Revelations from Patch 5.3

[Cilia]

Werlyt

Eorzean Gundam vs. Garlean Evangelion!

... except our Gundam was just a refurbished Allagan toy, and Sapphire Weapon was gimped. Terncliff was an interesting place to visit; those little border towns always remind me of Dollet from VIII for some reason. Predictably, none of the civilians there have anything positive to say about the Empire!

Valens van Varro is like, suuuuuuuuuper creepy. Someone should do something about him.

SO. We get some background info on the Duskwight holding Gaius' leash (I forget his name), and info on how Imperial Legates' armor is outfitted with data collection modules, which is how they got the combat data that's loaded into the Weapons. Yeah, totally expectin' Gaius' to be in Diamond.

Also, everyone knows you pilot in civvies. I mean, sure you could do it in a uniform or a specially designed suit (like the Late Allagan gear), but everyone knows real badasses go in civvies!

The Puppets' Bunker

Top 10 Anime Betrayals.

Seriously though, this doesn't make a whole lot of sense anymore. 2P helped us carve our way through Machine Lifeforms in the Copied Factory only to turn out to be a fully humanoid Machine herself... and then she calls in her friends who bomb Komra for no damn reason... and then 2B shows up out of nowhere to save you from her... and then you tear up the P-Units' Bunker to catch up to 2B, only for 2P to "birth" hundreds of unskinned copies of herself a la Adam and Eve from Automata who first fight as a sphere and then an amalgamated 2P.

What.

2B takes 9S and leaves to parts unknown, while guilt over the bombing incident leads Anogg to run away.

The last part of this better make some damn sense!

After mulling it over for a day, my thoughts on Elidibus:

He's ultimately a tragic and pitiable character, even if like the rest of the Ascians he was a genocidal madman.

From his true Ancient self's short stature, it can be inferred that like Zodiark was kept a child in Ivalician lore, Elidibus was very young (if not a child himself) when he took up his station and sacrificed himself to serve as Zodiark's heart. However, now being a part of Zodiark, he had to summon himself as a primal with the wish of "making all the Ancients happy" to interact with them, despite their differing viewpoints. Of course that failed and Hydaelyn was summoned, leaving to the 12,000 year struggle to reassemble Zodiark's fractured being so he could fulfill his purpose... but even when the last of the unsundered, Lahabrea and Emet-Selch, passed on, he still had to serve the purpose he was "created" for despite none of those who wished for his creation still being alive. Unlike the sundered Ascians, who could live in blissful ignorance, or even Lahabrea and Emet-Selch, who could have chosen to live normal lives (upon lives upon lives, etc.) Elidibus literally could not adapt to a changing world.

Ultimately, Elidibus was nothing more than a ghost of the ancient past - even more than Lahabrea and Emet-Selch, since his nature as a primal caused him to forget the very people who "created" him in the first place when they all passed on and he began drawing on the hope of heroes across the worlds for strength. Without the hope of heroes to empower him we are finally able to see Elidibus for what he truly was: a broken, lonely child who only wanted to see his loved ones smile again.

No wonder Emet-Selch helped us send him off. It was a damn mercy.

As for his summoning of "heroes," don't feel too bad. It was later stated he wasn't doing a full summoning, but only summoning the fragments of souls that wished to "eradicate all evil" or something along those lines; presumably the whole is fine on whatever world it came from.

On the PC's true identity

I mean, the sun fits beyond the Zodiac stuff. As the closest star it's also the only one we can say for sure is alive; many stars in the night sky are long dead, perhaps referencing how the Ascians' time has moved on but through the cycle of death and rebirth Azem has endured through the ages, much like the rising and setting of the sun.

If memory serves me right Hythlodaeus said Azem's memory wasn't well committed to due to their refusal to join the summoning of Zodiark, but that Emet-Selch still considered them a friend and is implied to be the stones' creator. Like as not he figured out the PC's identity at some point and left Azem's soul crystal, for want of a better term, behind in order to give his old friend a send-off, having accepted the passing of Amaurot and the time of the Ancients but knowing Elidibus simply cannot do the same.

Zenos and his Accomplice.

That it was Asahi('s body) was predictable enough. That it was being exploited by a fragmented Overlord, decidedly less so.

Either way, I hope they seriously up Fandaniel's writing or it's going to feel like a major step back after the excellence of Emet-Selch and Elidibus. Zenos really should have stayed off the damn stage; we already did the shonen rivalry bit with him, and he serves no other real narrative purpose.

Regardless, I'm going to watch Fandaniel much more closely than Zenos, since as an Ascian he's probably got hidden agendas and such up his sleeve (unlike Zenos, who is so single-minded in his purpose that Elidibus couldn't make a particularly cohesive phantom of him).

I'd like to try some Archon loaf, just to see how bad the texture and taste are. Supposedly it requires "feats of mastication" to consume, and that's probably one of the funniest phrases I've ever heard.

[dragonflie]

About the MSQ crystals

Saw an interesting twitter post from @Igeyorhm about each crystal, especially the one about Leo, Fandaniels.



Fandaniel's crystal quote:



My guess is that maybe the 'sound' that scared the ancient might have corrupted Fandaniel somehow.

And on a more big guess, what if this 'sound' was reborn as Zenos?

[RyuDragnier]

The Puppets' Bunker

Top 10 Anime Betrayals.

Seriously though, this doesn't make a whole lot of sense anymore. 2P helped us carve our way through Machine Lifeforms in the Copied Factory only to turn out to be a fully humanoid Machine herself... and then she calls in her friends who bomb Komra for no damn reason... and then 2B shows up out of nowhere to save you from her... and then you tear up the P-Units' Bunker to catch up to 2B, only for 2P to "birth" hundreds of unskinned copies of herself a la Adam and Eve from Automata who first fight as a sphere and then an amalgamated 2P.

What.

2B takes 9S and leaves to parts unknown, while guilt over the bombing incident leads Anogg to run away.

The last part of this better make some damn sense!

Welcome to the insanity of Yoko Taro. Trust me when I say this, his games only really make sense towards the end. If anything what is going on is par the course and is far less crazy than his usual stuff.

[KylePearlsand]

Werlyt

The Puppets' Bunker

Top 10 Anime Betrayals.

Seriously though, this doesn't make a whole lot of sense anymore. 2P helped us carve our way through Machine Lifeforms in the Copied Factory only to turn out to be a fully humanoid Machine herself... and then she calls in her friends who bomb Komra for no damn reason... and then 2B shows up out of nowhere to save you from her... and then you tear up the P-Units' Bunker to catch up to 2B, only for 2P to "birth" hundreds of unskinned copies of herself a la Adam and Eve from Automata who first fight as a sphere and then an amalgamated 2P.

What.

2B takes 9S and leaves to parts unknown, while guilt over the bombing incident leads Anogg to run away.

The last part of this better make some damn sense!

Copied Factory into Puppet's Bunker

Actually it makes a bit more sense when you think of what was going on in the Copied Factory. The Machine Lifeforms inside the raid were hacked and under the command of 9S. In his native game he is a extremely skilled hacker. As 2P is 9S' enemy, naturally they targetted her and anyone with her because they did not have a choice in the matter. Had 2P not been present, the robots would have likely still attacked us but 9S would have probably been a bit more open for conversation.

As for the boss, the Machine Lifeforms were experimenting with birth as explained in the collectables after the raid. 1 in 2B's room and 4 in the command center. As for why the boss looked like that... Yoko Taro likes to make grotesque giant women. He's weird like that.