have one, you're an asshole." 

Across the Rainbow Road: Pazuzu's Tower

Ben gets a tip about the tower.

Across the rainbow bridge is Pazuzu's Tower, presumably where the Crystal of Wind is being held. There is an elevator which the tower's namesake uses to move around and taunt the hero. Flipping switches makes it so he cannot stop on certain floors, I think? Since you go up the tower than back down flipping switches, then eventually corner 'Zu on an upper level I never got this conceptually. I think I was probably trying to put more thought into the logistics than is necessary, or welcome, in a game like Mystic Quest. I still don't know if you can hit the switches in different orders and end up fighting Pazuzu on a different floor depending on how you do it.

I filled out the rest of my equipment and spell slots in the tower, acquiring Excalibur and the flare spell.

Pazuzu

Prelude to the battle with Pazuzu

The last evil fiend elemental crystal master (I'm not sure if, like other Final Fantasies, the group of four has a collective name) is the large anthropomorphic predatory bird, Pazuzu. Pazuzu takes his name and appearance from an ancient demon of Mesopotamia, brother to Humbaba of The Epic of Gilgamesh (Humbaba and Gilgamesh also make appearances in other Final Fantasy games). I'll link to this article instead of wikipedia, as the article not only references the movie The Exorcist, but also has Pazuzu having a serpent headed penis in the description of his appearance.

This is a screenshot of a statue of Pazuzu as it appears in The Exorcist. The image is reminiscent of an iconic statuette that depicts the demon, although with an erect phallus added for shock value, no doubt. Source.

In Mystic Quest, Pazuzu can activate a shield, which if I recall, will make him counterattack if he is attacked while it is up. It's a simple version of an effect used in many RPGs. I simply waited until the shield went down. This might be a significant puzzle for someone new to RPGs, but it was not difficult for me.

I remember Pazuzu capturing my imagination in a significant way as a child. I believe I received both a book about demons and FF: Mystic Quest on the same Christmas. I read through the book, then when Pazuzu appeared in the game, it had an immediate impact on my imagination, fueling my interest and discovery. Ah, to be full of that wonder again.

After defeating the King of Wind Demons (Pazuzu), recovering the Crystal of Wind and the last coin, the heroes are stuck. They need Captain Mac's ship, which is landlocked, in order to reach the Focus Tower and use the final coin. They blow up a tunnel with the help of a thunder rock, and fill the empty space on the world map with water. I'll gloss over this part in the interest of expediency. Checking the dates on my screenshots, it looks like it has been over three months since I completed the game, so let's keep this bread truck rollin'.

Before they go get the ship, Reuben shows up to inform Ben that he discovered a stairway to the top of the Focus Tower after he took his little fall from the rope bridge. They take care of business, and then Phoebe joins back up. This is unfortunate, because unlike Kaeli, Phoebe's weapon is still the same from way back when we were in Aquaria. Then it was very powerful, at this point in the game, it is not. This is the first point in the game where some creatures cannot be defeated by a whack from Ben's weapon and his companions. This is kind of annoying, because it requires a big change in strategy. I ended up using more magic later in the game, which is good in a way, but rather than feeling like a natural increase in challenge, it just seemed artificial. I don't think I really have a good way to describe it, especially being so far removed from playing the game. There is a fine line that game designers have to walk between having the game be challenging enough that is rewarding, but not difficult in a way that is frustrating or an exercise in masochism.

This is how the final villain is introduced. A prophecy? That's both interesting and original.

  Doom Castle

Doom Castle is the appropriately named final area of the game. We got a tease of it earlier while exploring the Focus Tower. The music for this area is one of the best in the game, since I already linked to the OST, I bring you this awesome dude for the pleasing of your aural canals. It looks like he does metal covers of videogame tunes, but this one is already metal, so it's like putting metal in your metal. F*** yeah!

The "castle" consists of floors in the Focus Tower, which have the appearance of the four original dungeons holding the crystals. The exit from each floor is guarded by palette swapped versions of the four fiends. This creates a "boss rush" that harkens back to the original Final Fantasy, more on that when I play that game.

Ice Golem is now Stone Golem, but he still melts, like Harrenhal.

