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!

Community Building and Gil

Trickster over at The Adventure Gamer has a neat system to reward those who frequent his site with Companion Assist Points or "CAPs". I've been contemplating doing something similar myself to encourage participation here at This Bard's Tales.

(Updated 12/3/2015)

Here we'll be using "Gil", the ubiquitous currency of the Final Fantasy games. To start out, a community member (this is anyone who wants to participate... you don't need to be a registered member) may spend 50Gil to add any game to my playlist. A member may also spend 200Gil to move any game on my playlist up the list so that I will play it next (This is, of course, contingent on me being to able to procure a playable copy). So, for a total of 250Gil a member may both add a game and make me play it next all in one fell swoop.

Apparently you can actually see Gil coins in Final Fantasy 10, although I have little idea where. (Update: It's probably during "Gil Toss", didn't think about that)

So how do I earn Gil you say? Good question. Here's where we will start:

Any member will receive 5Gil for their first comment.

Any member will receive 1Gil for each comment they, thoughtfully, post. (In other words, legit comments will earn Gil, no shameful Gil grabs by just posting nonsense.)

In posts I occasionally put in cultural references and homages, if you're the first to notice any particular one, you get 5Gil!

As a note to myself, I'm awarding myself Gil at the rate of 2 Gil per post, and 5 Gil per rankings post. I haven't posted my play order yet, but I will sometime. I already plan to use my first 200 on Planescape: Torment!

There will be a leader board ranked by total Gil earned that will show also remaining Gil to spent seperately, muchs Trickster has with the CAPs.

So that's where we'll start, and I hope this jump starts the "community" a bit from This Bard's Tales.

Thank you, your humble entertainer,

~~This Bard