Wild Arms 3 Part 37: For a Different World

We are back in the saddle here on January 9, the Day of Fallen Angels. The term fallen angel sounds very aesthetic, but I think angels that have lost their wings are no longer angels. My
grandpa always said flouting one’s former title is disliked even among the old folks.

Previously on Wild Arms 3: I want to say that will be the last we will see of Melody and Malik, but there are really good odds we are going to fight them again and again for the rest of the game. However, they have been defeated for the immediate moment, so at least we have those two behind us for the next few screenshots.

And this picture features our good friend Leehalt.

And our even better friend, Werner Maxwell.

Apparently, Werner has revealed his whole deal is atoning for the past, so “standing in the way” of people that represent that past seems right up his alley.

“You know it killed us the last time, right? That was a bad outcome.”

Sidenote: with his gigantic collar and shadow-hat, we don’t usually get a good look at Werner’s face. His “shouting” portrait seems to be the only place we get to confirm the existence of a human face in there.

What? I feel like that would be the kind of thing you should let your family know about.

… See?

This seems to be Werner’s turning point of finally internally acknowledging that his daughter and her friends that are actively trying to save the world with the assistance of literal gods are maybe worth a touch of collaboration.

“Did you read my post about evolution? See, there are six types…”
“I stopped following your twitter long ago, Leehalt.”

Leehalt claims that Yggdrasil didn’t work the first time because they didn’t include enough bootleg demons.

“Yes. I just said that. I have said that a lot. Like… practically every time we have spoken. Werner, is your daughter a dummy?”

“I will finally hug a demon!”

At what point in your plan do you acknowledge that “revive legendary demons of destruction” might not be the right path?

Right. You’re crazy. Got it.

“I can’t believe we used to be on the same bowling team.”

Leehalt, he literally stopped you, like, three days ago. He shot you. You ran. You ran here. It was remarkably straightforward.

“Have you noticed there are a lot of ‘random encounters’ every time you try to go to the store?”

“Go! We’ll hold off Leehalt! And not just because no one made a battle model for you!”

“Go do science stuff at it!”

Werner listens to Virginia (which is significant all on its own), and dashes off to save the day.

“You remember I can teleport, right?”
“Yes, but you’re not going to.”
“True enough.”

Oh. Good. He’s back on the creepy “I had a crush on your mom” nonsense.

Virginia is so parent-deprived, she eats it up with a spoon.

“I abhor her and her sexy, abhorrent butt.”

“My vigor is hovering around zero, thank you.”

“Literally!”

Leehalt fight! Melody and Malik hadn’t fought us for a while, but Leehalt was the (or “a”) boss of the last dungeon. Guess someone wanted to squeeze in a rematch quickly.

Nothing new here.

In fact, nothing new about this fight at all.

M&M got new moves/shields for their fights, but Leehalt is exactly the same with his 1:1 counters.

Once again, if you are entertaining any sort of strategy here, use moves that hit multiple times, but have a weaker final hit (like using Gatling to run out of bullets for an unarmed final smack). Leehalt will only counter the final attack, not the cumulative attack.

And he’ll be out of your hair in no time.

Gah! I thought we would get through at least one update without your return.

She’s overclocking the Yggdrasil! She’s been a gamer this whole time!

“Hey! I’m here, too! Want to meet my mom?”

Sunk-cost fallacy of destroying the world.

“That’s right! We have a toady!”

“Up top!”

Have you ever considered using the ability to teleport people for good?

Oh, he comes pre-fishified this time.

Whole party getting sassy this dungeon.

“Sister, I was on the can and I just got poofed here.”

“After acquiring the demon’s power, everything just stopped. That’s when it hit me. How boring unlimited power and everlasting life can be. Up until now, there was so much I wanted to do…I was so desperate and busy trying to cross everything off my list. But I have all the time in the world now. I can just put off what I could do today until tomorrow. I have attained transcendency. Each time I remind myself of this, everything I’ve wanted to accomplish all seems insignificant. That’s why I’ve been devising something bigger…Bigger than you can ever imagine…”

Tragic explanation of malicious motives time.

“We’re standing right here, Janus.”

“I don’t mean to speak for the other blokes, but Filgaia sure is a stinkin’, messed up planet…And who better to fit the role of ruler than me? What do you think of that, Princess!?”

Oh, he wants global domination. Who could have ever guessed.

So the “trick” of the previous Leehalt fight is that this Janus fight starts immediately after Leehalt is defeated. This means you do not get a VIT HP refill (not that Virginia would get one in her current state anyway), and your FP is just where it was when Leehalt went down. This could be good or bad, as if you didn’t use much FP during that fight, you likely have more options than you would otherwise.

Janus is also going to be riding the coattails of the Leehalt fight in other ways, as he doesn’t really bring anything new to the table, either.

In fact, after a couple of difficult Janus fights across this chapter, Janus isn’t much of a threat this time. Like you are fighting a shadow of his former self or something.,

You cannot completely coast through this battle, but it is also not the “always watch your HP count” affair we experienced earlier.

Maybe it is just because he got a laser beam, and doesn’t use his AOE attacks as much?

Let’s not worry about it. Shoot away.

It’s a rarity that a boss gets to talk while they explode. I guess those effects aren’t just for show…

And… guess that’s it for Janus? That is the first time he exploded into nothing. Not even a potion berry for our troubles…

Welp, that’s how it goes in anime town. You reveal your sinister motivations based on the fact that you are going to live forever, and then you die.

Ugh, still more dungeon to go. Haven’t we fought literally everybody in this tower?

