Tag Archives: totally spies

26

Oct. ’22

Xenogears 03: The Will to Fight

Go go Dan!Fei Fong Wong has seen troubles. A man who once fancied himself a simple artist has been forced to fight others. And, every time Fei has embraced -the power-, he and those around him have suffered. When he gained the Weltall, his home village was obliterated. When he saved his friend with that same robot, he was banished to a sandy Hell. Now, when the deposed prince and sand pirate Bartholomew Fatima asks Fei to fight for his noble cause, Fei denies his new friend. Fighting has gotten Fei nowhere, and it is clear that nonviolence is the most direct route to peace.

And then Fei returns to Weltall to fight and repel an invading force of gigantic robot knights.

And then Fei joins a fighting tournament.

And then Fei fights a man that seems to exist only to fight.

And then Fei fights a man beloved by all.

And then Fei fights a woman addicted to drugs and violence.

And then Fei fights a ghost of his past, filled with resentment for the first time Fei fought.

And then Fei fights an even murkier shadow of his past, this time fighting only for the sake of fighting.

And then Fei fights a general that is himself suffering because of Fei’s unknown past.

So Fei learned a valuable lesson about his own possible passivism: never try.

In Fei’s world, violence is the path of the divine.

Even Worse Streams presents Xenogears
Night 3

Original Stream Night: January 19, 2021
Night of The Symphony (of the Night)

Random Notes on the Stream

  • There’s a coffee machine on the Yggdrasil. Huh.

  • BEAT claims to be paying attention, but he also asks, “are the pirates robots?”

  • As the kidnapping of Margie is discussed by non-robot pirates, we acknowledge the best JRPGs just steal everything.

  • “Fei has problems, but not problems we can fix.”

  • Fanboymaster lets me know that we need to get the Xenogears archives up. This stream was on January 19, 2021, and the first official Gogglebob.com upload of the Let’s Play went up on October 12, 2022. Only 631 days! I am not ashamed!

  • Powerpoint carpetI compare Legend of Legaia to the 2020/2021 COVID response. I should write an article about that…

  • “Are you there dad? It’s me, Bart.”

  • BEAT and Goggle Bob were taken to the criminal factory for mentioning Totally Spies.

  • … Oh yeah… Nothing in the game has happened at this point. I guess some dudes invaded.

  • It was inevitable we would start discussing the finer points of Neon Genesis Evangelion during a giant robot JRPG…

  • Robot Alchemic Drive sounds completely insane/grandmacidal.

  • Ramsus and Miang are introduced floating around in a Xenosaga-esque ship.

  • As the bad guys discuss their plans, we discuss the (then) pending Biden inauguration and Homeboys in Outer Space.

  • Here’s Aveh! Time to discuss Shasta McNasty.

  • “Welcome to Fiesta Day!” It’s the Xenogears Millennial Fair!

  • Abby Denton stops by as Fei straight up gets drunk.

  • Make way for the Ponytailed Slacker.

  • “I think Kingdom Hearts is just Xenogears with a budget” – Abby Denton

  • Caliscrub enters as our heroes eat at the local Red Lobster.

  • Let’s play hide and seek! Like in Breath of Fire 3!

  • Let’s discuss the Dead Rising franchise! It’s all about the wizard staffs!

  • Don't look too closelyAll Virtual Reality games are Wii games. This is my belief. At least for now.

  • Aliens from Planet Funkass are all that. Anyway, this section took forever because I didn’t know what I was doing. It happens.

  • “Why does Dan look so old!?”

  • And, obviously, as the fighting tournament finally begins, we discuss Murphy Brown at length.

  • Somehow, talking about Big Joe leads us to Hudson Hawk.

  • “Dan was born into male pattern baldness. He was molded by it.”

  • While Bart is in the sewers aqueducts, Abby explains how the poop bunnies work in Brave Fencer Musashi. Foreshadowing for future streams!

  • Okay! Bart is making some progress in the not-sewers, and we’re discussing random twitter users who might be Nazis.

