[Click here to start from the first progress log]
Things got incredibly busy this month, and since I’ve started to slot old games into any free space I have between newer titles rather than focusing equally on the two, it’s been almost 20 days since I last played Eternal Sonata. As much as I’d love to go 20 more without it, however, my OCD demands finishing so that I can file away its thousands of screenshots and officially mark this one as “done forever.” Last time, nothing in particular happened, with the game instead spinning its wheels and accomplishing nothing but wasting time. That could be considered a form of mercy, though, because everyone in this game is stupid and makes infuriating decisions.
Screw it, I have enough items
After handing over that weirdly equippable spell book item to the researcher and receiving the key to Aria Temple, the party heads over there. Earlier, Polka thought that she saw someone enter it, so they’re really just indulging her neuroses while Prince Crescendo makes up his mind about the stupidest way of approaching the brewing conflict between Baroque and Forte. This temple is actually a weird ice fortress, but chests have an annoying habit of teleporting away or being blocked off by ice. I experimented a little in the hopes that I’d manage to remove the ice, but ultimately decided that it wasn’t worth my time; the party currently has a ridiculous amount of money, and everything they’ve found in chests lately has been worthless.
Once everyone reaches the top, they encounter the Forte assassin who killed Claves. Her name is apparently Rondo, though you could be forgiven for not knowing that given how often bosses are introduced and summarily killed in this game. This won’t be an exception. Anyway, Falsetto shows up out of nowhere and has long, emotional speech full of pointing which boils down to “I wub Jazz, and killing Claves’ killer will make him totally hot for me!” This is really weird since he’s standing in the same room and her feelings were ostensibly a secret up to this point. There’s also a camera pan to Viola, who likewise craves those Jazz hands. As with other occasions where a character randomly shows up, our party has someone kicked out to make room (this is possibly controllable; I think it might consistently be the third character), and it ends up being Beat. That means having no boss pictures to sell, but the party has more than enough money. Rondo is laughably easy to beat, though Allegretto got knocked out because 20 days of other games made me forget which items do what. Moving Viola far away so that her arrows do more damage allowed her to wreck Rondo, though, and Falsetto finished her off without a problem.
After Rondo is dead, Falsetto and Jazz have an awkward moment, but it all pays off as Jazz finally gives her what she’s always secretly wanted, putting his fingers in her. Right through her shoulder. The animations in this game are really, really bad.
Surrendering for no reason
The shopkeeper has new items, so everyone gets new equipment. HP-restoring items are also maxed out (the ones that can be purchased, at least; lesser healing items stop being sold entirely as better stuff starts to become available). Then it’s time to go see what decision the prince and his spy fiancee have come to. Surprise, surprise—no one can find them. Even the people in the castle are worried about their sudden disappearance. I can’t hold their ability to suddenly disappear against the game because a lot of jRPGs do it, but it’s funny how royalty always have ninja-like skills that enable them to somehow evade everyone in a fully-staffed castle.
The group magically deduces that they’ve left to surrender to Forte, and that is indeed the plan for whatever reason. Remember, Baroque has overwhelming military might that Forte can’t match. Not only that, but Prince Crescendo’s fiancee is a princess of Forte. Quickly overwhelming Forte and uniting the two countries is a perfectly valid approach here that would minimize bloodshed (and eliminate the threat of mineral powder monsters), but the plot demands that Crescendo suddenly go limp-wristed and let Forte imprison or execute him. I hate when stories do this. Giving up against villain characters in the pursuit of peace as though doing so will magically make them stop being villain characters is not only tortured logic, but dangerously irresponsible and counterproductive since you’re removing the only obstacles in their way. It drives me crazy when characters have no foresight.
Since everyone telepathically learned the plans of the prince and princess, they’re given a key to a teleporter that’ll allow them to catch up with the pair. Why did the prince and princess not use the teleporter? You can’t even argue that it’s because there’s a guy watching over it, because both of their doors similarly had armed guards who they had to avoid. Whatever the reason, the teleporter leads to an awful maze full of other teleports. It’s easy to get turned around here, and there are all kinds of weird totem things that give you what I assume are hints about which direction to go in. The whole thing is vague and awful, and the game even drops another of those bad text boxes into the mix. No real work was put into this game.
Once they’re out of the maze, they find themselves at a weird fortune tree thing. A strange lady comes up and acts like she’s met Polka hundreds of years ago (that stone from someone Polka loved is definitely looking like a possible causal loop right now) and suggests that everything that’s happening has happened before. The whole thing is confusingly random, and it’s frustrating how the entire party forgets that they kind of have better things to be doing in order to play around with fortunes.
[Click here to go to Eternal Sonata log #9]
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