I guess we have to catch up with Werner.

… We’re not going to have to fight Daddy, are we?

Plenty of cockatrices on stairs to fight, at least.

Werner, you jerk. Did you leave the puzzle rooms activated in your wake?

I’m not making a GIF for this stupid puzzle…

Look, it’s Simon Says. You enter the room, all the tubes flash in order, and then you must activate the tubes in the same order you just saw them flash. Fail and then whole process repeats.

I hate these dang puzzles. I can do the Simon Says thing when there is a distinct tone difference involved, but my brain just does not hold on to random patterns. I may have gotten frustrated and used my phone to video the sequence after a few failures.

And never mind that I am technically recording this whole playthrough anyway…

Let’s get up and out of here.

The Yggdrasil system is comprised of a lot of hallways. Seems kind of wasteful, but I’ve never designed a planet-reviving/destroying system before.

Treasure rooms containing mimics are also extraneous.

Oh, an even fight? Ho-hum.

Cait’s Boots increase your speed when your HP is low. We actually picked up a pair (in both games) as a random monster drop back in the Luck Shrine, but it doesn’t hurt to have more shoes.

Money doesn’t hurt, either.

Then we have a simple puzzle that involves group block manipulation.

Jet has been sweating like a hog for three floors but everyone is too polite to say something. Virginia spent three days in bed feverish and wearing the same clothes. She figures she has no room to talk.

This room has a bit of a smooshing wall puzzle… Can we get a GIF going here?

There it is. Use the Gale Crest and remember to double back for those treasure chests.

Might need to use a ladder.

Here is one of the four absolutely essential Booster Kits in Wild Arms 3. The first was found in the final dungeon of Chapter 1, and now go ahead and guess how I would label this dungeon. This is arguably the easiest to find Booster Kit in the game (the previous one was easily missed in a non-descript dungeon branch, and the next two are hidden in different ways), and you are going to want to have those extra ECN points.

A whole 30. Remember when we just had ten?

Something is happening here. Another boss fight?

Never mind.

We know.

“I forgot everyone else’s names. Pete? Was there a Pete?”

"It’s gone from blow to suck!"

“Yeah… uh… about that? I have been sneezing constantly since we got near all these trees. Is that… is that supposed to happen?”

“About 99% less sand than you’re used to…”

Gasp! They screwed up the entire world!

No, seriously, what? Everybody just forgot the world was supposed to not suck?

“It is true that the great war of ages past has left battle scars from the use of science and magic. However, plenty of verdure did cover the lands, and the oceans were blue. The truth is…it was the Yggdrasil System and the Council of Seven that drove Filgaia to its deathbed.”

So you dinguses took a situation that was “not great” and made it “apocalyptic”.

Like, literally? Seriously? How does this square with a world that no one remembers as anything but a wasteland?

“The Yggdrasil System was out of control. It consumed all the energy it could from Filgaia. The generator couldn’t handle the load, and ultimately exploded. I thought all seven of us perished, but…It appears Leehalt, Malik, and Melody miraculously survived and restored the System to its current state in the last ten years.”

All of that squares with what we know, but doesn’t answer the important questions, Werner!

Great! Now he’s distracted!

(Sidenote: it is used here as basic technobabble, but, if that "name" sounds like nonsense, look up the Hermes Trismegistus sometime…)

I like to believe that if I became evil, I would maintain all my computer science skills, too.

Dammit! We’re going to lose our last seventy or so trees.

Time to use our ace in the hole? Come on. I love that phrase. Say it.

And Werner turns his gaze to his last hope…

… that guy?

Seriously?

Guess so.

Convenient that this dork hooked up with Werner’s daughter, the one unambiguously good scientist on this planet, and the dude that talks to gods.

Oh, we’re back to computer science references. Going to confirm here that “squeeze the cable and hope with all your might” is how most technology problems get fixed. Whole reason my website went down back in December was a lack of yearning.

Jet doesn’t know this. Jet didn’t even go to high school.

“Yearn! Damn you!”

“Do I need to put the cable somewhere…”
“Jet, I’m hearing a lot of questions, not a lot of yearning.”

Oh, this does make a bit of Wild Arms 3 canon sense. It has been firmly established that the “guns” of this world somehow mentally synchronize with their users, so there should be other technology that follows a similar template. And Jet’s ARM, Airget-Lamh, has not only been established as unique, but also that Jet cannot sync with any other ARMs…

But I really doubt that everyone is asked to nebulously hope while they are firing their bullets around.

Jet gets to remember a better world? And nobody else does? Unfair world.

Time to crank up the yearning.

“What is going on” indeed. Also: does Jet’s usual level of surly impact the process at all?

You are Lisa Simpson.

What? Jet getting mad at flowers fixed everything? What!?

And he’s all tuckered out.

“I’m good… just a little… Ugh… Is a grass hangover a thing?”
“Depends on who you ask, dude.”

Werner, could you please answer a question we are actually asking for once?

A simple “no” would have worked.

The entire tower is now shaking. I realize it kind of looks like Jet just decked Werner, and, while that would have been justified, that is not what is happening.

Or just the top floor is shaking. Uh… didn’t this exact thing happen at the end of Chapter 1? It didn’t end well then…

You knew we would have to reach the top of this tower eventually.

“Never! Not going to explain anything more until the end of the game! Daddy awaaaaaaay!”

And… here we are. Today has been a lot, so we’ll pick things back up next week.

Next time on Wild Arms: The thrilling conclusion of at least one plot thread!