During this sequence, a large phallic pillar moves across the screen next to the catwalk area. This becomes somewhat relevant in a bit, like penises are ever not relevant. On the next screen, the catwalk continues. Beneath it is something that looks like a conveyer belt, and in the background — next to more penis-like metal objects — is a large contraption with a green blanket sitting on top of it. The blanket makes me think that the soldiers use this in much the same manner as college students used the old abandoned building on my former campus. Again, I’m just setting up the scene for later — trust me, I’m at least as bored as you are. As Team Estrogen continues along the linear path, this may come as a surprise, but yet more phallic weapons pass by on the conveyer belt. These ones are some rather festively-colored teal and gold missiles. How appropriate that they are likely headed to Garden. Even if the current mission is unsuccessful, at least Squally will die in a hail of fabulous colors.
The girls — still blessedly silent — head down a staircase only to find another guard, well, guarding a door. An important-looking control panel is located conspicuously next to the door, and a second guard blocks the stairway on the right side of the screen. The first order of business is naming these two unimportant scrubs. How about Doofus and Dingus? Here’s your Recapper Fun Fact of the Day: these are two of the (many) nicknames I’ve given my rabbits.
PENISES!
Doofus, unlike his door-guarding counterpart PUGGY!!!!, allows the girls past without making a federal case of it. Inside the large, drab, metallic chamber, a fourth generic soldier — this one called Maintenance Soldier, but let’s call him Sephiroth instead — mentions that he’s waiting for a final missile launcher. I just bet he is. Another Maintenance Soldier, now named George, stands staring at a phallic pillar much like the one we saw in the room patrolled by PUGGY!!!!. Two more similar penis pillars stand impressively nearby, with what looks like a spot for a fourth next to one of them. I won’t play dumb anymore — these long, hard, beige towers are actually the missile launchers. Somewhere, Squally feels an urge to visit the missile base and he doesn’t know why. Luckily for Team Estrogen, both Sephiroth and George are staring in open-mouthed awe at the cocktacular majesty of the launchers and completely fail to notice the pink sparkling draw point nearby. Sweet! More magic for me!
After talking to Sephiroth, the girls spend the next several minutes running back and forth through the areas of the base they’ve already explored. This type of behavior may appear odd to you, but in their defense, they have a very good reason. You see, it comes down once again to the nature of their trusted friend, the GF Stratguidos. Sometimes he is, to put it bluntly, a total dickface. Instead of providing them with the information they need to successfully complete their quest, he occasionally decides to fuck them over. I don’t know why he does this. Maybe he’s jealous that they’re off on an adventure, a very exciting adventure that includes numerous poorly-planned missions and hours worth of drawing magic. I can see why he’d envy that. To get back at them and make himself feel better for being such a wanky-ass loser, he gives them poor advice. Or maybe he’s occasionally plastered off his GF-y ass when the game characters decide to consult him. It’s not for me to say. I can only tell you that in this instance, he only told the girls to go to the Observation Deck, but provided no details — or map! — to help them get there.
Yeah. How could I NOT figure out where to go next?
Without any sort of map or “GO HERE DIPSHIT” pointer, it takes a pitifully long time for the girls to find their next destination. This is the part where you expect me to sheepishly admit what a dumbass gamer I am and confess that I missed the huge, obvious, blinking door that takes me where I need to go. Most of the time you would be right, so I can’t be too mad at you. Unfortunately, by assuming, you just made an ass out of you and me. I discover the next screen only by accident when running aimlessly (and angrily) around the screen near Doofus and Dingus. There is a narrow hallway, partially blocked by the staircase railing, at the lower left corner of the screen. The game designers expected me to develop psychic powers and somehow just know that this almost invisible hallway leads to another screen.
Then again, now that I’m looking at the still shot of the screen, I see that a small yellow arrow on the floor points in the direction of the corridor, and a red glow emanates from the screen in that corner. It’s possible that all the games with retard-style maps that I’ve played in the last 3.5 years have lowered my navigation IQ. Great, now I’m depressed again.
Wow, that footage was amazing to watch — I especially like the part where the three girls stood without moving for five minutes while I angrily paged through the strategy guide. The hidden Observation Deck has steam rising through a grate in the floor, giving a somewhat Silent Hill-esque vibe to this scene. As much as I would love for Rinhoa to fall through and burn to death in a coal fire, the surroundings are just for show. Once the trio avails themselves of another unused draw point, they head over to talk to a pair of soldiers facing a railing. I could be misinterpreting the graphics here, but it very much appears that these two are standing spread-legged, aiming their wieners over the railing. And I’ve just discovered their nicknames. Peter basically tells the ladies to fuck off, as he is “busy” but Johnson reminds him that they’re supposed to “inspect the circuit room.” So that’s what they’re calling it these days. “We’re doing the real thing today, so there’s no way we have time for it,” Peter responds, confusing me. What is “doing the real thing” and how does it prevent one from “inspecting the circuit room”? He makes it sound like their penis-wagging trumps all other duties.
