Unknown Speaker 0:37 Combo Chain is a Games club JRPG podcast and I am Paul M. Davis, your regular host and who am I here with? Unknown Speaker 0:43 Hey, I'm Robert. I'm back again. Unknown Speaker 0:45 Yeah, welcome back. I think the last game we did together was Ys 8. Unknown Speaker 0:49 Yes. this is something very different. Unknown Speaker 0:52 Yes. But you know roughly a 30 years separation. Unknown Speaker 0:58 Yeah. Which is where most of the different come from I guess, yeah. vinted complicated GRPG stories back then. Unknown Speaker 1:06 They didn't. They didn't, though I have to say that the first shouldn't go any chance he has a remarkably complicated story for Unknown Speaker 1:15 That's true. Again, he is just kind of head, head and shoulders above a lot of things, though. Unknown Speaker 1:19 Yeah, it's true. I mean, like, I feel like this game, which we haven't even announced yet. But this game, we were going to be doing Phantasy Star, which was released for the Sega Master System in 1987, in Japan and 1989 in the US, but getting back to what I was saying, I feel like this game definitely has like more story to it than even like some, you know, the number of their predecessors even though the story of this game is pretty, it's pretty thin. Unknown Speaker 1:51 Yeah, and you even said it, they're, like, Dragon Warrior. came out after this in the US. That's not like general True, but you're here in theory, if you're in the US and you had this game and you saw kids playing Dragon Warrior, you had to be like, Okay, this crap Unknown Speaker 2:10 is way more advanced. Unknown Speaker 2:12 Yeah, I mean, it's funny. I think I told you this offline, but so this was the first RPG I played. And I guess I must have been 12 when it came out. And I picked it up and of course, you know, it was it was like 60 or 70 bucks because I had a battery and so it was definitely like a Christmas present. But, you know, that Sega Master System was not very well. You know, you got a lot of attention and was like getting thrashed by Nintendo. And, you know, the video game magazines at the time were just like, giving these giving fantasy star like 10 out of 10 and saying, you know, it's like, going to breathe new life and systems. Yeah, the best game of his job. Right to come to the US and whatnot. And so, you know, I, you know, it's my very limited number of games that were available on the Master System, or at least good ones. Yeah, definitely asked for this one for Christmas. And yeah, I took to it originally and I you know, like immediately and I think that's, you know, why this franchise it feels to me a lot more than some other RPG franchises is because it put the science fiction elements like so like to the forefront. But I also I remember I never play I'd never seen a game like it before. I guess I was going through the dates. Final Fantasy and come to the US 19 8087 and, uh, yeah, fantasy star came in 88. But yeah, Dragon Warrior didn't come till 89 I didn't know anybody who had Final Fantasy. And so, you know, and I didn't even know anybody who had you know, is playing like the big Like, or computer RPG. And, yeah, one thing one memory I have at times trying to show it to my friend out, you know how excited and how I was about it and how cool I thought he was like, I think this is a game for girls Unknown Speaker 4:22 that title screen, you know, it's got it's got a girl on it and Unknown Speaker 4:26 what is this? You use the color thing. He's like, Unknown Speaker 4:29 you just like walk around there like choosing menus and I was like, yeah, yeah. Unknown Speaker 4:38 That is me I Unknown Speaker 4:40 had a 12 or 13 year old can be I was like, like, simultaneously, like hurt by it but also like, feeling like whew, I might be a little cooler because I'm on like, you know, like, a game for older people or something like Unknown Speaker 4:55 oh, that's it. That's that's, Unknown Speaker 4:57 that's all Yeah, I gotta have those two like I mean, there's two sides kind of like fighting my mind. Unknown Speaker 5:05 But yeah, Unknown Speaker 5:06 I mean, it kind of is for older people in so far as you need to be able to read the game. Unknown Speaker 5:11 Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, the the mechanics and the trips that this game are hit on are not particularly, you know, complicated. It's definitely no more complicated than, I guess not. But putting it into text it was, you know, like in my case and a lot of people's cases, possibly the first RPG they ever come across. Yeah, and Unknown Speaker 5:37 I like the concept of this is actually a bit more complicated than those other games, you know, Final Fantasy Dragon Warrior. It's like, kind of cool stuff. It's not complicated, but it really appeals and that's kind of the thing for me. I didn't play this until, like the Xbox 360 Genesis collection that also included this and because I'm Absolute fool I keep buying Genesis game collections and that was my first time playing this I play fantasy Star Online for like 200 hours before I actually touched one of the real fantasy stars. But thing is this really impressed me even then it's it's kind of impressive. I mean, what's that I'm putting it in its context a little bit. I'm putting in its context a little bit but still it's like this is really well animated It looks good it actually moves pretty fast. And that said, you should play the switch version now if you should God because that's it's Unknown Speaker 6:31 amazing, faster got. I don't have it in front of me. But it's got top down maps. For all the dungeons which you know, even though the map the dungeons in this game was pretty cool. You will not be happy to have the option of the top down map to refer to it's got information on all the different spells all the different equipment and