Lights, Camera, Action! Let's Debut in Tokyo Mirage Sessions

Honestly I feel Barry just comes off as creepy, like I get what they were going for its just weird. Also as someone whose played this game seeing people’s predictions is :allears:

Please, please look forward to his appearance. That’s all I ask.

Who would have thought that the bright blue door marked with the Fire Emblem would be a dead giveaway to Tiki’s location. Yashiro must be a master detective to have figured that one out.
I didn’t think Eleonora would be using Virion, but at least you’ll be getting a bow user soon. I should have figured Yashiro, the anime rival, would be Navarre. And I’m guessing that Barry is either being possessed by a generic barbarian, or Vaike reclassed.

Please, please look forward to his appearance. That’s all I ask.

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So you might notice that things have been uh…quiet. Work’s been kicking my ass and I haven’t had any real time to put together any updates. I have been doing work (I just recorded like 4 hours of the game this morning) but I don’t know when I’ll be able to put it all together, maybe later this week? We’ll see.

[quote] I feel something really bad…and heavy… Yeah, it feels really heavy.
I think this is all coming from that place you were all looking at on TV. I think it’s called Daitou TV Station?
It’s going to be your first time going there, right? Make sure to be careful.[/quote]

So, last time Daitou TV was under attack by a possessed Barry. That sure went south fast!

…Oh, and I guess we got a new party member or something? I’m sure it wasn’t that important.

[quote] All right, contact saved! This is Itsuki, right? Anyway…
Why did this have to happen now!? My first message was supposed to sound more like a Hollywood star…
[/quote]

Ellie is our resident archer, and like all pre-Fates archers, is fairly fast and accurate, passable on offense, and garbage otherwise. She doubles up on electricity (since we can’t remove Itsuki from the party), but she does get some fire skills to help with coverage and we’ve been wanting for bow damage since the first dungeon. Otherwise, there isn’t much to say about her other than the fact that she starts at Stage Rank 1. After all, she just got back from an overseas trip and stars in a TV show that gets really poor ratings. Why would anyone know who she is? :allears:

On an aesthetic note, Ellie probably has the best design of anyone in the party. The rose arrows are a great touch, and Virion is far and away the best party mirage. Look at that fucking rose pauldron. Look at it!

And here’s the man himself, just chilling in the Bloom Palace. Let’s get acquainted, shall we?

Aha! Itsuki, I presume?

Yeah, that’s me… And you are…?

I am the noble Mirage partnered with Ellie… My name is Virion, good sir, and it is my distinct pleasure to make your acquaintance.

Oh, so you’re Ellie’s Mirage. It’s a pleasure to meet you too.

As you have doubtless observed, dear Ellie is somewhat… rambunctious. As nobles, it is our duty to refine her into a lady of class!

Um, I’m not really a noble or anything…

Is that so? Strange… I could have sworn I felt a kinship! An aura of elegance, style, and fated grandeur! But no matter! Those of regal bearing and great nobility must act with all the magnanimity due of their station!

If the mood ever strikes you, please, come by again for a chat! Conversation, advice, or witticism - all I shall happily supply.

[quote]

Virion is a side character in the first generation of Awakening. He’s a deposed noble from Valm (the continent in Awakening’s second act, which you probably know better as Valentia these days) who finds himself assisting Chrom’s army after a surprise Risen attack. His main character trait is being a massive flirt, but he doesn’t fall into the same trap that someone like Sain does, where it’s his only character trait of note. Rather, each of his supports builds on that in interesting ways, such as how he teases Lissa about being a spy when he’s simply writing home to his parents, his assorted conquests give him all kinds of connections to finance the army, and he’s quite adept at reading and manipulating people (which he dresses up as “fortune telling”), just to name a few of his exploits.

Of course, all of this is undermined by being a pre-Fates archer, so uh…yeah. Maybe next game, buddy![/quote]

Ellie’s only available radiant skill slows down enemies on the field, which isn’t much to write home about considering we’re already faster than them.

Anyway, now that we’re done with all our errands, let’s get rolling. Onward to Daitou TV!

:siren: Daitou TV :siren:

Yep, this sure is a mirage attack.

Oh, Itsuki…

Thank goodness… You’re all right.

There was a big…shadowy monster that attacked me, but Uncle Barry shielded me and-

Where is he now?

Over there…

You’re going to go save him, right…? Can I come with you…?

Wait for us back at the office. Don’t worry, we’ll get Barry back safe.

Okay…

[quote] no doubt about it, ms. maiko. looks like the station was just attacked
we found mamori! can you send someone to pick her up? we’re heading into illusory daitou tv station
[/quote]

Sounds like Touma’s got his head in the game, so we’d better follow suit. To the idolasphere!

It’s a…giant Japanese garden? Yeah, sure, let’s go with that.

I’ll be counting on you, partner! Now let’s show them how it’s done in Hollywood.

Illusory DTV is divided into two halves, with each one having the same basic structure. There’s a large central building with four exits in the cardinal directions, and a sprawling set of paths that go around to each of the doors. This time around, there’s a handful of tasks we need to do in order to set the stage and move on, but we’ll see more about that once we get inside.

New enemies! The Blackwing Knights are the big ones, because now that Ellie’s here, we finally have a good answer to enemy fliers. They’re packing the usual assortment of lance skills and are weak to bows and wind, so we can clown on them pretty effortlessly. The Phantom, aside from being dapper as fuck, is just another enemy in the ghost family - weak to electricity and bows.

