00:00.16
Dave
Hello everybody. My name is Dave Jackson and you're listening to tales from the backlog. This is a video games review podcast where each week I'm joined by a guest to bring a game out of the backlog, play it and discuss my guest today is a friend of the show returning guest on the show. 1 of the co-hosts of the good the bad and the backlog podcast. He's got a j pop star living inside of him. Adam welcome back Adam.

00:26.20
Adam
La La La La La La La La La La La La Thank you for having me I stole somebody's grid garment I mean comment grid and I'm ready to perform and should also say.

00:32.30
Dave
Ah, beautiful.

00:37.81
Dave
Ah, all right awesome that's right I was listening to your 100 episode special today and heard your co-host who will not go named on here trashing this game that we're talking about today. So the good host we'll say you're the good.

00:40.98
Adam
I am the good host of the good, the bad and the backlog not the bad host.

00:50.79
Adam
Um, yeah.

00:54.74
Adam
Yeah, yeah, exactly and you don't have to worry about him anymore because he is being arrested.

00:56.59
Dave
Ah, he's the bad and then there's the backlog.

01:03.61
Dave
Right for crimes against you know which we will not stand. 

01:16.30
Dave
Long time listeners of the podcast may recognize Adam and that unmentioned co-host from a previous episode of tales from the backlog where we talked about um prey moon crash which was the roguelike dlc for prey, a really good game. We had a good conversation. Can say his name now I think Kiran was on that episode 2 we had a good time although Kian demonstrated himself unworthy to talk about today's game so he's not here today today's game is final fantasy ten two which is an rpg developed and published by square for the ps 2 in 2003.

01:42.60
Adam
Good.

01:52.53
Dave
Ah, it has since been remastered and packaged alongside final fantasy 10 for basically every modern system. Um I played this on the switch I know it's available in lots of other places too since it is a sequel to final fantasy 10 when we set up the story for this game and talk about what this game is doing story wise even in the non-spoiler part. We're going to kind of spoil the end of final fantasy 10 so you can really talk about this story without talking about how that game ends. So if you don't want to be spoiled on final fantasy 10 go play final fantasy ten. It's great. And then come back and then of course for this game we will save the spoiler talk for the spoiler section at the end of the episode you can check down in the show notes for a timestamp for when those spoilers will begin. So. Final fantasy ten two we've prepared some elevator pitches for today's episode ah my elevator pitch for this game is what do you do after you saved the world and killed god in the first game. The answer is girl power. That's what you do Adam? What's your elevator pitch.

02:58.22
Adam
My elevator pitch is what do you get when you mix Charlie's angels with Sailor Moon Rupaul's drag race and final fantasy. You get fun of fantasy 10-2.

03:09.53
Dave
Ah, fantastic. Ah this um, like I said I played this on switch. This is my first time playing it on switch. It took me Twenty Eight point five hours to get 60% completion and to finish the game. Um, this is kind of a notorious one hundred percent game among people who try to do 100% runs. I did not even mess with that. I can find all that stuff on Youtube the reward for getting 100% so 60% for me. Twenty Eight point five hours Adam how about you.

03:48.13
Adam
Ah, you're just triggering me with this one hundred percent talk because um I originally played this game on ps 2 when it came out like 2000 and I'm sure it's in your notes somewhere 2003 there it is um.

03:58.33
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

04:02.60
Adam
But yeah I attempted the 100% that I think I put in like eighty plus hours got 99.9 and I could not figure out what the point 1% was to get that perfect ending. So this all forever I actually hang on.

04:15.00
Dave
Oof.

04:19.79
Adam
2 attempts at that by the way so I tried twice to 100% this game and failed both times and after that I was like you know what? I'm done, I'm satisfied. Actually I wasn't satisfied. I was really pissed off anyway. So that took me I mean I've written eighty plus hours here but that's probably 80 plus against 2 separate save files.

04:37.70
Dave
M.

04:39.47
Adam
So like one hundred and sixty hours but this time around I replayed it on switch for the hd remaster collection and I also got similar to your completion percentage I got around 64% but um, I've done like 2 thirds more than you no wait half is. Double as much almost played for 43 hours um not because I'm incompetent I just really like to level up and master ah jobs and abilities and stuff so that's my reason why.

05:01.31
Dave
Mm.

05:10.60
Dave
Yeah yep, this is ah we'll talk about it later of course. But if you like um, mastering jobs and you know getting that gold star next to all your stuff if you're that kind of Sicko This is a game for you. So.

05:21.75
Adam
Yeah.

05:25.50
Dave
You ah you said that you played this right when it first came out so tell me a little bit about your history with this I kind of assume that if you wanted to play this when it came out. It's because you liked Final Fantasy 10 before that right.

05:37.45
Adam
Ah, that is correct. Mr. Jackson I loved final fantasy 10 um I think I really hit my final fantasy love around 9 which is when I got my ps one and I had 9 and 7 at the exact same time 7 was so. Polygonal and boxy that I just couldn't get into it but I absolutely loved the shit out of 9 and then ps 2 came out and then I got actually I think ps 2 was out around the time 9 came out if I'm correct um or was imminently about to come out anyway. Point is coming off the back of 9.

06:11.30
Adam
Had to play ten ten voice acting oh my god voice acting like that didn't exist back in the day so that was mind blowing the graphics mindblowing. So I love 10 and then of course because I love ten so much.

06:24.99
Adam
When ten two was announced I was like fully on board 100% I'm like this game I can't wait to pick it up day one I did pick it up day one and I absolutely loved it and I maybe was a little biased and I I overlooked a lot of flaws but I was one of the people that picked it up on the day it came out and. Um, certainly I had a ball like I couldn't see anything wrong with it. I was in it 100% and loved it. So yeah, I'm an odd duckling I guess compared to the popular people. But what about you I know this is recent for you right.

06:57.64
Dave
Yeah, recent for me and it's weird because I played final fantasy 10 for the first time in 2006 so a little bit late but still a long time ago now. Um I didn't even know there was a sequel to final fantasy 10 for a long time like maybe in the last five years I learned about it and I never had a ps 2 so like I played final fantasy 10 on my roommates ps 2 and then a couple years later I played it again on a different roommate's ps 2 but I never had 1 for myself. So I never knew about the sequel. It was really it actually might have been when I bought the remaster. On switch and it came with ten two I was like oh they made a sequel that's weird and then I kind of like took a quick look at it and was like I love final fantasy 10 by the way we had an episode come out in December on this podcast about final fantasy 10 um, good discussion. I love the game and have played it 4 times now. So yeah, but I took 1 look at final fantasy ten two and I was like that looks stupid I don't want to play that just a real quick. yeah so yeah just like yeah I don't know looked at a picture I was like nope not playing that.

08:04.65
Adam
Blasphemy.

08:12.54
Dave
Um I watched the ending on Youtube because I was like well I want to know how this ends but I'm not playing it obviously ah, but it wasn't really until a friend of both of ours. Ah Rick from pixel project radio put out a solo podcast essay kind of defending I think he. Actually titled it like a defense of final fantasy ten two or something like that I listen to that I respect what Rick has to say and he convinced me that this was worth a try because he talked about this as like ah a nice story sequel to final fantasy 10 and I love the story in 10 so I was like alright fine. Ah, give it a go and um for some quick opening thoughts here. I think that the promise of an interesting story sequel to Final Fantasy 10 is fulfilled in 10-2. I really really really like what they did with the story in this game. Um.

09:12.19
Dave
Specifically for people like me who love the story of final fantasy 10 I think we'll talk about it. But I think they had 2 choices for a sequel. They could have escalated it but you killed god at the end of final fantasy 10 so how are you going to escalate that. So they decided to bring it down to earth a little bit and I really really like what they did. Um, I'm still kind of mixed on the game because I did not like the gameplay at all and this was like 1 of the big selling points about 10 2 is everybody loves the gameplay and I just could not.

09:49.48
Dave
Couldn't get it, I just didn't like it so much mixed in with the game but I have a lot of things that I really really like about it, mostly story stuff. How about you?

09:59.84
Adam
Um, yeah I'm I well no I'm not the same actually I like a lot about the gameplay as well. But like I've been a staunch fun and fantasy 10 defender for a very very long time.

10:13.90
Adam
And I think a lot of that has to do with just the absolute bias I had from being so in love with the game when it first came out and ah ah, neglected to bring it up but I was like in the zeitgeist of the moment on the internet when this game was announced and I was watching all the Japanese trailers and stuff and I was just in awe of like.

10:17.10
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

10:30.87
Adam
How Japanese it was because this was like a period in my life where I was like fully on board with like Jpop anime like the wacky Japanese shit I loved all that and this game like brought that into final fantasy and I know that when people hear that final fantasy fans. It.

10:43.00
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

10:49.41
Adam
Pushes them in the opposite direction. They're like gross I don't want Japanese final fantasy even though every final fantasy is being Japanese but you know it's too far like it is. It's not for me. My final fantasy is seven where I'm the edgy cool guy with a big sword and this is like girly and poppy and stuff and that's.

10:54.50
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

11:07.55
Adam
I Think that's why people pushed against it. But for me I Love the japaneseiness of it and how lighthearted in tone it was compared to the other stuff because to me it was never like a mainline final fantasy. It's always a spinoff and I was just excited like you to see what would happen in the story.

11:26.66
Adam
But it would happen in the world with Spira and I enjoyed the gameplay because it didn't like it allowed you to jump back into this world that you would already see but Jesus let me do that again. It allowed you to.

11:39.45
Dave
Yeah.

11:42.69
Adam
Jump into this world that you had already previously explored and you basically knew from back to front anyway and 2 years had passed so it's like okay I love this world. Let's go see what's happening in Killica because that was in rubble. Basically last time we saw it let's go see what's happening in Lucca where people play blitzball and stuff. Let's go visit our friends and Besaide.

12:02.38
Adam
And you can just at any time in the game just jump into a chapter and explore that area and or basically unless it's locked for story purposes and then just catch up with your friends and see how the world has changed and so on.

12:16.61
Adam
Find that the gameplay itself is like chock full of a lot of minigames and stuff and like silly little things rather than um, a serious journey that you would expect in a final fantasy. So I get why? you'd probably not like something like that. But for me I was fully on board like the story. The fun little actually some of the minigames are kind of shit. So anyway, long story short, replaying it nowadays with the amount of ah bias I had to it from back in the day I did start to see a lot of the shine come off because it is a Ps 2 game and it has not aged.

12:54.80
Adam
Particularly well so yeah I have issues with it now. But you know it holds a special place My heart.

12:59.43
Dave
Yeah, absolutely and I should say just right at the top of the show that you're right? This game does get a lot of shit out there and I don't think it deserves it. I think there are definitely things to criticize and I'm things that I will criticize but they're not the things that people normally shit on this game for.

13:20.50
Adam
Absolutely fully agree and when it comes to it I will shit on this game as well for specific things and I'm looking forward to it.

13:27.55
Dave
Yeah, yeah, all right? So ah, we will take a little bit of a music break. We will listen all right? So we will take a little bit of a music break. We will listen to a bit of the poppy music from final fantasy ten two when we'll come back. When we come back, we'll set up the story having a lot of trouble putting sentences together forgetting words all right.

13:46.79
Adam
What can I do for you sorry I'm having a lot of trouble keeping a stream of consciousness happening without getting sidetracked by so many thoughts.

13:59.68
Dave
Ah, all right? So bring it back. So final fantasy ten two is set 2 years after the events of final fantasy 10 the world destroying Kaiju sin is gone and the world is at peace. And this is kind of an interesting setup for a sequel to a game like final fantasy 10 with a story like final fantasy 10. The people in final fantasy 10 were living in this constant cycle of destruction rebuilding destruction, death , all of that and then at the end you. You solve it, you take all of that away and the world is left at peace. So now that's not an issue. This story kind of explores. What do people do after this existential threat is gone and the answer is that a lot of people are just chilling. Unk re living lives of leisure. There are places that's sin destroyed that are rebuilt. Um your characters from final fantasy 10 like they form a j pop girl group trio and they're doing concerts and. Go on cute little hunts for spheres and we'll talk about that and everything like when this game starts. Everything is so low stakes compared to the beginning of Final Fantasy 10 you know sin is destroying shit and this game really really like scales it back and it's like not most people in the world. They're chillin'

15:33.19
Dave
Um, there are people who are kind of picking up the pieces and ah like races of people that are picking up the pieces from what happened in final fantasy 10 but like your group your characters from final fantasy 10 that are kind of still around in the world. They're hanging out.

15:54.17
Adam
they sure are Mr Jackson um well I love this as well because you kind of just have to think about like this world of spira has been at risk.

16:10.26
Adam
Of Sin for such a long time that nobody ever really feels safe because it could strike at any moment until a summoner brings about the calm. But even then Sin always came back and Sin always destroyed So it's almost like living in a perpetual state of fear and what do you do when that fear is taken away.

16:29.24
Adam
You just become like what do you do like? That's the question legitimately like what do you do and they think oh you know, let's let's do this. Let's do that. Let's progress technology because maybe the Al Bhed aren't so bad and their technology really isn't that bad either and this fucking religion.

16:48.43
Dave
Yeah.

16:49.00
Adam
I swear sorry and this religion has been screwing with us since the beginning and we're not going to follow them anymore. They tell us that the albed Maina is bad but you know what screw them because they're liars and they make up all this shit. So we're going to progress technology is going to progress. We're going to you know. Enjoy things and entertain ourselves and basically like I'm surprised there aren't orgies in this game because that's what I would be doing if sin wasn't around. Um.

17:14.46
Dave
Ah, if ah if the team that made final fantasy sixteen made this game. There would be orgies. Yeah.

17:23.40
Adam
They better, Be want to see some Bacchanalia I Think that's the word. Um, but you know despite that it's actually a really interesting thing to examine in terms of character as well like una in particular. Her entire life was built around the belief that she had to sacrifice herself to Destroy Sin and bring about the calm and now that that's no longer a thing she succeeded about bringing about the calm but she's still alive. She's kind of like where do I fit in in this world and.

17:52.75
Dave
Um, yeah.

17:58.80
Adam
Think there's a lot of criticism about her being like a j-pop singer and being quite girly and she's not the same Yuna as she was in the first game but she actually is the same Yuna that she was in the first game. She's just trying to find her feet and she's being influenced by Riku who is the happy-go-lucky you know.

18:16.67
Adam
Girl from the first game and she's sort of emulating that because that's what she thinks she needs to be now that she doesn't have this weight of the world on her shoulders. So yeah, anyways, it's a good perspective, like an interesting way of changing around what the sequel or what you expect a sequel should be.

18:31.56
Dave
Right? Most sequels are just continuing the story with, you know, another big bad that's worse than the previous one or something like that. But like we kind of set up at the beginning I said in my elevator pitch like you beat the world destroying Kaiju and killed god.

18:51.53
Dave
In the first game you can't go higher than that so it is like a much more personal story for most of this like there are stakes that gets raised and the the threat of the world starts to or the yeah, the fate of the world starts to get threatened and stuff as you go, but the story setup is very much like.

19:11.90
Dave
How is everybody continuing now that this shadow has been lifted and you brought up unice. So like I really like how you know you go on this journey with una in this game too and like you said you can visit all the places in spira. Um. Right? From the beginning they give you this Map. You can select all of the levels. All the cities, all the places you went in the first game you can go to at any time you can talk to the people there and in a lot of the places there Yuna will reflect on the journey that she had in the first game. With Tidus who's the protagonist who disappeared at the end of the first game. Um, she'll reflect on her time with him because he was a love interest for her. She'll reflect on her friends and her guardians who are now scattered all around. Um. Rikku's the only one that's there with her from the first game that's still in this game so there's a lot of like you go to this place. You'll have a short little scene where Yuna kind of thinks about how things have changed or remembers a memory that she spent with the group in the first game. And I really really like this. This is one of my favorite parts of the game.

20:24.69
Adam
I like that they didn't sort of just slap together a sql and try and do that annoying thing where they're like you don't need to know anything about the first game to enjoy this game. Um, yeah, 100% you do, which is good. Yeah because we want to.

20:32.83
Dave
Right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, you do? yeah.

20:39.50
Adam
That connection to the first game. That's the entire reason why people would play a direct sql the very first final fantasy direct sequels mind you? um yeah, that's what we came back for and that's what we want to see so I love that they did you know tie all of these experiences and moments from the first game.

20:45.12
Dave
Um, that's right? yeah.

20:58.50
Adam
Into the second game and have her reflect upon that and yeah I mean there's just something magical about seeing a quote unquote heavily pregnant lulu still wearing a corset of some kind which you can't see her baby bump but you know just the growth of this world and the growth of these characters that you had met and journeyed with previously. So.

21:10.14
Dave
Yeah.

21:18.25
Adam
Yeah, that's exactly why we're here and it gave us what we want in that respect.

