I don't know if it was covered yet, but you actually can do the bird spell. It's 50 MP, which actually loosely tracks with how long a win can take. It's called Black Plume, and is dropped on floor 41 of Palace of the Dead.

May I recommend coming up with an agreed upon hand signal for when your guests want to contribute? It's not meant to be an insult. It could just be raising a finger or pen. I love his passion and contributions but the interrupting audio is a little off putting. For remote guests news stations will do this or ask guests to count to 3 once a host is done talking before joining in. It helps get around the issue of lag and remote interviews.

Man that Nybeth fight was hard, I didn't realize I could've left it either. I was really confused about the whole fight like I was missing something or I wasn't using a skill correctly 😂

Hey hey! Popcorn time to watch these guys!

This is a game of mirrored characters, of holy knights and dark knights who share a name, of Denam as a young Leonar, of Denam and Vyce, of Hobyrim and Balxephon, even of the Golyat Three and Cistinia's Bakram Liberation Three. (It's notable that at the same time your trio tried to assassinate the wrong Lanselot, Cistinia's team was trying to assassinate the REAL Lanselot... and they were all murdered for it except three, showing what would have happened if you hadn't been lucky.) I had a moment where Vyce stopped feeling like a foil and felt like a real character who could have made either choice. I think it hinges on the death of his father. I can easily see it radicalizing him in either direction. On the one hand, after Golyat, I could see that he would consider all Wallister life sacred, so he'd stand against you (Law Vyce). But at the same time, no fellow Wallister made any effort to save his father. They cowered in their homes, letting his feather bleed out on the streets of Golyat while Vyce rushed home on his horse. In that sense... seeing the Wallister in need, seeing more cowering in their homes, content to let the others die... I mean, that's Chaos Vyce in the making. I get it. (Fun fact, but Ravness was planned for the SNES Tactics Ogre, but got cut for pacing/room reasons. Her character ideas were re-used in FFT to make Agrias. So even between FFT and TO, we have mirrored characters. I think the theme of multiple routes helps show how much things can change.)

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

On Cistina, you MAY be right that they’re part of the group that failed to assassinate Tartaros mentioned in the Talk (although it only mentioned civilian casualties that doesn’t mean it didn’t involve Liberation Front deaths). But I’m pretty sure it’s stated there WERE others, later; it’s just they don’t matter to the narrative and are not established as characters.

Best part of my week: Tactics Ogre and my goodness, over 2 hours. That's what I'm talking about!

@dudemcguy1227

7 ай бұрын

Loved your OB64 video. It was great!

@TheTacticalRPGOdyssey

7 ай бұрын

I'm glad you enjoyed it!@@dudemcguy1227

@animagamer2

7 ай бұрын

I've truly been waiting for this all week!

@1:07:14 I understand how weird it sounds to someone from our modern era, but I actually love this line because it tells you so much about the character and the period that they're in. Back in the day, it was not uncommon at all for siblings with some sort of big gap- be it status, age, or beliefs- to have very little interaction with one another from a very young age. I think that very much could be the case here. Perhaps they were close once but certain ideological divides drove them apart and this was so long ago that it's possible Balxephon doesn't think of him very often anymore.

Well done gentlemen, I love this game and it's so fun to follow along with you guys!

Regarding the issue with the Balmamusa choice, I mostly agree with Mike's and Casen's criticism that the actual text/content of Chapter 1 does not provide enough evidence to make the audience believe that Denam is the kind of person who would consider making this kind of drastic "The ends justify the means" justification for his Law route choice. So instead, we are left in this kind of odd middle ground where the story gives Denam a clear history (childhood trauma) and characterization (Passionate, but calm and collected). And so the player's choice to make Denam follow the Law route has to do a lot more leg work when it comes to "writing the character". Basically, to make sense of Denam choosing Law, the player has to *assume* that the psychological trauma he suffered in Golyat when he was younger is still unresolved and is enough to turn him into the kind of person who would make this awful choice at Balmamusa. But the lingering effects of that trauma is not really shown to us by the text in Chapter 1. Especially when you compare Denam's demeanor and attitude to Vyce. That's what I meant in the discord discussion section (@2:08:13) when I said you kind of have to "head canon" the reason to understand why Denam could go Law route. There technically is a reason provided in his history as to why he could make such an awful mistake (Unresolved trauma, child soldier, and suddenly thrust into a position of authority), but the text never really hints that Denam has these issues or that he's such an extremist that he would be willing to murder thousands of his own tribe for the "greater good". The voice acting of Reborn version makes this even tougher because the VA makes Denam really sound like he's got a good head on his shoulders. Without voice acting you can make him sound different in your head. In my opinion, the game really needed 1 or 2 more character development cutscenes in Chapter 1 where Denam expresses to Catuia/Vyce that: "We must end this war as soon as possible and create a world where the Walister can live in peace. So what happened in Golyat can never happen again. That's what Father would have wanted. That's what we're fighting for. We have to do whatever it takes to make that happen!" Then when Denam is confronted by Leonar with the opportunity to make that "Whatever it takes" kind of choice, we see if he really meant what he said to his comrades or not. (Which Vyce can react and respond to one way or the other.) But as it stands now, Matsuno is asking the player's ability to "role play" Denam's choice at Balmamusa to do a lot of the character writing work. And that makes it really hard to analyze from a literary analysis perspective for the podcast. It's probably best to imagine "Law Denam", "Chaos Denam", and "Neutral Denam" as 3 separate characters. And analyze them as if they had different reactions/perspectives when confronted with the big choices of the story.

@rdrouynriv

7 ай бұрын

Eh, Law Denam is just Denam succumbing to peer pressure. Leonard is someone who is a compatriot that he looks up and he is young and impressionable so it can be justified if you take that into account. Plus he is part of the military and chain of command matters. There is a reason why that route is labeled the "Law" route.

@TheTacticalRPGOdyssey

7 ай бұрын

I still remember playing the game for the first time on PSP and picking Chaos and thinking "what kind of psycho would pick Law!" It's still crazy to me that Law pretty much has to be the defacto canon route since it is the route you have to go to unlock the CODA chapters. I like the idea of your "head canon" though. Maybe Denam has just compartmentalized so hard that there's no hint of the rage seething below surface. If anyone picked Law their first go 'round I'd love to hear their reasoning!

@bartandaelus359

7 ай бұрын

The issue I take with this read is that for Denam to go 'We must end this conflict as soon as possible by any means necessary to prevent another Golyat' We as the player must willingly commit another Golyat....

@dudemcguy1227

7 ай бұрын

@@bartandaelus359 I think that's a strong thematic point for the story actually. Law Route Denam uses the justification of "We must stop another Golyat from happening" that he's willing to commit a massacre of his own because he's convinced himself that the Walister are the "good guys" in this war and it's a necessary sacrifice for them to win the war and secure a future for his people in order to prevent future massacres. (Not to get too political here, but we have seen this mindset and it's effects play out in conflicts in real life.) Whereas Chaos Denam can't bring himself to do it and would say "No, I'm not willing to commit a massacre like the one that happened to my town in order to win this war. There must be another way." One version of Denam is putting his duty over his empathy (Law) while the other is doing the opposite (Chaos).

@michs7451

7 ай бұрын

@@TheTacticalRPGOdyssey I picked Law the first time while playing Tactics Ogre (and I was 17 at that time, around the same age Denam was in the original). My reasoning is that the Walister absolutely needed that strategic advantage if they were to come back from the jaws of defeat. War is horrible in any case, and it would be "better" to bring about a swift end to the war, by any means necessary, than to worry about moral scruples and wind up ultimately with even more casualties in the conflict. We already see how terrible the circumstances are of the Walister in Chapter 1 - their leader was even imprisoned and 5000 of their men were placed into concentration camps and forced to work for their bitterest enemies. I acknowledge that there was some headcanon here. But all the same, I thought that Denam might have been open to that choice if he thought about it. All of his resources come from the Walister and the Duke; where would he go if he rebelled at that point? Better to lay low, bring about a swift end to the war, and assume command by unseating the Duke / leading a revolt after the conflict.

Concerning Kachua and Vice: they are not friends. They despise and merely put up with each other as they compete over Denim, who is the only family/friend in their life. On Vice being a bully and his friendship with Denim: I remember Vice saying his father mistreated him and the townspeople looked down on him (like Chris from Stand by me). He is no doubt the kind of friend your mum would tell you to stay away from as she only sees him as a bad influence but while Vice is seemingly the dominant party, Denim is probably the only person Vice feels he can confide in and is more of a junior partner in crime rather than a victim of any bullying.