This, incidentally, is the big reason we got Bow-Thunder on Itsuki. Ellie’s starting skills leave a lot to be desired, with only Lance-Snipe and Sword-Plasma as session skills, and absolutely no one can pick up from her bow skills without Itsuki as a bridge. Itsuki/Tsubasa/Ellie is probably the best possible party for getting her going, which is pretty unfortunate because that’s not a great damage-dealing party.

On our way to the west entrance, we come across an unlit lantern. Just keep it in mind for now, it’ll be important in a bit.

And if we poke around on the decks a bit, we’ll find another lantern and a new Performa (Garden Artistry) by the west door.

Red Mages crumble to basically any physical attack, but they are packing some Tier 2 spells so don’t underestimate them in large numbers. Fortunately, they mostly spawn with Phantoms, which are far less threatening.

And our last new enemy for the moment, Infernos are basically just big buckets of HP. As you can probably guess, they’re fire-elemental and hit like a truck if you let them, but they’re weak to most other elements, especially ice - Kiria especially just chews through these poor guys. Just be careful if Touma is hanging around, because I’m pretty sure this is the first instance of an enemy absorbing an element.

Inside the building, the door to the south is blocked off by an orange barrier…

…And there’s a demon just standing around here. Let’s see what he wants from us.

First job: Get the stage nice and ready! Turn on all four of the lanterns outside! Report to me when you finish, then we’ll go to the set inside and I’ll give you your next assignment.

I-I understand!

All riiiiiight. Good answer, good answer. I’m expecting good things!

(I guess he’ll lead us inside if we finish our tasks… It seems simple enough. We might as well humor him.)

As Itsuki says, it’s simple enough. Light the four lanterns, and you can move on to the second floor.

Now that we’ve spoken to the director, this menu option pops up. From here, we’ll head back into the main building and go out the north door.

Past that, there’s the instructions for all the assorted tasks we’ll be doing in the dungeon. It’s…nice, I guess? But ultimately not very useful, because you can always just talk to the director if you need a refresher.

Der Freischütz increases Ellie’s crit rate with Bow skills. She’s already fairly critty because of her high skill, and this just makes her moreso.

And Kiria trades out Lullaby Song for Zan. Really, I should have dumped Flux, but either way this gives Kiria more or less complete elemental coverage and lets her sub in for both Tsubasa and Touma as needed.

The north area is fairly small and there isn’t much to it other than the lantern. However, we can sneak down a small side path to grab a pair of Mazan stones.

The area to the east is incredibly small, literally a single path that leads out to the lantern, but it makes up for that by going down and around to connect with the southern part of the docks. That one-way wall is the other side of the one you can see from the entrance.

Ellie picks up Skill Boost and Itsuki takes a pass on Wyrmslayer. Wyvern Riders are flyers and half of them are weak to electricity anyway, so it’s not nearly as imperative as some other skills are.

Wicked Lips is a fun one, slightly cutting the cost of all offensive magic. In practice, it’s largely useless simply because Kiria already has the closest thing to a bottomless EP pool, so this just makes it even more bottomless.

Tucked away in a corner is a pair of smoke machines. They’re nice, but smoke machines are incredibly cheap to buy and they’re so useful that there’s no reason to not be walking around with 20 of them at all times.

And in the farthest corner of the first set, we find a treasure key and a Bead Chain. This one’s fairly easy to miss, and it’s probably the best treasure on the entire floor!

With that, all four lanterns are lit. We could go see what the director wants next, but we could use an EP top-off before doing another dive, so back to the office.

You know what? Sure, lay it on us Aya.

Do you know the late-night gourmet TV show “Food Heaven”? Despite being on so late, the show is very popular and usually earns a rating of 15% thanks to its charismatic host Himemaro.

Recently, however, the ratings have been falling. From what I hear, it’s due to Himemaro’s poor performance…

They’re taping Food Heaven in Shibuya right now, could you got to the Gourmet House to check on her? If something’s wrong, please let me know.

A food critic? Now this is something near and dear to Itsuki’s heart. Don’t you worry, Aya. If there was ever a time you had the right man on the case, this is it.

This is also the first point at which we have a serious prestige crunch. Between Tsubasa and Ellie, six of our ten 3-star prestiges get eaten up in Radiant Skills, and that’s before we even start talking about the six or so new weapons we could forge (each of which requires 3-5 3-stars a piece).

Ultimately, I settle on making the Lilith Rod. Not because it’s particularly better than any of the other options, just that Kiria is going to be the first one to need a new weapon, so we might as well have it ready.

Anyway, next time we’ll finish up the first set and see what’s going on with our wayward food critic. See you all then!

Ellie being Stage Rank 1 is one of my favorite little touches in the game.

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Virion is probably the most stand-like design in this game thus far, though it would probably be more so if he had a rose brooch instead of a heart. Gotta have that consistent thematic design.

It just occurred to me that we’ll probably be getting Aya as a Peg Knight later and Mamori even later as an Est Archetype, probably with Est herself for that matter making her Peg number three. Though since Itsuki can’t be pulled from the line-up, I’m not certain how they’d squeeze in a Triangle-Attack.

I’m afraid to say that Aya is not a playable character

What? Laaaaaame.

Last time we learned of an ailing food critic, and that’s one thing Itsuki simply will not stand for. But first, let’s check up on some of the other residents of Shibuya.

This guy looks like he’s in a good spot. I’m sure he’s having a great day.

sigh …Hey, what’re you staring at?

Don’t play dumb… You were staring at the weird gate, weren’t ya? I’ve been looking for a guy like you. Think you could do me a favor?

Itsuki accepted the request “Iori in Love”.

Hoo boy, I think I can see where this one is going.