21:23.60
Dave
Yeah, everyone else in the world has moved on with their lives too and are dealing with the events of the first game or like just kind of continuing their life in their own way waka and lulu who are 2 of your guardians in final fantasy ten two of you as guardians. Um. They're having a baby together. So like yeah, it's one of those things. It's like the constant threat of death is lifted so people are like okay we can settle down we can have a family now you know, um, funny story about Lulu there. Ah she doesn't look pregnant even though she's going to give birth any minute now.

21:56.87
Adam
Yeah.

21:59.19
Dave
Ah, during the story here she doesn't look pregnant because they just didn't want to draw or make a new character model for her so there are um, there are some like that. We'll just say the production value in this game is less than final fantasy ten I feel like by a pretty big margin.

22:18.37
Dave
Um, stuff like the cut scenes aren't as you know striking as they were in final fantasy 10 the lip syncing on the character models some of the character models themselves are you know, just brought back. Not really touched up at all, some of the stuff is even worse. I thought the voice acting was worse in this game.

22:38.70
Adam
Oh controversial.

22:38.11
Dave
Then final fantasy 10 might be controversial. I have the controversial take that the voice acting in 10 is good and like they were really hamstrung by things outside of their control. The voice actors were so I don't know I played this game and just. Didn't like the voice acting as much as I liked it in 10. That might be personal bias because I played ten four times anyway.

23:01.30
Adam
Okay, I'll just say that I liked the voice acting in 10 and even the cringy ha haha scene I mean I get it. You have to be an idiot not to understand what the point of that scene is um but I think that I like to tend to just as much if not.

23:12.61
Dave
Right.

23:20.10
Adam
A little bit more because I think um I like the delivery of una better in this game and I feel like the actors who are involved in this game have um, actually I'm just having a flashback now to Brother. So I take that back. Um. A lot of the performances have improved. There are many or a handful of new performances which are terrible. So yeah, um, let's just call it Even there's some highlights and some low lights.

23:51.81
Dave
Yeah, there is a certain tone about this game. That's different from Final Fantasy 10. It's a lot more campy and a lot more goofy. Um for a lot of the game. There isn't really.

24:08.97
Dave
You know, danger or something like that just people having a good time and I think a lot of the voice acting performances ah characters that are introduced are more goofy and lighthearted and campy and their voice performances really reflect that um, thinking of like rikku.

24:27.31
Dave
She was like that in the first game though we can talk about brother now Yuna is kind of joined by her. She's part al bhed. It's a um, ah race of people within the world of spira here. They were like. Set up to be villains in final fantasy 10 but they were not villains at all. So you're kind of joined by some of Yuna's relatives and Riku's relatives in the al bhed. There's 3 main ones. There's brother buddy and shinra who are on the ship when you travel around. Um, buddy's fine. He's just kind of hanging out shinra's annoying but just kind of like kind of annoying I think and brother is like trying not to be trying not to like lay on the hyperbole too thick here. Brother's the worst final fantasy character I have ever experienced. He's.

25:18.27
Adam
Yeah, he is. He is okay, he has to be in my mind. The worst part of this game in its entirety like if you deleted him? Yeah, if you if you deleted him this game would be 10 out of 10

25:20.36
Dave
Terrible.

25:28.35
Dave
Yeah I can agree with that. Yeah.

25:37.93
Dave
Full letter grade taken away just because brothers here doing what brother does ah we kind of made fun of wakka and when we kind of like ripped on wakka a little bit for being racist in the first game and hating the al bhed. But every time brother talks I'm kind of like. Wakka might have a point. Yeah.

25:55.67
Adam
I see his point. Yeah, yeah

26:05.40
Dave
Yeah.

26:11.90
Adam
This needs to be explained specifically that rikku and brother, are brother and Sister, Yuna and rikku are cousins which means that they're related brother. The entire time is like flirting with with Yuna.

26:21.99
Dave
Um, yeah.

26:30.32
Adam
Trying to get her to like lap dance for him, not like not outwardly saying that. But he's like oh you not I want Ju to dance for me and also he's yeah and why is he so Russian he is so russian.

26:40.92
Dave
He's extremely thirsty, Extremely thirsty for Yuna None of the other Al Bhed have that accent.

26:48.60
Adam
None of the other al bhed. Um, yeah, exactly it is the strangest thing ever. It's like I want Ju to dance for you and you and I Yes I can't even do it? Um, but anyway, he's constantly like trying to, he's like in love with her and he's like what are you coming back to the ship and ah. You and or I love you I Want to hug you and anyway, um, it's It's just like this weird incestuous thing that makes me very uncomfortable and ah yeah, Also I think he may be anemic because he has his really deep dark bags under his eyes so he needs some more iron in his diet.

27:20.13
Dave
Yep, he's.

27:27.70
Dave
Maybe that'll stop him from being so thirsty towards his cousin. It will be good for him and be good for everybody playing the game. Yeah, he's if you were to stack up, you know make like ah maybe if ah.

27:29.25
Adam
Maybe. I can maybe he's maybe he's not from mount bad maybe he's from Alabama sorry.

27:44.67
Dave
If you were to make a pros and cons list of all the good parts of the game and all the bad parts I do think that brother is the worst part of the game and it's just unfortunate because he's around a lot. He talks a lot. He calls you on the radio a lot. He's just very prominent throughout the game. He's terrible.

28:02.52
Dave
Ah, some other characters that you um, meet throughout the game. There is a third member of the girl group with Unna Enriko her name is payne she is of the same goth like tribe that lulu is from and um.

28:19.41
Dave
I Don't really have a whole lot to say about her for a main character. She's barely a person. She just kind of there. She talks a couple words every hour and serves a point in the story for like you know her backstory ties in with other like important players in the story. But.

28:27.20
Adam
I like her.

28:38.45
Dave
As far as her as a character I don't really care.

28:42.43
Adam
Yeah I like her. Um I think a lot of her backstory is actually locked behind side content, specifically the crimson sphere stuff so back in the day when I played this on PS 2 and I did like every side content thing available I got the fully fleshed out pain.

28:46.35
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

28:59.75
Adam
And name is paine. Do we mention that paine is in. Okay, yeah, because that's so goth but she is like you. You need that third gothic wheel of this tricycle to keep it running smoothly. I don't know what I'm talking about. Yeah.

29:11.87
Dave
Yeah, Lulu retired so someone has to carry the torch.

29:18.43
Adam
I do love that she's from the same tribe. I'm just imagining this tribe of goths out on Besaid Island somewhere being like now we pray to what's that band Evanescence yeah evanescence or something.

29:22.87
Dave
Yeah.

29:31.63
Dave
Like the cure or something I don't know. Ah yeah, it was described like the guests on the final fantasy 10 episode Ryan and Chris described it as just there's like a continent full of.

29:48.24
Dave
These like hot goths like Lulu and paine. So I don't know if I would call them a tribe or what's going on with them. Ah, but apparently there's a continent full of characters just like them and if they make final fantasy ten three we have to go to that continent.

30:02.19
Adam
I Want to visit that island. Yeah yep I Want to see it. Um, but yeah I like her. She's just just the edgier darker third member of the team who is at times.

30:13.61
Dave
Yeah.

30:18.51
Adam
Very much a mood. She's like the one where she's almost like the player character where all this silly shit is going on around you and then she has to come in with the dry sarcastic comment and you're like yup work pain. That's it, slay it sis

30:35.31
Dave
Um, if you say so I got like almost nothing from her as a character. Um, there are yeah she definitely has a style for sure. There are a couple of others.

30:41.33
Adam
Ah I like to think she is like a little female. Um Elvis thing going on with a hair. Yeah.

30:53.97
Dave
I hesitate to call them villains but they're kind of set up as villains um leblanc and her crew I think the other two are called like oy and logos or something like that her ah they're just like team rocket.

31:12.77
Dave
Basically, they just kind of show up whenever you're out doing stuff. They're there to thwart your plans like una and her team are on these hunts for these items called spheres. The spheres contain recordings of lost memories and una is trying to find spheres so that she can locate them. Ah, tidus she's looking for tidus because he disappeared and this is like people fucking I don't know make home movies in these spheres and drop them or the spheres automatically record them I'm not sure exactly how they work but they're looking for these fears and then like this team rocket group shows up to try and steal the spheres ahead of them. Ah, and they're really goofy. They're really campy leblanc in her crew. I don't like them 1 bit as like characters. They're just too much. Um, like they're set up as like a comedy group they have like this weird like. But Bamp Ba Bo Bomp barrel music that plays whatever they go on screen. It's just that I don't like it. This is part of the story I don't like. It is like these parts with these characters.

32:20.62
Adam
No no I'm afraid not I'm afraid that doesn't work for me. Um I like them I like them because they are exactly like you said they're like team Rocket they're this sort of comedic antithesis of the gull wings and.

32:24.20
Dave
Ah, okay, let's hear it.

32:37.99
Adam
Leblanc she just does like team rocket. It's these silly little plans to sneak peek at you or steal Spheres and stuff and try and get back at the gullwings because they just have this rivalry which is beyond explanation and. I like leblanc a lot as a character because she is essentially just a drag queen. She has this super revealing outfit which is like a plunging neckline big like a collar and she uses a fan. She is literally a drag queen. She's just walking down the runway stomping and.

33:13.86
Adam
Yeah I don't know she's like the campiest part of the game and I think she is iconic. Um, but yeah, actually there's maybe not that much to her other than she has this relationship with somebody from ah the youth league which is a bit like ah you know. And I thought you were fierce leblanc. But apparently you're just after a man can't you just.

33:35.64
Dave
She's and that's like spoilers for her character but that becomes her entire character is she has to find Noojie Wooji and like noojie Wooji told me to wait here So I'm going to wait here like that's where her character goes.

33:40.80
Adam
Um, yeah, yeah.

33:48.50
Adam
That is a little bit disappointing because she was so I'm going to stump on your nuts in my high heels kind of vibe early on. Yeah yeah, so I guess I Okay fine I Kind of agree with you. She.

33:51.68
Dave
Yeah.

33:57.11
Dave
That's how she started. She has that vibe for sure.

34:05.67
Adam
She started out strong for me and I was really into it. But then as it went longer longer longer and further along in the story. She lost her independence. Yeah, she just kind of got sidelined a bit even though that.

34:14.52
Dave
She lost her mojo.

34:22.75
Adam
Actually we won't go into it but she is present towards the end of the game and does help to some degree but I don't know they turned her from being like what could be an iconic Diva character into being like a little lapdog. Yeah.

34:24.70
Dave
Yeah.

34:37.15
Dave
Yeah, kind of yeah ah we mentioned so again unna pain and rikku are they form this team of sphere hunters. They're looking for these spheres again. The spheres contain memories. Ah sometimes long lost memories. Ah, people can record their own spheres. There's like 2 kinds I guess or two ways they're made like you can make your own and leave them around like certain characters in final fantasy 10 did or it seems like there are others that just kind of are recorded if something big is happening nearby or something. Anyway, they're hunting for those because they're always in really hidden out of the way places in temples on top of mountains and stuff like that. Um, on one of these sphere hunts you find a sphere that's holding a memory of a person, a man that looks like tidus. Ah, as well as an insanely huge big mech weapon. So Yuna obviously is really interested in this because Tidus, her love interest in the first game, disappeared. She's trying to find him so you're told that ah the remnants of the church from the first game. Yevin. Wants to control this mega weapon so you need to figure out the mystery with this weapon and also find out the mystery with this man in the sphere that kind of kicks off like the story in final fantasy ten two and won't say anything more about what happens in the story but that's kind of the inciting event.

36:11.21
Dave
Um, and then just some general thoughts here I guess about the story. How do you feel about like the plot of final fantasy ten two

36:21.10
Adam
Um, before I say anything about that I Just want to say you would think that if all these spheres were like home recordings that the girls would stumble upon a lot of porn. But unfortunately they don't.

36:33.80
Dave
Ah, unfortunately.

36:36.80
Adam
Yeah, because that would have been in a really nice sort of side quest of tracking down all these adult Spears. Um, because fun fact, the very first photograph wasn't of a naked woman or something like when photography was invented. It was almost immediately used for pornography.

36:45.96
Dave
I That's I was going to say like I I don't know that that's true. But I'm also not going to say that that's probably not true. You know it probably like feel like every.

36:54.69
Adam
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

37:01.66
Dave
New technology is like okay how are we going to use this for sex somehow.

37:04.88
Adam
Yeah, great. We can take steel images now we're going to take still images of naked ladies. Um I'm pretty sure the very first motion picture ever taken was of a train in motion and then like two days later somebody used it for porn I bet. Um.

37:08.58
Dave
Yeah.

37:18.90
Dave
That's true. Okay, the train was a test run now now we're getting to the real shit. A.

37:24.66
Adam
Yeah, yeah, now we're going to run a train on this lady. Okay, um, back on topic I like the story of this game. I think it is deceptively complicated in a lot of aspects because without going into Spoiler territory at the moment but there are not.

37:41.27
Dave
Um.

37:44.46
Adam
Fuck without going into spoiler territory at the moment but there are a lot of ah what's that what I'm thinking of like callbacks to the first game. Um, there's a set of characters that are basically analogous of tidus and Yuna in this game and it kind of.

37:53.39
Dave
Yeah.

38:23.37
Adam
Anyway, there's these characters that essentially call back to the similar relationship that tidus and Yuna have so you know like has to like comes across all these spheres of this guy that looks like tidus who may or may not actually be him. And then also like this big world-ending threat which was actually foreshadowed in the first game if you pay close enough attention. Um, and then it also gives like this introspective nature to the story where unna kind of reflects upon her own relationship. That's now over for because of Tita's disappearing

38:59.64
Dave
M.

39:01.53
Adam
So yeah, you know I like the story. It's not like the biggest thing in the world but it's introspective. You understand why you know would feel a particular way that she feels within any given story moment. Maybe she feels like all of the effort that she went to in the previous game was probably for nothing because she lost the person that she Loved. But. Also like what is happening with all these other things like aeons and you know the world is still at Threat. So What's the point like I defeated Sin but the world is still under threat and Yada Yada Yada So You know she has feelings and it's a very emotional sometimes surprisingly so a game.

39:30.63
Dave
Yeah.

39:41.35
Adam
So and sorry does that make sense.

39:41.70
Dave
Yeah, yeah, absolutely like I think there's 2 types of storytelling going on. There's like the beat by beat plot especially early in the game when your villains are Leblanc and her crew. That's kind of campy and goofy and i.

39:49.42
Adam
Yeah.

40:01.80
Dave
Was kind of playing that for a while like wondering where is this going to go I wasn't really on board with that for for quite a while um the stuff that I was on board with was that kind of emotional reflective stuff with Yuna like you talked about like there's a couple of scenes that I kind of pinpointed in the notes where.

40:07.46
Adam
Okay.

40:20.90
Dave
In final fantasy ten. There was a very emotional campfire scene ah toward the end of the game and then in 10 2 you go back to the place where that scene took place and Yuna reflects on her thoughts during that time and the group that she was with and how she didn't want to like. Share her memories of this place for a long time because she wanted to keep them to herself and there's another part where you go back to a temple where Yuna in the first game she was on this pilgrimage from temple to temple gathering strength to take on sin basically and in. 10-2 those temples are now like tourist attractions and there's 1 in particular where some people got hurt and she's kind of bitter and resentful of them for turning these once holy places or places that meant a lot to her into tourist attractions and she's. Kind of like yes, serves you right? a bunch of assholes for you know, trampling all over this place that's sacred to me. Um, so those moments really worked for me throughout the whole game all the times when they called back to final fantasy ten I thought they did that really well and.

41:32.50
Dave
I Also think that this game does a really good job of playing with your expectations as a player and assumedly a fan of final fantasy 10 and like you have in your head an expectation of what's going to happen in the sequel to final fantasy 10 point because it ends on a bit of a. Not a cliffhanger but kind of like oh I didn't expect that.. How's this going to work out? Um, so you have expectations about how that's going to play out in this game and I think what they did with that you know being very vague here but playing with your expectations from the sequel they did a really good job of that. I Really like where that story went so stuff to talk about in the spoiler section but like a lot of the campy stuff was kind of fun sometimes but mostly didn't work for me, but this is.

42:27.49
Dave
Like ah a sneaky mature game from a storytelling perspective like I really like the writing and the like the storytelling as a sequel to final fantasy 10 in a way I didn't expect.

42:43.80
Adam
You said that much clearer than I did but that's pretty much exactly what I think like um, there are these moments even within the campiness and like this game is well known for having a lot of cringe So a lot of that has to do with like.

42:47.40
Dave
Yeah.

42:56.77
Dave
Um, yeah.

42:59.35
Adam
Characters and stuff and I know I sort of mentioned it earlier as well. But you know in particular um she is so vastly different from the way that you see her in 10 but she's not because if you think back to 10 she was kind of like this subtle demure. Ah I don't want to say conservative because she's not like picketing gay rights or anything but she she dressed conservatively um and and in this game she's wearing hot pants and has 2 guns and stuff and you're just like what what's going on but she will she'll do things in this game and say things in this game where you're just kind of like oh that's awkward.

43:21.86
Dave
Yeah. In.