Anyway, the result of this scene is that Selphie, Rinhoa, and Quistis must deliver a message to their buddies in the [missile launcher] room. Sephiroth and George are to “go on ahead” and Peter and Johnson will “catch up with ’em later.” Who am I to get in the way of a G-Army orgy? The girls say nothing, but the two soldiers turn back to their pud-pulling, confident that their message will be conveyed. It’s not like I have a choice in the matter. I find it odd that no one seems to give a shit that these three random soldiers are running around doing nothing while there are all these important preparations taking place. I can only assume that the Power of the Penis has distracted all of the normally intelligent, alert soldiers. Right.
Before Team Estrogen delivers their very urgent message, I would like to take a moment to address something. You might notice that I’ve been referring to all these soldiers as male, when I don’t have any actual proof of their gender. At first, you probably think this is part of my well-known plan to hold back women’s lib. No, I prefer to do that by making fun of fictional female RPG characters who act like dumbasses. My assumptions of gender are nothing that diabolical. I mentioned earlier that the soldier models of the women are all to scale. The generic G-Army soldiers are all the exact same height, all taller than the girls. “But wait,” you may say. “The military academies train both men and women. Plus, you’re missing the possibility that the Galbadian Army is full of six-foot amazons.” I will give you an internet cookie for making these good points. While it seems very likely that a place that trains up both male and female military students would allow women into their army, the second point is where that argument falls apart. Do you really think that the game designers, dirty lechers that they are, would have an army full of tall women without a) drawing a hell of a lot of attention to the fact via clumsy exposition, and b) making the army uniforms for the women inappropriately revealing in order to show off their inevitably huge knockers? I don’t think I need to answer that question for you. Now, I will allow for the possibility that I missed some essential dialogue somewhere where they explain the exact gender make-up of the army. I don’t care, I’m still going to assume they’re all dudes.
Why does this matter, anyway? Well, I’m sure it matters to the author of the 500-chapter Galbadian Army yaoi orgy fanfiction that you know exists somewhere. Apart from that, think about it. Without voice acting, it’s not that noticeable to us, but can you imagine how out-of-place little squeaky-voiced Selphie would be in a base full of guys? Even if the soldiers all had Phoenix Wright-style girl voices, Selphie’s chipmunk voice would still stick out like Tidus at a MENSA convention. It all boils down to another example of the retardation of the Galbadian Army in general, and this sequence in particular.
Anyway, Team Estrogen returns to the Chamber of Big, Hard Missile Launchers and Selphie taps the enthralled George on the shoulder to grab his attention, informing him that she has a very important message. Pissily, he turns away from the erect launcher in front of him and demands to know what the hell it is. Selphie, her ADD-addled brain unable to hold information for 30 seconds, inwardly panics as she tries to remember the complicated details of the message. It’s up to me to choose — do I have to do everything around here? Making an offensive mentally-handicapped face at Selphie, I choose the correct option. “It’s about inspecting the circuit room. [Peter and Johnson] said that they were too busy, so that you should go on ahead,” Selphie relays, surprisingly detailed for someone who had trouble remembering the basic message just ten seconds ago.
Well, George is not ready to go on ahead yet, as he has unfinished business with his room full of phallic objects. He tells Selphie to relay a message back to Peter and Johnson: he can’t “inspect the circuit room” just yet. I’m starting to regret not going for the “fuck up the mission, fight random battles” option. This “acting casual” is boring as shit. Even pretending the message is code for a big gay soldier orgy isn’t helping.
Next, Selphie interrupts Peter from his winky-waggling to convey this latest important message. Now the two soldiers have a dilemma — do they “inspect the circuit room” and leave their very essential jacking-it duties behind, or do they put off the “inspection”? I’m on the edge of my seat here. Peter emits the world’s longest and slowest string of ellipses (no wonder it takes the guy ages to whack off) before coming (heh) to the conclusion that Selphie and her silent companions should perform the “circuit room inspection” in their place. If we’re still going the “gay orgy” route, the presence of the three girls will be the equivalent of throwing ice water on the man-pile. How terrible. Johnson, perhaps sensing this, shrieks at his companion that this is “not cool” and they’ll be in deep shit if the base commander finds out. Peter doesn’t care: “All we do is go and make sure everything’s up and running, anyway.” There’s really nothing I can add to this. “(……Whoo-hoo! Blow the place to smithereens!)” Selphie mentally celebrates, thinking she’ll actually be invited to participate.