When I first saw it, I stuck my foot in and that was that: I found myself in a strange world. Next thing I knew, all these monsters were chasing me! I ran like hell, but… They still caught up, and I thought I was gonna wind up some monster’s lunch. But a girl came outta nowhere and saved me!

I’ve never seen anyone like her… That cutie was out of this world. Ahhh… She stole my heart. It was love at first sight…

Uh… Cat got yer tongue?

So, I need you to go through the gate and tell that girl how I feel about her. My name’s Souji Iori. She’s somewhere near the ticket gates in that strange world. Thanks, man! I’m countin’ on ya!

What is it with people and falling in love with demons? I feel like it’s in every single SMT game and they always go the exact same way.

Before we head into Illusory Shibuya, we might as well check in with the food critic since that’s where Aya’s going to send us anyway.

Ugh! I don’t have the words to communicate how delicious it tastes… I can’t be a food show host if I can’t describe the food… Ugh, I’m such a failure… sigh

Yep, off to the idolasphere.

Of course it’s a bunny cleric. Why would it not be?

What, you have something to say to me?

(A girl by the ticket gates… She must be the mirage Iori was talking about.)

Ahh, I remember him. He was clinging to me, yelling “Get me outta here!” He was so revolting, so I told him the way out and got rid of him. Just thinking about him makes my hair stand on end!

Hey, you! Tell that Io-whatever-his-name-is this… If I ever see him again, I’ll rip that jiggly pompadour of his to shreds!

(That’s pretty harsh, but I guess I should tell Iori…)

Well that went about as well as it always does. Let’s go kill some demons.

This guy is a little harder to find, he’s hiding underneath the middle ledge at the big three-path split towards the end.

It’s also the first time we’re on even footing with these guys, probably a little underlevelled. This has some…notable consequences, shall we say.

For starters, if they proc a weakness, that character is probably dead, even before the sessions start. This situation is not helped by me leading with Ellie and Kiria as my party.

Take two: Kiria is weak to swords, so this is still a bit of a gamble, but the myrmidons are weak to ice so we need her for damage. Touma resists fire and swords, in addition to giving us lance damage, so he’s in for Ellie.

Plus, he gives us much better session combos for dealing with the Leviathan. Ellie’s Sword-Plasma would have ended it immediately after Itsuki’s initial attack, which is unfortunate to say the least.

That said, we have a much more important job for Itsuki right now. With the possibility of eating 450 damage a turn, we need a defense buff up immediately.

Now that we can handle. 200 damage a turn isn’t too bad, as long as we get a little lucky with avoiding weaknesses.

That said, this is a problem. Hamstring is admittedly a Tier 1 lance skill, but even with Touma’s huge strength and hitting a weakness, it still barely scratched his health bar, and there are two of these fuckers to deal with.

Leave it Kiria to bail us out.

Doubly so when this attack doesn’t cause an enemy session because Labyrinth confused all the enemies. :allears:

With the incoming damage knocked down a bit, we have some breathing room to get on the attack. The Levianthan is probably the least dangerous of the three enemies here, but he can drop Poison Mist on us, and one less enemy is still one less enemy.

And there’s the money shot. Like I said, bringing Kiria is a bit of a risk, but damn if it doesn’t have a sweet payoff.

Touma picks up the Tier 2 Fire skill, as well as part of the Blockbuster skill (increases the crit rate of attacks in a session), and Itsuki trades Def Boost for Yasha Soul, which increases his crit rate with sword attacks. These fights are definitely getting trickier, but that’s what makes them satisfying to clear.

The batter is crispy yet thick! The texture is absolutely amazing. Such a refined taste!

This cream! It’s so rich! The meat and vegetables burst out of the cream… And a spiciness adds to the explosion of flavor! This combination of crispy and creamy pushes the flavor to a whole new level!

Wooooo! It’s like the flavors are dancing on my tongue! Zoyo! …I think I’m back. All right, let’s do this! Zoyo!

All that work for this amateur shit? Itsuki could have done that in his sleep. :colbert:

Itsuki delivered the mirage’s message to Iori…

She didn’t have to be so heartless! What, is it the pompadour? Is that it? Maybe it’s outta fashion where she’s from.

sigh I guess it was a lost cause from the start. I mean, we literally live in different worlds. I mean, it sucks, but I guess I’ll just hafta look for a new love.

…Anyways, thanks for the help. You and me are gonna be buddies, I can tell.

Request complete! Received Magic Incense x2!

Are we? Are we really, Iori? Well, at least we got a pair of stat ups for it.

Man, where do you people even come from? What do you want?

Do you have a part-time job!? I really want one! Something classy! In the big city!

Senpai, please tell me you know a fancier job here in Shibuya…? It’s such a trendy part of the city!

Man, it’s one thing to be like “Do my homework” or “Find 5 bear asses”, it’s quite another to literally ask “Find me a job!” Do it yourself, you lazy shitlord. :colbert:

Okay, fine. Go be a waiter and stop wasting my time.

That! Is! IT! Shibuya’s Cafe Seiren is THE hottest, flashiest place in town! Thank you, thank you! I need to hurry! I’m going to go now, bye!

Good, go get to work and thanks for the Melmarks. Now, back to the office and finally turn in this food critic quest.

cough …Okay, I’ll work on that. Thank you for all your hard work, and I’ll let you know if I hear any more suspicious rumors.

Anyway, another request, another Clap Track. Next, it’s back to the dungeon, for real this time!

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So last time we did a bunch of random shit, but we’re not going to get sidetracked right now, we’ve got to go save-

No! Bad Aya! Bad! I just said-

Have you heard of the comedy duo Ota-Yan Union? The funny man tells a silly joke, and then the straight man flips out. That’s basically their entire act.