you know, the It's basically just the same game with a number of like quality of life improvements added in there that Unknown Speaker 7:07 Yeah, they turned down the frequency of random encounters and been turned up the rewards. There's a little like st area in there, which isn't too useful, but I like reading it because you can kind of see the places where whoever wrote it had looked at this date and was like, I can you talk to a giant spider is doesn't make any sense. And then, you know, had to write up unexpectedly. This creature is capable of speech. Unknown Speaker 7:32 Yeah, yeah. And I mean, one of the things that's interesting, that's kind of funny is, at least for fantasy star one through four, even though they all kind of like all comprise like a single narrative, though three is kind of like, three was developed by different teams. So it's kind of cast out a lot of times. They're, they basically talk pretty closely related narrative and sure a lot of cannon but they are also victim to localization of the time which means that in each game you're basically going to the same three planets but the planets names have changed some of the names of like you know when he calls back previous games characters sometimes their names are difference and you know you have to like actually be like wow that statue kind of looks like a character from previous game Okay, I got it. Unknown Speaker 8:33 Yeah, there's a little bit of pain when you get just back in the day with that stuff. Unknown Speaker 8:38 Said localization is pretty good Unknown Speaker 8:41 for anyone in this game. Oh yeah, for sure. I mean, there's there's definitely places where you can see they didn't have very many characters so yeah, robot cop, all one word. Have no idea like if this is a localization thing, but the healing items are burgers, which is kind of funny. But also like there's these guys were living in bombed out buildings and wearing rags. Hey, buddy, can you spare cup of cola? That is the funniest thing in the world to me. Unknown Speaker 9:09 Yeah, yeah, there are there are another number of those things. And then also the four letter spellings of some of the spells. I can't think one that comes to mind, but they, they're sometimes very amusing. Just because they have to be abbreviated to some term that doesn't really make sense, but sounds funny. No, Unknown Speaker 9:30 yeah, maybe I do have in front of me. Some guy can look up some things here. Yeah. Anyway, we'll get to it. Unknown Speaker 9:37 So yeah, you know, start off just talking about bit about the development of the games. Yeah, so the the rise of Western RPG like ultimate wizardry. Those two games are huge in Japan, and really drove the creation of the very first Dragon Quest game by you next. which there are actually before before fantasy star was released in the US, there was actually two Dragon Quest games that have already been released in Japan. But yeah, watching the success of just the first one, and with the second one coming in, coming out during development, and it being just this huge like phenomenon in Japan almost instantly, Sega was like looking at their kind of beleaguered Master System. And they went to the development team and you know, we're like, we need to read you to make one of these right now step. And so yeah, I came out in 1997, Japan and the development team was led by designer Kotaro highest shooter, programmer using aka who you know is best known for his role as the producer and godfather and designer of Sonic the Hedgehog and the artist Reiko Kodama And rego cut by tail played a really primary role in the development of fantasy star one, two and four. And Cortana really has just had a fascinating career, most of it at Sega. But yeah shit since her 20s she's been one of the few women or when she started out in her 20s she was one of the few women to be working in Japanese game development. And also to have you know, get the role of producer, you know, at what at the time was one of the company's biggest franchises for like the 80s and 90s. Kodama was really integral and deciding that they make Alice the main character a woman, and later in the 90s they had her design art for Skies of Arcadia. Then there was whole the whole like, kind of like bad period of Sega which ran from like, you know, 2001 so Yeah, I don't know when you want to say like sales gotten slightly better Unknown Speaker 12:06 What's that mean? Yeah, I'm just not sure. I'm just not sure when that started years Unknown Speaker 12:12 but it's hard to say like what point you know, and it always feels kind of tenuous but it was really sad because for a long time during that, they that era they just like had her like working on just kind of crappy show aware and she finally kind of had something of a comeback with the seventh dragon series, which we've only gotten the third entry of in the US she also she was a producer on those games and, and the designer and it's really interesting because if you look at the seventh Dragon Games, the style is like super deformed, super cutesy. It's very, very different from the kind of like high fantasy heart high you know, hard sci fi look that you know, cross with an anime looks that fantasy star habits So, yeah, it's it's kind of a leave but the only one of those games that I play is number three that came to the US and you could definitely see sir some similarities, especially in the way that it kind of like merges like Unknown Speaker 13:16 fantasy and science fiction. Unknown Speaker 13:18 But yeah, you know, this that was something that the developers and Sega you know, that was a setting that they chose to really distinguish fantasy star from the other RPG at the time. You know, even though the game has like, definitely has fantasy elements and like fantasy mythological figures like