  • Bart has got some stealthin’ around to do while we talk about the many martial arts of Ranma ½.

  • Soraya Saga created Edgar Figaro, Sabin Figaro, and Bart. She definitely has a type.

  • On a personal note, I am so bad at this area, even just rewatching this sequence in an effort to make this post makes me want to fast forward…

  • Remember when we had to fight Shion in Xenosaga Episode 3? Good times.

  • Away we goI need a map for Xenogears. I need a map desperately.

  • Margie and Chu-Chu are rescued by Bart! Oh boy!

  • And Bart dies! It was immediately after a save point, so it wasn’t a big deal, but Bart absolutely was not prepared for Ramsus.

  • So I got frustrated and cheated/taught my characters all their death blows. Hooray?

  • While encountering Elly again, Abby performed her rhyming shmyming routine on the stream for the first time. To my knowledge, she has escaped justice, and has suffered no consequences for this act.

  • And then Kishi stopped by for the first time!

  • “Never trust tiny popes.” “What if they’re really cute, though?” “No!”

  • There is some religious learning going on thanks to Kishi’s mysterious “notes”.

  • And we close as Abby defends this bit of the game. She is correct that this section is a tour de force of Xenogears, but these videos seem to indicate they may not be perfect…

Next time on Xenogears: Let’s give Ramsus a hand.

No, not Ryu
Where have I seen this move before?

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27

Jan. ’21

World of Final Fantasy Part 08

Intervention Quests Part 1
Initial Stream: 11/10/20



3:00 – Everyone had two weeks to vote on whether or not they wanted to see additional story progress or the Final Fantasy character vignettes/side quests… and I didn’t see a single vote. Turnout is terrible this year. So we held a vote on the stream, and fanboymaster and BEAT both agreed it was time to hit the Final Fantasy Intervention Quests. As a reminder, these are all “out of time” moments provided by The Girl Who Forgot Her Name, and our heroes only pitch hit for the featured Final Fantasy character during battle, and the rest of these sections are simple “slice of life” stories (that often involve giant, malevolent sea monsters). First up are Tidus and Yuna aping some Final Fantasy X plot beats.

16:00 – The “bullet points” for the Intervention Quests are going to be mostly here to let you know when a new vignette starts. At approximately the sixteen minute mark, we are discussing “politics” and/or Quistis while Squall gets a featured story about future planning.

25:00 – Discussing Tidus while Faris and Edgar discuss something other than Tidus. And then it’s time to point out how Edgar is a pedophile.

33:00 – Terra encounters a certain unpleasant octopus while another bot invades the chat.

39:00 Bartz and Rikku is the crossover event you didn’t ever know you needed. It is mostly ignored in favor of Dragonball Z discussion.

46:23 –


What actually happened in the plot:

All Intervention Quests are canon in World of Final Fantasy, but are (almost) all considered “sidequests”, so this is all “optional” plot. That said, here’s what happened in this update:

• Yuna and Tidus, who met for the first time as part of the main plot, bond over repelling Bismarck (not the nazi ship) from Besaid.

• Squall, unlike his fellow Final Fantasy buddies, doesn’t have future plans, which worries his bulbous little head. Squall and Shelke go on a monster hunting mission, and Shelke tricks Squall into caring and planting a garden. This somehow makes Squall smile.

• Faris’s ship is attacked by Omega Bane, and she tracks it back to a potential dimensional gateway at the center of the desert. Edgar is familiar with the area, so he banishes Omega Bane with the help of Vivi.

• Terra teams up with, and then realizes she must destroy, Ultros, the least prime octopus.

• Bartz and Rikku try to rob Ifrit’s cave, but wind up inadvertently becoming friends with the fiery summons when they team up to repel some behemoths.


Intervention Quests Part 2
Initial Stream: 11/10/20


1:00 – Rikku is sailing the seven seas, and, hey, we’re actually discussing Rikku! It’s game related! It’s a game related, on-topic discussion! That hardly ever happens!