43:37.42
Adam
But then you think in 10 Oh actually she was quite an awkward character in that game as well because she was so sheltered for her entire life and now she's just as awkward, but she's trying to be more peppy because she's trying to emulate rikku who she's teamed up with but she's.

43:43.30
Dave
Yeah.

43:54.80
Adam
Kind of got that fish out of water character thing going on where you know? Yeah I'm the sum of that the shit. Yeah I'm the summoner that saved the world. But also I did live a very sheltered life and I'm just trying to figure out where I belong in this new world and who I'm supposed to be and still. The very awkward summoner from the first game I just look fabulous now.

44:14.50
Dave
Yeah, she basically didn't have a normal childhood. She was, you know, spent a lot of time preparing for this pilgrimage where she thought she was going to die at the end of it and so it makes total sense that she's kind of awkward and you know just kind of.

44:19.23
Adam
Yeah, yeah.

44:33.46
Dave
Try and stuff out as she's older and the the thread is passed and you gotta you gotta live and do something so she's like well I'm going to like you said Wearre hot pants and gonna have pistols on my hips and we're going to do pops like concerts and go to go on spear hunts. It's going to be great.

44:47.10
Adam
Yeah, it's almost like her being like okay I'm a young woman with my future ahead of me now. What the hell is a young woman supposed to be? I didn't think I was going to have a future So I just kind of emulate the people around me and see where it takes us.

45:01.17
Dave
Um, right exactly.

45:06.48
Adam
But at the same time her true nature comes through. She's always still trying to help people even though the gullwings and rikku and brother and buddy are like if we're going to help people. We need to charge for their services because it's a capitalist economy. Yeah, you know. But she's still like fuck it I Just want to help people.

45:23.32
Dave
Um, yeah, and she's also kind of like ah what's the word. She's like a hero basically around like everyone knows her. She's the one who saved the world and everybody knows it too.

45:32.62
Adam
Um, yeah.

45:37.72
Dave
Um, and it's kind of cool. How most people revere her for that like it's not to the point where she just says stuff and people do whatever she says it's not like that. But everyone knows who she is, everyone recognizes her and most people respect the hell out of her.

45:56.62
Dave
For what she did um and it's just interesting because like her whole life was doing this summoning but now the summoning is over the aeons are gone. She's not a summoner anymore so she has to reinvent herself and that's kind of like what everyone in spira is doing.

46:12.51
Adam
Um, yeah.

46:15.73
Dave
Everyone's kind of reinventing themselves or trying or you know maybe some people are not doing well by the way like the ah the Guado who were kind of the the villain race in the first game like they or the.

46:34.89
Dave
The antagonist was one of them was their leader so they're like intensely guilty about how everything went um, people who were really devout in the first game probably having trouble with that because if they found out the church was a lie. Ah, there's a lot of people trying to reinvent themselves. We'll say.

46:54.38
Adam
Yeah I love that whole Guado subplot by the way I thought that was awesome. Um, it's kind of like what the Germans did after World War two and it's exactly like that. Um, oh damn you said something that I wanted to touch on. It just completely left my mind. Um, oh yeah.

46:55.85
Dave
Mean. Yeah, yeah.

47:11.68
Adam
You brought up a good point as well about people sort of revering Yuna and stuff. There's also a flipside to that where some people just don't like her because they think that Spira should stand on its own two feet and not rely on the summoner anymore and I thought that was a really interesting point as well.

47:26.14
Dave
Um, yeah, and realistic too, like nobody's going to have a 100% approval rating. You know.

47:30.10
Adam
A. Yeah, yeah, and then I really liked showing that guy up with my gun shooting minigame Besade Island to be like ha sucks shit why are you wearing an eagle mask anyway. Ugly.

47:44.71
Dave
Um, ah yeah.

47:51.81
Adam
Anyway.

47:53.12
Dave
Ah, so um, yeah let's put a pin in the story we will revisit the story in the spoiler section for now. Let's listen to some more music. We'll come back and talk about the gameplay. So final fantasy Ten two is a direct sequel to final fantasy 10 but the gameplay is totally changed up from final fantasy ten ten was a true turn based combat system. No atb gauge um, you can sit and think about your moves as long as you want to in that game. Ah, this game 10-2 goes back to that atb combat where everything is happening in real time. You have a bar that's charging up when the bar is full. You can make a move and you know the enemies work with these rules too. You can't see their bars but they're there. Um. Difference in this game compared to other games is that other games in the final fantasy series that use atb is you can have people attack simultaneously. So if you hit attack and then rikku attacks and then pain attacks and they all hit relatively close to each other. You'll get bonuses for some kind of stacking attacks. And you can interrupt an enemy that's trying to charge up a spell if you go attack them and that can happen to you. Also there's like a warm up for abilities and spells and stuff like that. So ah, this combat system is pretty.

49:24.15
Dave
Busy like there's a lot of stuff going on. There's a lot of like you put it in attack and then you have to wait for it to charge up and then someone can run over and hit you and interrupt it and then you have to start charging up the spell again, but you can do the same thing to the enemies this is even before we talk about all the wild customization and stuff that you can do. Um, I really really really really struggled with this. I don't generally struggle with atb combat like in final fantasy 6 or in chrono trigger or something. I'm fine in most games like that. In this game I was not fine and I eventually turned on the. Weight mode which means the thing is still charging in real time you can still attack and interrupt and stuff. But once your bar is full. You can sit and wait and they're not going to come attack you while you're waiting. So I turned it on to make it a little bit more. Turn based will say and I true I upped the a to b gauge charging speed so that I could attack more often. Otherwise I was just getting pounded repeatedly in this.

50:38.40
Adam
Yeah, this game is surprisingly chalLenging with the battle system if you choose to play it the default way that it intends you to play and um I understand why but correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure I told you from the beginning.

50:44.95
Dave
Yeah.

50:54.48
Adam
Put wait mode on and you just didn't do it for a while.

50:55.85
Dave
You probably did but like I always want to try it on whatever the default is you know, but I was getting destroyed.

51:00.67
Adam
Yeah, actually come to think of it I think games like Chrono trigger and final fantasy 6 they have wait mode turned on as a default don't they like when you're in the menu selecting your attacks. It's waiting for you. The enemy just doesn't attack. You. Okay.

51:18.41
Dave
Ah, not chrono trigger chrono triggers is on active by default and I'm not sure if FF 6 at least the super Nintendo version I don't even know if there is an option in that game.

51:32.44
Adam
Okay, I'm fairly certain It's on weight by default for final fantasy nine at least because they have at B as well. And um I don't recall ever being attacked by a monster while in the menu selecting a spell or something. Um, but yeah I actually.

51:38.40
Dave
Yeah.

51:49.30
Adam
Love this battle system, but I am a huge proponent of turn on wait mode as soon as possible because you can get, like you said, completely pounded if you are not a quick thinker and like to know exactly which attacks you want to use and when and unless you're. Overleveled or something like that you can get killed very very quickly in this game If you're indecisive and want to spend too much time looking at your skills because even in the skill menu these these fuckers these enemies will just start attacking one of your characters and they might might get in. And they might get in like 3 hits in a row on one character and completely knock them out and yeah, it's very easy to be overpowered so I actually really appreciated the chalLennege in this but just put it on weight Mode. Do yourself a favor. But yes I liked it.

52:40.79
Dave
Yeah I agree it is yeah, definitely satisfying to chain together attacks get bonus damage. Um, yeah, so this is just like the base.

52:42.88
Adam
I Liked chaining things as well. That was particularly fun seeing that chain Gauge get up.

52:57.81
Dave
Like the mechanic that everything else in the combat system is built on is this Atb system. Um, this game has a wildly customizable job system. They call them in the game they call them dress spheres I don't know because it's a group of ladies and everything's going to be named after dresses. Um.

53:15.67
Adam
Because it's fashion.

53:17.52
Dave
But you pick? Yeah, okay yeah, Fashion Sweetie have you heard of it. Yeah I get it. So um, so the dress spheres are jobs. Basically you pick up dress spheres as rewards for doing quests.

53:25.12
Adam
SpilLenneciaga dollling.

53:36.60
Dave
Sometimes you find them as treasures, sometimes you get them as rewards for doing main story stuff. There are a lot of them and a lot of them make up like the regular jobs that are in you know rpgs the warrior the white mage the black mage the thief stuff like that. There's a lot of really off the wall. Jobs in this game though like there's so many that there are a lot of really weird and specific ones um stuff that I didn't even use. There's a bunch that I didn't even find that compounds my issues with this game, in particular this is not me saying that this. Job system is bad. I actually think it's good. But for me personally I get really stressed out by the idea of infinite customization. I really like rpgs like Final Fantasy 10 where everyone has a defined role and I can just build them within that role. Like Lulu's a black mage now I'm going to make her the best black mage that she can be in this game. Anybody can be anything and it gets even more complex than this but like this is step 2 I'm already swimming in deep water. Basically. Just because I get stressed out by customization.

54:51.50
Adam
Oh Dave you've got it all wrong. The appeal of the job system is that yes, anybody could be anything but you decide who gets to be what. So for example, one of my favorite things to do in this game is each 3 of the girls.

55:02.23
Dave
Right.

55:10.77
Adam
Um, women ladies. Ah, actually I forget how old they are. I think they're like 20 or 18 or something so I guess they are girls um each of the main 3 ladies have their own default dressphere from the beginning and pain is always going to be a warrior. Um.

55:16.27
Dave
Yeah.

55:29.73
Adam
Rio was a thief by defaultYuna is a gunner. She's a shooty shooty bang bang lady. She has cuts. Um, what I love to do is I love to switch the dress spheres from the beginning to play against the type.

55:33.87
Dave
I Think so yeah, right.

55:48.65
Adam
So I'll like to make paine the thief and then I'll make rikku the gunner and then I'll make you know the warrior and stomach like that. So. It's almost like at least this is how I play it. I get to decide who does what and who will be what because they do have their own base stats. But it doesn't affect too much. Of how they perform within each of the dress spheres. So There's no like 1 particular character who is the best character at all the magic classes so you have to make them the magic classes I'm like Nah fuck it pain is a warrior with a sword from the beginning. So I'm going to make her my white mage.

56:16.67
Dave
Right.

56:24.21
Adam
I'm going to make her be the dancer because it's hilarious to watch this chick with an Elvis haircut who is so gothic start dancing the jitterbug or something like that. So. It's almost like you go to It's almost like playing with your own toys or not that you had them as barbie dolls as a kid being like oh. Today I'm going to be a chef and this character is going to be the mechanic, not that those are classes in this game. But anyway, that's how I play. I like to assign the classes to these different characters. Be like you are my dedicated dark Knight and you are my dedicated alchemist and you're that character because you wouldn't.

56:48.86
Dave
Right.

57:01.76
Adam
Look like somebody who would typically be that. So yeah, that's how I like to play it.

57:05.78
Dave
Yeah I would just you know using the Barbie analogy like I would just make lawyer Barbie be a lawyer like that's all I want to do I want to make her the best lawyer that she can be that's all I want but this game is making me decide what I ended up doing was. Ah, there were maybe 5 jobs that I used throughout the game and all 3 of the characters were good at all 5 of those jobs and I didn't fuck with any of the other jobs because I was just like I found some stuff that worked and I just wrote that through the entire game because I was just.

57:42.20
Dave
The thing that makes it worse for me Personally, it makes it great for others. This is what other people love about this combat system is you have these other items called Garment grids where you slot these dresspheres in on these tracks and you can switch your jobs at any time during combat and.

58:01.70
Dave
Each garment grid gives you stat bonuses different stat bonuses for each one and if you move jobs along these tracks in a certain order. You can see it on the garment grid if you move in a certain order. You'll get extra stat bonuses or you'll get new abilities that you can use in that combat system. Or something like that. So me the person who's like just really having trouble with customization. They kind of they teach you that you want to keep switching jobs along this track. And so you'll switch from this job to this job and you'll get an hp buff and then you switch from this job to the next job along the track and you'll get like a magic buff and they're like keep switching jobs and get more buffs. And then if you fill out the entire grid in 1 battle, you can do a summon and they're really powerful so that's what you want to do. But then I would get into combat and the enemies would destroy me and I can't do the switching strategy the way I wanted to the way the game taught me I should do and so on. That was when I started texting you and be like dude I fucking hate this like what am I doing wrong here, please teach me how to play this game so credit to you and also to um Chris from the final fantasy 10 episode and Ryan from the final fantasy 10 episode and Rick also for.

59:27.70
Dave
Give me advice. There was a point in this game many points I'll say where I didn't think I could beat this game because I was struggling so much with the combat system and the advice that they actually gave me that worked was don't try to do that all the time. Don't try to fill out the whole grid switch 1 time. Get 1 stat buff and then go fight and set it up in a way that the first job switches. You do will give you a good stat buff and then just fight and adjust to whatever is going on and fuck trying to get the summons unless you're really struggling basically and once everybody told me that.

01:00:00.60
Adam
Um, yeah, yeah.

01:00:05.52
Dave
Then I was fine. I beat the game. It's actually not that hard of a game because nothing in the game can handle 3 dark nights fighting but boy I struggled for so long. It was really hard.

01:00:18.75
Adam
Yeah, well I mean that's the same thing with final fantasy right? is yes Yuna can summon her aeons but you don't want to summon her aeons in every single battle because then nobody else gets experience right? Yeah, so it's the same sort of thing where um in this you have all 3 ladies and.

01:00:29.29
Dave
That's true. Yeah.

01:00:36.73
Adam
Do you want to make a summon with each of them or pick one to have it, have them constantly change and then have the other 2 be supported or whatever. But um, yeah I don't rely on those things that I don't think I maxed out those gum and grids either I think I summoned. 3 times and that was it throughout the entire game because like the thing that I love most about this is I can put a different Garmin grid on each of the girls and they have their own dress spheres within that. So. It's like okay rikku is going to be the alchemist with the dark night and the samurai or whatever and.

01:01:14.80
Adam
Pain is going to be the white mage and the dancer and I can't actually remember what else I gave her but they all have their own grids. They're all going to change into very different jobs for the most part. But I always reach a point within the games where I'm like I'm going to max out everything with everyone and then that's why I did. That's why I did at the top of the episode twenty more hours than you was because I just sat there like yeah.

01:01:38.63
Dave
Just grinding out jobs and abilities. Yeah.

01:01:44.34
Adam
Yeah, grinding out everything until I get that little star that I've mastered. Um, but I love that I Love like this kind of customization, this kind of leveling up is what I live for because I get to play dress ups with these bobbies which is.

01:02:00.76
Dave
Ah.

01:02:01.78
Adam
What I could never do as a kid and it's like yeah I get to like play with these cute girls I get to dress them up and um, it sounds perverted when I say it like that. But like it's fashion.

01:02:15.19
Dave
Ah, all the jobs have their own costumes that are outrageous. So if you're into the fashion of like the different dress spheres there. You should see them. They're they're crazy.

01:02:16.43
Adam
Yes.

01:02:26.20
Adam
Yeah I think it's also an important point. I think it's also an important time to bring up that this is where the Sailor moon aspect comes into it because there's like this really cute little transformation animation each time they switch between the jobs. Ah.

01:02:38.90
Dave
Um, it's very long. Yeah.

01:02:40.91
Adam
It's fun for the first time but turns it off in the menu. Otherwise it's going to waste a lot of time. Yeah, but ah yeah, it's kind of like in old school digimon where the digital evolutions were taking too long so in later episodes they took like ten seconds ah like 2 seconds and then it was over. Um, but anyway.

01:02:59.13
Adam
I Love like the outfit changes. I Love all that stuff and I think this game also catches a lot of flak for being quite unquote fanservice and I just want to defend it because I think in the Grand scheme of fan service. A very flat chested rikku in a bikini is not particularly attractive compared to a lot of anime with big titted. You know chicks walking around and Jiggle physics like you think fan service You think big Butts Big Tits Jiggle motion um sexually suggestive.

01:03:25.86
Dave
Ah, ah.

01:03:34.85
Adam
Ah, situations and stuff in terms of fan service in this game. It is incredibly mild I would say.

01:03:41.60
Dave
Yeah I think that this game definitely has the most revealing costumes of any final fantasy game for sure, but there is like a girl power kind of theme to the entire game and like you said there is like this dress up aspect and.

01:03:51.80
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:04:01.23
Dave
We talked about how in final fantasy 10 every time you win a battle lulu bends over in her tits jiggle in the camera and that's not in this game. So um, yeah I didn't I didn't particularly see this as like fan service you trying to give Dave a boner or something like that it was.

01:04:09.67
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:04:19.94
Dave
Very much like now they have all these cool costumes and again like this is a world where people were not allowed to have fun and enjoy things before. So now this is you know people wearing these outrageous costumes and stuff like that feels right for the world in a way that.

01:04:38.33
Adam
Yeah I don't think any of them are particularly sexy either. I think the biggest tits and the most sexualized character design is leblanc with her plunging neckline and her tits aren't even that big. They never jiggle they’re hard as a rock.