That’s more Squally’s style, if you know what I’m saying.
After more running about, Team Estrogen discovers that the “circuit room” is behind the door guarded by PUGGY!!!!. For some reason, even though these are obviously icky girls, PUGGY!!!! accepts Selphie’s statement that Peter and Johnson told them to perform the “inspection” to make sure everything is “up” and “running properly.” He allows them to enter. The room, that is. PUGGY!!!! runs off to prepare for the festivities, now that his shift is over.
Disappointingly, the circuit room turns out to be exactly that. Not that I was particularly hoping for a sweaty G-Army group buttsex scenario, but at least it added necessary spice to this recap. Selphie slowly walks over to one of the futuristic control panels — complete with large computer screens — and finds herself unsure how to continue. Yes, Selphie, the girl who’s all about violent destruction, suddenly needs my help figuring out whether she should “just hit whatever” or “hit a few buttons here and there.” Good lord. I know the game designers are struggling to make this whole sequence interactive, but come on. I’m not sure the choice matters — Stratguidos proves once again to be as useless as boobs in a Suikoden game — so I just pick the second one. Nothing happens. This brings up another set of choices: “Just press whatever!” or “Bang on it hard!” You know, this is starting to sound like Twink awkwardly (and unwillingly) attempting to please a woman. As much as “bang on it hard” sounds entertaining, I choose the other option, just because I’m afraid a lot of loud banging will draw unwanted attention and ruin my chances for upping my SeeD rank. Yes, I’m still trying to earn that damn prize, despite what I said earlier. Sigh.
Selphie’s bumbling causes the power to go out. “Huh? Heeey… The lights went out…” Selphie DURRs over a black screen. But there’s no time for lesbian shenanigans! The backup power (I’m assuming) turns on, bathing the room in a sickly greenish-yellow glow. A message over the intercom orders the Maintenance Team to investigate the source of the power outage. Shit! By the way, up until this point, both Rinhoa and Quistis have been standing silent over by the wall, contributing absolutely nothing in the way of help. Not that I’m complaining about Rinhoa’s silence — oh boy, am I ever not complaining — I just thought I’d mention it because it’s kind of odd and nonsensical. It’s almost like the game designers didn’t want to program a lot of alternative dialogue and actions for all the different possible character combinations, but I’m probably misinterpreting their intentions.
Party pooper.
Rinhoa breaks her blessed silence to mention that it might be prudent to get the hell out of the room before someone finds them there. No shit, Sherlock. After they exit the room, they stand in front of the door for a moment before two Maintenance Soldiers rush down the stairs and confront them. It’s not looking good for our heroines, and even worse, I don’t know which two soldiers these are. Peter and Johnson? Sephiroth and George? Sephiroth and Peter? Johnson and George? I’ll stop with the obvious padding now. Whatever their true identities, these guys are hopping mad over the power outage. Yet again, I get to choose how to proceed. I know I complained about some of the vague choices before, but this time I think my pea-sized brain can figure out the consequences of the “fight” versus “talk” options. I have Selphie put her finely-honed mind to work on a believable lie. Except it’s my mind and not hers that has to pick from the next two choices: “We just got here” or “We were just about to go call on you.” I choose the first one randomly, which turns out to be wrong. I’m going to blame this on Selphie, who adds in what I imagine to be a poorly-acted manner, “We have ABSOLUTELY no idea what’s going on!” She probably has shifting eyes and everything. Maintenance Soldier sees through this, also insisting he and his soldier friend saw them leave the room. Whatever, they weren’t even on the screen then.
Luckily for me and my precious coveted SeeD rank, I get another chance to make up shit, similar to a Phoenix Wright witness testimony, only this time in my favor. Selphie insists that they were only in the room to check it out before alerting…whoever they were supposed to alert. “It’s a big mess in there! There’s no way we can repair it!” she shrieks dramatically, as if someone took a sledgehammer to the generator rather than just pressing a few random buttons on a console. Since the theme of this recap is “The Galbadian Army is Dumb” the two soldiers buy this totally obvious fabrication. Therefore, it serves them right when Selphie, Rinhoa, and Quistis follow them into the circuit room and beat the ever-loving bejeezus out of them. We are not shown this sequence — it’s conveyed via offscreen sound effects and horrified dialogue. Therefore, it’s just as likely that the three girls flashed their boobies at the gay soldiers, causing them to vomit themselves into unconsciousness.