Now we could just mate Sisbo and Brobo right away but why not put 'em ta use first? Feeding 'em various Greens ups their stats an makes 'em suitable for racing! 3 wins in a given rank means they move up to the next!
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Haven't gone ta town on this games translation issues lately but these 2 screens are a stark reminder of 'em! Almost all of the Greens/Nuts are misspelled!
Now that they're racing stars lets hook 'em up!
Non-yellow chocobos!! Now its not just the competing jockeys that have 'em! Blue chocobo are good at going through rivers right? But in the water/space sections of the race courses they slowdown. Yet in the uphill portion they don't. Meanwhile green chocobos are good at mountain climbing but the uphill parts slow 'em down while the water/space parts don't. Weird~
If ya mate Blue & Green you can get one which has BOTH of their abilities! But theres a cooldown time (aka go battle monsters) between mating and being mature enough to mate!
So lets do just that! An in the process showoff FF XIII's ultimate limit break! Sure looks nice!
Course fighting battles also gives the sage more time to remember stuff! One that can cross oceans?!
Now before trading up for a better model, what can Blubo do? Walk in shallow water allowing access to a cave nearby Mideel! Its here ya pick up the Quadra Magic materia! Link it with a green materia to cast a spall 4 times in a row. Thats overkill!
Grebo can run up mountains which means it can get to this cave near Wutai! Inside is the Mime materia! It lets one party member mimic the previous ones move. Got 1 Ultima materia but wanna cast it again? Mime it! Does not apply to limit breaks.
...but wait! There's more! Ya know that lake around the middle of the western continent? One with a waterfall? Those are always suspicious in videogames! Grebo can scoot across the mountains isolating it an let ya go inside to find some lady?
Nibelheim again? Fine, fine. The lady is interested not in the well dressed man but in the fellow scientist. "If she's happy then... I don't mind." *coughbullshitcough*
Thats kinda dodging the question of "why experiment on humans!?".
Afterwards the lady collapses an presumably the well dressed man goes to get help and in return gets shot, straight up. Cold blooded. Then the scientist starts doing experiments on him
thats messed up!
Lucrecia has been living here for ??? number of years wishing for death. Shame the Jenova cells in her kinda help resist that. Its terrible she never got ta hold her kid even once an pretty cold of Dracula to say he's dead even if it is technically kind of true!
Hold up! Way back in Pt.22 while approaching Cosmo Canyon for the first time I saw this place that really stood out. An as ya can see, our bird buddy can get us here to!
The Ancient Forest has itself some gimmicks! Can't just run around to progress through it, ya gotta use a limited supply of bugs/frogs to create platforms and launchers! Also got the return of environmental hazards, last seen in... the Cave of the Gi?
At one point ya can get shot up into the trees which enables ya to grab a very good and female-exclusive armor and the Typoon summon materia! Woosh!
At the forests end the party reached a cave which housed the end of their materia grinding nightmare! Kinda. The Apocalypse sword may only have 3 slots for materia but they are triple growth slots!!
The forests monsters may not have been anything worth mentioning but battles progress time so they were fought! Its not just sage advice or chocobos that require time progression but the waterfall cave as well! Lucrecia took off an left behind Dracula's ultimate weapon and limit break! Both of which are kinda trash especially the gun... unless ya wanna grind out 10k+ kills with it.
Another visit to the Chocobo Sage revealed part of how an ocean bird is born. Gotta mate the river+mountain chocobo with a wonderful one found near the Icicle Inn. Feeding & racing comes first as usual! Wodude may just be a yellow-bo but its speed matches that of the blue & green ones! While Blabo exceeds them all! No issue getting either of them to Rank A!
Blabo lives up to its heritage of crossing mountains and rivers to access this cave alil northwest of Costa Del Sol. If for some reason ya wanted a party member to surpass the 999 MP limit, the HP <-> MP materia will do the trick!
Also this lil bit of land ya can only access by bird is referred to as North Corel Area. I think it should be called Bird Area since you can fight some REALLY big ones here!
While passing more time to get chocobo info, Mr Meows grew so large the other party members got pushed outta the battle! Slots really is the best!
With those battles behind 'em the final key to the ocean chocobo puzzles been unlocked! Carob Nuts? No! For this one instance its a Zeio Nut thats needed! The forest in the tiny strip of islands to the east is where the Goblins holding 'em live. Can steal their nuts and get the enemy skill Goblin Punch from 'em!
Now theres a problem. Only got 6 stables so we gotta say farewell to Sisbo and Brobo! They earned a retirement as their kids are grown up and they've left a living legacy!
And what a legacy it is! This majestic creature can go anywhere including a second island which doesn't show up on the map! And inside the cave here is...!!! Ahahahha. Hahaha. MWAHAHAHA!! The
win button!! Eh? No I'm not drunk on power or anything >.>;
Thats not the only materia this bird called ULTROS (in all caps because anything else would be wrong) can get us! There are a couple of materia that can only be randomly won through racing! Not to mention some armor/accessory!
Moving ULTROS up through the first three ranks is super easy. Enter race, set controller down, watch as he wins with no input needed from the jockey! Which is usually What, but if This or Goddamn T are in the party they may pop out and express interest in racing. Auto-pilot mode generally works for S Class to, despite the competition matching or exceeding his top speed. Stamina and hidden stats must make up the difference.
However... you'll be much more likely to encounter Joe in this rank. How did TEIOH break the stamina cap? I call foul and demand it be tested for performance enhancing drugs!
They are beatable, but you'll need to take the reigns! Free victories against this pairs just not gonna happen!
An winning lots is what the party wants! After enough wins in S Class Ester'll give 'em a set of prizes! Counter Attack materia, Precious Watch, Cat's Bell, Sprint Shoes, and Chocobracelet. Thats almost all the rare race prizes ya can win!
Theres still more reasons ta race on btw. The Enemy Away and Sneak Attack materia can only be gotten here. Plus some of the race prizes in this S rank can be traded for 300/500 GP! And you'll need a total of 3000 GP ta buy Gil Plus and Exp Plus materia over at the Wonder Square! How does a Gil Plus materia work anyway? If you wear it at work do you get a bigger paycheck?
By the way the partys still missing something. Mideel! Ohhh yikes. This place is a mess. The quake sure did mess it up bigtime. -_-;
The weapon store guys gone missing much to his wifes worry. Could he have passed through that fake door in the shop??
Not alls doom & gloom however. The lady who'd been super stocking up on goods from the other shops now runs one herself! She's got all the items/weapon/materia the towns shops previously had and at a discount! Or so ya would hope but she's just kidding around about that part.
Very unhappy, yep that sounds right. Pretty blunt but realistic of the doctor. The nurse reminds What he'd better be thankful for This watching over him! She also still offers a free rest service! With that all the free rest stops, an also all the world map locations have been identified! Gotta be super close to the end of the game now huh?