Dark King

At the top of the tower waits Dark King. It would be proper english to call him "The Dark King." I prefer calling him Dark King as a proper name, because that's what the game seems to imply, and I find it humorous. In a twist that is not really original, but at least adds a little bit of creativity to the plot, Dark King says that he created the prophecy of the Knight of Legend; although he doesn't go into detail why. Even if his purpose was to get would be heroes to come to him to die, he probably set them up to get maxed out on equipment like Benjamin is. Once again, I'm probably thinking about this more than the writers did.

Dark King drops the bomb.

Mystic Quest continues another Final Fantasy tradition, that is, the final boss having multiple forms. At this point it's expected, but that doesn't make it any less cool, to me.

This is Dark King's fourth and final form.

S***... I guess he is the Dark King. However, the the is not capitalized so...

The Ending

After defeating the Dark King, Ben finds out that the old man on the cloud is actually the crystal of light; guiding him all along. What follows is a satisfying enough series of cutscenes that feature all of the characters in the game. In the end, they send Benjamin off on Captain Mac's ship to greater adventure. I find it kind of refreshing that none of the females are shoehorned into being his love-interest/companion for the trip.

The happy send-off.

Tristan shows up out of nowhere... and Benjamin sails off into the sunset.

Sorry I lied... the sun will set later...

Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, Chapter 5: Everybody (This Bard's Back) (Official Post)

Crank it up, because just like the Backstreet Boys, I'm back!

Like I've said before, August is my busiest month of the year. That is no excuse for such a long absence though, my dear readers. Moving forward I promise at least two posts a month, looking to maintain at one a week for the future.

When last I left you, my dear readers, Benjamin had beaten the dual-headed dragon/hydra of the volcano, and freed the crystal of fire. The world map is divided into four quadrants, and I had explored three, so I had a good feeling I knew where I was going next.

As I usually do, I'd been playing it conservative with the expendable seeds. Turns out they weren't as rare as I thought.

The next quest indeed involved the last remaining quarter of the map, where the town of "Windia" was located. (Windia... Windy... Air Crystal? Yeah, I know you get it...) The quest for the Crystal of Air began with a fair amount of character swapping. First, Reuben is knocked off a rope bridge, then Tristan joins for a bit. Benjamin and Tristan head through a forest, only to be stopped at a large tree.

Benjamin could probably use a little help in the diplomacy department.

Hehe... heh.

Having been trumped by the tree, the pair travel to find Kaeli, who can talk to trees. Kaeli is still recovering however, then some stuff happens, Tristan ends up going treasure hunting with Spencer (Phoebe's grandfather?) but leaves Ben with the Dragon Claw. Kaeli is concerned about her father, Captain Mac.

The plot in FF:MQ is neither complicated, nor are the characters, but it can be a little hard to keep things straight because the dialogue moves so fast. Plot movement and revelations usually happen one or two sentences at a time. There isn't much time or motivation to get invested in the characters either, but hell, I don't think that's what they were going for. MQ is entirely meant to be what it is, a simple introduction to the role-playing genre.

Just as I was starting to think that Tristan was an irredeemable douchebag, he left Ben with the Dragon Claw. Found as a treasure in the first dungeon and taken by Tristan, it allows the player to latch on to far away targets and pull the character across gaps.

The master tree was another huge dungeon, as seems to be the norm after the first area in the game. The monster fights got pretty repetitive, but few RPGs have that one figured out, so I can't hate too much.

In Windia, Ben can use the Dragon Claw to travel between twigs here and get to a Final Fantasy easter egg.

There aren't any other Chocobos in this game, so it ties the game to the universe, see? It's all very exciting, I'm sure.

While it is possible to get through the game by "mashing the A button" and attacking, it is more interesting to try to figure out the enemy's various weaknesses and exploit them. Knowing the weaknesses also makes defeating the monsters more efficient, which in turn, lowers the chances that the party will fall victim to a frustrating total party status effect lock out, or TPSELO (Pronounced "Tip-se-low"). TPSELOs are definitely the low-point of playing this game. Generally you are pretty safe to experiment, however, some creatures can reflect your spells! I found this mostly happening with the slime type creatures.

