#I'm still not over the 2k sandwiches in Albion

[randomnameless]

Land 5 aka before the final boss done !

Albion...

Well, it has a city named Bordeaux !

Ça fait un bail que Bordeaux et l'Aquitaine ne sont plus aux mains de la perfide Albion !

What else can I say...

The final stage bgm was kickass, I loved the architecture and the "subquests" with goats and the character who turns ennemies green was... A thing lol. Still Nigel isn't a deadweight so that's something nice.

Plot wise...

Ugh.

If anyone got it better than I do then please help me lol, because from what I understood, the pope (hereditary title in this verse) got only one child (tfw your line is super special magical plot related but you only get one kid) and told both of his right arms, Nigel and Sanatio, that they should never speak of her to anyone, including themselves.

So... Nigel secured Scarlett far away (uh...) 6 years ago and didn't tell Sanatio, per the pope's orders, Sanatio knew Scarlett existed but since her existence must remain secret, per the pope's orders, he... Uh... Never knew where she was ?

So when the pope decided to fold against the evil empire, and subsequently later died (something Gharnef is pissed about, because the pope's line is the only one able to destroy mc guffins) Sanatio thought that he had to pretend the pope was still alive to make sure Albion and the Orthodoxy would not descend into chaos ?? Like, Nigel couldn't tell him that "I shipped Scarlett to parevia aka an island that is as far from Albion as the UK is from France, under her dad's orders some years ago, let's find her to both protect and mount a resistance against the empire ?"

I knew Albion was scrapped because bankruptcy and all, but damn if in a game where Gilbert, Virginia, hell Alain and to an extent Yunifi and Morad exist, this felt contrived as fuck.

Besides, I know you are technically able to go to Albion before doing bastorias, Drakengard or Elheim (Bastorias or Elheim must be done though) but damn if doing things in order paints Scarlett in a crap light, after Erigor and witnessing the elves zombies and learning about the occupation in both Cornia and Drakengard with mysterious plagues around, and we open Albion with Scarlett worrying about her dad (while she was there when Galerius told us he was dead !) and wanting to show Alain the place where she picked up flowers when she was younger.

Special mention to her former childhood friend Raelys (?) with whom she reunites and wants to go to their special flower field again... Only to be ambushed by Raelys because while childhood memories are nice and all, Raelys' younger brother was taken hostage and she wants to save him.

Then we have Fodoquia's backstory... And Scarlett looks like an ass, especially for someone who was basically supposed to inherit Albion, who never cared about her country and her people.

Still in the few subsequent chapters she expresses her desire to help the people of Albion and her care for them (with still the memetic "I always thought about you" to get childhood friend when a majority of her rapports so far where about Alain, her feelings for him and jealousy at the other female leads or fluff) so there's that.

Ultimately I believe this discrepency is both due to the game being short on money but also the writers having wrote Scarlett as the "ojou" archetype, when the elf twins, even with their 5 lines about the plot of their land, and to some extent, Virginia and Yunifi/Ramona are concerned about their homes and people and written as such.

Plot happens and it's revealed, the empire is actually full of body surfers who were banned to the shadow realm for having sacrificed an unicorn and their big plan is to transmigrate everyone in living bodies, Scarlett's line is special because her magical powers are the result of experiments on humans with blood/parts/powers (?) of an unicorn, the failed results were duds and gave birth to the feathered people (angels) but Scarlett's ancestor was a success, the Cornian royal line is also special because it was founded by a young woman who was the only one granted immortality and not banished to the shadow realm eons ago, so she got some magic powers but gave up her immortality, and the laguz were originally elves who decided to become laguz so their bodies couldn't be snatched, but they forgot how to turn back.

Anyhow, for all of the unicorn imagery Alain got, I found it cool that the "our line was founded by the Maiden in the Unicorn and Maiden duo" thing is/was referenced in Ilenia/Virginia's skillset, it sort of helped to lessen the "uwu Alain is the saviour and chosen one" thingie that hits especially hard after Drakengard and Gilbert's last convo where he confesses he and Drakengard in general have always been jealous of cornia, so learning only Cornia's king can be the "chosen one" to get rid of the evil ghost empire...

Also, since you can skip Drakengard to reach that point and ignore her existence, I guess the "Alain saviour bcs he descends from the Maiden and has the magic ring" feels even weirder when Virginia is also in the party, but she can't equip the magic ring (granted if Alain were to die, would Virginia be able to equip it plot wise ?)

Fwiw, even if Gerard's infinity +1 sword can be used by Alain, I gave his magic ring to Virginia, his other grandkid by beating his ass with the Tricorns, plot be damned.

I mean, I usually dgaf about chosen ones plots, but when the second arc was all about a potential claimant/heir accepting to stand down and let their sib/cousin run the show, the game saying "only sib/cousin can save the world" feels a bit like a slap lol

Alain gave the "totally not-engagement ring" to Joseph, his dad in all but blood, and I rounded up several rapport conversations (wtf was Fodoquia and Bryce's lol) and mini quests.

Units wise... Ramona works well with the angels who have their discharge skill lol, and Bertrand spinning with his hammer will never cease to be hilarious.

I'm sure I'm not using Berengeria well though, because now she keeps on dying (ffs you have a giant shield can you just use it for once ??)... But Bruno makes up by hitting like a truck.