But rumor has it that Aniki, the straight man, has lost his timing. And now he’s a shell of his former self on stage…

Otakura, the funny man, wrote on his blog that they’re training in Harajuku for the Manzai Grand Prix, a comedy contest. Itsuki, please go and check it out for me. A mere shell… That worries me.

Yep, that’s great Aya, we’ll get right on it. You said Illusory DTV right? On my way.

(The real answer, of course, is that we barely scraped by in Illusory Shibuya and we would get destroyed by the Illusory DTV enemies.)

And hey, speaking of Illusory DTV enemies, the Red Barbarian is newest axe enemy in town. He’s actually kind of a pain, because he resists both electricity and ice, which is the cornerstone of the Itsuki/Ellie/Kiria party.

Ellie’s stage rank being so low to start isn’t nearly as big of a deal as it seems, since she gets a lot of stuff really early. Her first sidequest is at Rank 3, and she gets an incredibly important skill at Rank 6 when everyone else gets it around Rank 8 or 9.

And while it’s always nice to pick up more session skills, Elec-Snipe is about as useless of one as you can get. It pretty much exists solely to let her combo off of Itsuki since she’s the only other party member with Electric skills, and no one else can pick up from Bow skills.

Anyway, since we lit all the lanterns, the director removes the barrier and we can head upstairs. On to 2F!

New floor, new enemies. Yomotsu Shikome can fuck your day up with wind spells if you let them, but they’re weak to electricity. Itsuki and Ellie should make short work of them, no matter how little you’ve used her.

There are a pair of beads just hanging out immediately to our right on 2F. It’s kind of absurd how easy it is to get high-end healing items in this game, and combined with the fact that you have multiple items that do the same thing (see Fresh Spicy Curry and Revival Beads), it’s really hard to actually die unless you get way in over your head.

The center of 2F has a locked chest, our teleporter, and the director with another task for us. We’ll start with the director.

The AD’s waiting close to the small room to the north, so go get your next instructions!

He rules with an iron fist…

…You say something, guy?

N-No! Nothing!

The ol’ delegation move, what a classic. Well, before we head north, let’s crack that chest open.

That…was probably not the best use of a chest key. But sure, whatever, I’ll take it.

The director asked us to come help the AD… Is that you?

Oh, much obliged! I need you to adjust the lighting in the cast members’ waiting room. I was in a rush and got them wrong…

Find out what each cast member wants to figure out how many paper lanterns they want on, and fix them accordingly. After you adjust the lightning, make sure you confirm with each cast member before you come back.

You can turn the paper lanterns on with these, so good luck!

I actually kind of like this one, since it requires a little thought. More than “Press the four buttons” did, anyway.

There’s a lantern room immediatly to the AD’s left, so let’s pop in real quick and see how it works.

So right now, one of the three lanterns are lit, which we know is wrong. If we talk to the demon…

Alright, easy enough. We have two spare light sources, so we’ll use one of them to light a second lantern and try again.

And that’s one down. Note that lighting the lantern did consume one of our light sources, but if we need more we can always go back and talk to the director again.

On our way to the west door, we meet these fuckers. Knights have a massive pile of HP and defense, and resist bows, wind and lances. However, outside of Itsuki’s Zio skills, we have no way of inflicting magical fire or electric damage, so they might as well resist that too. But like the Infernos, they have a massive Kiria-sized problem in that they’re weak to ice and have non-existent resistance.

Mind you, the HP is still a problem. It would go marginally faster if we swapped Ellie out for Tsubasa, but a 200+ damage hit doesn’t even knock them below half health. Hell, Itsuki’s Fatal Sword, despite being a Tier 2 Sword skill, barely cracks 130 damage.

Ellie picks up Tarunda as we work our way around the west deck. An attack debuff is probably the least useful thing she can be doing, but I guess it’s better than nothing.

That said, now that she’s maxed out her current weapon and unlocked her first sidequest, there’s no real need to keep her in the party either. Tsubasa and Kiria are both one rank away from their next sidequests, so we’ll be rolling with them for the time being.

The western lantern room starts with all three lit, and he wants it a little darker. Two lanterns will do the trick here.

Stage Rank 7 simply nets Itsuki Endless Act, the physical get-out-of-jail-free card.

That person likes his room bright, but I don’t need it to be THAT bright.

The southern room, while not particularly difficult on its own (he wants it dropped to one lantern), mostly exists to set up the final one. That one is not completable without taking the flame essences from this room (or backtracking all the way to the director to get an extra one).

Because the east room requires you to have three banked flame essences. If this is the last one that you do, you should have the three that you need ready to go, but if not, you’re going to be doing some backtracking.

Anyway, with all four dressing rooms taken care of, let’s head back to the director.

Along the way, Tsubasa picks up Healing Expertise, which increases the amount of HP her spells restore. Passive skills aren’t as useful as you’d think in this game, but there are definitely clear winners and losers, and a heal boost is a hell of a lot more useful than Res +2.

You probably won’t get lost…but don’t stop and smell the roses, or you’ll be late!

And with that, we are now completely done with the first half of the dungeon. Coming up next is the miniboss, so let’s go cash in our radiant skills and make some new weapons.

Itsuki has a trio of new toys, but we’re going to be paying special attention to the Matador. Not only does it come with intrinsic Auto-Sukukaja, it teaches Itsuki the skill Dual Dispatch, which rolls Horseslayer and Armorslayer into one skill for just 10 MP. As far as utility skills go, it’s about as good as you’re going to get on Itsuki.