In terms of Denam's choice, I thought it mainly in terms of "Being loyal to your lord" (in this case the Duke), which is a common Japanese-focused plot device I've seen in several games. Blindly following your lord, believing in their right to rule, following the chain of command, ignoring all morality, seems to be a part of Japanese culture, or at least its history, so they may have figured that option would be considered just based on that, though I agree that Denam up to this point hasn't been characterized as someone who believes strongly in following orders. It's quite the extreme test of loyalty for the Duke to expect Denam to agree to kill 5000 people, without explanation, relying on Leonar to relay the order.

You're right about the blank slate character, Mike. That's why SMT's main characters never talk. You always choose.

Mike, it's okay to not like something.

37:00 "Talk" section in Tactics Ogre is essentially "Rumors" in the FFT Taverns. It's much deeper in this game than FFT.

The way I reasoned about the L route the first time I played (original SNES version almost 30 years ago), was that Deman was led to believe there was no other choice, to a degree even coerced to do it. He did not protest any of the assignments from the Duke leading up to the big choice; He seems undecided and rolling along with the flow in Chapter 1. And how the L route unfolds after the choice tells a story of a character in penance for their past decisions.

@rodrigohartmann9951

7 ай бұрын

Finished watching now. I think Mike's observations are valid, I agree with the sentiment that the L route choice was not built up sufficiently to be believable. To explain it away the player inevitably makes use of head-cannon. TO:LUCT is one of my favorite games of all time, yet I can easily recognize this. I think folks might be getting too protective of the game, seeing how it is foundational to later Matsuno's achievements; But don't forget he was also young and somewhat inexperienced, his own biases about the world might be showing up here and that's totally OK.

@oblivion9999

7 ай бұрын

@@rodrigohartmann9951 Yeah, Matsuno is blind and biased and all arguments for the route are just people being protective of the game because we just love that dude so much. Great points there.

@flexoffender8159

7 ай бұрын

⁠@@oblivion9999they made valid points that you’re obliviously ignoring in order to straw man them. It is a valid complain that relying on the players to create some headcannon in order to justify character behaviors is just weak writing. You can argue that it didn’t ruin your experience but for some people that kind of thing does ruin the game for them and that’s entirely valid.

@oblivion9999

7 ай бұрын

@@flexoffender8159 missing the context the game gives while condescendingly telling others that reading into it is headcanon is not all that valid.

@animagamer2

7 ай бұрын

Those are my thoughts exactly. It's not just the person, but the environment. Denim went from being (as far as he knows) a literal nobody to part of a group of men who answer directly to the Duke of their kingdom. The amount of external pressure to agree with the Duke's choices is insane. I wonder if giving the player an omniscient perspective was a good idea because, at this point in the game, the player has no love for the Duke. He gives bad vibes. But I imagine they would feel a lot different if all they ever saw was the side that Denim did. But I understand why Matsuno didn't do that because then it'd just be a seemingly good character talking you into making a horrendous decision, which is a typical villain motif. The omniscient perspective gives you a much more complete perspective on the Duke. You know he's not a good guy, but if you are charitable you can also see that he's not just a mustache-twirling villain.

For anyone else who was distracted by Ivan's backdrop: Hylas and the Nymphs, oil painting by John William Waterhouse, 1896

Another influential Queen song on this game should be Under Pressure, cause that’s what I’d feel playing it 🫨

I didn't realize you guys kept recording when I was in the discord after I hopped off lol so my discord replies were without any context to what you guys were saying. But in any case I think you came to the right conclusion to focus on one route first before turning to the interpretation of other ones. The C/N choice I'm sure will cause similar controversy!

I was going to comment on things throughout the discussion, but as I got further into the video I realized I had to focus on the Big Choice. I feel that Mike and Casen are falling into a trap that surprises me for them. They both are talking about having to recalibrate their understanding of who anyone is in light of the end of the chapter. And the truth is, you really don't. "I'm shocked that Denam could even be capable of this." Well, in the Chaos and Neutral routes, he couldn't do this; that's why there is a chaos chapter 2 at all. Denam is a unique case within this game -- his mannerisms and surface traits are consistent, but the player has authorship over the fundamental axioms that guide his decisions. Law Denam and Chaos Denam are not the same person, because he has made one of a pair of choices that represent diametrically opposed values. Again, if you choose X, you don't have to reconcile Denam's capacity for Y -- because he doesn't have it in this version of the story. Catiua is relatively easy to get. Denam is all she has left after the Lodisien raid on Golyat -- preserving his life is her one and only priority right now. At the top of this game, she would probably start an ogre battle herself if it meant that she and Denam would be together and safe. For me, Vyce is the most interesting case of the three for the end of chapter 1. At first blush, it feels gamey and contrived that he does whatever the opposite of Denam is. But when you look back, it actually makes perfect sense. Vyce is angry and traumatized over what happened to his home and his family. I suspect that there has always been some low level resentment or tension he's felt towards Denam -- but by the time we become participants in this story, he isn't even bothering to hide it anymore. He is generally hotheaded and hateful, but he mostly talks about things like he is parroting propaganda he's been fed. But when he's aggro toward Denam and Catiua, it's much more direct and personal. He attacks their relationship (admittedly, it's fair in some ways). In the law route it's muddier, because he gets to maintain the facade that his concerns are with the state and lives of the Walister. But the chaos route lays his real motivations bare. Vyce will do the opposite of you because he is so twisted up with rage that the target of his wrath is completely distorted. In the raid he lost everything and everyone. His best friend is "in the same position," but he still has a sister. He still has someone who cares for him, and looks out for him. He can stomach a sit-down with Lanselot Tartarus because, at this point, his resentment toward Denam has usurped his thirst for revenge

I love this channel. Keep up the good work, gentlemen!

I went Law first since I went in blind and didn't know this was a real choice. I figured the 5,000 were dying anyway. The question for me was: am I going to abandon my allies? Can I win this war on my own, or should I keep my alliances and try and influence the situation by staying in league with the Duke. So yea, I wasn't choosing to save 5,000 people. I was choosing whether I keep the duke as an ally, or I become a guerilla fighter without allies.

This is not to be a critique of mike at all- but i think the timing of the jurassic park review could not be more perfect for the argument mike is making. In the JP review he talks about how hard it is for him to get lost in emersion in new movies bc of his background as a writer -he says hes constantly breaking down archetypes and story patters in his head and he cant help it. I do this all the time when experiencing a “new” story and i may not be a writer myself, but i truly cant help it. I 100% understand where he is coming from in his argument in this episode. Thank you for the long episode guys it was really enjoyable and thank you to the guest as well.

Honestly, listening to some of the discord discussion...it sounds like some people can't accept that not every bit if Tactics Ogre's story is flawless.

In Universe:"Why is it called Ogre Battle and not Ogre War?" "Because the gods whooped them in ONE battle."

@ValeVin

7 ай бұрын

The more of the games in this series I play that hint at the original Ogre Battle, the more wacky it sounds... in the best way. Gods against evil, humans and ogres, and then random king who upset some goddess with a furry leopard hat and she turns him into a squid.

@orcbrand

7 ай бұрын

@@ValeVin sounds like real world mythology doesn't it! lol

Yes.

The gameboy advance tactics ogre game was really good. It's the game that got me into tactics games.

@orcbrand

7 ай бұрын

It's a solid game! It's just difficult to recommend a gameboy advance title in 2023 while also comparing it to the 2022 version of Tactics Ogre. If you play Reborn first and you really like the world and storytelling and enjoy tactical rpgs and don't mind emulating GBA it's a strong recommendation. If you don't have much patience with games like this and only do it for plot, you might enjoy a warren report recap of it more.

@Mors

7 ай бұрын

Knight of Lodis and Golden Sun were amazing RPGs to have on GBA. What a handheld.

@animagamer2

7 ай бұрын

@@orcbrand You say that like the GBA Fire Emblems aren't still held in very high regard, or that Golden Sun isn't considered one of the best JRPGs of that era. Don't sleep on the GBA, and don't let other people sleep on it either!

@orcbrand

7 ай бұрын

@@animagamer2 I like the gba fire emblems I just hate emulating the gba

@animagamer2

7 ай бұрын

@@orcbrand Really? Why? It's one of the simpler systems for emulation newbies, VBA is one of the most plug and play emus ever, no plugins no bios just download, extract get your ROM and play.