"Sir! Their shields are up!": Metal slimes punish me for attempting to make the game more interesting.

Do I even need to caption this one?

Don't take me for a fan of the Backstreet Boys, but their videos are larger than life.

Mount Gale

I don't remember how exactly, (I'll take better notes in the future) but the team of Ben and Kaeli reason that it is possible that whoever is controlling the Crystal of Air (or Wind, not sure) is to the East of Windia, on the nearby Mount Gale. Mount Gale was a typical mountain area for the game, with the addition of the twigs I showed earlier that the Dragon Claw can be used to traverse over hazards.

I got stuck for quite awhile on this map, it turned out I was looking for the wrong thing. I saw some twigs, and assumed I needed to use the Dragon Claw, when in fact, it turned out I could jump over a pit to progress. I'm ashamed to say I wandered around for at least a half hour trying to figure out how to progress. Mystic Quest is not without it's challenges, at least for my dumb ass.

Sometimes areas like this are disguised cave entrances. It wasn't.

Dullahan

The boss at the top of Mount Gale is Dullahan. The name comes from an evil spirit of Celtic/Irish mythology. The dullahan, (pronounced DOOL-a-HAN), is a headless rider, usually on a black horse who carries his or her own head under one arm. Usually the dullahan is male, but there are some female versions. The head and the mouth is usually in a hideous grin that touches both sides of the head. Its eyes are constantly moving about, and can see across the countryside even in the darkest nights. The flesh of the head is said to have the color and consistency of moldy cheese. The dullahan uses the spine of a human corpse for a whip, and its wagon is adorned with funeral objects (e.g., candles in skulls to light the way, the spokes of the wheels are made from thigh bones, the wagon's covering made from a worm-chewed pall or dried human skin). When the dullahan stops riding, that is where a person is due to die. The dullahan calls out the person's name, at which point the person immediately perishes. (Source)

I'm sure you, like me, are familiar with the "headless horseman," however, did you know about using the spine of a human corpse for a whip? That's a whole new level of awesome.

I appreciate alternate interpretations of the familiar. I also love breasts... don't judge me! (NSFW Source)

Dullahans make appearances in many Final Fantasy games, including 3, 6 (pictured below), 9, 12 and 14 (Source). Oh... see the 3, 6, 9, 12 pattern? I have some theories about these patterns in FF games.

FF: MQ's Dullahan has taken being headless to the next level, also having a headless horse! What will they think of next? Some stimulating expositional dialogue takes place between Benjamin and the villain as they meet atop the windy peak of Mount Gale.

Brilliant!

Benjamin and Kaeli defeated the horseman who was sans heads. If I remember correctly (once again... better notes next game) this stopped the wind, which allowed an engineer named Otto to use his machine which could create a rainbow bridge to Pazuzu's Tower.

Best to heed that head!

The rainbow bridge.

Here's an action shot of the heroes crossing the rainbow bridge, however, I don't think it's possible to do it with Reuben in game. This must be a post-world-saving frolic by two star-crossed lovers.

Will the Knight of Legend succeed in deposing Pazuzu, up in his tower? Or will dark designs reign supreme, making this vision of a carefree future only a faded dream? Come back next time to find out!

The Future of the Gil System

The Gil system, much like the EU to Great Britain, has turned out to be more of a commitment than it is benefiting this blog. Therefore, I propose tossing it out, returning to the purity of a pre-economic system! Break the tyrannical chains of capitalism! I still want you, the esteemed readers, to be able to get me to play your favorite games though. Hype them up in the comments, and I'll get to them as soon as is reasonable with the flow of the blog.  

Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, Chapter 4: I Love Me Some Pastrami

There are 3 pretty sweet jams I could pick from for tonight. Instead of pick, I will instead delight your ear holes with all three.

First there is the theme of the next town, Fireburg. Which is, wait it for it... the city of Fire.

Within Fireburg, there is a house band at the Hotel (complete with neon sign), that Benjamin can listen to, and a fine young lady to dance with as well. You get it, Benji!

"Gimme some sugar baby."

Lastly is my favorite in the game so far, the metal influenced theme of the Lava Dome. I think any reasonable person has probably thought at one time, why isn't there more 16bit metal out there? Well, your wish has been granted, by Mystic Quest.