For Tsubasa, the Stingray and Hayakaze are largely identical, it just depends on whether you want to upgrade her lance skills or wind magic first. As nice as Assault Dive is, it’s not that much of an upgrade for her, so we definitely want the Hayakaze here.

Kiria is in a similar position. Lorelei increases her magic evasion and the Vajra blocks confusion, but otherwise this is a pretty blatant “DO YOU WANT FIRE, ICE OR WIND MAGIC?” choice.

And finally, Ellie picks up this…interesting weapon. On the surface, it doesn’t look very good since it makes her weak to every flavor of physical attacks, but the skills that it has make it worth it. Flame Strike (Tier 2 fire attack), Fire Boost, and a very early Arrow Rain (Tier 2 arrow damage to all enemies) makes it worth putting up with the weaknesses, especially early on in the dungeon.

But we’re not going to be doing any of that nonsense next time. Next time, we’re going on a date. See you then!

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So hey, things have been pretty quiet lately, and the reason is basically that I needed some time away from LP to recharge and play some stuff on my own time. So I did! I beat Trails of Cold Steel earlier today, it was real good (aside from the very very end, but that’s an hour out of like, 50), and I’m going to get the next update put together later this week. Maybe Wed? Watch this space.

Woo. Looking forward to it.

Welcome back, everyone! It’s been a little while since we checked in with our anime children, and boy do we have a special one today.

Hey, Itsuki! There’s a favor I want to ask of you.
I’ll be waiting in front of the Shibuya station. Hurry up!

Why, whatever could poor Ellie need? Let’s head over right away.

But first, we have this poor fellow.

Hey, you! Have you seen a girl named Momoko around? She kinda spaces out a bit…

>Itsuki accepted the request Dating Difficulties.

Well, if you do, let me know…

I feel you, man. Getting stood up sucks. But you know who doesn’t have that problem?

That’s right, it’s time for Itsuki to stretch those romance muscles. The Master of Love is officially on the case.

If I can help, I’ll gladly help out.

R-Right. That’s quite prudent of you. So…um… I-It’s kind of awkward talking about it in the middle of the street…

…I know! The classroom set! There’s a classroom filming set we always use. Let’s go there!

[quote] I’m waiting at the classroom film set! You’d better hurry, Itsuki!
[/quote]

Who are we to keep a young lady waiting? Off to the set!

:siren: Read, Chat, Fall in Love, Part 1 :siren:

Um… Well…I-I… I-I need you to… breath To, um…go on a d-d-d…

Itsuki’s phone rings

Ah. Sorry, I should check this.

Itsuki?
I assume that right about now, Ellie is blushing bright red and stuttering “D-D-D…” like a DJ.
Yes, she’s doing exactly that.
I’ll speak for our shy girl Ellie and explain your mission this time, okay?
You two…need to go on a date!
What?
Well, Ellie was in a bit of a pickle.
See, she’s appearing in this TV drama called “Dandelion in Love.”
But she doesn’t get how a high-school girl who’s in love with the idea of love feels.
So wouldn’t the best way to figure that out be going on an actual date? That being said…
Good luck being her partner!

Uh, Ms. Maiko?

:allears:

D-D-D…

A date?

Er… Ms. Maiko just sent me a topic. What’s all this about?

There’s nothing “about” it! I-It’s exactly as she must’ve put it! This is only to dial my character in, you hear!? If you get the wrong idea from this, I’ll make you my next archery target!

Actually, will you even be able to help me train for this?

Ice cold, Ellie. I can’t believe you’re doubting Itsuki’s romantic cred.

You’re the one who called me to do this, though.

What, losing confidence, are we? I guess that’s expected. You ARE new to the industry. I’ll have to train you in the ways of Hollywood.

How does training me help you…?

H-Hey, Ellie?

You’d think you wouldn’t have to go look at magazines to get date ideas in a place as busy as Shibuya, but sure, let’s go along with this.

What’re you doing, Itsuki? Hurry up and come where I am.
Where’s that?
Didn’t I tell you some place I can read magazines?
Why’re we going there separately?
It’d be a real scandal if someone were to think we’re on a real date, you know.
Anyway, I’ll be waiting!

Anyway, off to the Hee-Ho Mart.

:siren: Read, Chat, Fall in Love, Part 2 :siren:

We’re starting this date off at a convenience store…?

What’s so weird about it? Everyone in my hometown in Saitama does it.

That’s kind of hard to believe…

I’m not sure what she’s showing Itsuki, but he’s either horrified or speechless. I choose to believe the former.

Ituski, this jewelry’s so cute! This says that they have a store in Shibuya, let’s go check it out later!

…Sure.

What’s with that warped idea of dates? You’ve never dated anyone before, have you, Ellie?

Wh-What’s wrong with that!? It’s just, there are no Hollywood men around that suit me!

Huh.

You’re right. I wonder if she’s biracial? She looks like a doll, I wish I could be like her.

…Hmph.

You sure stand out.

I’m half-Scandinavian, after all. They just think I’m some novelty, I’m used to it.

Where to?

Your girlfriend’s saying she’s thirsty. As the boyfriend, you need to sense what I’m getting at. It’s all training!

So yeah, this quest is mostly just following Ellie around Shibuya. Ignoring that the only place we can actually go is Cafe Seiren, I thought Itsuki’s question was quite appropriate. There’s a lot of places we could have gone to get a drink, Ellie. :colbert:

Now that we’ve gathered intel, it’s time to get neck-deep in my training! Next is a standard go-to place on dates!
I’ll be waiting for you there! I’m so thirsty I feel like I’m going to become a dried up persimmon.
Wait, where are you?
Figuring that out is part of the training! You better not make me wait too long, okay?