01:04:38.71
Dave
Didn't bother me at all.

01:04:49.14
Dave
Yeah, hundred percent yeah

01:04:57.54
Adam
And she's more of a comedic relief character than a sexy character. You know so there's like this silliness to it and I think a lot of the outrageous ah costume designs and stuff like that is more like something that you would see in harajuku in Tokyo like where all the the. Goth lolitas and stuff hang out with their crazy outfits and all that sort of stuff. It's not like ah it's not like ah what you would find on a hentai porno or something like that. It's very very mundane. Non-sexualized outfits but they're all great. Most of them are really good I think.

01:05:35.40
Dave
Yeah, some of them are real funny too like there's I think it's the dancer that has like this just this outrageous hat on like this really fancy hat and stuff I don't know if it's the dancer or.

01:05:48.53
Adam
Ah, now is that the samurai on I Kentucky maybe here oh the black mage. Yeah.

01:05:51.70
Dave
It's not. It's not a samurai hat. It's like a fancy lady Kentucky derby hat there's one of the jobs that has something like that I can't remember yeah the black mage hat. That's what it is. it's it's ridiculous yeah um yeah so

01:06:04.90
Adam
But go to the races. Yeah I thought sorry I was just going to say I also love the fact that each of the girls have their own specific designs for each of the jobs. It's not 1 job fits all in.

01:06:17.40
Dave
Yeah.

01:06:21.72
Adam
The character designs all of them look different in different ways. They all have the same motifs and stuff like that. They're all essentially the same thing but they're all designed specifically differently from each other and a lot of them are color coded differently as well and I love the attention and detail they put into that.

01:06:35.13
Dave
The attention to detail. They couldn't make a pregnant lulu character model but they they made fucking forty character models for all of the the 3 girls wearing all the jobs that's are their and that's true. That's true. Um.

01:06:45.90
Adam
Do you know how many polygons it takes for a pregnant belly that shit costs money.

01:06:55.50
Dave
The next part of the customization that the last part that goes deeper is each of the jobs have abilities that are specific to that job the unlock by fighting and getting a special type of experience. Points. Um, and you can set what ability you want to work on. Um, the issue I had with this because I had a problem with this too is you don't know what abilities are coming up next. So like there's a couple of jobs. The white mage was one of them where there was an ability I wanted. Maybe let's say it's Esuna that heals status effects. It's not on the ability board when you first start it's on the ability board. You can't see it. You don't know where it is. You have to unlock something else before Esuna and then you know Esuna will pop up once that first one is unlocked. But the first one sucks. I don't want that ability so I didn't want to spend time unlocking. It. So I went most of the game without some very helpful abilities because I didn't know what I should be prioritizing which sucks because this fear grid in final fantasy 10 you could look at the entire sphere grid and plan out how you want to build your characters. Ah, so it's like four separate levels of customization and combat in like final fantasy ten two s gameplay all 4 of them did not work for me and I just really had a hard time. Um I had to check a guide for love.

01:08:30.46
Dave
What abilities are there and where are they so how can I prioritize them? Some of the abilities are really really good though. So like once I found out that the thief gets an ability where they get to act first in every single fight. Um I would start every character as a thief. Set up the garment grid so that your first job change would give you a big stat buff for that character's main stat for the job I wanted them in. They have the ability to go first. So they start every battle I switch to their main class. They have a buff before the enemy can even do anything like that's really cool. But that's a rare instance of me figuring all this out for myself. A lot of it was just you know I'm looking at the ability list. I don't really think any of them sound good but there's good stuff. Hidden behind the stuff I don't want and that was kind of a bummer.

01:09:24.20
Adam
Yeah I want to counter that if I may because ah it it's essentially like the old school final fantasies right? You have a white mage character like ah Rosa from final fantasy 4 You never.

01:09:40.30
Adam
Oh wait, hang on. Maybe this is a terrible analogy but I'm just thinking maybe in fun of fantasy 4 You actually bought the abilities. But if I'm correct you didn't. You ought to unlock them as the character leveled up so you wouldn't necessarily know exactly what ability they're going to unlock as they're leveling up; it just happens after they level up.

01:09:55.64
Dave
Right.

01:09:59.60
Adam
So the way that the ability thing is set up within the dress sphere is you can either prioritize a specific ability that is on the board at the moment and it's kind of divided into 2 in some way. So the ones at the top are your active abilities, the ones that you select. In battle to attack an enemy with or to cast a healing spell or whatever else and the ones at the bottom are typically your passive abilities. So the ones that allow you to act first in battle reduce the cast time of black spells black spells black magic spells. We're going to get canceled.

01:10:25.20
Dave
Um, yeah.

01:10:38.93
Adam
Um, or white magic or whatever cast times. Um, so it's kind of like with whites white spells fuck with white magic spells in particular you kind of have to think of the hierarchy of spells in. All of the final fantasy games which you always start with a cure. You always go up to a auna than a qaga or or not a qyraga a cure then you know you build up to protect reflect blah blah blah and then you end off with a Curaga which is the best healing spell that sort of thing. So as you learn the abilities. It's not good to skip one because if you skip one then you may not unlock the next one to be learned so it's like you have to learn the hierarchy. You can't just skip straight to the Ultima or the holy spell you know what I mean. So yeah, they couldn't do it that way because you wouldn't want a level 10 character who suddenly knows the best. Spell in the entire game because you've grinded out to do that.

01:11:38.45
Dave
Yeah, it's just that they give you the choice in this game of what you want to level up and sometimes those hierarchies like cua like cua Cura Curaga that's laid down it ah out in a way that made sense.

01:11:57.99
Dave
But a lot of the other abilities didn't and it would be like you know you learned this white magic spell and then behind it is the 1 they cure status effects the one in front of it wasn't related in that way but like you're giving me a choice of abilities to level up.

01:12:17.74
Dave
But you're hiding it. You don't really make it clear what the connections are between them. So like you're giving me a choice I'm going to pick the stuff that sounds good but the stuff that I actually want is hidden behind the stuff. That's not good. You know like that's where the issue was for me. Um.

01:12:33.16
Adam
Okay, but the less good stuff. Okay, the less good stuff though is typically of a much lower app requirement than the good good stuff. So you know the level that you're receiving Ap you're like okay, it's.

01:12:36.35
Dave
But all I had to do was check a guide like.

01:12:45.54
Dave
Yeah.

01:12:52.50
Adam
Quicker for me to dump 20 a p into a cure spell than try and level up something a passive ability which is going to take 100 ap points rather than 20 because that's more of a late game ability anyway.

01:13:05.00
Dave
I suppose but like I wanted the higher level thing I want the thing that cuts casting time down because casting takes time and enemies can interrupt it and if your spells get interrupted. You mean you could get party wiped because your big healing spell got interrupted. So.

01:13:09.98
Adam
Okay.

01:13:22.95
Adam
Okay, yeah, that makes sense but then it just means that you can cast the weakest magic really fast and just playing Devil's advocate

01:13:24.91
Dave
I Want that stuff anyway.

01:13:32.65
Dave
That's true. Yeah, so yeah, it's not too yeah, not to not to, you know, camp out on this for too long, but just something that you know compounded other gameplay issues that I had with it like I was very lost the game.

01:13:39.17
Adam
Yeah.

01:13:50.00
Dave
Explain it to a certain degree. But I think that they make it more complicated than it actually is, like the instructions they give you make you think that you should be doing a lot more than you actually need to be doing as far as battle strategy goes. So um, yeah.

01:14:08.76
Adam
Um I can get that.

01:14:09.10
Dave
Let's ah, let's listen to a bit more music and then we'll talk about other game play stuff to finish up this non spoiler part.

01:14:13.58
Adam
Okay, when we come back I Want to ask you which jobs you use the most.

01:14:19.95
Dave
Okay, let's do that before the music breaks. So I will read. Yeah, just go ahead and ask if I'll fit it in. Yeah.

01:14:28.85
Adam
Just wondering though I fix it and post just wondering though off the back of that which jobs were you using the most because I think there's like what 18 or something dress fears that you can get.

01:14:46.50
Dave
Um, there's a lot.

01:14:47.64
Adam
Yeah, there's quite a few and I like to experiment with almost all of them and sometimes I pick the weakest ones just out of fun. But you said that you relied on like 5 only so which ones were they.

01:14:59.65
Dave
Yeah, um, thief so that I could get that first move on every turn I never used anything else that the thief did but everyone started every boss fight as a thief just to get that free switch um dark night because it's.

01:15:16.20
Dave
Just very very powerful if you know if you master it um black mage like I had Yuna be a black mage and she was She was the main damage dealer for a lot of the game. Um.

01:15:30.42
Dave
Ah, use the warrior because they have like the armor break magic break spells or abilities. Those are super helpful. This is where some familiarity from final fantasy 10 comes in because a lot of the abilities do transfer over in the same way. Um, and then for a lot of the game I used the dancer.

01:15:50.80
Dave
Ah, Riku was the dancer because they can do like ah put darkness on everybody's ability. Um, and they she sings and dances and the singing in like the music throughout the rest of the game is pretty good. Um. Singing during the battle like when you turn on the dancer thing and she sings a little ditty is terrible but it's funny so that made me laugh often, but it was pretty useful for a lot of the game but like toward the end of the game. It was really just like a thief in the dark knight.

01:16:12.75
Adam
Yeah.

01:16:26.20
Dave
White mage for protecting stuff and then maybe Warrior not much else. Not much variety.

01:16:34.60
Adam
Okay, that's a little disappointing because it sounds like you're using quite weak base classes. So you didn't experiment much with the other ones. Um, but fair enough I think for myself I primarily used Gun Mage on almost everybody because that's.

01:16:51.30
Dave
Huh.

01:16:51.49
Adam
Like the blue mage of the game and you get some really powerful spells that way I also used berserker towards the end of the game for almost everybody samurai is extremely useful because you can nullify status bonuses where certain enemies. Boost their defense and their attack so you can immediately nullify that um and I also use lady luck for all of the girls because it doubles your experience points and ap points I'm pretty sure. Um, and. That 1 is mostly reliant on slot machines and using dice and their dice attack. You can roll like 4 dice and um, if you get like four sixes then it's like what's my math hang on for. Ah. 20 it's a lot of hits in and it takes a while so it gets the um it gets the combo meter really high and the bonus damage really high. But also if you get 4 of the same kind it doubles the damage of each of those hits so you can take down bosses in a lucky dice roll very very quickly.

01:18:05.55
Adam
Um, but yeah, other than that alchemist I found was my main healer because it just uses items and you can use a megapotion like every single turn and heal everything. Oh. There's so many good ones I could go on and on dark knight I use that of course because it's so overpowered but after a certain point I had to sub it out. But I basically didn't use any of the default starter 3 jobs and I moved on to everything else as soon as I could.

01:18:33.89
Dave
Okay, you know why I didn't experiment with all those fun-sounding jobs is because you have to grind to like ah unlock the abilities and stuff like that and I am not opposed to grinding but if I'm going to grind.

01:18:37.59
Adam
Why tell me.

01:18:49.54
Dave
Combat either has to be easy and mindless like in final fantasy 6 or in zeno gears or something like that or it has to be something I really like um like in final fantasy ten I like the combat I didn't mind grinding um in this game was neither.

01:19:08.46
Dave
Of those. It was not easy and I didn't like it so I didn't want to fight stuff. So let's say I pick up the samurai jobs. I fear I take one look at it. I'm like I don't really know what this is good at and I'm definitely not going to spend the next hour grinding up the abilities to find out if it's good or not so I'm not using it. Um, once I basically once someone gave me the tip that dark night was great. I was like okay I'm mastering dark night and everything else. Ah see ya yeah like.

01:19:36.48
Adam
Okay, so once you mastered something you continued using that through the entire game ah say this is where you got it wrong once you master something you move on to the next thing. Yeah.

01:19:43.27
Dave
Yep. I mean I know you're supposed to move on to the next thing but like I'm having a really hard time with combat so using jobs that don't have their good stuff against you know. Ever Increasing Difficulty was a bad combination for me because I'm just I just had such a hard time with this whole thing.

01:20:06.10
Adam
Okay, okay, well you kind of the way that I would do it is I would kind of um, what's that word like I would have somebody close to mastering something then I would have somebody just starting a new one and then I'd have somebody. That's it.

01:20:22.90
Adam
Sort of in the middle so they're all of varying degrees of mastering a class and then that way you can sort of pivot back and forth somebody masters something they do something else. That's kind of weaker but they also have 2 other characters backing them up who are close to mastering something so it's like a power. It's like juggling the power or whatever.

01:20:40.88
Dave
It does but I cannot relate to that. That's like next level strategizing. I was nowhere near that and just again had a really hard time with the combat Basically until maybe two thirds of the way through the game I figured out the like.

01:20:41.33
Adam
So it makes sense. Yeah, okay.

01:20:51.19
Adam
Yeah.

01:21:00.11
Dave
Stars Ah, start as a thief, switch to the best class and then just pound the enemy with dark night. That was basically what I did. So yeah, it's just I'm kind of a lost cause with this combat system if I played it again. Maybe I would be better but I don't think I'm going to play this game again.

01:21:05.74
Adam
Okay, all right? Yeah I feel that.

01:21:17.73
Adam
Okay, fair enough. Let's move on.

01:21:19.40
Dave
So yeah let's move on. Let's listen to some music. We'll come back and clean up other gameplay stuff so in ah, ten two we talked about how you can. Choose any location available on the map at any given time you can basically choose when you want to do main story quests or when you want to do side quests. They will Mark like big side quests that are available but you can also go to other places and just go. Walk around or go grind or do whatever you want in these other locations. Um, side quests are interesting in this game. We said at the beginning this is a tough game to 100% and it's because in order to 100% it you have to complete all of the side quests. And what that means and the thing that makes that tough is the side quest in this game continues from chapter to chapter so like in chapter one you go to besaid you start a side quest you'll finish that part and then in chapter 2 you got to go back continue that side quest yada yada yada. And then while you're doing that. It's still difficult to 100% it. But like that's how the side quests work. So if you're able to see them through to the end you get good rewards. A lot of them have really really good stories which I want to talk about in the spoiler section. However,

01:22:46.39
Dave
Ah, early in the game I did not start a lot of the quests or I broke them halfway through because I went somewhere the quest will say like ah.

01:23:00.55
Dave
Go to this subregion of this area and then you'll find someone to do a quest and then I go there. It turns out, it's this giant fucking mountain I can't find the quest so I just left and then that quest is broken for the rest of the game like there's no more side quests on Mount Gagazet because I fucked up the. You know leg 2 of 5 or whatever. Um, so it's interesting how they laid these out as like these continuing stories and not just these one off you know quests like a lot of open world games. Do um, that also makes it harder to keep up with them if you're not following a guide.

01:23:35.82
Adam
Yeah, it was an interesting choice. Um I didn't mind it personally because the first time I played it I was so enthusiastic about going to every single location anyway. Um, but.

01:23:47.30
Dave
Is it?

01:23:51.34
Adam
If you want a 100% this game you one hundred percent need a guide because there are like minute little actions that you take which will contribute to a point one percentage of your completion rate which you can miss which I have missed twice. So.

01:24:05.20
Dave
Um, yeah, yeah, yeah, not that not that you're bitter about it or anything.

01:24:09.73
Adam
Even with a guide. It's almost no no I mean you know on the PS 3 they didn't even have trophies so it's not like I was playing for a platinum or anything but you know if you're on the PS 4 version or something don't even bother even with a guide. It's next to impossible but I kind of like.

01:24:28.97
Adam
The choice to do it the way that they did it um not with the percentage completion rate. But with the way that the side Quest is set up so you're on your little selection screen of I Want to go to be say Island I Want to go to ah zanarkand I Want to go to wherever.

01:24:47.84
Adam
It doesn't necessarily have a mission start thing on it unless it is a main mission so you might not even know that there's a quest there until you actually go. So once you go there and you start talking to people. You're like oh the al bed want me to do this. So yeah.

01:25:07.21
Adam
Like you said, if you don't finish that sidequest within that chapter and then you move on with the main story when you come back in chapter 2 you can't continue it most of the time. So yeah, there's also like crimson spheres that you can miss in the very first chapter which I missed this time around. And if you don't have them. You can't go to the bonus dungeon at the end of the game. There's no way to go back and collect them so I was like fuck I really screwed myself over with that because I just I was going off of like muscle memory and not using a guide this time around and whoops turns out I don't remember everything from like.

01:25:45.31
Adam
Twenty years ago that I thought I did but yeah overall I don't mind like a lot of people would criticize this game for not being a journey through the locations like in fun and fantasy 10 But.

01:25:46.93
Dave
Ah, yeah, yeah.

01:25:59.72
Adam
Ah, don't mind this freedom to select each location and go and do it at your leisure if you choose to.

01:26:04.70
Dave
Not a lot of the game likes the story the like quieter character moments. But also these side quests are set up to reward people who love the story of final fantasy 10 and want to keep revisiting these places.

