LogFAQs > #972800792

You... are correct. Is that what you wanted to hear? That I was driven by some... cheap, naive impulse? That I... That I can't think about anything else?

Keitaro Miura
I'm unsure why they locked this last section off, nothing major happens and I don't think it even reveals much about Hijiyama's story. Miura and his long time colleague have a nice chat, this really is one of the most believable friendships in the game, and we get mentions of BJ, Chihiro, and an appearance from Natsuno. A smaller finale than most, but definitely one of the best characters.

Renya Gouto
As one would hope, Gouto's story provides some much-needed answers. As one would expect, it also throws a bunch of new questions our way. The path is less about Gouto himself and more about the clone formerly known as Chihiro Morimura, and excuses to give us many more welcome flashbacks that help clear things up. There's only one scene here that I think centres on Renya himself, and it's an excellent one where he confesses his love of Ms Morimura and his frustration at being driven by such base emotions.

After Ms Morimura's death, Gouto has figured out that baby Chihiro is not a clone of our top-heavy teacher nurse, but instead a direct clone of Professor Morimura from 2188. I did not see this coming, I thought they were leading us to a reveal that she was 426. But it's a great way to tie us back to the original story, and get some answers from 'humanity's traitor' herself. Though she mainly sits there quietly while Renya delivers the exposition dumps. Again this isn't a complaint, I like being spoonfed when things are this ambiguous!

One flashback reveals that Ida was lying about Juro killing the 4 who tried to loop again. We didn't need to learn this info directly, it was pretty obvious, but seeing Morimura break down in guilt over it makes the scene worthwhile, and helps strengthen her motivations for bringing Juro back later on. The myriad of 2188 logs (yay!) come from all corners: Ida, who I think looks more like Gouto than Amiguchi in 2188, berates everybody including the person watching the log (lol, classic Ida); Takamiya and Morimura talk about making clones with some language that goes over my head, and a blatantly evil Kengo Ogata AI taunts 2188 Gouto. The last one doesn't really land as well for me, Nenji's dad is one-dimensional and it's awfully late to add a new key player to the proceedings, but Gouto sets out to halt Project Ark so it's possible there's a later reveal to come from this. Making Ogata Sr the one directly responsible for the infection is a bit cheap, but I suppose it doesn't alleviate Chihiro's responsibility entirely.

As for Child Professor Morimura herself, she's an arrogant sinister egomaniac who will stop at nothing to get what she wants... but what she wants, it seems, is to save the species. She just doesn't trust anyone else to do it right. She's layered pretty nicely considering how fast her arc moves along, and Gouto's key role is to remind her of her own humanity and argue the case for this world's inhabitants to fight for themselves. It works, and she berates herself as she begins to grow fond of Renya and his plan, helping to shift 1.2 million civilians to Sector 3. It's cool seeing the destruction scenes from way back when shown from here on the ground level, and I like that Miwako played a part in helping proceedings.

Another major help comes from Morimura's newly revealed biological son, Tsukasa Okino.

Takatoshi Hijiyama
Instead of sticking with Gouto it feels right to shift to these two. While waiting for Inaba to show herself, Okino and Hijiyama are attacked by androids, and Okino shifts Hijiyama to safety before being attacked. Then Hijiyama runs around the school looking for anyone who can save him, not even stopping at the cafeteria. That's how you know it's serious! His only pause is to reminisce about an encounter with Okino, and then the game's constant MVP BJ comes to the rescue. Bless you, BJ! It's too late to save the AI Okino, but Takatoshi resolves to fight to keep a home for Okino to return to, which is so very sweet.

We know Okino comes back for the final battle, so his return isn't a surprise. But the information he brings us is! He reveals to Hijiyama that the world as he knows it is a simulation, and 80% of the innerlocitor's processes go to simulating reality to make it believable for the 15. I have to admit I'm a little confused here, I thought the sectors were real constructions 30km in diameter and that their waning stability is the reason we can have no more resets. But Okino says the sectors are a simulated space, and only the pods they are in are reality. The people, though created by UC, must be real by some definition or why would Chihiro bother saving all 1.2 million of them? Are you telling me Miwako isn't real, game?? Maybe I misunderstood this and Tsukasa is just putting things in a way Takatoshi can understand. I took 'simulated space' to mean the space itself is non-existent, but maybe he meant the space is where the simulations take place.

More easily understood is Takatoshi's way of declaring his love, and no longer burdened by shame he marches with a clear head into the final fight. A solid story, still hope these two have a happier epilogue ahead.

Renya Gouto
The professor softens, and Renya makes her a bet that this world can take care of itself. Even she can't deny this possibility, and she shifts some satellites to create one final opportunity for us to save the world (which she refers to as Earth!). She's done a lot wrong, but I can't help but love her for addressing Keitaro as big brother here and wishing him luck.

And... that's it! We're onto the final battle for real this time. There's ten more scenes left unseen in the event database, and an unusually large amount of analysis logs still missing, so I hope we have more story to come. I'm not clear on absolutely everything (an understatement and a half), but I'm eager to see what happens after the Deimos' demise.

A random thought I've been having: I wonder if Tamao was originally planned to be a playable character? She's likely one of the 15, and is always tangentially evolved in events. I kept waiting for her major role to come through but it never did.

Also, did any of you pick up on the 'design engineer' slip from Chihiro to indicate she was the professor? I don't recall what I thought at the time but I think I just assumed Morimura knew everything at that point >_>

Cleared:
Shu Amiguchi
Ryoko Shinonome
Tomi Kisaragi
Yuki Takamiya
Natsuno Minami
Nenji Ogata
Juro Kurabe
Megumi Yakushiji
Ei Sekigahara
Iori Fuyusaka
Keitaro Miura- CLEARED
Takatoshi Hijiyama- CLEARED
Renya Gouto- CLEARED