Kuattro
Augur
UPDATES
1 - The One Update. You're on it.
2 - The Socratic Dialogue Update
3 - The Hairdresser's Shoah Update
4 - The Down There Update
The Missing Update
5 - The Operation Chink in the Wanzer, part One, Update
6 - The Operation Chink in the Wanzer, part Two, Update
7 - The Operation Chink in the Wanzer, part Three, Update
8 - The no, the other Russians, Update
9 - The What The Hell Is Going On Here, Update
10 - The Shitty Update
11 - The I'm Running Out Of Things To Call These Update
12 - The Full Disclosure Update
13 - The Angry (Angrier, if that was possible)KabukiKazuki Update
14 - The The End Update
------------------------------
1 - The One Update. You're on it.
2 - The Socratic Dialogue Update
3 - The Hairdresser's Shoah Update
4 - The Down There Update
The Missing Update
5 - The Operation Chink in the Wanzer, part One, Update
6 - The Operation Chink in the Wanzer, part Two, Update
7 - The Operation Chink in the Wanzer, part Three, Update
8 - The no, the other Russians, Update
9 - The What The Hell Is Going On Here, Update
10 - The Shitty Update
11 - The I'm Running Out Of Things To Call These Update
12 - The Full Disclosure Update
13 - The Angry (Angrier, if that was possible)
14 - The The End Update
------------------------------
So, the other day I came across this post. Since your friendly neighbourhood serial killer Double Helix made sure that the possibility of any kind of Front Mission sequel was squashed like a bug with a vengeance (apparently it wasn't enough nuking the place, Americans also had to fuck up Front Mission), I thought "why not go with the next best thing?", so getting ready for a new Front Mission 3 play-through I found myself, when it occurred to me that it could be a good idea to share the good word with the fine, discerning gentlemen of the Codex, who can surely appreciate incline when it's staring right at them. And so, here I am, trying my hand at this for the first time, and probably set for a ridiculous failure. But still.
Anyway, enough with the platitudes and the unsolicited excuses.
I presume most of you are familiar with the game (we do have a considerable selection of avatars from the series in this very forum), but just in case: Front Mission 3 is a game about driving giant robots in order to beat the living shit out of other giant robots. And helicopters. And tanks. And parked cars. And walls and barriers. And people. And anything in the way really. All of it while navigating through dark, ominous conspiracies in a geopolitical scale that could very well lead to massive wars, the use of terrible WMD, and enormous loss of life. But mainly it's about making things go boom.
And without further ado, let's get this started.
JDF Test Facility, Okinawa Ocean City
"System check completed. Load the pilot data into the system."
"Roger. I'm loading the pilot data now."
I leave his name as the default, Kazuki Takemura. Yes, I could have named him Arseblaster or Pompousius Escato III Esq., but the poor fella has enough coming his way without me adding to it, let's give him at least some respite.
"Load confirmed. The final test for the SHUNYO will now commence. We're ready on our side. Kazuki, activate the wanzer."
Fellow gentlemen, it gives me great pleasure to introduce you to the future of war and mayhem, the Shunyo Mk111. Look at it closely, because by the end of the game, you are going to learn to hate that motherfucker's guts for all the times you will have to fight certain character using it. Until WE get to use it, and then you will love it. In the meantime, we only get to drive daddy's Rolls-Royce for a bit and then we have to give it back.
"Activated"
Activation confirmed. First, we'll check movement. Move to the designated area."
"Roger that."
And so, it begins...
All right maybe it's time for professor Kuattro to explain some things. If the robot's happy dance when he destroyed those two rust buckets didn't distract you, when you use a weapon against an enemy, you get a bit of experience, and a lot more when you destroy it, as marked very clearly in the screen.
I wouldn't like to presume anything, this being a reunion of bright minds and all, but in case it need explaining, gain enough experience and you level up your weapon skill for each weapon type (shotguns, machine-guns, launchers, rifles, melee, cannons? flamers? Some I might forget, some I might have invented, we'll find soon enough). The better your pilot skill is at that particular weapon, the better he is at killing things with it.
And also, every time you destroy an enemy wanzer part, you see some little medals piling up.
When you have accumulated a given number of little medals, your pilot gets a big chocolate medal, and some more APs with it. Right now, more APs are a bit useless, but in the future, as we will see, they will become quite handy.