Thanks for making the discussion, I tried this game on the psp years ago, and didn't have enough context about the politics or paid attention to Vyce enough, that when I refused the genocide, I was shocked how Vyce when super evil, and maybe it's cause of how much I invested on him build wise, but I wanted to keep him, so I reseted and went Law route (lol). I was kinda really heh on the game past that point cause I had disconnected myself cause of that event that I didn't really enjoy the game that much. Not sure if I'm feeling like giving it another go, but we'll see when you guys finish the whole analysis.

I agree on playing through an entire path before trying a different one for story reasons. It is also the best strategy from a gameplay perspective; once you beat the main game a feature called “World Tarot” is unlocked which lets you go back and replay the story while maintaining your current party. This is of course useful to try different story paths but can also be used to save a character you accidentally let die, or even to redo fights for rewards. By using this system, you can end the game with every special character recruited. This feature was introduced in the PSP version of the game.

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

I hope Ivan can explain World Tarot to them after they finish Neutral; the plan is for them to get the worst ending there (which probably will happen naturally), then the Gilbald ending on Chaotic and the Princess ending on Lawful. They’ll need at least some understanding of CF for the middle one to succeed (plus to get a particular recruitable character).

The highlight of my week. I can't wait to watch this and have all the pain of tactics ogre be worth it

Brilliant. You guys are gold.

I found the decision quite interesting and I went with Law Route first, because I found it convincing enough when the game told me that this is the only way to win the war.

So happy you guys are doing this game. Cheers

Great episode guys! Definitely one of my favorites so far. Can’t wait to see y’all delve further into it.

Thanks for the awesome video. Very good game

Enjoying the analysis as always, keep up the good work guys

Great discussion guys, especially with regards to Balmamusa. I mentioned a little bit of this already on the episode when it was live, but I chose Law in my first playthrough and absolutely loved the game’s narrative from then on. All throughout Chapter 1, we are led to believe that Denam, Vyce, and Caitua would be our protagonists fighting for “the good guys” and against Galgastani oppression and to rescue Denam’s father from the Dark Knights of Lodis. I think that scene works for me precisely because it comes out of nowhere and is such a gut punch. Denam, the Hero of Golyat, is suddenly forced to contend with the fact that he is not necessarily the hero by default, that he is serving no kindly leader but a political schemer morally no better than his adversaries. It’s interesting because Denam is forced to open his eyes for the first time and see the war for what it really is and the lengths that might be demanded of him to secure victory. It also is worth mentioning that Denam is but a teenager, and that all of his resources are given by the Walister. It would make sense for him to follow orders here (1) either to secure a speedy end to the war; and (2) to overthrow the Duke and install a kinder, gentler liege at some later point in time.

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

There’s also how he was suddenly thrust into the role “Hero of Golyat”; he’s having a crap-ton of pressure put on his shoulders and when you get this what do you do? Following orders has been getting results; how can he know that the moral path won’t see the Walister increasingly crushed under the boots of Galgastan? For my part, I would have sooner chosen this than White Phosphorus (which would have made me never play SO:TL). There’s an optional scene in the Ravness recruitment where she discusses this with him; we’ll get to that eventually of course.

@michs7451

7 ай бұрын

@@borjankosarac3645 I think the game at that point leaves it open enough that Denam could possibly go either way (of course, the text seems to lean to Chaos). I think an idea that I'd like to see the game explore more would be the consequences of retaining one's moral integrity above all else. In Chaos, Denam is taking the very real risk that the Walister people might lose the war, because he was unable to overcome his moral scruples. Denam in that route would also be an exile, left out to dry, unable to productively contribute towards the war efforts of his people.

@oblivion9999

7 ай бұрын

@@michs7451 It's also important to note that Denam does not directly partake in the massacre. The way the two goofs speak is as if Denam's choice is between not participating and slaughtering a bunch of innocents while laughing maniacally, which is not the case.

@michs7451

7 ай бұрын

@@oblivion9999 There's no need to talk about Mike and Casen that way. I think from the way the scene is initially framed, you don't get a sense that Denam is not as involved in the massacre as someone like Leonar. Either way, I think the difference is a slight one. Denam in the Law route was complicit in a horrific massacre and ought to bear responsibility for his actions. Even in that route, I don't think Denam shies away from what he has done.

@oblivion9999

7 ай бұрын

@@michs7451 I think t's valid to refer to them as goofs from the moment they get so stuck mocking and criticizing a route they're not even planning on playing yet, whitlist missing out on much of the context the game provides. Either way, I think the difference is a bit greater than what you put. Denam was not into the plan, he was brought there to liberate his people and by the moment he gets to make a choice, there is very little he can actually do about it. This is planned out by the Duke in a way Denam has very little agency on how things will turn out, since, in order to oppose the plan, Denam will have to forsake his Liege, he will have to risk hurting his cause, he would be throwing away his reputation, putting himself, his sister and all of his squad at risk, all of that knowing that he can't do anything to actually save those people. From my perspective his biggest crime here is turning a blind eye to a horrific situation while his hands are tied.

@2:05:00 If you want to know where to play to and what choice to make without having to listen to the Law Route Spoilers. Play through Chapter 2 and choose "You're right, this is no time to fight." (Neutral).

I had the exact opposite reaction to the choice. In my mind, I was simply thinking "Ah, so here's where it happens. This is where the party turns in the Duke", but then after I saw that you could choose to actually go through this my mind started spinning. And it's like you said, I had to rewrite my impression of all these characters in my mind on the spot. Could Denim actually do this? And it's then that the chapter titled echoed in my mind "There is blood on my hands. How long till it lies in my heart?". That's when I realized everything had been building towards this and it just blew me away. Absolutely love it.

The Vyce thing is tricky, and it's definitely reviled by a lot of people. I will say that there are at least..... arguments, missing information, and dots that can be connected that I think validly justifies the supposed "change" in personality beyond just being a plot device, but in a way that probably still won't be convincing or feel "perfect" for most (on balance, I like it more than I dislike it). I would argue that his earlier lines get reframed by what is hinted about how his mind actually works after the fact, and you may realize your first impression of what was being presented was mistaken (partly because the surface reading fits a common stereotype that's easy to accept at face value and hard to shake). It's not that explicitly told, though-- you kind of have to piece it together based on context clues (it's so ambiguous and unclear that it remains an uncompelling flaw for most). People often consider this early deception a flaw no matter what because it feels jarring/nonsensical in the moment (and it definitely does), but I think the big moment is meant to reveal that his character mystifyingly isn't as simple as what he appeared to be initially (and that people aren't in general), and it's meant to create a mystery/enigma that extends beyond the initial playthrough. There are numerous subtle little moments (even before Balmamusa) that foreshadows that both Vyce and Catiua are not remotely motivated by any of the war-related moral convictions or revenge/justice-related motivations that they let on or pay lip-service to in their dialogue (numerous contradictions in his words/actions suggest this: the fact that he stays quiet during the peace treaty scene is one, a very deliberate choice, and the way he frames his objection to Cistina based on lack of hardships compared to what HE suffered rather than what initially seemed like straight nationalism/tribalism is another). I think you caught onto the Catiua ones, but may have dismissed the Vyce ones as plot inconsistencies or oddities. Both Vyce and Catiua are instead purely motivated by entirely self-serving personal interests, attachments, and complexes that overshadow these other broader considerations for them (these get projected onto Denam a lot), and everything that they present related to surface level convictions are merely ploys that allow them to manipulate their world view in the direction of what they actually want. I feel like this is a heavy commentary on what most people tend to be like as well-- actual convictions tend have very little to do with what actions most people take in these conflicts-- I think this is one of the main themes of the game as well. This is more obvious and perhaps well done with Catiua, which I assume is why Casen feels that her character is still in tact (unlike Vyce, they never hide this or save it for later), but everything that applies to Catiua technically applies to Vyce as well-- they're basically identical but opposite parallels/contrasts to each other (the idea of a helicopter mom stupidly excusing their son's actions no matter what is not that different from the idea of a rebellious teenager stupidly reviling their parents' actions no matter what). The delivery of one is just less convincing and upfront, but it's cool in a different, archeological-dig kind of way, I feel. The character and the transition in particular could have been cooked more, I agree, but on balance, I ended up liking what they were going for a lot. I also think that they exaggerated the difference in Vyce portraits in the PSP version in a way that hurts the transition (the original portraits portray this change less cartoonishly). Having more scenes where these two characters grapple the "ends justifies the means" struggle leading up to the Balmamusa choice would defeat the purpose of their characters, in my opinion (though it's a reasonable suggestion for Denam)-- the point is that they initially don't care about the ends OR the means, they care about themselves and their own feelings (maybe an extra scene where someone calls out Vyce's contradictions would help, or would it be too on the nose?). Personally, I found this extra dynamic really refreshing and missing in Final Fantasy Tactics. I also find it very useful to keep in mind that Vyce is very similar/is the psychological precursor to Argath far more than he has anything to do with Delita. Other characters serve as far better precursors to Delita, in my opinion.