Nusa and whatnot. It also has spaceships and robot cops. And not surprising given the given the time it was developed but also, you know, by, you know, some of the designs that they they lifted They took a lot of inspiration from Star Wars which you can see pretty much in the outside of the outside of the game with the robot cops who yes actually Imperial star triggers Unknown Speaker 14:12 yes and then you go to a desert planet you know pretty Yeah, pretty much what you would expect is kind of like a mishmash there's like guns and then there's just swords like you start off like almost like a regular progression that you're getting a fantasy RPG like here's a copper yeah Unknown Speaker 14:27 steel so or less like, but then it was a laser sarin or lightsaber. And yeah, by the best by the end of the game, like some of the best weapons or guns like Unknown Speaker 14:38 laser gun. Yeah, well, the guns are interesting one because they do a flat amount of damage, but they hit every enemy. So like, you won't always use them, but it is, like useful for a certain range that you'll have one gun for a while and another gun for a while, right? Probably towards the end. You'll switch back to Unknown Speaker 14:57 Yeah, for that characteristic. Now That kind of like a demarcation between the two. But yeah the The other thing that they're really focused on, which is a huge contrast, I think, to you know, if you compare this to say like the first Dragon Quest game, is they really really focused on the visuals like, first Dragon Quest game. There's not much to look at. Unknown Speaker 15:26 Yeah. Oh yeah, I mean there's RQ character designs, but they don't animate or anything in battle. Unknown Speaker 15:32 You know, PC games, the western RPG and the PC games that were from the popular time. And even though the Master System wasn't like, incredibly more powerful than the NES, I think that I know that it had a larger color palette, and I think it was had a slightly faster processor. So they were able to push the graphics a little further Then developers on the NES or family com could do. So yeah, they really wanted to push the visual elements and probably the most notable thing place that you'll see it is, and the dungeons which take place. And basically, first person, the first person 3d dungeons. And at the time it was released. This was a mind blowing the visual effects. Now, you know, with these eyes and kind of look at it, and it's like, oh, well, you know, there's probably, you know, only like 10 or 12 backgrounds being rendered here, you know, because Unknown Speaker 16:38 every dungeon Yeah. And you can see like, over in the animation where I'm turning right, that wall just there's a wall with the passage for a second. Unknown Speaker 16:47 Yeah, because there's only one I mentioned very primitive by our standards today. But if you put it in the context of its time, it's it's pretty impressive. I think one of the things they did was that was really smart is that they just went from Like a very like one single toned dungeon design. So they you know, even though lots of different sort of like areas is like the desert area, the tree area and the ice planet, all the dungeons pretty much look the same. And it gives them like some sort of cohesive a certain a certain cohesiveness. But it also lets them like make them at all, and also let the developers make them like, look as good as they possibly could, Unknown Speaker 17:34 within the memory memory constraints that they had. Yeah, for sure. Unknown Speaker 17:39 Yeah, and so the design and animation was for those was largely done by Eugene aka, which, you know, isn't that much of a surprise. He really kind of gained name at Sega as being like, kind of one of their, you know, one of the best designers and develop developers even before Sonic came along. And then one of the other Kind of like, really stand out aspects of the of the game are the battle screens which display backgrounds that are relevant to whatever kind of climate you're in. So you know, if you're on the desert planets, there's a there's a desert backdrop if you're going to trees is tree backdrop, and the enemies are animated this very rudimentary but there is some animation. Unknown Speaker 18:27 Yeah, I think that's probably my favorite visual aspect of the game is like there are some really fun enemy animations even though you do end up some of them are probably a bit too long because if you have five enemies you have to watch this one second animation five times a return but Unknown Speaker 18:42 you're still impressive at least for a little while. And they're very, very I mean, you know, this is one of those cases where even you know, even though the graphics were primitive, and I'm sure they'll nothing to revoke Adamas original sketches Similar to like the early SSMT games like you can definitely add even the early Dragon Quest games you can definitely feel like there's like a strong artistic hand and in the design of the enemies, the characters and everything. Yeah, even if they're just like a bootstrap sprites, it's like, there's a very kind of consistent visual language here, which is which is pretty, pretty cool. Unknown Speaker 19:27 Yeah. Alright, so getting into like the mechanics and the actual actual playing the game, it's pretty much what you would expect, you know, for an RPG from that time you get into with a four person Party, which again, compare this to Dragon Warrior we had one and you will you also have to fight more than one enemy at a time, only one type, but you'll fight several enemies, which is again, this came out before Dragon Warrior in the West. But anyway, each of your characters like has an archetype. You've got a well rounded you've got to strength but no magic guy well we'll get to those in a second and outside the