01:26:20.30
Adam
Yeah, yeah.

01:26:22.73
Dave
That's really shows in the side quest too. Um, I think that it's interesting that they set it up this way. Um, the quote true ending is hidden behind getting a 100% completion but as we said like just don't fucking. Do it just watch it on Youtube like play the game, beat the game and then.

01:26:41.52
Dave
Just watch the real ending on Youtube and we'll talk about that real ending in the spoiler section for sure. Um, what you're doing in the side quest now that I've said like I like the way that it's set up and I think a lot of the story content in the side. Quest is good. I think a lot of what you're doing gameplay-wise in the side quests. Is terrible. Um, there's a lot of alternate gameplay like not just going to this place. Do dungeon type gameplay. Um, there is a run and gun section. Ah, where they make up this entire new gameplay form to run and gun kill these monsters. There's a section where you have to race with the albed to kill monsters faster than them. There's a lot of different things like you know, mix it up style stuff. Um, but I think you mentioned this at the top of the show. This is the biggest thing that stands out as this being a Ps 2 game. This stuff feels bad. I think a lot of these sections are really terrible like that run and gun section is awful and like I wanted to do it because I wanted to see what was going on with the quest in that section.

01:27:52.94
Dave
But I hated that gameplay and there's some of them that's not bad, but there are some where it's like whoa this is I don't know if I could put myself back in 2003 but like I don't think I would have liked this back then either.

01:28:07.20
Adam
Yeah I don't think I liked it back then either as well. Um, it's this weird thing where all of these mini games are underbaked and it's because I mean this is just the way I rationalize it to my head squares are good at rpgs. I Mean not so much anymore. But they were back then so they weren't super familiar with things like run and gun ah thingy Bobbs or ah, what's that actually sphere break chooses actually sphere break I will give them that. Fear break is actually quite good but they've always been good at like the mini ah card games and stuff. Yeah, so that's kind of in line with the card game type of thing but coins. Um, but other things like the cactuar minigame like shooting the cactuars and going and finding them around the world.

01:28:47.19
Dave
The mini games and their card games. Yeah.

01:29:04.47
Adam
That was painful. I hated that one. Um and also they've completely bastardized blitzball I don't know what the hell are they thinking with that. It's yeah I hate it hate it.

01:29:04.49
Dave
Yeah. Oh My God Yeah they turned blitzball into like football manager like that video game. You know what? I think part of it is with these mini games is they all take place within the same combat engine or not combat Gameplay engine.

01:29:24.18
Adam
Yeah, yeah.

01:29:27.63
Dave
From final fantasy 10 and then ten two and that engine like was made for running weirdly around these levels like the run animation for your characters is so weird and unique to this engine.

01:29:38.40
Adam
There.

01:29:45.69
Dave
When they try to translate it out of that you know out of turn based or the Atb combat and they're like we're going to use the same engine to make a run and gun minigame. It's just bad like it doesn't fit. I think that's what's going on.

01:29:53.97
Adam
Yeah I mean I mean thinking back to 10 some of those menu get mini fuck some of those minigames were kind of shit too now that I think about it like the chokobo one to get Tiduss ultimate weapon that was shit. Yeah.

01:30:13.82
Adam
That was terrible. I hated that um ah like blitzball was really good. I wasted a lot of time on blitzball. Yeah, no, you can tell that the minigames intend to be coming from a place where they had a much lower budget and they may or may not be very well versed in. The type of genre that they're trying to do like this whole shooting thing like I get Yuna has guns now so we have to put in a shooting minigame. But you know we're not very good at shooting case in point, final fantasy 7 dirge of cerberus I think that came out after this I'm pretty sure. But yeah, um.


01:30:49.41
Adam
Ah, if they're going to do the minigames they need to get in touch with the people that make Mario party because then they can at least make decent minigames. So yeah, yeah.

01:30:59.79
Dave
Yeah, put some fucking warrior where minigames in here I will agree with you. Um, sphere break is fun. It's a kind of math game with coins. It's tough to describe. I'm not really going to try and describe how it works.

01:31:05.44
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:31:15.69
Dave
But as far as card games or like you know tabletop games. It's the answer to the triple triad and stuff like that. It's pretty fun. Um, it doesn't replace blitzball because they fucked up blitzball in this game blitzball sucks you you get a chance to do it and it's just.

01:31:22.74
Adam
Yeah.

01:31:35.56
Dave
It's all stats. It's that you don't have any control over the players. It is literally like you are playing football manager again like that. Um, but sphere break is okay, there's some missions where you have to go do it. Um, sphere break gets way too hard for me like there is a certain point where I was like I can't.

01:31:45.41
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:31:59.10
Adam
You're not good at maths.

01:32:01.14
Dave
I'm like I can add 4 plus 7 which is what this game is doing but like the way they make it difficult is there like okay so on easy mode. You have to hit the target number and get like 20 points or something like that.

01:32:14.89
Dave
Like I can do that I can do the medium where it's like get 40 points and then it's like for a 5 star difficult match. Do it fucking 85 times and I'm like I can't I just like can't do it in 60 seconds or whatever. How much time do you get? okay.

01:32:29.35
Adam
Okay, yeah I don't have a problem with that one. Um also kind of semi on the subject of ah minigames to some degree. We kind of neglected to bring it up earlier but this game has like.

01:32:32.73
Dave
Fair enough.

01:32:46.44
Adam
Jumping and ah climbing obstacles in dungeons which is unique for this game I'm pretty sure I don't recall that. Yeah I don't recall it being in a fight I don't recall it being in a game other than fun and fantasy tend to up until I think.

01:32:49.62
Dave
Um, oh yeah, yeah, it wasn't in 10

01:33:05.57
Adam
Think it was next in 13 or something so this was like the first time that you've had some sort of semblance of platforming to some degree but it's like the whole automated hold down the button and approach the ah the ledge and she'll automatically climb it. Um, yeah, anyone just thought that was worth bringing up because there are.

01:33:23.71
Adam
Some strange dungeons in here with very linear corridors and very strangely placed ledges to climb up onto interesting design choices.

01:33:32.28
Dave
Yeah, there are some games where that kind of thing makes my lizard brain happy like I like and see if stars tend to not really do it for me. I think it's just the animations are really sloppy and.

01:33:48.27
Dave
When you're hopping from platform to platform you like bounce like way high up in the air from platform to platform and it looks goofy and like find. Final fantasy 10 had really goofy run animations and ten two had really goofy run animations like you know runs with her hands out to her sides and stuff like that and so like the jumping is goofy like that too. So I don't know if it just really didn't really do it for me. It's kind of funny to look at I guess.

01:34:05.30
Adam
Yeah, yeah.

01:34:13.63
Adam
Yeah, ah I wish they had remastered the animations when they redid this game but I guess they didn't have the budget. Did they.

01:34:17.79
Dave
Um.

01:34:20.85
Dave
At least they put a fast forward in that was good. They did in their remastered one.

01:34:28.84
Adam
Oh I don't think I ever use it. Whoops.

01:34:32.30
Dave
Um, it's not in 10 But it's in 102

01:34:36.61
Adam
Ah I had no idea I'd played this game without the fossil.

01:34:41.10
Dave
Well there we go. That's why your time was higher. Um.

01:34:43.36
Adam
Oh well, yeah, that makes sense. Oh well.

01:34:50.66
Dave
Yeah I guess the last thing to bring up before we do wrap up here is I meant to talk about the music earlier but I didn't um, the music is interesting in this game. The. Soundtrack is composed by noriko matsueda and takahito eguchi and it's very different from a lot of other final fantasy games. Um, we talked about the campy tone of the story. A lot of the music is upbeat, like a kind of dance guitar based. Ah, music. Um, I like dance rhythms, catchy melodies and stuff like that. Some even have some big band style horns and stuff with really interesting soundtracks. Um, can't say it's one of my favorites in the series.

01:35:40.98
Dave
But it does kind of fit the world living after you defeat the big evil in the previous game. So everyone's kind of living a happy life and discovering happiness again like the music kind of reflects that I think is interesting.

01:35:56.69
Adam
Yeah I like quite a few of the tracks a lot like the um intro ah not the introduction to the game. But when you boot it up, that piano Melody that I play I think is one of my favorite final fantasy songs. Ah yeah, it's really nice.

01:36:07.15
Dave
Um, yeah, yeah, it's good.

01:36:14.24
Adam
But even back then when I'd played this for the first time I remember thinking oh why don't they just get nobuo uematsu to do this because that would have been better. Um, but yeah, it's a different vibe. It's a different take and you know for better or worse I appreciate that they tried something new. Um.

01:36:32.39
Dave
Um, yeah, the yeah, the pop songs. Oh yeah.

01:36:34.14
Adam
With the J Pop songs though I don't know if you want to talk about that. Yeah I thought they were all really good like that what can I do for you song terribly translated but catchy as hell.

01:36:45.20
Dave
Um, yeah, yeah there I think there are 2 like actual pop songs. Maybe three I can only think of 2 but the 2 that I can think of they're real cheesy when you first hear them.

01:36:53.26
Adam
Yeah.

01:37:02.77
Dave
But like about a minute or so into the song I'm I'm not in my head along like I'm into it, especially um, a thousand years which there's a big concert scene in the game and unice thinks this song called 1000 years and it's like they're really like catchy good pop song I really enjoy it.

01:37:06.32
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:37:20.21
Adam
Um, it is very of the time like early two thousand s power ballad Mandy Moore style Jessica Simpson ish kind of like pop ballad and I'm like you know what.

01:37:25.41
Dave
Yeah.

01:37:32.43
Dave
Yeah, yeah, that was one of those things that like when I first looked at final fantasy ten two I'm like unising in this song I don't fucking want this and then like when I actually get around to playing it.

01:37:35.24
Adam
It's nice. So I don't care. This is great. Yeah I like it.

01:37:51.91
Dave
I like this song. This is a Bop I'm into. Um, so yeah, um, other like I guess musical identity in the game. A lot of the battle tracks are built on like rock electric guitar type stuff which is.

01:38:11.51
Dave
There was some of that in final fantasy 10 and you know, not unlike ah other games in the final fantasy series to use like rock and electric guitar and stuff too. But those are like your 2 main vibes of the game. You've got your pop whether it has vocals or not. And then you have like these electric guitar songs too. So.

01:38:32.19
Adam
It's almost like an electric guitar but in a Jazzy style. It's very strange. Um, yeah, also looking back on that song.

01:38:39.26
Dave
It's definitely not like the heavy metal song from final fantasy 10 like it's not like that at all.

01:38:48.69
Adam
I Kind of cringe nowadays that whole screamo thing.

01:38:49.12
Dave
Yeah, we talked about it in that episode. It makes me laugh and I like it because I like Final Fantasy 10 But it's not a good song.

01:38:59.28
Adam
Yeah, no I remember back in the day though I was like ah I'm so cool listen to this wicked like yeah this is hard rock. Yeah, and now I'm like okay um I kind of cringe when that song comes on. But anyway.

01:39:03.90
Dave
Oh hell yeah I Yeah I'm so.

01:39:14.23
Dave
Um, yeah, yeah music and intent to like I said it's got a lot of good songs in it I like it for matching the vibe of the game. It's.

01:39:16.36
Adam
Um, yeah, no, it's good.

01:39:29.65
Dave
Very different from the way soundtracks work in a lot of other final fantasy games. Um, ummatsu' is not doing it So a lot less focus on you know, character themes that you know reflect the emotion of the scene and stuff like that like there's not a whole lot of that but it is a lower budget production than.

01:39:48.15
Dave
Lots of the main games. So I know it's still good though.

01:39:50.29
Adam
Yeah for what it is I think it's good. Um, but a lot of people would judge it quite harshly simply not for simply because it's not the way uematsu and I'm one of those people that was guilty of doing that back in the day. I appreciate what it is now though.

01:40:00.20
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

01:40:06.55
Dave
Yeah I don't think that's fair to what it's actually doing. I think the people who worked on it did a good job. So let's ah, do some wrap up thoughts before we get into the spoiler section for final fantasy ten two as we always answer in this section.

01:40:09.36
Adam
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:40:22.90
Dave
Adam who would you recommend play final fantasy 10-2

01:40:27.46
Adam
Um, I would recommend people play it if they like Sailor Moon um I would recommend people play it who are comfortable with their masculinity because it is a quote unquote girly game but I actually didn't think it was like.

01:40:40.24
Dave
Um, yeah.

01:40:45.41
Adam
Super girly I think this game is perfect for someone who's into that sort of Jpop Idol Japanese style thing like um in Tokyo Mirage Sessions for example they're all about like being pop idols and stuff. It's very similar to that in a vibe but not an actual like set and real life kind of pop idol thing and for everything that we say about jpopy stuff. There's only 2 songs in this It's not like they're actually a traveling j-pop group. Um, but it's got that silliness that vibe and I think.

01:41:11.80
Dave
Um, yeah.

01:41:17.58
Adam
In some ways this game was like ahead of its time because if you look at like modern day k-pop that shit is fucking viral if that if this game came out in modern day with this J-pop k-pop style stuff going on people would be like in love with it. But because it came out so early.

01:41:26.48
Dave
Aha.

01:41:35.80
Adam
In the two thousand s before that was mainstream and popular people have criticized it. So this game is for people who appreciate an eastern style of pop music, who appreciate a magical girl anime style costume change and if you don't like it. You can take yours. Toxic masculinity and fuck off because if you give this game a chance. You're going to see something good in it and don't be like my co-host on fucking good the bad, the backlog Kieran who didn't play this game past chapter one because it was too girly too poppy for him. Um, all I have to say about that is. The reason why it doesn't like it is because he's a homophobe so there you go mic drop.

01:42:18.30
Dave
Ah, well I don't know I follow that up so I'll just say my name like an unqualified recommendation. If you love the story of final fantasy 10 you should play this because this game is for you? Um, we didn't really answer the question. Of what we did. We did kind of touch on it but like there's some sequels where it's like do you need to play the first game and some of them. The answer is no, this one's definite. Yes, you should play the first game first and this game is made for people who love the story of the first game and want to see an interesting take on it.

01:42:44.23
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:42:54.92
Dave
A sequel story after the kind of story that final fantasy 10 is um and I think that they did all of that stuff really well. Ah I had a lot of trouble with the gameplay but I see what's there for people who do like it like I don't think the gameplay's bad I just didn't like it. Um, if you're the type who loves customizing jobs. And grinding out abilities and mastering all of these things and creating strategies and stuff like there's a lot here for you. That's not me though. So I had a hard time but it's still an easy recommendation if you like final fantasy 10 if you didn't like final fantasy 10 like maybe there's something else about the atmosphere the can't be tone of it all but like this is very much the sequel to final fantasy 10 so it's hard to recommend outside of people who already like the first game I think like people might like the gameplay as a.

01:43:46.93
Adam
Yeah.

01:43:50.90
Dave
As an rpg you might like that. But I don't know how much the story is going to do for you if you don't already love the story of 10

01:43:58.11
Adam
Yeah, actually that's something that I want to bring up as well that I forgot about was this is like quintessential jrpg customization stuff. So if you're really into that and you're a big jrpg fan. You could find a lot to love here as well.

01:44:12.87
Dave
Yeah, if you like job systems woo this is a game for you? Yeah, okay so before we get into spoilers. It's time for a little bit of housekeeping before I talk about myself. Adam tells people about the good, the bad and the backlog.

01:44:16.62
Adam
And yeah.

01:44:31.25
Dave
And where people can find you.

01:44:31.60
Adam
All right? So the good the bad in the backlog is my podcast that I do with my co-host Kiaran who has recently been fired for hating on final fantasy 10-2 However, we are another backlog podcast we um, actually. Unfortunately through the entire year of 2023. We didn't play very many high-profile games which is why our listenership has disappeared but we are planning on covering more important and popular games in the coming year. So definitely check us out if you like a bit of banter if you like. Very non-serious take on games that we've been playing. Um, we tend to play a lot of games that we kind of suspect are going to be bad and then long behold. It turns out that they're really bad so we will shit on some of them. Um, but yeah, come and check us out on the good the bad and the backlog we'll oh wait. A Linktree is linktr.ee/goodbadbacklog and while I'm doing that if you don't mind I'd also like to promo king of games 1996 which is yeah, it's either out now or coming imminently soon to the retro hangover podcasts.

01:45:34.13
Dave
Yeah, absolutely.

01:45:43.59
Adam
Main feed where you can catch me as one of the main hosts and the very own Dave Jackson as a guest on many of the episodes and we did many of them together. So yeah, come and check out king of games 1996 it's a tournament style podcast where.

01:46:00.79
Adam
We pit games against each other from the year ninety ninety six to find out which game deserves to be crowned the king of all games of 9096 um yeah so just Google search for retro hang of the podcast and you'll see it on there.

01:46:07.36
Dave
Yeah.

