Nudibranch Lover

The character moments were all really good in this patch. Asat Pramad and Himeko, the Trailblazer and Himeko, Motoko and Himeko, the Nameless uniting as one... everything comes back to love, passing that torch onwards... To Trailblaze forward. In a sense, Himeko is the embodiment of the Trailblaze, of passing that torch onward.

I also loved that refutation of, "One must become accustomed to loss" (paraphrased). It's something that's been hammered into us constantly, that we have to lose things to move forward: Firefly, Mikhail/Misha, Cyrene... And the antagonists too, believing that destruction is the only way forward.

This does remind me of Sunday's whole plan in 2.2, where he wanted to create a world without suffering and loss. And this patch is also a refutation and acknowledgement of that ideal: while loss and suffering aren't something we should accept or just surrender too, but they are an agent for change, a motivator to keep moving forward.

We'll probably get yet another confrontation of these ideals in the form of the other TB (who is very heavily Terminus-coded), who has seen these losses and refused to accept them, but gave up in the process. This is also something Asat Pramad did, after being broken by everything he endured...

Speaking of Asat Pramad: he's a very fascinating character. Someone whose ideals, whose kindness and love led him to Destruction. He says he doesn't care about Himeko and the Express, but he's very affectionate to her and relieved she's alive. He says he didn't shoot down the Express because he wanted it to destroy Himeko later, but it's clear it was his own sentimentality. Even him becoming the Lord Ravager aligned against Elation is out of a sense of mercy-killing The Laughter, giving the universe a merciful end instead of a chaotic, painful one. At the same time, he's very sadistic and will willingly cast off the ones he loves for his own amusement. He loves but is equally willing to destroy, and the two aren't contradictory. He's also someone lost in his own cynicism, if that makes sense? Like his powers literally run off of dragging everyone else into his nightmarish despair and making them think there's no way out. I wish we got to dig more into him, especially his relationship with Graphia and the world (which kind of got offscreened into the Improv Tour). I also get the feeling he's gonna pull a, "We'll meet again" Team Rocket-style at the start of next patch and then show up later for another confrontation. Probably with some complicated feelings towards Himeko if he shows up in the Endgame.

Outside of his strange life philosophy, Asat Pramad is very funny. He disguises himself as doors (and is disgusted at the insinuation that he'd be playing a toilet), gets upset when his health insurance pension gets cancelled (would that even still have been a thing if Planarcadia is destroyed?) He takes selfies with a bunch of people before throwing them into oblivion, acts like an old man, is very indignant about the Trailblazer using their phone, and decides to, for the lolz, give us the mother of all lore dumps in a creative and fun way. I also heard his latest Furbo postings are very unhinged? Haven't read them yet though. It was very freaky watching him run around on the map though.

Speaking of his lore dumps: Fascinating tidbits on the Lord Ravagers, especially their weaknesses. Also, I forgot if it was Archforger or Luxbane who was described as like a dog, and now I want Lord Ravager family fanart for it. Also, I love how when asked about the TB's other self, he's like, "Idk lol." I forgot what he said about Akivili off the top of my head, but it was very mysterious. The Fourth Finality being Preservation (of all other Paths, which leads to the end of the universe) was not on my bingo card, but makes sense. I thought he was going to tell us it was the IPC/Voracity lol. I think he also mentioned that every Aeon knows how they're going die the instant they ascend but I don't really recall. Also, that Stellaron... who the heck made us? Unfortunately I forgot what other options I chose to ask him RIP. But apparently there's RNG involved? Huh. I got mostly Critical Success rolls, so I thought it was fixed. I'll have to look it up later.

His boss fight was also really cool (and also a big step up from Irontomb's presentation). When I fought him, I brought Himeko Nova, Sunday, RMC, and Dan Heng PT. Unfortunately, I am not the most strategic player, so it was scuffed. I'm also not sure if it's just my Himeko's terrible build or if the enemies were absurdly tanky, but it took forever to kill those mobs. Though I think for story fights this works in the story's favor so you can fully appreciate the dialogue, animations and such (this is a bit difficult when you are Trying Not to Die, though, which is a major issue for me vs. Irontomb. Though it was mitigated by me having to redo the fight like 3 times lol because Phainon was Not the Best Choice for that one).

The mechanics also seem like they're not massively inhibiting to work around with multiple units as long as you have a decent sustain and multi-target attacks (not sure how the Meme mechanic interacts with Phainon, though). Which is great, because: Sparxie, Pom Pom, Fulwish, and Graphia have... not been fun... I also loved the "Pick a mechanic to benefit you and Asat Pramad gets the other buffs" mechanic; a fantastic bit of gameplay-story integration.

His second Phase Boss OST also slaps. And his animations were awesome. I was not expecting him to hit us like a baseball bat.

I'm also not really sure how Himeko Nova rotations work? I should probably switch to Hyperspeed Sunday but I'm still building Himeko... It's so much fun shooting enemies with her on the overworld, lol. I'll have to test her out again in Currency Wars, because I had no idea what I was doing lol.

Speaking of Himeko: the scenes with her and Motoko were very touching, and also kept giving me Cyrene flashbacks. I was also expecting them to like, fuse, instead of Motoko taking on the Weathering Curse onto herself so Himeko could live. I also thought for a hot second we were about to have another closed time loop wherein TB or Himeko was the Aha talking to Motoko to ensure Himeko would set off on her journey, but that doesn't really make sense. I also figured she wasn't going to die, but the way we prevented her from dying for us was a pleasant surprise: wishing for it. That Stellaron, though... there's gotta be a catch. For all we know, Himeko could end up in a coma or worse when we make it to Astropolis after this. Or worse, there are long-term knock-on effects on the Express as a whole... So we're not out of the woods yet.

Speaking of the Express: Welt, shouldn't you be more concerned about Himeko??? Or did you have absolute faith she'd be alright, in your companions? That they could get to her in the event you could not? I mean, it would make sense, but he seems kind of unconcerned, which is strange, given his whole motivation for coming here IIRC was Himeko. Unless he knows there's something worse coming. I did also get the impression that they just haven't had the time to process it and the Stellaron considering that right after this, Voracity decides to wreck havoc.

Speaking of which, the X.3 and X.4 patches are really the "Everything gets destroyed and a bunch of people die and we have to get them out of there," moments, huh. Some NPCs mentioned their parents didn't get out and Pearl is desperately trying to manage the situation. I feel like we could've marinated on it a lot longer like in 3.3, but it worked well enough for set-up. But a lot of it got offscreened...

I did adore seeing everyone step up to the task and not giving into the despair Asat Pramad is trying to force on everyone: Ashveil, Pearl, the Stellaron Hunters, Yao Guang... even Sparxie, at our behest. In particular, I really loved Cinderborne standing up for others even though he wasn't powerful to end the crisis. Nihilux is also really sus, but I don't have enough to go off on for her.

And speaking of Yao Guang: I loved the part where we had to dodge the lightning strikes on the map and where she locked Asat Pramad's fate into place. However, her suddenly getting zapped into non-existence (?) felt a bit too abrupt for her supposed "death", though, in terms of emotional investment and her own character arc. I don't think she's actually dead, though, because it feels like too soon to kill her off. That, and everything's gone to hell so there's no time to process the consequences of that yet.