Corona Jumper: Romancing SaGa 2, Part 7

Saturday, November 23, 2024

Romancing SaGa 2, Part 7 - Subier and the Sea Ship

Next Empress is the descendant of Andromeda, and basically the same character copypasted. Look at all those damage-type resistances I'm piling up.

With all of these remakes and revivals, is it possible we may some day see Cheetahmen 3?

Talk to this sea-explorer in Toba and (if the conditions are right, because this game has to be complicated) it'll trigger the next set of events. Subier, who is basically the Fiend of Water for this game, is stirring up trouble in the seas. Phil Collins was such an RS2 fan that he once wrote a song about Subier. "Su! Su! Subier!"

Problem is, the next area is the Sunken Ship, and you can't get to it unless you can breathe underwater. This requires the Mermaid Potion, which is locked behind a fairly lengthy quest that trips up a fair amount of players. It looks like there's a lot that can go wrong with it.

HOWEVER! If you made peace with the Narwhal before this point instead of fighting him, it sends you a Mermaid Potion and allows you to skip the entire PITA quest. So I never had to do it, which was dodging a bit of a bullet. So protip, make peace with the Narwhal.

This was kinda amazing, because I wasn't looking forward to the quest at all.

Made sure to run around recruiting some folks, like Bear (again). Wasn't Bear in the beginning of the game too? Maybe this is Bear The 8th or something.

Next area is at the ocean floor which is pretty cool. I've had a thing for ocean floor dungeons since I played Breath of Fire in 1996.

Unfortunately, the Sunken Ship is one of the most confusing dungeons in the game, with doors that take you somewhere else if you go back through them, pits everywhere, and so forth.

The boss here is an absolute joke, with like 700 HP (aka two hits at this point)

::Andromache's nipples perk up::

With the Sunken Ship out of the way, the lair of Su! Su! Subier! is revealed. The 5th of the Seven Heroes. Considering one of them is right before the final boss, this means we're super close to the end here.

Su! Su! Subierrrrrr! is a tough customer, but he's no Kraken. At least we've got all of our equipment for this one.

It turns out that all of the Seven Heroes have a much-stronger second form if you take too long to confront them / do too many quests in the game. Apparently they MIGHT also go to the second form if your hero is over 700 HP. So I don't know which version of Su! Su! Subier! this is, but I think it's the first form.

This game continues to be a bit of an enigma, with all these moving parts. In my case, I went after all of the Seven Heroes as early as possible, and thus didn't have to deal with second forms as far as I know.

Another land is annexed to the Empire, and...

Another time-skip, but a lot shorter this time. Short enough that my perky-nippled previous Empress could still be ticking at this point. Also, that chapter itself was very short compared to the others. I guess I was just about out of quests to do so it had to kinda wrap up.

Wait a minute. It's Final Emperor time ALREADY? Feels like this was a fairly short game. Come to think of it, maybe none of the SaGa games are terribly long.

Indeed, it's time for the final chapter, using the character you chose/named at the beginning (who is also the strongest of all the Emperors). The final chapter is all about finishing up various quests in the world and powering up for the insanely-hard final boss.

Looks like all of the generational quickenings end here, for some reason. That's right, Pecil is truly the final emperor. All of the emperor quickenings die when he dies. Well that's depressing.

The final chapter has a few things to do: 1) Another termite invasion. 2) The Sealed Cave with a Kzinssie rematch. 3) The 6th Hero, whoever you have left at this point. 4) Any out-standing quests and scenarios you have left in the world that you want to check out. 5) The final dungeon with the 7th Hero.

Got some new characters to recruit in Avalon, like these Royal Guards who are super strong.

The second-best character (behind the Final Emperor) is this Ninja. I wish you could recruit more than one Ninja because they do SO MUCH DAMAGE.

I think I gave the last spot to Bear The 12th. Onward to the latest termite invasion:

The termites are now invading Avalon...and the Termite Queen turns out to be a diabolical talking monstrosity!

Is she like, evolving into a humanoid? What the hell is UP with the termites in this game?

After that very unsettling dungeon/fight, the next final chapter scenario involves the Sealed Cave from the very beginning of the game.

Yep, remember this place? It's finally unsealed. But why?

::checks notes:: Kznssie is waiting here, now powered up to Form 2. This guy gave our heroes fits at the beginning with his instant-death attack, and MURDERED LEON. Wait a minute, we're like 600 years later now, how is he still hanging out in this cave?

It's crucial to break out the Soulsteal resist ability from the beginning of the game and put it on everyone, since he can use his death spell on everyone now. Matter of fact, keep it equipped for the rest of the game because the final boss uses it too.

Yep, this is a Form 2 Hero alright. He's way stronger, has way more HP, and a much more impressive sprite. Much tougher fight than any of the Form 1 Heroes.

Not too bad. Thought there might be a lategame difficulty spike, but so far nothing I can't handle.

Now that he's gone, I'll never have to try to spell his name again.

At this point I believe I've crossed the threshold of max-powered enemies due to number of battles fought. As a result there's nothing stopping me from grinding away in the lategame, foes aren't going to get any worse.

The eastern lands of 'Nam are the next goal, as here's where I'll find the 6th Hero. I think the Sealed Cave is supposed to be the 2nd-to-last dungeon, but you can't progress until 6 Heroes are down either way. In other words, the 6th Hero should be significantly easier than the fight I just had.