When we last left Benjamin, he and Phoebe had just defeated the massive man of ice in the Ice Pyramid. Phoebe then made a hasty getaway to make it back to her grandfather, Spencer. Ben had the urge to fully explore the pyramid, but found it much too difficult on his own. The status altering powers of the enemies were constantly disabling him, whether it be by sleep, confusion, petrification, or paralyzation.

Ben's solo album was considered a failure by both critics, and fans.

Giving up on any remaining treasures in the Ice Pyramid, Benjamin returned to Aquaria to meet with Spencer. Spencer seemed to believe that only the Knight of Legend could have returned the light of the Water Crystal, and as such, bequeathed to him a key. The key opened a chest in the Focus Tower, which held the Venus Shield. Benjamin was relieved to find that it protected against paralyzation. If only he could find magical protection from confusion, his quest would become much easier.

The Old Man on the Cloud also nonchalantly gave Benjamin his next quest.

So, Benjamin proceeded through the Focus Tower and came to Fireburg. The city lived up to its name, being surrounded by hot smoking lava from the nearby active volcano. The very stones themselves pulsated with a red heat.

Casa de Fireburg, in all it's neon glory.

Reuben was easy to find, "You make a fantastic sandwich!" Benjamin exclaimed, but Reuben was much more concerned about other matters; his father had been trapped in a mine by a huge boulder. Benjamin, being a hero, obliged to help him.

The mine was a bit of a maze, with conveyor belts and elevators for the easy movement of ore. The duo defeated a massive genie named "Jinn", and beyond found Reuben's distressed dad. Benjamin used his most recently acquired bomb skill to chuck an explosive across the chasm, loosen the rock, and send the boulder on its way.

Is this a reference to a certain movie franchise? Perhaps a call back to Final Fantasy Legend II? Or both?

Reuben's dad returned to Fireburg to rest after his ordeal, but thankfully, he did have a key piece of information for Benjamin's quest.

Getting to the Lava Dome would require a little trip through the volcano, however. All three of the dungeons in the area of fire proved to be large and somewhat of a maze. The Lava Dome especially so, as it wrapped back on itself, just like you would expect a dome to do.

The volcano was surrounded by gas which obscured the monsters wandering there, that is until Benji found a gas mask that had likely been left there by previous explorers. The leader of the monsters, Medusa, gave the pair fits with its powers of paralyzation and petrifying snake hair.

It took three times to beat her. Luck is a big factor in this game, so I'll try not to take it too hard.

Having successfully trekked up the steep side of the volcano, Ben and Reuben were able to descend the side of the hot, gaseous, and foreboding lava dome. They first had to operate a pressure plate which opened two massive wrought-iron doors, marked with a symbol of flame. Entering the doors, they nimbly jumped to pillars of stone perched precariously over the flowing lava. Benjamin was apprehensive about facing the gargantuan two-headed hydra they found there, as his ice magic was expended. He had a small stock of magic seeds he believed would restore his power, but decided to save them for a later time as they were quite rare, and instead depended on his powerful holy Wizard spell, "White".

It seems like more of a dual-head dragon to my eye, but perhaps these things are classified differently in the world of Mystic Quest.

The master of fire was no joke, but, Benjamin and Reuben were again victorious! With the fire crystal restored, the volcano exploded in a massive eruption, pouring lava through the nearby mountains and opening another path to the Focus Tower. Thankfully, Ben and Reuben were protected from immolation by the magic of the crystal.

Considering there is one quadrant of the map left to explore, I have a feeling I know where it is!

Guess The Ranking - A New Opportunity to Earn Gil!

Greetings readers, fans, and other internet vagrants! I've come up with another way for you to get precious Gil, once again taking a cue from The Adventure Gamer(s). If you can correctly guess a game's overall ranking after my first post, you will obtain 10 Gil! You will have until my second post is posted to make a prediction in the comments. I'll make an exception for Mystic Quest since this is new, you have until my next post, number 5, to make a guess!

Comment to gain Gil and influence my playlist!

1 Gil to Raifield for commenting!

Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, Chapter 3: Age of Aquaria

Today's tunes are from the icy dungeons of Aquaria.