@1calv

7 ай бұрын

I wholeheartedly agree with your comment. And yeah, I'm surprised they didn't notice how the shape of Vyce's sprite is literally Argath. It's understandable that they assume "Vyce is friend character therefore his relationship to Denam will be like Delita" but ironically Denam himself is more like Delita than Vyce is. I also agree that the argument between Cistina and Vyce has nuance because of their completely different situations.

@Gaarkukan21

7 ай бұрын

I consider Vyce to be a pretty great foil for Denam. In essence he's an insecure person who either gives into his worst traits just to spite his perceived childhood rival or snaps out of his jealousy the moment he realizes said rival is willing to commit genocide. In denying the genocide Denam gives into his emotions while Vyce gives into his Hatred leading him to drown in his insecurities. In joining in on Genocide Denam gives into cold logic while Vyce gives into critical thought leading him to become a more well-rounded person later in the story. His betrayal seems unreasonable when in reality Vyce really was just that petty towards Denam. The story does color their relationship as having always been aggressive, mainly from Vyce's feelings towards Cautia.

@richardkhchang

7 ай бұрын

@@1calv Also, they have the exact same plot-cross-bow moment. I disagree on Denam being similar to Delita, though-- it's still very much the same mindset that Ramza occupies, IMO. I think you could argue that Law Denam is early Corpse-brigade era Ramza, Neutral Denam is mid-game Ramza, and Chaos Denam is end-game Ramza. The two guys who I think are Delita through and through are........ SPOILERS BELOW Leonar and Lanselot Tartaros.

@richardkhchang

7 ай бұрын

@@Gaarkukan21 Another way that I like to interpret this is that if Denam commits genocide, Vyce's inferiority complex gets completely resolved, because he's won, essentially. After that moment, Denam IS an inferior person to Vyce, and nothing he ever accomplishes will ever change that-- it no longer makes sense to be jealous of him. This frees himself up to be his own person again. There's a missable scene I think after one of the law chapters end that I think vaguely suggests this (it's called "Familiar Friends").

@Gaarkukan21

7 ай бұрын

@@richardkhchang That's more than likely a large part of his character arc becoming more receptive to Law Denam. He grew out of his reactionary phase and starts to see the bigger picture.

I like games such as Tactics Ogre and Shin Megami Tensei where the player is in a sense invited to be both the director, the writer, and the audience member of the story. It is very immersive for me, and feels as though my actions have a key role in shaping the plot and the future of this world. It’s very interesting that Matsuno was inspired by the “delusionary” period between Star Wars and Empire because he’s pretty much making it mandatory for his audience to do that with this game. I think the main problem with Tactics Ogre is that they went halfway with some of their storytelling decisions. Vyce’s abrupt change in personality is still unconvincing for me, and the game almost requires the player to go out of their way to choose certain dialogue options and imagine a scenario where Denam would be likely to choose that particular option of events. I had no problem with Balmamusa, but Neutral severely strained my disbelief and I look forward to seeing how the both of you think about that path moving onward.

It’s weird that people will do backflips to justify law as any kind of logical choice when the literal devs felt the need to add tangible character recruitment incentives because so few people picked it Also legitimate criticism is when someone agrees with the criticism, being too hard on a game is when someone disagrees

It’s cool to see that this game can still generate such lively discussions many years after its release. I do agree this game is definitely a product of its time and with the updates could have been presented better but I applaud this game for not being afraid to punch low. I also see this as one of those “choice” heard round the world. Notably I am reminded of Fire Emblem Fates in its original inception it was a game built around a single choice Hoshido or Nohr with both a story context and a gameplay context. Unfortunately the games writing quality and desire to make the main character look good no matter the choice stifles its impact. It also didn’t help that they decided to sell it as two separate games. Tactics Ogre was doing a lot of impressive things for its time and that is to be commended. I look forward to seeing you tackle the rest of the game.

@dangerousshoes

7 ай бұрын

development of fire emblem fates be like

Was it just me or did this video have a ton of ads in it relative to usual? Loved the discussion and totally agree with Mike and Casen on the choice at the end of the chapter

There's a lot of comments on here already, but I want to add that Lawful does not equate good. Chaotic does not equate evil. It might make more sense to label it as Order and Chaos instead. One is for reclaiming order, one will cause cause further chaos. Even Neutral doesn't fit. It's more like if Denam chooses his own way instead of following one side or the other. If he doesn't listen to either Vyce or Catiua. It's not neutral, it's just his own solution. One can make an evil decision for the sake of order, ending the war. Stomping out the resistance, upholding the empire, IE Anakin's fall to Darth Vader. I also think your criticisms on the characters are valid however. Vyce is cartoonishly evil compared to Tartarus. It's more like he is just consumed by rage and that determines most of his decisions. The characters do not really fit neatly into the simple roles of Order, Chaos, or Neutral and that can cause some dissonance. Love the game though. Already poured hours into it looking for more FF Tactics like games.

I think you can use the Milgram experiment for Denam reasoning to go along with the plan

Thank you for reuniting the Tactics Ogre community once again!

Hmm. I've never had any difficulty accepting Denam's decision either way. As you say, Denam is calm and measured, and... that's about it, until now. He isn't the ostensible bleeding heart; that's Catiua. It feels like you're trying to ascribe the rationalization of Vyce's decision (that he's impulsive and reactionary) to Denam, when they have totally different reasons for going through with it. Denam, rather than being rash, makes the decision out of calculation; he realizes the plan really is necessary to galvanize the people, or they're going to lose. He's shocked at first, but comes around when he realizes the stakes, because Leonar is recounting his own conversation with the Duke -- that's what that flashback is implied to be. I agree that Vyce's character isn't nearly as well-developed, nor his dynamic with the lead as well-executed, as FFT's Delita. But that was Matsuno iterating and honing his storytelling. That said, while Vyce's different personalities and portraits can be jarring, it is developed a bit better later on; Vyce is indeed impulsive and reactionary... but partly because of how he sees himself as a foil to Denam, a contrarian against him, for reasons gone into later. Overall I think that the game does a pretty decent job maintaining a consistency of character with Denam between Law & Chaos. Much of his core characterization is the same regardless, but the choices he makes inform his struggles.

@orcbrand

7 ай бұрын

Thank you this comments sums up my thoughts on this better than I could.

"I don't even drink wine in Harvest Moon!" bruh i just about spat my coffee out in the office

Learning the details Vyce and Denam's friendship and past is possible... only on Post game final chapter of all things which is extremely late (also some details in chapter 2 chaotic battle conversations). But basic gist of it is that after the trio became orphans, Vyce did a lot to help feeding them, hunting, stealing from bakram soldier's tables etc. all the while Denam and Catiua didn't leave their hiding hole. Catiua never thanked him and instead pampered Denam which made him very jealous. And it seems he barely even got a thank you for all that hunting and risking limbs. It seems its during this time that he transformed into a real bitter boy.

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

Probably had burgeoning misgivings before that - like, is Denam just pitying me because he feels bad my father is a derided drunkard? - but yeah; it probably solidified into far greater grievances with them over time. There is much Show, Don’t Tell in this narrative which is as always a double-edged sword. But Matsuno was still improving his storytelling craft back then; even as someone who unilaterally prefers this to FFT (if nothing else, the Lucavi just lose me at the last stretch there), I can recognise the writing isn’t yet as sharp.

having gone Law first, Vyce is a fascinating character to me for spoiler reasons for that path. I find the way he butts heads with Denam and Catiua to be extremely reflective of how real world resistance movements tend to go - you /have/ to team up with people you don't like because there's a greater enemy. That seems to be a recurring narrative trend in this game - juggling people you don't like, actions you don't agree with, and weighing them against the greater cause. It's about the ethical equations of how much do you hate the enemy in order to balance out the rest. I like Vyce's unlikability at the start here because it really conveys that feeling of: when you wage a war as a resistance, you don't have the luxury of choice when it comes to your allies. That seems in line with the greater idea behind this game so far.