dungeons we already mentioned inside the really nice 3d view but outside you just got it regular top down view random encounters. One thing that's different though is you get vehicles in this game that are somehow inventory items, but when you use them then you just get to go around and you have like a Land Rover let you get over hazardous terrain. You have like hovercraft let you sail so you know some other games around this time we're doing stuff like that, but I think it's pretty cool that you first of all, they're all very sci fi ish and that you just get them as items that you use it anytime. You had, like, move overland. Unknown Speaker 20:39 Yeah, no, it's cool. Also, they're very, like terrain centric. Like, I think a lot of it, you know, Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, and the airships but these are very specifically like, okay, you're, you know, you're on, you know, in a mountainous region region. So you want to use land Yeah, or can't remember The name of it but there's like there's a a machine to get through the ice as well. Unknown Speaker 21:05 Yeah, I was just gonna mention that too if you didn't like the icebreaker where you just smash away through something mountains with it just cool even though there's like no way to visually tell which ones you can go through and so that that's one of the more like, I'm glad game packs exists now parts okay. Unknown Speaker 21:22 Even though that's it, yeah, Unknown Speaker 21:23 and there's also Yeah, there's also you also get a spaceship which is kind of necessary because you're going around from one planet to the Unknown Speaker 21:31 next. Yeah, Unknown Speaker 21:32 and sorry to cut cut here, but I'm just laughing when I just laugh It is a game facts because I remember calling the Sega tips line. Unknown Speaker 21:43 Yeah, the scam was I had the game. Unknown Speaker 21:47 And I guess so many people had called about fantasy star that the person I got on the phone was just like, Okay, let me just take your address, and about two weeks later in the mail, I got like a photocopy what was basically like a, you know, a games fax in 1989 it was just like this large like photocopied booklet with like map dungeons and like walks rooms and all this kind of stuff. And yeah, so that must have and this was before like Sega or Nintendo or charging you to call for tips. So I guess the phone people were just like, All right. We're we're spending all of our time explaining like dungeon dungeon designs to kids. Oh, yeah, say making make a document about this. That is really cool, though. That's a cool thing to have. Yeah, I wish I still had it. Unknown Speaker 22:44 Yeah. Oh, well. Unknown Speaker 22:46 So party members. Like I said, you got four of them. Alice is your main character. It's not spelled like normal human Alice. It's sci fi. So it's a LIS. Yes, she's like a kind of what you would expect for your main character. She's well running She's got pretty good physical tack. She's got a bunch of different magic spells and she's kind of the only character in the game with like a really well defined Well okay, not well defined, but she has a motivation and personality that you can kind of get because at the beginning game you see her brother killed by some of the robot cops. And she vows revenge on the evil king guy classic. So second party member is now again not spelled the way you think it's MYAU and it's a cat so yeah, he's a cat to can talk I should mention that game doesn't see this is weird. So I guess cats can just talk in this universe and sort of a support spells kind of character I guess I would say doesn't like you don't get a lot of equipment. Being cat can't equip regular weapons, but everything you get for him is some special drop he actually has one thing I like about this game is the help spell which is just a an all purpose buff is actually good. I'm always, always down for any geography. You were the bus bells are good. Unknown Speaker 24:01 Yeah, yeah. Because there's so many, so many games where you can just kind of like power power your way through the bus and the bus. Unknown Speaker 24:10 Yeah, so the third character is Odin, and it's a friend of Alice's brother when the first things in the game is he's as he's dying, says, Alice go see Odin, but he really is just a guy with a big neck who hits stuff very hard. He can't use magic, he can use the gun so that's just one thing. He doesn't have any story or anything at all, but still, you're gonna be happy to have him because he hits stuff really hard. Yeah. And last person get is Noah. You have written here one of the last experts and I don't remember if that's actually a thing that the game says. I just remember he's a dude in a cave who joins you. Unknown Speaker 24:45 Yeah, I don't know. Looking back now I'm thinking that I think they mentioned at once in this game, but that comes up more and in the following games. I think they do mention it once in this game, but it's the kind of Like, you know, this, this order of monks who had been carrying on like knowledge for and kind of their magical, their magical knowledge and abilities for, you know, millennia? Unknown Speaker 25:16 Oh, yeah, okay, I want them to get the rest of these games on the switch so I can play them in a nice way. Anyway, he gets told to join you by the governor of what's the desert planet called again? Unknown Speaker 25:29 desert us? Unknown Speaker 25:30 Yes, yeah, he just gets told to join you so he does. He's got really good attack magic. And he gets he actually gets a little bit of characterization because you meet his master at one point and they have a magic tool to get a good piece of equipment for him. I'm always down for even though if you don't expect it. It's a real pain. Yeah, because the thing about this game is stuff is just sort of in