01:46:15.39
Dave
Yeah, and Chris and Shane from retro hangover have both been guests on this podcast before um, so yeah, really recommend people go check out the king of games this episode is going to come out in March so. I think it will still be only on their patreon but it will be coming to their main podcast feed in a couple of months so you can go ahead and subscribe to retro hangover and you'll start getting those king of games 96 episodes. It was a lot of fun. Um I played a lot of games for the first time for that tournament. We had a good time.

01:46:32.63
Adam
Yeah.

01:46:47.81
Dave
And also the good. The bad in the backlog despite Adam's best efforts in pitching I think is a really fun show you Adam and Kieran have great banter between the 2 of them. Um, lots of ah lots of games that you say are unimportant or not popular, but that means. I often get to listen to Youtube talk about games that no one else is talking about so that has value and I appreciate that. So ah.

01:47:10.16
Adam
Fire True. It's normally like what's currently free on Ps and let's come play that true.

01:47:21.90
Dave
Ah, ah, well, there's value there too. It's a really good show. I appreciate it proud to be a patron of it and support what you guys are doing um recommend people. Ah I.

01:47:28.49
Adam
Thank you very much.

01:47:35.30
Dave
Why don't you give me one? I'll give you one first for the good the bad in the backlog I think people should listen to your days gone episode. That's probably my favorite episode of yours.

01:47:46.20
Adam
Yeah, um, so much so that the hanky code has come ah has become an in fuck The Hanky code has become an ongoing joke and an in-joke for quite some time and that joke was made like.

01:48:00.16
Adam
Two years ago now almost um I would like to recommend ah actually just maybe the game of the year episode that we recently did for 2023 that was a fun one because there's also a mailbag episode and we don't often talk too much about our personal life. 

01:48:00.64
Dave
Um, yeah.

01:48:20.10
Adam
Like to squeeze in a couple of personal anecdotes here and there and there's quite a few in the game of the year episode. So yeah, get to know us a little bit better I think yeah.

01:48:26.21
Dave
Yeah, absolutely all right? So you can check down in the show notes for links to both the good the bad and the backlog and for retro hangover if you want to check out the king of games 96 and if you would like to support this show. Ratings and reviews are really helpful. So if people are looking for podcasts about final fantasy ten two um they might find this episode help juice that algorithm you can join the discord server if you want to come in and talk about final fantasy 10 2 other video games movies stuff like that. The Discord server is a good place to do it. And you can also support monetarily by going to patreon.com/realdavejackson that is the Patreon and you can vote in polls you can get bonus episodes all kinds of cool treats I also have another show called a top 3 podcast where we do top 3 lists I think that show is a good time. And I hope you will too. So Adam and I are going to take a break and when we come back, it is spoiler time for final fantasy 10-2.

01:51:08.55
Dave
All right? Adam and I are back in its full spoiler time for final fantasy ten two and we'll just start this off. There's a couple of big talking points I want to hit on throughout this. It's not really going to be a chronological walkthrough of the story but there are some things I want to talk about for sure. Ah, the first of which being the sensual massage part of the game. Um, this is just a way to kick off the spoiler section. This isn't really an important part but we talked about mini games earlier and 1 minigame that neither of us brought up is that at some point in the game.

01:51:47.95
Dave
When leblanc and her crew are still the villains Unna has to put on a disguise to infiltrate her house basically and yada yada yada ah Yunas in like servants uniform in leblanc's bedroom and leblanc demands a massage. So you do this massage mini game to make her fall asleep. I think that the goal of it is to get her to fall asleep.

01:52:15.74
Adam
Um, well everyone climaxes they fall asleep right? It's like a dopamine rush. Yeah.

01:52:21.46
Dave
That's true. Ah the mission, so thing that goes up on the screen that says like you know mission start and your objective that's written on the screen is not give leblanc a massage. It is quote satisfy leblanc.

01:52:36.90
Adam
Yeah, that's accurate.

01:52:39.13
Dave
So yeah, Ah, it's a really weird minigame where you have to pick the right spots on her back to massage and if you pick the wrong one. You get like this bone cracking sound and she screams in pain and if you get the right part. She moans in pleasure. And you try and do that enough times to make her fall asleep.

01:53:00.71
Adam
Yeah I like that mini game. Um, ah, did you find it? Sexy is that a good question. Were you aroused? Okay, the same there's a certain level of like.

01:53:05.80
Dave
No is goofy as hell now I was not aroused by it goofy as hell. But

01:53:17.77
Adam
When something is supposed to be sexy. You can tell that it makes you uncomfortable or whatever. But then when something is supposed to be really silly. You just go along with it and you think it's funny and this was one of the silly things with a sexual Innuendo buried underneath. I was like I Really like this, this is hilarious. To me.

01:53:38.20
Dave
It's funny but I don't think that it's sexual Innuendo being buried. It's very like yeah, it's very overt but it's also not um, it's not sexy in the least like.

01:53:41.38
Adam
Yeah, well I do that.

01:53:48.86
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:53:51.36
Dave
Yuna's wearing this full body suit that her face is covered with and like it's she's wearing hazmat clothes. That's what it looks like. Basically yeah, maybe that? Okay, maybe it is sexy. Maybe I'm wrong.

01:53:56.33
Adam
She looks like a Gimp.

01:54:04.60
Adam
Yeah, maybe it's an s and m thing um have you ever had an SAndM massage before have you had a massage in general from someone that you paid for. Okay I had ah I don't want to go off tangent but I had a massage once from a woman.

01:54:07.22
Dave
I have had massages. Yeah.

01:54:20.25
Adam
Who just recently got back from the food court because it was in a shopping mall and she had been eating something garlicky and the entire time she was massaging me. She was burping and I could smell her food and then she blew her nose and she was sniffling the whole time. She blew her nose.

01:54:28.13
Dave
Oh Jesus.

01:54:36.45
Adam
I Kid you not. She did not wash her hands and then she immediately began massaging me again. So after that no more massages.

01:54:41.86
Dave
Ah, no, what a terrible thing to have taken away from you. Massages are great. Yeah.

01:54:47.76
Adam
Yeah, well I didn't get the Lablanc experience. Let's just say that this game ah set me up for an expectation which was never delivered in my adult life when I actually went for a massage. So.

01:54:52.60
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

01:55:01.63
Dave
Yeah, not to continue the tangent but I did go for a massage in Bali one time that I thought was just a regular massage when I went in there for a cheap massage. It turned out to be a leblanc experience and in the middle of it.

01:55:17.99
Adam
Um, oh dear.

01:55:19.56
Dave
There is this Australian guy in the next stall who is yelling about them stealing his wallet so I got up and like got the fuck out of there real fast that was the vibe I was getting was coming. Yeah.

01:55:25.87
Adam
Oh my god did she try and happy ending you? 

01:55:55.62
Dave
Ah, all right? So ah massage check. Um first, the kind of big thing I want to talk about for Final Fantasy 10-2 is all of those things that we hinted at, like this game as a sequel to the story of final fantasy 10 and how people are living. Basically after all of that. Um I think something we can talk about is the guado that we kind of set up in the non-spoiler part. Um, but the Guado are like. Really guilty about how things turned out in final fantasy 10 with Seymour and how they followed him and they were the villains for um, well not all of them. But you know some of them, some of them were running the church which you know.

01:56:43.17
Dave
Controlling People's lives with a lie and all of that. Um, and in this game you get to see them kind of reconcile with you know how they live after they made a bunch of bad choices earlier like in the original game.

01:56:44.85
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:57:01.10
Dave
Um, and there's a quest line. What's that? What yeah, that's right? Yeah yeah, so there is a side quest where.

01:57:01.28
Adam
You're forgetting 1 particular thing so it interrupts your forgetting. 1 particular thing that they did that was notably bad. They massacred a lot of the ronso. So there's a bit of beef going on there.

01:57:20.42
Dave
Some of the young ronso want to go ah like kill all of the Guado and you have to go kind of help Kimahri talk them down from that and then the Guado are basically like living in depression and some of them are living in self-imposed exile like some of them. Say like we're just going to go out in the forest until we die like that's how they decide to deal with it.

01:57:40.61
Adam
Yeah, yeah, they all abandoned guado salaam which was their home and they're all living in Macalania Woods and because they abandon guadosalam. That's where Leb Blacca set up her little headquarters and stuff.

01:57:54.17
Dave
Yeah.

01:57:57.35
Adam
Yeah, it's very much a we've done something real bad and we're going to punish ourselves for it because we don't feel like we should be a part of society anymore and that's kind of hard to take um, especially because most of it was under the orders of Seymour who was obviously no longer around but it's kind of like you know.

01:58:03.45
Dave
Yeah.

01:58:12.00
Dave
Right.

01:58:16.11
Adam
Do they take the blame like they should take the blame for that when they're not necessarily. They weren't necessarily acting on their own beliefs. So much is being instructed by somebody else I don't know it's a gray area.

01:58:26.88
Dave
Yeah, somebody yeah, it's like you said it's that kind of you know the germans after world war 2 like taking orders from somebody and it this is this is fantasy land so they're taking orders from somebody who is.

01:58:36.52
Adam
Um, yeah.

01:58:43.24
Dave
Much more powerful in physical and magical strength than the average citizen. Basically um, but it is interesting how they live with that they decide that they're going to basically just go go out in the woods and fucking die. That's how a lot of them decide that they're going to deal with it. Um.

01:58:59.52
Adam
A.

01:59:02.22
Dave
And then the way that that quest ends is kind of goofy but like there's a getting the band together side quest that you do where you train round up these musicians to put on a concert and the the Guado hear the band playing in the woods and they say it heals their souls and so now they're.

01:59:16.66
Adam
Yeah.

01:59:19.74
Dave
Not going to wait in the forest until they die. So the ending of that quest was kind of weird but like all the setup for it I thought it was pretty good. Um, they kind of pick a lot of different little avenues to explore how people handle life after final fantasy 10

01:59:37.94
Adam
Yeah, um, no I agree the music heals everything kind of storyline is ah was a bit of a cop out ending. But um I appreciated hearing throughout the chapters. As each 1 progresses you can revisit and revisit and then old god I can't remember his name, his name's not Trafalgar. No, that's not it. The greenhead guy Greenhead Guado guy um the way he explains.

02:00:05.11
Dave
9

02:00:09.98
Adam
What's happening to his people how they're feeling about it What they're planning to do how they feel about the ronso and what they've done and how they can make amends by just disappearing all that kind of stuff was like deeply fascinating Even if it wasn't the most engaging series of side Quest from a gameplay point of view. Just.

02:00:27.33
Dave
Yeah.

02:00:29.78
Adam
Digesting that story was particularly good and that's something that you can really easily miss if you're just like fuck it I'm just going to play the main story. You know you wouldn't even yeah, yeah, like you did.

02:00:33.85
Dave
Um, yeah.

02:00:38.56
Dave
Yeah, and you would miss the ronso story line too. The other side of it like the I well I did um some of it I didn't finish it I did the first part where Kumari is talking about how the young people are going to March off to war to go.

02:00:54.37
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:00:56.10
Dave
Kill all the Guado and Kamahri is like I can't help because I have to stand here at the bottom of the mountain or whatever like he gives some excuse why he can't um, but that was interesting too to see both sides how they deal with this atrocity that happened in the past. Basically.

02:01:14.22
Adam
Yeah I think the way that it ended for the Ronsos was at least in my game they kind of accepted that what happened has happened and that a series of ah ah sorry, let me do that again and that. Continuing on the vioLence is just going to create a whole nother cycle which isn't going to be good for anyone so they sort of not necessarily choose to forgive and forget but they choose to move on. So yeah and I think they come to that conclusion by these two ronso kids who have been out seeing the world for themselves.

02:01:35.55
Dave
Okay.

02:01:50.76
Adam
Trying to figure out what it is that they actually want to do, they really want to kill all these Guado and they and initially they do but then they come to find that there's more that the world has to offer if I'm remembering correctly. Yeah vioLence is bad. Basically.

02:02:09.90
Adam
2 main themes of the story: music heals everything and vioLence is bad. Okay.

02:02:15.15
Dave
Ah, we're going to revisit music healing everything because there's a particularly goofy part in the main story about that later. Um, let's see other stuff. Ah, sequel stuff. Um I guess. The big thing is that it's part of the main quest but part of what you're doing in this game is there's a bunch of disturbances at the temples around spira and part of the main quest is that Yuna has to go to the temples and help out. Um, even though a lot of times people don't want her to go there they feel like she's the only person who should be allowed to go in there or should be welcomed in. But there's a bunch of you know, warring factions in this game and they don't want you to know around. So sometimes you have to sneak through anyway, what you find out is causing these disturbances in the temples.

02:02:51.10
Adam
Yeah, yeah.

02:03:05.90
Dave
I wasn't quite clear on this but ah versions of her old aeons have popped up dark aeons like are they reincarnated or are they ghosts.

02:03:19.77
Adam
Um, there are manifestations from the far Plane um and it has something to do with vegnagun. He's yeah because he's burrowing.

02:03:28.89
Dave
Okay.

02:03:34.61
Adam
Down through the ground and everything is connected to the fire plane and then it's almost like somehow we're sending these darker versions of the aeons up from the fire plane to fight back against the people.

02:03:45.39
Dave
Right? And and the aeons are in the far plane, the far planes kind of like the afterlife life stream type thing. Um, they're in there because one of the big, you know, climactic moments in final fantasy 10 is that Yuna has to kill all of her aeons 1 by 1 um, and it's kind of an emotional scene because they are your summons throughout the game. They were the tools that she was going to use to fight sin and then at the end of the game she has to kill them all and um I don't know if you know this we talked about this in the final fantasy 10 episode. Ah, if you have on a censor I think it is you can see their thoughts. The Aon's thoughts and they're all saying stuff like please kill me, please put an end to this and it's really fucked up in intent. Not not this game.

02:04:31.60
Adam
Um, oh no I didn't I think I yeah I think I vaguely knew that I remember seeing it but that was like twenty years ago so I had to really remember.

02:04:40.61
Dave
Yeah, so this is interesting because this is a big climactic moment in 10 she kills all of her aeons in order to remove the power of you Yevin at the end. And then in this game her aeons are back and she has to face something like this traumatic thing that she did at the end of the first game and kill them again and you have to go through 1 by 1 all of the aeons, even the optional ones. Um, and it's just. Really like really interesting for her to have to confront this like memory that she's probably trying to bury this memory of but now it's back. She has to kill all of the aeons again.

02:05:24.26
Adam
Um, yeah I liked that? Um, ah, there definitely are the dark versions of the ions. Um, do you remember was there an explanation in 10 for why? The dark versions were there. Okay.

02:05:31.10
Dave
They are the dark versions. Yeah.

02:05:40.13
Dave
Nope I don't remember an explanation other than you know, optional bosses for sickos.

02:05:46.39
Adam
Okay, all right because I was just wondering if there was maybe some sort of law reason why the dark versions in particular are the ones that are in this game other than they just look scarier. Um, but yeah I liked that aspect because.

02:05:54.10
Dave
Yeah.

02:06:00.63
Adam
I Mean let's be honest, they didn't have the highest budget so they were using any reusable asset that they could use. They're going to use it? Um, but yeah, having her fight back against the aeons I think it's only really, ah now she comments on it with a couple of them.

02:06:02.57
Dave
Um, yeah.

02:06:19.13
Adam
Um, valefor is that how you say it and veil for I've always said it like that. Ah I always took it as veil as in like a gale of wind but you know if somebody else isn't pronouncing it who knows the correct answer. But anyway her first sum and she comments that.

02:06:22.85
Dave
Um, I always said valefor but.

02:06:28.42
Dave
Right.

02:06:38.50
Adam
She just had to kill her first summon and then there's also bahamut where she sort of stands up and opposes him because bahamut is not only one of her main summons from final fantasy 10 but he is essentially a faith himself which she had a direct communication with in 10 which is.

02:06:38.92
Dave
Yeah.

02:06:56.46
Adam
What makes him slightly more special is because he is the one responsible for ah Tidus being basically brought to spira in some way. So yeah.

02:07:06.40
Dave
Right? Ok I thought I thought the part with um I thought the part with valifour was really interesting because it's in besaid.

02:07:21.19
Dave
Again, you're going back to the first location from the first game you gotta fight the first a on and then at the end of it. Um, you beat valefor and the people there want to burn the temple down to stop this from ever happening again and Yuna and waka don't want to.

02:07:35.59
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:07:40.52
Dave
Um, and I thought this is really interesting because in final fantasy 10 wakka was the most religious person in the group. Besides maybe you know they were the top 2 most religious for sure. Um, but in 10 they found out that their religion was a lie so part of me would think that like.

02:07:47.96
Adam
Yeah.

02:08:00.38
Dave
This temple represents a lie that was sold to them and that they would want to but they don't and I thought it was really interesting. I think Yuna gives ah an explanation that she still has fond memories of the beginning of her journey. At this temple with waka and lulu that's where she met Tidus for the first time. Um, it just kind of gave me this idea that the memory that she has with the group she comments on in a lot of different places in this game supersedes.

02:08:32.93
Dave
How this place also represents the lie that was sold to them from the Yevin religion. Basically.