@jamesk2325

7 ай бұрын

also gotta say, The Choice really hit hard for me because after seeing just how wretched the galgastani treat the wallister to this point, plus how miserable the conditions are, and that they're continuing to eradicate the Wallister - the context of the heirophant starting a /blood war/ to exterminate them - I totally can understand the logic of "if we kill one camp, we can save everyone else - and if we don't, we're all going to die horrribly anyway." It's a desperate move made out of desperation, and I can understand it for that reason and in that context. I don't think it's necessarily the correct choice but I do think it does a great job of establishing just how desperate the Wallister have become. It's a trolley problem.

@fernandozavaletabustos205

6 ай бұрын

The Law choice of Balmamusa is chosing the "lesser evil", even if that decision turns into a monster.@@jamesk2325

I have to hard agree with Casen here that Vyce is not a character, he is a plot device. In any analysis, it's good to talk about what's both well written and what is poorly written. And I think Mike and Casen did a fantastic job in breaking down the chapter 1 major choice in the game.

1:39:00 I am so glad Casen questioned that statement. Not that the Nationalist position was the wrong interpretation, because it was a national position. But to associate it by making it about race is a tad extra. We see this in writing and in history, whether the Sunni and Shia Muslims, differing tribes in Africa, even North and South Koreas. Each side is vying for the power to have their side recognized as a sovereign power over a nation, not necessarily their own individual nation. To associate that with only a single race seems a tad narrow sighted. There is this one saying I’m sure other people in the comments have heard. So long as there are 2 people on earth there will always be conflict. The conflict will continue until the human population drops to 1 or less.

My ancestors survived "stockholms bloodbath" during the medieval age when 100 + people got beheaded by sneaking out of the castle/city- this game is dark but then again "innocent people" who got executed got to heaven in their view, so it was a diffrent mindset.

As far as the stuff with paths, Vyse, and the story goes, you hit the nail on the head at time 2:24:00+ . Chaos feels like the natural path. I'm also sure it was the path that many people would have chosen without guides/KZread, I know I sure did. I like to look at Law as a "what if" scenario, that you can come back to later. "Well yea, of course that's not what I would have done, but.... what if my story had continued down this path." This satisfies me for most of the issues that come up, because I agree Law would be weakly built up in the beginning. You can tell it inspired Final Fantasy Tactics Delita and Ramzah. I hope this is another helpful way to look at things.

I dunno, the context of the Wallisters having been on the losing side of a war of ethnic cleansing was enough to see Denam ,or anyone, make the Law decision. I mean once The Hierophant is done clearing out the rebellion at home the Wallisters are next on the chopping block and have no chance of resistance w/o unification. For the Wallisters this is a battle for survival. EDIT: Having finished watching the Discord Discussion, I think the guys on Discord need to chill a bit. Like they are free to see and analyze this story however they see it in the moment. Even though I have stated that I didn't get the same disconnect as they did, doesn't men I think they are wrong, or need to change their perspective, or that they are judging the game incorrectly. The idea that there is a wrong way to interpret art in any form is ridiculous.

@dudemcguy1227

7 ай бұрын

I don't think anyone on the discord said that anyone was "wrong" for having a different interpretation. I think Casen may have just phrased it that way when discussing the concept of the player having to "write the characters" for the director, but I don't think that's exactly what we meant to imply or say. Sometimes they have like 10 or 20 minutes to talk after the episode before Casen has to catch the train, so that section is usually just a fun back and forth with the Patrons on discord to talk about the story. We didn't know that our discord discussion would be inserted at the back end of the podcast (this is the first time that happened lol), but overall it was probably a good thing because without that extra back and forth at the end Mike and Casen might have come off as too harsh on the game in just the part that was recorded with Ivan for the podcast.

@sehrverrueckt3358

7 ай бұрын

@@dudemcguy1227 Understandable, but that was how it came off as someone who was only viewing the podcast.

Re: decision at the end. I believe the choice is more about whether Denam is someone who follows orders (law) or chooses his own path (chaos). If you go the Law route in the moment I don’t think the reading is “I Denam wholeheartedly supports this decision.” It is more saying “This is what Leonor and the duke command me to do.”

@bartandaelus359

7 ай бұрын

This is just an observation but the way I'm seeing it from the outside of this fandom is that the only people who defend it are the diehard fans who can quote loot drop rate tables at you from memory. Really intense fans seem to be super forgiving of this, likely because all the added context form all other routes and later talk sections and lore etc retroactively inform their understanding of it and create enormous bias. Anyone playing this for the first time clearly thinks doing genocide is an obviously objectively bad thing and Denam wouldn't do it based on what we've seen.

@kalemuteki

7 ай бұрын

When I first played the game, it was TO:R at release a year or so ago. I went Law route because (1) I didn't know this was a choice and (2) it felt like a choice between keeping your allies OR throwing all your alliances away and fighting on your own. Since these were a bunch of kids, it felt like it was natural to follow orders. Maybe I could later stop the massacre, but I can't be insubordinate now. So it isn't all just rationalization. I tend to roleplay in games, so I was making this decision as if I was a 17 year old in way over his head. I didn't feel like Denim was "the chosen one", so why would he go against his lords and commanders? These are the good guys and your friends. Would you betray them? It's fine that others find this completely abhorrant and impossible to pick anything other than "Stop this Lunacy!" The writing could be better. I don't know if the SNES pixel graphics could have been a good medium for this. Looking back, the choice is the moment Denim realizes that his betters aren't actually better. In Chaos, that decision came before the slaughter. In Law, that realization happens immediately after the slaughter. He then is given the opportunity to replace the royalty either from within the alliance, or from without. Going Law first also gave me a different insight into Vyce. His switch for Chaos was even more jarring because of how different he is from Law.

The intelligent tyrant leaves just an ounce for the oppressed to live for, so that they are kept from having absolutely nothing to lose, because it's when people have nothing to lose that they become truly (and justifiably) radicalized -- and the oppressor knows that. This is a state of affairs deliberately established by the oppressor, and if left that way will perpetuate the suffering indefinitely. It's a classic dynamic between the powerful and their victims that exists at many scales and at many points in history. You're trying to kickstart a rebellion, you know what the oppressors are doing to placate people who might otherwise seek liberation, and you could undermine that insidious tactic to the long-term benefit of a people, breaking the spell of marginalization and terror that they are held under by the imperial or colonial power. Will you just allow an evil empire to forestall justice by dispensing 'cattle's luxuries', when you could forcibly martyr a few people who won't even fight for their own lives, liberating not only millions currently living but all of their descendants, too? I'm a relatively comfortable person living in a wealthy, peaceful country, so I can't say what my thought process would be in the Walister position -- but you can't be surprised that desperate and brutalized people would see the logic in it, even see it as a moral imperative. How many more Walister will eventually be killed if you don't do it? Galgastan slaughtered an entire village because they THOUGHT a rebel was hiding there. What cost is too high to make this stop? This is part of the evil of oppression, too -- the evil that those afflicted are forced to consider when stripped of all other options by a disproportionately powerful enemy. An example is Battlestar Galactica 2003, which won a Peabody award for depicting a scenario in which the desperate protagonists were forced to consider the use of suicide bombs when faced with a genocidal occupation. I think this choice, from the perspective of these characters, is much more fraught than we can easily imagine in our positions. This is enough to make me believe, even at this point, that Denam would consider killing those people, and that Vyce might think that it would be evil NOT to. It's also valuable in that it confronts the audience with the harrowing position that such peoples can find themselves in. Incredible that Matsuno was doing this on the Super Nintendo. I agree that the Vyce character is a mess and that we needed to see his equivalent of a Teta (or Tietra).

great podcat thanks a lot

Mike flexing his beard game

I feel some context of being in a military organization might take effect into the reason for choosing to kill those people. Not often do you disobey orders from a superior in a Military organization. There is a reason for a chain of command and order of operations. (not to get too political) But that would be seen as someone who does drone strikes for a military to be "no im not doing that" ( which may happen on the rare occasion but not often). Denam up to this point has yet to refuse an order given by the Duke. Not once did he go im not doing this mission. He followed the Dukes orders without much thought or hesitation. This is a lot of what if's and hypotheticals but an interesting thought none the less.

@DarkSol13

7 ай бұрын

This. To add to that, I think SMT and some other similar games have conditioned players to always treat Law/Chaos/Neutral choice as it relates to general MORALITY, whereas In my opinion Tactics Ogre frames its choice as it relates to AUTHORITY even if said authority is enforcing things that are morally evil. It honestly makes way more sense to read it that way. EDIT: I mean, hell, the whole Law/Chaos/Neutral thing is just arbitrary terminology (and a loaded one at that) invented by players for the sake of convenience to begin with. I'm not 100% certain, I'd have to check, but as I recall even SMT games don't feature this denomination in the in-game text. Not on save files and not anywhere else.