dungeons and arbitrary places. So you have no way of knowing that's going to happen until you stumble into it. Yeah. Unknown Speaker 25:58 Yeah, that's definitely what that's definitely An element that shows shows it shows its age it's definitely got that thing like I was playing I was playing a lot of Dragon Dragon Quest 11 Unknown Speaker 26:10 last oh yeah Unknown Speaker 26:11 I meaning to get to that eventually so Unknown Speaker 26:12 good so good Unknown Speaker 26:15 and you know going back and like playing fantasy star again I was looking at Dragon Quest 11 and being like, wow Is this a little too user friendly because like you never wonder where you're supposed to go You always like have a good idea of where on the map you need to go. And it's not as simple as like follow the red.on the world map to get there it's not quite that simple but you know, oh always have like, Go West through this and then go north and then west from there. But at the same time looking back on fantasy Star Wars you know, in games of it's been enjoy. Are you just sort of like, you just walk around the world map until you're like stumbling. Yeah, you know, a item Or, you know, a piece of equipment that you need to continue. Unknown Speaker 27:05 Or a dungeon that maybe is too hard for you. Yeah, yeah, this is a like, pretty open ended game and that's cool. There's upsides and downsides. Like I, I kind of want both to exist. Unknown Speaker 27:15 Yeah, I mean, I think that's one of those things. That's one of those things. It's always difficult like an RPG design. Like I don't think that they've even figured that out today where you know, even though RPG you know, RPG, and especially like JI RPG is like, Dragon Quest 11 or Z to play Chronicles to, they want to create this, they want to definitely create the sense of an open world, but it's really hard to get around. Like, using the strength of certain enemies as being like sort of a gate. I don't think that they've, you know, like, as a way of telling you did the player you can't go any for this right now in the game, and, you know, 30 years On I don't know, if there's been an easy, you know, like a much better approach. And I don't know if they found a much better approach 30 years on. Unknown Speaker 28:10 Yeah. Well, you even got like, people argue about that with the Fallout series to this day. So it's not a settled question, I don't Unknown Speaker 28:16 think but yeah, getting back to a fantasy star. You know, just basic premise. You start out and three planet algos start out go star system, which is under the democratic rules King classic, which knows he was a pretty pretty good real ruler gave everybody you know, everything he gave everything he could to all those people, and it was a fair time leader. But over time, things started to change. And that was you know, because of a new world religion which was rumored to have come from another galaxy and basically the dark priests of this religion, which had never been seen by any mortal promise immortality to anyone who joined since King classic was getting old basically the idea of living forever appeal to him so he was the first to join join because of this he started to change and start wearing this very like threatening evil looking set of armor that Unknown Speaker 29:24 I love that the first thing the dark pretty smooth for everyone sees that armor is like no this is bad Unknown Speaker 29:30 and some some some scary armor Unknown Speaker 29:35 The Emperor's New scary clothes Unknown Speaker 29:39 meanwhile not not content with you know joining some dark religion he decided to make the economy trader and you know starts charging outrageous taxes and business all the three planets is pretty much goes the shirt. Tired towns fall into decay says you know Definitely relatable to modern day the setting Unknown Speaker 30:05 and then as time passes yeah Unknown Speaker 30:06 this is begging for like politics right joke and I just don't have it right now as Unknown Speaker 30:12 far as I can go with that. But you know as as as this happened as happens and many video games, Time passes the world's kind of go to hell and people are suffering and then monsters began a period. Linda dead come back to life and people will just start fearing the web the worst And so yeah, basically through the splash of black magic last week has become an evil tyrant. You have brave people who starts rally and secret against classic, but as robotic cops are pretty much ruthless and hunting down defenders of people. And one of those people was Nero who worked at a spaceport on camera needs which was the central town on the planet Palma and he was driven to plot against classic because his father disappeared many years before trying to learn all last sexy secrets. And so the game basically starts out in the year AW 342 with Nero being caught and killed by the robotic cops Unknown Speaker 31:22 seemed to kind of gnarly for 1988 Unknown Speaker 31:29 it's kind of like lying there dying a little bit better than eating out and they just beat them up in the Unknown Speaker 31:36 streets is it's pretty brutal. Yeah, Unknown Speaker 31:40 he's just dying they're bleeding out and he passes short story short over to his sister Alice and asks her to basically take up his quest and you suggest to her that she seek out legendary or legendary warrior Odin for help. Yeah, so at agree if hatred for classic Alice sets out of the world, and best to avenge. Unknown Speaker 32:05 Yeah, I should note, I think all of the above must be from the manual because the game doesn't say any of that. And it's not necessary context, but it's nice to Unknown Speaker 32:14 have general premise that I think was described. Unknown Speaker 32:18 Yeah, I mean, you know, last because evil Unknown Speaker 32:22 it's kind of implying