5:00 – Eiko makes a new wolf friend, so let’s talk about Justice League. The animated series, to be clear, as that is clearly the best iteration of the ol’ hero club.

10:00 – Tifa meets some zealots. How old would you be in the Final Fantasy universe? And would your hat stay on your head?

16:00 – Yuna and “The Sad Spiral” sounds like a good time. Final Fantasy characters need therapy, and so do we after discussing Fountains of Wayne.

26:00 – After some wedding discussion, here are Yuna and Rydia in a Volcano. Then BEAT gets hungry, and we fight Lady Ifrit.

32:00 – Cloud and Lightning are palling around while we discuss terrible streamers, teenage sins, and how we’re all attractive. Also, please remember the duck stream.

What actually happened in the plot:

• Rikku battles the Mimic Queen and discovers that literally all the treasures across the sea were a bunch of (now dead) mimics.

• Eiko investigates a “weird feeling” and discovers her ancestors’ “Fenrir” mirage, Elefenrir, who offers a cryptic warning.

• Tifa fights off a gigantic, robotic hand, and tells some religious fanatics that Enna Kros helps those that help themselves.

• Yuna helps Ami of Green Gables (thanks, Zef), a poor woman who wants to sacrifice herself for the good of her hometown. Valefor’s non-union equivalent, Nirvalefor, guides Yuna to help Ami by defeating Ultima Weapon. Thus, Ami no longer has to be a martyr, and she didn’t even have to lose her imaginary dream-boyfriend to do it.

• Yuna and Rydia enter a volcano to find Ifreeta, Ifrit’s cousin who has been possessing humans to be a general nuisance in the world. The two summoners banish the fire cat girl.

• Cloud and Lightning investigate a mirage (Iron Muscles) menacing a local village, but apparently Sephiroth has been in the area repelling the mirage. Cloud ventures off on his own to hunt his mortal enemy, but Terra convinces Cloud to go back and help Lightning. Cloud and Lightning destroy Iron Muscles, and Sephiroth is never seen.

Intervention Quests Part 3
Initial Stream: 11/10/20



0:30 – Vivi and Golems accompany a brief description of quests that have gone before. Long story short: when boiled down to their base archetypes, nearly every male Final Fantasy protagonist becomes Zidane. It’s weird!

5:00 –


13:30 – Discussing Fire Emblem/Lucina /Gachas while Quistis and Squall hang out in Garden.

16:00 – Ample Vigour arrives, and then leaves us wanting as Einhänder shows up again.

20:00 – Penguin time means we have to repeat a whole dungeon. There’s crying underwater from that stupid queen and yours truly, as this Intervention Quest contains an entire “level” that we already completed once. And it wasn’t that good the first time! Regardless, this appears to be the only Intervention Quest that is so intensive, so it’s at least noteworthy.

28:00 – “We’re going all in on this fried bread thing.”

41:00 – And the moral of the story is we’re never going to stop talking about that mysterious liquor lady.

What actually happened in the plot:

• Vivi stops a golem uprising and decides to live another day, confident he is not a mere golem (which makes sense, as golems in this game are basically just Pokémon).

• Celes tries to cheer up the still-recovering-from-vampirey folks of Tome Town by performing an opera, but Ultros arrives, and messes it all up. Ultros is repelled, but, sorry, Celes won’t be singing in this one.

• It is confirmed that Balamb Garden is apparently a mirage, Eden, even if stuff discovered there, like the Gunblade, could be Cogna related.

• Shantotto attempts to open a secret vault by killing the Quacho Queen, but Lann and Reynn convince the Quacho Queen to open the door without bloodshed. Unfortunately, there’s a monster in the vault that could potentially explode and crack the continent in half… but Shantotto uses a spell to disarm the volatile kraken. The day is saved, and our heroes loot the vault.