Our hero, Benjamin, had made his way through the Focus Tower, and found himself in another part of the world. The land in which he found himself was a dangerous land of winter; the beauty of the snow covered hills marred by the presence of dangerous beasts. Ben hooked up with Phoebe at a seemingly empty temple, and made his way to Aquaria. The city was encased in ice; under a spell of eternal winter.

In three sentences, Phoebe laid down the plan. Spencer was stuck in a tunnel he was digging, now that the dirt was frozen solid. To melt it, they would need the Wakewater from the Spring of Life, however, the Libra crest which warps to the Life Temple had been stolen by a monster in the Wintry Cave. *deep  breath*. Exposition is fast and furious in Mystic Quest, but, at least it's simple. 

Ben represents the player well here.

They recovered the crest from a giant squid, then Warped (It's capitalized in game for some reason...) to the Life temple... only to find the spring dry. The Old Man on the Cloud was there, and gave them the last remaining Wakewater, in a bag. It's in a bag... like a skin would make sense, but he says bag.

Phoebe is not the most resilient person. As a side note, I do like how you can see the last thing that was said, unlike other Final Fantasies.

Returning to Aquaria, they found that the Wakewater only restored the plant in the middle of town. Phoebe surmised that the real culprit must be the monster who had taken the Water Crystal. Their next destination was the massive ice pyramid where the monsters could turn themselves invisible. Before they could get there though, the Falls Basin blocked their way. 

There is a decent little puzzle in the Falls Basin. Ben must move a series of ice columns into position in order to jump on them. If I haven't mentioned it, the B button allows the player to jump a square. He can also jump over chests, and probably some other obstacles; it's a little bit of action gameplay for the kids!

Since Ben can only push the columns, not pull them, you can get yourself stuck. When this happens, you have to walk out and re-enter, which resets both the columns and the monsters. Like I said, a decent puzzle.

My first try, I pushed this column one more square to the left, which left me stuck and having to start over.

It's also worth mentioning that there is a decent meta-game going on in Mystic Quest with the weapons. Many of the creatures are weak to not only the usual elemental magics, but also weapon types. Finding out these weaknesses is a reasonable way to pass the time, more-so than simply mashing the attack button.

Let me axe you somethin'!

Next up was the...

The gimmick of the Ice Pyramid is that the monster encounters are invisible on the map, more like you would find in your typical RPG. This was quickly mitigated by my finding the magic mirror on the first floor, which turns things back to normal. That's fine with me, I've found I prefer being able to see the coming encounters. As a long time RPGer, random encounters are something I've kind of lived with. I can't count the times I've been extremely frustrated when I'm trying to explore an area, find a hidden door etc., and keep hitting encounters every 5 steps. Even in games like the Gold Box series, I wouldn't mind random encounters when you enter an empty room, but getting ambushed in hallways is both annoying and takes away from verisimilitude. That reminds me of when I was playing Pools of Darkness, and a stock message of "monsters sneak up on you" popped up with the picture being giant iron golems. You're telling me a 15 foot tall iron construct 'bushed me in a hallway? At that point, I question why my characters are in this profession, it might not be their calling.  

Ben can fall off these ledges, which normally wouldn't be a big deal, however due to my ineptitude with touch screens, it took me a few tries to successfully navigate. Who would have thought it; more advanced technology making the game harder?

The Ice Pyramid was a reasonable challenge. A large amount of monsters have abilities that disable or confuse your characters. Since you only have two, you spend a lot of time under these effects or curing them. I even had to run from a battle, so the game isn't super easy. Thankfully, my intellectual prowess was enough to surmise that the man of ice at the end of the dungeon would be weak against fire, and he wasn't too hard.

"Ich schmelze! Oh... My body!"

After the Water Crystal is safely recovered Phoebe basically says "I'm out!" and leaves. The Ice pyramid is quite large, and there are a number of paths I haven't yet explored. I'm tempted to do so on my way out, but it will likely be difficult, if not impossible, due to the aforementioned status effects and only having one character.

Despite it's simplicity, I'm enjoying Mystic Quest well enough.

Comment to gain Gil and influence my playlist!

1 Gil to Raifield and Charles Geringer for comments!