that he has some like, secret plan or he's up to something, but that doesn't come down, you just Unknown Speaker 32:28 kind of figure out as the game goes along, but also, some of it also, you know, some of it is also like, just in like manuals of the game and so that actually kind of like it's clarified and some of the later games so Unknown Speaker 32:43 yeah, that makes sense. They had to go back and kind of fill in some of those details for finding new sequel hooks. All right, which one of us was going first with the story? So that's that's kind of just sort of dumped into the world. You can't even get to like the spaceport because You don't have a pass and you can go actually find Odin who is in the cave of Medusa which Medusa is not inside but he has been turned by turned in stone so she was there I guess what said you got to find a cat now well okay, we start the so instead you go and get your pass and you find now on the desert planet who has like some sort of anti purification group then you really really quickly get to party members and you've got a whole gang together then there's a quest that isn't important but I have to mention you get you buy cake from a bakery that's the bottom of a dungeon which is good because the game understands how absurd that is like when you go in the guy running a slight Yeah, sorry. So it's it's legitimately deliberately funny, which is very weird. But I'm into it. Yes, you get the dungeon cake and you actually us that get an audience with the governor of Motown via that's the desert planet name. You said somebody else for my whatever it's called Mojave, apparently. Oh yeah, I think we're mixing up the desert in the ice planet. Yeah, he's the one who gives you the letter of introduction to Noah, who then joins you and then yes, yeah, QX good all four party members pretty fast. And eventually you get a spaceship called vino and you can now travel freely between PAMA Batavia and dexterous the ice planet and you're just completing quests and figuring out how first of all to get to classic and you know, secondly what happened with him finding things these messed up. Towns he's destroyed. Yeah, you can like a lot of just MacGuffin to prison man, a crystal Eclipse torch. And like the look Connick gear, just some special space metal that is the strongest stuff. You probably don't technically need it. But you know, the game says Oh, you're definitely going to need that fight classic. Yeah. And you get all that stuff together. You do a whole bunch bunch of stuff and all those items to get to classic sky castle you have fly there in the back of now turns into like a wing it thing that's fun Unknown Speaker 35:09 yeah like a giant Unknown Speaker 35:10 there's also a weird thing where like you can actually get stuck up there because if now dies you can't use it and you have the teleport back spell but if you run out of MP it's the whole thing so it is possible to fight last like the boss and then be stuck. Yeah, that's never happened to me or anything. But I imagine this has happened to at least one person that it must have sucked. Unknown Speaker 35:32 Yeah, I'm sure I don't think that happened to me. That definitely definitely didn't happen to me in a replay but didn't happen to me Luckily, in my first time through Yeah, well, anyway, Unknown Speaker 35:43 luckily, you've got all your phone equipment now and you just fight last night. He's not super difficult or anything. He just hits you and you hit him back until he falls down and then you are successful. You have saved the alcohol system and everything is perfectly done. Unknown Speaker 35:58 Yeah, and except Surprise, surprise. Laughing isn't the final boss. And before your team can celebrate, they hear this theory voice that says quickly go see the governor and metallic yet and so once they enter the Governor's Palace, they are transported to this eerie dungeon with really high level enemies. And this dungeon is like the dungeon the sky castle dungeon is tough like there, it'll definitely throw a lot of different Unknown Speaker 36:28 Yeah, there's a lot and there's like a mini boss and then last, like at the end, so it's a bit of an endurance test. Unknown Speaker 36:33 Yeah, yeah, it's definitely an endurance test and like keeping your stats up enough to go against classic or the final boss. Well, you know, taking on these lower level level lower level enemies can be pretty challenging, you know, but so yeah, once you make your way through the maze, they come face to face with the dark falls, which was renamed dark force in later games so there's never really been like a good like canonical like description for like or listing of what his name is Unknown Speaker 37:10 yeah I know an online they went back to falls Unknown Speaker 37:13 yeah yeah and this game it start falls I think in fantasy star to its force and I think it for they may have gone back to falls because fall for has a lot of callbacks to this game. And so yeah, you get in there sorry falls He kind of looks like this giant blue bodybuilder with a body like designed by HR. Oh wow. Yeah. Yeah, there's stuff it's definitely got some of that, you know 80s post alien like kind of like sort of technological sort of organic Unknown Speaker 37:48 Yeah, cool vibe to like it comes out of nowhere and inexplicably, but it's a cool final boss. Unknown Speaker 37:54 Yeah, yeah. And so dark falls not surprisingly is the hardest boss in the game, but He's just a really really tough in general, a tough guy about in general. It's really important that you have the crystal that knows been carrying, it kind of turns the tide in your favor. But even though you die, you actually don't get a readout on the enemies hp. And a couple services that are on the line. They as they said it averages around 400 Hp Yeah. And for them so