02:08:41.30
Adam
Yeah, it makes sense like you can, um you can be an atheist and still appreciate how beautiful Notre Dame Cathedral is and also if you're looking at the infrastructure of ah, a.

02:08:48.53
Dave
Yeah, true. Yeah.

02:08:56.10
Adam
Island like Besaid there's not like there's that many buildings there. So the Temple would be quite useful to keep around.

02:08:57.53
Dave
Um, yeah, that's true. Yeah, um, just an interesting story. I think little moments like this are some of the strongest stuff like storywise that this game does is commenting on.

02:09:11.96
Adam
Yeah.

02:09:15.77
Dave
All parts of the journey. Everybody who is involved. Um, it's It's really good The ah the one where you fight Dark Yojimbo is the one where um, people got trapped in the temple by monsters tourists because it turns into a tourist destination and Yunas kind of like you know what fuck them like.

02:09:18.88
Adam
Yeah.

02:09:35.61
Dave
Serves you right for going in there and defiling this place but you go get them out anyway. Um, dark ixion was kind of interesting because it was fused with a machine when you fight it was kind of interesting like body horror for an aeon. So.

02:09:52.16
Dave
You probably didn't like seeing that. Um.

02:09:54.55
Adam
Sorry, my neighbors are vacuuming so you just continue talking. Like right above my head. So All of this audio that I'm speaking right now will be worth nothing.

02:10:03.97
Dave
Ah, let's see.

02:10:15.68
Dave
And after you beat dark ixion this kind of kicks off like the next part of the story like the early part of the story was like the leblanc team Rocket Storyline Um, you. You know, somebody's going to try and take over this mech weapon. But after you fight dark Ixyon That's what kicks off like the real story here. Um, and there's an explosion that knocks unna down into this big pit. All the aeons are coming out of these big pits in the chambers of the faith in these ah temples. She falls down into the far plane where she hears um quote Tidus who you think is Tidus at this point talking and then he appears so he's the guy from the recording from the sphere earlier in the game and he shows up and. The only problem is he says that his name is Shuyin and that he says that he misses her and by her he doesn't mean Unit. He calls her Lenne So you have these 2 lookalike characters that are not who you thought they were. Basically and they're not who each other thinks that they are um in this this sets off. Yeah that yeah.

02:11:34.90
Adam
Sorry or it is originally Tidus and his real name was shuyin from the beginning and he is gaslighting the hell out of Yuna to make her think her name is Lennene because he's tired of her name being you know.

02:11:52.73
Adam
Just a fan theory.

02:11:57.32
Dave
So I'm glad you brought that up because now we start talking about like the real story of final fantasy 10 two? Um, which is the story of the reappearance of Lenne and shuyin and something that gives context to the story in final fantasy 10 um. So a little backstory here before we get into that that theorizing um a thousand years ago title of that pop song 1000 years um Lenne

02:12:24.13
Adam
Um, ah, beautiful.

02:12:26.67
Dave
Ah, was a popular singer in Zanarkand the future version of Zanarkand like the high tech version that Tidus starts in Final Fantasy Ten in? Um, but then the machina war broke out and Lenne just happened to also be a summoner so she got sent to the front lines. Um shuyin is her. Partner will say love interests. Not totally sure. Um, shun tried to steal a machina weapon and save her but they both died. There's a cut scene in the present day. There's a bunch of like. Fighting between these factions and Yuna decides that the way to heal the world is to have a concert so they put on this concert in the fucking thunder planes of all places in spira to have this concert and she gets up on stage and.

02:13:13.10
Adam
It is.

02:13:20.84
Dave
She's singing this song 1000 years and during the song the projection of Lenne like comes out basically and the cutscene shows Unna and Lenne singing side by side. Um, and so what actually happened is the dress sphere. Songstress dress fear that Yuna has been using. Um Lenne had that dress fear a thousand years ago so she kind of reawakens when Yuna starts using that and then shuyin knows that Lenne is there and is trying to get back together with her. Ah.


02:14:47.73
Adam
The Thousand Years song by the way is a really really good cut scene. It's probably my favorite cut scene of the entire game just based on like all the visual fluff and all the particle effects and stuff. Ah the song also is a banger like we said earlier but.

02:15:00.37
Dave
Um, yeah.

02:15:04.32
Adam
It's like this juxtaposition and I love this whole idea of ah this dress sphere is like the embodiment of a person from a thousand years ago and Yuna is just borrowing it to borrow this job of songstress or whatever but it's almost like the spirit of that person is in the dress sphere and it just.

02:15:21.20
Dave
Yeah.

02:15:24.22
Adam
Awakens from this moment of singing this song and and something about the reaction to the thunder plains and blah blah blah. It's like her spirit comes alive again from the past and sings a little song about her love shun which Mirrors Yuna's love with Tidus.

02:15:41.98
Adam
So it's like they are 1000 years apart but they're experiencing a similar thing. So I thought that was awesome and um, something important to also bring up is this machina weapon that shuyin was trying to steal is the reason why sin was summoned in.

02:15:46.97
Dave
Yep.

02:16:01.68
Adam
The first place because Thousand years ago there's this machina war or this big war between bevelle and zanarkand and yu yevon who was the main summoner is the guy who eventually summoned sin to end this war and the reason why he did that was because bevelle had a.

02:16:19.88
Adam
Mark you know weapon which was capable of destroying the world and this is something that ah Lulu I believe brings up in Final Fantasy ten while they're riding the shoo puff again across the moonflow Lake thing. So it's mentioned in 10

02:16:33.61
Dave
Ah, yeah.

02:16:36.79
Adam
And it's kind of like they just took that little thing and was like all right? Let's make that the main antagonist of or the big bad of the sequel. So it's kind of like ah it's like sin version 2 but in muck uniform which I think is really cool.

02:16:40.28
Dave
Right.

02:16:49.95
Dave
Yeah, basically yeah, so during that thousand years concert cut scene in the thunder plains. You get the cut scene of unice singing and then Lennen kind of comes out and yuna and Lenne are singing side by side like they don't. See each other there. They don't talk to each other or something but they're both there. You can see them. But what's also happening is you see the flashbacks of how land and shuyin died a thousand years ago just getting killed in combat basically um, trying to protect each other and so like you said. This sets up like this dual storyline with these 2 couples trying to find each other a thousand years apart basically shun has like reappeared in the present day because Lenne is back I think I think that's what's going on.

02:17:38.21
Adam
Doubt.

02:17:45.85
Adam
Yeah, I'm pretty sure having Yuna use. The dressphere is somehow awakened shuyin. That's what I'm yeah I'm going to assume at something like that they don't say specifically why he's back and why now.

02:17:53.76
Dave
Yeah, something like that.

02:18:02.16
Adam
But it would make sense that that's the reason why.

02:18:02.21
Dave
Right? Yeah, and so she and is like doing everything in his power to find Lenne just like Unna is doing everything in her power to find Tidus. Um, back to that fan theory. I think that the resemblance is too similar for shuin to not be the original Tidus like the thing that Tidus was based on modeled after because Tidus is a a projection of sorts in final fantasy 10 he's not real.

02:18:24.94
Adam
Okay.

02:18:36.57
Dave
I Think that that's shuyin.

02:18:38.80
Adam
Yes I think so too are you aware of the whole theories about dream zanarkand and real zanarkand. Okay so dream zanarkand.

02:18:49.34
Dave
Maybe but probably not.

02:18:57.11
Adam
In final fantasy ten is not actually 1000 years in the past it is current and in modern day spira. It is just so far out into the ocean and protected by sin and harsh waters and stuff that nobody can travel there. This is the.

02:19:11.15
Dave
Okay.

02:19:14.10
Adam
This theory that I've read on the internet I don't know if it's true or not but this is how they explained it so in the original game Tidus didn't travel in time he was existing in the current time and place. But as a projection a summoning of the faith which is ah. Dream zanarkand is basically like that whole pillar of the faith in ah real zanarkand area. There's like thousands and thousands of people that have become this faith and are doing a summoning I'm correct I'm pretty sure they're also summoning sin.

02:19:47.82
Adam
So they're summoning sin and this other dream zanarkand which is made up of their memories of the real zanarkand. So if real anakind existed a thousand years ago and shun was a part of real zanekind. It would make sense that the faith that are summoning this dream zanarkand have. Created Tidus as some kind of conglomeration of different people from a thousand years ago and shuyin is probably the basis for which they base that off but you are like cow in a dream. The floor isn't really the floor and things get confused and stuff and.

02:20:22.46
Adam
You could be speaking to your mother but at the same time. She's also demi Debbie Reynolds or Marge Simpson or something you know like things that don't make sense. Things get confused and mixed around. So maybe this dream version of Tidus is originally based off of shuyin but because he is essentially an aon in himself. He is summoned.

02:20:39.89
Adam
Being from this other dream world. He is what they imagine this person to be then and there and he's given form and he's not like based specifically just like there's no.

02:20:55.11
Adam
Ah, Thousand year ago version of Tidus there's shuyin from a thousand years ago who looks identical to him. They remember what Shuin looks like but they've given him his own identity now so it makes sense so that's vaguely the theory.

02:21:03.85
Dave
Um, ah yeah, yeah, and it makes sense and one of the things that helps theories like that is that final fantasy 10 clearly demonstrated that the faith does have real power and that like.

02:21:16.85
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:21:20.70
Dave
Stuff like that is possible. They do real fucking magic in final fantasy ten. So it does make sense and it makes sense with what I think they're trying to set up with this whole shuyin and Lenne storyline. Ah, it makes sense that Tidus was based off of Shu and it would tie everything together really neatly, um, really satisfying way. So shuyin is going to all of these Lengths to try to find Lenne Lenne is inside of Yuna.

02:21:54.19
Dave
What Shuyin eventually decides to do is to try and take over vegnagun which is that giant Machina weapon again and the only way to stop him basically is to kill him. Um, and I think that like.

02:22:11.54
Dave
As most people are playing through final fantasy tend to I think a lot of people are going to be hoping that they will bring Tidus back because what you want for una is for her to have a happy ending and to reunite with Tidus like I think a lot of people at least start this game. Hoping that because the way final fantasy 10 ends. It's really fucking sad when he disappears and all of that. So I think that like Shuan's quest to get to Lenne represents the player in una's desire.

02:22:35.24
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:22:48.00
Dave
For her to reunite with Tidus and your quest at the end to defeat Shuyin and put an end to it. All is kind of like ah again again, a figurative representation of defeating that desire to reunite with Tidus. Put that to bed and realize that that's not the most important thing um and they have conversations with shun and Lenne actually says something to that effect. She says something like it doesn't matter that you couldn't save me. It's okay to rest instead of persisting. Ah, by yourself it's okay to basically give up on this. It's okay to move on. Um, and I think that they're trying to tell that in a way to us into una that like it's okay to not reunite with Tidus and that's not. The point of this whole thing was that I read on this.

02:23:48.64
Adam
Um I would semi agree but I feel like Lenne and shuyin did reunite because she comes out of the dress sphere and stuff and you ah.

02:23:59.34
Dave
Yeah.

02:24:02.89
Adam
Reunites with Shuyin and they have like this little moment towards the end and then they both go off to the far plane together. So it's kind of like they're moving on or going to quote unquote heaven together. But they are finally together. So that's how I kind of read that um I do agree with you. However, that. I think Yuna seeing Lenne and shuyin should have been or is her way of accepting that she may or may not ever be reunited with Tidus so I think that it's it's almost like.

02:24:36.11
Dave
Um, yeah.

02:24:41.87
Adam
She's accepting the fact that um, these 2 people who died a thousand years ago had been separated for 1000 years and it's kind of it's hard to explain because at the one point it's like I feel like the lesson that she should be learning is that it's okay to move on be your own person. And live your own life without pining for this guy. That's no longer there and that's a great lesson but at the same time it's almost like she's also learning that if you truly love someone even after 1000 years of being separated as spirits. You will be reunited. You know what I mean. So.

02:25:01.60
Dave
Yeah.

02:25:14.54
Dave
Me yeah.

02:25:18.36
Adam
It's kind of got like that Disney thing to it and um, yeah I don't know I mean I'm guilty of being one of those people that started playing final fantasy ten to think oh I can't wait for them to get back together because I love these 2 characters and go ahead.

02:25:28.57
Dave
Yeah, of course back when I thought I would never play this game I watched the real ending on Youtube because I wanted to see them get back together. That's I knew that was going to be it because it had to be like this is a.

02:25:39.88
Adam
Yeah.

02:25:46.89
Dave
You have to reunite the couple. Um, there was other interesting dialogue like in the boss fight and before the boss fight from una that makes me think that she is realizing that this is not to say that it's not important but like to.

02:25:49.20
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:26:06.20
Dave
Like show that she's okay with moving on. Also um, there's dialogue from Lenne to that effect too and I think that like Yuna seeing Lenne tell shuyin that the past can't be recovered and that it's time to rest and move on I think that.

02:26:08.10
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:26:23.70
Dave
Yuna can see that and realize that her own lost past can't be recovered either. Um.

02:26:27.45
Adam
Yeah I think the interpretation of this is going to be vastly different based on how old you are because yeah, like as a teenager when I was playing this I was all about yeah, get them back together.

02:26:36.66
Dave
Yeah I think so.

02:26:46.65
Adam
True love conquers all that Disney shit kind of stuff and now as a thirty plus year old who has been through a handful of relationships shall we say it's like I'm seeing it as.

02:26:48.68
Dave
Um, yeah.

02:27:02.61
Adam
Yeah, you know what? you love someone. It didn't work out. They're gone now you need to move on better yourself and find somebody else because you know you can't define yourself by a single relationship and unfortunately this isn't this isn't the final fancy version of sex in the city. This is like.

02:27:18.20
Dave
Right.

02:27:20.98
Adam
You know that kind of Disney storytelling of you know, Love Conquers All and true love and blah Blah Blah Blah Um, True Love doesn't exist f way high just just kidding but never to this degree. True Love is like tolerating somebody who snores because you like spending time with them. True Love isn't like trying to. Go down to the depths of the fire plane to bring somebody back from the dead. Yeah.

02:27:43.90
Dave
Right? Commandeering a giant mech weapon and trying to destroy the world because you'll literally do anything. Yeah, um, that's true. Yeah, there's also um, a really good speech that Unna gives that I wanted to talk about here.

02:27:47.39
Adam
Yeah, yeah, that's not true. Love that's a personality disorder.

02:27:59.73
Adam
Depth.

02:28:01.75
Dave
I think it's actually right before you fight vegnagun and then fight she and um, you know gives a really good monologue. It's probably the best speech that una's ever done in both of these games other than maybe the one where she's saying goodbye to everybody in final fantasy 10 um. She talks about how it felt to kill her aeons at the end of final fantasy 10 she talks about how she felt when Tidus faded away. Um and she talks about how she knew that this is what they had to do to save spira. But after it was over. It didn't make them feel any better. Um, how they still felt pain.

02:28:34.50
Adam
Yeah.

02:28:38.30
Dave
How they still felt regret. Um and how after the fact everybody tells themselves that they had no choice which might be true, but telling yourself that and um, you know, knowing the knowledge that like you you had to do that doesn't actually help you. Move on from everything. Um and that kind of like galvanizes everybody for the the fight against Vegna gun. Um, and then after that I think you get that quote from Lenne where Lenne talks about how you can't recover the past and I think that like these 2 things together show that. You know's starting to understand that nothing is really going to solve all of that that hurt you know from killing the aeons from watching friends die Oren faded away after that I believe um and.

02:29:36.14
Dave
Yeah, the pain of tidus disappearing like this kind of endless questing and effort and all of that like it might number 1 it might not be possible but number 2 um, it might not be It might not solve everything and I think that like. Yuna starts to realize this throughout this part.

02:29:54.66
Adam
Yeah, that speech is the key turning point of Yuna's character development throughout both games like she has been through all this shit in the first game and then the second game she like finally I mean.

02:30:01.91
Dave
Yeah.

02:30:13.58
Adam
Ah, to throw it back to the beginning where I think I said something about her having a facade of trying to figure out who she's supposed to be you see her completely drop that facade here. She is 100% the person who she was from the first game but grown and matured and she's just like your plan sucks. This is shit.

02:30:31.88
Adam
Like we're not going to sacrifice anyone to try and beat this. We can do this without unnecessary death because I'm tired of losing the people that I care about and I'm like oh you go girl? Yeah and it was just like a very.

02:30:43.54
Dave
Um, exactly yeah.

02:30:51.14
Adam
Great moment of personal maturity and growing and I'm like this is good. This is promising and this is like that level of humanity and heart that a lot of people tend to overlook when they think about how they tend to think about the silly and the goofy They don't think about how.

02:31:07.16
Dave
Really.

02:31:11.50
Adam
You know there's actually like quite a nuanced ah story of character development for Yuna in particular in this game and it's summed up beautifully in just this one moment in this one speech.