@michs7451

7 ай бұрын

@@DarkSol13 Speaking as a massive SMT fan, I don't think Law/Neutral/Chaos in those series of games translate to morality inasmuch as a general worldview. Kid Capes has an excellent video on it, entitled "Beyond Good and Evil" that talks about how the SMT series (especially SMT1) deal with these concepts. SMT does explicitly refer to the endings as "Law/Neutral/Chaos" in case anyone is curious.

Been following these episodes silently but wow i have a LOT to say on this one honestly, so pardon me for the text wall. Should have no spoilers tho That said minor thing first, "Lanselot is the protagonist of another game" is like, a true statement, but in that context was slightly misleading? Knight of Lodis was made after this game, it was made AS a backstory for lanselot essentially (and set-up to a few other things, most of which i think never bore fruit, so is the fate of the ogre series), you're not neccesarely supposed to be sympathic to him in this game because you know him or anything. Its not quite like the Xenobians, who you COULD have met before when the game release, for instance. What i want to say about the L route specifically is very difficult to put into words in a good way, this was difficult to write and i had to think a lot about how to convey it, but i'll begin with this: There was a lot of focus in how Denam is either 100% character or 100% blank slate, and to me that is bizarre because in my opinion, not just him but 3/4 Ogre series protagonists are like, in the middle, they are both things. Its both true that there is characterization, theres a character, the character doesn't BEGIN at chapter 2, but its also true that the choices you make mold that character, and i don't really see a contradiction or an issue in that. It doesn't null some criticism of course, i think theres some valid aspects to what both of them said about the writing, but i also think theres a part of the criticism coming from a completely wrong angle because it refuses reconcile these 2 aspects of Denam. The above applies to Vyce too while at it, and personally i think calling him a plot device is IN MY OPINION (no offense) a bit too overreductive. Thats again, not to say that your criticisms towards him are invalid, i actually have my fair share of criticism regarding vyce, albeit MY issues with him are more so with C/N vyce, which probably sounds insane rn, but can't go further without spoilers so i'll leave it at that Personally i'm quiite fond of this approach, both suggestions made to make the choice scene "work better" would, for me, have made it vastly worse. I do not think i would have liked this game as much if we made it a Shin Megami Tensei style "one is a reprensentative of L route and one of C route", and thats coming from someone that likes Shin Megami Tensei. I think the way the game approaches it is far more interesting as is. I don't think i conveyed my points nearly as well as i wanted but i think i gotta stop at some point lol theres a few more things i wanted to say regarding the cistina dialogue choices but i'll end up rewrote this entire comment enough already

My guy Ivan trying to get you guys in trouble with that nymphs mural on the background >XD Hopefully youtube don't give you guys flack for that

@orcbrand

7 ай бұрын

haha I did ask ahead of time if it's too racy 😂

btw was Reborn really rewritten? Did they not just take the script from the PSP version?

Casen saying "THEEEE 'GUCH!" was absolute gold

I only watched until the "law route discussion" section, so I'm only responding to what came before. I think that, more than most, I can understand the Duke's plot and why someone would go along with it. I imagine myself as a member of a systematically oppressed group, where all of my people have been suffering for decades and where everyone who's left is either part of a losing revolutionary battle OR stuck in an internment camp. In that context, it's not hard for me to imagine myself *considering* the Duke's plan. It's not that the massacre is even remotely palatable: We're talking about a false flag attack on your own innocent, oppressed people. But even so, it's a plan that *makes sense*. This is a context of long, systemic oppression and a sense that your people are being defeated by their own helplessness and loss of faith in any improved future. And, beyond the Duke offering some real hope for a better future, Denam makes the choice from a position of powerlessness: If he refuses, the massacre is going to happen anyway. If he opposes the Duke, not only is the path to defeating him unclear but he's now undermining the one political figure his people can rally behind. I can see why someone would be willing to entertain these actions for the sake of a better future. To me (and I think this probably makes me sound like a horrible person) the reason to refuse is not because the atrocity is so unthinkable. It's because the nature of the atrocity calls the Duke's long-term plan into question. If he's willing to do this to the Walister people, why should we believe that his rule will actually improve our lot? The chaos route Denam, to me, isn't just saying, "I'm unwilling to make this immoral choice." He's saying, "The Walister need a future free from this oppression. Helping the Duke gain power doesn't feel like liberation. It just feels like allowing a different man to hold our chains."

Should Demin choice have been to resist the duke’s command or run away?

I like the conclusion you guys get on the end that was how I played the game I finish first and when replaying I was shocked on how different the character were depending on the route.

The reason Denam as a character might choose the Lawful route is because he, Catiua, and Vyce were motivated to fight by their parents/town being massacred, and as they build their resistance and notice the other wallister are not so motivated it's expected that giving them the same motivation you have should work. I agree this is bad writing and BS narrative because typically when you're inspired to fight against somebody massacring your people you don't respond by massacring your people. Also granted Denam's town wasn't 5,000 wallister in a concentration camp, but they were still wallister killed for no good reason, and other similar events were going on so I think people would still either be interested in fighting, or interested in fleeing/hiding and that's that. maybe killing people in the camps specifically made them think flight was not an option anymore, but come on, it's not like the people who chose not to fight were living decent lives without being massacred. it's a real edgy "this is the cruelty of the practical reality" without giving us maybe a character who thinks they're above the people being massacred like a Noble who hasn't experienced being on the receiving end, unfortunately that is the opposite of the character we have been presented with. I wasn't very impressed with Tactics Ogre generally speaking, which is a real shame because i love the genre and ability to get so many varieties of Dragon on my team. The overt forceful balancing of the enemies and battles didn't make the game harder per say, it just made it more linear and uninteresting. No reward for setting up your own style, because that might not be the effective style without over-levelling, and no reward for getting "stronger" because everything is nerfed down. If anybody wants to design an RPG and make it FUN look at this game (reborn version) and FFT:WOTL to understand how much more satisfying it is to start the game at parity with your opponents, or often underdogs compared to your opponents and become absolute units towards the end with one man armies. not only is it more satisfying and rewarding in a gameplay perspective, but it makes slower more tedious battles like TRPGs have avoid becoming a complete slog/chore after the game goes on for too long. I got to the post game for Reborn and immediately lost all interest in the other branches and post game content because no special legendary equipment or hard to unlock class/skill/character is ever going to be more impressive than casting poison on somebody.

What I find interesting about the Balmamusa decision, is how sure the duke is about how this massacre will be percieved. In addition to the atrocity being committed, there is a chance it won't have the effect the duke wants. What if a witness escapes and tell other Walosters that their own Duke Ronway's soldiers are killing their own people? There is a strong possibility this could completely backfire and they won't get the support they need. I agree with Mike's criticism here. The decision is very black/white. The game gives no negative consequences to the chaotic decision, but if there was a negative consequence, the whole situation would be incredibly bleak.

@michs7451

7 ай бұрын

This is a great point! It's callous how readily Duke Ronwey was willing to sacrifice 5000 of his people and perpetuate a horrific genocide when there was no sure hope on his part that the war would go his way.

Nooooo you're making me drop out. I'm currently in Chapter 3 of Chaos route and will heed your words. I am loving the podcast on this game guys and will be back to continue after I've finished said route.