Okay, back to the stories.
"It's a good wanzer. Great performance, I must say."
"Yes. It's our finest yet."
"Hey, Dr. Koike Yokosuka Base wants these shipped right away. Anything you can do to help?"
"I called a cargo helicopter. We'll deliver 2 new wanzers for now."
"Hi!"
"Hey, Kazuki. Impressive, as always."
"Thanks. You did great, too. You were under a tight deadline."
"It's a chance for us to be involved in the Japanese Defense Force. Receiving a part of the national defense budget would be great."
"That wanzer is an assault type. Isn't it aggressive for a purely defensive army?"
"Maybe they're gonna start a war."
You should cut your hair.
"Ryogo?!"
"That would never happen. Japan would never start a war."
Excepting all those other times. I should know.
"At least on the surface."
You should cut your hair.
"We've been sending out forces more often. There have been more civil wars within the OCU since Alordesh."*
"Like when we sent out our wanzer teams a few years back?"
You should REALLY cut your hair.
"Back when we had no decent wanzers, and got wiped out?"
"We learned from that experience. But our military policy remains purely defensive."
"Yeah, it's not like there'll ever be a war in Japan."
You should... no? Okay, okay.
"Hey, Ryogo. What are you doing here!? I thought you were working in Yokosuka."
"What do you mean, "what am I doing here?" I'm here to deliver some construction wanzers."
Seriously, you look like a girl. It's pretty confusing.
"There's a major construction project in Ocean City. Ryogo is delivering the wanzers for it."
"Anyone can do that. Why you!?"
Whoa there. Don't scream at the lady dude.
"The boss trusts me, dude."
Oh god. Okay, never do that face again, please.
"You begged and pleaded, right?"
"Hey, how did you know?"
"Why don't you take your job more seriously?"
Okay I'm feeling some anger management issues here. Why do you keep screaming for the stupidest reasons?
"I'm not listening!"
Okay maybe he deserves the aggro.
"Kazuki will accompany me to Yokosuka Base for wanzer delivery. It'll be around midnight when the cargo is ready. Get some rest until then."
"Workin' late again, Kazuki? You workaholic."
"You have work to do, Ryogo. Take the wanzers to the site."
"Alright, alright. Hey, come with me."
"Why should I?"
"Because we're buddies! Come to the residential construction zone with me.
...
Okay! This seems like a good time as any to stop things.
So, first of all, my manifesto:
What I can't promise:
As you could see, I recorded that first mission in it's entirety. I had thought first of only recording the combat sequences between wanzers, but then I realized that would be a couple dozen every stage, which is not really doable. So the options are, either I do it like that, recording the full combat, or I do it through screenshots. The first method has the advantage of being much easier for me, and the (dis?)advantage of me not being able to insert my stupid commentaries during combat, because I can't be arsed to start editing videos, I don't do this for a living. The second method, apart from being preferred by those amongst you that adhere to the ideas of Ludd, has the definite disadvantage of sending much more work my way, but hey, at least I'll get to make silly jokes between image and image.
So tell me which one you prefer, so that I can feel bad when I ignore you and do whatever I please.
Also, this being and RPG and serious , it contains C&C that none of your gaijin so called RPGs can ever aspire to equal. And you get the honour of expressing your opinion about that.
The game contains two different storylines, one where we pair with the ex-Russian scientist Emma and the USAN (if we go with Ryogo), and another where we go with Kazuki's adopted sister Alisa and we end up working closely with the People's Republic of Da Han Zhong (if we ignore the damn fool). I think. Give me a break, it’s been almost 15 years since I’ve played this game.
So, my friends, tell me. Tell me which story would you like to see in this Let's Play, and tell me why it's Emma's.
No, seriously, we are going with Emma.**
* Confused about that? Maybe you should go and play Front Mission 2 then. Or wait until a handsome, smart and dashing Spaniard decides to give it another go after being a stupid git and deleting all his saves half-way through that game, and posts about it in this very forum. Also does anyone know if I can create links that allow you to point at different parts of your own post? That would be pretty freaking useful right now don't you think? Oh come on, you only need to search for "Alordesh" and you'll be back where you were in no time.
** I prefer Russian women. Not that it matters, they are both Russian because they are sisters. Oh shit! Did I spoiler it?
Anyway, enough with the platitudes and the unsolicited excuses.
