13 Sentinels: Hijiyama, Gouto, Still Even More Fighting
Technically there was a bit of jumping around here such that it was like: Gouto -> 3-1 to 3-5 -> Gouto -> Hijiyama -> Gouto -> More fighting but for the sake of brevity I'll consolidate each bit.
Hijiyama: Okino takes Hijiyama back to the UFO presumably to talk to Inaba but it never happens due to an android ambush. Okino can temporarily stop them because they respond to his voice somewhat but not forever. He runs into the same "need to operate it from far away" issue that past!Okino did and Hijiyama gets sent back alone. He runs off to find another shifter and eventually tracks down Minami by accident. BJ tell him Okino is in critical condition and he'll get him back but they arrive too late and Okino dies. I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop because obviously he's around in the final battle. I was expecting he had an android backup that he was going to point Hijiyama to in his letter but nope, he gives him his Sentinel and it turns out it IS a virtual world and in reality the 15 are inside incubation pods in the Sentinels... Matrix style I assume. Huh, and honestly I was leaning back towards it being a physical world when Okino revealed this.
Gouto: Okay, so Gouto's story is pretty different from the others in that it's basically him unraveling the mystery to Chibimura (and the occasional flashforward showing some of Chibimura's actions during the final battle that we've previously only seen her mention over comms in Destruction Mode) but damn if I didn't enjoy it. Picking up where we left off with Gouto saying Chibimura isn't the Morimura they've known all this time but the 2188 Professor he continues by accusing her of wanting the group to fail here in order to loop another time. He follows this up outlining that her plan was to have her memories override Fuyusaka when she turned 18 and to also have Ogata's father (who is revealed to be the actual mastermind behind the nanomachine apocalypse by ordering Morimura to take the actions she did that caused it) overwrite Ogata. Only once she became Chibimura she realized the kaiju attacks had wildly derailed the plan and had to be solved first. She used her admin ID to stop any future attacks but the already produced kaiju would still overrun this cycle but that suits her just fine. Gouto finishes this by accusing her of the murder of Morimura and she responds by trying to shoot him only made the rookie mistake of forgetting she had Gouto get her the gun and he installed safeties into it whoops.
He then presses her on her motives for transplanting her own memories and she explains there needs to be a leader or else the survivors will descend into the same in-fighting that ruined the colony. Gouto then decides to make a bet with her - if they can beat the kaiju invasion they'll have proved they've passed this test of character that Chibimura was worried about. They'll leave a single terminal up in exchange for her no longer sabotaging the operation and so that if they lose their end, the loop will recur as she wanted. In the final scene we flashforward to a point ahead of where my Destruction Mode is where they're down to 3 terminals and Gouto requests she get them in contact with Inaba because he knows she can bypass the horizon issue having done it before. No leverage, just a favor so they at least have a chance. She relents and states she can do it but it'll be a one-shot limited time deal because doing so will cause the relay satellites used for it to fall out of stable orbit and if they can't finish their plan before they crash that's it.
And that's 100% for Remembrance Mode!
Battle: Cleared 3-1 through 3-7. Also since I apparently unlocked all the locked Mystery Files my Mystery Points are being converted into tons of meta-chips from now on so I've been going wild with upgrades lol.
Overall: Okay, so the big, outstanding issue I see here is the clear incompatibility between Chibimura wanting to loop one more time and seeming confident it would happen against Morimura and Inaba suggesting that's not possible and this loop is different and would be the last one if not EVER then at least of its kind. I'm inclined to believe the latter because it seems more narratively appropriate and also Inaba is probably the most informed about the situation given she's been chilling up on the colony. Nevertheless, I'm a bit curious then what Chibimura has overlooked that has caused her to have this mistaken belief. I suppose the second issue is how the sabotage happened now. We know from the log that 2188 Gouto was dead set on preventing Ogata's father from getting his way and reincarnating in the new, terraformed world. My theory there now is that Gouto went to Shinonome as one of the only survivors after the shootout and dispelled whatever illusions she had about the situation by telling her the truth and she then sabotaged the project with the kaiju invasions as outlined in that message she recorded. ...At least I think that's the best explanation that ties what information we have together.
Probably a good chance I can beat the game next time? Should just be battles I imagine. Analysis % seems weirdly low for how much I think I have left but maybe beating the game adds a whole bunch of stuff that will make up for that.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?