02:31:20.99
Dave
Yeah, absolutely and I think that this is the end of Una's quest like unna at the very beginning She saw that recording of the person that looked like Tidus and that gave her hope that they could be reunited and. This part where she gets to the end and she sees number one. This isn't Tidus number 2 He's on a fucking war path and he wants to destroy the world because he's on the same quest that she's on and she just realizes that like this is the end This is it. This is not worth it. Basically like we can't.

02:31:46.62
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:31:58.20
Dave
Keep doing this. Um I also thought it was very funny that when you fight vegnagun um characters from the past encourage you from beyond we'll say there are quotes from Braska her father Yuna’s father. Um Jecht.

02:32:10.10
Adam
Ah, yeah.

02:32:17.20
Dave
Tidus’s father for those who are just playing along Auron who was one of um, well actually the 3 of them Braska Jack and Oren they defeated sin the time before unna did Jack became sin. He's Tidus his father. He's an asshole and when you're fighting Shuyin. Jecht has a quote where he says put that cry baby to sleep because he he looks like his son and he always made fun of his son for crying because he's a piece of shit father and that made me laugh just as a callback. So um, at the end of all of this Yuna just says that she's going home.

02:32:41.41
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:32:53.70
Dave
Basically no more questing to find Tidus. This is it after you defeat shuyin and vegnagun and save the world. Ah, Yuna says this is the end of the quest um in the regular ending that is so before we talk about the regular ending I think this is.

02:33:12.60
Dave
Basically perfect to wrap up the story of una throughout both games this kind of slightly misguided but understandable quest to try and reunite with Tidus but then realizing that you know it's either impossible or not worth it. All the troubles that you would have to go through to do it, all of the maybe suffering that other people would have to go through to do it. It's all not worth it. Um I think this is a really excellent ending. This is the ending that I got of course.

02:33:44.94
Adam
Yeah I think I got ah I don't know why but I seem to remember even in this recent playthrough that I got an ending where he comes back I don't know how.

02:33:59.17
Dave
Um, maybe I'm misunderstanding how you unlock that ending I'm not sure.

02:34:02.94
Adam
Yeah I don't know how I I have this sneaking suspicion that they've done something different with the remaster where it's like not so hard. Um I don't know, maybe look honestly I could be just combining the video that I watched on Youtube with my actual experience of playing the game. But I feel like I remember getting that experience like actually getting that ending. Um, but I don't know, I don't know, don't quite me on that. It's been a couple weeks. Ah yeah, no anyway I prefer actually I'm not sure what I prefer let's just just move on you. You explain the endy and then i'll.

02:34:26.78
Dave
Okay, okay.

02:34:40.52
Dave
Okay, so the true ending is the 100% ending which I watched on Youtube before I even played this game but then I watched it on Youtube again after finishing the game. Um.

02:34:40.67
Adam
Figure out which I prefer.

02:34:56.27
Dave
You beat you in all of that's the same and then at the end. Ah the little faith boy that's been in both games asks Yuna if she wants to talk with him again. Um him because they can't say Tidus' name because in final fantasy 10 you could name your character in a giant mistake for the story. Um.

02:35:12.70
Adam
Yeah, worst.

02:35:16.12
Dave
Tidus wakes up underwater and he gets up and runs out the airship pulls in a gun, jumps off and runs out and gives him a hug um very reminiscent of the end of 10 when she tries to run and give him a hug but he disappears and she just passes through him. Basically um, it's the same here except they connect and they hug. Ah Yuna asks if he's real and he says I think so do I pass and yells get a room you two and um, they kind of talk eunice says she has a lot to tell him about what's happened Tidus.

02:35:47.76
Adam
Oh walk off.

02:35:55.46
Dave
Talks a little bit and gives a monologue. Um, he tries to piece together how he came back. Um, he thinks that the faith brought him back or maybe he's still a dream but he doesn't care because they're going to stay together. Um, Yuna kind of worried about that. This isn't real and that he's going to disappear again and they kind of have a quick talk about it and ah Tidus says cherish me and I will cherish you. We got to stay together. Um, and it's a really emotional reunion because like I'll talk about my feelings about this in a few minutes but like. This is the reunion that I wanted the first time I finished final fantasy 10 like you get the emotional reunion between them.

02:36:40.73
Adam
Yeah, see the romantic in me really likes that they get back together. Um I probably would have done it in a different way. But it's neither here nor there. Um, but yeah I mean I was happy to see them.

02:36:45.90
Dave
Listen.

02:36:57.36
Adam
But the adult me I Want to see you know off on her own being like I need no man I'm I'm strong and independent I've I'm over that guy. Um, but yeah I don't know, like I can't decide which one I prefer. I think you know young me.

02:37:15.56
Adam
Really wanted that perfect ending so badly because I really cared about both characters so much and now old me is so jaded that I just wanted her to be successful and independent on her own without him. Um, I have also heard some.

02:37:32.92
Adam
Theories about how it is that he actually came back and one of them was that since Eor is a summoner. She's essentially just summoned him back like he is now her summon which is interesting. Um.

02:37:45.69
Dave
I Suppose that like she didn't forget how to summon there's just nothing left to summon until that point so like it that could make sense. Um.

02:37:48.80
Adam
Um, yeah, yeah I mean something each summon has to have a faith right? So what? if you know is her own faith for that summon and she's summoning the memory of him back or something like that I don't know.

02:38:07.14
Dave
Now we're getting into levels of how things work in the world that I don't quite understand. Um, yeah, ah, 1 other thing about this real ending I thought was funny real quick is that they show walka's Baby Waka and Lulu had their baby.

02:38:07.21
Adam
I Don't know. Yeah, Conspiracy theory stuff.

02:38:22.17
Dave
And Wakka's baby has the same hair as the flip up in the front and everything. It's very cute. Um, so I think that as emotional as this ending is and how much I like it despite how much I thought I wanted this.

02:38:28.57
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:38:40.63
Dave
Going off of what led up to the ending with the resolution of the Lenne and Shun story. Um I think that this ending is more fan service than surveying everything else they came before it like I don't really believe that this is the ending that the writers wanted. Like this is not the canon ending in my opinion. Um, because everything else leading up to this seems to be supporting. You know, realizing that this is not worth it for whatever reason she decides that or maybe that it's impossible. Um.

02:39:01.93
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:39:21.26
Adam
Have you played the final fantasy 10-2 last mission thing that comes in the remaster stuff. Okay, ah yeah, it's a rogue-like dungeon crawler type of thing. But yeah.

02:39:23.35
Dave
I did not no I heard about what it is and whatever it was I forgot didn't sound like something I wanted to do? Oh no.

02:39:38.50
Adam
It's based on the canon. It presumes that the ending where Tidus doesn't come back is the canon ending. So it continues on from that point as if it's not the perfect ending. So I like to think that maybe.

02:39:53.96
Dave
Um, yeah, okay, that makes sense.

02:39:58.40
Adam
Yeah, maybe the perfect ending is the alternate ending which is actually canon. So yeah I don't know, let's go with that one. Although that there's that whole audio drama thing which is also on this compilation which I haven't listened to but it's apparently fucking terrible. So.

02:40:04.42
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

02:40:14.72
Dave
Um, that's what I hear.

02:40:18.31
Adam
Yeah, so if we're worrying about fan service or fan fiction levels of writing I'm pretty sure that the official writers have already reached that point. So let's ah, let's just leave it at 10 to.

02:40:27.46
Dave
Yeah, yeah I do think that this ending where they reunite is just fan service to avoid outrage from people who really wanted them to reunite.

02:40:44.60
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:40:46.79
Dave
Because it seems to fly in the face of the themes that they explored and then resolved with that Lenne and shuyin story. So.

02:40:54.52
Adam
Yeah I think I agree with you. I think it was unnecessary and it's only there because people want it and if they didn't get it and they played this long ask game and attempted to get a perfect ending and they didn't get teus back. There would be.

02:41:07.73
Dave
Um, yeah.

02:41:12.93
Adam
Not riots because not that many people bought this but there'd be some disgruntled forum posts for sure.

02:41:19.51
Dave
There'd be some angry well not and not in 2003 no angry tweets. But there'd be some really fucking choice Myspace statuses about this. Um.

02:41:23.76
Adam
Yeah, absolutely from the ah people that dared to get past the very introduction of the game. They weren't turned off completely by J pop.

02:41:36.22
Dave
Yeah, and part of me is like ah because they made it so difficult to get so they were like the ending where they don't reunite. That's the real ending. That's the story. We're trying to tell.

02:41:40.55
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:41:51.20
Dave
And if you fucking sickos won it that bad if you want them to reunite that badly you could get the 100% which is an outrageous thing to do hope you bought the strategy guide or we're trawling on game facts in 2003 to get that 100% so

02:41:59.67
Adam
Yeah.

02:42:06.78
Adam
They wanted to torture the player and rub extra salt in the wound to be like you want this? This is what you want or here you go, You're going to have to walk through flaming coals and snorting salt to get there or something.

02:42:14.12
Dave
Yeah.

02:42:20.98
Dave
Um, yeah, yep, exactly you're gonna have to do that fucking cactuar side Quest in the desert. Ah I would hope you do.

02:42:24.90
Adam
To make this as unpleasant as possible. Yeah I actually did that one you get a really good gum and grid for it. Yeah.

02:42:38.16
Dave
I Took what I went and saw that question I was like oh I'm not doing that No fucking way.

02:42:42.23
Adam
Yeah, normally I wouldn't but it doubles a p and experiences I was like yes I need that for level grinding. Yeah um, go ahead.

02:42:47.55
Dave
There that's the grinding. Yeah, ah, let's see oh just one we where he touched on like the serious story stuff. So um, the part where they let you play blitzball I thought was funny. Unna and rikku and paine and like the al bhed fucking like castoffs like the bad news bears they form a blitzball team. The gullwings form a blitzball team and their first matches against the ronso the image of Yuna.

02:43:13.84
Adam
Yeah.

02:43:24.27
Dave
Riku and pain playing a combat sport basically against the ronso that are like these eight foot tall fucking like like gorilla lion animals was very funny to me like they just get the shit kicked out of them in the first match you play.

02:43:33.42
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:43:40.73
Adam
I Also love that blitzball is basically something that only people that can hold their breath for a really long time are able to do and they just explain it away with ah you know, being like I've been practicing holding my breath like okay, great.

02:43:46.28
Dave
Mean.

02:43:52.40
Dave
Yeah, cool David Blaine like you can hold your breath your breath for like 25 minutes you can play blitzball hope you don't get punched in the stomach.

02:43:58.40
Adam
Yeah, ah Jesus Christ also I'm curious because um I didn't listen to your 10 episode yet. But what was your opinion of rikku and her.

02:44:13.30
Adam
Change in this game I think not that she changed that much.

02:44:18.19
Dave
Um, ah I don't think I have an opinion about rikku. She's okay, not I think I think we liked her purpose in 10 story of humanizing the al bhed so that like.

02:44:21.39
Adam
Um, ah okay.

02:44:25.73
Adam
Okay.

02:44:35.24
Dave
Wakka is not the only window you get into how the al bhed are she joins your party or you you meet her early in the game but then she joins the party and everybody including waka at some point has to like realize that they're not evil I Think that's her purpose basically and I think she serves that purpose.

02:44:37.20
Adam
Yeah.

02:44:54.57
Dave
As a character I don't think there's a whole lot to her.

02:44:56.31
Adam
Okay, well she was my favorite character and fan of fantasy 10 and when I was a teenager I wanted to marry her so she was my first waifu and on a personal note I was.

02:45:11.99
Adam
Very offended with what they did to her hair in this game because I hate the braids so they took her from being a character that I really liked and then made her ah gave her a terrible hairstyle that I hated so.

02:45:29.74
Adam
Kind of like negated my excitement about being able to play with her again. So I was like damn it damn Rikku What have they done to your hair. This just will not do oh she always has yeah the hair is the same every time It's those ugly braids So like god.

02:45:34.26
Dave
Um, just change her dress sphere. She'll get a cool new ah new costume and everything the hair persists.

02:45:47.60
Dave
Then she's got to be the black mage so she can wear that big ass hat to cover it all up.

02:45:48.75
Adam
Damn it. Um, even then even then the braids like pointing poking out of the front of a hat. It's a real shame. It's a real shame. It's one of the second negatives in this game other than brother is rere hair. So yeah, anyway.

02:45:58.96
Dave
Yeah, yeah.

02:46:06.88
Adam
Also fun facts: I own Rikku and Yuna official final fantasy 10-2 to action figures which I picked up while I was in Japan on foreign exchange. Yeah, setting a box somewhere that is not worth anything.

02:46:18.30
Dave
Nice does she have the hair that you don't like in the action figure. You could just take the action figure and just snap the braids off her head. Yeah.

02:46:26.00
Adam
Yeah, she does but I put a hat on her. Yeah, take a swap it with Yuna’s hair Anyway, um I can't really think of anything like super relevant that's worth bringing up other than than what we've already talked about.

02:46:40.70
Dave
Now but just to no we didn't and it's because I like they serve a purpose of like.

02:46:44.40
Adam
We didn't really mention Nooj and bareli though or gippel.

02:46:55.73
Dave
Being the people who know what's up and you kind of follow in their footsteps for a lot of the game but I didn't really have a whole lot to say about them or their plot their part in the story like there's some interesting backstory like there's a.

02:46:57.93
Adam
Yeah.

02:47:11.84
Dave
Ah, there's like a backstory scene where you see them preparing for operation mihen that I thought was cool as a final fantasy 10 callback. But yeah, that's that's really it I just didn't have a whole lot to say about them.

02:47:24.71
Adam
Okay, fair enough I mean they are just the heads of the opposing factions which are new. Yevin the youth league the Mickey Mouse club

02:47:29.88
Dave
Yeah, the youth league and there's one more I can't remember yeah.

02:47:40.20
Adam
Um, what's the machine machine nation machine I don't know I don't know and sync machine I don't know anyway. But yeah that they were okay ah I didn't mind them.

02:47:42.33
Dave
Oh okay, the machine youth or something like that. No, I don't know. Yeah, we'll just go at the Kiwanis Club

02:47:58.60
Adam
I Mean they were just sort of background dressing. Really, they do have a part in the main story. But again it's kind of like pain. They're all tied in with each other but you don't really get exposed to that particular side story or backstory unless you explore the Crimson sphere side Quest which is notoriously hard.

02:48:12.27
Dave
Yeah.

02:48:17.25
Adam
Ah, or I should say is notoriously easy to miss. Um, but yeah anyway.

02:48:22.23
Dave
Yeah, all right? Well that is final fantasy ten two and we had a lot to talk about. I'm happy we got to talk about those things with the Lenne and shuyin storyline and how this game ties into final fantasy 10. It's a really interesting sequel. Um I ended up with a lot of respect for the storytelling in here which I thought was surprising. I didn't expect to come out of this with the final thought and like. The most important thought I had about this game's story and about this game in general is that they really showed a really deft touch with writing this like they showed respect for the original story. They showed respect for what happened in the original story. Ah, characters reflect on what happened and then they didn't give you know quote what you want again. I don't think it's canon that they reunite but the way that they got there was good enough that now I'm on their side. You know so it's it's it's really good i'm.

02:49:34.25
Adam
Um, yeah.

02:49:36.75
Dave
Just really impressed with how they handled this story.

02:49:38.58
Adam
Yeah, what you said just then which was you don't get what you want is that what you said? Yeah yeah, okay perfect I'm going to extend that into the fact that.

02:49:45.99
Dave
Yeah, like you us, you know the teenage us like you said the teenage us wants them to reunite. We didn't get what we want.

02:49:58.71
Adam
Players who came tend to not get what they want, which was more 10 because they gave us something which is different and new and updated and completely different in vibe than what you wanted, but just because you didn't want.

02:50:17.46
Adam
Sorry, but just because you didn't want it or what they were presenting to you doesn't mean that what's here isn't actually very good because you know. Again, everybody saw this as being something that was not worth experiencing or playing based on what it was presenting to you in the very first few chapters of the game and you had to dig deep enough to actually find something solid and good here. So if you look past all of the window dressing.

02:50:42.81
Dave
Yeah.

02:50:47.54
Adam
The fancy outfits the campiness the colorfulness the lightheartedness there is actually like key final fantasy 10 story. Ah what? So what? I'm thinking of um expansion here that is worth experiencing.

02:51:03.11
Dave
Yeah, absolutely yeah I think it was the great philosopher Socrates that said you don't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes if you try final fantasy ten two you'll get what you need.

02:51:15.37
Adam
You get what you need exactly. But I mean no worries. It's been a pleasure. Thank you for having me.

02:51:20.94
Dave
It was Socrates that said, " Adam, thank you for coming on man. I really appreciate you taking all this time. We will give the recommendation again at the end of the show. Um, for everybody who stuck it out to the end to check out the good, the bad and the backlog. And to check out the king of games 9096 tournament links again are both down in the show notes for this episode. Um, highly recommend that good podcasting stuff and yeah again, thank you everyone who tunes into the end your heroes. I hope you've enjoyed this discussion. And tune in next week for the next game to come out of the backlog.