Choosing the law route reminds me of, in Crono Trigger, choosing not to save kid -- it's the only way to get Glenn

An episode over 2 hours lets gooooooooooooo

This is going to be a long comment. Edit: (I do not recommend reading unless you've completed at least 1 playthrough) I want to explain the difference between nationalism as liberation and nationalism as oppression, because I do not think saying "secure a future for the Wallister" is the same is white nationalism even though it's a similar phrase. Most people consider white nationalism as an evil because it is used to oppress others. National liberation, on the other hand, is used to fight against such oppression. The nationalism on the Wallister side is not about genociding Galgastanis in the way that Galgastani nationalism is oppressive towards Wallisters. They want to liberate themselves and establish a state so that they can free themselves from Galgastani occupation. Galgastani nationalism is not about liberating themselves from anything, it is about making a Galgastani ethnostate and suppressing the Wallister. This is also why the scene with Cistina complicated. The position of the Wallister, who are in such terrible conditions that they have no choice but to fight back with everything they have, is far different from Cistina's relatively privileged situation. Who is she to decide how the Wallister should resist oppression when her people are not currently under occupation? The Wallister are in no position to compromise, they have to fight, and they have to be selfish at least temporarily. However, Cistina is also not wrong. There comes a point where this nationalism stops being useful once the Wallister are out of complete destitution. Because the real battle, that Cistina correctly assesses, is along class lines. But my point is that the immediate objective of the Wallister is to liberate themselves, the class conflict will come later. Oh boy, Balmamusa time. I totally understand your guys' criticisms (even though I disagree), however you spend so much time being confused that you forgot to actually talk about what was being said. I disagree that it makes no sense for Denam to pick the law route (even just going off of chapter 1). Nobody in the scene (except for maybe chaos Vyce) is making any moral justification for the massacre. Leonar's argument is that they will lose this war if they don't do this. You forget that even Leonar was appalled (just like Denam) when the plan was first explained to him. He did not convince himself that these means would be morally justified, he convinced himself that this is the only way to win. You are right to say that Denam is not the type of person to do this, but the point is exactly that. He is being manipulated into doing something he otherwise would never do. Being told it's his only option and that he has an obligation to do so. Otherwise good people can be made to be complicit in doing something terrible if they are coerced to by an authority figure who will likely kill you if you do not comply. I think the point of the choices is simply to explore "What if this character had been in a state of mind (or was convinced) to make this decision?" I don't think they are completely different characters across routes (even Vyce), just different possibilities for their personalities to develop Looking at this decision as being intended to be morally gray is probably not the best way to look at it; this decision in hindsight is clearly not intended to be morally gray. Because (spoilers ahead without specific details) being complicit in the massacre *is* the *wrong* decision. The game spells it you for you in both routes that it was, in fact, evil and meant to further then ends of the nobility, not the people. The reason Denam made the decision at the time is because he did not know that the ends that come from taking the quick and bloody way to victory, are not the ends he actually desires. It's also a mistake to try and see Denam and Vyce as a Ramza-Delita relationship. Most of the themes in FFT are present in Tactics Ogre but in different places. I'd argue you see more elements of Delita in Denam or Leonar than you do in Vyce. Ok I'm done. I love the podcast so far. I'm excited for chapter 2.

@1calv

7 ай бұрын

Thinking about it now, my comment comes off as kinda harsh. I just get excited to discuss this game. I think Mike, Casen, and Ivan are doing a great job, and their initial reaction to the end of chapter 1 is understandable.

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

You weren’t all wrong, especially on the matter of expectations with the “friendships” compared to FFT; see, Ramza and Delita actually had very similar temperaments to start with, but the class lines and how they led to Tietra’s murder fractured them - albeit, they were still somewhat cordial later and worked together several times. But in Denam and Vyce, they’re of the same working peasant class yet because of their differences in home lives and upbringing, they’re already in a state of “friendship in name only” (arguably, Denam is a genuine friend whereas Vyce isn’t).

2:23:33 I'm pretty sure the response you're looking for to the "the justification comes later/in the other route" is "that you needed it to have happened already." You don't think you should have to play through the game a second time, and take a different route, to see the thing that would have made the choice work for you, if it had just been done beforehand.

That cold open was so spot on.

From a gameplay perspective, I wanted to add that the normal recruit skill works on hawkmen. The beast tamer in Cistina's fight also drops their classmarks. While they do let you empower and tame dragons and monsters, they're powerful on their own (whips are amazing with great finishers), and their lobber ability lets you toss healing items to allies... toss buff items to allies.... and the most important thing: toss debuff items on enemies, including bosses. Tossing a weaken on a physical boss or spellspoil on a caster boss like Nybeth makes life a lot easier. While you only get four item slots, debuff items last about 50-70% of a battle. (You can also toss breach or enfeeble.) And a hawkman beast tamer means they can also get into position to debuff. The lizards in Gannp's fight can be recruited with a wizard/enchantress's coax ability. The same way hawkmen have access to some classes humans don't (vartan), lizardmen and snake ladies get access to hoplites (a powerful defensive unit), juggernauts, and matriarchs. Juggernauts get autoskills that peel phalanx/dragon's eye/buffs/debuffs off nearby enemies, silence/mana drain them, or stop them. Matriarch/patriarch marks won't come until later, but I'd argue they're the best general caster in the game. Having a flood dragon to use as a bridge or ladder to help your troops navigate water/walls is handy. And there's no point in the game where a gryphon wasn't useful. Monsters have high hp but lower defense, meaning they're lightning rods for archers and casters. Dragons gain defensive skills, making them great tanks. Gryphons' version of "throw stone" hits super hard against casters and archers, and they get a life steal. For dragon varieties, the difference is movement type and breath attack. Fire dragons can stand in lava, flood dragons water. Fire has weaken breath (Dragon's Eye going off means the status effect from the breath will always hit), flood has breach (lower physical attack), light has spoilspell (casters do half damage), dark has enfeeble (makes them take 50% more magic damage), hydra have poison. I guess, going into chapter 2, you've now got multiple races to recruit (hawkmen, reptiles, dragons, monsters, faeries from vartan's fey pact) with their own classes to play around with. Go wild =] (If you're after gremlins or orcs, they're classified as demons, so you're out of luck... for now.) Oh, and the enemy needs to have super low health and you need to be right next to them, then the recruit chance goes up to about 40% max. But they also need to be able to consent. So silence or fear prevents recruitment. You can't force someone to join you.

My opinion is that all the justification is on Hamilton. Denam's with him implies that Hamilton is sort of a role model, but the way Denam talks to him has a hesitance that implies that Denam is scared of what he himself will do. But Hamilton does NOT tell him not to do the evil thing. He gives advice on how to keep moving forward, no matter what.

My way of understanding Vyce is that it's wrong to think of him as a person with a singular point of view. He's more of a fated rival to Denam and the end of the chapter here is kind of the inflection point where he was going to define himself in opposition to Denam no matter what. Deep down he was never going to be Denam's sidekick.

Y'all definitely did what ya said you weren't trying to do and harped waaaaay too friggin much 🤣 But oh well, still a good pod

1:27:00 Did you notice Matsuno used this False Flag scenario in the FFT opening battle?

1:29:08 Join the dark side. we have cookies moment

There’s a lot of complexity to certain characters you won’t see in just one route; in a way, there’s different aspects to certain people depending on how events play out. This also applies to minutiae like how you interact with Cistina; if you didn’t prioritise saving her (which is the only way she can die in Chapter 1; otherwise it is like Argath in FFT where letting them fall is Game Over) and she lives, she’s more aloof towards Denam which is why she doesn’t ask why you fight. More salient is seeing how Vyce develops based on Denam’s actions, but that’s for later. Appreciate how complicated everything is, and that we’re given people who aren’t immediately likeable; ironically the Xenobians are the most amicable group in the story even with their own agenda. On Ravness: to my understanding she was intended to be part of the original build on the SNES but limited cartridge space meant she got cut. If true, this means Agrias in FFT was reusing a then-unused character design, at least until the PSP put her story in… It’s also a bit unclear exactly how many story branching was planned; the 2020 interview where Matsuno talked of BLM, he seemed to say there were FOUR routes originally (they were called Route A, B and C; presumably one would be D if there was an additional branch). My guess is that a lot of additional content that would have appeared elsewhere was distributed between the three paths they prioritised actually making; Chapter 4 is also the same story but with different bits based on which route you played into.

@orcbrand

7 ай бұрын

The initial plan was for 4 routes, yes. The 4th route was going to be a *second* neutral route that you would access from Chapter 2 Law. Spoilers below Presumably, in 3LN you would side with the Duke against Leonar, and he would survive as he does in 3CN. But we can only speculate.

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

…OK, on Vyce I will say this: my interpretation of how he reacts to Denam’s choice at Balmamusa is that he EXPECTS the Chaos path. Except that if you go Law, he’s recoiled in shock; Denam is the “good boy”, he’s the one everyone always looks to and praises, the one who everyone expects good things from. I do not believe that Vyce would ever have expected Denam to make this choice and when he overheard Leonar’s proposal he was ready to double down on his worst character traits… and if Denam goes Chaos, he absolutely goes the path there (also for Neutral but we’ll get there). But if he goes Law? Suddenly things are not so clear to Vyce; how could DENAM do this? And all of a sudden Vyce, who was very much seething in resentment, has to contend with a MASSIVE paradigm shift. And that’s it for now.

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

That was what I’d gathered, yes; I was just trying to explain it in simpler terms. In that sense, Law was probably the A route & it’s Neutral branch was B route initially; from that C route was (and is) what we know as Chaos, and the Neutral we got was probably considered D route… I actually never saw any source suggesting that Chapter 4 would have DRASTICALLY changed to the point of being a whole different plot resolution. Nor can I see how that COULD have worked. It feels more like that hearsay that people want to believe in and I get that, but the plot feels like it wasn’t ever built for a totally different final act.