Now this is a traditional place to go on a date. Come on, let’s really get this training underway!

:siren: Read, Chat, Fall in Love, Part 3 :siren:

Ah yes, that traditional date drink, the rainbow-colored smoothie.

What’s that?

Don’t you know? This is a smoothie! And it’s loaded with enzymes! It’s a must-have for Hollywood celebrities!

…Is it good?

O-Of course it’s good! It’s popular in Hollywood, after all!

Because it’s special… I mean, because Hollywood’s the best!

I’m not sure I follow.

You know how I’m biracial? I feel like I stick out like a sore thumb no matter where I go. It’s like I don’t belong anywhere.

But if I become a Hollywood actress, I think things will be different. Like, once I becomes that famous, the world will make room for me - somewhere I actually belong.

So that’s why…

I-I may have said a little too much! Anyway, Hollywood is the best of the best!

Say, Itsuki! I want to go to the jewelry place I saw earlier!

So off to Carabia, then. At least this one is as unambiguous as it gets.

You know where I mean by a jewelry store, right?
It’s like I’m giving you this question for free!
Isn’t this getting a bit off topic…?
Haha, I’m starting to have fun with this.

Aw, she’s starting to get into it. Not that she’d ever admit that she had a good time with Itsuki of all people, but it’s a start.

:siren: Read, Chat, Fall in Love, Part 4 :siren:

It’s nice coming somewhere like this once in a while. There’s this mature woman’s atmosphere about it.

Wow, I didn’t know they had a replica of it…

Something wrong?

This is right… We aren’t doing any training at all… sigh I’m no good at this. I honestly don’t get things like dating or romance at all.

Sorry, Itsuki… I dragged you around for nothing…

But it was fun. I got to see a new side of you that I didn’t know about.

Huh?

I was thinking that, if you really were my girlfriend, every day woudl be new and exciting.

S-Say, Itsuki… Do you think we look like we’re going out to the people around us right now?

Yeah, I think so.

…O-Oh, I see.

Hm?

If we look like boyfriend and girlfriend, then what I’m feeling right now must be…

Eleonora Yumizuru’s soul as an entertainer has achieved a new awakening! Eleonora’s inspiration has taken form as a new Performa: Secret Tenderness!

Haha… I think I figured it out.

I see…

Yup. I think I can pull off my role as a high-school girl. And I couldn’t have done it without you. Thanks for everything today.

Like most of the first sidequests, this just unlocks an Ad-Lib attack for Ellie (although it’s a damn good one, as we’ll see next update).

I don’t believe you’ve taught me anything, though.

By the heavens! Do you not recall how I’ve toiled day after day, teaching you the refined conduct of a true lady?

Have you now?

It seems I must more strictly teach you the proper etiquette befitting one’s stature henceforth. Without my peerless tutelage, the high society you strive for will be naught but a dream within a dream.

I’ve said this time and again: it’s not high society, it’s Hollywood! Geez, Virion, get it right…

:siren: Read, Chat, Fall in Love, Part 5 :siren:

So… won’t you choose me, please?

A cliffhanger? Those monsters. I want to complain to the director.

What’d you think? Wasn’t my acting pretty realistic?

I can’t wait for next week’s episode.

Of course you can’t! Everyone said the same too. Spending the time to train in person definitely paid off.

Still, that isn’t all I’m capable of. There’s more of my Hollywood story… To be continued!

Eleonora Yumizuru has grown as an entertainer and has become “Lovey-dovey”! She acquired the Ad-lib perfomance One-Sided Love!

Anyway, last thing for today is to grab Ellie’s DLC outfit.

:siren: Tokyo Millennium Collection: Ellie :siren:

It’s a maid outfit. What else do you really want me to say?

Yeah. That maid outfit really left and impression out there. I think you riled up the crowd the most today.

Naturally! I did do heavy research into how Hollywood supermodels walk, after all.

So in other words… What you showed off was how Hollywood maids walk?

You forgot to say “perfectly,” Itsuki. Hehe…! Now I’ll be ready if I ever get an offer from Hollywood for the role of a maid!

I…don’t think that’s quite how that works, Ellie.

You looked cute in that outfit out there too. I can’t wait for the day you play a maid.

Hrgh…! A-Are you stupid or something, calling me cute!?

But, it was cute.

Th-That’s not important! You stupid moron! Blyeeeah!

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Well hello! I didn’t see you there. I was just on my way to the Illusory Daitou miniboss, and look what I stumbled upon.

Ellie just picked up EP Fitness, so nothing too special there, but Kiria unlocked her next sidequest.

Anyway, we’re picking up at the east exit of 2F. Technically we’re done with the first set, but this side opens up to the last set of terraces that we couldn’t access earlier.

It leads us to a couple goodies, including the Piercing Eyelashes in a locked chest. It’s not a terrible accessory, but we have better options for pretty much everyone.

It also leads us to this little cave of goodies. If you’ve been paying attention, you’ll remember that we never reached the east entrance to 1F from the outside. For our trouble of finding this secret little room, we get a Balm of Life and a cool 35k in cash.

And before we head to the miniboss, we do a tiny bit of grinding to pick up this little gem. I think Arrow Rain is the first multi-target physical skill we’ve picked up, and it’s pretty solid! Medium bow damage to everything on the field is nothing to sneeze at, especially in an area where any fight might have 2-3 peg knights in it.

And that’ll do it for Set A. Off to Set B!

It looks like we don’t really have much choice… Just have to keep moving.

Hold it! Something’s coming this way!

Careful, everyone! Here it comes!