this Yeah, in this battle can go on for Unknown Speaker 38:33 two turns out of your one. Unknown Speaker 38:35 Yeah, he does. He does. It goes on for a while. So it's definitely an endurance test. And, you know, he is He seems more susceptible to magic than physical. But you'll also be wanting to use some of your spells to heal your team because he can tackle heavy punch. So you really gotta kind of like manage your offensive MP attacks with you know more defensive MP MP of spells and that can be pretty pretty tough and so you know once dark Falls is basically defeated you know Alice kind of gets like a superpower you know is able to drive or soar deep into the enemy and the dungeon disappears at Find yourself back at the governor's mansion and the governor is pretty much returned to normal and he's he explains that he was possessed by a dark force. And then he explained to Alice that her father was once the king of Argo and he asked if she will ascend to the throne and rule out ago Unknown Speaker 39:42 and I'm sure canonical if she says yes, but you can just say no which I like it doesn't change anything in particular, but you know, doesn't but down must you it's just he says, Oh, well too bad. Unknown Speaker 39:52 They also do that is when you come to come across last a quarter. He's like, Hey, come on, join me and you know, for the game, so Unknown Speaker 40:00 Right yeah again to proceed. Unknown Speaker 40:04 But yeah, yeah you you say yeah, you'll take from you way farewell to the rest of your team. And that is pretty much the primary story of fantasy star. It's hard because there's things that I want to talk about that come up in later games but I don't want to give any spoilers you know, oh yeah, Unknown Speaker 40:25 yeah. I never do I want to play those even more now. So yeah, we'll find a way it's good. Unknown Speaker 40:32 It's it's good to play this game and have a lot of the fantasy fantasy star history and more in your head specially when playing fantasy star for because too, is you know, extensively insane world. And it's definitely like a follow up to one. Three was developed by an entirely different team, because to such a hit both in Japan and the US that they got strangely The Golden x team to develop the three and so that's the one that everybody you know, it's a big fan of fantasy star, kind of like WhatsApp looks at a scan since like, I don't know if that's really cannon and then fantasy star for was, you know, produced by Reiko Kodama and a lot of the original developers came back and that really ties everything up I think that they knew that that was going to be the last mainline fantasy fantasy star game because yeah before Unknown Speaker 41:33 callbacks Unknown Speaker 41:34 to the first game yeah there are more after that but they went online and just everything got very different I like those games but they're just not the same thing but I'll you know, all of the the four main games are really just still very blanking on the word. There's still very ambitious for it. Yeah, because I haven't played them through. I've already said that but they have like the second games ending really stands out for a lot of people as pretty wild. that third game has like, different generations of characters. That fourth one just looks gorgeous has these animated cut scenes has again, just like plot developments that you didn't see in many games at the time. So I like that that much really kept carrying forward to the series after this. Unknown Speaker 42:17 Yeah, definitely. And, you know, like, world building is so strong in this game, you know, and none of it is none of it. None of it is like an incredible like, yeah, they didn't invent anything particularly new in this game, but the way they mix it all together, really, really sets it apart from a lot of the games of, you know, of its time it definitely sets it apart from the other eight, eight bit RPG that we got in the United States. Even though like in Japan, or you know, they got a little they got some games that were a little more advanced with Dragon Quest two and Final Fantasies, due to In the first two, Mughrabi 10 say games that were a little more ambitious, you know, considering that Final Fantasy came out on the heels of the first dragon, Dragon Warrior and first fan of Final Fantasy it's really ambitious and yeah, it has like a really like rich interesting world that was interesting enough for them to basically carried it carried on and three following games. Which is something that's unique and it's still unique in to this day and RPG franchises You know, a lot of times like, you know, Final Fantasy is a perfect example. It's like, every, every time you play a new Final Fantasy game, it takes place in its own certain, like, self contained world. Yeah. Even though all these worlds happen to have choker bows and some of the same elements. They're completely discreet from one another and The first four fantasy star games, you know, even though they're separated by thousands of years, they are very much taking place on the same planets and with a lot of the same elements. Unknown Speaker 44:12 Yeah, for sure. And that's like one of the things that makes me curious about like, two is Oh, how do they handle? what's what's Parma like then or whatever? Unknown Speaker 44:22 Yeah, and they do some really interesting stuff with that just kind of don't feel like this is too much of spoiler but like, the climate split planets change over millennia, you know, so, yeah. Oh, that's cool. I mean, guys Unknown Speaker 44:37 are very, like, why a very story specific, but Unknown Speaker 44:42 it is really cool for that event that much attention to detail. Yeah, rather than being like, Oh, we've got a template. We're just gonna set this scenario in the same kind of like template that we set