About Vyce. I’ve always thought that in law route it’s revealed that Vyce is all talk. He is the loudest when it comes to screaming about fighting, but when faced with real danger he freezes. Same reason can be applied to him being silent during the meeting with Dark Lancelot.

I don’t agree against this whole bad route decisions and the cost of doing such a thing is “stressful”. It’s an amazing second story route and if you’ll watch game of thrones and be completely engrossed why can’t you actively make the decisions those characters make in a game world? I think the writing is historical and amazing in the way that you could go both ways. After a decade in the military I’ve seen how complacency allows people to follow laws/rules that kill thousands today. I truly believe in reality most would do what their superiors tell them and to go against the norm is the only thing that makes it a story and not history.

Thank God for Casen on this podcast and his ability to pour the waters of reason on the half baked incendiary language of identity politics. Ivan isn't a bad guest, but it's clear he is not as informed about the patterns of the world as he should be for someone so enthusiastic about a story regarding global politics.

Yeah late to watch but looking at both choices simultaneously is not smart. It functions as something that you will experience the rest of that story right after so trying to gauge it without doing that is not a good choice. I pretty much agree a

still waiting on my copy to arrive for my switch but dropping by to show some love!

just finished listening to the episode so I know this message will most likely be lost but regardless; when it comes to the decision of Balmamusa the way I saw it and came to accept it was by looking at it as a D&D game decision where your alignment doesn’t necessarily dictate what you do. You can be an evil person and still make lawful decisions just how you can be a lawful person and make evil or morally grey decisions. In Denam’s case it wasn’t a vendetta or anything but simply immaturity. Denam is too young to understand what to do in this type of situations since up to this point in the game he’s mostly been following orders and essentially being used by those in power. The biggest problem I used to have in accepting this was simply that I associated law = good when that’s not necessarily what applies in this game.

So I stopped the video at Casen’s warning, but now I’m confused about how I’m supposed to play along with the podcast series. Are they doing the chaos route all the way through first like Casen suggests? Do they say where I should play up to next? Or should I just complete the game then come back to the podcast afterwards?

@TheBawster

7 ай бұрын

No still neutral 👍🏻

@debrucey

7 ай бұрын

@@TheBawster so for next week where do I play up to?

@stanm4410

7 ай бұрын

​@@debruceyYou will want to finish chapter 2 and then choose to "rejoin" as your dialogue option at the end of the chapter. I believe it's the first option.

@debrucey

7 ай бұрын

@@stanm4410 thank you ❤️

Yeah the Balmamusa decision seems flawed. I think the only way to get a good answer to why it was the way it was is to ask Matsuno himself.

1:36:00 Okay i stopped watching at rhis point at your recommendation but please keep in mind for next episode that you record that myself and probably others are only gonna be thru Chapter 2 on the Chaos route and will have no knowledge of the Law route. So olease no Law spoilers next week or maybe have a separate lengthy spoiler discussion for the Law route.

@CasenSperry

7 ай бұрын

At the end of Chapter 2, select the "rejoin" option.

Bringing up Suikoden, albeit in sprite art context, is a great link to the latter part of the discussion here because the opening scene of Suikoden 2 (and suiko2 spoilers follow) is a VERY SIMILAR betrayal to the Balmamusa scene. It's a linear story moment rather than a choice, but the villains in this, Luca Blight and Captain Rowd do get some chance to contextualise and explain themselves, and their presence in the story is shaped around that choice. (Luca in particular, but even Rowd gets some time to monologue his thoughts on the scenario). Because it is Linear it doesn't have to balance the decision like Matsuno might, but I think it's worth contrasting the two approaches. I am playing with you, I don't know yet if the decision point in Order will be explained really well later on but I think it is very useful to look at this and say, hey, we see in the first FIVE MINUTES of Suikoden 2, Captain Rowd is presented as being both your trustworthy military commander and the architect of a massacre for nationalist reasons and personal gain. Then immediately after the betrayal you get the opening credits scenes again which feature Rowd training the main characters and showing you the kind of guy he was, and it didn't feel unnatural or sudden simply because you DO get scenes during the betrayal where Rowd explains himself, and it's baked into his personality that it makes sense. With Denam it feels like whiplash. Nothing about his behaviour implies the kind of psychotic bloodthirst you need here. BUT I also think about how the route is called LAWFUL and not LAWFUL GOOD. The D&D alignment chart has Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic on one axis and Good, Neutral and Evil on another. I think Chaotic may be Chaotic good, but Lawful is definitely Lawful neutral. I think this version of Denam may be a good guy personally, but he's completely subordinated himself to the chain of command. He's the walking Nuremburg defense. It would have served the story really well to give Denam some dialogue to SHOW that, but that's how I think making that choice can be justified. It's a semi heel turn. Not completely, because he may yet struggle from the inside to fix the Wallister, but he's still going to act as their subordinate regardless. Nevertheless, we forge on another week...

Feels weird trying to remember all the story details of this game that I played just a year ago and it being drowned out by 150+ hours of postgame dungeon crawls and figuring out what the hell the Chaos Frame was and how that worked, etc. The mechanics drowned out the story to me by the end, though that's not necessarily a negative as the mechanics rabbit-hole was just as deep as the story.

We were doing netural routes first right? 😅

@orcbrand

7 ай бұрын

Yes, it's a little confusing but you wanna go down the chaos route *before* we get to neutral. Neutral route starts in Chapter 3.

@TheBawster

7 ай бұрын

Gotcha 👍🏻

I went through the lawful accidentally just out of curiosity... I hope I can still follow the podcast :D

33:00 Guests in this game are more or less a rescue Mission (like Mustadio). The difference is it isn't game over, the game just trudges on (like life). The ones who are main characters in the narrative (Catiua, Vyce, Leonar, etc) are the ones who will Warp away (i.e. the ones who the story can't live without).

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

And despite how they described it, Matsuno has them programmed to flee NOT when the HP reaches zero but when it falls below a threshold (like a quarter of the total or something). Man was well aware of plausibility there… heck, considering Wiegraf in FFT, note that the first fight he flees when he’s low, but the second fight (where he’s mortally wounded and then makes the DWTD) has him go to zero.

While I see where Mike and Cason are coming from in thinking that there isn’t enough buildup to the big decision, I don’t have as hard of a time understanding how the main character could end up making this decision. I think the fact that the party never thought about how far they were willing to go is the entire point. These are literally teenagers going around mass murdering people and you guys didn’t have a hard time conceptualizing that aspect because it’s such a traditional video game trope, but look at what has physically happened along the way. You have probably killed what, 100 people or so as denim and the crew by now? It’s really such a huge logical gap to think they could be coerced by an authority figure into doing something even worse that they will regret and had never fully thought about? I think you guys were hitting it on the head towards the end, that bringing yourself too much into the game is the issue with this. Of course none of us would massacre 5000 people, but most of us haven’t killed hundreds of people in an ethnic conflict by age 18. The real question of the L route here is “Is everyone who does something that seems inconceivably evil an evil person?” And I don’t think the answer to that is super clear. I think someone who Mike presented Denim as, someone lucid and calm, could still be convinced to kill 5000 people there and I see no contradiction there. It seems silly to me to say “this character would never do that “. You’re telling me if you met 18 year old Stalin you would have been able to predict with absolute certainty whether or not he was evil? It may be tidy literary writing to write that way but it isn’t in any way realistic or indicative of how the real world works though and I feel that was what was trying to be touched on here.

Hello.

Oof, hearing Vyce just becomes a goodie-two-shoes to contrast Denam in the Law route feels absolutely baffling. I assumed that playthrough would have you siding with him and aligning with his very clear (even before Balmamusa) extremist character motivations.

@13:00 Dame Ravness is meant to be a callback to Agrias from FFT, Matsuno wanted to further explore that style of character who otherwise disappears from the narrative early in FFT.

@borjankosarac3645

7 ай бұрын

It’s reportedly the opposite, actually; the character who became Ravness needed to be cut from original TO:LUCT due to limited SNES hardware space, so the design and baseline was recycled for FFT. But when remaking for the PSP, Matsuno got the chance to add a lot of the features he wanted to originally have including that character and did something interesting with her… It’s actually interesting how Chaos (which branches to Neutral) kills several noteworthy names characters quite early in contrast to how Law handles them (at least explicitly).