:siren: Illusory Daitou Miniboss :siren:

This miniboss is more difficult than you’d expect, but still fairly simple overall. She comes with a pair of mages and barbarians that are significantly beefier than their random counterparts, and the barbarians in particular are going to cause Ellie and Tsubasa a lot of trouble if they aren’t dealt with immediately.

Kiria can handle both sets of mooks, but unfortunately the mages null ice. That slows us down a bit more than I would like, but right now the first priority is reducing enemy numbers.

Multi-target physicals work in the exact same way as multi-target magic. You only get a session if the enemy you target is weak to the attack, no matter what other weaknesses you might hit. While I really want to take care of that barbarian, he isn’t weak to bows and there’s no reason to waste the extra damage, so targeting the boss it is.

And then this happens anyway. So much for my careful planning.

As you can probably guess, One-Sided Love inflicts charm.

It’s not as useful as you’d expect, given charm’s pedigree as an ailment. Occasionally they’ll do something dumb like smack another enemy, but the vast majority of the time, it just makes enemies waste their turn doing nothing.

First move from the Chaos Peg Knight is to cast Sukukaja and Sukunda. This is obnoxious because…

The red mages will happily spam Mediarama until you put them out of their misery. When you’re dealing with an accuracy penalty on both ends, this fight can get out of hand very, very quickly.

Touma being a backup member means that he dodges the Sukunda penalty, plus it gives us a strong physical fire attack. That makes quick work of the red mages, if nothing else.

When she’s not busy buffing, the miniboss will throw out a pair of Skewers for moderate damage. This is much more dangerous when it leads into a combo with the barbarians, but we’ve already neutered that threat with charm.

With the trash taken care of, we can get to work on the peg herself. Tsubasa/Ellie/Itsuki is probably the best party here, thanks to hitting her electric, wind, and bow weaknesses with more or less every combo.

Around Turn 6, we get everyone’s favorite message. This time the barbarians are out, and more peg knights are in.

This is where Ellie’s choice of weaponry comes back to bite me in the ass. Normally she’s only weak to axes, but since her bow makes her weak to all physical attacks, she immediately takes three lances to the face and bites it. Thankfully the turn order makes it so that I don’t lose anything (Tsubasa goes first next turn anyway), but that could have gone south very, very quickly.

Now, Ellie gets to work her magic. Arrow Rain will hit a weakness on 3/4 enemies on the field, plus I can immediately follow it up with a session on one of the peg knights. This is why we did that tiny little bit of grinding before coming here.

okay ellie jesus i get it

Any remaining difficulty in this fight is gone once Ellie lands that second charm. The resulting session wipes out the mooks, and the boss herself goes down with minimal fuss shortly thereafter.

Not much to say about the aftermath, really. Ellie upgrades Fire Strike to Flame Strike and Itsuki and Tsubasa get slight upgrades to Fang Breaker and Mazan.

We also unlock Tsubasa’s second sidequest, so it’s a good day for sidequests in general.

:siren: Stronger Together :siren:

Oh hey, look who decided to come visit. He does house calls and he comes on location. What a reliable guy, that Yashiro.

I’m under no obligation to tell you. Besides, it’s hardly your concern.

Wait! We want to save our friend. If you know something, please tell us!

Again with this “friend” business… If you intend to continue with your little games, you will need to be stronger. As you are now, you are weak. I suggest you train further before you concern yourself with anyone else’s welfare.

I…don’t think that’s right. That can’t be the only way to strength. There has to be some way we can all become stronger, together!

…Pathetic.

…Watch your tone. I don’t have much patience for sheep who are helpless without their flock.

Having friends doesn’t make you a “sheep.” But I can’t expect you to understand the difference.

…You’re right, I don’t understand. Very well, keep playing with your so-called friend and let him drag you down. I imagine it’s only fitting.

Him? What, Itsuki? What do you have against him?

And with that, he walks off. We can chat with Kiria in the arena, but all she does is muse about why Yashiro was even here.

Next time, Set B!

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Oh dear, Yashiro’s gone full anime rival. We’ll really be in trouble once he starts using the term “sheeple.”

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Set B is much smaller than Set A, although a large part of that is because we’ll be making a very short visit today.

Before we go inside and meet the director again, our favorite cleric is hanging out on the left side of the building. You know the drill by now.

>Itsuki accepted the quest “Ditch the Deadbeats”

Right… I need you to track down that butter-voiced Inferno and his friend, the cocky Blackscale Rider. Oh! And I forget his name, but the last one in the trio is the worst. The worst! Get the slowest slowpoke ever!

Well, the Inferno is easy, and the “slowest slowpoke ever” is pretty obviously the knight, so that’s already taken care of. We haven’t seen any Blackscale Riders yet, though.

Once we’re inside, we’re immediately greeted by the director and another barrier. Nowhere else to go, so we might as well see what he wants.

:siren: Dia Witch Iroha :siren:

We had a singer lined up, all squared away. Set to sing a certain song. But now? Cancelled! No replacements! No understudies! Too last minute…!

But I think some of you kids might have the chops for it. I want one of you to fill in! Could you give it a shot? Now the song, right, the song is the main theme for Dia Witch Iroha!

Well, I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn’t that. I guess it makes sense though, this is Barry’s idolasphere, after all.

What!? After all that running around, you want us to sing some anime song!?

You can’t be serious… We gotta sing here?

This is too much…

Daitou TV always stick to their show schedules, even in emergencies. But really, man? Anime? HERE?

…I don’t know that song at all.

Oh, I remember Barry making a big deal about the limited-edition box set for this anime! I think…

I don’t even know why they provided the other choice, really. :allears:

Now, Touma! Sing! “Dia Witch Iroha” and “Masqueraider Raiga” both air on Sunday mornings, right? I’m sure you’ve got this!

