Yet more Suiko
I beat Luca Blight yesterday. The scene where you have the confrontation with him is absolutely my favorite single scene in a Playstation game. The buildup, the previous scenes with Luca, and the fact that you need 18 of your very best fighters (I don’t think I’ve ever beat him all 3 times on the first try), a few quivers of arrows, and finally a duel against him to defeat him has convinced me he is my favorite villain of all-time. Too bad you only find out the reason he’s a maniac so indirectly.
Little touches in other scenes flesh out the story wonderfully. For example, if you load data from the first game and get McDohl with Kasumi in your party, you get a (rather sad) scene between her and McDohl. I didn’t have time to experiment, although Viktor had some brief dialogue with him right when you first talk to him.
So now I’m wondering what happens to all these main characters after the games. I mean, McDohl wanders off somewhere, obviously. But he’s probably got a long life ahead of him. After S2, in the “best” ending, if I’m remembering right, the main character keeps a true rune (trying to avoid spoilers). I also recall in S3, all the characters still had their true runes at the end. What do they do then? Is an eventual Suikoden going to involve lots of True Rune-wielding heroes taking down the power-hungry Harmonian empire (which had a subplot in S3 about their hunger for the True Runes)?
Back to my current run-through of S2. Beating Luca was the 11-hour mark, if I’m remembering right. 2 hours earlier than most of my previous times.
Now I’m at the 16-hour mark and just past the Rockaxe Castle stuff. I’ve seen the second Clive scene at Muse and I also know I pulled off the 108 stars / reaction-time thing at Rockaxe correctly, so now it’s time to hurry up and wait, I guess.
Should finish this one tomorrow mid-evening, and I’ll probably start up number 3 tomorrow as well.