Intervention Quests Part 4
Initial Stream: 11/10/20

00:00 – There is some interesting discussion regarding the production of Marvel vs. Capcom/Howard the Duck opposite Bartz and Gigglemesh saving a town. Eventually, there is discussion of Spider-Man arcade, a game near and dear to my videogame preserving heart.

8:00 – Additional discussion of Marvel vs. Capcom and what could have happened to Street Fighter 3 while Snow and Celes do… nothing.

14:30 – Moonboy and Devil Dinosaur are not Edgar and Vivi, but they’re not Primal, either.

19:00 – There’s no battle in this vignette, just cutscenes. This is weird, and prompts a discussion regarding Mr. Bucket, and how he wants you to put your balls in his mouth.

21:00 – Faris, Ifrit, and we’re apparently not worshipping Satan.

25:00 – Refia and Sherlotta venture into the snow while we discuss children’s cartoons and fetishes and let’s not talk about Totally Spies.

30:00 – We are done talking about Goodfeathers and how much we hate aspects of Animaniacs just in time to watch the ongoing adventures of Undead Princess.

34:00 Goblin Princess and the immortal question: is high school worse than working in The Simpsons writing room?

What actually happened in the plot:

• Gigglemesh and Bartz are more or less tricked by Bahamutian Soldiers, but team up to recover a victory.

• Snow and Celes fight Gigglemesh over absolutely nothing. Typical crossover fight, I suppose.

• Edgar and Vivi win over the support of the Figaro guard ostensibly through Vivi being annoying.

• Faris sponsors “Underdog Day”, a day when her crew can challenge the captain for control of the ship. An overeager moogle accidently summons Ifrit, whom Faris has to knock off the plank.

• Refia and Sherlotta battle Undead Princess (another refugee from Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time), and then hire her to promote the Inn. Then Sherlotta and Undead Princess work together to stop some Metalliskulls that are haunting the area.

• Princess Sarah was kidnapped by Princess Goblin, who apparently has a crush on Warrior of Light. Warrior of Light lets Princess Goblin down easy, and rescues Princess Sarah.

Additional note that seems to explain a lot: In game, there is a running encyclopedia for characters encountered in World of Final Fantasy. The entry for Undead Princess reads:

Hey, Wait a Second…
You may be wondering why so many characters from the CRYSTAL CHRONICLES series have been popping up in Grymoire. Well, take a look at the person doing character design, and you may have your answer.

So that solves at least one unsolved mystery of World of Final Fantasy.

Intervention Quests Part 5
Initial Stream: 11/10/20


00:00 – Refia tries to build a bridge while we discuss how to own people on the internet. Or maybe we’re just looking at Dril tweets again. Or Spider-Man?

6:00 – Time for (what I’m pretty sure is) the DLC event. It is not a Gundam.

9:30 – Kishi joins us. Kishi is not a Gundam.

22:00 – We finally win as Omega God bonks over.


“He” is now Ted Woo, author of Shadow Mad.

31:00 – Kishi requests a repeat performance, so we’re watching the Faris bit again. Let’s consider this an example of how you can repeat these quests unlimited times.

36:00 – In an effort to torture fanboymaster, we close this stream out by taking a look at the World of Final Fantasy pokédex.

What actually happened in the plot:

• Refia tries to build an ice bridge, so she recruits Sherlotta to additionally recruit Shiva. The bridge is built, but doesn’t last long.

• Enna Kros has a conversation with Alexander, the gigantic mirage currently serving as a motionless bridge. Apparently they fought “for the throne” at one point. Eden of Balamb Garden, Lute of Ragnarok in Cornera, and Midgardian Ormr (presumably) of Midgar are all mirages, too. Alexander had Omega God hanging out on it in a pocket dimension (or something), so Enna Kros summoned Lann and Reynn to fight him off. Omega God is defeated and captured, and now, having completed all available Intervention Quests, Lann and Reynn are free to journey on to the endgame.

Next time on World of Final Fantasy: This stream was the same week I got married, so BEAT is responsible for the Bad End.

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