What!? Wait, how do you even know that!? Look, Sundays or not, I’ve never watched that anime before!

Nope! Good voices. Fine voices! But none of you know the words! Come on, isn’t there something you can do?

Looks like we’ve just got to buckle down and learn the song… Let’s head back. We’ve got two professional singers with us, I’m sure we can do this.

What, you guys need a meeting first? Fine, let’s take five. But we’re on the clock here! Got it?

So, we’re stuck here until we can sing the theme song to Barry’s favorite anime. Time to head back to the studio!

Hey, Barry would probably have CDs and DVDs of “Dia Witch Iroha!”
sigh Why do I have to do all this research on a theme for an anime that I’ve never watched before?

And there’s a little poke from Ellie if it wasn’t immediately obvious what you needed to do.

:siren: To Iroha from Me :siren:

Let’s take a listen.

Everyone is intently listening to the music, but someone is clearly more into this than the rest of them. No points for guessing who.

Hmm, the professional intently listening and in love with it, or the panicking teenager? :thinking:

Tsubasa, can you do it?

U-Ummm… If I had more time…

What about you, Kiria?

…This voice… It’s so…adorable…

Uh, Kiria?

Huh!? O-Oh, nothing! It’s fine, I’ll sing it… Please let me handle this.

Kiria Kurono’s soul as an entertainer has achieved a new awakening! Kiria’s inspiration has taken form as a new performa: To Iroha from Me!

Go go plot coupon!

All right! Next stop, the Bloom Palace! If Kiria’s shining with that kind of performa, we’ve got nothing to worry about!

Anyway, this is where I originally intended to end the last update, so I went and did a bunch of offscreen stuff between the last recording session and the next one. So here’s a bunch of out-of-place stuff that doesn’t really go anywhere!

Itsuki and Ellie get Sword and Fire Boost respectively.

Prize Winner increases the money and performa bonuses that we get for doing sessions.

And we get a host of new weapons, our total haul being the Poison Arc for Ellie, Mill Cutter for Itsuki, Yggdrasil Rod for Kiria, and Eligor for Touma. Now back to your regularly scheduled content!

So, now that we’ve learned the song, let’s blow the director away.

:siren: Dia Witch Iroha, Part 2 :siren:

Well? Chop chop! Let’s hear it!

…Looks like I’m up. Leave it to me.

:siren: :siren: :siren: Dia Witch Iroha :siren: :siren: :siren:

Shining bright, I can feel a glowing light
Shining in my heart
Here comes a perfect magic spell!
(Healing!) (Feeling!) (Appealing!)
100% and reaching out to you -
Dia-Dia-Witch-Witch Sweet!

I’m Iroha, a witch in training!
Everyone ready?

1, 2, 3, 4!

Everything goes round and round…

Kiria is uh…exceptionally excited to sing this song, and you should really watch the video for this scene. That’s all I’m gonna say on that particular song.

So, what’d ya think?

Hm… This might be even better than the singer we originally had planned for the show… Awright, this’ll do just fine! You guys go wait in the next room! I’ll go on ahead!

Phew… Yeah. Not a bad song at all. Okay, let’s get going.

Immediately after the director, we run into the wrong side of a one-way door. Hang a left, and…

Well, we get ambushed first. At least there’s no savage enemies in this one!

So yeah, we hang a left from meeting with the director, and then immediately run into him again. Thankfully this is the last time.

Our guest musician’s performance got extended, and we can’t squeeze in the anime song…and the script got changed. Please deliver these new scripts to the tall guys standing outside. Book it!

“Book it”? Do you want me to make an appointment with them, or-

We gotta start shooting before the writer changes his mind, otherwise he’ll change the script again! It’s a race against time!

That countdown on the bottom of the screen isn’t a joke. I don’t know how long the timer is (based on when I got the halfway prompt, it’s around 10-15 minutes?), but if we don’t deliver all three scripts before it’s over, we’ll have to do the entire segment again.

The actual area outside is just another terrace maze. I’ll spare you the details and just hit the highlights.

Troublemaker increases the success rates of inflicting status ailments for the entire party as long as Ellie is in the active party. It’s…okay? Status ailments in general aren’t that useful, but it’s a nice support skill if you specc’d Kiria that way, I guess.

We finally run into a Blackscale Rider, and like their Fire Emblem counterparts, they’re basically just beefier peg knights. Same weaknesses, similar strengths, they just trade some Res for a healthy chunk of HP and Def. Would have been cute if they pulled from Radiant Dawn and were weak to Thunder instead of Wind, but TMS rarely acknowledges that those games exist anyway.

There’s three of these guys we need to hit, one each in the north, south, and east.

Itsuki trades Res Boost for Quick Step, which boosts his evade against physical attacks of all flavors.

Endless Act is as it always is, a filler skill that might accidentally save your ass some time.

And a handful of goodies scattered around the area. The performa is part of the combination for Itsuki’s Prize Winner skill, as detailed above.

Anyway, the whole thing is pretty easy, and as long as you don’t go out of your way to fight literally every single enemy you see, you should have plenty of time to get all the scripts out. Back to the director!

You can listen to that big guy’s live show. I don’t know what it is, but his techniques are really something. It’s not every decade you get to see a superstar! Go for it! Just don’t cause any trouble for the performer!

Phew! Okay, who’s hungry?

True to his word, we walk out the north door and we’re at the end of the dungeon. Next time, it’s Barry’s big show! See everybody then!

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I didn’t care much for this dungeon when I played it, the puzzles felt like busy work. Though this upcoming boss fight is a real treat