I presume most of you are familiar with the game (we do have a considerable selection of avatars from the series in this very forum), but just in case: Front Mission 3 is a game about driving giant robots in order to beat the living shit out of other giant robots. And helicopters. And tanks. And parked cars. And walls and barriers. And people. And anything in the way really. All of it while navigating through dark, ominous conspiracies in a geopolitical scale that could very well lead to massive wars, the use of terrible WMD, and enormous loss of life. But mainly it's about making things go boom.
And without further ado, let's get this started.
JDF Test Facility, Okinawa Ocean City
I leave his name as the default, Kazuki Takemura. Yes, I could have named him Arseblaster or Pompousius Escato III Esq., but the poor fella has enough coming his way without me adding to it, let's give him at least some respite.
Fellow gentlemen, it gives me great pleasure to introduce you to the future of war and mayhem, the Shunyo Mk111. Look at it closely, because by the end of the game, you are going to learn to hate that motherfucker's guts for all the times you will have to fight certain character using it. Until WE get to use it, and then you will love it. In the meantime, we only get to drive daddy's Rolls-Royce for a bit and then we have to give it back.
And so, it begins...
All right maybe it's time for professor Kuattro to explain some things. If the robot's happy dance when he destroyed those two rust buckets didn't distract you, when you use a weapon against an enemy, you get a bit of experience, and a lot more when you destroy it, as marked very clearly in the screen.
I wouldn't like to presume anything, this being a reunion of bright minds and all, but in case it need explaining, gain enough experience and you level up your weapon skill for each weapon type (shotguns, machine-guns, launchers, rifles, melee, cannons? flamers? Some I might forget, some I might have invented, we'll find soon enough). The better your pilot skill is at that particular weapon, the better he is at killing things with it.
And also, every time you destroy an enemy wanzer part, you see some little medals piling up.
When you have accumulated a given number of little medals, your pilot gets a big chocolate medal, and some more APs with it. Right now, more APs are a bit useless, but in the future, as we will see, they will become quite handy.
Okay, back to the stories.
Okay! This seems like a good time as any to stop things.
So, first of all, my manifesto:
What I can't promise:
- I will add witticisms and other funnies in order to not just deliver the straight story, otherwise it could get rather dull, Front Missions (and Japanese games in general) not being particularly famous because of their stellar writing. But I'm neither especially witty nor funny, so I cannot tell you what will be the end result, but I really, reallylike to believe that I am. So be prepared. Just... be prepared.
- I am extremely lazy. I can't promise regular updates. Hell, I can't promise there will be any updates, specially if I find writing them a hassle (even writing this was a bit of a hassle, but I had fun with it in the end so...). I'll do my best though, for my loyal followers. That's you.
As you could see, I recorded that first mission in it's entirety. I had thought first of only recording the combat sequences between wanzers, but then I realized that would be a couple dozen every stage, which is not really doable. So the options are, either I do it like that, recording the full combat, or I do it through screenshots. The first method has the advantage of being much easier for me, and the (dis?)advantage of me not being able to insert my stupid commentaries during combat, because I can't be arsed to start editing videos, I don't do this for a living. The second method, apart from being preferred by those amongst you that adhere to the ideas of Ludd, has the definite disadvantage of sending much more work my way, but hey, at least I'll get to make silly jokes between image and image.
So tell me which one you prefer, so that I can feel bad when I ignore you and do whatever I please.
Also, this being and RPG and serious , it contains C&C that none of your gaijin so called RPGs can ever aspire to equal. And you get the honour of expressing your opinion about that.
The game contains two different storylines, one where we pair with the ex-Russian scientist Emma and the US
So, my friends, tell me. Tell me which story would you like to see in this Let's Play, and tell me why it's Emma's.
No, seriously, we are going with Emma.**
* Confused about that? Maybe you should go and play Front Mission 2 then. Or wait until a handsome, smart and dashing Spaniard decides to give it another go after being a stupid git and deleting all his saves half-way through that game, and posts about it in this very forum. Also does anyone know if I can create links that allow you to point at different parts of your own post? That would be pretty freaking useful right now don't you think? Oh come on, you only need to search for "Alordesh" and you'll be back where you were in no time.
** I prefer Russian women. Not that it matters, they are both Russian because they are sisters. Oh shit! Did I spoiler it?
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