LogFAQs > #961283586

NBIceman posted...

I'm still reading! Just don't really have much to add to this particular stretch of the game. Glad you're enjoying it, though.

Yeah, the only truly interesting thing at this point is Eleanor starting to turn. Rokurou vs. Shigure will most certainly become interesting when I boot the game up again. I'm just trying to entertain.

Alanna82 posted...

Have you seen Erika Lindbeck's "Karen from three houses" joke? Its hilarious. (I don't think it has spoilers for three houses, its just about an original character.

My husband and I met Erika Lindbeck before. I have a piece of artwork signed by her.

I have not - may have to look into that. I'm adoring her as Magilou and already liked her as Futaba and Jessie (FFVII), so she's high on the list of people I want to meet. Not sure when it'll happen since conventions are dying out because COVID, and the one big one near me that's still alive had her as a headliner in 2020 (February, right before the apocalypse) so earliest we'll see her again is 2024. I envy you!

Cons are nice for those. Velvet's VA, Cristina Vee, was supposed to be at said con in six weeks until she decided to take the year off from cons. Looking over the list, the only VAs from this game I've met are smaller parts - Elizabeth Maxwell (aka Sae and Urbosa) at a different (dead) con and Bonnie Gordon at the very first con where she was a guest (right after she was on The Quest, a reality show for RPG nerds that didn't get advertised, but I 100% recommend it). Both autographs are still on my wall. The picture with Bonnie and her buddy from The Quest, Patrick, should be somewhere on my Facebook still.

Only Tales character I have a piece of custom signed artwork for is Leia. I had it commissioned and Lauren Landa happened to love it. And before "pics or it didn't happen," here ya go...
https://i.imgur.com/09YgynM.png

Back to our regularly scheduled programming...
I beat Shigure and, uh, the plan never happens. He just walks away having shattered Rokurou's new blades. The cat says everyone knows Eleanor to be a traitor, yet she brushes it aside with Abbey this, Abbey that. She'll wake up before long. There's a fun skit of Eleanor monologuing and everyone overhearing, despite her talking about sewing Velvet's outfit. I bump into the bandit from before and he's going to Loegres to open a restaurant for "Bandit cuisine" - the rough, greasy-spoon type foods bandits make in their camps. Might be a good way to reform more bandits, too, since they'll feel like doing entrepreneurial endeavors, too. There's a scene at the inn where Rokurou is practicing incessantly to beat Shigure... gotta admire his dedication even if he's extraordinarily stubborn. And Eizen's crew are very skeptical of an Artorius henchwoman coming aboard. It's that dynamic that fascinates me most right now, and whether we'll be able to get Eleanor to flip her loyalty by seeing how evil the Abbey actually is. Anyway, there's nothing better to do here, and Kurogane is tagging along, so... off we go into the wild blue yonder!

At least until there's a COVID outbreak on the ship... er, I mean Corsair's Scourage. Apparently you can only get it at sea and it's quite contagious for humans, but you can't transmit it over land. There's a flower named sale'tomah that can produce medicine for it, so we randomly get to detour. Which... okay then. Not sure why this was necessary plot-wise. This conversation between two fishermen about the prison island's patrols thinning out, dismembered body parts in fishing nets, and the theory about prisoners being used to feed, uh, Velvet was interesting, but it didn't need to be in this port, did it? Nor did the conversation where Magilou mentions suing Rokurou via the EEOC (despite not being in his employ) and Eleanor learning about the Bushido Code. I am still curious as to how Rokurou's ancestor made it to a different planet from Japan...

Eizen says this bridge was secretly funded by his crew to help Reneed become a bustling port, but after that the Abbey took over sea travel. Bastards. The goal is to destroy them so the people can prosper, yes? Also wouldn't shock me if something happened to this bridge; you don't have a cutscene like that over something so trivial, so it's probably more than that. News of High Priest Gideon's passing has made it here, alongside telephone game rumors that the daemons were huge, three-eyed horned things. How flattering.

Of course, the flowers are out of stock because the Abbey sealed off the forest due to another "big" daemon that they're too inept to kill or even locate. A young man is lamenting his father's foolhardiness and the father mentions that Westgand will be prosperous in "a hundred years or a thousand." This fascinates me because I figure this place ends up being very, very different in Zestiria, but I'd rather not torture myself by playing that. The rain would make me miserable, though. (P.S. the scout ship has access to the Amarcian Subcontintent with "three warring kingdoms"... so is this the same planet as Graces, or not?)

A few other little things before I stop for now:
-There's this nonsensical card-matching game that makes zero sense even as I play it. I try twice and give up because I still can't make heads or tails of it.
-Bienfu's "Hammer and Thongs" thing sounds... kinky in the most hysterical way. What does he think this is, a porno?
-Eleanor inquires about the Reaper's Curse and... Eizen really does seem to bring misfortune to those around him. Or, in Bienfu's mind, he just THINKS it does. Eleanor rejects a reunion when Bienfu hits on her again. Poor thing. Honestly... is there another JRPG series that abuses mascots the way Tales does? In Symphonia, Corinne DIED, though was very forgettable; in Abyss, Mieu took a LOT of abuse - poor guy; Bienfu is a punching bag similarly, but I can't say he doesn't deserve it from the women especially. I mean... "Physically Escalating with Cuties" says enough.