before. It's like, definitely builds on what what came in Before it does stuff that would seem like you know, really like, like, gives you a good sense that like a lot of time has passed. Unknown Speaker 45:13 Oh, one thing I just neglected to mention is one thing you can do in this game is get out of some fights by actually talking to the enemies if they look sentience, they like actually will be and you can sort of talk your way out of a fight, which isn't translated in a way that makes sense. They'll just say something that isn't comprehensible in the fight stops, but it's a cool idea. Little bit of a nod to kind of tabletop role playing roots of the whole thing. Unknown Speaker 45:40 Yeah, that is really cool. I'm trying to think Can you can you talk with the zombies and this one? I don't Unknown Speaker 45:47 know. So they pre pre fine. Unknown Speaker 45:52 Yeah, cuz I was looking at the monster list and the switch version. It tells you how you can talk to all the enemies you can talk to I don't think somebody Were there. I also realized I didn't have one of the enemies that I definitely fought on the list because I never actually killed him. I just talked my way out of every fight with the basically Java's thrown the desert planet and people and grow their job was great. But Unknown Speaker 46:17 yeah, I mean, it's funny when I was, I mean, I've never been super into Star Wars. But, you know, even as a kid, I wasn't really in Star Wars that much. And so I remember the first time when I looked at the robot cops in quotes as an adult, and was like, Oh, my God is a straight Lyft. And it's still it's still in that era of, you know, Japanese developers being like, Oh, you know, nobody's gonna nobody's really going to care if we just steal this or steal this, you know, or, you know, you have like, Beatles music, background and eat birthday. Unknown Speaker 46:55 Birthday Earthbound and stuff like that. Unknown Speaker 46:57 Yeah, yeah. It's pretty fun. Yeah. It's interesting. I wonder if I wonder how much you get away with these days before Unknown Speaker 47:03 he starts? Not this much. But uh, yeah, Unknown Speaker 47:06 yeah, less than this. Unknown Speaker 47:08 So yeah, I mean, I would say that the switch Sega ages version is definitely the one play. And this, you know, at this time, it's definitely a quiet classic in my eyes. I mean, you know, I've been had this game in my life for, you know, since 1989. So I have really strong feelings for it. But I do think it's held up really well. Though, I can't imagine going back to it and doing just straight play through without the quality of life improvements are added in the Sega ages version. But we're all you know, all around. I think we've been talking about that console episode about the fact that this is just really ahead of its time in a lot of ways. And, you know, there's just a couple of other things that are interesting that I think we're worth mentioning in fantasy Are to even though that was released for the Genesis they go they go for a top down dungeon instead of the 3d one as I do here, and they don't have specific backgrounds for during any of the battles which is both of those are kind of interesting because for them to like kind of like take a step backwards with their 16 bit machines even though you know, the graphics in general were much better was interesting to see that this game was it even ahead of some of that sequel. Even ahead of its time compared to like some of the sequels Unknown Speaker 48:37 now that's pretty interesting. Yeah, I'm sorry but yeah, I would like to think if like anyone has an interest in like this vintage of RPG which isn't going to be everyone but if you are and you haven't played this like that's which version is really good. I came to this way after was out and I was impressed. So that's Yeah, I mean, it definitely definitely Unknown Speaker 48:56 does not feel like you know, like you fragile, eat your veggies kind of stuff. Unknown Speaker 49:03 Or, you know, sit on my lap young man and I'll tell you about the history video games. Unknown Speaker 49:11 There's enough going on there. There's enough like world building. There's enough charm and interesting story beats even if they are a cliche and mechanics that I know it still really holds up. It still holds up really well, I think. Yeah, I agree. Well, should we round it out here Unknown Speaker 49:31 here? I think it's Do you have anything Unknown Speaker 49:34 you want to plug Richard? No, not especially just have my Twitter account where I post garbage and navigate Ferrari and you know, whatever I have been, I keep thinking of things I want to do and then I don't sometimes I have to get streaming working on my new laptop. That was Unknown Speaker 49:53 streaming box that works about 50% of the time that I try it. But yeah, I'll highly the higher Highly recommend following Robert on Unknown Speaker 50:02 on Twitter, he's a pro pro Twitter follow. Unknown Speaker 50:06 Yes. And I think pretty much all I have Thank you is that you can follow me on twitter at Paul and Davis. I don't really tweet that much and most of what I do tweet is me making dumb jokes from screenshots of stuff that I've taken on my switch. But you can listen to my other podcasts which is a which is Mega 10 marathon. It's a game by game journey through the Shema Gamay, 10, say and persona games and find that at Mega 10 marathon calm. And yeah, if you like to show that show or this show, please go to iTunes review it and let people know. So yeah, thanks for thanks for listening. And thanks for coming on again, Robert. Yeah, I'm sure yeah, anytime. Unknown Speaker 50:55 There's plenty of other games out there. Unknown Speaker 50:57 Cool. All right. Thanks for listening. Unknown Speaker 51:01 Yes. I think of some Transcribed by https://otter.ai